The Red Queen Dies (33 page)

“I think that the person who the witness saw might have been wearing a disguise.”

*   *   *

Baxter was at his desk when McCabe got there. He pointed to a box of muffins. “Sorry I had to duck out before you got back yesterday.”

“Something you had to do?”

“My own hot date. Her meeting was canceled. She called—”

“And you went? Nothing much was happening anyway.” McCabe took a blueberry muffin from the box and sat down at her desk.

If I keep on eating my way through this case, McCabe thought, I'll need to run five miles a day for the next month.

She opened the master file instead.

“Nothing new,” Baxter said. “Forensics is still sifting through the garbage from the old lady's house and nearby trash cans, but so far nothing that looks like it might have come from Jessup's purse.”

“I've been thinking some more about our odds and ends. Like the flowers at the first two crime scenes. But no flower near Jessup's body. So last night, I watched
Mrs. Miniver
again.”

“The movie you and Greer St. John were talking about?”

“She said that her mother had named her after Greer Garson, who played Mrs. Miniver in the movie.”

“Yeah. And she said something about a scene in the movie when Mrs. Miniver was reading
Alice in Wonderland
to her children.”

“They're in the family's bomb shelter. The children fall asleep, and Mrs. Miniver and her husband talk about their own childhood memories of the book. And then the bombing gets closer, and the children wake up and begin to cry,” McCabe said. “But the reason I watched the movie again is because I remembered the rose. The village stationmaster names a rose after Mrs. Miniver. Vivian Jessup had a purse in the shape of a rose.”

Baxter said. “So you're saying that it might mean something, that instead of leaving Jessup a flower, the killer took away her rose purse?”

“Not that knowing that is particularly helpful.”

Baxter leaned back in his chair. “Here's something else that may not be particularly helpful. This morning I stopped by Pluto's Planet, where our girl Bethany worked, to sample the breakfast buffet. While I was there, I showed Redfield's photo around.”

“Anyone remember him?”

“A couple of Bethany's colleagues thought they had seen him in the place now and then. But, on the other hand, they thought he might have looked familiar because they'd seen him on the news, giving Jacoby a hard time. The manager's going to run Bethany's receipts to see if she was ever Redfield's server when he ate there.”

“Well, at least you've been doing something more constructive than watching old movies.”

Baxter raised an eyebrow. “Don't tell me that you're getting discouraged, partner.”

McCabe popped the last bite of her muffin into her mouth. “Me? Never. As long as our killer eludes, I—sorry, we—will pursue.”

“‘Eludes'?” Baxter's grin widened. “If only Ted Thornton could hear you now.”

“He'd undoubtedly recognize a riff on Robert Browning.” McCabe's hand hovered over her mug. “Pluto's Planet, Mike. Remember when they were trying to get the building permit to have a vertical garden attached to the restaurant?”

“Vaguely,” Baxter said. “I wasn't that interested.”

“Me, either. Other than the idea of the farm being right there beside the restaurant. But I do remember that the old couple who owned the mom-and-pop store next door didn't want to sell. They did eventually, and there was something about it on the news. Something about the investment company that was bankrolling the restaurant owner.”

“And are you thinking it might be one of Ted Thornton's companies?”

McCabe said, “That kind of project took money. It's the kind of thing that Ted Thornton would have wanted to be involved in, isn't it?”

“So let's see what Research can tell us about the money behind Pluto's Planet.”

“Although,” McCabe said, “you would think Thornton would have told us if he had a financial investment in that restaurant, wouldn't you? Given that our first victim worked there.”

“Never know what might slip a man's mind,” Baxter said as he sent the query to Research. “Okay, they're on it.”

“In the meantime,” McCabe said, “let's have a look at what Pluto's Planet has on the Web.… Great. A hologram.” She waved her hand and the image of the restaurant and the adjoining building spun out.

