When I was satisfied that I knew exactly what I was going to do and how long it would take me to do it, I decided to pay a visit to one of the local van customizing shops in Hollywood. I wanted to find out about having a padded shelf installed along one wall where I could mount a dozen small monitors and make sure they would slide off while I was driving. I also wanted to look into some sort of smaller chair that I could use while monitoring the system from the back of the van.
After I had described what I wanted done to the cargo area of my van, the owner of the van customizing shop assured me he could have one of his guys do it over the lunch hour, but only after I let him think that I’d be bringing the van back at a later date for a full customization job. I didn’t know if that’s what I’d be doing, but it didn’t hurt to let him think that that was my plan. I stopped in the next day during lunch and showed them one of the monitor units and how I wanted to secure it to the shelf. They assured me that they could set up a dozen such mounts on a padded shelf inside of an hour. I left the van with them and walked up the street to a coffee shop to kill an hour.
When I returned an hour later to pick up the van, the custom shop owner met me at the overhead service door and walked me over to my van. He opened the double side doors, stepped up into it and showed me what they’d installed. Across the opposite wall was a shelf, maybe nine inches deep, with a series of what could only be described as the spring mechanism part of a rat trap, only with a less powerful spring. He lifted the spring up and set my monitor unit in place and eased the spring back down. He gestured toward the monitor.
“Go ahead,” he said. “Give it a tug.”
I felt the monitor nestled under the spring unit and it was secure. Beneath the shelf unit they’d installed half a sheet of plywood with carpeting stapled to it. Onto the carpeted plywood they had attached a short swivel chair that both swiveled and reclined but didn’t roll anywhere it was secured to the floor. I sat in the chair and tested my reach to the monitor and to the other eleven spaces. It was perfect and I told the owner so.
I followed him back to the office and he handed me my invoice. It was very reasonable, considering the time frame they had to work with. I paid the bill and drove away with phase one of my rolling surveillance van. When I got back to the parking lot behind my building I began unpacking and mounting twelve mini monitors on my newly installed shelf. Once I had them all mounted, I carried the empty boxes up to my office and stored them in the closet. I found a small bag and set all the mini cameras in it and left it on my desk. The bag would be coming with me to Powell Industries on Thursday.
I spent a few minutes calling home to check on Gloria and Matt and then just sat behind my desk wondering how the big upcoming case would play out. I was still deep in thought when my phone rang.
“Cooper Investigations,” I said. “This is Elliott speaking.”
“Hello,” the voice said. “You don’t know me, but I was talking with Lieutenant Anderson this morning and he was telling me that you may be just the person I need to do a job for me.”
“What sort of job are you talking about?” I said. “And when did you need it done?”
“I need someone to follow my girlfriend,” the man said. “I have a feeling she’s been fooling around on me and I just gave her a pretty big ring last month. I’m afraid if she finds someone else, she and my ring will be history. Can you help me?”
“It’s what I do,” I said. “Why did Lieutenant Anderson specify me?”
“He said you just bought some new surveillance equipment,” the man said. “I’ve tried following her myself, but I keep losing her in traffic. Can you handle this for me?”
“When did you need it done?” I said.
“Right now,” the man said. “After tomorrow it may be too late. She’s planning on visiting her aunt in Sausalito, or at least that’s what she tells me. I’m afraid she may be going to visit some other guy.”
“Well,” I said. “I’m free right now and for most of the day tomorrow. After that I’ll be involved with a big case and won’t have the time. Can you come to my office to square away the details?”
“I’m already here,” he said. “Lieutenant Anderson told me where it was and believe it or not, I’m out downstairs in the lobby of your building. Can I come up right now?”
“Sure,” I said. “I’ll open the door for you. Just come on in.”
Two minutes later the man walked into my outer office and stood just outside the doorway to the inner office. He knocked on the door frame. “Mr. Cooper?” he said.
I waved him in. “Come on in,” I said. “Have a seat.” He sat across from me and nervously looked around my office. “I’m Elliott Cooper. You never gave me your name,” I said.
“Greg,” the man said. “Greg Murdock.” He grabbed my hand and shook it briefly.
“So, Greg,” I said. “If I understand you correctly, you not only want to know if your girlfriend is fooling around, but you also want your ring back. Is that correct?”
Greg nodded. “That’s right,” he said.
“Hold on a minute,” I said. “If you want the ring back, doesn’t that mean you also want to end the relationship? And if that’s the case, what does it matter who she’s seeing?”
“Well,” Greg said, “it’s a little more complicated than that. If I’m wrong and it turns out she’s not seeing anyone, then I want her to have the ring. But if she is seeing someone, I think I should be able to get the ring back, don’t you?”
“All right,” I said. “We’ll do this one step at a time. I’ll tail her and let you know what I find out before proceeding to the next step. How does that sound to you, Greg?”
“Yes,” Greg said. “Let’s do that first. Because if she isn’t fooling around, I wouldn’t even want her to know that I hired you to follow her. You will keep that part to yourself, won’t you, Mr. Cooper?”
I crossed my heart with two fingers and held them up, like any good Boy Scout would. “You have my word on it, Greg,” I said. “So if you will just fill me in with the information I’m going to need, I can get started.”
