Ring of Silence Page 9

  She gave a half smile. “He created animosity through melodramatic provocation.”

  “What does that mean?” Fenwick asked.

  “He didn’t care what other people thought. He would debate, and I’ve seen him take several sides on one issue, just as long as the side he took was controversial and likely to get him publicity.”

  Fenwick said, “He was a blatant hypocrite, but you were staying with him?”

  “Being a protester and getting what you want takes time, effort, and commitment. The more protests, the more publicity, the more people attend.”

  Fenwick said, “Unless they get frightened by the violence and don’t show up.”

  ”Fear cannot be what rules our protests. There are a lot of good well-meaning people here. Some have sacrificed their lives to try to make the world a better place. Real people have been shot by real police.”

  Fenwick interrupted, “And vice-versa.”

  She shook her head. “You represent the patriarchal power structure so I wouldn’t expect you to understand.”

  Turner interrupted before Fenwick could get into full debate mode with her. He said, “We’ll need to seal off this room. We’ll let you take a few things. We haven’t opened all the suitcases. If you want, we can have a woman officer here to check your things before you take them.”

  “I don’t need much or have much.”

  “If he didn’t confide in you, who did he confide in?”

  “Sorry, I don’t know. You’ll have to talk to some of the other protesters.” She rounded on them. “I have some questions for you.”

  They just looked at her. They had learned to let players in the drama keep talking. They were more likely to trip themselves up. She stared at them each for a few seconds then said, “What are you doing to find out if this was a false flag operation?”

  “Beg pardon?” Fenwick asked.

  “Killing those two as being part of a plot by the government to switch the focus to protesters.”

  “How does that work, exactly,” Fenwick asked.

  “The important part for our conversation,” she said, “is my trying to figure out if you’re part of covering up the crime, or you may have committed the crime. Or the crime was planned by the government to have another excuse to take out guns.”

  Fenwick said, “Other than pointless, endless speculation, do you have any evidence for that?”

  “Hah! Evidence. Maybe all you’re doing is going around making sure the evidence that the government cooked this up is all destroyed.”

  Fenwick asked, “If there’s no evidence for anything that you say, how could there be any proving what you say?” She started to respond, but he held up a hand. “If it’s all endless, proofless, speculation, why then aren’t we free to speculate that you did it, for whatever reasons we could find, or hell, according to you, don’t need to find, or we could plant some evidence, to make it look like you did it? Since we’re endlessly speculating, why don’t we just arrest you and be done with it?”

  “I wouldn’t put it past you.”

  Tuner put his hand on Fenwick’s arm to forestall further debate. He said, “We have work to do, Ms. Zelvin, so unless you know something specific, we’ll have to ask you to take a few things under our supervision.”

  She knew nothing else. After she grabbed some basic articles from the smallest suitcase, she shuffled out the door. They made sure she got on the elevator before returning to the room.

  Back in the room, they looked at each other. Fenwick pulled in a lungful of air. He said, “False flag?”

  “You’re not up on your conspiracy theories?”

  “I’ve never actually met anyone who admitted to believing that shit. The government holds a massacre in order to take away your rights, often gun rights? Who believes that shit? And is it supposed to make sense?”

  “You expect a working cop to be able to explain the lunacy of the universe? We’ve both seen too much to even try.”

  Fenwick sat on the edge of the bed. He said, “What the hell was that all about? She makes no sense to me.”

  Turner said, “She wanted to make sure she’d be higher on our suspect list?”

  “If that was her goal, she has succeeded.”

  “Or this may have been her room, and she didn’t care if the guy she was sharing it with was dead.”

  “The dead guy wouldn’t mind.”

  “Presumably not.”

  “She didn’t seem broken up about either guy being dead.”

  “Have we run into anybody who’s sad about either one yet?”

  “Well, no.”

  They inspected the room. The computer they bagged for Fong. Turner opened the third suitcase and called Fenwick over. “Half of this is clothes.” He pointed. “Then there’s all this electronic shit crammed into this other side.”

  “What the fuck?”

  Turner said, “I recognize an iPod, the iPad, and there’s all these millions of wires, but I’m not sure what all these other components are or what connects to what.”

  “Bag it all, and we’ll take it to Fong.”

  Along with the key, the manager had given them the combination to the safe which was on the floor of the closet. Turner opened it and gave a low whistle. Fenwick leaned over. He gave a soft, “Wow.”

  It was filled with stacks of money.

  Turner said, “We need the crime scene people in here. They’ll have to count all this.”

  Without touching anything, Fenwick glanced at the bills visible at the tops of several stacks. “All hundreds.” Fenwick stood up straight. “Zelvin didn’t seem concerned about the safe.”

  Turner nodded. “If she knew this money was here, you’d think she’d have tried to get into the closet and the safe in some way.”

  They shut and locked it.

  After their inspection, Turner and Fenwick stood together looking at the distant lights of the Loop.

  Fenwick said, “Strikes me as a special kind of stupid to be carrying around that much cash. Why?”

  Turner shrugged. “Let’s try simpler stuff. Where’s he from?”

  While Turner checked the wallet the found on the body, Fenwick Googled. Turner said, “This says he’s from Newton, Iowa.”

