“Sure. Give me a call when you arrive downstairs so I can let you in.”
“Will do.”
After we’d hung up, I went back to the conference room. Both women looked up at me with fear in their eyes.
I hurried to fill them in. “No, it’s not bad news. James said I could tell you one piece of information that might be important: Adeline’s death doesn’t look like suicide, and it at least suggests that the other deaths might not be. He thinks it’s murder, but he still doesn’t have enough to open an official case.”
“Well, at least we know that our work here might be good for something,” Marty said. She stood up abruptly. “I’m going to go distract myself by bothering Rich in the processing room.”
Shelby stood up as well. “Then I’ll go pretty up my spreadsheets. Will you be passing them on to Agent James?”
“He said he’d be here later this afternoon to pick them up. Thanks, both of you. Good work.”
I went about my usual business for the rest of the day—appalling how much paperwork was involved in running an institution—and James called about four to say that he was running late, and would I mind waiting until six? I told him that was fine.
Shelby stopped by shortly after his call to give me the spreadsheets. She dropped into a chair and said, “Well, I’ve learned a lot.”
I sat back in my chair. “I can imagine. I won’t claim I knew half of what you put together. It does seem kind of incestuous in Philadelphia, doesn’t it?”
“Sure does, although I’m sure it’s just as bad in other cities. It’s all about who knows who, and there’s a lot of horse trading that goes on. You know, I’ll give to your cause if you’ll give to mine.”
“Isn’t that the truth? I guess it’s kind of like a local aristocracy. So I have to work that much harder to make people open their checkbooks.”
“Marty is part of it, though,” Shelby said thoughtfully. “Do you think she should be scared?”
“I don’t know, Shelby. In the more than five years I’ve known Marty, I’ve never seen her scared of anything, but I think you’re right—this has her rattled. Give Marty a tangible problem and she’s all over it. But this? It’s harder when you don’t know if, or from where, an attack is coming. But she’s a single woman who lives alone. So I’d rather she was on her guard, just in case.”
“Amen. And here I thought this would be a nice cushy job.” Shelby stood up. “Well, I’m heading home in a little while, unless you need me for something else.”
“Go! I’m going to stick around and hand your information to James.”
Shelby grinned. “I think you should go back to his place and go over them in detail. Maybe a bottle of wine would help.”
I won’t say the same thought hadn’t crossed my mind. “I’ll see you in the morning, Shelby.”
CHAPTER 9
Once the third floor had emptied out, I went downstairs to wait for James. I watched as Front Desk Bob gently ushered out a few lingering patrons who had just one more item they had to look at right now. I sympathized: many people couldn’t make too many trips here, and it was frustrating to have so many resources and so little time to use them. We were doing the best we could, making documents accessible online, but it would never be enough. Most of the visitors had no idea who I was, as I smiled and nodded when they went out the door, clutching their precious notes. When the rooms were emptied, Bob looked at me. “You need me to stay?”
I shook my head. “No, you go on. I’m waiting for someone. I’ll lock up.”
“See you tomorrow.” Bob disappeared toward the back of the building, to make sure everything was secure in the rear.
Normally I found the silence of the empty building soothing. The thick walls of the Society building effectively muffled noises from the outside world, even though the street outside was a busy one. It seemed so hard to imagine murder and mayhem in this stately space, but I had learned the hard way that even here, some less than pretty things lurked. I’d come face-to-face with a couple of them. Sometimes I marveled that I could handle coming into work each day.
Because I loved the place, of course. I loved being close to so much history and sharing it with the public. It wasn’t the past that was dangerous, it was the present.
Still, I jumped when my phone trilled: James, waiting outside. I gathered up my bag, making sure Shelby’s envelope of spreadsheets was still there, and hurried to open the heavy front door, a relic from an earlier time. I armed the alarm system, pulled the door shut behind me, and turned to welcome James.
He looked depressed, and I told him so.
“I keep thinking I’m missing something—something that would convince the right people that we have a serial killer on our hands.”
I glanced around to see if anyone, friend or stranger, had overheard the term serial killer, but the pedestrians kept moving. “Maybe our list will help.”
“If it doesn’t, I don’t know what I can do next.”
I had never seen James Morrison so frustrated or helpless. “Do you want to talk about it?”
“If you’re willing, it might help if we went over the list together. I’d ask Marty, but she has a tendency to go off half-cocked.”
“I know what you mean, but right now I think she’s really worried. And I’ve already told her she’s too close to the people involved to see the big picture, if there is one. How about we pick up some food and go to your place?”
“I’d really appreciate it.”
“Great. Let’s stop at that Indian place—it’s on the way.”
I was always amused at how differently James and I had made homes for ourselves. I lived in a tiny former carriage house in the leafy suburbs, and I had filled it with flea-market finds and a few semi-antiques from my family. James lived in a stark, sparely furnished apartment in an older building near the University of Pennsylvania campus. It was neat and efficient—everything my place wasn’t. (He had, after several visits, admitted that he had a cleaning service that sent someone over once a week, which made me feel better.)
