Holy City (Jack Francis Novel)

by M Murphy

  Within minutes, Colin had emergency services on the phone and used his FBI sway to bypass any hesitation the operator might have had with our request. From the back seat, Hannah lay silent, but I could still see her breathing and the blood stain on my coat getting bigger. Twenty minutes later, the ambulance met us at a barren spot of road along the Ashepoo River and the EMTs went to work on Hannah. They had her in the back of the ambulance and I jumped into ride along just as they began to stabilize her. With a quick wave to Colin, we were off moving again and heading back towards Charleston with lights and sirens screaming.

  Chapter 69

  The waiting room at the medical university in downtown Charleston was like any other I had been in, and I hated it. There is no place in the world worse than an emergency room waiting area. It was nothing but a container for worried, emotional, and anxious people and today I was one of them. Hannah had been in surgery for a while and I was getting uneasy. My legs were tapping and I couldn’t figure out if I wanted to sit down or pace. The vibration in the pocket of my pants was a welcome relief, as I stepped outside to answer.

  “How is she?” Colin asked.

  “Don’t know yet. They're still in surgery.”

  “It’ll be fine. She must have taken that first shot that came at us.”

  “I was thinking the same thing.” I said. “How’s it going on your end?”

  I knew Colin would have to go back to the scene, report to his superiors and call everything into the local authorities. It was a red tape nightmare I was glad I didn’t have to deal with.

  “The Agent in Charge out of the Columbia, SC field office is pissed at us, but he’ll have our back when it comes to dealing with the locals. I’ve met some of the sheriff’s deputies and we are heading back to Tidwell’s plantation now. I’ll show them around and give them my report. Anything you want said, or even left out?”

  “Let’s try to keep why Tidwell took Hannah out of it for now.” I said. “The locals can work on a motive if they really have the desire to know.”

  “Sounds like a good idea.”

  “Also, I noticed a small center console sitting at the dock when we pulled away. My guess is that the boat was Makem’s ride out of there, so keep an eye out. I’m sure they’re long gone by now though.”

  “Will do. I’ll call when I get a chance and update you a little more once I’m able to get a signal again.” Colin was already beginning to cut out as he spoke.

  “Alright. And I’ll leave a message if I find out any progress on Hannah.”

  With the cell phone back in my pocket, I returned to the depressing waiting room. Colin was going to have his hands full with the locals. They would be respectful of his FBI creds, but this was their turf and I was sure they would be upset with what we had done. I also wondered what kind of influence Trenholm would have over their actions. If he wanted to press their investigation into our little escapade one way or another, I was sure he could. In that case, having the Bureau in Columbia behind us was important.

  Trenholm’s influence, I was sure stretched to the South Carolina capital, but I doubted he had infiltrated the Bureau there.

  The FBI wasn’t made up of good ole’ boys from the Lowcountry,

  so I highly doubted Trenholm would have much persuasion inside their Columbia location. At the same time, I could see Trenholm wanting the whole thing kept quiet. Getting us in trouble in order to have us out of the way was one thing, but I doubted he would want to bring attention to why we were there in the first place, or why Hannah had been kidnapped.

  Chapter 70

  I sat by Hannah’s bed and watched her sleep for a few hours until the nurse convinced me that it was time to leave. She would sleep through the night, I was told, and I headed back to my place to freshen up and get some rest myself. The hospital was about a mile walk from my home on Church Street, so there was no reason I couldn’t walk back. It would give me some time to clear my head, and figure out if this was how the game was going to end. Having lost a woman I was close to a few months ago, Hannah’s brush with death today had me re-thinking life. I had left Cleveland and came south to think and take time for myself away from the lifestyle I had been leading. When Alex had been shot in Cleveland, it took a lot out of me. We might not have been anything more than lovers, but when someone dies because they were involved with you, it makes you re-evaluate the type of life you lead. Now, within a year, two women I got close to had been shot. Fortunately, Hannah would survive, but once again I found myself wanting to run.

  When I got in the door, Colin was already there. I gave a puzzled look at him sitting on the couch watching TV, shoes off, feet up, and palming a cold beer.

  “I convinced Mrs. Legare to let me in.” He said.

  “I didn’t realize you knew her.”

  “Just met her when I got here, but an FBI badge and knowing your whole life story was enough to convince her that I was a friend.”

  “You’re not getting a hotel?” I asked.

  “Maybe, I wanted to check on you first. How’s Hannah?”

  “Out of surgery and sleeping like a baby. The doctor said she’s going to be fine.” I went to the fridge, grabbed a beer, and joined Colin on the couch. “How do I get myself into these situations?”

  “Don’t blame yourself.” Colin said. “This isn’t Alex all over again. That was a trained assassin and she was a target. Hannah was simply in the wrong place at the wrong time.”

