After another twenty minutes — possibly a record for the thirteen miles of I-278 and the Verrazano Bridge — Musseridge brought Uncle Sam’s Caddy to a halt in the St. George Ferry Terminal parking lot on Staten Island. Before Lamont could set foot on the asphalt, he had to radio the NYO dispatcher with a street address, in case he and Musseridge were to require backup.
Entering the Au Bon Pain, it took Lamont a beat to get his bearings. He could have sketched its layout from memory. But the video hadn’t encompassed much beyond the counter, and the photos had been stills. Now the place was full of the clamor and motion of the patrons and employees.
Because the store manager was cute or because there was free pastry in the offing, Musseridge assigned himself the task of apprising her of the FBI’s presence and official operational objective, then obtaining her signed acknowledgment at the bottom of an FD-597, a form that yielded two carbon copies — using actual carbon paper.
Lamont found the table in question unoccupied, and replete with a tented advertisement for the restaurant’s new cheddar and corn chowder. Sliding into one of the two chairs, he drew from his pocket a flashlight that to all appearances was a pen. He discreetly snapped a translucent orange disk the size of a dime over its bulb tip, then clicked on the 470-nanometer blue light, which would make bloodstains appear to darken, enhancing fourfold the contrast between the blood and the stained object. He aimed the beam at the triangular placard’s three edges, and … nothing. No surprise. The placards were replaced due to wear or, his hope now, shuffled between tabletops during cleanup.
He intended to scan every placard in the restaurant, but first he needed to come up with an explanation devoid of phrases like “blood spatter.” While searching for the right words, he spun the placard before him. The photograph of the chowder made Lamont hollow with hunger; he’d eaten nothing since a cold slice yesterday afternoon. He would order something, he thought, until his blue beam ran across the placard’s other side. Nothing on the left. But black spots on the right. Black spots that disappeared when he flicked off the blue light, meaning they were bloodstains.
He blinked to reboot an imagination that had possibly gotten the better of him. Again he saw the blood. This time it brought the euphoria of hitting a home run. Until he noticed a second substance within the blood. Probably the cleanser sprayed onto the tabletops. Cleansers typically contained ammonia or isopropanol, and the introduction of even water could kill DNA evidence. He could only pray that enough uncontaminated blood remained to make a match to an offender in the DNA database. Quantico was working on handheld devices that could profile such samples in seconds, determining the gender, ethnicity, and eye and hair color of the shooter, then search for matches in multiple DNA data banks around the world. Five years away, they said — which meant twenty-five, Musseridge said. For now Lamont opened a clear plastic evidence bag and dropped in the placard. He would collect the rest of the placards for good measure.
Although Quantico’s evidence lab was the best in existence, it was far from the speediest. An expedited order could reduce the wait time only from weeks to days. All Lamont needed was a written request approved by his supervisor. And the Assistant Special Agent in Charge. And the Special Agent in Charge. And the Assistant Director in Charge. Still, the find was exciting enough that Musseridge forgot about getting the pastry in his rush to return to the office and launch into the paperwork.
11
Kevin O’Clair hadn’t done fieldwork in his eleven years at the NSA. He’d never done fieldwork — period. This morning was a first. He drove his take from the divorce settlement — a ten-year-old beige Nissan Qwest minivan — along a desolate stretch of Queens Boulevard, passing discount stores, fast-food restaurants, and, mostly, abandoned office buildings. On a quiet side street between a run-down dry cleaner’s and Bayside Putt-Putt — where the minigolf course had been replaced by a go-kart track — he found Schechter’s Home Appliances.
The store took up the first floor of a dilapidated split-level house. A worn banner announcing the business’s fiftieth anniversary celebration sagged from the upper story. Who would ever guess that this location racked up $3 million in profits last year and stood to double that figure this year? Not even the proprietor, Irving Schechter, knew what a lucrative trade in electronic surveillance devices his son Leonard conducted from the basement.
O’Clair slowed as he drove past, on the lookout for any unusual motion.
“Then the Fire King said, ‘I want the heads of all the Water Warriors,’ ” Nathan said from the booster seat in back, breaking O’Clair’s concentration.
The seven-year-old retold television show episodes line by line. His facility was usually a source of wonder for O’Clair. Now it was throwing O’Clair off his game, and he needed to get back on it because of the black SUV that had been behind them since Queens Boulevard.
“Hang on just a sec, buddy,” he said. “I really want to hear the rest of the story, but …”
Bypassing an open parking spot in front of Schechter’s, he turned left onto a tree-lined residential block. The black SUV continued on, pulling into a Wendy’s. O’Clair’s shaky rearview showed a young woman yawning and stretching her arms as she slid from the driver’s seat to the parking lot. Two boys flew out of the back. It was 9:42 on a Saturday. Probably a mom resorting to corn syrup to kill the eighteen minutes until the go-kart place opened, O’Clair thought.
Relieved, he doubled back to Schechter’s while his son detailed the remainder of the plan for universal conquest. Bringing Nathan along this morning was a good cover, as long as he stayed in the minivan. Around strangers, there was a fair chance he would share the wrong information, like their names.
“Buddy, I’m going to need you to wait in here while Daddy runs into the store for a minute.”
“But I’ll get bored.”
Just a few months ago, prior to reaching the age that he could be left alone however briefly, Nathan used to plead to be left in the car while O’Clair ran errands.
“I’ve got a question to keep you busy,” O’Clair said.
Nathan perked up. “A puzzler?”
“Say you have building blocks that are each one foot long and one foot high. How many blocks would it take you to complete a wall ten feet long and five feet high?”
Nathan chewed it over while O’Clair parked in front of Schechter’s.
“Got it,” the boy exclaimed. “You need fifty blocks total, right?”
“Not quite. Again, how many to complete the wall?”
Nathan erupted into laughter. “Only one block to complete the wall.”
Pride overrode O’Clair’s disappointment in the longevity of the time killer. He reached around his headrest to his son’s waiting palm for a resounding five.
“Okay, here’s a tougher one: A Ping-Pong ball falls down a hole in a cement basement floor. The hole is one foot deep and only a tiny bit wider than the ball. How do you get the ball back out without damaging it if you can use only these three things: your Ping-Pong paddle, your shoelaces, and a plastic bottle of water?”
With Nathan lost in contemplation, O’Clair got out of the minivan and headed up a walkway of circular paving stones fragmented by wear and weeds. Ducking beneath the anniversary banner, he pushed open the door. An unseen bell tinkled as he entered an underheated showroom where off-brand toasters, blenders, irons, and vacuum cleaners packed worn shelves and glass display cases. Behind the counter, a doughy man of about seventy-five adjusted his bow tie. Thick eyeglasses magnified the hope in his watery eyes. “How may I help you, sir?” he asked.