Margaret Truman's Experiment in Murder Page 25

  So it wasn’t that Puhlman now had less belief in the project and his involvement in it that caused him concern. What nagged at him was the fact that too many people knew about it. He wasn’t worried about the CIA. After all, this rogue use of Borger’s techniques was blessed by Colin Landow, who held an important position in the agency. Should Itani be successful in assassinating Mortinson, the agency had the means to cover up their involvement at every level.

  Borger, Puhlman knew, wasn’t at all concerned about having Itani traced back to his house. He’d treated him for headaches, pure and simple, and would express shock that this nice young man had turned out to be a killer. Itani’s amnesia would remain solid. No, it was the money men bankrolling the assassination who worried Puhlman. How many were there? Could they all be trusted to keep their mouths shut? Perhaps the biggest cause of Puhlman’s recent sleeplessness was Itani’s murder of Elena. Borger was confident that her body would never be found, and that even if it were, she couldn’t be traced back to him. Was he right? Having the CIA back you was one thing; covering up the murder of a young woman at your house was another. If her body was discovered, it would become a matter for local law enforcement, whose mission was solving crimes, especially murder.

  He could only hope that everything would go as planned. He and Gibbons had traveled to Washington under false names and would return to San Francisco without anyone even knowing that they’d been there. Borger had said that he intended to shut down the experiments and that he would compensate Puhlman handsomely. “Just a few more days,” Puhlman told himself over and over. “Just a few more days.”

  * * *

  A tired Nic Tatum got off the red-eye from San Francisco and went directly home, where he called Cindy.

  “How did it go?” she asked.

  “It didn’t go at all,” he replied. “I don’t know why I even bothered making the trip. I never made contact with Borger, and got the brush-off at the clinic he runs. On top of that I almost got arrested for parking at night outside Borger’s mansion. I left messages for him at his clinic and on his answering machine. He was either away—although I saw someone in the house—or decided not to answer the calls. Either way, the trip was a bust.”

  “But at least you tried.”

  “A for effort, huh? I feel like a jerk.”

  “Don’t. I’m glad you’re back. I really want to go with Mr. and Mrs. Smith to the Mortinson rally.”

  “Sure. Whatever you say. Mortinson’s a shoo-in huh?”

  “Looks that way. Welcome back. Dinner tonight?”

  “Sounds good to me after I get in a nap. Love you.”

  She smiled as she ended the call. It was only recently that he said that he loved her.

  Things were progressing.

  * * *

  Colin Landow’s office suite at CIA headquarters at Langley was small and tucked in a remote corner of the sprawling building. Only the superior to whom he reported and a select few in the upper echelon were aware of precisely what sort of operation Landow ran. All that was known was that it involved top secret psychological testing and experimental projects, all of it conducted away from the agency and employing nonagency medical and scientific personnel. There were many such low-profile offices and operations within the CIA about which only those directly involved had any knowledge. Added to the CIA’s seemingly unmanageable web of intelligence-gathering apparatus were sixteen federal agencies, each a fiefdom with its own culture, objectives, and funding. It had become too large and unwieldy, its operations wildly diverse and beyond congressional scrutiny and oversight.

  Which was fine with Colin Landow.

  He’d spent the morning reviewing the results of a pain-management experiment that had been conducted in Seattle, which had gone well according to the report. At noon he left the building and drove to a mall in suburban Virginia, where he met with one of two assistants, Bret Lancaster, who’d been recruited by Landow fresh out of Harvard. Landow had been Lancaster’s mentor and protector throughout Lancaster’s eleven years with the agency, and he appreciated what Landow had done for him to the extent that his loyalty to Landow was total. Lancaster was a short, slightly built man with a narrow face pitted from a severe case of teenage acne. His interests aside from working for Landow were limited. Some thought that he was homosexual. In truth he was asexual; his disdain for women was almost pathological. Very much a loner, his life revolved around Colin Landow and the CIA.

  “How did it go?” Landow asked after he and Lancaster had gotten soft drinks from a concession stand and found a picnic table away from others.

  “Fine. I spent time at the building. Koontz from the bureau was there, and we spent time with the Secret Service agent in charge of the event. He’d been made aware that we’d be sending someone, and I told him I’d be there for the event. I and a few bureau agents will be admitted through a separate entrance that doesn’t have scanning equipment. There shouldn’t be any problem. We’ve been cleared.”

  “The location we’ve picked for the drop?”

  “That should work well,” Lancaster said.

  “And you have the weapon.”

  “Yes. It was at the safe house as planned. I’m sure that everything will go smoothly.”

  “Good work, Bret. Our friend has been cleared by the senator’s staff and the Secret Service, and he has the necessary ID tag to be allowed entry. I suggest that after you conceal the weapon, you stay for a portion of the festivities but leave before the main event.”

  “That’s my plan.”

  Landow handed Lancaster an envelope. “I’m sure you’ll find that it’s what we agreed upon.”

