Mind Switch (44 page)

“We keep the tapes in a storage compartment in the hall. At the beginning of each work day, I take out the old tape from the recorder and put in a new one. I mark the date of the tape on a label, attach the label to the tape and then put the tape in the storage area in the hall.”

“Is the storage area locked?”

“No, visitors to our company are always escorted because of our numerous classified security areas. If one of them tried to enter the storage area, we would know.”

“What about employees of the company, do you have any constrictions on them?”

“No, they could have entered the storage area at will. Every employee has a top secret clearance; so Mr. Schultz saw no reason to keep the area secure from them.”

Fred found that logic inconsistent, since Schultz seemed to fear more from his employees than outside intruders. Fred suspected that Schultz had never given the storage of the tapes much thought.

Fred said, “Thanks for your help, Mr. Ball. And I’ll need to take this tape with me.”

* * *

Fred returned to the station, entering the side entrance being careful to avoid the chief. He called in Patrolman Larry Steel, who was the station’s expert on video equipment. “Larry, I want you to check out this tape to see if any part of it has been erased, removed or recorded over. If so, I need to determine if the original image can be restored. The tape is time coded; so I also want you to go from 5:30 to 5:45 p.m. on the tape; and in each frame blow up the area which is about 100 feet from the right hand edge of the parking lot. Give me stills of that area. Please do the same in the 5:45 segment of the tape. I need to make a comparison of that area for the two time periods. And whatever you do, be careful not to get your prints on any part of the video.”

Patrolman Steel returned in less then an hour. “Well, boss, bad news, we can’t possibly restore the erased area because it wasn’t erased. The tape was spliced. It was a neat job but there’s no way one can splice a tape without it being noticed.”

“That’s what I suspected; and what about the stills?”

“Here they are, Lieutenant. You can see that the cement wall at the edge of the parking lot shown in the earlier frames is intact. On the 5:45 frames, the wall has been damaged and fragments have been scattered on the parking lot.”

“Yes, that would be consistent with the damage from the bullet that was fired at Miss Lang. So that seems to support her story that she was fired at just after she left work. It also appears,” Fred went on, “that whoever did the shooting was employed by AU, because they had knowledge of the details of the company’s security operations. The tape was obviously altered so as not to disclose the person’s identity.”

Steel said, “I don’t understand; why didn’t they just get rid of the tape?”

“No, they couldn’t do that,” said Fred. “That would have created an obvious gap in the filed tapes. Of course, a blank tape could have been inserted in its place but then the handwriting on the outside of the tape would be different from that of the security head. I suspect the person responsible hoped that no one would examine the contents of the tape; and in a short time the tape would have been copied over, obliterating forever the missing information regarding the shooting. Larry, please check this tape for fingerprints, although I’m not sure it will be worth your time. I will bet you my week’s paycheck that the prints you will find will be mine, the security head’s and no one else’s.”

* * *

The next morning Fred awoke to the irritating ringing of his nightstand phone. He looked over to Maureen who, with her ear plugs in, continued to sleep peacefully. He glanced at the nightstand clock; hell, it was only 6 a.m.

It was the chief. “Fred, we have an appointment at the CIA field office in Room 201 at 8:30 a.m.. Be there early. Miss Black will be there, as well as her attorney. By the way, did you enjoy your day off?”

“Ah,—yes, thanks, boss, it was great!”

“Good, I guess you had fun in your office, right?” Without waiting for an answer, the chief said, “See you around 8:15,” and hung up.

Shit, Fred thought, he finds out everything.

Chapter 69

Fred entered the CIA field office promptly at 8:15. The agent on duty checked the appointment book, and after verifying Fred’s identification, said, “Take the elevator up to the second floor. Room 201 will be to your left.”

Fred had hoped that the interview with Miss Black would have been on neutral grounds. The CIA field office was far from neutral; but at least the chief was willing to stick his neck out to continue the investigation in spite of the DA.

When Fred arrived at the second floor, he saw a black plastic arrow indicating that rooms 200 thru 210 were to his left. As he walked to his destination he passed several young, very fit males all well dressed in black business suits. I guess they must go incognito on assignment, he thought. They sure would stand out in a crowd if they wore that attire in a foreign country.

The door to room 201 was open. Sitting at a conference table was the chief, Miss Black, and a man whom he had never seen before. A thin man with a ruddy complexion sat to the chief’s left. An ear piercing voice yelled, “Close the door and sit down, you’re late!”

Fred started to protest that he wasn’t late, but decided to let well enough alone. He knew this was obviously an attempt by the CIA to gain early control of the meeting.

When Fred took his seat, the thin man to his left continued to speak.

“We want you to know we are here for the single purpose of insuring that you will not harass Miss Black any further. She is on assignment and your interference may have already compromised our mission.”

The chief spoke up. “We’re sorry about that, but murder takes precedence over whatever your mission might be. At this stage, Miss Black is still a suspect in a murder investigation.”

The man to Fred’s left started to protest, “Wait a minute, Miss Black is not a suspect—”

“—Excuse me,” the Chief broke in, “I am speaking; and as the person in charge of this investigation, I am telling you that she
is
a suspect. I would like to believe that someone may have planted evidence to direct suspicion in her direction. And I would hope we can clear her during this meeting, which we might be able to do if you cooperate . . .”

The thin man said, “Let’s stop this charade. The DA told you to desist from treating Miss Black as a suspect. Did he not?”

Much to the surprise of Fred, the chief responded firmly and unequivocally. “Look, the DA and I usually agree on most matters.” That was a lie, Fred thought. The chief continued, “But in this case we do not. If you don’t cooperate, I will pull Miss Black down to headquarters; and in the front page of tomorrow’s paper, the entire city of Sarasota will know she is a suspect.”

