Murder at the FBI

by Margaret Truman

Kneeley, who was becoming increasingly agitated, said, “She’s right, damn it. I never saw that gun before.”

  “Not even on the firing range the night Pritchard got it?” Lizenby asked.

  “No, not even—”

  Saksis turned to Kneeley. “You were there, weren’t you?”

  “No, I… Yeah, I was there, but I didn’t shoot him. She did.”

  Helen Pritchard got off the couch, and joined the group near the desk. She said to Lizenby, “Is there any reason why I must stay here?”

  He shook his head. “No, you’re free to go.”

  “Wait a minute,” Kneeley screamed. “She shot him, for Christ’s sake. I was there and saw it.”

  “Why?” Saksis asked.

  Pritchard fixed Saksis in an icy stare, then smiled and started for the door. Saksis reached into her purse and pulled out her .357 magnum. “You stay, Mrs. Pritchard,” she said.

  Paul, the bogus bartender, swiftly turned his shotgun on Saksis. “Take it easy,” she said, “I’m a special agent, too.”

  “Without passport,” Lizenby said. “Put it away. Go on, Mrs. Pritchard, get out.”

  Saksis kept her revolver on Helen Pritchard. She said to Lizenby, “I don’t know what’s behind all this, Ross, but it smells. I’m telling you as a special agent of the FBI that this woman placed that .22 in his desk no more than a half hour ago.”

  “Butt out, Chris. It doesn’t matter.”

  Saksis looked at everyone in the room. Paul’s shotgun was still leveled at her. She quickly went to the door, backed up against it and said, “I’m fed up with this charade, and I’m not moving until somebody starts acting responsibly.”

  Lizenby knew the others were looking to him for a resolution to the impasse. He said to Helen Pritchard, “Sit down.”

  “You said I was—”

  “I said sit down!”

  She muttered and went to the couch.

  “Satisfied?” Lizenby asked Saksis.

  “Not at all.”

  “Fine, I’ll get to you in a minute.” He said to the other agents, “Do it.”

  One of the men had carried into the study a large leather catalogue case, the sort used by airline pilots to carry flight charts and manuals. He opened it and took out an electromagnet attached to a battery pack. There was a strap on the magnet that he slung over his shoulder.

  “Hey, wait a minute,” Kneeley said.

  The agent carrying the magnet ignored him as he flipped a switch and held the magnet inches above the pile of computer floppy disks on the desk.

  “Goddamn it, that’ll—”

  “Erase everything,” Lizenby said, smiling. He told another agent to pack up every scrap of paper in the room and to remove it for immediate destruction.

  The magnet was passed over every inch of the study—desk, credenza, cabinets, walls, and floor—while Paul and the other agent packed Kneeley’s papers, including Pritchard’s original notes and the Hoover files, into boxes. Saksis watched with a deepening sense of dismay, especially when the powerful electromagnet was held over and around the computer in which the disk containing George Pritchard’s accusation about Lizenby was still in its drive.

  But then she remembered what was in her purse. She’d brought the disk from her own machine that she’d used during Kneeley’s transmission to his publisher. Although it didn’t contain the material about Lizenby and Sue White Cloud, Lizenby didn’t know that. Maybe, just maybe.

  When Lizenby was satisfied that everything had been magnetized and erased, he instructed the others to cuff Kneeley and to take him to the car. Kneeley protested all the way out the door, especially to Saksis, whom he cursed out vehemently.

  “Okay,” Lizenby said to Helen Pritchard, “you’re free to go.” Saksis again started to protest, but Lizenby spun around and said, “This time I mean it. Butt out!”

  Saksis slowly lowered her magnum and sat on the couch as the electromagnet was packed in its case and everyone prepared to leave. “The ferry captain knows you’re bringing the cars back,” Lizenby said to Paul. “Thank him for the cooperation.”

  Paul said to Saksis, “No cars on Fire Island. We had to work it out. Sorry for not playing straight with you, but that was the assignment.”

  She shook her head and looked down.

  “I’ll catch up with everyone later,” Lizenby said. “Agent Saksis and I have some talking to do.”

  Saksis’s head snapped up. “Talking?”

  “Yes. Just sit still. I’ll explain everything if you give me a chance.”