“What do you need?” Greg said.
“Well,” I said, “for starters, I’ll need her name and address. A description of her car and the license number would help. Tell me where she works and where she hangs out. Give me the names of some of her friends. The more you can tell me, the easier it will be for me and the faster I can get results. Do you have a picture of her that I could borrow?”
Greg gave me all I needed and more. His girlfriend’s name was Angie Bower. I tucked the girl’s picture in my shirt pocket, thanked him for his business and excused myself so that I could get started on his tail job right away. I was secretly looking for an excuse to use my new mini cam helicopter anyway and this was as good an excuse as any. After Greg left my office, I call Dad and told him to be waiting out in front of his house and that I’d pick him up in ten minutes.
It seems that Dad was just as eager for something to do as I was for wanting to try out the spy copter. He was waiting in front of his house when I pulled up. I got out and ran around to the passenger’s side and he slid behind the wheel of my new van.
“Nice van,” Dad said.
“I just got it,” I told him. “It’s going to be my command central vehicle.”
“Where are we going?” Dad said.
I pulled the piece of paper with Greg’s information concerning his girlfriend and said, “We’ll start out on Hollywood and Western.” I checked my watch. “Our subject should be coming out of work in just a few minutes. We’re tailing her for her worried boyfriend.” I reached behind my seat and picked up the spy copter. “Looks like I may get a chance to try this thing out.”
“Look at us,” Dad said. “We’re like a couple of kids on Christmas morning. You with that helicopter contraption and me, well, I’m grateful for whatever I can pick up in kicks these days.”
“Speaking of that,” I told Dad, “How’d you like to fill in fo
r Gloria for a few weeks while she’s home with Matt. She’s needs a little recuperation time herself.”
“That would be great,” Dad said. “If I have to watch one more daytime television show, I’m going to…”
“Hold on, Dad, there she is,” I said, gesturing out the windshield at a young woman coming out of the bank. She matched Greg’s picture and description perfectly. I told Dad to turn the corner and pull up at the curb while I watched her. She walked over to the car Greg had described and the license plate number matched. “She’ll be pulling out soon, Dad. Stay with her.”
Angie Bower pulled out of the parking lot and onto Hollywood Boulevard, heading east. Dad pulled away from the curb and stayed right behind her. We followed her east on Hollywood to Harvard Boulevard, where we both had to stop for the light. She kept going straight and Dad managed to stay with her. I noticed Angie’s left turn signal start blinking at Normandie Avenue. She sat in the intersection, waiting for oncoming traffic to pass. As she sat there the light turned yellow and then red. She continued north on Normandie and we were stuck on Hollywood Boulevard at the red light.
“Well,” I said, “this’ll be the real test.” I started the copter’s bladed spinning, held it out my window and let it go. I took it up to fifty feet, above any electrical wires that crossed some of the streets. I adjusted joystick and the copter banked to the north. Below and a little ahead of the copter I could see Angie’s red Chevrolet continuing on Normandie. When our light turned green, Dad turned left and drove north on Normandie. We were probably two or three blocks behind Angie’s Chevy, but I know exactly where she was and was able to instruct Dad, if the time came to make another turn.
From the tiny monitor screen, I could see the red Chevy. She had turned east again on Franklin. A few moments later I told Dad to turn right. Now there was only one car between our van and Angie’s red Chevy, but she was still a block and a half ahead of us. Angie turned north again on Alexandria Avenue. I knew from the information Greg had given me that this was nowhere near Angie’s house. She lived in Glendale a few blocks from Colorado Boulevard. This could be a wild goose chase, or Angie could be leading us right to her rendezvous point with the other man that Greg had been worried about.
Alexandria Avenue ended in a T at Ambrose Avenue. Angie turned left and pulled up to the curb. I maneuvered the copter around and brought it back to the van. It flew down right next to my open window and I stuck my right arm out and grabbed it by the base, bringing it back inside the van.
I turned to Dad. “And that,” I said, “is how it’s done in the twenty-first century.” I held onto the copter and pointed the camera on it toward the house. I had managed to capture Angie’s image on the monitor. I told Dad to drive slowly past the house where Angie had parked her Chevy. She got out and walked up an inclined stairway to a ranch style house that sat probably ten feet about street level. She walked up to the front door, knocked and was greeted by an athletic type guy in a tight tee shirt and jeans. She wasn’t even all the way into the house when the guy grabbed her by the waist and pulled her to him kissing her long and hard right there in the doorway. He pulled her inside and closed the door.
I turned off the camera, laid the copter down on the floor behind my seat showed Dad the little monitor. I pressed the play button on the unit and held the monitor so Dad could see the images. After Angie and the guy in the tee shirt closed the door, I pulled the monitor away, shut it down and turned to Dad. “Looks like Greg’s going to want that ring back,” I said. “It seems Angie has found greener pastures. Let’s go.”
Dad snaked his way back down the side streets and onto Hollywood Boulevard. I told him to drive back to the office. “You remember how to get there?” I said.
