"Then I'd brace myself if I were you," he said, his voice suddenly grim. "It's going to get worse."
Her shoulders slumped. Carter finally went behind his desk and sat down. She seized the opportunity. Slipping her hands under
her jacket and skirt, she worked the panty hose down her legs. It was awkward but doable, and, other than appearing to be squirming in the hot seat, she managed the feat. While he opened her file and began to read the notes he or someone else had compiled against her, she grabbed the hose and wadded them into a ball. She had her shoes back on by the time he looked up
at her again.
"I received a call from Mike Andrews," he began. There it was again, that grim, you're-gonna-get-your-ass-fired tone of voice.
Her stomach felt as though it had just dropped to her ankles. "Yes, sir?"
"I believe you know him?"
"Yes, sir. Not well," she hastened to add. "I found his number and called him before I left the office."
"And during that phone call you convinced him to deploy a SWAT team to First National Bank on…" He looked down again, searching the file for the location.
She rattled off the address, adding, "The branch is near the state line."
He leaned back, crossed his arms, and said, "Tell me what you know about these robberies."
She took a deep breath and tried to relax. She was on safe ground now, in control. Since she had typed all the agents' reports
into the computer and looked at the bank tapes, she'd learned, and pretty much memorized, every little detail.
"The robbers call themselves the Politicians," she said. "There are three of them."
"Continue," he urged.
"There have been three robberies in the past three months. The men, all wearing white clothes, entered the first bank, First National Bank and Trust on Twelfth Street, on March fifteenth, exactly three minutes after the bank had opened for business.
The men used guns to subdue the personnel and one customer, but they didn't fire those weapons. The man shouting the orders held a knife against the security guard's neck. When the other two were running toward the door, the leader stabbed the guard, dropped the knife, and then left. The guard had done nothing to provoke the man. There was absolutely no reason to kill him."
"No, there wasn't," Carter agreed.
"The second robbery took place on April thirteenth at the Bank of America in Maryland. A bank manager, a woman, was killed during that robbery. The leader was on his way out the door. He suddenly turned around and fired point-blank. Once again, there didn't seem to be a reason, because the personnel had been desperately trying to cooperate."
"And the third robbery?"
"That one took place on May fifteenth at Goldman's Bank and Trust in Maryland," she said. "As you know, the violence
escalated. Two people were killed, and a third was left lor dead but has miraculously recovered."
"Okay, you've got your facts down," he said. "Now, tell me. What made you think a little branch of the First National Bank in Virginia would be the next target?"
His stare was unnerving. She glanced down at her lap while she gathered her thoughts and then looked up again. She knew how she had arrived at the conclusion, but explaining it to the head of in-house operations was going to be difficult.
"I guess you could say it's all in how I look at things. It was all there… most of it anyway, in the file."
"No one else saw it in the file," he pointed out. "They hit different banks with the three robberies, but you convinced Andrews
that they were going to hit another branch of First National again."
"Yes, sir, I did."
"It's… remarkable how you talked him into it."
"Not really," she said, hoping Andrews hadn't told Carter every word she'd said.
"You used my name."
She inwardly cringed. "Yes, sir. I did."
"You told Andrews the order came from me. Is that correct, Delaney?"
Here it comes, she thought. The you're-getting-your-ass-fired part. "Yes, sir."
"Let's get back to the facts, shall we? Here's what I want to know. The Politicians had struck on March fifteenth, April thirteenth, then May fifteenth. We didn't know why they were hitting on those specific days, but you did, didn't you? That's what you told Andrews," he reminded her. "But you didn't go into an explanation."
"There wasn't time."
"There's time now. How did you arrive at your conclusion?"
"Shakespeare, sir," she answered.
"Shakespeare?"
"Yes, sir. The robberies all followed the same pattern, almost like a ritual of some kind. I got a printout of the first bank's records for the week prior to the robbery. I did the same with the other two banks. I thought something might show up that would link them," she said.
She paused to shake her head. "I had reams and reams of printouts all over the office, and I did find something a little curious. Fortunately, I had the discs from the banks, and I was able to cross-check with the computer."
Carter rubbed his jaw, distracting her. She could see a hint of impatience in his eyes. "Sir, bear with me another minute. Now,
the first bank was robbed on March fifteenth. Does that date trigger anything in your mind?"
Before he could answer, she plunged ahead. "The ides of March? Julius Caesar?"
He nodded.
"That must have been in the back of my mind last night while I was reading all the printouts, and I noticed an ATM withdrawal was made by a man named Nate Cassius. I still hadn't quite put it together," she admitted. "But I realized, if I was right, and I
was hoping to heaven I was, that the leader of the Politicians was leaving us clues. Maybe he was playing some twisted game. Maybe he was waiting to see how long it would take us to catch on."
She had his full attention now. "Continue," he said.
"As I mentioned before, the dates frustrated me until I did my research. I looked up the Roman calendar and found that when the Romans were calculating the length of the months, they also figured the date of the ides. We know from Shakespeare's play Julius Caesar that the ides of March falls on the fifteenth. But not all the months. Some fall on the thirteenth. So, using that logic, I went back over the ATM withdrawals the week prior to the second and third robberies, and guess what I found?"
"Did Nate Cassius make a withdrawal from those banks?"
"No, sir," she answered. "But a William Brutus did in one bank, and Mario Casca did in the other… and the withdrawals happened just two days before the robberies. I think they were sizing up the layout of the banks."
"Go on," he said, leaning forward now.
"I didn't put it together until the last minute. I had to pull up the transaction records for all of the banks in the tri-state area from
the eleventh on."
"Because the other two withdrawals were made exactly two days before the actual robberies."
"Yes," she said. "I spent most of the night crosschecking with the data I had in the computer for the eleventh, and by gosh, there
it was. Mr. John Ligarius had made a withdrawal from that little branch of First National at three-forty-five in the morning. All of these names-Cassius, Brutus, Casca, Ligarius-they were conspirators against Caesar. I didn't have time to run a check on the people who owned these cards, but I did find out that the cards were issued from banks in Arlington. It added up. Ligarius made