Rhoads wanted a closer look at the guy. As he took a step toward the man, he felt a tug at his jacket. He turned and looked behind him. No one was there. He spun around and looked the other way. No one there, either. He tensed. He looked down and saw a boy, perhaps five or six.
“Hey mister,” the boy said, “The man said to give these to you.” The boy held up a pack of Winstons. “He said to see if you say thank you.”
This took a second to sink in. Then Rhoads grabbed the boy’s wrist and squeezed.
“Drop those cigarettes right now, son,” Rhoads ordered.
The frightened boy yelped in pain and tried to pull away. Then he did as instructed.
The man in the cable sweater spun toward Rhoads and the boy.
Rhoads crouched down to get a closer look at the pack without touching it. He turned the pack with the temple piece of his sunglasses and saw immediately that the pack had been tampered with.
Rhoads looked up at the child. “Where?” he said. “Where did you get these?”
The boy shivered then cried. His fingers quivered, and he tugged at his lips.
“The man,” said the boy, pointing toward the lobby doors. “Out front. In the parking lot.”
“What?!” Rhoads stood up. “A man. What was he wearing? What did he look like?”
The boy seemed paralyzed.
“Look, son, I’m a policeman. I need to find him. What was he wearing?”
“He was old. Had a hat, a big white one. A kind of tan jacket with things here,” the boy said, indicating his shoulders.
Rhoads began to rise but felt a powerful hand push down on his shoulder. He was startled to see how many undercover officers had materialized in the shop. Most of them were men, a few were women. One male agent, made up to look aged, complete with a walker next to him, put a large silver handgun in Rhoads’s face.
“I think that’s Rhoads,” someone said.
“Get out of my way,” Rhoads said, twisting away from the heavy hand and getting up. He figured the shortest distance between two points was straight up the middle. “It’s Virgil. He’s here!”
And he charged.
He rushed the crowd of agents and burst through them. He ran furiously through the lobby, burst out the front door, and looked wildly to the right. He saw nothing, no one. He spun toward the left. Six or eight agents, guns drawn, shouting into hand-held radios and cell phones, hesitated for a moment near Rhoads, then, as if on cue, splintered off and sprinted in different directions. Cars screeched and peeled out, horns honked.
At the far end of the vast mall-like parking lot, Rhoads spotted a figure, possibly a man.
That shape could be right, that could be him.
Immobile for a split second, the shape—now Rhoads could see it was a man—seemed to gaze back at him. The two were separated by one hundred yards, but to Rhoads, their eyes met and flashed at each other. The sun glare from all the windshields in the parking lot seemed dull in comparison.
Rhoads broke into a run but jumped back not an instant too soon. He had come inches from darting out in front of a Greyhound bus that was pulling up to the front of the StarCity main entrance. Rhoads lost his balance, fell backward and to the ground by the bus’s exhaust pipe. Coughing, he was up in an instant. The bus had stopped, blocking his way. He sprinted around behind it and headed toward the corner of the parking lot.
Nothing was there. Not a man, not a car. Just black asphalt and white lines.
Franklin stood in the parking lot under a bright noonday sun and screamed at Rhoads. “What in the hell do you mean you didn’t notice what kind of car?”
“It happened in an eighth of a second, Franklin. It barely registered in my brain before the bus tried to kill me.”
Two agents hustled over with the real estate agent. Another had the boy.
“Deputy Franklin,” one of the agents said, “This woman may have been with Virgil. She said he came into her office an hour ago and…”
Franklin listened to the story of how Virgil posed as a prospective condo buyer, said he needed to the use the restroom, and never returned. When the woman inquired about all the commotion, hotel security brought her to the FBI.
“Where’s your car?” Rhoads asked.
She looked around, confused. “There it is. The white Mazda.” She pointed.
“Her car’s a crime scene,” Franklin barked to a subordinate.
Rhoads elbowed in closer. “Ma’am. Describe the kind of gloves the man was wearing.”
