For Hannibal it was the start of a typical workday, if there was such a thing. There was a limit to the kinds of trouble people got into, so there were only so many ways for Hannibal to earn his living. Some days, he provided physical protection for someone. Like his last case, that was mostly waiting for something to happen. Some days he delivered messages his client could not deliver themselves, usually backing the message up with violence. That kind of trouble most often ended quickly. Hannibal’s time in the secret service had prepared him well for those assignments.
The rest of his workdays were what he called legwork days. That meant doing the drudgework he hated, pursuing leads to find something or someone. His days with the New York police department had prepared him for those days.
After a good long run to clear his head and a frozen waffle breakfast, he brewed a fresh pot of coffee and worked the telephone for a couple of hours. He didn’t tell Anita, but she had actually given him a pretty good lead on Rod. The car he drove was a very special customization. Whoever did that work would remember it. And people who do that kind of thing know each other. One call to an auto customizer led to another, on a telephone trail that seemed to move farther and farther west, until he got the comment he was waiting for.
“Mister, only one man on the east coast could have pulled off a chop job like that one.”
Hannibal stepped out of his building just before eleven o’clock, pushing his sunglasses into place. A shout from up the block got his attention as he reached for his car door handle. Monte Washington was marching toward him. As always, Hannibal stifled his reaction to middle school fashion. Hannibal was sure Monte’s jeans were below his narrow butt, and he wondered what kept them from falling off.
“Dude! I been wanting to talk to you,” Monte said. His hair was in tight cornrow braids these days, and his chocolate complexion darkened by the summer sun. “You gotta tell me what it was like, hanging with Huge Wilson. Did you meet Missy and Timberland? And I know he got all the fly honeys, but did he share?”
“I was working, Monte. I wasn’t focused on the honeys,” Hannibal said. Was Timberland a person? Hannibal thought it was a brand of boots. “And I’ve been wanting to talk to you too, after the last time I spoke with your grandmother.” Monte was the first person in the neighborhood to speak to Hannibal when he first arrived. Much of his drive to keep drug dealers out of the area stemmed from his concern for this one young man and the grandmother who was raising him. For Hannibal, Monte symbolized the promise of the future.
“What’s Grandma been telling you now?” Monte asked, sliding his portable CD player’s headphones on.
“She told me about your final report card this year,” Hannibal said. “I’m not happy. We had a deal.”
“It wasn’t all that bad, bro.”
“You can do better,” Hannibal said. “And I wonder if you’ve been reading this summer like you said you would.”
“You want me to waste my time with my head in a book?” Monte asked with a grin. “Maybe we need to hook up a new deal.”
Hannibal turned to lean back against his car. He had the feeling he had stepped into a well concealed bear trap. “What do you have in mind, you little hustler?”
“I know you didn’t realize what a great opportunity you just passed up,” Monte said, padding around in what Hannibal thought were Timberlands. “But since you made the connection, well, you could introduce me to Huge.”
“I could.” Hannibal looked around his block, smelling the eternal heat of the city and feeling the summer slipping away like Monte’s chances at success. Did he realize that he was in a race, and that some of his peers were already running? “But that’s a tall order. I think a meeting like that, under positive circumstances, would be worth, let’s say a book every two weeks, through the summer, and maybe the same deal after school starts.”
“What?” Monte back-pedaled. “You don’t want me to have no life at all?”
“Well, if it’s not worth it to you,” Hannibal turned and pulled the handle of his car door.
“Okay, okay, but for that deal, I got to have five minutes alone with the brother, so I can get him to listen to some of my rhyming,” Monte said. “I could be his next big thing, you know?”
“Sure, Monte. Now listen, I got work to do. And you better get to the library and find something good because I’ll hook you up with Huge before the end of next week.”
Before his conversation with Monte faded from his mind, Hannibal was cruising down I-295, watching for the exit to the Beltway that would point him toward Maryland. The nearest mechanic who would admit to being able to perform the kind of automotive surgery needed to create Rod’s car lived across the Potomac in the Southern Maryland county of St. Mary’s. It was the same man who had been identified by his peers during Hannibal’s telephone investigation.
Hannibal still marveled at how abruptly his urban environment faded to a rural setting. The city feeling dropped away within twenty minutes of driving, when he turned onto Maryland’s Route 5 and headed south toward Mechanicsville. He spent a lot of time alone with the Tornado, and he knew just where on the RPM scale she would settle into a smooth and steady cruise. This was the speed at which his Volvo was happiest, and once he hit it he liked to settle back and enjoy the scenery moving past him. At these times he enjoyed his favorite guilty pleasure, the classic rock music that always made him feel so good. None of his friends could really appreciate the Lynrd Skynrd album thumping in his CD player right then, but he was sure the people who lived on either side of the road he was cruising down would love it.
