“I saidadded inspiration, you dummy. I want to watch the holo. There’s bound to be something, something somebody said or did, that will give us a clue.”
The rest of the morning disappeared in a blaze of activity. But at two o’clock we were ready. At 2:05 Wainwright announced his decision: Guilty. At 2:10 one team from All-Risk, along with some of our operatives, moved into Murdock’s office. A second team went to the Bank of San Francisco. At 2:15 they zapped us the account records of GMR Holdings.
“What’s the time in Switzerland?” asked Joe as the records scrolled across the screen.
I thought for a minute. “Bedtime, I’d say.”
“Damn. Bet Swiss banks aren’t open Saturdays, either.” Joe pointed at the screen. “I don’t like the look of that.” His fingers danced over the keyboard and the screen split into half a dozen different displays.
“See,” he said. “All the money was sent to Swiss banks. All these transfers—” all but one of the displays lit up “—went to three different Swiss banks. Union Bank, Credit Suisse, Bank Leu. All big names.”
“We should get some cooperation out of them. What’s the problem?”
Joe punched a button on the keyboard and the display that hadn’t been highlighted filled the screen.
“Right there. That wire went Saturday. Anstalt Bank. Where the hell is Vaduz, anyway?” He highlighted the bank’s name and an information screen appeared. “Vaduz, Liechtenstein. Oh hell.”
“Liechtenstein,” I murmured. “So how do we stand with them?”
“Those guys in Liechtenstein don’t say ‘boo’ to their own mothers. Let’s see. Court order required,” he read from a new display. “Hmmm. To get that, the whole case has to be retried in Vaduz. Witnesses. Everything. God knows how long that would take—years possibly. They don’t recognize our adjudication process.”
“Anyway,” I said, “what’s the bet all the money is some other place.”
“Ha. Want me to take the wrong side of a sure thing?
The phone rang and a message blinked on the screen that Tony Ramirez was calling. “Good,” said Joe as he pushed the Accept button. Tony’s face appeared on the screen.
“Seen the bank records?” he asked.
“Yeah,” said Joe. “Liechtenstein.”
“And Switzerland, which is a bit more cooperative. Monday, we’ll be filing cases in both places.”
“So what are the chances of getting any information?” I asked.
“Not good,” said Ramirez. “Better, though, when we get a ruling that Murdock stole the money from the joint ventures. That case should be finished this afternoon.
“You got anything?”
“Lots of questions,” said Joe. “You got any answers?”
“Lots,” Ramirez laughed. “See what you guys can dig up in Switzerland.”
“Sure. We’ll be on the next ship out. Let us know if they find Murdock guilty of theft.”
“Will do.”
After Tony had signed off Joe asked me, “Who
“Gunter Lattman. Remember?”
“Let’s call him.” Gunter’s number appeared on the screen.
“Wait! How cooperative do you think he’ll be if you wake him up in the middle of the night.”
“You’re right,” Joe said, grudgingly.
“Send him a message, ask him to callus as soon as he can. Let him wake us up in the middle of the night.”
Joe nodded as the phone rang again. It was Andy, one of our investigators who’d gone with the All-Risk team to Murdock’s office.
“What did you find?” I asked.
“She didn’t leave much for us to find. Most of the computers have been wiped clean. We’ll see what we can recover, but I wouldn’t hold your breath. She’s had a whole week.”
“Anything at all?”
“Well… I don’t know. We haven’t moved anything yet. I’d like you to come down and have a look.
Joe, I mean. My gut feeling is he might smell something.”
I didn’t take offense. Joe’s “nose” had taken on a mystical quality in our company.
“We’re on our way.”
What had clearly been Murdock’s office had a wonderful, close-up view of the building next door. We entered through a general office/reception area with three desks. One other door led into a smaller office which had been Annabelle Pearson’s.
Joe stood in the center of Murdock’s office, deep in thought. We all knew better than to interrupt him when he was in this state.
This office, like the others, had been all but stripped clean. Other than a few papers in the trash cans, a few files lying around, some old newspapers and magazines, all that was left was two bookshelves full of
books. Mostly travel guides.
After a while Joe said, “It’s too obvious.” One of the All-Risk guys started to ask him, “What—and was silenced. “Wait,” somebody whispered to him.
Joe walked to one of the shelves and scanned the titles. They were mostly tourist guides to countries in Africa and South America. On one of the tightly packed shelves there was a hole where a book had been removed. The missing book was one of the travel guides.
“It’s like Murdock left instructions. ‘Ms. Pearson,’” he recited, “‘please destroy everything but don’t remove or touch anything on the bookshelves.’”
“It’s like Murdock’s trying to tell us, ‘Please waste your time looking for me here.’”
“Somewhere in Africa,” I said. “Starting with N.”
“Nigeria,” someone said.
“Niger.”
“Nairobi.”
“Nepal.”
“Nepal’s in Asia, muscle head.”
“Never mind.” Turning to Andy, Joe said, “What I’d like you to do is set up these books and shelves in my office
“Right,” said Andy.
“Wherever he is, I’ll bet he’s not where that bookshelf is pointing us to.”
“Perhaps he’s sitting there laughing at us while we’re looking everywhere else,” said one of the people from All-Risk. “Wheels within wheels.”
“That really helps narrow down the search,” I said.
“Or maybe Annabelle Pearson took it,” said Andy. “Maybeshe wants to go there.”
Talking to himself again, Joe murmured, “I’ll bet she does.”
“Want me to order you guys pizza or something before I head for home?”
Molly’s voice pulled me away from the screen. I rubbed my eyes, bleary from hours poring over files and documents. By contrast Molly (our receptionist) was bright and chirpy: she was about the only member of our staff who hadn’t been putting in twenty-six-hour days.
Joe seemed to be asleep, his feet up on the desk and his chair laying all the way back. With Joe, appearances are always deceptive. “Good idea,” he mumbled without opening his eyes.
“Want the usual?” she asked.
“Sure, pepperoni,” I said.
“Yeah,” said Joe, “with just a sprinkle of hash.”
“You too?” said Molly, looking at me.