“You’re right. He was wearing gloves. I thought that was odd, but he said he had bad circulation and that his hands were always cold, even when he lived in Florida.”
50
On Wednesday afternoon, the duty officer at the FBI’s ERC received a faxed transcript of a portion of a conversation on National Talk, a call-in radio show that had been broadcast live earlier that day on National Public Radio.
In a cover letter accompanying the transcript, the show’s producer said he had taken a call from someone claiming to be Virgil on the 800 line.
“SOP to record it,” the producer had written. “The caller’s voice is so muffled it was a chore to get even this much. We have no idea whether this is real or a prank. In transcribing, we found two brief unintelligible segments, each less than a couple seconds long. We think one was just a laugh.”
The partial transcript read:
1:40 P.M. WEDNESDAY OCT 11, 1995
HOST TONY LOPEZ: And here’s Walt in Fort Myers.
CALLER: Hello, Tony. My name’s not actually Walt. I’m more popularly known as Virgil, which I can prove. But I do have an intriguing question even if it isn’t exactly on the subject, Tony. How do you think they will ever catch me… [THIS IS WHERE WE TOOK HIM OFF THE AIR BUT KEPT RECORDING]… unless I lead them to me? Which I will, as soon as I’ve made my number. That number is, by the way, 430. It represents one one-thousandth—that’s one tenth of one percent—of the 430,000 people who’ll die this year from smoking-originated diseases. Just one year!
Anyway, practically half a million men, women, even children. I’m just starting a backfire is all, combating a huge fire with a few well-placed little ones. I’m a saint just about, a folk hero, and they can’t stand it! Ambitious, yes. Doable? I think so. Stealth is my watchword. I’m smart. I have no criminal record. And not that I’d let them have one, but I don’t even think my prints are on file anywhere. I’m relatively sane. I’m motivated. I feel, no, I know, my small crimes combat larger ones.
I’m fully justified. Listen, I have taken responsibility for my life, and I have treated my body as a temple. Why don’t the tobacco companies take responsibility for spending six million dollars a day advertising their poison? [Unintelligible.] My so-called victims are already smoking, voluntarily destroying their own lungs and themselves in slo-mo. I’m just expediting. Is that such a crime? [Unintelligible.] I’ll answer that. It’s not a crime, not if it teaches people a lesson. The body is sacred—that is what this country needs to learn.
Unlike most people, I’m going to accomplish something of real value before I die. What I’m doing will absolutely raise people’s consciousness about smoking and about their other deadly habits, habits that are killing them, habits that companies make their money on. Hundreds of thousands of others may quit, or better yet, never start.
Once I’ve hit my number, then they can have their way with me. Don’t worry, I don’t plan on killing myself and leaving you hanging. Suicide is nature’s severest form of self-criticism, and Tony, no matter what they say, I’m not down on myself. Okay, now, Tony, sayonara. And make sure this tape gets to a fellow named Rhoads, care of the F-B-I. The tape’s evidence. Even if you think I’m not me, you have to report it.
51
Tucson, Arizona
The anchor on WTCR-TV Tucson began the six o’clock newscast with a local angle.
>
“The impact of cigarette terrorist Virgil has struck near home for the second time. A long-haul trucker was shot and killed when hijackers commandeered his United Tobacco truck early this morning… near the I-17 on-ramp north of Phoenix. The body of Jacob Edmundson was discovered just after dawn by the Arizona Highway Patrol in the Interstate’s east-bound lanes.
“An Arizona Highway Patrol commander in charge of the investigation said as the threat of a nationwide cigarette recall increases, he expects more cigarette-related violence.”
The newscaster’s image disappeared and was replaced by Commander Harold Lamphreys at the crime scene. “People are addicted to nicotine. If the recall goes into effect, cigarettes will be selling for ten, fifteen, twenty dollars a pack. We’ll be seeing robberies like this one every day.”
52
Asheville
Nick Pratt decided it was in his best interest to go on the air and read the statement Virgil requested. Every molecule of his being resisted, but his sense of survival, financial and political, prevailed.