  “That’s almost worse.”

  “But she’ll be fine, and there is no reason to blame yourself.”

  “You’re probably right, but it doesn’t make me feel any better. At the Bureau or in the Army I was prepared to have those around me put in danger. It was our job and something we all signed up for, but Hannah’s a college professor. Where did she sign up for this?”

  “Hannah, like Alex, chose her own path. No, she did not choose to get kidnapped or be shot at by a crazy Civil War reenactor, but continuing on the case and pushing it further with all the warning signs was her choice as much as yours.”

  “It’s true, but it doesn’t make me feel any better.” I said, sipping my beer.

  “So what now?”

  “I’m not sure. We never proved who killed Jason or the other woman, but I’m pretty sure it was Tidwell. Now that he’s dead it seems pointless to carry on down that road.”

  “What about your little treasure hunt? That seems to be where the trouble all started.” Colin pointed out.

  “Well, it was as much of a treasure hunt as it was a quest for answers. Tidwell believed his family had been somehow betrayed by the Trenholms, and therefore they had betrayed the South, but I’m starting to believe he was wrong.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “The first time I ran into Tidwell he gave us the impression that the Trenholms had betrayed the South by stealing the Confederate Treasury and using it to rebuild their fortune. The group charged with guarding the treasure was led by Tidwell’s ancestor, and when it went missing he was blamed and the family name became ruined throughout the South. I’m beginning to believe Tidwell was right, his family was set up to take the fall, but I think the Trenholms had the backing of the KGC.”

  The KGC?” Colin asked.

  “The Knights of the Golden Circle, the Southern secret society I told you about on the phone.”

  “Right. Let me get this straight. You think the KGC stole their own treasure and purposely put the blame on the Tidwells. I have to ask, why?”

  “I’m not sure, but I get the feeling that Trenholm, Makem, and their cronies are the KGC. Which means that they are protecting the treasure. Tidwell wanted to find it to prove that

  the Trenholms stole it in the first place, but now I believe that’s pointless because the rightful owners are still in possession.”

  “So that’s why he wanted Hannah. For the letter and then the urn.”

  I looked at Colin for a moment and then it dawned on me. “The urn, where is it?”


  Chapter 71

  The next morning Hannah was awake and getting closer to being her old self. Before I even finished my first cup of coffee, my phone was ringing with a list of demands. The first thing Hannah wanted was out of the hospital, but that wasn’t going to happen without the doctor’s okay. Instead, I appeased her by bringing by a charger for her cell, her trusty tablet, and a comfy sweatshirt she liked to lay around in. Colin dropped me off at the medical college and he headed back out to Tidwell’s plantation to work the crime scene with the locals. He didn’t have to be out there, but we needed to know if the urn was still where we had left it in the shack. I was also beginning to wonder where Tommy Makem had hidden himself away.

  “Good morning, Sunshine. How are you feeling?” I said to Hannah, as I walked into her room.

  “Good morning. I’m doing well. I think I’ve got most of my blood back” Her smile was as bright as the sun coming in through the window. “Did you find everything okay?”

  “Yeap, I’ve got it all right here.” I patted the canvas bag I had in my hand before delicately placing it on her lap. Her leg was still heavily bandaged, but beside that she looked amazingly better. “Have you had breakfast yet?”

  “Some powdered eggs and toast.” She answered.

  I watched as she went through the bag and then struggled to put the sweatshirt on. A look that said back off came across Hannah’s face as I moved in to help, so I settled into a chair and waited. Once the sweatshirt debacle was over, she plugged her phone in the wall and booted up her tablet. Apparently, Hannah wasn’t wasting any time reconnecting with the world.

  “What happened?” She asked.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Yesterday. The only thing I remember was getting shot. Everything else is a blur.”

  I hadn’t really thought about that, so I filled her in on everything. Even the part about Colin and me losing the urn.

  “It’s not a huge deal if he doesn’t find it.” Hannah said calmly.

  “Why?”

  “The pictures. It’s why I also have copies of all my research. See.” She held up her tablet and scrolled through the pictures she took of the urn at the cemetery. “We probably have everything we need right here.”

  “Do we even want to bother? Tidwell is dead, and I’m pretty sure he killed Jason, so why move forward and risk anything or anyone else.”

  “Because, we don’t know why Jason died. I know it’s for a secret his family has kept since the Civil War, but what secret is worth the price of a life? That’s what has kept me intrigued. I don’t care about finding lost Confederate treasure. It will end up in a

  museum if I have my way. What I care about is the why.”

