The Case

by Leopold Borstinski

  His name was Colonel Mustard and he was with the Brigadiers. Okay, I lied. His name was Colonel Mumford and he implied he was something to do with the Palace, but he wasn’t particularly specific.

  To be honest, the key fact I focused on the first time we met was that Lambretti had recommended him to me and that meant there was zero chance of failure on my part. And that focuses your mind, man.

  At this point in my life, I had no secretary and my office was just a room in a serviced building - times were tough and sleuthing was not the game it had been a decade before. So I was pleased to see a strange face walk into my room because that translated as greenbacks in my eyes.

  Mumford explained the matter he had to discuss was delicate and I assured him nothing he said to me would be repeated to anyone else. I was more confidential than a priest because I held a licensed firearm and would shoot anyone who asked too many questions of me. He raised his eyebrows at me in total disbelief.

  “Colonel Mumford, I’m exaggerating for comic effect. But, believe me when I tell you that I run a successful business be keeping confidences, not be blurting things out. Why else do you think the Don would have recommended me in the first place?”

  Mumford sat silent for a spell in the only other chair in my office. There was a metal, locked filing cabinet to one side of my desk and a filter coffee machine on a small table on the other. A hat stand in the corner by the door. That was all I had by way of furnishings - apart from a small Chinese rug under my desk so I could take off my shoes and uncurl my toes.

  UNTIL NOW, I had reckoned there was a woman in Mumford’s story who either was playing the field or who needed following because he thought she was playing the field. I thought about the camera I kept in the bottom drawer of the filing cabinet for just such cases. But I was wrong. So wrong. Thinking back, I really wished it had been yet another caught-in-the-act photo shoot.

  “It’s Sofia.”

  I was silent, nodding to encourage him to talk but not wanting to appear to hang on his every word in case he clammed up. My guess: Sofia was his wife and the story would unfold in a predictable fashion.

  “I haven’t seen her in two days.” Silence. Moisture appeared in the corner of his left eye. This Brit was showing an emotion.

  “Take your time, Colonel.”

  Silence.

  “Does she often go off for days at a time?”

  “What? No? Of course not. She’s fourteen years old for Christ’s sake, man.”

  Then it dawned on me. This wasn’t a case of wandering hands; it was a case of wandering daughters.

  “This is a job for the Missing Persons Bureau. Why are you here and not talking to them instead?”

  “Are you mad? You fool, don’t you understand? I received a note this morning.”

  “Do you have it with you?”

  He pulled a folded sheet of paper out from inside his jacket and thrust it towards me. I reached across my desk for the note but he dropped it on the desk instead. Hard to tell if this was an accident or he was playing some stupid power game. Either way, I read the note:

  “We have the girl. Get $500,000 or we’ll return her piece by piece.”

  “Where and when did the note appear?” I asked with all the seriousness I could muster to reflect the significance of the note.

  “This morning. It fell out of the newspaper that was delivered to my hotel room.”

  “Which hotel was that?”

  “The Hilton on the Avenue of the Americas.”

  “And why did you go to Lambretti and not the cops? You didn’t say.”

  Mumford looked coldly at me and then a shiver went down my spine as he looked coldly straight through me.

  “The situation is delicate. I am not here and neither is my daughter, so I can’t involve the police.”

  “You’re not here?”

  “No. Let’s just say that my work for the British Government is ... confidential and officially I simply am not in the United States.”

  “Ah, I see.”

  “Exactly. And if I am not here and Sofia is not here then I can’t go to the police to complain that my daughter isn’t here, now can I?”

  “Yes.”

  “So Mr. Lambretti suggested you would be able to help instead.”

  Mumford was a British spy who, for reasons best known to himself, had brought his daughter over on one of his sprees. Lambretti wanted me to find the kidnapped daughter of a British spy who had illegally entered the country, probably just to do a spot of shopping or something.

  “I can see why he’d have done that.” Now it was my turn to be silent.

  “Have you considered using your network, shall we say, because if this has anything to do with your work, the chances are it’s the Russkies. MI5 or MI6 is far more likely to be able to help than me.”

  “Can’t be Comrade Boris, they wouldn’t hold her to ransom. They would have merely slammed through the hotel door and shot me in the head. These are not circuitous times, Mr. Adkins.”

  “Call me Jake and I take your point.”

  “What I need you to do is to find these fellows before they harm my Sofia and deal with them accordingly.”

  “Accordingly?” He was using long words and his accent was almost impossible for me to figure, so I didn’t completely get what the guy was on about.

  “Yes, deal with them. Mr. Lambretti didn’t recommend you just so you could help me rescue Sofia. You need to kill the bastards who have taken her, goddamn it.”

  MUMFORD WAS CLEARLY losing his temper and I needed him cool as ice for him to be any help to me - so’s I could help him and keep in Don Michael’s good books. The other thing, of course, was that I myself was none too happy at the thought of having to shoot a bunch of bad guys, especially as right now I had zero idea why they’d nabbed the girl in the first place.

  “Okay, okay. What exactly was Sofia doing hooking up with Simone Lambretti, then?”