  Fenwick said, “The Internet claims he lives in a yurt in India. Don’t people live in yurts in Mongolia?”

  “Jeff was watching one of those Animal Planet wilderness shows.” Jeff was his younger son, super smart, and often surprisingly well informed about esoteric bits of out of the way knowledge. Turner continued, “Some guy lived in a yurt far out in the woods in Minnesota. Looked to me more like a luxury yurt condo than a nomad’s tent. For several months, Jeff did huge amounts of research on making yurts handicap accessible.”

  They checked the room for listening devices. Under the swivel chair Turner found two items taped to the bottom. He got Fenwick’s attention and motioned him over. Together they turned over the chair.

  Turner said, “I’m pretty sure these are CPD dash cams or at least they look like them.”

  Fenwick said, “What the fuck?”

  Turner said, “More stuff to give to Fong. We’ve got to know if they’re new or used, and how the hell they got here, and if it was Shaitan, how the hell he got hold of them in the first place.”

  Fenwick asked, “Shaitan is in on a conspiracy against us? Against the Chicago police? Just likes to collect souvenirs from crime scenes?”

  “If these are from cop cars that were at the earlier scene.”

  Fenwick said, “Double and triple fuck.”

  They found no other listening devices. Turner said, “We should have checked for them first.”

  Fenwick said, “We’ll have to check every place we enter for them.”

  When the crime scene people arrived, they pointed out the safe and its contents.

  Thursday 11:31 P.M.

  They strolled back to their car. The wind was still up but a glance at the local weather radar on his phone showed Turner t
hat all the local storms had dissipated.

  Sounds from the cars whizzing by on the nearby Eisenhower expressway mixed with the rustle of the leaves on the trees.

  Turner pressed the unlock button on the car’s remote.

  Fenwick bellowed, “Gun.”

  Turner flopped to the ground and yanked out his gun. In seconds Fenwick squat-walked onto Paul’s side of the car.

  “What?” Turner asked.

  “There is a bullet hole in the car door next to the handle. There wasn’t one when we parked.”

  “You sure?” Turner asked.

  Fenwick gave one of his most menacing grumbles.

  Turner called for backup then said, “You didn’t scream ‘bullet hole.’”

  “Would have taken longer. And wouldn’t have been as effective. And I didn’t scream.”

  Turner dropped any discussion of voice level.

  Still crouched on the ground, Fenwick eased open the car door. The interior light went on.

  Turner said, “If someone had a gun, you just made us targets.”

  Fenwick pointed to a hole in the headrest of the passenger seat. “And it travelled inside. That wasn’t there.” He slammed the door shut.

  Fenwick was fastidious about his environment. Turner knew his buddy would have noticed.

  “Random or deliberate?” Fenwick asked.

  “I’m low on extra-coincidence pills right now.”

  “Who then? And connected to what? The sniper who hit the guys on the roof top was bored and decided to attack us too? The sniper wanted to kill us so he killed those two in hopes we’d be assigned the case, knew where we parked, risked taking a gunshot on the street when we weren’t around? We saved the kid and rogue cops are after us? We saved the kid and rogue community members are after us? Stop me when I get to something you think is plausible.”

  Turner said, “At this point I think a million things are possible. I’m just not sure which one is probable. And there could be several thousand other possibilities. If they were trying to kill us, why not wait until we got back here to the car? Or, hell, shoot us as we walked down the street.”

  “Maybe they wanted to scare us?”

  “To what end?”

  That stumped Fenwick for several moments, but then he said, “It could have been a random shot. I suppose.”

  “That’s definitely plausible, but I’m going to keep an open mind. A random shooter killing two guys on a roof top, hits two victims with incredible accuracy, and then sets out to murder a car. Why? What does he gain, accomplish, prove?”

  Fenwick says, “I think the correct medical diagnosis for this is ‘fucked up.’”

  “And who could disagree?” Turner asked.

  Fenwick speculated, “Someone knew we’d be going here? Somebody recognized the car? Knew our schedule? We can’t be sure this is about us. Some bad guy doesn’t just randomly begin going places and come up with us. There’s gotta be sense to this.”

  Turner grinned. “Good luck with that.”

  They sat in shadows on the pavement and pulled in breaths. Fenwick broke the silence. “As a reaction to this, maybe we could try running around like morons with our hair on fire.”

  “Dealing with frustration in an immature manner isn’t my style.”

  “Another one of your flaws.”

  “Are we having a contest?”

  “No, I’d win that one.”

  A squad car squealed to a stop six feet from them. Turner and Fenwick held up badges.

  Everybody began doing reports and paperwork. Molton showed up with the bomb squad. He said, “We’re going to be certain.” An initial check found no explosive device.

  The three of them speculated about possible and plausible, but got no further than when Turner and Fenwick discussed it. At the news of the cash in Shaitan’s room, Molton raised an eyebrow. “I’ll monitor the crime scene folks on that.”

  As they were leaving, Molton told them, “Be careful. We can’t leave out the option that this was a deliberate attack. We’re getting random bullshit since Carruthers opened fire. I don’t like random. Consider all of it as one. After we get evidence, we’ll sort out what goes with what.”

