named me Vartouhi because they liked the name.”
“I would have guessed Middle Eastern from your looks,” Kurt said.
“Actually, Irish and Native American,” the woman said, smiling. “It’s a common mistake. People with some knowledge of the world sometimes guess Italian or French. More commonly these days, people assume Hispanic. Few note the Kurdish name,” she added with an interested glance.
“I’m something of a student of the Middle East,” Barb said. “Ancient history. The Hurrians are related to the Hittites.”
“I don’t recognize either group,” Vartouhi said, her face blank.
“Hurrians are Kurds,” Kurt said. He grinned at Barb’s look of surprise. “Anthropology degree. The Hittites were a branch of them that at one point conquered most of the Middle East. I notice that your entry has some Hittite elements. The double archway. The intervening friezes…”
“Hittites stole most of their architecture from other cultures,” Reamer said. “Good stone workers, but if you observe their pre-conquest architecture, it’s fairly simple Neolithic stuff…”
“Darling,” Vartouhi said, placing her hand on his arm again. “I doubt that they want to hear a lecture on architectural development.”
“Actually, I find it fascinating,” Barbara said. “I’ve heard the same theory before. I’m under the impression they were most influenced by the Sumerians.”
“It’s unlikely,” Reamer said. “Most of their later motifs incorporated some Sumerian motifs. But there is an unexplained jump in technology…”
“Darling, the Kincaids are here,” Vartouhi said. “We need to say hello to them.”
“Oh, yes,” Reamer said. “Of course.”
“Enjoy yourselves, Special Agent, Mrs. Everette,” Vartouhi said. “Live for each moment.”
“In this life I am dead, Ms. Cass,” Barb said, nodding. “I live for the hereafter.”
“What in the hell…?” Kurt said as the pair drifted away.
“Don’t,” Barb said. “Not here.”
“So what do we do now?” Kurt asked.
“Mingle?” Barb said. “Talk?”
They stayed an hour. Most of the talk was of the Madness cases, and when it became known that Kurt was working the cases he got used to saying “I can’t discuss an ongoing case.” Finally, when it seemed they’d been there long enough to be polite, they left. The guards at the elevator performed the same pantomime with the security keys, which meant that nobody got to leave the building unless they were allowed out.
They descended to the ground floor in silence and stayed that way as far as the car.
“Okay, give,” Kurt said as soon as they were in the car.
“Not here, either,” Barb replied. She started up the car and drove out of the parking garage, then stopped on the street facing the building. “Notice anything?”
“No,” Kurt said. “It’s an office building.”
“You’re the FBI agent,” Barb snapped. “Use your eyes. The elevator was marked for seven floors, a basement, a mezzanine and the penthouse. Count the floors.”
“Seven,” Kurt said a moment later.
“Where’s the mezzanine floor?” Barb asked.
“Sometimes that’s built into…” Kurt said, then looked again. “There’s no way to fit one in.”
“So where does the mezzanine button go to?”
“Where now?”
“The office.”
“Now give?” Kurt asked when they were back in the offices.
“You notice anything about our conversation with Vartouhi and Reamer?”
“Like she kept cutting him off?” Kurt asked. “I’d love to have an hour alone with him in an interrogation room.”
“And you’re not going to get it,” Barb said. “He’d have a very high-priced lawyer present, at the very least. More than that.”
“Like she knew who we were, where we were from, what we were working on?” Kurt said. “Yeah. Noticed.”
“Most of that stuff she can get from public sources,” Barb said. “Credit records. Ownership background.”
“Stuff we can’t access without a special finding,” Kurt said bitterly. “But, yeah, I know.”
“But that we’re working the Madness cases is privileged information,” Barb said. “Right?”
“More or less,” Kurt said. “It’s not special compartment like SC, but it’s not commonly available.”
“So she has access to that from some source,” Barb said.
“Could be any number of ways she’d get that information,” Kurt said. “Like I said, it’s not compartmented information. Through Reamer, she’s obviously tied into the business and legal structure in the town. Secretaries talk. Bureau secretaries talk to legal secretaries at other firms. Lawyers golf. If it’s not SCI, there’s no reason that it wouldn’t come up.”
“In casual conversation?” Barb asked.
“You saw how much interest there is in the cases,” Kurt pointed out. “But that’s not all. You were nervous as hell in there.”
“On the rest, I’m not sure how much I can talk about,” Barb said. “There are indications that this case has something to do with a civilization the Hittites destroyed. And there is an unexplained jump in Hittite architectural development. If I remember my reading right, Hittites were primarily a warrior race, and they absorbed various aspects of culture from other races, mostly by enslaving them. Gods, art and architecture. But there’s one strain of architecture that has never been adequately explained. And there’s not much known about the civilization that’s connected to these cases except that the Hittites wiped it out. Coincidence? I don’t think so.”
“What the hell does architecture have to do with psychotics?” Kurt asked, grabbing his head.
“Watch your language, Agent Spornberger,” Barbara said. “The architecture of the entryway is similar to Hittite, but… Look, I’ve been doing some really weird reading as part of this job. Stuff I never thought I’d have to read up on. But that doesn’t make me an expert by any means. The thing is, I don’t think that entryway is Hittite. I think it’s…something else. There is something nagging at me, though.”
“What?” Kurt asked.
“I can’t place it,” Barbara said, grimacing. “I wish I was more of an expert at this. The house, there’s something weird about the architecture.”
“Well, there’s the missing floor,” Kurt said.
“Something else,” Barb said. “Can you get blueprints at this time of night?”
“For tactical reasons the Bureau gets copies of all new building permits and their schematics,” Kurt said, firing up his computer. “So…yes.”
“There,” Barb said, shuddering. She pointed at the screen. “Do you see it?”
“Shit,” Kurt replied, nodding. “That building looks just like the symbol Vartouhi was wearing the other day.”
“Three lobes,” Barb said. “I think that ‘house’ is laid out as a temple. And nobody should know what that kind of temple looks like.”
“Who in the hel…heck are you talking about?” Kurt asked.
“Uh…” Barb said, then shrugged. “Need to know. The powers that be determine who has need to know.”
“Your powers that be?” Kurt asked, angrily.
“ Yours, actually,” Barb said.
“Oh, great,” Kurt said. “I’ve got the responsibility, but nobody’s giving me the information? Why?”
“That’s a very interesting question,” Barb said. “But not an important one at this point. Thing is that nothing’s adding up here. I’m going to sleep on it. I’ll see you tomorrow, but not early. I need to talk to somebody.”
“Great,” Kurt said. “You go ‘see somebody.’ I’m going to go get out of this monkey suit and get a beer.