His head was still bobbing when he turned off the highway, and again onto an even smaller road. He slowed to a crawl to drive over the ruts and potholes, eventually moving onto a road barely wide enough to accommodate two cars passing. Willows lined the road, leaning far enough over to occasionally brush the Tornado’s white roof. Just as he was beginning to doubt the accuracy of his directions, Hannibal saw four single-story buildings. One looked as if it might hold an office, while the others were clearly garages and work areas.
The pit bull snarling at him at the end of a short chain marked this as rural white territory. Sarge called these people SMIBs, an unflattering acronym for Southern Maryland In-Breds. Of course, Hannibal had been in Black-owned junkyards with a very similar look except that for some reason, the brothers always had rottweillers or Doberman pinschers chained to their gates.
Hannibal sat for a moment, parked in front of a row of vintage cars, and partial cars. He allowed himself those few seconds to decide on the best approach to get the information he needed. Despite the barking dog, no one came outside to meet him, so in his own time he opened his door and stepped out. The car’s air-conditioned atmosphere puffed out with him and evaporated, allowing the heat of the day to wrap around him like a soft blanket. The humidity fogged his Oakley’s for a second. The smell of oil or transmission fluid was tainted with the odor that rises when someone who chews tobacco has spit in the same place too many times. He looked down to see dust rise from the hard packed dirt surface and settle on his previously glistening shoes. On an impulse, he pulled his gloves off, dropped them on the seat, shut the door and headed inside.
Ten steps later Hannibal opened the door of the first cinder block building. He knew right away why no one had stepped out. A loud compressor was keeping that room ice cold. He saw everything he expected to see there: a parts manual open on a wooden counter, vinyl chairs on the customer side, a Coke machine in the corner, barely clad models on the calendar on the opposite wall, and a hard-skinned, smiling white man standing behind the counter.
“Morning,” the man said. “What can I do you for today? You looking for a car, or you want some work done on that 850 GLT outside?”
Hannibal held his hand out for a shake, and got it. “I’m Hannibal Jones, and I’m betting you’re Clarence Nash.” Nash was in his early fifties, with silver hair and a beard that had simply grown as far as it wanted to and stopped. He wore overalls, but his hands were clean and his shake was firm. Hannibal’s research told him that this man was a mechanic, an artist and a salesman. He figured he could probably get away with a direct approach with the man, if he sprinkled it with a bit of flattery.
Nash took Hannibal in with one broad glance, and there seemed to be a great deal of activity going on behind his face. “I’m Nash, but folks here about generally call me Van. And I’m thinking maybe you ain’t here about no car. Hardly anybody comes here in a suit, and you ain’t no Marylander anyhow. You ain’t with the IRS, is you?”
“No kind of law, although I do have some experience in that area,” Hannibal said. “I’m private now, just trying to help a client find an old friend. I don’t have too many leads, but I think this guy was a customer of yours.”
Nash stared idly out the window toward the sound of a power sander being used in one of the garages out back. “Well, son, I’ve had a lot of customers in the last couple of years, and I don’t keep real good records here.”
Hannibal leaned an elbow on the counter while he slid his hand into his pocket. “I understand sir. This is rather an odd request. But you must keep some sort of records and I have been authorized to pay you for your time checking them. Of course if my information is right, you’ll remember this fellow. I’m told you’re the only man alive who could have built his car. Corvette in front, Cadillac in back. Sound familiar?”
While he talked, Hannibal watched Nash’s face move from suspicion to irritation to offense and finally to what looked like disgust. For a moment he feared he had miscalculated the best way to approach this man.
“Oh, that asshole,” Nash said, his eyes rolling skyward. “Well, if your client really is a friend of his, you ought to get a better class of client. But I’m betting the real reason you’re trying to find him is because he welshed on a bet or screwed your client’s old lady. Right?”
“Well, something like that,” Hannibal said. “He stole something from a lady and I’m trying to recover it.”
“Yeah, that figures,” Nash said, turning to rummage through a stack of thick binders. “Always talked about women like they was trash. I’ll never forget that guy. One of them pretty-boy weightlifters with squinty little eyes and hands like a gorilla’s paws. And the job, Jesus what a job.”
“You mean the car?”
