3 Time to Steele (18 page)

“So, if you’re not investigating fraud,” said Lester, “what exactly
are
you investigating?”

“Homicide,” I said.

Lester sat up straight, something I wasn’t sure he was capable of given the state of his joints.
“What?
Someone’s been murdered?”

“No one you know, in all likelihood,” said Steele. “But we have reason to believe someone you’re familiar with may be in danger. Do you know a scientist by the name of Buford Gill?”

“Oh, yes, Buford. Of course I know him,” said Lester. “Anyone who reads our publication would be familiar with his name. You’re saying his life is at risk?”

“Possibly,” I said as I glanced at a mound near Lester’s desk that I suspected might be hiding a chair. “What can you tell us about the man?”

“Well, he’s brilliant, for one thing,” said Lester, leaning back in his seat. “I’d dare say he’s one of the sharpest minds of our age. Makes me feel like a first-year undergraduate at times with the intricacy of his theories—” A bit of a bitter frown crept across his face as he said that last part. “—but, regardless, I’m glad he chooses to publish with us. The issues featuring his papers always sell better than those that don’t.”

“He’s popular, then?” said Shay.

Lester French rolled his eyes. “Well…in a sense. Let’s just say that, while Gill’s papers inevitably get published, they always engender a healthy debate, both during the peer review process and afterwards. While many of our readership look forward to Gill’s publications to read his insights, others look forward to them simply to try and find holes in them.”

The old man chuckled and shook his head. “And Gill’s never been one to shy away from debate. He’s always been very combative toward others who try to disprove his theories. So invariably, Gill will publish a paper, and someone will publish a rebuttal to his points, and Gill will publish a fiery counter-rebuttal. Honestly, we usually see a spike in our circulation for several issues
after
Gill’s initial publication for just such a reason.”

“That’s great,” I said, not entirely truthfully, “but the real question that concerns us is, do you know where to find him?”

“Ah, no, unfortunately,” said Lester. “He’s quite the recluse, which I assume you probably already know if you’re asking me about his whereabouts. I suppose you could ask around his old department at the University of New Welwic. Someone there might have some idea where he disappeared to. And by old department, I mean Physics and Astronomy, not Physics and Chemistry. That department was shuttered years ago at the same time the building housing it was condemned for chemical contamination. Damned shame, really. It was a nice building.”

“You can’t tell us you honestly have no clue where the man might be,” said Steele, resting an elbow on a stack of textbooks. “He publishes in your journal. Surely you have some open method of communication with him? Otherwise how would he be able to submit his findings?”

“Well, that’s the clever part,” said Lester, waggling a finger. “I’ve seen Gill a couple times over the past few years—chance occasions, mind you—but after he lost his position at the University following that spat with the offices and the departmental changeover, he went into hiding and, for lack of a better term, became very…
wary
of people, including me. I mean, he’d always been antisocial, but he just got… Well, it doesn’t matter. Long story short, we set up a system whereby he could submit papers remotely.”

“Remotely?” said Steele.

“Yes,” said Lester. “When he has a paper he wishes to submit to us, he sends it in via courier from—well, who knows where, honestly. Our reviewers read his work and supply their comments and suggestions, and we bundle those together with his original paper and any correspondence we get from readers and leave those in the communal mail slot in the lobby downstairs. Gill then comes by and picks up the bundle, though he must do so very early or very late because I’ve never bumped into him at the office since we instituted the program. Overall, it’s rather inefficient—he only checks the mail slot once a month or so—but it works.”

“That sounds like a lot of effort to go through to make sure one author gets published,” I said.

Lester shrugged. “As I said, the man’s brilliant. And more importantly, he sells journals. Figuratively speaking, of course. He’s not on our payroll.”

I glanced around the office one more time, wondering to myself if there was
anyone
other than Lester on the magazine’s payroll.

“So you have no idea where we might be able to find him?” asked Steele.

Lester shook his head. “No. I’m sorry. As I said, try his old university. He might still have a few friends there.”

Steele wasn’t willing to let the matter go that easily. “We noticed a few of his recent publications had a collaborator. An S. Turner? Do you know where we might be able to find this person?”