  “Always the good historian. We know what happened, but the real question is the why. Okay, I get it. Here’s what I’m thinking. I think Tidwell was crazy as shit, and I don’t believe the Trenholms actually stole anything.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Trenholm and Makem are working together, and it seems they are only a small portion of a bigger group. It’s the only way the local media and the South of Broad neighborhood haven’t gone crazy over two killings…there is a powerful group at play, which makes me believe the KGC is alive and well in Charleston.”

  “Alright I’m on the same page with you so far.”

  “Great, I was worried you would blow my theory right up.”

  “I still may.” Hannah said.

  “Anyways, go back to the end of the Civil War and Tidwell’s great-great grandpappy, or whoever he was, is hauling the remains of the Confederate Treasury to a secluded spot to be loaded onto blockade runners, but when they arrive the treasure is missing. Tidwell believed that his ancestor was set up by Trenholm to take the blame, and I believe he was but not for the same reason.”

  “You’re losing me.”

  “I think it was a giant illusion. The KGC and George A. Trenholm used the elder Tidwell and his men as a decoy for where

  the real money was going. Laying the blame on them for the theft would create even a larger distraction. The Union Army and later the Federal Government would take the rumors of Tidwell and

  his men stealing the remains of the Confederate Treasury as reliable fact when they conducted a search for the gold. Meanwhile, the KGC, led by Trenholm had already moved and hidden the treasure to the actual location.”

  “It does make sense.”

  “My question is, and this may prove my theory correct, how was the Trenholm family fortune rebuilt after the war? Did he suddenly have money, which would indicate he stole the gold, or did he build it up through connections and deals already established. Trenholm was in a position to take a huge fall when the war ended, so as a smart business man he must have been prepared for it. He could have easily had the means in place to reestablish his fortune knowing the US Government would punish him for his ties to the Confederacy.”

  “The answer is a little of both. Through my research with Jason we found that the Treholm family never became paupers. When Treholm was released from Federal custody he simply went back to the life he was used to. I’m sure part of it was an illusion or show for the public to keep up perception, but James Trenholm was continuing to run Fraser, Trenholm, & Company from Liverpool…out of reach of the Federal Government.”

  “So I’m right then?”

  “Nothing positive, but your theory seems to hold.”

  “Then why keep looking? It seems we have all the answers.” I said.

  “Not all. Why would a group of men hold on for something this long? Why would they still protect it with their lives

  and to the threat of others? There’s something else there and I need to know.”

  Chapter 72

  Hospitals are horrible places in my opinion, but sitting there all afternoon with Hannah wasn’t bad. Colin called with the news that there was no sign of the urn, and we had to assume Makem had gotten a hold of it after we left. While this was bad news it also provided us with a little more insight into our theory. From the moment we saw Makem heading towards the dock at the old plantation house with the urn, I knew it was the only reason he had come out there with us. The fact that he stuck around after being whacked in the head was a sign of its importance to him and his small group of friends. I also had to believe that they were relieved and felt a little bit more secure knowing that the urn was not in mine or Hannah’s hands, but what they didn’t know was that we had all the information we needed from the pictures on the tablet.

  The KGC or whomever Trenholm and Makem represented would have to assume that they had stopped our little treasure hunt by taking possession of the urn. It would give us an opportunity to work without being followed. Looking at the still bandaged leg of Hannah, I was also acutely aware that I was on my own for the time being. None of that mattered at the moment though. We had been over the pictures all afternoon with no luck in trying to decipher the message. I was getting antsy with every brick wall we hit, and deep down inside I had already concluded that it would be Hannah that solved this riddle and not me.

  “I’m going to let you get some rest.” I said. “We’ve been at it since breakfast, and you need your some sleep.”

  “I’m fine. What we need is to figure this thing out.”

  “It’s only been a day your body needs to rest and heal. I’m going to go and I’ll come back in a few hours to check on you.”

  “I’m just going to sit here and look at this thing while you’re gone, so you might as well sit with me.” Hannah said stubbornly.

  “I’m not going to lie…I need a break as much as you need rest. What do you want for dinner? I’ll bring you back something so you won’t have to rely on hospital food.”

  “Surprise me.”

  “Alright. Seriously, try to get a little nap in. I need you one-hundred percent if we are going to finish this hunt properly.”

  “I’ll try, but no promises.”

  Standing up I moved towards Hannah and kissed her
on the forehead before turning to pull the shade on the window.

  “Hey.” She said. “I was enjoying the view.”

  “Too bad. Now get some sleep.”

  I walked out of the room leaving her still with the tablet in hand and headed out to Calhoun Street. The town had woken up considerably since I had walked into the hospital and now traffic was as thick as the mix of college students and tourists on the sidewalk. Weaving through vacationers taking pictures and students texting I managed to make it over to King Street, where I grabbed a sandwich and a beer before heading back to my place.