“Colonel,” Anne said, troubled by Schwarzkopf’s expression and tone, “I thought you were in conference with Charles.”
“Yes, Mrs. Lindbergh. But he and Colonel Breckinridge needed a word in private. Mr. Heller?”
I thanked Anne Lindbergh for her kindness in general and her ham sandwich in particular. Schwarzkopf bowed to her, in his silly formal way, and the two of us stepped into the room beyond the kitchen, a spacious well-stocked pantry.
He looked at me with disdain. “I don’t know how you people do things in Chicago. Judging by what I read in the newspapers, you don’t do them very damn well. Murder in the street. Corruption in city hall. It took the
“This is fascinating, learning all about Chicago like this. But don’t I have an appointment with Colonel Lindbergh?”
He trained his hazel eyes on me like the twin barrels of a twelve-gauge. “In New Jersey, I run a force of one hundred and twenty hand-picked, highly motivated and rigidly disciplined men.” He thumped my chest with a forefinger-just like that inspector out in the garage had. “You’re in my territory, mister. You’ll play by my rules, or you won’t play at all.”
I grabbed his finger in my fist; I didn’t squeeze it, I didn’t get tough with him. I just grabbed the finger and stopped him thumping me with it. His eyes and nostrils flared.
“Don’t put your hands on me,” I advised. “You might get your uniform mussed.”
I let go of the finger and he drew it back, indignantly.
Through clenched teeth, he said, “You were rude and disrespectful to one of my key people, Inspector Welch, who is no doubt twice the policeman you’ll ever be. You used coarse language of a kind that may be acceptable in Chicago circles, but will not, mister, be countenanced here-not in my world.”
I smiled pleasantly. “Colonel Schwarzkopf, let me make a couple things clear. First of all, I’m just here to advise and to help, because several people wanted me to come, including Colonel Lindbergh. Second, that asshole Welch called me ‘sonny boy,’ twice. Do I look like a refugee from a Jolson picture to you?”
That froze him. He did not know what to say to me. He did not know what to make of me. He just knew, whatever I was, he didn’t like it or me.
“I don’t think you’re going to fare very well with Colonel Lindbergh,” he said, finally, with an icy smile.
“Well,” I said, shrugging. “Why don’t you lead the way, and let’s see.”
Nodding curtly, he did.
4
Footsteps echoing on hardwood floors, I trailed Schwarzkopf through the foyer past the second-floor stairs and into a large living room where a dog was barking. I didn’t see the animal at first, but its bark was ringing through the open-beamed room, the shrill sound of a small, hysterical pooch. To my left, French doors led to a flat terrace where a New Jersey trooper, in his perfect light-blue uniform jacket with orange piping, stood guard. Despite the bustle of activity elsewhere, this room was empty, but for the barking dog, who revealed himself as a little white-and-brown wirehaired fox terrier on a pillow on a green sofa. Fireplaces stood like brick bookends at either side of the big room, both unlit, emphasizing the coldness of the house.
That coldness wasn’t restricted to temperature: the newness of everything-the vague smell of recent paint and plaster, the absence of personal touches (the hearth was bare)-made the house seem charmless, impersonal.
“Wahgoosh!” Schwarzkopf barked back at the dog as we passed.
I didn’t understand what he was saying-some Teutonic curse, for all I knew.
“Mutt’s been barking constantly since we got here,” Schwarzkopf said, with quiet irritation.
“Did he bark the night of the kidnapping?”
Schwarzkopf shook his head no.
“You know what Sherlock Holmes said about the curious incident of the dog in the night.”
Schwarzkopf frowned, nodded toward the terrier. “That damn dog didn’t do a damn thing in the night.”
“That was the curious incident,” I said. “Inside job, you think?”
Schwarzkopf shrugged, but his manner said yes.
Just beyond the living room, sitting on a straight-back chair leaned against the wall, was a small, dark man in a three-piece black-and-gray pinstripe with a flourish of white silk handkerchief flaring out of his breast pocket.
“Hiya, Colonel,” he said to Schwarzkopf, not getting up. His accent was New York through and through.
Schwarzkopf, who seemed to like this guy even less than he liked me, grunted.
“Ain’t ya going to introduce us?” the cocky little guy asked, nodding toward me. He had a tabloid newspaper,
“No,” Schwarzkopf said, as we moved past.
I jerked a thumb back at the guy and began to speak, but Schwarzkopf cut me off with: “Don’t ask.”
He came to a halt before a big white door and knocked twice.
“Come in,” a voice within said. The voice of a young man-a weary man, but most of all young.
Slender, blond, handsome, haggard, Lindbergh stood behind a big dark oak desk cluttered with notes and phone messages, and smoothed his brown suit coat-he wore no tie, his collar loose-smiling warmly at me, extending a hand, as if we were old friends. Seated across from him was a lanky, distinguished-looking gray-haired, gray-mustached fellow in his fifties in a three-piece gray tailored suit. He also rose as I entered, and just kept rising-he was as tall as Lindbergh, easily, and Lindbergh was probably six-three or-four.
“You’d be Mr. Heller,” Lindbergh said. He nodded to the man in gray and said, “And this is my attorney, Colonel Henry Breckinridge, from New York.”
I reached across the desk and received the firm handshake I’d expected from Lindbergh; Breckinridge was equally firm with his handshake and smiled in a tight, businesslike but friendly manner. His face was soft, his features bland, but his steel-gray eyes under bold strokes of black eyebrow hinted at something stronger.
Lindbergh gestured to the chair next to Breckinridge and I sat, while Schwarzkopf stood behind us, at parade rest. Lindbergh’s smile disappeared. “Sorry about the mix-up-Whately was supposed to bring you directly to me.”
“That’s no problem, Colonel.”
He sat. “Well, I apologize if there’s been any inconvenience. God knows we appreciate your presence. I know Anne is thrilled to have you on the case, after your success with those kidnappers in Chicago.”
“Well…thank you. I’m just here to help, if I can.”
Attorney Breckinridge spoke up in a mellow, modulated voice that must have served him well in court. “We’re expecting agents Irey and Wilson of the Treasury Department later this afternoon.”
“They’re good men,” I said.
“I received a call from Eliot Ness,” Lindbergh said, “recommending you highly, Mr. Heller. We hope you can stay on until-well, until Charlie is home and in his mother’s arms.”
“I’d like that.”
“I’ve spoken to Mayor Cermak,” Lindbergh said, “and he indicated your department would assign you here until I choose to release you.”
“Well…that’s fine.” It seemed odd, though, to be assigned directly to the victim’s father; why not to Schwarzkopf? Not that I wanted to be.
The phone rang, once, and Lindbergh answered it. His responses were monosyllabic and I couldn’t get the gist of the conversation; I let my eyes roam around the dark-wood-paneled study. Several walls were dominated by books, not the usual unread, leather-bound variety you see in a wealthy home, but novels and books of poetry mingled with scientific and aviation tomes. A fireplace on the wall opposite the door cast a warm glow; above the mantel was a framed aeronautical map. Light filtered in through a sheet that had been hung over the uncurtained window, across the room behind me. This was, I knew from what I’d read, the window directly under the one that the kidnapper had gone in. The nursery would be directly above us.
There were no mementos of fame in this room: no replicas of his silver monoplane, no medals, no trophies.