Nash returned to the counter and slammed a big binder down on it to accent his words. “Damn straight. You know how the sixty-eight ‘Vette had that crease on the side of the front quarter panel and the doors?”
“I have to admit I don’t know much about old cars.”
“Well, they had a crease along them, horizontally, see?” Nash talked while he flipped through blue, perforated pages. “Ran down the side. So when I cut the body in half…”
“You cut the car in half?”
“Such a beauty too,” Nash said, shaking his head. “But, yeah, he only wanted the front part, before the doors. Just back to the windshield. Then I had to reform the fiberglass on the sides, to make it match up when I mounted it on the El Dorado. That meant cutting the front off that beautiful nineteen fifty-nine Caddy. It’s what he wanted, and he paid big money for it too, but believe me, driving that thing must be a bitch.”
“My client said he called it a Corvorado,” Hannibal said. “Why would a guy want to do that?”
“Why?” Nash looked up, surprised. “Boy, you’re talking about driving the biggest, flashiest thing on the road. The ‘Vette’s all nose, and that El Dorado was all ass, so you end up with this long, racy, high powered bitch that can haul ass while it’s hauling you and a half dozen of your best friends. And with the fiberglass nose making her tail heavy, I bet you she’s a hell of a street racer. And he could take care of her.”
“Meaning?”
Nash looked up again, surprised. “Meaning that he knew the machine. Think he must have been quite a shade tree mechanic, something you city boys wouldn’t know nothing about. Hell of a driver too. I rode with him on her shakedown drive. Ah, here he is. Rod Mantooth.”
“You sound a little like you admired him,” Hannibal said, staring down at the receipt in Nash’s book.
“No sir, he was a genuine son of a bitch,” Nash said, looking as if he was about to spit. “Had a hateful word for anybody you could name, and thought he was God’s gift to the world. Never seen a man swagger like that, except on TV on the wrestling shows. And the way he talked about the ladies. Damn.”
Hannibal smiled a bit. It was getting easier and easier to hate this Mantooth guy. “Sounds like I want to watch my back when I find him. But I guess he made an impression on you. Can you give me a description?”
Nash’s lower lip pushed forward, and his eyes went up and to his left as he searched his brain. “Five-ten, maybe, but he had to be pushing two hundred pounds and solid as an old oak. Black hair, and black eyes that were, I don’t know, kind of cold, you know? Kind of dark skin, too. Not like you, I mean like spics or Italians get. Real hairy arms too. And kind of a craggy face, although I bet women go for him.”
Hannibal assembled a picture in his mind, much as a police sketch artist might. He would consult it later if he thought he had the man in his sights. “I’m picturing loud, short sleeve shirts, jeans and cowboy boots.”
Nash snapped back. “How’d you know that? Well, it’s just the kind of stuff he always had on. He’s sure not from around here. He might have been a wannabe surfer dude but from that accent I’d bet he’s an Alabama boy. You know, the kind that barely get through fifth grade and learn about loving from their sister.”
Hannibal nodded that he got the idea, all the while marveling at the way some rednecks can put other rednecks down. At least he had Nash on his side. He pointed at the receipt again. “So, do you have a copy of his check? I might be able to trace him through his bank.”
“Don’t really know much about this business, do you?” Nash asked, scratching himself in a way that made Hannibal uncomfortable. “Don’t see many checks in this business. But most of my customers don’t pay in crisp, brand new hundred dollar bills.”
Hannibal’s face revealed nothing, but that news hit him like an unexpected punch. Lots of money probably meant that Mantooth had already sold whatever information he found at Anita’s home. But maybe, if Hannibal found him soon enough, he could at least recoup some of the money he had received for it.
“Okay, you clearly didn’t trust this guy. I’m betting you made him give you an address.”
Nash grinned, flashing tobacco-stained teeth. “Sure did. He was living good, too. Had him a room at the Hilton in Washington. He didn’t belong in no decent hotel but, I guess in one way them hotel boys is just like me. They take care of you as long as your money’s green. Maybe he’s even still there. I sure hope you catch up with that son of a bitch. And I hope when you do, you kick his ass.”
The second he had the Volvo started, Hannibal cranked the air conditioning up to maximum. Pulling out of Nash’s yard his uppermost thought was how much dust he had stirred up and how much of it had settled onto The Tornado’s hood. He would have to run through a car wash before the day was out.