A pool camera crew had been invited to WHQ and were set up and waiting in Old Carolina’s media room.
Anna Maria Trichina and public relations consultant Arnold Northrup sat with Pratt in the Executive Suite. Surrounding them, propped up on aluminum easels, were poster-sized excerpts of the specified passage from the Surgeon General’s report.
Northrup cleared his throat. “You re on the air in fifty minutes, Nick. You’ll be on for a max of five minutes, basically within the time frame of local newscasts on the West Coast and prime time elsewhere. I can guarantee that every network will wrap your presentation with reports summarizing other Virgil publicity, including experts who will be commenting on what you’re about to say or what you’ve just said.” Northrup shouted toward Pratt’s open office door, “Where’s the makeup guy?”
Pratt fumed. “You’re trying to tell me it doesn’t matter. The CEO of the biggest tobacco company in the world announces to two billion people in every country on the planet that cigarettes will, contrary to previous statements, give them cancer, heart disease, everything, and it doesn’t matter?”
“No, Nick,” Northrup said. “I’m not saying it doesn’t matter. I’m saying you don’t have a choice, and we’re doing it this way to control the damage.”
“Of course I have a choice. There’s nothing that says I have to push the company I’m responsible for out the window.”
Northrup chuckled nervously. “Get it out of your system, Nick. The hardest thing for men in high places is to get over the illusion that they can control events like this. You can scream all you want at the flunkies you see every day, including me, and we’ll do anything you want. Let me put it in plain English for you. Everybody in the country knows what’s in the Surgeon General’s report. Everybody knows cigarettes damage you. That’s not your exposure here. If you don’t do what this guy demands, everyone he kills after this is going to be seen as your victim. Not his.”
Pratt’s upper lip quivered. “Anna Maria, get me coffee.”
She rose stiffly and left the room.
“I ought to play my voicemail for you. Every other CEO in the business has plenty of guts when it comes to me taking a brave stand and telling Virgil to go hump himself.”
“That’s another reason to play along. Don’t forget Pensacola.”
A makeup artist appeared and set his box full of cosmetics on Pratt’s desk.
Pratt eyed him without amusement. “I just had an idea,” he said. “Let’s slip ads into the New York Times and the Los Angeles Times and the Wall Street Journal. The headline will read, ‘We will never negotiate with terrorists.’ Then we sign the ad, R.J.R. and Philip Morris!”
“Not funny, Nick.” Northrup sat down in a leather chair, crossed and uncrossed his legs, and got up. He paced, thinking.
“Listen,” said Northrup. “We have to get all this into perspective. This is nothing but packaging. You put little warning labels on every package of cigarettes, but you use tiny type against a dark background and the words just fade away. We can do the same with this. We write a preamble expressing your personal grief and sorrow over these insane murders. Make it clear that you are bowing to extortion only to save lives. You read the damned thing, then you close with a reminder about psychotic serial killers, victims, orphaned children.”
Pratt glared. “And what about Virgil’s specific instruction about appearing contrite?”
“What will he care? He’ll be in the spotlight again.”
“And the other CEOs riding me?”
“Make them regret it. Take the lead. Publicly call them to an industry conference to establish standards for preventing product tampering and for response to future situations like this one. Let this never happen again. That kind of thing.”
The makeup artist went to work and Pratt stared at the easels, shaking his head.
53
Valzmann, dressed as a deliveryman, sat casing the Dallaness house from the driver’s seat of a pizza truck parked half a block away. After several minutes, he spoke into a radio then exited his truck with a pizza in a cardboard box, walked to the house, up the path, and rang the bell. Anthony Dallaness, out of breath, went to the door in a bathrobe, pajamas, and slippers. A sitcom theme song blared from a television in the background.
“Hold on! Hold on!” Anthony said. He opened the door and saw the pizza deliveryman. Valzmann stepped in and kicked door closed behind him.
“Hey! Nobody ordered anything here.”
At that, Valzmann drew a switchblade from his windbreaker. It snapped open.