  When they were alone in Kneeley’s study, Lizenby asked whether she wanted a drink. She declined, and he poured himself one from the bottle” Kneeley had left. “Sure?” he asked.

  “I don’t want a drink. I want answers.”

  “Back off, Chris,” he said as he sat beside her on the couch. He raised his glass: “To us.”

  “I don’t believe this.”

  “Believe what, that I care about you even after my nasty note?”

  “It has nothing to do with that note, Ross. It has nothing to do with us, with caring. That’s out the window. I want to know what’s going on here with Kneeley and Helen Pritchard—the whole mess.”

  He tasted his drink and positioned himself so that he was directly facing her. “Chris, you got in over your head. This turned out to be a lot bigger than Pritchard’s murder.”

  “I gathered that. Please explain.”

  “Sure. Helen Pritchard was there that night with Kneeley. They intended to put the pressure on Pritchard about the files and notes he’d sold to Kneeley.”

  “She sold them.”

  “Yeah, and he went along for a while. He evidently had a pang of conscience about the whole thing and had told them he was about to spill to Gormley and Shelton what had happened. They argued. Frankly, I think he intended to kill them, but that’s beside the point, too. The bottom line was that Helen used the .22 he’d bought her to shoot him. She and Kneeley shoved the target hook into his coat to keep him from falling and then they got out.”

  Saksis looked across the room at the pile of papers and disks on the floor and tried to think rationally about what he’d just said. He’d presented it so calmly and matter-of-factly, as though there wasn’t a doubt in the world. But that didn’t explain why he let Helen Pritchard walk free.

  “If Pritchard killed her husband, why was Kneeley accused?” she asked.

  Lizenby laughed and shook his head. “Gormley cut a deal with Helen Pritchard. If she’d help us lay it on Kneeley, she’d walk.”

  “Why? What was to be gained by that?”

  “It neutralizes Kneeley. If he makes any further moves to write his goddamn book about the bureau, he’s nailed with a murder conviction. He’ll see the wisdom of sticking to poetry once it’s explained to him. Do you know what the bastard tried to do? When he saw trouble brewing over the book because of Pritchard’s murder, he went directly to Shelton and tried to cut his own deal. He’d drop the book in return for a half million. He’s a swine, and when Helen Pritchard found out about it, she decided to protect her own interests by playing with us.”

  “What does she get out of it besides immunity for murdering her own husband?”

  “I don’t know the details, Chris. I don’t want to know. My job was to put it together and bring it to this point.”

  “You instructed her to put the gun in his drawer?”

  “Yeah. He’s a dead man on the Pritchard murder unless he agrees to get his nose out of bureau business. You remember: ‘Don’t embarrass the bureau.’ Those files and notes would have done just that.”

  “It’s sick. They’ll both walk free so that the bureau isn’t tainted.”

  “Don’t question it, Chris, it makes sense. There’s more at stake than one agent’s death. We’re covered. Pritchard was murdered by a terrorist who’s fled the country. Just another terrorist act.” He smiled. “It took a lot of thinking to put this together. You think about it a little and you’ll see
the wisdom of it.”

  She got up and went to the window. The storm had abated; a hint of sun to the west threatened to break through the fast-moving low gray clouds.

  “I hear you’re going to Montana,” he said from the couch.

  “Yes,” she said, still looking out at the ocean.

  “You don’t have to.”

  “No?”

  “I can square it with Gormley if you want. I wouldn’t be doing it out of altruism.” He came up behind her. “You know, Chris, now that this is over maybe we can pick up where it got nasty. There was too much pressure on the relationship for it to run smoothly. I miss you.” He placed his hand on her shoulder. She violently shook it off, moved to the side, and looked at him incredulously. “You’re sick,” she said.

  “I’m in love,” he replied.

  “You’re—”

  “Look, I made mistakes, Chris, but—”

  “Like killing Sue White Cloud? Was that a mistake?”

  “What?”

  “Sue White Cloud, the Indian teenager in Arizona. Was that just ‘a mistake’?”

  He shook his head. “Is this what happens when you sleep with your Apache boyfriend, Bill what’s-his-face? The Indian paranoia and fantasies come out to play?”