  “They both went to the same school in Switzerland and had kept in contact during the summer vacation.” He translated the last phrase into American, much as you would explain a pencil to a two-year-old, but I chose not to take offense; the guy’s daughter had been kidnapped after all.

  “And who knew that you guys were going to be over here?”

  “No-one. It was just a vacation.”

  “No-one?”

  “Well...” I raised an eyebrow because we both knew that to make a transatlantic flight and to stay in a hotel meant there were loads of people who knew. Also, you can add on all the people who followed Mumford because of his work and you have a long list of potential kidnappers, even before you throw into the mix some random opportunists who happen to see a guy and his daughter wearing nice clothes walking down Fifth Avenue.

  But after Mumford had thought for a while and taken the question seriously, there didn’t seem to be any obvious suspects. Of course, there was the ransom note and the promise of another one.

  “And what about the money?”

  “What about it, Adkins?”

  “Jake, please. People call me Jake. I mean, can you raise the money?”

  “Well of course not. If I could raise the money, I’d just hand it over and get Sofia back. It is because I don’t have the money that you and I are in the same room together. You really are exceedingly obtuse, aren’t you?”

  I let that one slide too. The guy was stressed and being verbally abusive, but that was part of the job: sucking in other people’s angst.

  “And did you keep the newspaper the note fell out of?”

  “No, by Jove, do you think that was important?”

  “I have no idea. I’m only asking. To cover obvious ground, find any clues there are to find.”

  “I see. So where do we go from here?”

  “Good question. I think it’s time for you to go back to your hotel room and for us to start some surveillance. Wherever we go next, we should find out how the notes are getting delivered to you - who is delivering the note and
maybe follow them back to their pit.”

  We hopped into a cab and hightailed it back to the Hilton to sit out the long wait until a follow-up letter appeared, probably the next morning. At the back of both our minds was the stone cold fact that after twenty-four hours, the chances of finding a kidnap victim alive plummeted to near zero.

  BACK IN MUMFORD’S room, we sketched out a plan for the rest of the day. For now, he’d stay put and I’d check out the hotel staff and anyone else I could find who might know something about something. Mumford was desperate to be doing some constructive task other than waiting, but I convinced him his best place was the hotel room - if only because in the unlikely event the kidnappers decided to call him, he needed to be by a phone. But to make him feel better, I got him to write down a list of people who would want to hurt him and had the resources to do so in another continent. We agreed those criteria should narrow the names down to something vaguely manageable as his day job meant a lot of people were pissed with him a lot of the time.

  Meanwhile, I popped down to the front desk to talk to housekeeping or whoever else it was that looked after room service with a smile.

  Frank was seventeen years old and had the swagger of a teenager with attitude. Luckily for him, this was slowly being smothered by the rest of the hotel staff who had no time for his youthful arrogance. By the time I was waving a Jackson in his face, he learned to answer my direct questions in a direct manner - otherwise the bread went back into my pocket. He also understood that if he lied I’d rip him a new asshole, so that meant we were able to hold a civilized conversation without any distractions.

  “So you bring the breakfasts and papers up to the rooms on the fifteenth?”

  “Yessir.”

  “And how does that work?”

  “Huh?”

  “What precisely is your routine? What do you do so that each guest ends up with the right food and the right newspaper?”

  “Oh. There’s a list of newspapers I’m given by Mr. Naughton and each tray is already numbered. So I take the list, check the room number and grab the right paper from the piles on top of the trolley. Then I take the tray and knock on the door of the room. Easy.”

  “And has anyone ever given you something to put inside the newspapers ever?”

  “Sure thing!”

  My ears twitched and the hairs at the back of my neck stood up.

  “A dude gave me a note to put in his girlfriend’s New York Times a couple of weeks ago. That’s how he proposed to her, schmuck.” I sighed.

  “No, I mean in the last couple of days. On the fifteenth. Capiche?”

  The boy furrowed his brow as he imagined the money floating back into my pocket.

  “No, nobody’s given me nothing for the last couple of weeks, not on that floor.” Beat. “But yesterday I did have to leave the trolley for a minute when I was on the fifteenth. Some dude couldn’t figure out where the ice machine was and I took him there ‘cause he couldn’t follow my directions.”

  “Really? When was this?”

  “Yesterday, like I said.”

  “And what did he look like, this guy?”

  “Tall, thin, black hair. Wore metal-rimmed glasses like he was smart or something.”

  “And his clothes?”

  “Gray suit, blue shirt, bow tie.”

  “And had you seen him around the hotel before?”

  “Um... no, don’t think so, but I spend most of my time back of house. It’s only room service when I get to see the guests.”

  “Would you recognize him if you saw him again?”

  “Yes, I reckon.”

  “Okay, if you spot him, or find out what room he’s staying in, let me or my friend know - we’ll be in 1504.”

  Frank nodded, all the while keeping his beady eye on the greenback in my hand.

  “Here’s something for your trouble now,” and I raised my hand out for him to take the note. Frank put his hand out and touched mine to get at the note at which point, I put my other hand over his.

  “But if you fuck with me, I’ll break your hand clean off.”