  Lancaster thanked him and walked away. Landow left the mall fifteen minutes later and returned to his office, where he considered calling Borger in San Francisco. He decided not to; the less contact with him the better at this late stage of the project. From this point forward, Dr. Sheldon Borger was on his own.

  CHAPTER

  38

  SAN FRANCISCO

  The identity of the body that had floated up in the bay off the airport became known to the authorities not through forensic science but by the deceased’s mother, Mrs. Caroline Marciano of Portland, Oregon.

  “My daughter Elena is always so good about staying in contact with me,” she told the officer who took her call, “but I haven’t heard from her in days. I’m so worried that something has happened to her.”

  The officer put the call through to Detective Duane Woodhouse, whose involvement in the case of the unidentified woman in the bay was common knowledge in the department. When he was told that the woman’s name was Marciano, he immediately came on the line and asked her to describe her daughter. The general description she gave matched that of the body in the morgue. He asked a few more questions, including what her daughter did for a living.

  “She’s a model,” the mother replied. “She’s very beautiful.”

  Woodhouse gave her the address he had for Elena Marciano and asked whether it was the address she had for her daughter.

  Mrs. Marciano immediately sensed that something was wrong. “Why do you know her address?” she asked. “Has something happened to Elena?”

  “It’s possible, ma’am, that your daughter has died.”

  The woman’s gasp caused Woodhouse to wince.

  “We can’t be certain,” he said, “but I would appreciate it if you would come here to San Francisco. That’s the only way we can be sure.”

  “Oh, my God,” she said through gulps of air, “what happened to my baby?”

  “Please, ma’am, we really don’t even know if it is your daughter. The only way we can be sure is if you are willing to … well, if you’ll come here and identify the body.”

  “The body?”

  It was the same response that he’d gotten when he asked Elena’s next-door neighbor, Mrs. Crowley, to come to the morgue. “To look at the body?” she’d wailed. “No, I will not do that.”

  And they had no way of forcing
her to perform that grisly task. The building superintendent, too, had begged off.

  “Yes, ma’am,” Woodhouse said to Mrs. Marciano. “It’s very important that you do this. Do you have a husband who could accompany you?”

  “I did. I mean my husband passed away a little over a year ago. Cancer. His prostate.”

  After hearing more about her deceased husband’s bout with cancer, and a description of the sort of childhood Elena had enjoyed—“a good solid Catholic upbringing”—he convinced her to come to San Francisco and made an appointment to meet with her the following afternoon, possibly with her brother if he could take the time off from his job. He owned and managed a construction company, Woodhouse learned before they ended the call.

  He reported the conversation to his superior. “If it is her daughter,” Woodhouse said, “we’ll need a warrant to enter her apartment.”

  “Not a problem,” his boss said. “So the mother thinks her kid was a model, huh?”

  “Hookers always tell their parents that they’re models,” Woodhouse said. “Kind of sad.”

  “Hopefully she kept a list of her johns.”

  “Hopefully.”

  “And hopefully she wasn’t too successful as a hooker. I’d hate to have to interview a hundred satisfied customers. If she was good at her job and as beautiful as her mother claims, it’ll probably involve some of our better-known upstanding citizens.” He laughed.

  * * *

  Woodhouse was out of sorts when he awoke the next morning, a feeling he usually experienced when having to face the parent of a dead son or daughter. He had two daughters of his own, ages eleven and thirteen, and wondered what it would be like to have a cop waltz you into a morgue and pull back the sheet to reveal your own flesh and blood. That contemplation gave him the creeps, and he worked hard to dismiss it as he went through his day at the Thomas J. Cahill Hall of Justice on Bryant Street until Mrs. Marciano and her brother showed up. The mother was a nice-looking lady, he observed, trim and energetic, plainly but appropriately dressed in a blue skirt and white blouse, and carrying a tan raincoat over her arm. Her brother was a big, rough-looking sort of guy who wore an ill-fitting gray suit, white shirt with a too-tight collar, and a thin red tie; he obviously had dressed for the occasion.

  Mrs. Marciano started crying the moment Woodhouse introduced himself, which prompted the brother, whose name was Anthony, to put his arm around her.

  “I know this is tough,” Woodhouse said, “but it’s necessary.”

  “Before we go and look at the body,” Anthony said, “can you tell us what happened to the person we’re going to see?”

  Woodhouse spared them the grim details, saying only that a young woman approximately the age of the daughter had been found dead out near the airport. But knowing how the days in the water had bloated and disfigured the body, he made reference to it to spare them the shock.

  “Maybe you’d better go alone,” the mother told Anthony through her tears.

  “An ID from either of you will suffice,” Woodhouse assured. “Shall we get it over with?”

  The morgue was located in the same building as Woodhouse’s office. He led them to it, where he informed the medical examiner on duty that they were there to identify the body of the Jane Doe taken from the water. The medical examiner consulted a sheet: “Number six forty-two,” he said and led them to a window overlooking the morgue.

  Woodhouse looked at Mrs. Marciano and her brother.

  “You go, Anthony,” she said.

  He drew a series of deep breaths and announced that he was ready. After giving his sister a reassuring hug, he accompanied Woodhouse and the ME inside to the bay that coincided with the number assigned to the body.