  Rather than inconvenience some beat cops, they took a cab back to the station. Molton would stay with their unmarked car until the bomb squad was completely finished. He’d also take direct charge of all the forensics at the scene.

  Outside their cab, but before they entered headquarters, they stood on the steps. Fenwick said, “How did that beat cop have the nerve to confront us?”

  “Huh?”

  “The more I think about it, that might be the oddest thing that’s occurred today.”

  “Not the gunshot in the car?”

  “I guess they’re neck and neck.”

  “Maybe he was just an asshole.”

  Fenwick said, “Maybe there’s a Friends of Carruthers society.”

  “If there is, we could join, and maybe get some insight into human nature.”

  “Insight into stupidity?”

  “Far too often these days, kind of the same thing.”

  “I wonder if that cop we confronted had a camera.”

  Turner said, “He didn’t. I was careful to observe his uniform. He was from Palakowski’s district. They aren’t using them yet. There were no witnesses.”

  In Chicago, police body cams were being introduced over a number of years. They were only in one or two districts by this time.

  Turner continued, “I’m not sure what we’re going to have to put up with from our own.”

  “You criticizing my actions?”

  “No.”

  “You’re not happy with my behavior?”

  “That list is too long. Specifically tonight? No. The problem is, I think I would have done the same thing if I’d been the one closest to him, and he’d mouthed off to me. Or maybe worse.”

  “You? Mister Calm?”

  “As a dear, hefty friend of mine is wont to say, it’s a curse.”

  Fenwick said, “What if the Friends of Carruthers Society is also killing random protesters?”

  “What’d Molton say? Consider all this as one?”

  “Yeah.”

  “We’ll have to just follow the evidence. Like we always do.”

  Fenwick sighed. “I’m tired, and my arm is beginning to ache.”

  “Let’s see if we can’t wrap this up and get the hell out of here at something like a reasonable hour.”

  “That’ll be lucky.”

  Friday 12:14 A.M.

  Inside the station, the first thing they did was find Steve Fong who inhabited an office in the deepest sub-basement of the decrepit old building. Naked pipes clanged and gurgled in the hall. The linoleum on the floor had long since faded to yellowish gray and begun to curl at the edges. Although today, great swaths of the old linoleum were now stacked in a corner. Fong was replacing it with new materials on his own time. The job looked to be over half done.

  His office had been part of the coal bin back when someone actually had to stoke coal into a furnace to heat the place. The LED displays from all the electronic equipment added to the dim light from a forest of small lamps. Fong had tried to install stronger lamps, but if he plugged in too many even slightly high-powered electronic devices, all the circuits in the building shorted out. He had the largest computer monitor Turner had ever seen, but it was seldom on, as it used up too much of Fong’s limited power. More wattage in the basement had been promised. Like all promises at Area Ten, it never got fulfilled.

  Fong was six-foot-three and rail thin. He had a wicked sense of humor.

  “You guys okay?” Fong asked.

  They mumbled yeah.

  “Somebody attacked your car?”

  “Word travels fast.”

  “I got scanners down here that cover the city. You heard what happened to Rodriguez.” Fong tapped a speaker.

  “What?”

  “He got threatened. Some anonymous scammer got into the s
ystem, threatened him over the police radio.”

  “Son of a bitch,” Fenwick said.

  Turner asked, “How is that even possible?”

  “I’ve heard of it happening in other cities,” Fong said. “In one place, someone used a store-bought two-way radio and turned it into a police walkie talkie.”

  Fenwick rattled the box of electronics they got from Shaitan’s room. “Anything in here that might work to cause that?”

  Fong glanced. A few seconds later, he took out what looked like a kids communication kit from a toy game.

  Fenwick said, “That?”

  “I’ll go over it. Could be.”

  “When was the call made?”

  “After eight.”

  Turner said, “Shaitan was dead long before then. Unless someone put this stuff in his room to implicate him.”

  Fenwick said, “Or he just randomly happened to have duplicates of the exact stuff we’re looking for.”

  They looked at him. “I know,” Fenwick said. “Not likely. What the hell is going on here?”

  Fong said, “It all sounds kind of inexplicable, eerie, and moving toward frightening.”

  Fenwick said, “Got that right.”

  Turner asked, “Was it a male or female caller?”

  “I’ve listened to the tape.” He pulled it up on his computer. It only took a few seconds to play. The caller said, “Be true to the blue, or we’re going to slit your throat.”

  “Sounds male,” Turner said, “and it doesn’t sound like he was trying to disguise his voice. Does the caller want Rodriguez to be true to me and Fenwick as cops who saved a kid, or to be true to Carruthers who almost killed a kid?”

  “You want people who threaten to be more specific?” Fong asked.

  “Well, yeah. If someone wanted to comply with a threat, it would be great if we knew what compliance was.”

  Fenwick said, “You’re so demanding.”

  Fong said, “Maybe you should put out a Threatener’s Handbook.”

  Turner had the grace to smile and thought a moment. “We have to be careful and take it seriously, although it could be just some random nut.”

  “Nothing on us?” Fenwick asked Fong.