By the time he reached Route 5 his mind had returned to his case. He turned the fan down to its lowest setting and pushed buttons on his car phone. The robotic voice of an operator informed him that there were ten Hilton Hotels in the Capital area, but he was only interested in the four technically in Washington. With the Maryland countryside flowing past in an endless wave of green, he called the first hotel.
Hannibal’s years as a policeman in New York had taught him how to act like a cop, but one of the less obvious things he had learned in the Secret Service was how to sound like a cop. There is a tone, a pace, an approach to asking questions that people recognize as official. Using the right amount of authority, Hannibal was able to get three hotels to confirm that they had not had a guest named Rod, Roderick or Roger Mantooth in the appropriate timeframe. The fourth Hilton explained that they could not divulge that kind of information over the telephone. Hannibal thanked them and drove on, now knowing where Rod had stayed.
The final phone call ended just as Hannibal was merging onto the Beltway, turning his CD player back up, and noticing the gray Ford in his rearview mirror. Traffic on I-495 was light at this time of the morning, but moving quickly. He wouldn’t be on that road five minutes at this pace, so he stayed in the right lane. ZZ Top’s raucous white-boy blues slammed out of his four-speaker system, informing him that “Jesus Just Left Chicago.” Mouthing the words along with the music, he focused on the vehicle three cars back in his mirror.
The flat gray Ford Fairmont was as close to nondescript as a car could be. Boxy but not too big or small, it would be the perfect tail car, if someone wanted to follow someone else. Nothing distinguished it from the mass of Detroit molded metal on the road that morning. Nothing except familiarity. Hannibal was almost sure he’d seen this car behind him just before he reached Route 5, half an hour ago. Of course, it might not be the same car. Even if it was, there was nothing so strange about another driver taking the best route from the Eastern Shore to the District. Still…
A Land Cruiser was slowly sliding past Hannibal on his left. To Hannibal, nobody needed a vehicle that size unless they were entering a demolition derby. A Voyager trailed it by a little more than a car length, its driver’s attention divided by four children bouncing in the seats behind her. Hadn’t they heard about seat belts in that household? Well, maybe he would give them a reminder.
A slow smile spread across Hannibal’s face and he was singing along with the music under his breath. As he and the band reached the chorus, “Beer drinkers, yeah, hell raisers,” Hannibal released his accelerator to let his Volvo drift back so that the four wheel drive Cruiser was completely past him.
“Let’s do it, Tornado,” he muttered between lyrics. Watching his mirrors closely, he slapped the shifter down into second gear and made a sharp slide to his left. Chauffeur Mom slammed her brakes and Hannibal moved through the space and directly into the third lane. The woman was yelling at her charges, who had flown all about the inside of the van. Hannibal could spare only a sliver of attention to the kids buckling up, because he was watching the Ford, which also jogged hard left. It paused in the middle lane for a moment before moving over to the third and settling in three cars behind Hannibal.
“Well, I guess that settles that,” Hannibal said. But already his exit was coming up — exit 2B, leading to that little stretch of I-295 that would take him to Maine Avenue downtown. Pressing the accelerator to the floor, Hannibal felt his engine move comfortably into overdrive as he pulled the steering wheel to dive in front of the Land Cruiser. Again he slid across two lanes of traffic to dart onto the exit ramp, and then downshifted as his car leaned into the sharp right curve. His tires made a small squeal of protest, but only for a second. When he slotted into traffic between two other skillful and determined drivers, there was no gray Fairmont in his rearview mirror. And from there, no one could guess where in Washington he may be headed. Hilton hotels were not among Hannibal’s usual haunts.
When Hannibal stepped out of the elevator in Cindy’s building he saw that the sign on the door had finally been changed. “Niesewand and Baylor” had lost its senior partner shortly after Gabriel Niesewand went to prison for his involvement in a conspiracy to defraud a wealthy client, and the murder he committed trying to keep that conspiracy a secret. Hannibal had something to do with that conviction. Now the sign read “Baylor, Truman and Ray.”
"And Tinker to Evers to Chance," Hannibal thought, reminded of the famous triple play. However, moving those other two partners onto the firm’s masthead did put Cindy a step or two closer to full partnership some day soon. Her star was rising very quickly indeed.
Like any major law firm, this one had its gatekeepers, but they all knew Hannibal and hardly raised their heads as he entered the office. When he did get someone’s attention, he just pointed at Cindy’s door and smiled.
“No one this morning,” the receptionist said, meaning that Cindy had no appointments. Nodding thanks, Hannibal pushed Cindy’s door open and stepped quietly inside.