  “Ready?” he asked.

  Woodhouse observed Anthony Marciano and wondered whether he’d have to prop him up. The bigger they are, the harder they fall, the detective was thinking.

  The ME opened the bay and slid out Elena Marciano’s remains. She pulled back the sheet to reveal her face.

  “Jesus!” Anthony said. “It’s her. Elena.”

  “You’re positive?” Woodhouse asked.

  “Yeah, I’m positive,” Anthony said, turning away quickly and heading for the door.

  “Thanks, Doc,” Woodhouse said, following him from the room.

  Anthony simply nodded at his sister, who slumped into a red plastic chair, wept, and muttered prayers.

  They returned to Woodhouse’s office, where his offer of coffee or a cold drink was declined. He elicited from them where they were staying and said that he’d arrange a car to return them to their hotel, adding that he’d need to speak with them the next morning. He also asked the mother whether she had a photograph of her daughter, which she did and handed it to him.

  When they were gone, he informed his boss, who’d already arranged for a warrant to enter and search Elena Marciano’s apartment.

  The superintendent scrutinized the warrant before allowing them access. Woodhouse was accompanied by another detective and two crime scene investigators, who took both still photos and videos of the place. Woodhouse noticed that Elena Marciano was a good housekeeper. The apartment was immaculate, not a piece of paper or a dish out of place. The furnishings were expensive, mostly white leather in the living room and deep white carpeting throughout, except for the bedroom, which differed in its color scheme, the carpet bloodred, the furniture sleek black, and an assortment of pin spots recessed in the ceiling on a series of dimmers. The bed was king-sized and covered in red-and-gold bedding that Woodhouse thought might be Egyptian inspired.

  After a walk-through, Woodhouse settled at a desk in the living room and read entries on a monthly desk calendar. Elena’s penmanship was as neat and precise as her surroundings. Items noted on the calendar consisted mostly of last names, with a time next to them, and in some instances a comment or two. Some names appeared more than once, some even more frequently than that. After handing the calendar to his colleague, Woodhouse went through the desk’s drawers, pulling out anything that might be of use in establishing leads. They included a green leather-bound phone book, envelopes containing sales receipts, a file of paid bills, and a second file that held bills to be paid. There was also a photo album containing color pictures of Elena with various people, including shots of her with her mother and Uncle Anthony. No doubt about it. She was gorgeous.

  Everything from the desk went into evidence bags, along with a digital answering machine whose memory was filled to capacity with incoming messages.

  “There’s no computer,” Woodhouse’s partner commented.

  “Check with the super whether she had a car,” Woodhouse suggested.

  His partner returned a few minutes later. “He says she did have one but sold it six months ago. She rents, according to him, and takes taxis and car services.”

  “All right,” Woodhouse said. He instructed the crime scene techs to dust for prints, especially in the bedroom, bathroom, and any glasses in the dishwasher. He and his partner returned to their offices at 850 Bryant, commonly known as “the hall,” and wrote up their report.

  “If she was a call girl,” his partner commented, “those names on the desk calendar are a good place to start.”

  Woodhouse agreed and checked his watch. “I have to get home, a family thing. See you in the morning.”

  As he reached the door, his partner said, “I’d like to nail the son of a bitch who did this.”

  “With any luck we will.”

  And he hoped that they’d be lucky enough to not need luck.

  CHAPTER

  39

  Sheldon Borger had not been aware that Elena’s body had washed ashore and was now on a slab at the city morgue. But that changed when he opened the paper the following day and read that the original Jane Doe now had a name, Elena Marciano, and that she’d been identified by a family member. The article carried the headline MYSTERY VICTIM NO LONGER A MYSTERY. The writer reported that according to anonymous police sources,
the victim, originally from Portland, Oregon, was thought to have been a high-priced call girl. There were no suspects, but the investigation was ongoing. A photo of the victim taken from the Internet in which Elena appeared to be working at a trade show accompanied the piece. Evidently she had done some modeling at one point in her life.

  Borger had read the newspaper after returning from the airport where he’d driven Sheila Klaus for her return trip to Washington. The sessions with her, and with Carla, had gone smoothly; he was confident that the control he exerted over her was complete and that she would carry out his instructions to the letter.

  “Damn,” he muttered as he slammed the paper down on the desk in his study. He cursed again, this time his invective directed at Puhlman and Gibbons. They’d assured him that the body would remain submerged. I never should have trusted them, he thought. If her body had been properly disposed of, no one would have missed her. After all, she was just a prostitute, he reasoned, probably from a broken home. Who would worry about her disappearance? No one. And if someone did come forward, the police would dismiss his or her concerns. They had bigger, more important things to worry about.

  Borger read the article again.

  Now his wrath turned on Itani. He never should have left him alone with Elena. But how could he have anticipated that the young man would turn on her and do such a thing? He was obviously mentally unbalanced. If Itani was capable of turning his inner anger on someone outside of Borger’s influence, he might do it again before he was turned loose as an assassin.