Murder at the Library of Congress (16 page)

“What are you going to do with them overnight?” Annabel asked.

“Lock them in my office, I suppose, unless you want to stay awhile and keep going through them.”

“No, thanks,” Annabel said. “I’ve got to head home.”

She went to her desk space on the upper gallery and gathered her belongings. She’d come down the stairs and had said good night to Consuela when Lucianne Huston entered the reading room. “I was looking for you,” she said.

“I was out for the afternoon.”

“Where did you go?”

“Just out. Part of my research. Did you get the interviews you wanted?”

“The security chief, but he didn’t have much to add to
what I already know. That Prussian, Ms. Graves, says she’s got me set up tomorrow with the lawyer, name’s Mullin. I hate interviewing lawyers, party of the first part and that crap. I’m on my way to our D.C. affiliate to file a report for the seven o’clock news. Want to come with me?”

“Thanks, no.”

“I’m leading with the Bitteman story. Two murders here, both victims chasing the elusive Las Casas. You know John Vogler?”

“Yes.”

“Seems he had a fistfight with Michele Paul over an affair Paul had with Vogler’s wife.”

Annabel said nothing.

“Getting juicier all the time. Or at least live. Well, take it easy, and thanks for lunch.”

“Sure.”

Annabel watched Huston walk toward Consuela’s office.

“Lucianne.”

The journalist turned. “What?”

“You told me you were sent here because there had been an art theft and murder in Miami.”

“Not
because
of that, but it started the process. Why?”

“The artist? Did you say his name was Reyes?”

“That’s right. Fernando Reyes.”

“Oh.”

“Why do I get the feeling this is meaningful?” Lucianne asked.

“Beats me. Somebody mentioned him, that’s all. Just a coincidence.”

Lucianne’s expression was probing.

“See you tomorrow,” Annabel said. “I have a husband with a bad knee limping around our apartment getting dinner ready. Got to run.”

“If he ever gets tired of cooking for you, send him down to me. I haven’t had a man cook for me in a long time.”

Fat chance, Annabel thought, smiling and walking away.
Get your own man, tiger.

20

Sue Gomara looked out over the vast main reading room from her position at the central desk. Directly above was the famed domed ceiling, a hundred and sixty feet high, the female figure in its cupola representing human understanding. Surrounding that woman were a dozen other paintings saluting the countries or epochs that had contributed most to the development of Western civilization.

The room itself was inspiring, especially since its reopening in June of 1991 after being closed to the public for more than three years of renovation. The card catalogs, part of the decor for eighty-nine years, rendered outmoded by LC’s computer system but still used by some, had been moved to another location. Reader desks now completely encircled the raised central desk. All the desks had been wired for laptop computers. Soundproof carpeting, its design based upon the room’s architectural elements, had been installed, providing the sort of voluptuous quietude expected of libraries. The visitor’s gallery and alcoves on the second-floor-gallery level had been glassed in to further reduce noise.

Peaceful, contemplative, dignified
—those were words Sue often used to describe where she was interning to friends who viewed the Library of Congress as only something to add to out-of-town visitors’ sight-seeing lists.

Until recently.

Until the breathy, vile calls started a month ago.

Her eyes went to the magnificent John Flanagan clock above the room’s main entrance. Five-thirty. Time to pack up that stint, go back to Hispanic to change clothes, and head home.

“Sure I can’t buy you a drink?” a colleague at the central desk asked as Sue tidied up her station. Ken Silvestrie had been asking her out ever since he started working the main reading room six months ago. He was attracted to Sue the moment he first saw her, especially her eyes, large, oval brown eyes filled with compassion—and passion?

“Ken,” she said pleasantly and quietly, “I told you my boyfriend wouldn’t appreciate my going out with you, or anybody else for that matter. Besides, you’re working till nine-thirty.”

Silvestrie’s smile was boyish. “When I get off, I mean. You’re not married to the guy, Sue. I mean, what’s the harm of us having a drink together? We
work
together. Just a drink to talk—”

Sue laughed, something else he was attracted to, her easy laugh and her large, white teeth.

