by Dan Kelly
“That’s good to hear, but how does he feel about what’s going on around the globe today and what is his strategy for dealing with the current situation?”
“Mr. Halkias is a strong proponent of laissez-faire capitalism and firmly believes the current economic turmoil the world is in is due to governments sticking their noses into situations that should be taboo for them. Since he is not a publicity hound, it’s not generally known that he’s been working behind the scenes meeting with some of the world’s most influential business people to change things. They must be getting pretty close to a solution because Mr. Halkias has been in a very upbeat mood lately.”
“That sounds very laudable Mr. Cavanaugh, but dealing with politicians can be a very time consuming business. How does he plan on dealing with the here and now?”
“In two simple words, fiscal prudence. He too will do everything he can to cut expenses along with cutting profit margins to help his customers weather these tough economic times. He has the financial reserves to do this and has already embarked on such a strategy.”
“Well, Mr. Cavanaugh, I believe we’ve taken up enough of your time. Thank you for the information you’ve provided. I will be making my decision in a week or so and will get back to you one way or the other.”
“You are very welcome and I am confident that when you consider everything we have to offer and compare us with our competitors you will decide in our favor.”
On the way back to their rental car, who’s getting off one of the elevators but Basil Halkias. Before they can find something to hide behind, he spots them and gives them a quizzical stare.
They glance at him and quickly move to the revolving door leading out to the street. Barbara says, “Uh, oh. He’s remembering seeing us somewhere and it probably won’t be long before he puts us in the Chez Genevieve while he and Robert Feldman were there.”
“His curiosity may have been aroused, but I don’t think he’ll dwell on the coincidence too long. From what Cavanaugh just told us he’s got more important things on his mind.”
Chapter 18
-Elizabeth-
Joel couldn’t have been more wrong. It only took a few seconds for Halkias to connect the dots and remember where he had seen them before. He asked the receptionist, “Did you talk with those two people leaving the building?”
“Yes I did Mr. Halkias. They met with Mr. Cavanaugh.”
“Thank you, Gladys.”
As he followed Joel and Barbara out of the building, he pulled his cell phone from his belt holder and called Cavanaugh. “Ted, you just met with two people, a man and a woman. Who are they and what did they want?”
Cavanaugh told him and then asked, “Basil, why are you interested in them?”
“They just look familiar to me that’s all, but their names don’t mean anything to me. Sorry to have bothered you.”
“Something doesn’t smell right.” His next call was to Bob Feldman “Bob, I want you to check out a couple of people, a Joel Jergensen and a Barbara Sheehan. Also, check out a company by the name of Clear Sky Enterprises. This Jergensen says he owns this company.” He explained why he was interested in these people and Feldman agreed it was worth looking into.
His next call was to Jim Hollingsworth. “Jim, have you received any input from Ferguson on what’s happening at the White House?”
“I just got something from FEDEX. I haven’t had a chance to open it yet. Hold on.” A minute later Hollingsworth came back on line with, “Sam says the President is really up in arms about the lack of input his advisors have supplied regarding what’s behind everything that’s happening. He’s threatening a shakeup in his staff if they can’t deliver. He says that there was an emergency meeting called of all his advisors and there was a lot of grumbling when the meeting adjourned. He was not included in the meeting, but was able to pick up snatches of conversation which made reference to a new player being brought into the game. He doesn’t have any idea who it might be.”
“Okay, things are going as planned. We’ll keep the pressure on for a couple more days and then move into the next phase.”
As Halkias heads for his car he’s thinking, “I should be ecstatic that things are moving right along, but these unknown quantities entering the game are spoiling the mood. Who the hell are these people from Clear Sky Enterprises, is the company legit and who is this new player? Maybe I’m overreacting, but if I don’t get some answers real fast I might have to escalate things.”
Chapter 19
-Tampa-
An hour after leaving Ubiquitous Argosies Joel and Barbara were wheels up heading for Tampa and six and a half hours later, fighting a stiff headwind, they touched down in Tampa. Barbara had phoned ahead and made an appointment to meet with Tiffany Cabot at her home at 8:30 that evening which gave them enough time to check into a hotel, rent a car and get something to eat.
Hollingsworth’s ex was thrilled to have the opportunity to tell all about her former mate and to have it published so all would know what a reptile, her words, he really is. Over dinner Barbara said, “I think it would be best if you let me take the lead with Tiffany Cabot. It’s likely she’ll feel more comfortable responding to my questions than to yours. You know. The woman to woman thing?”
