The Night Falconer (9 page)

“Who are some of his partners?”

“Big banks. Some Who’s Who on Wall Street. All I’ve been able to come up with so far. And he’s got his own activist credentials, in a way.”

“How so?”

“Through his church and some other organizations, he and his wife have given lots of money and been very involved in helping new immigrants settle here in America, especially African and Middle Eastern immigrants.”

“So what’s he hiding?”

“Good question.”

“You found all this out from the internet?”

She shrugged. “That and a few phone calls. And, let’s just say I might have visited a few people’s servers when they weren’t looking.” She smiled.

“I don’t want to know.”

“But I’ve got more.”

“What’s that?”

“If there really is a guy running around the park playing falconer, whether Watisi has hired him or not, we might be dealing with some kind of re-enactor.”

“What do you mean?”

“I kind of got sidetracked, but I think you’ll find it interesting.” She pulled the laptop screen to a better angle for me to read.

“That’s the problem with all this online stuff. There is so much information out there at your fingerprints, you end up spending half the day sifting through minutiae.”

“Just read, Dad,” she patiently instructed.

I did as she said. “It’s a web site about falconry.” No big deal. I’d seen plenty of sites like this before. This one wasn’t even particularly high-tech. No flash intro or streaming video of screaming falcons. Nicole was pointing me toward a section of text on the page.

FALCONRY IN AMERICA—AN UNSUAL TALE.

While a growing metropolis, New York in the 1840s and 1850s was not then the great city it is now. Most of the population still lived toward the southern end of Manhattan island. In the area just above Midtown that would eventually be seized by eminent domain to form Central Park, was a place known as Seneca Village.

It was a mixed race settlement of around two-hundred- and-seventy free blacks and whites, with three churches and a school. For a period of time, the village served as a critical junction on the Underground Railroad, helping to ferry escaped slaves pursued by bounty hunters on their journey northward into Canada and freedom.

Obadiah Robertson was a former slave, but not in America. An Ethiopian, he had served in the house of a wealthy Arab, where, owing to his skills with animals, he had been pressed into service as a falconer. There, his formidable talents training the swift hunting birds earned him an honored place and eventually, his freedom.

Robertson (his Americanized name) migrated to the United States and settled for a time in Seneca Village. He trapped and hunted with peregrine falcons, red-tailed hawks, and even owls. Before long, Robertson, who had become a devout Christian, began guiding groups of slaves up the Hudson valley, into the Catskills, and on into Canada. Short in stature, with quick, lithe movements, he was a superior guide, and he frequently traveled with one of his hawks or falcons. His hunting prowess allowed him to provide meat for the starving refugees while they were on the move, without fear of attracting attention by the use of a firearm.

“Pretty wild story,” I said.

“Keep going.”

Robertson disappeared under questionable circumstances in 1851. Some said he was murdered near Seneca Village. Others claimed that after the dissolution of Seneca Village he had taken a native American wife and gone to live with the Indians in upstate New York. For years afterward, escaping slaves on the trek North would whisper tales about the mysterious caches of rabbit and squirrel meat that would sometimes appear at their campsites, especially in the dead of winter when they were near starvation and struggling through the bitter cold. These events, it was said, were often precipitated by the distant screaming of a hawk or the hooting of an owl.

“What do you think?” Nicole asked when I looked up from reading.

“Unbelievable.”

“I was cross-referencing property listings around the park, got into a bit of the history, and decided to plug in falconry to see what came up.”

“Amazing. Nice work.”

“Do you think this could be significant for our case?”

“So what, you want to go tell Darla and Dr. Lonigan that now we think we might be chasing a ghost?”

“Wait,” she said. “There’s even more.” Her fingers danced across the mouse pad. She clicked on the cursor and a new web page came into view. It was a small section of text, part of a larger examination of the architectural archives of Manhattan.