We spread out our food on his small but immaculately clean table (why was it my table was always covered with salt and pepper shakers, unanswered mail, and a host of things I didn’t know where to put?), and he pulled an open bottle of wine from the refrigerator and held it up, raising an eyebrow.
I laughed. “Shelby would approve.”
“What?” he said, retrieving two glasses.
“She mentioned that maybe some wine would loosen up our thinking.” I took a glass from him and sipped.
“At this point, I’ll try anything. There has to be something I’m not seeing.”
I doubted that, but maybe he was looking for facts and obvious patterns, while what we had put together was more about nuances and subtle connections. “Why don’t you look over the spreadsheets while we eat? Then we can talk about it.”
I dished up from the takeout containers and kept my mouth shut while he quickly scanned the pages, nodding occasionally. By the time he’d finished reading, we’d cleaned our plates and finished our first glass of wine.
He squared up the pages and laid them on the table, then sat back and rubbed his face, as if trying to erase his fatigue. I remained silent, waiting for his assessment.
It came quickly. He pulled his chair forward, sat up, and looked at me. “First, I have to tell you this is great work. This is exactly the kind of stuff we probably wouldn’t have found, certainly not as quickly.”
I was warmed by the compliment. “Thank you. So why don’t you tell me what conclusions you draw from it?”
“Before you tell me yours? Okay. It seems clear that the greatest overlap is on three primary institutions: the Art Museum, the Society, and this Forrest Trust. What’s this trust all about?”
“I’m not familiar with it, but I’ve asked Shelby to put together a summary of whatever we have in our files.”
“You came to the same conclusions?”
I smiled. “We did. But there were three
of us, and it took us longer than it took you.”
“So the three people who have died all shared connections, past or present, with these three institutions, or with each other through secondary links.”
“Have you talked to a profiler?” I had no idea if the local FBI office had a stable of such people, but I knew James had found one who specialized in arsonists and who had previously been extremely useful to us.
“Since this is not an official investigation, I can’t go to them.” He got up and started pacing, although in his small place he couldn’t go far.
“James, what would it take to convince the police to call it a murder?”
“I don’t know!” It looked as though he wanted to punch a wall, but then he controlled himself and said less vehemently, “That’s the problem. I have nothing concrete that I can take to the police, or to my bosses, who could override the police. Everybody’s so damn budget-conscious these days that they won’t look at anything that doesn’t have a high probability of producing a solution—it has to look good in the Metro section. And even if everyone agreed that these deaths were somehow connected, we still don’t have a motive. Why would anyone want these particular people dead?”
“I wish I could help,” I said softly.
James stopped pacing and dropped back into his chair. “You already have, Nell. You put together information that we couldn’t. You let me blow off steam. You believe me, and you tell me I’m not imagining things.”
“And I mean it. James, we—Shelby, Marty, and me—all agree with you that something hinky’s going on, we just can’t quite put a finger on it. But why now, all of a sudden? Was there some trigger, or a deadline?”
“I don’t know! And I’m getting damn tired of saying that. Marty’s right—we don’t know who’s safe and who’s at risk.”
Poor James—even with his years of FBI experience, he couldn’t figure this out. And if he couldn’t, who could? Together we had cobbled together a glimmer of . . . something. But people were dying, and we weren’t getting any closer to figuring out where to look next. Maybe sleeping on it would prod something to a higher level of our consciousness. Or maybe a distraction would jump-start our brains into working on the problem. A physical distraction, that had nothing to do with crime or society or museums. And I wasn’t thinking of a fast game of tennis.
I stood up, walked deliberately around the table, and held out a hand. James looked up at me, confused, and when he took my hand I pulled him to his feet, and close to me. The man wasn’t dumb: he figured out pretty fast where I was going with this.
We succeeded in distracting ourselves, or each other, for, oh, an hour or so. But who was counting? When I finally looked at my watch, I realized I had about thirteen minutes to catch my train. The alternative was showing up the next morning wearing the same clothes, which seemed a little tacky. Lucky men—no one cared if they wore the same necktie two days in a row, and it was easy to keep a clean shirt in a desk drawer.
“I’ve got to go,” I whispered in James’s ear.
“Maybe you should start keeping some clothes here,” he responded.
“Maybe I will, in the future. But for now, we could both use some sleep. You know, to recharge the batteries and all that?”
“I’ll drive you home. I don’t have to be in early tomorrow. Besides, you’re my consultant. I need to do some more consulting.”
I didn’t argue.
CHAPTER 10
James and I drove back to the city together in the morning. What would it be like to do this more often? I wasn’t sure. I valued my “alone” time on the train, where I could read the paper or a book, or just sit and think. Time alone with the leisure to think was a rare commodity in my life.
At least I’d succeeded in cheering him up. The recharging part had been great, but the thinking part I was still working on. Maybe caffeine would help.
“You can go straight to your office. I’ll walk from there,” I said as we battled morning traffic going into the city.
“What, you don’t want to be seen with me at eight o’clock in the morning?” he joked.
“I need the exercise, and I have to get some serious coffee along the way.”
I was going to be a determined optimist and assume that since James’s phone hadn’t rung last night, there were no new crises—or deaths. Of course, he might have turned it off, the better to pay attention to me and only me. Which was nice . . . but I made a mental note to check the obituaries again today regardless.
