“Yes, ma’am,” I say hopelessly. “I’m working as hard as I can on the issue, I promise you.”
“If your little girl wasn’t in a private school, you’d work harder.”
“Mrs. Handley, I—”
“You don’t have to explain, baby, I understand. But you take a stick to them selectmen and supervisors, if you have to. That’s what they need. Sometimes I think the schools were better before integration. At least we learned the fundamentals, and we graduated knowing how to read.”
There’s no point trying to explain that I have no authority over the county supervisors or the state board of education. “Sometimes I wish I could do exactly what you suggested, Mrs. Handley. Now, you’d better get out of this cold. And Merry Christmas to you.”
At last she smiles. “You too, Mayor. God bless. And don’t pay these reporters no mind.”
I look toward the door of City Hall as I move on, hoping to avoid more conversations, but that’s too much to ask. This time it’s not a journalist or member of my constituency who buttonholes me, but John Kaiser. The FBI agent is sitting on the steps beneath the lamppost, obviously waiting for me.
“Don’t you have anything better to do?” I ask. “A meeting with Oliver Stone, maybe?”
He makes a sour face. “I’ve got some news for you.”
My blood quickens, more out of dread than hope. “My father?”
“No, the Double Eagles. Leo Spivey is dead.”
“Who the hell is Leo Spivey?”
“The Eagle who owned that booby-trapped warehouse. A hotel maid found his body in a room across the river. He appeared to have put a bullet through his own head. The hits just keep on coming.”
“Was it really suicide?”
“Fuck, no. Knox’s goons got him. Sheriff Dennis’s men are over there now, working the scene as a homicide. To the best of their abilities, anyway.”
“Maybe Spivey killed himself rather than be punished by Knox or his buddies.”
Kaiser shrugs. “Either way, the cause is the same. You and Dennis hit the Knoxes’ drug operations. Soon we’ll have bodies piling up everywhere.”
“I know you wanted everything to keep running nice and smooth while you worked on recruiting a star witness against Forrest, but my dad doesn’t have six months to wait on you.”
I start to move past him, but Kaiser stands and blocks my way.
“One more bit of news. Our Legat agents in Rome tracked down the serial number of the Mannlicher-Carcano from Royal’s house.”
“And?”
“It was shipped into the Port of Los Angeles in 1962, one shipment after the lot that contained Lee Harvey Oswald’s rifle. Our next stop will be finding the U.S. retailer. That might take a little time, but the director’s with us now, and we’re pushing hard.”
“The director doesn’t think you’re nuts?”
“It’s pretty hard to deny physical evidence.”
“I told you earlier . . . I’m not interested.”
“And if we track that rifle to Louisiana?”
I turn up my hands in exasperation. “What do you want me to say? My only concern right now is my family. If you want to spend your time trying to crack the Kennedy case, have at it.”
“Do you feel the same way about the murders of Albert Norris, Pooky Wilson, and the others?”
“We know who killed those guys now, or who ordered the hits, anyway. Brody Royal, and he’s dead. If you want to nail Snake Knox and the other Eagles, you need to get on our side. Because Walker and I are going to be squeezing those guys’ balls before you even get your plan into first gear.”
Again I try to move past him, but Kaiser raises the flat of his right hand to my chest. “I know you don’t want to listen to me. But will you listen to Dwight Stone?”
God, is this guy pulling out the stops. “You think a phone call from Stone is going to make me reverse course on busting the Double Eagles?”
“Not a phone call. Stone’s flying in today on a Bureau jet.”
This actually stuns me. “In? Here? For what?”
“To talk to you. He’s been trying to find a way down here since Tuesday night, when I told him about the bones coming out of the Jericho Hole. He was looking into chartering a plane. But you seeing those rifles in Royal’s basement and hearing Royal say the Knoxes killed Pooky Wilson at the Bone Tree convinced the director to authorize a Bureau flight to bring Dwight down here to consult. He’s only going to be here for a few hours.”
“Why such a short stay?”
Kaiser takes a long breath. “Because he’s dying, Penn.”
A sick feeling hits me high in the stomach. “What?”
“Liver cancer.”
“I had no idea.”
“You know Dwight. Old school. A lot like your father, I imagine. He’s scheduled for an operation tomorrow. This visit is the Bureau’s way of giving back a little of the respect Hoover took when he fired Stone in ’72. Before Dwight goes under the knife.”
“Goddamn it, John. When’s he coming in?”
“He ought to be here by six P.M. Can you spare him an hour of your time?”
Kaiser’s revelations are almost too much to process quickly.
“The way I heard it,” he says, “it was Stone who made it possible for you to solve the Delano Payton case seven years ago.”
I nod. “He did more than that. Stone saved my life up in Colorado.”
“So will you come by?”
I have no choice, and Kaiser knows it. “Yeah. But only because it’s him. I think you guys are crazy to believe those rifles are real.”
“The evidence will tell, one way or the other.”
“What does he want to ask me, John? He’s not going to change my mind about anything.”