Obadiah Robertson, who could read and write, unlike most former slaves, supposedly kept a journal of his bird training activities and other exploits. In particular, the book apparently chronicled Robertson’s hunting adventures around Manhattan and his use of a rudimentary tunnel system under a section of what is now Central Park. Called BOOK OF THE MEWS, a reference to a facility used to house raptors, this leather-bound volume was rumored to have been part of a private collection in New York City but has never been found. If located, it would prove an invaluable primary source document for the history of New York City and Seneca Village, as well as for the ancient sport of falconry. Robertson was said to be fond of hunting with a specially trained Great Horned Owl at dusk or sometimes even after dark.

I looked up at Nicole. “So you think someone’s gotten their hands on this book?”

“Could be.”

“Might be living out some kind of historical fantasy.”

“Or even better. Maybe they’ve found one of his old tunnels and are using it to keep something hidden.”

“Have you found out anything else about this Robertson character? Does he have any living descendants, that sort of thing?”

“No. I’ve found several other references to Seneca Village. There was even a children’s book published recently. But nothing about him. And to do a complete genealogical tracing, I’d need to have a wife or a child’s name or something else to go on.”

“What about the book?”

“I searched all available online databases and came up with nothing. It’s not listed for sale anywhere. Not that I expected it to be.”

“So for now all we’ve got is an interesting story.”

“With one coincidence—the possible similarity to a falconer hunting in Central Park.” she said.

“Right.”

“And you’ve always told me you don’t like coincidences during an investigation, Dad,” she said.

10

Darla Barnes’s office was in the Richmond Hills section of Queens. Nothing special. A second floor walkup over a realtor’s office in a commercial strip of tired storefronts. We only stopped by for a few minutes on the way to her house so she could check her mail.

While I’d been talking with Jayani and looking over Nicole’s internet find, Darla had been busy on another case, taking pictures with her digital camera of a pickup basketball game on the Upper East Side. The players were impressed, she told us, must have figured her for a scout, especially one six foot eight dunking machine whose day job was stacking boxes. The Knicks wouldn’t be calling. But the insurance company the phi slamma jammer had scammed out of several thousand dollars in workman’s compensation payments just might.

“Nothing but bills,” she said, closing the door behind her as we left descending the stairs.

“Tell me about it,” I said. “Where’s the glamour anymore in the private eye life?”

“Honey,” she said. “Ain’t no glamour here. “Lest you plan to be paying for it.”

The sky outside had turned a gentle shade of mauve as the sun in the west ducked beneath a bank of clouds. The air smelled of fried chicken and spices. A group of Asian drummers and dancers were performing on the street a few blocks away, drawing a sizable crowd.

“How far to your house?” I asked.

“It’s close. Just a few blocks. Makes for an easier commute than back when I was working Transit, I’ll tell you that much.”

“Okay.”

“So you guys have made some progress,” she said.

“Some.” I told her about my conversation with Jayani and Nicole told her the story about Obadiah Robertson and what else Nicole found.

“Strange,” was all she said. “Where do you go from here?”

“I thought we’d try staking out one section of the park tonight,” I said. “Someplace that would be likely for a falconer after game.”

“You mean you think this guy with the owl might really be hunting with the thing, not just stealing people’s pets?”

“I don’t know. But it’s what the birds do.”

Her house turned out to be a pale blue Cape Cod cottage with a porch. At the end of the street, a cul-de-sac backed up to a reed-filled swamp next to a school playground. Three children were playing in front of the house, one boy of about ten and two little girls on bicycles. A middle-aged black man with gray eyes to match his gray beard sat on the porch shucking ears of corn into a metal bucket and keeping watch over the youngsters.

The kids looked on warily at first, probably confused at the sight of the unfamiliar vehicle. Then they caught sight of Darla as we stepped from the van.

“Mommy!”

One of the little girls hopped off her bike, dropping it on the sidewalk before running into her mother’s arms.

“Hey, Sweetness.” Darla gathered her daughter up and kissed her on the cheeks. “Marco, you come on too. There’s someone here I want you to meet.”

