The Screaming Room jd-2

by Thomas O`Callaghan

  His eyes found hers.

  “That’s Cindy. She’s my backup.”

  “Sounds very happy for you.”

  “She’s a sweetie!”

  “Seems everyone is nice around here. Please, go on.”

  “Okay. Getting back to the guy who took my call. I told him the customer was a dead ringer for the photo on the front page of the Daily News. Except for the color of his hair. Even with the hood the photo looks like someone with light hair. I told him aside from that, he’s the guy! Then I told him he paid seventeen hundred in cash for the notebook. His voice perked up. He sounded even more interested. Anyway, he read back my name and asked if the number I gave him was a work number. I told him it was. He then asked if it would be okay to call me at work if he needed to. I said yes, ’cause my supervisor, Adeline, is okay with that.”

  I’ll bet, thought Driscoll.

  “Five minutes later she tells me I have a phone call. I says, ‘Nah. Nobody works that fast.’ But guess what?”

  “He called you back.”

  “Not him, but another man who said he’d been given the message. ‘Is this Rita Crenshaw?’ he asked. I nodded. Go figure! I was excited. He asked again. And I blurted, ‘Yes! Yes!’ He asked me where I worked. I gave him the address. He then asked if I would meet him on the corner of Tenth and Fifty-sixth, in front of the Duane Reade. Said something about not having a permit to drive a stretch limo on West Fifty-seventh. Who knows? But when he said ‘limo,’ I said, ‘Step aside, Britney.’ It wasn’t like he was someone I met on the Internet. It is broad daylight. I figured a guy who could afford to shell out three million wouldn’t be driving a Chevy.”

  Driscoll felt offended, but quickly dismissed it.

  “I was told he could be here in five minutes. Yikes! I almost asked him if he’d have the money with him. I don’t think I did. At least I hope not. So, before I knew it, I had switched lunch with a coworker and was on my way to meet him.”

  “Did you tell your supervisor about it?”

  “I think so,” she grew silent and began counting on her fingers.

  Driscoll watched. It appeared she was going over some sort of checklist, perhaps about the events that had rapidly taken place. She leaned in, conspiratorially. Driscoll noted she was blushing. “I don’t want to sound disrespectful,” she said. “Adeline’s a sweetheart and I believe I told her I was meeting someone for lunch in front of the drugstore. But, between you and me, if you looked in her right ear, you’d see out her left.”

  “The men who you spoke to, what’d they sound like?”

  “Whaddya mean?”

  “Did they sound young? Old?”

  “I know where you’re going. It wasn’t Mr. Shewster I spoke to during either phone call. They were all business when they spoke. Malcolm’s more of a codger.”

  Oh, boy!

  Thirty-five minutes later, after he had thanked Rita for detailing everything she remembered about both her likely encounter with Angus and her entire conversation with Shewster, Driscoll rejoined Margaret and Thomlinson. They informed him that Forensics had arrived to sweep the place and that a team of officers was going door to door seeking any further information on Angus. He headed for the door.

  Two questions gnawed at him: Why hadn’t he gotten a call from Danny O’Brien telling him that their electronic shadow had followed the Shewster vehicle when it ventured out for the rendezvous? And why was Shewster so fixated on the PC Haven receipt for Angus’s computer purchase?

  Just before he got his foot out the door, Adeline brushed past him. He’d been a cop for a long time. She was either taking something out of his breast pocket or putting something in. Because her awkward sleight of hand hadn’t been missed by Margaret, Driscoll, as a courtesy, would wait until he was alone to see what the lady had passed him. He believed he knew what he’d find. Adeline was no artful dodger. The Lieutenant never kept anything in that pocket. Until now.

  Chapter 75

  When Driscoll returned to his office, there were three messages from Danny O’Brien, the TARU technician, staring up at him from his desk. He picked up the phone and called.

  “TARU,” a voice answered. The Lieutenant recognized it as that of Steve Halley.

  “They finally let you out from under, Steve?”

  “We all need a breath of air now and again, Lieutenant. Even short timers like me. I take it when it’s offered. I’m awful sorry to hear about your wife. You holding up okay? How’s your sister?”

  “She and I are fine. Thanks for asking.”

  “If you ever need another soul to turn to…”

  “I know. It’s nice to hear it.”