The restaurant was on two levels, a bar and casual dining on the ground floor, a formal restaurant on the second level with a balcony. A walkway linked the restaurant to the self-contained building next door, a three-story food-production plant with water-hydrated crops and the fish farm.

“According to this,” Baxter said, reading the notation, “only the workers are allowed inside the vertical farm because of the risk of contamination of the crops. The walkway is only for emergency evacuation via the restaurant.”

“If you read the labels, it looks like they're raising everything from artichokes to tomatoes in the farm,” McCabe said.

“They must be raising enough to have a surplus. This morning, they were setting up for a farmers' market in the restaurant parking lot.”

“I've bought stuff there on occasion,” McCabe said. “This is an impressive operation.”

McCabe closed the Pluto's Planet node and went back over to her desk to pick up her coffee mug. “I thought of something else last night when I was doing my movie watching. Mrs. Miniver has an encounter with a wounded German soldier. That reminded me that we haven't spent a lot of time on the neo-Nazi angle. Whitman brought it up during the first task force meeting, but we more or less let it drop after that.”

“Because we discovered the science camp link between Bethany and Sharon and that Ted Thornton, Vivian Jessup's good friend, had financed the science camp. The only link to Nazis is the phenol as a murder weapon.”

“I know. But we may as well run it through just to be sure we've covered our bases.”

“Okay, we have nothing better to do while we're waiting to hear from Research.”

“I have some sources that I found.” McCabe sent the nodes to the wall. “Here's the article that I read about the use of phenol. These two say more or less the same thing.”

“What's that one with the photographs?”

“It's a collection of photographs and interviews with survivors of Nazi prison camps,” McCabe said. “I looked through it, but … I can't believe this. It was right there staring me in the face.”

“What was?” Baxter stood up and came to stand beside her.

“Look at the first name in the second column,” McCabe said.

“Aaron Jessup,” McCabe said. “Playwright and—”

“That's Vivian Jessup's grandfather. I saw his name in her bio.”

“‘Sent to prison camp with his parents, sister, and older brother,'” Baxter said, reading the entry.

“I looked at this before Jessup was killed. I was focused on information about the phenol not … Dammit.”

Baxter said, “And neither of us thought of asking Research to dig into Jessup's family tree.”

“But we knew about the grandfather. That he had come to England after World War Two,” McCabe said. “You would think one of us would have thought of going back to look.…” She shook her head. “Okay, we didn't think of it. We'd better run this by the lieutenant.”

Baxter's ORB buzzed. “Baxter … Excellent! Thanks.”

“Was that Research?” McCabe asked.

“Give them the right question. It seems Teddy does own an interest in that company that financed Pluto's Planet. The company is one of his subsidiaries.”

McCabe looked again at the photograph of Aaron Jessup, Nazi prison camp survivor. “So I guess the question is what we follow up first.”

“I vote for Teddy.”

“That makes sense. While we're there, we can ask if he knows anything about Vivian Jessup's grandfather.”

They met Lieutenant Dole in the hallway. He was scowling. “Where are you two going?”

“To talk to you,” McCabe said. “We found a link between Ted Thornton and the restaurant where our first vic worked.”

“That can wait. I've got an announcement.”

They followed him back to the bull pen. He called for the detectives who happened to be there doing paperwork to gather around. “We're on high alert from now through Halloween night. So if you have any plans for the next few days, cancel them. You may be pulling a double shift and you may be out on the streets on patrol.”

Groans erupted and the lieutenant held up his hand. “I'm going to be here, too, so suck it up.”

“What's the alert about, Lou?” one of the detectives said from the back of the room.

“All we got is a credible tip received by another agency that something may be going down here in our state capital between now and tomorrow night.”

“That's kind of vague,” Baxter said.

The lieutenant turned and fixed him with his stare. “Yes, it is. That's the way all these alerts are. Could be gangs, could be terrorists, could be aliens from outer space. We just keep our eyes open.”