The other little girl waved goodbye to Sweetness like Nicole and I were the bogeyman and pedaled her bike down the sidewalk, up the driveway and into the garage of the house next door. The boy stood a ways off at first—he was busy doing something with a fishing pole—before he came over to accept a hug from his mother as well.

“Did you buy a new car, Mom?” he asked.

“No, I’m afraid not.” Darla laughed. “It’s a rental. I ran into a little trouble with mine.”

She turned the children toward us. “Marco, Sweetness, I’d like you to meet Mr. Pavlicek and his daughter, Nicole. They’re detectives working with me on a case.”

I stepped forward and reached out to shake the boy’s hand. He looked me squarely in the eye, facing things head on the way his mother must have taught him. Sweetness wanted me to shake her hand too.

“And on the porch over there is my friend Carl.”

The man nodded at us but made no move in our direction.

“Thanks for watching after the kids this afternoon,” Darla said to him.

Carl nodded again. He’d finished up his corn and stood with a slight grimace. Against his chair leaned an ornately carved walnut colored cane. He bent down to pick it up with one hand, and reached over and picked up the bucket of corn with the other, looping the handle over his arm.

“No trouble,” he said, limping toward the screen door to the house. He cantilevered the door with his elbow and slipped inside with the bucket tucked against his body. Not exactly the cold shoulder, but a far cry from the welcome wagon.

“Carl was a fireman. Retired on disability.”

“He know who I am?” I said.

She nodded.

“He’s uncomfortable with me then.”

“Yes,” she said. “But don’t let it bother you.”

“He live with you?”

“No. He’s got his own place up in Bayside. A motorboat he likes to take out on the water too. He and Marco would probably go to sea on the thing if they could get away with it.”

“Call of the wild,” I said.

“Right. Like we ain’t got enough wild happening around here already.”

She turned to the children. “Kids, you go on and get washed up now for dinner. Mr. Pavlicek and Nicole and I will be inside in a few minutes.”

The two kids followed after Carl and the screen door slammed behind them.

“I just remembered something. Don’t know how it slipped my mind,” Darla said when they were out of sight.

“What’s that?” I said.

She stared at me for a moment as she pulled her oversized handbag off her shoulder and started walking back toward the van. “Come on, I’ll show you.”

We followed her around to the rear of the vehicle away from the house where she lifted up the hatch. There in the back was a gray canvas bag. She unzipped the bag and lifted two jet black mini-Glocks from inside, a couple of clips of ammunition as well.

“How did you—?”

“Called a judge I know. Man owed me a really big favor. I got him to sign the paperwork for an emergency authorization.”

“On a weekend no less. All legal and everything. What did you do after that, break into the registration office?”

“Nope. Actually, I took care of the judge and the registration business yesterday before you two ever showed up. After the threat on my voice mail, I had a bad feeling this thing could turn ugly and I didn’t know whether you people would be carrying or not.”

“So you were just testing me earlier.”

She offered me a sheepish grin. “Pretty much.”

The plan called for dinner with Darla and her family, then some rest at her place before heading back into the city to spend a few midnight hours in the park. Darla said she’d decided to come with us, at least for the first go round. Carl had volunteered to baby sit a little while longer until Darla’s sister showed up. The sister would take the children back with her to Pennsylvania the following morning.

Marco took the news of the impromptu vacation stoically, but Sweetness made it tearfully clear she didn’t want to leave.

“But we’ll miss the fireworks, Mommy.”

“Oh, they have nice fireworks out at your Aunt Veronica’s house too, darling. You wait and see.”

“But you won’t be there with us.”

“Mommy’s got to go to work on an important job. But I’ll come out and get you both and bring you back as soon as I’m done. Probably just a few days, that’s all.”

An hour later, after dessert and coffee, Carl retreated to the family room where he sat alone nursing a Budweiser and watching the news. The kids hung around long enough for dessert, but beat a hasty retreat too when the grown-up talk grew too boring. Sounds from a video game echoed down the stairwell.