  “I know you killed her, Ross.”

  “You know nothing. Where did you ever come up with such garbage?”

  “George Pritchard.”

  “Really?”

  “Yes, really.”

  “Tell me more.”

  “Why? I’d rather tell the bureau and the Arizona authorities.”

  “They’d laugh at you.”

  “Not with what I have.”

  He said like a parent having fun with a small child, “And just what is it you have, my pretty little maiden?”

  “Proof. Pritchard’s own words.”

  “Show me.”

  “Some other time, Ross. Besides, I’m not the only one who knows. Helen Pritchard does, and so does Kneeley.”

  He slowly turned and went to Kneeley’s desk, perched casually on its edge, and allowed one foot to dangle back and forth. He reached under his jacket and came out holding a .22 revolver. “The difference between you and them, Chris, is that they’re pragmatists. They understand a deal and aren’t filled with adolescent idealism.” He laughed. “Helen Pritchard tried to put the arm on me once she saw her book deal going down the drain. They invented the word greed for her. We had a little talk and she very quickly saw that it was in her best interests to view it differently. That’s the sign of maturity, Chris, the ability to shift gears. Being too rigid never works in the end.”

  “But why, Ross? What happened in Arizona?”

  “A misunderstanding, that’s all. What do you have, a set of notes from Pritchard? I doubt that. Helen says she gave Kneeley the originals. Well now, wait a minute. I know Kneeley put everything on disk. The material you intercepted last night when he was transmitting to his publisher didn’t mention it.”

  “You know about that?”

  “Sure. You tapped him, we tapped you. Everybody was hooked in, a nice little network.”

  “How long?”

  “Were you tapped? A couple of weeks. The difference is your tap on Kneeley was illegal. Ours was legal.”

  “Ours?”

  “The bureau. Jake Stein’s unit.”

  He was dazzling her with confusion.

  “The redundancy squad, Chris. Did you miss that lecture at Quantico? Happens on lots of big cases. You set up a unit like Ranger, then you staff it with somebody who’s investigating the investigators. Stein was a torpedo in Ranger to keep tabs on it for Gormley. Your problem was you kept running in your own direction. That’s not the FBI team spirit, Chris. Maybe you’re lucky to have Montana to go to. If it were up to me, I’d—”

  “Kill me?”

  He frowned, then nodded. “Yeah, kill you. All things considered, I’d rather…” He grinned and started walking toward her. “Tell you what, Chris. This thing resolved itself pretty neatly except for you. Why not join Uncle Sam? He needs you. I need you. Everybody has some dark side, some shoebox in the closet that’s all taped up and sealed. I have a skeleton in my closet, and I bet you do, too. Let’s drop it, forget it, and get on with our lives. I really like you, Chris. You turn me on like few women have before. Let’s play grown-up. Give me what you have and you can walk away, go to Montana and get your career back on track. Is it in your purse, back at the apartment, where?”

  “It’s…”

  He slowly brought the revolver up so that it was aimed at her face. “I’m all through being nice, Chris. I don’t have any trouble pulling a trigger.”

  She knew he was serious. He could shoot her and claim she was part of the Kneeley-Pritchard conspiracy to expose the bureau. And what did she really have? Nothing, a disk that didn’t contain any reference to what happened in Arizona.

  “It just dawned on me, Chris, that I’m wasting my time with you. It doesn’t matter what you have. Hell, what does it amount to, the ramblings of a man who was selling out the bureau, and who was looking to make the story more sensational to sell more books.” He defiantly stuck his chin out and smiled. “You’re a loser like all the other Indians. You’re dirt. And you’re dead.”

  “I’ll give it to you,” she said. “You’re right. No one would believe me anyway.”

  He visibly relaxed and lowered the gun. She opened her purse and went to reach inside.

  “No games,” he said. “Leave the magnum in there.”

  “I know.” She handed him the disk. As he took it, she lunged for the hand holding the .22 and grabbed his wrist, the momentum of her move sending them across the study. She rammed his gun hand against the wall, and the revolver flew into the air, landing in the center of the room. She twisted his arm up behind him and brought her knee sharply into his back. He grunted and fell to his knees.