“Halloween makes everyone jumpy,” another detective, French, said. “We've had a high alert for the past three years. Last year, we all turned out for a break-in at a middle school that a couple of patrol units could have handled.”

“Whether we like it or not,” the lieutenant said, “we are on alert. You will do your jobs. Understood?”

There was a mumbled chorus of “Yes, sirs.”

“You'll be getting more information about this,” Dole said as he turned to leave. He motioned to McCabe and Baxter to follow him.

In his office, they brought him up-to-date on what they had discovered about Pluto's Planet and about Vivian Jessup's grandfather.

“Okay, pay Thornton a visit. Ask politely about his interest in Pluto's Planet and see if he has anything useful about Jessup's grandfather and the death camps. If he can't tell you anything, check in with Jessup's daughter. And let me know if there is anything to take back to the task force. As the commander pointed out to me in his office this morning, Halloween isn't the best time to have people on edge about a serial killer.”

“Maybe they'll stay at home with their doors locked, like Clarence Redfield has been suggesting,” McCabe said.

“The older ones will. The young ones won't,” Dole said. “Two of our victims were in their twenties, Detective.”

“But, Lou, now we know there's some kind of connection between at least two, maybe all three of the victims. We just haven't figured out what it is.”

“Yes, we have,” Baxter said. “It's Ted Thornton.”

Dole fixed him with his stare. “Are you ready to say Thornton is our killer, Detective?”

Baxter flushed pink. “No, Lou, I just meant he's the connection.”

“Maybe. But until you can tell me we're ready to make an arrest, you keep working all of your leads. You understand me?”

“Yes, sir.”

Dole rubbed his hand over his gleaming scalp. “Get moving. Let me know what happens with Thornton.”

“We will, Lou,” McCabe said.

“He's in a mood,” Baxter said when they were out of earshot.

“He's getting pressure from the top. With the captain out on sick leave, he's got to deal directly with the commander. And the commander has to deal with—”

“And the shit rolls downhill.”

“Although in this case, he was just reminding us not to jump to conclusions.”

“Are you in the habit of doing that?” Baxter said, his grin back.

“When I first started out, yeah, sometimes. But he was talking about himself, too. He once made a mistake that almost got another cop killed.”

“What'd he do?”

“Tell you another time,” McCabe said. “Let's talk through how we're going to handle Thornton.”

 

32

 

When McCabe reached Bruce Ashby, he said his boss was in Albany and in his office but that he had appointments the rest of the morning and that afternoon. When McCabe said it was important that they speak to Mr. Thornton, Ashby said they could come over, but they would have to be brief.

Thornton's office was in the corporate park that he had built when he established a base in Albany. A high-end complex with solar-paneled buildings and a park with a pond.

They took the elevator up to Thornton's suite and identified themselves to his secretary. She escorted them into his office.

Thornton, wearing a sports jacket that sagged a bit, along with blue jeans and a black T-shirt, got up from behind his desk to greet them.

“I'm afraid I don't have a lot of time today, Detectives. But Bruce tells me you said it was important.” He gestured toward the seating area, where a coffee urn was already on the table. “Please sit down and have some coffee.”

Baxter sat down on the sofa and reached for the urn. He glanced at McCabe.

She sat down in one of the armchairs, and Ted Thornton took the other.

“We came across something rather interesting, Mr. Thornton, and we wanted to ask you about it.”

He leaned forward, elbows on his knees. “Please … please, go ahead. What is it that you want to know?”

“It's about Pluto's Planet. We happened to notice that you own the investment company that financed the purchase of the restaurant and the construction of the vertical farm next door.”

Thornton nodded and sat up straight. “Oh, is that what you wanted to know. “Yes, as investments go, it was solid. Vertical farms are going to be an increasingly important part of twenty-first-century agriculture. They're one solution to the problem of how we feed an urban population.”

“And in the case of Pluto's Planet,” Baxter said, “you're feeding the restaurant's customers.”