-15-
"Okay, Luis," Meg said, "power up." She pulled a chair next to his desk and sat down. Quill prowled nervously around the office. She tapped at the keys to the units hanging neatly on the wall, flicked aside the window blind to look out at the darkening sky, and switched the radio on. The announcer was forecasting the arrival of Hurricane Helen the next day. She flicked the radio off.
Luis reluctantly took a seat in front of his PC. "You're sure this is legal?
Meg shook her head. "No, it's not legal. But you want another chapter in the book, don't you?"
"Well..."
"Of course you do. You're helping us catch a body snatcher. Maybe. Come on, Luis, cheer up. Log on."
"Log on? I am logged on. All the while you were with your guests I am hacking. I have the gateway. I have the passwords. I have..." Luis typed, swore in Spanish, deleted, and typed again. "Okay." He input rapidly, the keys clicking. "Okay. Now, you're sure about this? You want me to break into this man's files?"
"Hack away," Meg said firmly. "Now what?"
"We try to log on the system as 'anonymous.' This is stupid as an account name, but very usual." He input. "This does not work. So we try to log on as 'guest.' This is also stupid, but usual." He input a second time. "No. No good. Third time lucky, as they say here in America. What is this man's name?"
"Franklin Carmichael," Quill said.
"And..." Luis sat back. "Hola!"
The screen asked FILE NAME?
"Hooray!" Meg yelled. "Okay, this law firm cross-references by birth date of the principal clients. Try Quill's." She gave him the numbers. Within seconds, the application they'd filed that morning with Carmichael appeared on the screen.
"Whoop!" Meg tapped Luis aside. "Mind if I take it from here?"
"I don't mind. I think that maybe I will take a walk outside, and that maybe you have borrowed my computer without my permission."
"Now, Luis," Meg said. "This is fun." Her fingers flew over the keys, scrolling through the file. "Why, the little creep!"
"What little creep?" Quill came to peer over her shoulder. After they'd left his office, Carmichael had added a few notes about them. The most interesting was 'QUERY: criminal charges re: VT's disappearance? Probably. Inquire Stan at WPBPD.' "
"Who's Stan?" asked Luis.
"Who cares?" said Meg. "Quill, Carmichael thinks we did it."
"Oh, dear. Let's try for the Taylor file."
Verger Taylor's birth date was known to half of America, principally because he'd been born on the fourth of July fifty-five years before and used this as evidence of his commitment to American laissez-faire. Meg keyed in the numerics. A long list of file names scrolled across the screen. "Jeez," said Meg. "Here's the file on his divorce from Cressida."
"No," said Quill. "It's private."
"Quill, all this is private!"
"I don't care. Don't open it."
"And here's the file of the divorce from Tiffany yikes, this reads 'pat. suit: Amber St. Clare.' You don't suppose..."
"Just look for Murex, Meg."
"Okay, okay. I'll have to scroll back, then; they're alphabetized. Yep! Here is it."
She clicked on the file name, and a document scrolled across the screen. "Good lord," Meg said in disgust. "This thing's huge. Help!"
"What are you looking for?" asked Luis, who had not carried out on his threat to leave the room.
"I don't know." Meg sat back and ran her hands through her short, dark hair in frustration. "Carmichael said Ernst profited from the rise in stock, but how?"
"Search for anything in the Murex file related to Kolsacker," Quill suggested.
"Brilliant, Watson."
"Obvious, Watson."
Meg requested a search, typed in Kolsacker, and the hard drive hummed. "Purchase price, stock option, buy-out." Meg read. "Let's try buyout." She moved the mouse, clicked, and the screen filled with type.
Quill read with Meg, over her shoulder, and was the first to say, "Ha!"
"Ha? You have found something?" Luis asked.
"Ha!" said Meg. "We sure have!" She looked around. "Can we print this sucker?"
Luis nodded. "Sure."
Meg selected PRINT and the printer burped, whined, and subsided to a steady hum. Paper began to feed, and Meg leaned back with an exclamation of triumph.
"So what did you find?" Luis asked again.
"Verger and Ernst sold Murex last year to a German company. Part of the deal was a staged payout, with stock options coming due at six-month intervals for eighteen months. Ernst was due for a payout on stock yesterday afternoon. And it was a lot of money, Luis - he stood to gain over ten million dollars."
"Ten million!" Luis said. "Do you know what I could do with ten million?"
"Lots," Meg said briefly. "Anyhow, Verger decided to buy the company back a month ago, at least according to the information in The Wall Street Journal. The German company was going to litigate. As all of us know, litigation is costly, and the news of the suit made the price of the stock go down, down, down - until Verger's disappearance, of course. Now the stock is going up, up, up. It took a nice hike yesterday - and Ernst cashed in."
"But why is Verger's disappearance an advantage," Quill asked, "and not his death?"
"The document says that in the event of Taylor's death, Carmichael will execute any standing orders. Doesn't say a word about what happens if he just beats feet. As Birdie and Bea told us this morning, Ernst is in charge until Verger comes back or is proved dead. So Ernst had enough time to cash in. Which maybe was all he wanted."
"We've got a motive," Quill said, "but we don't have any evidence. If it's true, how the heck do we catch him?" She sighed. "And still get home in time for spring."
Meg grinned. "See this? The next payout's due in thirty days. What if we E-mail Carmichael - with an electronic order from Verger to press the Murex suit forward. That'll drop the stock price again for sure."
"What's that going to do?" Quill said, exasperated. "Think about it, Quill. You're Ernst Kolsacker. You illegally moved and/or otherwise disposed of your partner's body. Everything's fine until he starts to speak beyond the grave. All of a sudden, you've lost any advantage you might have keeping your partner alive, but absent. It is highly advantageous to your future to have him turn up dead; Quill. That means the police will have to find the body. You see."
"I see that. What I don't see is how that's going to implicate Ernst Kolsacker any more than he's implicated already. And that's nada."
"Hey," Meg said. "It's the physics of murder."
"The physics of murder?"
"For every action, there's an equal reaction. The more Ernst has to act, the higher his chances of exposure. And of course, there's one more thing. Ernst is going to be able to track where this order came from. I mean, he can backtrack from this message into our system just as easily as we broke into Carmichael's. So. Is Ernst going to run to the cops and tell them we're interfering with his ability to make a profit on Murex? Not likely. That's risking too much exposure. As soon as he finds out where this order originated, he has to act. Most likely," Meg said sunnily, "he'll come roaring after us. Tonight."