Lester removed his spectacles and rubbed the bridge of his nose, gesturing with his glasses as he talked. “Unfortunately, no. I know even less about that person than I do about Gill. The first time I saw the name was on Gill’s second most recent paper. Given they’re a coauthor, I have no correspondence system set up with them. We only do that for lead authors.”

“Come on,” said Steele. “Think. You must know something that could lead us to Gill. Maybe a piece of information he dropped in passing. Anything!”

Shay’s jaw was set tight, and she punctuated her remark with a slap of a stack of journals, which made Lester jump as he returned the glasses to his face. The performance was out of line with her normally even keel behavior—in fact, I’d only seen her like this during our good cop, bad cop interrogations. I wondered what might be agitating her, until I realized our current case might be hitting a little too close to home. Perhaps I shouldn’t have drawn so many parallels between Buford Gill and Shay’s father while at the library.

I approached my partner and put a hand on her shoulder. “Steele. We’ll find him, but Dr. French doesn’t know where he is. We’ll have to try something else.”

Steele turned to face me. In her eyes I saw fierce determination, but the fire within melted away after a second or two. “Sorry. You’re right. Dr. French, thanks for your time, and apologies for—” She mimed slapping the books. “—well, you know.”

“Don’t worry, dear,” said Lester. “No offense taken. I imagine your profession must be far more stressful than mine, at least in most senses. Which reminds me…before you go, could I ask
you
a question?”

“Sure,” said Steele. “Why not?”

“Well,” said Lester, adopting his best set of wide puppy eyes, “academic journals aren’t exactly a high margin enterprise. Perhaps I could interest the two of you in a couple subscriptions? Or some for your friends?”

I glanced at Steele. Suddenly her determination and remorse had turned into apprehension. I could understand the feeling. I felt like a holiday party guest being cajoled into trying Aunt Millie’s famous fruit cake that tasted of sawdust and fossilized raisins.

I considered it a minor miracle when both of us emerged from the office, minutes later, without having purchased a single copy.

29

We took Lester’s advice and visited Gill’s old colleagues in the Department of Physics and Astronomy at the University of New Welwic, but the few professors and staff who had anything nice to say about the man knew less about his whereabouts than they did about modern fashion conventions. By time we’d finished knocking on office doors and asking questions, I’d had it up to my eyeballs in four-buttoned vests and extra wide Balthus-knotted ties. Frustrated and disappointed, Shay and I indulged our moods in a bit of silence and quiet contemplation on our rickshaw ride back to the precinct.

Upon arrival, we found Rodgers and Quinto at their desks looking not much happier than we did. Rodgers nursed a mug of hot coffee, and Quinto had broken out the mug he reserved for his strongest brews of tea, which couldn’t be a good sign.

“Tell me you’ve had better luck than we have,” I said as Shay and I approached the pair.

Quinto looked up from his desk. “Hey Daggers. Steele. Your trip went that bad, huh?”

“Are you kidding?” I said. “Buford Gill’s a ghost. Taxation and Revenue’s file on him is a decade out of date. Nobody knows where to find him—colleagues, professional acquaintances, nobody. Not even the journal he publishes with regularly has any idea how to contact him. He has a special drop box system in place with them to allow for anonymous pick-ups and drop-offs. If not for the fact that he checks the box every month or two, I’d think the guy had evaporated off the face of the earth, or at least high-tailed it out of New Welwic for greener pastures.”

“Well, it could be worse,” said Rodgers as he set his coffee down on his desk. “If Gill Sr. is a ghost, then Harland Wyle is a will-o’-wisp.”

I raised an eyebrow. “A what now?”

“A will-o’-wisp,” said Shay. “It’s a flickering light in swamps people talk about in folklore. But I have to admit I’m struggling with the metaphor, Rodgers.”

“Alright. Let me try again.” Rodgers flourished a finger in the air. “If Gill Sr. is a ghost, then Harland Wyle is a breeze on a gust of wind.”

I frowned and glanced at Quinto.

“Don’t look at me,” the big guy said. “I have no idea what he’s talking about.”