Dad just gave me a sideways glance and rolled his eyes. When we got back to the office, I brought the monitor unit with me to my desk, flipped open the USB connecter and plugged it into my laptop computer. I loaded the helicopter footage onto my hard drive and called Greg Murdock. He told me he could be at the office in thirty minute or less.
I was able to complete his tail job with a day to spare before I had to start on the Powell Industries case. While I waited for Greg to show up I turned to Dad and said, “Speaking of helping out around here until Gloria’s back,” I said. “I have another case I’ll be starting on tomorrow that involves installing a dozen of those little spy cameras in the Powell factory. How’d you like to help me with that, too?”
Dad face sported a big grin. “Say no more,” he said. “I’m in. What time are you going over there?”
“I figured seven or seven-thirty should do it,” I told him.
“Won’t they be closed by then?” Dad said.
“That’s the whole point,” I said. “I have to wait until they close at five-thirty and give everyone there a chance to clear out. There’s bound to be a few brown-nose stragglers who stick around after hours to rack up points, so seven-thirty should be a safe bet for us.”
I told Dad about Carlton’s Powell’s concerns about his own general manager and that he suspected the thefts to be an inside job. “That’s why we’re installing a dozen little cameras all over the place tomorrow night. If anyone’s getting in late at night to take things, we’ll be able to capture them on the monitors.”
“And you think they’ll be coming in Thursday night to take the stuff?” Dad said.
“Probably not,” I said. “If anything, they’ll come in on Friday or Saturday, knowing that any theft wouldn’t be noticed until Monday at least. And even then, they may not strike this weekend at all. Powell has left it open ended for me. I can stay set up in the factory for as long as it takes.”
“And he’s okay with paying your daily rate?” Dad said.
When I told him what Powell netted between his six factories each year, he whistled. “Better milk this cash cow while you can,” he said. What you charge him probably wouldn’t even cover his laundry bill.”
“I know, Dad,” I said. “I thought about that, but decided to play square with him. It could mean future jobs in his other factories as well; if this one gets the results he’s looking for.”
“You have a point there, son,” Dad said. “I could use a trip to those other five cities.”
“We’ll see,” I said. “Let’s first see what we can do with this branch.”
A short time later Greg Murdock walked into the office and looked at Dad. Greg’s eyebrows furrowed when he didn’t recognize Dad. He turned and saw me, his face softened and he let out a sigh. “So,” he said hesitantly, “what did you find out about Angie?”
I gestured toward my client’s chair and turned my laptop screen toward Greg. “Suppose you watch the video first,” I said. “Then we can talk about it.”
I started the video and Greg watched intently, his eyes glued on the laptop’s screen. I had just released the mini copter into the air above the traffic and it hovered over the cars. A moment later he pointed at the screen. “That looks like Angie’s car,” he said.
“It is,” I told him. “I followed her out of the bank parking lot and didn’t start the copter cam until she lost us at a red light. That’s where this video begins. Keep watching.”
Greg followed Angie’s car through the traffic and up the narrow, winding street toward Ambrose Avenue. When Angie parked her Chevy and got out, Greg watched as she climbed the cement steps to the ranch house. His eyes got wider when the door opened and he could see for himself that his fiancé was now wrapped up in some other guy’s arms. When he saw the guy kiss Angie, he turned away from the screen.
“I’ve seen enough,” he said. “I can’t watch any more of this.”
“Well, that’s a good thing,” I said. “Because that’s where I turned off the video camera.” I transferred the short video to a small 256K jump drive and handed it to Greg. I’d just add the cost of the jump drive to his bill. Hell, I’d bought a dozen of them for three dollars each, so I could afford to hand them out to my clients. “There’s the eviden
ce you’ll need,” I said. “I’m sure if it comes down to having to show this to her, she’ll give you back the ring without an argument. If she doesn’t, well, then you can always use the video as evidence if you have to take her to court to recover the ring. Either way, at least now you know where you stand.”
Greg turned his head away from me and wiped his eyes. He took a deep breath and turned back toward me. “So what do I owe you, Mr. Cooper?”
“Give me a minute,” I said, and wrote out an itemized bill and handed it to him. He looked it over and didn’t question anything about it. Greg opened his wallet and pulled out two one hundred dollar bills and handed them to me. He had some change coming, but held up a hand when I offered it.
“Keep it,” Greg said. “You’ve more than earned it.” He took my bill, folded it twice, slipped it into his pocket and headed for the door. Before he left, he turned to me and said, “Women. They’re enough to make a straight guy like me turn gay.” He thought for a second and then added, “Skip that last part. I can’t imagine ever getting that fed up with the opposite sex.”
He left without further comment and when I felt he was out of earshot, I turned to Dad and we both broke out in laughter. “Thanks, Dad,” I said and handed him one of the hundred dollar bills. “That was actually kind of fun, wasn’t it?”
Dad looked down at the hundred dollar bill. “All this just for driving you around?” he said.
“It would have been no game without you,” I said. “Can you imagine the pileup on Hollywood Boulevard if I was driving and trying to maneuver the helicopter at the same time? Besides, it was nice to be able to work with you again.”
The Complete Cooper Collection (All 97 Stories) Page 231