“You’re probably right. As wannabe co-authors of a book it would look kind of peculiar if I didn’t participate in the interview at all, but I’ll keep my involvement to a minimum. If something comes up that I’d like to delve into in more detail, I’ll tug on my ear as a sign to let me intervene.”
“You’ve been watching too many movies. Jergensen. She might be astute enough to pick up on something like that. Just barge in like a bull dog like you usually do when you’re on to something. Be yourself. Be natural.”
Wiggling his eyebrows in a Groucho Marx imitation he whispers, “That’s me. Mr. Au Naturel.”
Chuckling she said, “You know, Jergensen, you need to work on your timing.”
“I’d think with all of this candlelight any time would be the right time.”
“Well you’d be wrong. My eyes are so sore from having to squint and strain to see anything clearly that if I never seen another candle again it will be too soon.”
“Well now that you’ve shattered the mood we might as well head for the Cabot residence if we want to make a good impression by being on time. C’mon Midnight.”
Smirking she grabbed her purse and they headed for the parking lot.
Mrs. Cabot turned out to be quite the looker if you liked long legged blue eyed blondes with a cosmetic model’s creamy complexion and a swim suit model’s body. Joel quickly decided that he could learn to appreciate someone with those attributes. Barbara quickly decided to give him a sneaky sharp poke in the ribs to get his mind back on business.
After they were seated in an expansive and beautifully decorated living room, Barbara opened the interview with a smile and an appropriate complement and then things went downhill from there, downhill for Hollingsworth that is. Tiffany had enough dirt on her ex to obliterate a healthy chunk of Florida’s swamp land and she didn’t hesitate to dish it out in truck loads.
“James is a genius when it comes to real estate, but a complete moron when it comes to being a family man. He is only interested in what people think of him and where his next million is coming from. In his mind, he is always right and if you disagree with him you are always wrong and he won’t think twice about telling you so. His business ethics are close to none and I’ve been a witness to some of his shenanigans unbeknownst to him. He’s a showoff and only takes the time to develop relationships with those who are on the top of the heap financially. My impression of most of his associates is that they are very powerful and extremely ruthless and I hated to be in the same room with them. The ones I met scared the daylights out of me. In fact, one of his colleagues was the straw that broke the camel’s back and led to our divorce.”
Barbara asked, “Who was that?
“A man by the name of Basil Halk
ias. I never met him, but I overheard a phone conversation between the two of them and it really got my blood boiling and my nerves into overdrive. James had him on speaker in his study when I happened to walk by and something Halkias was saying caught my attention, so I decided to eavesdrop.”
“What were they discussing?”
“You’re not going to believe it.”
“Tiffany, I’m one of the most open minded people you’ll ever meet. Tell me.”
“The possibility of another American Revolution, an insurrection from within our own borders which could be successfully accomplished by a small, select yet dedicated group of powerful individuals which would include them. I was astounded to hear such drivel coming from the likes of them and was more than curious to find out where the conversation might be headed, but the maid was calling for me so I had to move on.
“I never confronted him about what I had overheard because, frankly, I became afraid of what he might do to me. When the help left for the day, I was all alone in the house with him completely unprotected. When we were dating he was nothing like what he became after we were married. Our marriage had been deteriorating for quite some time prior to this phone conversation incident and I was appalled at what I had overheard, so I decided to file for divorce and get out before something really off the wall happened.”
By 10:30, their brains were overflowing with the less seemly and much more private aspects of the Hollingsworth facade. They thanked the lady for being so forthcoming and open and got her permission to call her if they needed her to clarify or expand on anything she had told them.
Driving back to the hotel Barbara remarked, “If we accomplished nothing else tonight, I think our meeting with Tiffany acted as a cathartic for her. She definitely appeared to be more relaxed and relieved to get what she told us off her chest.” Laughing she added, “Hell she seemed downright ecstatic.”
“I’m surprised she put up with the creep for ten years. His comments are interrupted by Barbara’s cell sounding off. It’s Sammy. “Whatcha got for me Sammy?”
“Barb, every one of these people has offices in the vicinity of Elizabeth. As for Robert Feldman, he’s the owner and CEO of Intricate Information Security Systems, a top rung company that charges exorbitant prices for their services and is also based in Elizabeth. Supposedly, his IQ is off the charts and the rumor is he’s no one to mess with. Basil Halkias is one of his clients.”