Rodgers sighed and rolled his eyes. “I was
trying
to come up with a way to say that even though you’ve had a hard time locating Gill, Harland Wyle’s been even harder to find. I mean, not in the literal sense. We know exactly where he is—in holding. But at least there’s a paper trail indicating your guy exists. Not so for Wyle. He has no arrest record, and we stopped by Public Records to see if he’d ever been admitted to a psychiatric ward. No dice. We even stopped by Taxation and Revenue, but they didn’t have a file for him either.”

“All of which corroborates our theory that the guy’s been lying to us about everything,” said Quinto. “Including his name.”

“So, basically, we’re no closer to solving Darryl and Anya’s murders than we were this morning,” said Shay.

“Basically,” said Rodgers. “Although, on the bright side, if Gill Sr. is
this
hard to find, chances are Scar Face hasn’t found him either. At the very least, there haven’t been any runners tearing through our halls with bad news.”

I crossed my arms. “Forgive me if that doesn’t make me break out in dance. Both of our murders have occurred early in the day. Who’s to say Buford Gill’s death would be any different? And, of course, it’s always possible the man’s already been murdered and nobody’s found the body yet—which wouldn’t surprise me if the man’s as big a recluse as everyone says.”

“Well, I don’t know what to tell you,” said Rodgers. “I’m not sure what our next move should be, unless you want to turn the screws on Wyle some more and see if he changes his story, but seeing as we already tried that…” He shrugged and took another sip from his mug.

I frowned. I still hadn’t figured out what it was about Wyle that bothered me. There was his ludicrous time travel story, of course, but I could deal with craziness and lies. What I couldn’t deal with was craziness and lies that fell just close enough to the truth to make me go ‘Hmm.’ The timing of his break-in at Darryl’s apartment and his intrusion at Anya’s house seemed more than coincidental, and I wasn’t sure I believed Shay’s simple address-based explanation of how he tracked down Anya.

I tapped my chin. “You know, maybe we should talk to Wyle once more.”

“Again?” said Shay. “What’s your angle going to be this time?”

“My angle,” I said, “is that regardless of whether or not he’s a whacko or he’s manipulating us, he knows something about the murders we don’t. If he’s crazy, perhaps by playing into his delusions, we can get him to reveal a clue we haven’t yet uncovered. And if he’s not crazy, perhaps by making
him
believe
we
believe in him, we’ll achieve the same effect.”

“I’m not sure I totally follow,” said Quinto.

“It’s ok,” I said. “Come with me and follow my lead.”

Most of the time a command like that resulted in jeers or at the very least some mild resistance, but apparently everyone was really and truly stumped. As I turned toward the back stairs, everyone followed me without so much as a snort or a roll of the eyes.

I led my entourage down the back stairs to the holding pens. Drunken Goakey Joe had been set free, but Harland Wyle still sat in the same cage he had earlier in the day. He stared at the rough stone floor of the cell, neglecting to look up at the sound of our octuplet of pattering feet.

“Hi, Harland,” I said as I stopped in front of the wrought iron bars.

Wyle kept his gaze trained on the floor. “What do you want this time?”

“I want to go over one part of your story, again,” I said.

“Not this again.” Wyle sighed and turned his face up to meet mine. “Why should I? So you guys can have another laugh at my expense? This may be funny to you, but I’m still agonizing over the possibility that everything I’ve ever known and loved is gone—or rather never existed. Dealing with your mockery in addition to that is more than I can deal with.”

“Possibility?”
said Steele. “So you’re no longer convinced your future has changed?”

Wyle shrugged. “I may have overreacted. Trust me, it’s easy to get emotional when you think your world just winked out of existence, but I thought it over. The theories we developed regarding time reconstruction are solid. If my reality was extinguished, I should’ve felt a substantial wave in the time streams, even accounting for the spatial gap between me and the psychopath from Citizens for Simplicity. Either that, or I shouldn’t exist anymore. Either way, I’m pretty sure my future still exists, which means there’s time to right the ship. I think…”

I regarded Wyle and his crop of wavy black hair. The guy’s wacky robe and implausible story were overt sign of lunacy, but even though I didn’t have any formal training in psychology, I’d met enough drunks, whack jobs, and nutcases to get a feel for the group. Wyle didn’t fit. That meant he was lying—but boy, he was a pretty good actor.