  She released her grip and tried to catch her breath. He suddenly propelled himself to where the gun had landed, sprawling on his belly a foot from it. She ran to the door, opened it, and stumbled outside. Directly in front of her was the spiral stairway. She grabbed the railing and started down but missed the first step. Her hand wrenched free of the railing and she tumbled down, head hitting metal, feet clawing for a foothold, one shoulder wrenched as she attempted to break her fall. She stopped falling halfway down by landing on her rear end, got up and continued.

  She heard footsteps above her. Lizenby had reached the middle of the stairs and then stopped. He pointed the .22 at her and said, “I loved you!”

  Then, from behind, the thick hulk of Jubel appeared. He raised both hands and brought them down on Lizenby’s neck. The gun floated into the air and Lizenby came crashing down the stairs, landing at Saksis’s feet. He was out cold.

  Saksis looked up at Jubel.

  “I heard,” he said. “I’ll tell them. They pay me.”

  “They? The FBI?”

  He nodded and came down the stairs. “Kneeley was bad. They had to stop him. Paul’s my friend.”

  Kneeley. They had to stop him. Neutralize him, she thought. Jubel was an informer—had been recruited by the bartender, Paul, who was undercover—an Unkempt.

  She could manage only to say “Thank you” before the pain in her shoulder, arm, head caught up with her. She went to a chair and sat heavily in it.

  “Can I get you something?” Jubel asked.

  “No, nothing. How long?”

  “What?”

  “How long have you been an informant?”

  “Not long. I’ll take you to the ferry.”

  “All right, but first I have to make a call.”

  27

  Bill Tse-ay sat on a hard wooden bench in the first floor lobby of the Department of Justice Building. His hair had grown back sufficiently to almost cover the scar on his head that had been left by the surgery. A cane rested against the bench. His left leg still went its own way on occasion, but Dr. Goldberg was confident that he’d r
egain full use of it in time.

  He checked his watch; Chris Saksis had been giving her formal statement for almost three hours. He’d brought some magazines to read, but found it impossible to concentrate. More than anything, he wished he could be with her. He knew the psychic pain she must be suffering.

  Ten minutes later she came through a heavy set of doors. At her side was her attorney, Roland King, an Oglala Sioux who was active in many Native American causes. Their footsteps echoed from the marble floor as they crossed the broad lobby and joined Bill on the bench.

  “How did it go?” Bill asked.

  King shrugged and looked at Chris, who’d obviously been crying.

  “Chris?” Bill took her hand.

  “It went okay, I guess, everything considered. I’m sorry you had to wait so long.”

  “Come on, tell me, what’s the verdict?”

  King’s smile was rueful. “I doubt if there’ll be one,” he said. “The FBI seems—how shall I say it?—seems reluctant to prosecute Mrs. Pritchard and Mr. Kneeley.”

  “Really?” Bill asked Chris.

  She nodded. “It’s pretty obvious that they’ll stick to their deal with her—not prosecute for the murder of her husband in return for…” She choked up, swallowed, and finished. “For ‘neutralizing’ Kneeley.”

  “So much for justice,” Bill said.

  “They consider it justice,” King said. “Making sure that Kneeley doesn’t give the bureau a black eye with the public is justice enough. Besides, Kneeley didn’t kill Pritchard, so letting him off the hook for the murder makes sense, I suppose.”

  Chris said, “Helen Pritchard’s gone to California. She’s getting married again.” She managed a thin smile.

  Bill spun the cane in front of him and stared at the movement of the handle, saying without taking his eyes from it, “What about Lizenby?”

  Chris and Roland King looked at each other.

  Bill glanced up. “What about him?”

  Chris replied, “He tried to make a deal with Gormley. If the bureau would help get him off the hook for the Sue White Cloud murder, he wouldn’t tell what he knew about Pritchard’s notes and Hoover’s files.”

  “And?” Bill asked.

  “And they turned him down,” King said. “In a sense, Helen Pritchard redeemed herself a little, with the help of some pretty heavy arm twisting. She’ll testify against Lizenby in Arizona based upon her knowledge of her husband’s notes and files. The Arizona authorities think there’s enough of a case against Lizenby to prosecute successfully.” He paused, gauged Chris’s reaction before adding, “They want Chris to testify against him, too.”