“Sit down, Anthony.”
Anthony, hair stuck in sweaty clumps, hadn’t shaved for days. It was difficult for him to breathe, but he gamely drew himself up.
“Oh, get real, Anthony. Look at yourself. You’re a wreck. Sit down.”
He stood still. Valzmann slapped him across the face.
Anthony stepped back and sat down on the sofa, already wheezing loudly in fear.
“All right. What do you want, sir?” Anthony’s eyes fixed on the man’s tiny white earring. He’d describe that to the police for sure. Some kind of junkie or something.
“I’m afraid your wife Mary has been a bad girl. She took something that didn’t belong to her, and I’m going to get it back. I think you know what I need, Anthony. Tell me where the computer disks are, we’ll have a slice of pepperoni, and I’ll be on to my next delivery.” Valzmann smiled. “Where are they?”
Anthony’s increasingly heavy breathing made it seem like he was about to cry.
“Look, I’ll tell you, you got me scared. Maybe someone gave you some wrong information. Mary wouldn’t be involved in anything like stealing.”
“Anthony?”
“I’d tell you. I swear it. And I don’t know anything about any disks. Do you want money?” Anthony reached toward his wallet on the end table next to him.
“Anthony.” The tone was menacing. Valzmann relaxed and smiled. “I really don’t have time to screw around with you.”
Swiftly, Valzmann drew a clear plastic trash bag from an inside pocket. With virtually no resistance, he yanked it down over Anthony’s head. Anthony hardly moved, like a kid resigned to take the hypodermic in the arm from the school nurse. Valzmann held the bag closed with his gloved fist at the neck.
Anthony’s eyes grew large, distorted by the plastic.
Valzmann slapped him through the bag. Anthony’s face twisted in pain. His chest heaved and his arms flailed.
Valzmann removed the bag from Anthony’s head. Anthony hunched forward into a paroxysm of coughing.
“Raise your hand when you’re ready to tell me.” He wanted to let Anthony catch his breath. “I’m counting to three, and then we’ll do it again. Where … are… the disks?”
Wild eyed, Anthony shrugged. “I don’t know. Pleas
e. Can’t you call back? Mary will know. There may be some confusion.”
I told Pratt she’d never confide in this jerk, Valzmann thought.
“You’re not making any sense, Anthony.” Valzmann put the bag back on. This time Anthony resisted, reaching up and grabbing at the gloved hand that held the bag tight around his throat.
Valzmann laughed.
Anthony turned purple and after several moments, his flailing and flapping quieted down, then ceased. Valzmann removed the bag and pushed Anthony backward to an upright sitting position. He put his head close to Anthony’s and examined the fixed and dilated pupils. After returning the bag to his pocket, Valzmann pulled out a cell phone. He pressed a button.
It rang twice.
“Sir. I know this isn’t your private line, but may I report? Thank you. I tried to get the tickets from the first scalper. But we got canceled for lack of participation. We expected as much. Are you sure you don’t want me to try for the second? I know she’ll be here shortly. I’ve been told she’s just left the store.”
He listened for a beat.
“Yes I know you’re in a rush. Oh, it’s that late already? Okay. No, sir. I won’t try for the second game until we know for sure we can get the tickets. I know. It would be stupid to. Yes, sir. Goodbye.”
He hung up and glanced at a wall clock. It was 8:59 p.m. Valzmann picked up the TV remote and changed the channel to CNN. He sat down next to Anthony, whose still-warm body slumped to the side. Valzmann reached over and again adjusted Anthony into an upright position facing the television. Valzmann then picked up Anthony’s wallet, flipped through it, found his driver’s license, and removed it.
Light from the television flickered on Anthony Dallaness’s dead, staring eyes. Valzmann looked toward the television just as Pratt’s image appeared on the screen. At that moment, headlights played across the living-room window, distracting him. A half-minute later, he heard the sound of a garage door grinding open. Then it began closing.
Find Virgil (A Novel of Revenge) Page 15