“Good job, Sammy. Now go home and get some sleep. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
When Barbara goes quiet, Joel gives her a quick glance and sees her deep in thought. “What was that all about?”
“I think we might be on to something.” She tells him what Sammy found out and then he becomes quiet.
A couple minutes later he says, “I’m having trouble accepting the fact that on our first attempt to identify the people who are behind everything that is happening we might have zeroed in on every one of the suckers.”
“It’s nice to think that we might have pulled that off, but all we’ve really accomplished so far, Joel, is to find some apparent and I emphasize apparent connections between all of them. Why don’t you call Hank and bring him up to date and ask him to arrange for tails on the rest of this bunch? Until one of this crowd slips up somehow or leads us to something, someplace, somewhere we’re stuck in neutral.”
Joel called Hank and then they both retreated into their own thoughts, trying to come up with something else Sentry could do to get into high gear and in the face of these sickos before they can do any more damage.
Chapter 20
-Somewhere Up in the Sky over Illinois-
The flight back to Elizabeth with a brief stopover in Atlantic City to pick up Collette was uneventful, but the flight back to Chicago the following day is turning out to be anything but.
Scattered intermittent communications interruptions all over the country have begun to occur again and Joel has lost contact with the tower at O’Hare Airport. The airport is fogged in and a squall off Lake Michigan is headed their way. Looking at Joel nervously Barbara says, “I thought when we took off from Elizabeth the weather forecast was for fair skies with a ten mile an hour headwind and the foul weather wasn’t supposed to hit the Chicago area until late tonight.”
“Evidently, Mother Nature decided to exercise her prerogative and changed her mind. I’ve plenty of experience flying in bad weather and normally wouldn’t be too concerned because I could do an instrument landing, but with the loss of the required signal transmissions from the ground that’s out. I’ m going to have to find someplace else to set down until this bad weather blows over.”
“Can’t we fly above the storm or around it until we can find a safe place to land?”
“At 20,000 feet we’re close to the maximum safe altitude for this plane and we don’t have bottomless pits for fuel tanks. Fuel consumption isn’t a concern right now and we have more than enough if we could land at O’Hare as planned, but that’s too risky now. Everybody, listen up. We need about three football fields of roadway or open field to put this little bird down safely. Keep your eyes peeled.”
Joel changed his heading to due south away from the path of the oncoming storm and reduced his altitude to 4500 feet. The skies were clear where they were, at least for now, and he hoped they could find someplace to land before they ran out of fuel.
Ten minutes later Barbara spotted a clearing in a wooded area off to starboard that appeared to be large enough to land in, but she couldn’t make out its condition that well from their current altitude. Joel took the plane down to 1500 feet and everything was now crystal clear, alarmingly so. The hundred or so horses grazing in the field would have been a delightful diversion under any other circumstances, but not when you had to worry about crashing into them. The horses could also see and hear them clearly enough to be spooked a bit by the sight and sound of the approaching aircraft.
“The area is big enough, but if we spooked those horses from up here, what will they do if we try to land? If they stampede, one or more of them could run right into the plane and I haven’t a clue about the survival rate in that kind of an accident. We have enough fuel to continue looking for another hour or so and we’re flying away from the storm heading for Chicago. Perhaps we should keep on searching.”
Looking through the cockpit window Barbara said, “I hate to bust your bubble, buddy, but aren’t those storm clouds dead ahead?”
Joel had been so preoccupied with searching for a place to land he hadn’t noticed the change in the cloud cover on the horizon. “Damn! It looks like the decision has been made for us. Okay everyone, make sure you’re buckled in nice and tight. Our landing is probably going to be a very rough one.”
Joel circled around and lined up with the field where there were the smallest trees in their line of flight and was about to reduce speed and begin his descent when Collette called out from her seat behind Barbara, “We’ve got company off to our right, below and behind us.”
Joel banked right so he could get a better look and spotted a Cessna 162 Skycatcher about 500 feet below them and it looked like they were in the process of doing what Joel was about to do. It also looked like they didn’t have any choice in the matter as smoke was pouring out of the engine cowling. “Perhaps we can learn something from their landing that can make ours a safer one.”
As the other plane continued on down to the open field Joel quickly realized that it wasn’t going to clear some tall oak trees that were directly in its flight path. “The plane is losing airspeed too rapidly. It’s going to clip those trees.”
No sooner were the words out when it happened. The plane severed the top limbs of the trees, flipped over on its back, crashed to the ground and erupted into flames. The horses went nuts, scrambling every which way with most of them running off into the woods.