The thin man had a look of disbelief all over his face. “You do that, and you will be fired.”

The chief smiled smugly. “Look, I’m a civil servant, I’m far overdue for retirement; and much worse things have happened in my life than the possibility of being removed from a job with the prospect of enjoying a full pension. In fact, I can’t wait to take that trip around the world that I have been looking forward to, and take in some much needed deep sea fishing. The good news is that even upon my departure, Miss Black would continue to be investigated. You cannot shut our system down, and beyond that you have no leverage over me, sir, none whatsoever.

“Now if you want to cooperate, and I strongly suggest that you do, I would like my very competent lieutenant to ask Miss Black a few questions. If she is innocent, believe me, he will find out quickly. And by the way I am not an aficionado of espionage tales. That, sir, is entirely your business, ours is murder. Frankly, I don’t even understand why there are still spies in what we now consider friendly nations. Hell, according to the papers, Russia started recruiting post cold war spies after we had supposedly become friends. Red China owns a hefty percentage of our treasury notes and is helping finance our national deficit. They and Russia have become active trading partners with us. Will the games you guys play in your black worlds never end? At any rate, Lieutenant Harris, please take over.”

Fred was not ready for this. He was still amazed at the effectiveness and precision in which the chief had gained the high ground. He was also surprised at the chief’s tirade, but he wondered if it was simply an attempt to take control of the setting. He looked to his left, the thin man was reeling with anger and biting his lips; however, he remained silent. Miss Black’s anger was even more apparent, it was displayed all over her beet-red face. Her knuckles had turned pale white, where her fingers were tightly bent into hardened fists.

Trying to buy time while he tired to determine how best to proceed, Fred said, “Look, as the chief has indicated, Miss Black, we want to believe that you’re innocent.”

“Get on with it,” the thin man blurted out.

Fred knew that this interrogation would not be a cake walk. “Okay, very simply, Miss Black, as we have indicated previously, an attempt was made on Mr. Schultz’s secretary’s life, not once but twice. In the first instance it was an attempt to shoot her in the parking lot of AU. We located the spent cartridges from that attempt. The second attempt on her life was executed by turning on the gas on her kitchen stove while she slept. Now, as you know, we had an authorized search carried out in your house and in the process located a .32 caliber weapon hidden beneath the hall closet floor.
 

“We fired the weapon that we recovered from your home, using one of the bullets still contained in that gun. Our experts conducted a comparison of the markings on that bullet with the one found in the parking lot. Our tests showed that the barrel marking from your weapon was the same signature as the spent bullet found in the parking lot. We also were able to lift fingerprints from Miss Lang’s kitchen stove. The fingerprints on file for you at AU were an exact match to the prints on her range.

“And by the way,” Fred continued, “the surveillance camera of the parking lot in Analysis Unlimited revealed only two cars in the parking lot just prior to the period in which an attempt was made on Miss Lang’s life. We checked the plates on both cars. One was registered to Miss Lang and the other to you. Now, can you explain any of these situations?”

Miss Black spoke coldly, “First of all, Lieutenant, I do not keep a gun in my house. My authorized weapon is kept in a safe in my office in this building unless I am on assignment.”

“Ah,” Fred replied, “but that doesn’t mean you didn’t have a second weapon that you kept at home.”

“Did you trace the ownership of the weapon?” asked Miss Black.

“We tried but we hit a dead end,” Fred admitted.

“If you looked at the video from the surveillance camera, couldn’t you see the person that shot at Miss Lang?”

“Unfortunately, that part of the tape had been cut out.”

“I see. But if I were the shooter, wouldn’t I also have cut out the frames showing my car in the parking lot?”

“I suspect you didn’t think of that.”

“Lieutenant, I always think of everything – just ask my associates. It’s obvious the real murderer wanted his or her identity removed from the tape but also wanted the evidence of my car to remain. Can’t Miss Lang identify who it was that shot at her?”

“She said she was so scared that she ran to her car and she didn’t have an opportunity to look for the shooter.”

Fred jumped to the more incriminating part of his investigation. “What about the presence of your fingerprints on Miss Lang’s stove? Were you ever in her house?”

“No, but it’s not difficult to lift fingerprints from an object and then have them preserved on a latex base for use later. That is hardly a technical impossibility. If you watched any Bond movies, you would have seen the technique used back in the 60’s. And I can certify to you that it can be done and accomplished quite easily.”

The thin man nodded his head as if he had shared some personal experience in that area.

The chief interrupted. “Miss Black, you have been planted in the AU Company for some reason. Is it possible that the person you are after has attempted to falsely plant this evidence on you?”

Miss Black replied, “I would like to say yes, but to the best of my knowledge, until this incident, only Mr. Schultz knew that I entered the company as a plant. Unfortunately, up to this stage I haven’t been able to uncover the identity of the person we are after. Look, I know you are investigating a murder, which very likely has nothing to do with what the CIA is interested in. The murderer, I am sure, had no idea that I am an agent, or he would have selected another person to try to pin this on—a person who would have been a much easier target to convict.”

Fred asked, “Miss Black, please help us prove that you are not guilty. Where were you Tuesday night?”

“For your information, I was home that entire evening and night.”

“Do you have a witness to support your alibi?”

“Unfortunately, no, I don’t. But this person, who is trying so hard to pin a crime on me, seems to be very clever; don’t you think that person insured that I had no witnesses to defend my alibi that night?”

Fred decided to shift direction in his interrogation. “This person you are looking for, can you tell us without revealing confidentiality, what state secrets he leaked?”