“Talk business?” she said, touching his arm.

“Yeah, something like that.”

“Thanks for the offer but I can’t.”

“He’s always out of town.”

Which was true. Sue’s live-in boyfriend of the past seven months, Rick Holt, was a junior auditor for the Senate Financial Institutions and Regulatory Relief Subcommittee of the full Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee. Long title, simple job—travel the country and audit federally chartered banks to ensure their compliance with federal regulations. He was gone three weeks out of each month.

There were times when she considered accepting other men’s offers of a drink or dinner, but she’d resisted those urges, spawned by loneliness, because Sue Gomara could be as much of a pragmatist as she was a dreamer. She envisioned a future with Rick Holt and wasn’t about to jeopardize it. Too, having fallen in love with him meant being able to leave campus housing for a more grown-up life in an apartment. Her parents hadn’t been pleased at first, but soon accepted their daughter’s decision and continued to help support her college work and career aspirations.

“See you tomorrow, Ken,” she said, stepping down from the circular desk and heading for the main entrance.

The reading room was filled to capacity that early evening, and she’d fulfilled hundreds of requests for books since coming on duty at noon after spending the morning in Hispanic. She was tired, yet satisfied with the way the afternoon had gone. Few days disappointed her since beginning her internship in conjunction with her postgraduate library science studies at the University of Maryland.

She kept her eyes straight ahead but took in selected readers’ desks with her peripheral vision. Most men and women using the room were serious about whatever it was they researched, and were pleasant, too. Normal people.

But there was the predictable cadre of strange-o’s who showed up each day for their own particular reasons. The Bride of Christ sat at the desk she usually grabbed first thing in the morning, poring over yet another Bible. A man with blazing eyes, insane eyes, and who always wore a black cape sat at another desk going through a pile of telephone directories from around the world in search of the name of the person who’d placed a curse on
him. And there was the street person Sue had been told by her supervisor to ask to leave a few days earlier because of complaints from other patrons about his body odor. She’d expected she’d need the help of an LC police officer, but was pleasantly surprised when the scruffy man didn’t mount a protest and simply left the room. He was back, hopefully having found a working shower.

She wondered as she walked from the main reading room whether one of the men seated at a desk in that vast space, dedicated to knowledge and enlightenment, was the one who’d been making the calls. Was one of those normal-looking persons the pervert?

“Remember,” she’d been told during regularly scheduled security briefings, “the person who’s likely to try and steal a book, or deface a book, is probably the most normal-looking man or woman in the room. The kooks are annoying but they tend not to be destructive, to property or persons. It’s the scholarly gentleman or woman, half-glasses perched on his or her nose, nicely dressed and polite—that’s the person to keep an eye on.”

After fairly trotting back to Hispanic—she seldom did anything in low gear—and changing into jeans and a U. of Maryland sweatshirt, she went to the main entrance, removed her upside-down badge from around her neck and placed it in her handbag, handed the bag to the officer, returned a “have a pleasant evening,” and stepped out onto First Street. It was indeed a lovely evening, cool and dry and with a huge full moon beaming down on the city where the nation’s business was conducted.

Damn him! she thought as she walked down First in the direction of Capitol South Metro Station for a train to the Farragut West Station, not far from her ground-floor apartment near Dupont Circle. The obscene calls had set her whole being on edge, even though the police
had assured her that “chances were slim” he was a violent person who would initiate physical action against her: “Obscene callers are
seldom
violent.”

How comforting.

And now a murder within the library itself. As far as Sue was concerned, the murderer had to be someone who worked there. The new security system was too formidable for an outsider to gain access to the stacks and to the Hispanic division’s upper gallery, where Michele Paul sat. But she also knew that no security system was foolproof. Just thinking of Paul’s murder caused her stomach to turn.