  His boyish grin fled his face. He nodded and I let go of him so’s he could get to his cash and he walked extraordinarily briskly away.

  9

  BACK UP AT Mumford’s, I explained to him we’d need to wait until morning if our Frank had actually been misdirected by one of the gang members. I holed up in 1506, adjacent to Mumford and we unlocked the connecting doors, in case things got ugly in the morning. Frank told me he delivered the papers around 5:30 to be certain of catching everyone before they woke up, so I set my alarm for five to give myself a chance to splash water on my face before the excitement of the day kicked in.

  Mumford and I sat up talking for a while, but he was brooding over his little girl and I was tired of expressing fake sympathy. Don’t get me wrong, I felt for the guy, but I didn’t feel that much for him and he’d been pissing and moaning on the same subject for the whole day and I’d just about had enough - even if he was the client and the spirit of Lambretti was hovering over his shoulder. Enough was enough and I made my excuses and cut into the neighboring room.

  I took a slug from a miniature bottle out of the minibar, sat down and watched a bit of TV before the Ed Sullivan Show bored me into hitting the head and going to sleep.

  I woke up with a start at a quarter to five, darted a glance at the clock and lay awake in a cold sweat. Must have been quite some dream, but I had no memory of it whatsoever. I went into the bathroom and used a finger for a toothbrush and patted my hair down to make it look slightly less slept in, put back on my clothes and stuck my ear to the adjoining door. Mumford was snoring loudly. I scooted over to the front door, listened but heard nothing. Then I looked out of the hawk eye lens in the door and saw less than I’d heard. Zip, nada, zilch.

  I STOOD THERE with my eye glued to the wood of the door for a lifetime, every so often I’d lean in so close I could sense my eyelashes swiping against the surface of the lens and then I’d pull back with a start - and commence again.

  Eventually, I was rewarded with the briefest of sights: a flash of a bow tie and I knew it was time to party. There was some kind of talking going on and I thought I recognized Frank’s muffled voice. A slip appeared under my door as Frank fed my room with the notification there was a complimentary newspaper.

  Swiftly, I opened the door and looked in the direction Bow Tie had gone. Putting my finger to my lips, I looked quizzically at Frank, who pointed down the corridor. I gave him a thumbs up and edged along the corridor, my hand hovering over my piece, but I was not stupid enough to draw it on the man I was following.

  I saw him turn the corner and ran to catch up. As I got to my left turn, I saw the stairwell door swing shut. Two choices: go into the stairwell and see if the guy goes into a room on a different floor or bet on him leaving the hotel discretely. The truth is there is no way you can follow someone on an echoing set of stairs; not an option. So I had to guess if he was staying in the hotel or just a casual early morning visitor.

  With a couple of seconds thought, I wait straight to the elevator and hit the down button. If Bow Tie was a guest, he wouldn’t need to wait for a newspaper delivery to send a note to Mumford. So down I went, watching the dial slowly descend from fifteen down to the letter L, for Lobby.

  As the elevator doors slid open, I caught Bow Tie leave the hotel and jump in a cab. Out of the doors myself and into a yellow box. There are very times when you get to say a cliché and mean it. This was one of those times.

  “Follow that cab!” I said and the cabbie smiled at me, nodded and screeched forwards.

  “Careful!” I instructed with as fierce a tone as I could generate at short notice, “The idea is they don’t notice us following them.” Another nod and some much better quality driving ensued.

  We headed east and took the Midtown Tunnel out to Queens. By this time, I had already negotiated with my chauffeur to enable him to stop freaking out about leaving Manhattan. Fear
vs bread? Bread wins every time.

  Five minutes later and Bow Tie had stopped his ride and opened a passenger door. Another guy - I couldn’t see his face from that distance - hopped in and the cab carried on meandering its way to LaGuardia Airport.

  Paying my driver an extra fifty so he’d hang around and wait in case Bow Tie and his buddy double backed on me, I launched into the terminal building just fast enough to see them head straight for their gate: Logan. I went to the desk and bought myself a ticket, as well as a newspaper to hide behind during the flight, having made sure I was at the back of the plane. There was no time to phone Mumford; he’d have to wallow in his own juices for a while.

  FROM THE BACK of the plane, I kept a good eye on Bow Tie and Buddy who were near the front. There were only twenty or so rows, so I was far enough away not to be seen but close enough to be able to keep tabs on them after we landed.

  During the flight, they joked and chatted all the way so whatever they were cooking was going to wait until they got into Boston.

  Screech of undercarriage hitting tarmac and a brief wait before the doors, front and back, opened up and we disgorged into the Boston night. Outside the airport, they grabbed a white taxi and I followed them in a more casual manner, because New England is not Manhattan.

  The journey was surprisingly short because we stayed in the docks, near the airport, and didn’t head off into the city. This kept the fare low but there is nothing good about following two guys into a warehouse on a dock when you know they are involved in the kidnap of a teenage girl.

  On the plus side, at least I knew they were the right guys. There was a slender chance I’d followed some random dude to Boston, only to find him heading back to his wife and a night watching TV with his dinner on his lap.