“Evidently the murderer slipped behind him, looped the wire around his neck, and that was it. Since he’d been smoking all evening, according to Ancilla, it couldn’t have been very hard to sneak up on him.
“But once Makepeace had the wire around his neck, Soldan did fight. The ME says it looks like there’s skin under Soldan’s fingernails, probably from Makepeace.”
Ruth said, “Makepeace has got to be a mess—bullet wounds, a scraped face from that newel post exploding, and Meissen’s fingernails—and the guy’s still going.”
Julia said, “He’s got a powerful need.”
Sherlock said, “I wonder why he didn’t clean Soldan’s hands once he’d killed him. He’s a professional and professionals wouldn’t leave hard evidence like that.”
Dix raised his head. “Who cares? Makepeace certainly doesn’t. We still don’t have him and we don’t have Pallack.” He rose and walked to the front windows and said over his shoulder, “What we’ve got is nothing—no evidence, no witnesses, not a single one of Dr. Ransom’s journals that we all hoped would give us the reasons and the motives—” He faced the windows again. “It has to be Pallack, all of you know it.”
“Yes, I agree,” Ruth said. “I wonder why he had Makepeace kill Meissen.”
Savich said, “For some reason Meissen was a danger to him. Don’t forget, both Ransom and Meissen were his own personal mediums. He’s in the center of all of this, Dix is right about that. We’ll get there, Dix, be patient,” But Savich could tell his words were falling on deaf ears.
“Hey,” Ruth said, “maybe it was Meissen who hired Makepeace to kill August Ransom.”
Cheney said, “Only if he wanted his clients. Sounds nuts to me, but we’re talking woo-woo here so who knows?”
There was a tense silence because no one knew what to do next, when suddenly Savich stood and announced he and Sherlock would be leaving for New York on the red-eye.
They drove to SFO in under twenty minutes and made it to the gate with five minutes to spare.
CHAPTER 55
ATTICA, NEW YORK
Big Sonny Moldavo of the New York Field Office met Savich and Sherlock at their gate when they deplaned at JFK and escorted them to the black Bell FBI helicopter waiting to take them to Attica. “Bobby’s your pilot, hell of a wild man. He was a helicopter pilot in Desert Storm, buzzed the Republican Guard whenever he got bored, but, hey, don’t worry, he’ll get you there.” When Big Sonny left them in the wild man’s hands, Bobby spit a good six feet, stretched, and gave them a lazy grin. “You guys must be real important to get such fancy treatment. Okay, Attica’s between Rochester and Buffalo—it won’t take too long. Climb aboard and buckle up.” In the next minute they’d lifted off and were soon looking down at a beautiful clear day over lower Manhattan.
Sherlock took a drink of water, and handed the bottle to Savich. He drank deeply, wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.
She looked down. They’d already passed over Manhattan and the suburbs. They were flying over flatlands now, broken with pine and oak forests. Occasional small towns dotted the countryside. She pointed down to a red barn, glittering in the morning sunlight.
Savich nodded. “This whole business—even though we know it’s Pallack, there’s no way we could talk a judge into granting us a warrant to search his penthouse or his office.”
She drummed her fingertips on her leg. “I know, but you’ve got to remember we only arrived in San Francisco two nights ago—amazing, given all that’s happened. Why are we going to see Courtney James now, Dillon?”
“I had MAX look him up the other morning. He was a neighbor of the Pallacks so he knew all of them, Thomas Pallack, and his parents. For years. And I realized he must know Thomas Pallack better than anyone else living. If anyone can fill in the blanks, I figure it’s James.
“Then we hit all the excitement with Makepeace and I had to put him on my mental back burner.
“But the thing is, even though it’s only been two days we’ve been on this, I’m worried about Dix. He’s so frustrated he looks ready to burst out of his skin. I have this hope, Sherlock,” and he raised her hand to kiss her fingers, “that since we’re stopped dead in our tracks in San Francisco that maybe, just maybe, Courtney James will have something to say that will break up the roadblock.”
“What could he tell us? All his knowledge, his memories of the Pallacks, is thirty years old.”
Savich sighed. “I know, I know.”
“But you’re hopeful.”
He kissed her, said against her mouth, “Yep, I’m hopeful. We’ll see.”
Sherlock hoped so too, although she couldn’t imagine what Courtney James would tell them that would be of any use. She yawned. Even though both of them were good sleepers on planes, the last few days had wiped them both out. It had to come to an end soon, she thought, it simply had to. She leaned her head back, closed her eyes, the sound of the helicopter blade rumbling through her head, and imagined the three of them playing on the beach in Aruba.
An hour later Bobby set them down on the rippled asphalt helipad at Tomlinson Field, the small airport outside Attica, and waved them to a nondescript beige Ford Escort parked at the edge of the tarmac. He gave them both a sharp salute and a lazy smile, said he was glad neither of them had been big yakkers, and in the next breath added, “Hey, maybe we can have some more fun on our return trip.”
“Can’t wait,” Savich said. “I was just thinking the ride over was smooth as my treadmill.”
Sherlock said, “Yeah, I especially liked how my stomach heaved up to my ears when you banked halfway over to set us down.”