She let herself in the apartment. Until the calls, she would have immediately changed into pajamas and robe if she intended to stay in and get to bed early. But the calls had changed that routine. She checked each window to make sure it was locked even though metal ironwork covered them, and double-checked the front-door locks. Rick had been there when the first call came four weeks ago, and he insisted they add a heavy dead bolt to the existing lock.

Feeling relatively secure, she responded to Wendell, rubbing against her legs, fed him, then poured herself her nightly glass of red wine, which she took to the bedroom, gave an extra tug to drapes covering the window, and changed into a gray sweatsuit and sneakers. The TV was in the living room. She turned it on and sat back to watch the evening news, a contented cat on her lap.

International events, and a brewing ethical scandal in Congress, led the newscast. Then, as Sue considered a second glass of wine, Lucianne Huston’s face filled the screen.

“I’m Lucianne Huston at the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C. The murder of senior specialist and researcher Michele Paul in this imposing institution of learning has predictably shaken those who worked with him. The police have been conducting nonstop interviews with his colleagues, many of whom I’m told were not particularly fond of the deceased. I’ve also learned that eight years ago, another researcher from the library was a possible murder victim. I say ‘possible’ because his body was never found. His apartment had been ransacked and police found traces of blood. This victim, whose name was John Bitteman, was a rival of Michele Paul’s—both had devoted their professional careers to attempting to prove the existence of diaries allegedly written by Bartolomé de Las Casas, close friend and sailing companion of Christopher Columbus on his first three voyages from Spain to the Americas. It was also alleged that Las Casas had drawn a map pinpointing where Columbus had hidden millions in gold. Where the investigation into this latest murder leads is conjecture at this point, but we’ll continue to report developments as they occur. I’m Lucianne Huston in Washington.”

Sue had heard about the disappearance of John Bitteman, but only in snippets. It had happened long ago; she was only sixteen years old. Those who had been there at the time and with whom she talked about it worked in the collections management division, which administered book services through the main reading room, not the Hispanic and Portuguese division. Most had known Bitteman by reputation only.

She went to the kitchen to see what was in the fridge for dinner when the ringing phone stopped her. She reached for it but paused, her hand hovering over the instrument. Was it
him
again?

“Hello?” she said, voice taut.

“Sue. It’s Hope.”

A sigh.

“Think I was your secret admirer calling?”

“It crossed my mind.”

Hope Martin worked as an assistant at the Corcoran Gallery of Art; she and Sue had been friends since meeting there at a fund-raiser a year ago.

“Rick out of town?” Hope asked.

“Yes. Denver, I think. Or Chicago. One of those places out there. How are you?”

“Great. Had dinner?”

“No. I was just foraging for something.”

“Let’s go out. My cupboard’s bare.”

“I suspect that’s the case with mine, too. Where?”

“Zorba’s? I’m in the mood for tabouli.”

“Okay.” The cafe was around the corner from Sue’s apartment. “A half hour?”

“You’ve got it. If you get there first, which I know you will, grab a patio table. It’s warm enough.”

Sue changed into slacks, a sweater, and light purple and pink crinkled windbreaker and was out the door when the phone rang again. Go back in and answer it? Hard not to. She picked up on the fourth ring, just before her answering machine kicked in.

“Hello, Ms. Gomara.”

The deep male voice spoke slowly, hesitantly, as though he’d stammered at some point in his life.

“Who the hell are you?” Sue said. She’d asked the police to provide a way to trace the calls, but they suggested she see whether the caller persisted. What constituted persisting? she wondered. This was the sixth call, at least, even more when you added the times he reached the answering machine and said nothing.

“Don’t be angry with me, Ms. Gomara. This is a friendly call.”

Hang up? She wished the answering machine had been activated. She wanted his voice on tape.

“How do you know me?” she asked. The police had told her to say nothing when he called, simply to hang up: “That generally frustrates guys like this. They want a conversation with you. Don’t give them the satisfaction.”

“That doesn’t matter,” he said. “I love the way you look, the way you walk. I like beautiful women who are intelligent, too. Such a beautiful woman to be so smart.”

“Look you creep, you’d better—”