Not a corner office yet, he reflected, but still quite an impressive space for a young associate. Her desk was covered with papers, books, and small sheets containing her hastily scribbled notes. Tastefully decorated he thought, with a lovely, subtle fragrance from the bowl of floating violets on a side table.
Cindy herself was nowhere to be seen, so he dropped into the visitor’s chair closest to her desk. While he waited he picked up one of the firm’s brochures, curious to see what else had changed since Niesewand’s departure. He saw now that the firm specialized in “Emerging Business, Technology and E-Commerce (EBTEC).” Must everything have an acronym, he wondered? “At Baylor, Truman and Ray we recognize that fast-moving businesses have special needs. We have assembled a multidisciplinary team of attorneys to serve those needs — including attorneys with backgrounds in the intellectual property, securities, corporate, real estate, land use, telecommunications, environmental, labor and litigation practice areas…”
Hannibal wasn’t sure how you could use the word “specialize” with a collection of areas like that, but there was pride attached to the fact that his woman, Cindy Santiago, represented the “securities” part of that list for emerging businesses. What would his brochure say, if he had one? “Hannibal Jones recognizes that life is hard and unfair. He specializes in helping people who are in trouble and need help to get out of it.” Not so impressive, he thought, but it did sound more like real work.
Cindy rushed into her office in a navy blue suit and heels. She froze when she saw Hannibal, delight dancing in her dark eyes. Her arms were filled with large bound volumes of legal precedent, and she clutched a pencil between her teeth. One long strand of hair had worked loose and hung down to tickle the tip of her pert Latin nose.
“Now here’s a lovely surprise,” she said, once she had dropped the books on her desk and pulled the pencil free of her mouth. Hannibal stood and they shared a brief but warm embraced, ending the hug with a quick kiss. “Just in the neighborhood?”
“Actually, my current case brought me nearby, and I thought you might like to run out for a late lunch. Or have you eaten, already?”
“Oh heavens no. In fact, I really can’t get away today. Do you want me to order something in? We can eat right here while I get some of this research done.”
Not exactly what Hannibal had in mind, but he said, “Sure, that sounds great. If I can use your computer for a minute.”
“Help yourself,” Cindy said, rolling her chair a little out from her desk. Hannibal pushed the visitor chair over beside her and tapped the keys while she spoke into her intercom. The two quickly became immersed in their own tasks and sat in a comfortable silence until a young lady who may have been hired for her cuteness laid food on Cindy’s desk and withdrew without a word. Cindy put her notebook down and corralled her soup and salad. Hannibal leaned back and began unwrapping his hot pastrami on rye.
“Well, this is kind of cozy,” Cindy said. “So tell me how this new case is starting out. Missing person, right?”
“Well, sort of,” Hannibal said after his first bite. The meat was hot and fresh, with a generous slathering of sharp, stone-ground mustard. Perfect. He sipped from his lemonade to clear his mouth. “The guy apparently stole something from a young girl he was staying with. I found out he had a suite at the Capital Hilton over on 16th Street right after he left the girl.”
“What did he steal?” Cindy asked. “That’s one of the most expensive places in the City. Certainly the most expensive of the Hiltons.”
“Well that’s just it,” Hannibal said, tracking mustard down his thumb with his tongue. “We don’t know what he stole, but it does sound like he’s already sold it, doesn’t it? Anyway, he was only at the Hilton for a week. I think he found a new mark pretty quickly.”
“Okay, so you got a forwarding address, right?”
“You could be a detective,” Hannibal said. “Actually, he left both a previous and a forwarding address, one in Denver, the other in Miami. But as I just confirmed with on-line mapping services, neither address actually exists.”
“Okay, so he’s somebody who’s used to keeping a low profile. Where do you go from here?”
“From here I go back to the victim for more background info. But enough about my day. How’s that DPO going?”
“Spectacular,” Cindy said, pushing her fork around to gather the last of the dressing from her salad bowl. “I was just putting together a presentation for some new potential investors.”
“I thought this was a great investment. Do you have to sell it?”
Cindy shook her head, still smiling. “My poor investment-ignorant Hannibal. One of the biggest problems with DPOs is the lack of a secondary market to trade these securities in. I mean, unlike shares of say, TRW or IBM that change hands by the millions every day on the New York Stock Exchange, the stock of DPO companies is kind of illiquid.”
“Meaning it’s hard to sell,” Hannibal said.
