Well, it was obvious to Shawn, anyway, and now that it had been pointed out to him, to Gus as well. Not that Gus knew how Shawn had figured it out. They hadn’t had a chance for a private discussion since it had come up.
Still, it didn’t seem to be the time to school the professor on his old friend’s true nature, especially since that friend’s servant was at the controls of the jet they were using to escape the police. And since that jet was accelerating to liftoff down some darkened runway.
“Well, this is quite an adventure,” Kitteredge said. “Once again, I apologize to the two of you for dragging you into my mess. But I think when all is said and done, you’ll find it was all worth the trouble.”
“Uh, no trouble at all, Professor,” Gus said.
“Now you stop that right now,” Kitteredge said.
“What’s that?” Gus said, wondering what he had done wrong this time.
“You must stop calling me Professor,” he said. “We’ve been through so much together that I’ll be hurt if you don’t call me by my first name.”
Gus felt a surge of pride flow through him. Even if he had studied for that midterm, even if he had been able to name every one of those slides, he wouldn’t have been offered this privilege.
“I’ll be happy to… Langston,” he said. “And you call me Gus.”
“He has been,” Shawn said. “And speaking of hasbeens, maybe we should talk about what we’re going to do now, since it’s pretty clear that Langston here can’t go back to teaching, and we’re going to look pretty silly trying to run a detective agency from inside a prison.”
“Actually, that’s not a bad idea,” Kitteredge said. “I imagine that with your unique abilities you could be tremendously useful to the other inmates. After an initial testing period, they would be coming to you with-”
Even Kitteredge, who frequently became so enraptured by his own thought process he had no idea what effect it was having on others, was stopped by the glare on Shawn’s face. “Although I can see why you’d prefer not to be in a position to start such an enterprise,” he said.
“Thank you,” Shawn said. “So let’s figure out how we’re going to avoid that.”
“It seems perfectly obvious to me,” Kitteredge said. “We know the Cabal was behind the murder of Clay Filkins, so all we have to do is expose them and let the truth come out. It will be a grand adventure.”
“That would be great,” Shawn said. “Except that the real truth about the murder is back in Santa Barbara. And since we’re climbing almost straight up, I think our flight is intended to go a little farther than thirty-five miles.”
“If the proof is in the picture, why do we have to go anywhere?” Gus said. “Why can’t we just figure it all out right here on the plane and then turn it over to the police?”
Kitteredge looked surprised, as if he’d expected Shawn and Gus to understand what he’d been thinking all along. “The picture, even now that we know about the crucial verse, isn’t enough to convince a doubting world,” he said. “We need to retrieve the sword.”
“And just where would all that be?” Shawn asked warily.
“That we still need to figure out,” Kitteredge said. “It’s in that verse, but we may have to compare it with some of Morris’ and Rossetti’s other works, along with those of some of their contemporaries, to understand the meaning. Those works are scattered far and wide.”
“How far?” Shawn said.
“And how wide?” Gus said.
“I believe in terms of those pieces freely available to the public at large, we’ll find several of them at the Tate Gallery,” Kitteredge said as he checked through a mental catalogue. “They’ve got both the Waterhouse Ophelia and Burne-Jones’ The Golden Stairs, which I believe together announce the Cabal’s manifesto. There are the Arthurian frescoes at the Oxford Union. Lizzie Siddal’s grave, of course, is in Highgate Cemetery. Those are the clues that seem the most compelling, although I’m sure now that we have the key, each one will lead to a discovery previously unimagined.”
As Gus listened to the list of locations, something was nagging at the back of his mind. He knew he hadn’t been to any of those places, but even aside from that, he was sure he was missing a connection. Then it hit him.
“Professor,” he started, then corrected himself. “Langston. The Tate Gallery, the Oxford Union, Highgate Cemetery-aren’t they all in England?”
“Of course they are,” Kitteredge said. “And we will be, too, in about ten hours.”
Chapter Thirty-three
Even after all his years on the force, there was almost nothing Carlton Lassiter didn’t like about the institutions of law enforcement. He loved the ritual of the morning briefing, the ceremonial bonding of the post-shift cop bar, the rigid adherence to standards of excellence. Unlike most of his peers, he even welcomed strictures like the ones placed on police by the Miranda rules. Working within a rigid set of restrictions only forced you to be smarter, better, and stronger.
The one thing that Lassiter didn’t like about the profession was the replacement of thought with procedure. And this was a prime example, he said to himself as he pulled up a few car lengths behind the squad car sitting across from Henry Spencer’s house. When you were searching for a suspect, it was standard practice to post lookouts at the homes of his family and friends, and clearly that’s what was going on here. The department needed to find Shawn Spencer, and they hoped he might show up to see his father.
But one moment of thought would have made a chimp realize there was no reason to waste a team of officers and a departmental vehicle on Henry Spencer’s street. Or, more precisely, on former detective Henry Spencer’s street. Although he’d been retired for years, Henry was and always would be a pure cop. If a wanted fugitive showed up on his doorstep, he’d find a way to detain him and then call for backup.
Of course, the brass knew that. But he could practically hear the conversation in the chief’s office. Sure, he was a fine cop, but this is his son we’re talking about.
If he’d been there for the discussion, Lassiter would have made sure that everyone knew the truth-that would only make Henry Spencer more certain to make the call. Because he’d know that if Shawn was innocent, the fastest and safest way to prove that would be to turn him in.
Instead, they assumed that Henry was as weak and foolish as the average member of the citizenry. But if he were, would he be standing by the squad car, handing the officers frosty glasses of lemonade?
If Lassiter had been in charge of this investigation, things would be running differently. But he wasn’t. He wasn’t even allowed in on briefings. All because that quack of a shrink didn’t understand how a man was supposed to react to a bad situation.
Well, he was going to show her what a real man did when the chips were down.
At least he would if those two cops would move.
Lassiter needed to talk to Henry Spencer. He was the only one who would understand. But if he was spotted, word would get back to Chief Vick that he’d been at Spencer’s house, and she would leap to the assumption that he was trying to work the case even though he was on suspension.
Of course Lassiter could always do what Spencer was doing now-walk right up to the squad car and sweet-talk the surveillance team. In normal circumstances that would have been his first move. But he knew what he’d feel about any other cop-particularly one as high in the command structure as he was-who’d allowed himself to be taken hostage in his own station and been responsible for freeing a suspect wanted for murder. Lassiter wouldn’t be in a mood to do any favors for that loser. He couldn’t imagine that these two would be, either.
If only there was a burglary in the area. Or a hit and run. A flasher, even. Anything to pull those two away from Henry’s door. But this was a good neighborhood, and the presence of a squad car only made it safer. There was no way Lassiter could get to see Henry without Chief Vick finding out. He couldn’t even call. With Shawn on the wanted list, the cops would have put taps on Henry’s home and cell phones.