  “Hold the line. I know Danny’s been eager to talk to you.”

  “Thanks.”

  The Lieutenant had a great deal of respect for Halley. He’d lost a son to leukemia a dozen or so years back. After burying the boy, he went home and poured every drop of liquor on hand down the drain of the kitchen sink. His cabinet was well stocked. He rescued two lives that day. His and his wife’s. Bleak are the days of a whiskey widow. Bleaker are the nights of a mother who buries a child she bore. He no longer had Sean. But he’d be damned if he’d continue to steer his wife to an early grave.

  The booming of voice of Danny O’Brien sounded in the Lieutenant’s ear. “Hi, Lieutenant. I know you’ve got a long list of people to explain to. I want to help you do that. We followed the limousine down Fifth and into the park. According to the GPS tracking device, midway through the park, the vehicle stopped. Then sat there. We figured his car broke down or blew a tire. Though unlikely, he may have been meeting someone there. We sent an Aviation copter over the site. Couldn’t make out much through the cluster of trees. We had a blue and white enter from Central Park West and cruise through. Zip! No stationary car. But the GPS still had him sitting there. The patrol car continued through, then turned around, and circled back. Nada. But they reported a patch of rough road. A series of potholes, right about where we had the GPS sitting. We believe we know what happened. Although the unit wasn’t sighted at the scene, there are sewers on both sides of the roadway. We had the Environment Protection Agency dispatch a truck. They dredged both sewers, eventually finding the GPS in the northern drain.”

  “You got another unit? One with Krazy Glue?”

  “We’ve got the next best thing,” said O’Brien. “Sorry about-”

  “No need to apologize, Danny. Some guys have all the luck.”

  “And excellent timing.”

  “The guy’s crafty. I’ll give him that. But he hasn’t perfected the art of disappearing. Not yet.”

  Driscoll hung up the phone and leaned back in his chair. One mystery had been unraveled. What Shewster was going to do with a PC Haven receipt still had the best of him.

  Chapter 76

  It was nearing three in the morning. All Angus heard was the tapping of keys and his sister’s snoring, which sounded, for the most part, like a muted motor with a rough idle. But her sudden guttural outbursts were annoying the hell out of him. Had he been in bed, he’d grind his heel into the fleshy part of her thigh. That shut her up in a hurry.

  Right now, though, he wasn’t in bed. He was pounding away on the notebook. He’d slept very little over the past week. His ass ached from its constant contact with the hard wooden stool he had placed next to the barrel that supported the laptop. His eyes hurt from peering into the dull luster of its twelve-inch screen. But he was on a mission, a tedious, time-consuming one that required intense concentration. Therefore, he would not, could not, tolerate her snoring. So he puckered his lips and let loose a high-pitched whistle every time his sister snorted like a wild boar that had its testicles shocked by a Taser.

  It always prompted the same response: “What? What is it? What?” with his sister nearly leaping from her skin.

  And it always worked, allowing him to return to the mundane and irksome task at hand. He had learned much about the Lieutenant over the course of the last seven days. But he
was yet to find what he was looking for.

  Chapter 77

  “Jesus H. Christ! There it is again! Where the hell is that high-pitched whistling coming from?” Cassie grunted, eyes half open, spotting Angus quietly pecking away at the keys. A pencil behind his ear. A pad of paper at the ready. His gaze riveted to the screen.

  “Angus, didn’t ya hear that?”

  “What?”

  “That freakin’ whistle!”

  “I ain’t heard a thing. Go back to sleep, Lovee. You must be dreaming.”

  She muttered something intelligible, dislodged a wedgie, and let her head hit the pillow.

  Was I dreaming? Maybe.

  “We’re never gonna get back home,” Cassie whispered, huddled next to her brother in the last pew of the church. “Not to Carbondale. Not to the loft. They musta cloned that Driscoll guy. He shows up everywhere! The guy probably walks on water.”

  She looked around the church. There were a handful of visitors, some lighting candles, some standing before one of many statues, the rest seated. They all looked the same. Same height, same clothing, same sinister look on their face, skeleton-like. They were humming. “We’re running outta places, Angus. We’re gonna hafta move to another planet!”

  “If you’d like.”

  Huh? Why was he so polite and agreeable? “We might need another country.”

  “That’s a can-do.”