“You know, I’ve never asked what your average caseload is. I assume you don’t handle only one case at a time.”
“Of course not. We’re busy, and there aren’t enough agents to go around. Most often we deal with high-profile stuff—terrorism, drugs, organized crime, corporate fraud.”
“And don’t forget art theft,” I said. We’d first met over his investigation of theft at the Society.
He smiled. “Yes, that, too. Any one of us works on ten to fifteen cases at a time. Not all of those are active. Some may be in the legal queue, and with others we’ve done all we can do and we’re waiting for something new to jump-start it again, but they’re still technically open cases. They stay open until we arrest someone. So you can guess how reluctant our office is to take on a case with nothing more than one agent’s suspicions to go on, and no hard evidence.
I knew what he was saying, but the FBI’s reluctance to open an official case into “our” deaths was still frustrating. “James, what does it take to make this an official case?”
He sighed. “There are standards for initiating an official FBI investigation. Trust me when I say that this case does not meet those standards. Yes, I believe there is a killer out there, but I honestly think that no one else in my office would, not yet. Have crimes been committed here? Probably. But the evidence does not reach a level that demands our action. Unfortunately that’s not my decision to make.”
“And so a killer gets to bump off his victims and thumb his nose at you?” I said bitterly.
He was angry now, and I couldn’t really blame him. “You think that doesn’t bother me? It does. Remember, some of the names on that list are people I know; some are even my relatives. Which puts me in an even more difficult position—if anything, I should recuse myself, if this ever does become a case, because of just that personal connection. I’m already working on this on my own time—what is it you want me to do, take justice into my own hands?”
Having an argument now wasn’t going to accomplish anything—I knew he took this seriously. “I’m sorry,” I said quietly. “I know this is difficult for you. But it’s not easy for me, either—this is my community, and it hits close to home for me, too.”
James’s anger faded. “I’m trying, Nell. We’re getting closer. And I have discussed it with my Agent in Charge, but he won’t budge. We’re already stretched thin, and this case, such as it is, just doesn’t fit the criteria, not yet. At least he’s listening to me. I hope that soon we will have enough to move forward.”
We’d arrived at his office and I hadn’t even noticed. James pulled deftly into a parking lot off Arch Street near Independence Hall and turned off the engine. He turned to face me. “I’m not stonewalling you, I swear. It would make me extremely happy to figure out what’s going on here and stop it, with or without official permission.”
“I know. We’ll find the killer,” I said, and with that I planted a serious kiss on his lips, then got out of the car and set off toward the Society before he could react.
I arrived a little later than usual, and members and visitors were already milling around the catalog room, trying to decide where to start. It was kind of overwhelming, I knew. I smiled at a few of them I recognized, and nodded hello to Felicity, our reference librarian, who was busy helping someone. The elevator arrived promptly for a change, and I took it to my office on the third floor. I was nearly there when Shelby spotted me. “Hey, Nell, got a moment?” she called out.
Since I hadn
’t “officially” arrived, I figured I might as well talk to her now. “Sure. What’s up?”
“You saw James last night, right? And gave him our information?” she asked.
“I did, and yes. He agrees with our conclusions, but it’s still not enough. And he’s mad about it—at his agency, at himself, at the world in general. I don’t blame him. He’s good at what he does, but he has so little to work with on this, and his own agency won’t let him do much more.”
“Hey, he’s got us!” Shelby said.
“And he appreciates that. We’re going where no agent has gone before—into the darkest depths of Philadelphia society. Or do I mean heights?”
“Aren’t we brave?” She smiled. “What now?”
I considered for a moment. Maybe we were getting too bogged down in the details and missing the big picture. “I’m not sure. Let’s talk it through.” Maybe a night’s sleep had produced some piercing insights. Well, half a night’s sleep for me.
“Okay,” Shelby began slowly. “Based on the three hundred or so names we’ve collected, representing the past and present board members serving Philadelphia-area nonprofits, three institutions connect the highest number of individuals: the Art Museum, the Society, and the Edwin Forrest Trust. That’s just over ten percent of the names.”
I nodded. “Good. Keep going.”
Shelby looked a bit perplexed. “I’ll try.” She chewed on her bottom lip for a moment, then began again. “These people live in different areas, anywhere from Center City to out of state. Of course, they may all have lived closer to Philadelphia or in the city originally, but I haven’t had time to check past addresses. Both men and women, although the group is skewed toward men.”
“As are the boards,” I said. “This is excellent. Keep going.”
“Um . . .” Shelby said, clearly thinking while she talked. “Mostly WASPs. Age range is fifty to ninety, so I guess they didn’t all go to prep school together, unless it was a legacy thing within a family. For those who held jobs, they were mostly professionals—lots of lawyers, for instance, and some stockbrokers and bank managers. The occasional politician. Most belong to multiple other organizations, like exclusive membership clubs, or the DAR for the women. If I had to guess, I’d say that most of them have been in the same room at the same time with most of the others. Okay, that’s not real clear, but you know what I mean.”
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