  “Yeah, right. Like we’re gonna be able to hail a taxi, say ‘JFK, please.’ You know what kinda security they got at airports these days? And the last time I looked, JFK was still in New York City! They probably got dogs there that look like Driscoll. We’re screwed, Angus. Unless Scotty can beam us up to the Starship Enterprise, we’re screwed.”

  “Look on the bright side. We have each other.”

  “Jesus, Angus, you’re creepin’ me out.”

  “Ya know what I always wanted to do when I grew up?” he whispered.

  “I got this one! Trade in your feathers and become a cowboy.”

  “Cute. You’re so adorable. I always wanted to become a millionaire, silly.”

  “Go on! They laid off security at Fort Knox?”

  “Lemme show ya. Hand me the phone.”

  Sitting on the pew was a phone. Not a cell phone. A freaking landline phone. Cord and all! She was leaning over trying to figure out what it was connected to when she heard Angus speaking on it.

  “1-800-854-4568.” She heard him say as though it were voice-activated.

  “Hey, that number rings a bell,” she said.

  “Cute, times two, Cass. Ooooo. I could just squeeze ya.” He gave her cheek a pinch.

  She was stymied. Still wondering where the phone came from, she began to stare at Angus, who was now dressed in a suit, a bow tie, and a straw hat, the phone to his ear.

  “Hello,” he said. “I’d like to speak to Mr. Shewster, please…Oh?…Well, I think he’ll make an exception in my case and take the call…okay. If you insist. Ya got a pen? I wanna make sure you get the message down just right. Good! Here’s the message. Tell him Abigail was still wearin’ the strap-on when we propped her up on the pole… That’s right. Pole. Strap-on. S as in Sam, T as in Texas, R as in Roger-you got it? Strap-on. What’s that? Sure. It’s 858-734-6523… Nah. He’ll know who it is. Tell him it’s a toll-free call. Not to worry. It won’t cost him a cent.”

  Angus hung up, put the phone on the pew, and said. “See, Cassie. Now I’m gonna be a millionaire. Actually a millionaire three times over! Boy, oh boy! I can’t wait. Why I-

  A high-pitched whistle sounded.

  “What? What is it? What?” she screamed, bolting upright in the bed. Wiping beads of perspiration from her brow, she spied Angus, still seated at the computer. “Only a dream. Thank God. It was only a dream.”

  Laying back down, she heard the pounding of her heart and the tap, tap, tapping of keys.

  Chapter 78

  Malcolm Shewster was good at a lot of things. Through the years he had mastered the art of baiting a hook for deep-sea fishing. It is an art, he’d been told. Not merely a skill. He was also adept at setting steel traps for catching critters. And he took pride in the fact that he could take down quail with a twenty-eight-gauge shotgun without inflicting injury to anyone standing nearby. He even possessed the dexterity needed to lasso a calf.

  Admittedly, he was a younger man when he acquired and honed these skills, but he had discovered he could capture just about anything, if he put his mind to it.

  As Friedrich Gernsheim’s Concerto in C minor, Op. 16, emanated in absolute clarity from the fifth-generation iPod, Shewster was scanning the PC Haven receipt onto his computer.

  He swayed his hands in maestro fashion, waiting for the image to appear on his own notebook, a Pegasus 330.

  “Voila!” he said, pleased with the transfer, which he quickly minimized so as not to interfere with his online conversation with Kyle Rogers, an associate of sorts, and CEO of Bengal Enterprises in Los Angeles, California. He, like Shewster, was an ambitious industrialist. He was also a man in demand. It was only last year that he’d been asked to chair the board of trustees for a nationally based corporation. He accepted the designation graciously, promising to comply with the record-keeping and disclosure requirements of federal law. The corporation he was asked to help govern wasn’t going to turn into another Enron or Tyco International. No sir. As long as he was in at the helm, no stockholder or employee of PC Haven, Inc., need worry. He was a man of conviction. A man of character. A man who knew the intricacies of corporate America.

  One of those intricacies involved favors.

  “Ready when you are, Malcolm.”

  By simply tapping on a touchpad, Shewster placed the image of Angus’s purchase on the WiFi expressway. Before the pharmaceutical mogul powered off, Rogers was viewing it.

  Chapter 79

  “Lieutenant, we’re all at the mercy of physics,” said Danny O’Brien, leaning against metal shelving inside TARU as Driscoll examined what the tech had placed in his hand.

  “You think this has a better chance of staying onboard?” Driscoll examined the black device that looked like a cigarette holder Hitler might have used. “It feels so light.” “Cedric tagged the Lincoln with a Qicktrack. It’s a good GPS, but maybe too heavy for a chauffeur who likes to ride the rumble strips. What you’ve got in your hand is a Protrack. Granted, it’s lighter. Thinner too. But those are pluses. Cedric will need more time and a ratchet, but I think he’ll be able to wedge it between the limo’s fuel tank and its support straps.”

  The technician disappeared. When he returned, he handed Driscoll a three-eighths-inch drive ratchet set and a laptop.

  “What’s with the laptop?”

  “It’s configured to work with the Protrack.”

  “You mean I can follow him myself?”

  “If you want to.”

  Driscoll looked pleased.

  “One more thing, Lieutenant.”

  “What’s that?”

  “You might want to hold on to Cedric’s cigars when he tags the vehicle. He’s gonna be working under twenty gallons of gasoline.”

  Chapter 80

  A knock sounded at the door to Shewster’s suite. Muttering something unintelligible, he went to answer it.

  “Hmm…showdown time, huh?” he said to Driscoll, who looked like he’d come to conduct a hanging. “I’d figured you’d drop by sooner or later. Come in. Come in. We’re not going to air our grievances in the hall.”

  Driscoll barreled past the man and entered the room. “You’re crowding me, Shewster. I’m an inch away from arresting you for interfering with a police investigation.”

  “C’mon. We both know that’s not about to happen.”

  “No?”

  “You reach for a set of cuffs, Lieutenant, and you’ll be back to pressing a uniform.”

  “You threatening me?” Driscoll asked, looking like he was about to put Shewster through the wall.

  “Sit down.”


  “I don’t know who the hell you think you’re talking to. I’m not some goddamn-”

  “Please, Lieutenant. Have a seat,” Shewster said, motioning toward the sofa. “It hasn’t been my best day either. You can put away the sword. I’ll tell you what you came to hear.”

  Driscoll didn’t move.

  “Please. No more threats. Miss Crenshaw wasn’t as big a help as I thought she’d be.”

  “What’s with the store receipt?” Driscoll asked.

  Shewster sat down. “Do you like cookies, Lieutenant?”

  Driscoll thought he’d stepped into an episode of The Twilight Zone. “Suppose we cut to the chase,” he said.

  Shewster gestured like he was telling a child it was okay to cross the street and offered a smile.

  The Lieutenant straddled a wooden chair, facing him.

  “Good. Good. See, we’re making progress.”

  “I didn’t come here to be toyed with, Shewster.”

  “What we’re both seeking, Lieutenant, is one and the same.”

  Yeah, right. “What’s with the store receipt?”

  The business man used the palms of his hands to massage his face, his fingers to rub his eyes. He then looked squarely at Driscoll. “You know as well as I do anonymity isn’t always as Webster defines it. Thanks to the Internet and to the resourcefulness of tech-literate people, privacy is another word that has an asterisk next to it.”

  “PC Haven. Rita Crenshaw. The store receipt. You wanna tie those into where you’re heading?”

  “My plan to help the police apprehend these killer twins is to include a Web site, for use by folks who prefer the Internet for communicating. Not everybody trusts Ma Bell anymore. The site will enable the net-only enthusiasts to stake their claim to the bounty. There will be a blog to keep visitors up to date on the latest developments in the chase. If I were the target of that chase, I’d be checking that blog every hour. That’s where the PC Haven receipt comes in. Sure, any owner’s manual would give me the specifications and capabilities of the notebook this killer purchased. But I’m a businessman who deals in products. A variety of products. Pills, syrups, inhalers, vaccines. Each one designed for a specific purpose, but each one unique. I’m the type of adversary, Lieutenant, who needs to know everything about his opponent. Right down to the dates on the coins he’s carrying in his pocket. Like I said, an owner’s manual would give me the notebook’s capabilities. What it’s not going to tell me is how vulnerable it is to privacy invasion. More to the point, that generic manual is not going to tell me how vulnerable his notebook is. I need to know every miniscule detail of the workings of that particular computer. Right down to whether the guy who installed its hard drive had a hangover at the time!”