“Well, yeah. There are sales restrictions, and they’re not on an exchange so, yeah, we have to sell them.” She stood, smoothed her skirt, and leaned over for another kiss. “You know, lunch was nice, but I owe you a real, home cooked meal. I’m thinking pollo con quimbobo y platanos with some black beans and rice.”
“Okay, pollo is chicken, right?” Hannibal stared into her eyes with both hands on her waist, gently tugging, trying to drop her onto his lap. “That does sound good. Tonight around eight? That would give me time to straighten up.”
Her eyes broke from his as conflict flashed across her face. “I’ve got a lot to do here, baby. Not sure how I can swing it tonight.”
“Yes, I know, you’re ever so busy. But tell me this: when will be a better time? When will you not be busy?”
At the gentle urging of Hannibal’s hands on her waist, Cindy lowered herself onto his knees, wrapping an arm around his shoulders and brushing his nose with her own.
“Yeah, I guess you’re right. Okay. Dinner tonight, at your place. My man comes first.”
“That’s what I like to hear,” Hannibal said in a very soft voice, “and maybe I’ll have a little surprise for you then. Of course, if something comes up…”
“No, I absolutely promise.” Cindy’s mouth pouted and she batted her seductive eyelashes. “I would never want to disappoint my honey. If I don’t come through…”
“If you don’t then you get a spanking,” Hannibal said, wagging a finger at her.
“Oh?” Cindy said, turning her face to look at him out of the corner of her eyes. “Do YOU promise?”
It was close to three o’clock when Hannibal again parked in front of Anita’s home. He noticed that her lawn was turning brown, partially from being cut too short. Sometimes a person can pay too much attention to some jobs and do more harm than good. He imagined this girl polishing the finish off furniture too, or destroying clothes by washing them too often.
Anita opened the door before he could ring the bell. “It’s good to see you again,” she said. “Have you solved it all so quickly? Found Rod and brought back whatever he took away?”
“Not quite.” Hannibal stepped into her sterile front room. “Thank you for meeting me here. I’m glad your schedule is so flexible.”
“Oh, I have a full day’s work but I always start early and finish early,” Anita said with evident pride. “So please, have a seat and tell me what you’ve learned. Coffee?”
Hannibal continued to stand at the counter separating the kitchen from the living room. “Sure, coffee’s fine. I wanted to tell you where we are with the investigation. First of all, your friend Rod will not be easy to find. He’s covering his tracks pretty well, using false addresses and so forth. So I’ve decided to approach this from two different directions. First, I’m afraid I’ll need to question this LaPage woman. You said you saw Rod coming out of her house.”
He watched Anita nod as she fussed about the kitchen. She was dumping out the coffee she had brewed for herself, making him a fresh pot. “Mr. Blair might not like that. They’re neighbors and I think they belong to some of the same associations and such.”
“I’ll check with him,” Hannibal said. “The other best chance is to figure out what your father left here that anyone would want to steal. He must have told Rod about his treasure. People get lonely in prison, and sometimes that makes them talkative. Maybe he really did expect the man to come here and protect you. In any case, I think it must have been something he took away from work, maybe insider trading information or pharmaceutical trade secrets.”
“I don’t think Daddy would do anything like that,” Anita said as she poured freshly filtered water into the back of her coffee maker.
“Even so, I think I need to talk to some of the people he worked with.”
Anita paused for a moment in the middle of measuring scoops of coffee. “I’m afraid I don’t know any of the people Daddy worked with.”
“I see. Well, I might find some leads in his office, if I can poke around in there a little more.”
“Of course,” Anita said. “Whatever might help. Say, I’ve got some corn muffins here. Why don’t you go ahead to the study and when everything’s ready I’ll bring a tray down to you.”
Walking down the carpeted steps to the office, Hannibal was shaking his head, silently admitting that Anita’s subservient attitude was starting to irritate him. But then, if the girl had shown a bit more backbone, this Rod would never have been able to take advantage of her as he did. Hannibal always thought all women raised by men would be more like Cindy, who spent her formative years with just her father. Perhaps Anita was looking for a replacement for her lost father when Rod appeared on the scene. If so, he must have enjoyed being taken care of and catered to in a way Hannibal never would.
While one part of his mind toyed with that personality puzzle, the rest of it explored the office, searching for some evidence that Anita’s father had connections with anyone else at Isermann — Borner. Nothing on the desk or any of its cubbyholes yielded a clue. He leafed quickly through the books on the dust-free shelves. It didn’t take long to ascertain that Mr. Cooper never made personal references.
Letters? Memos? Hannibal turned his attention to the gray metal filing cabinet in the corner. He yanked at the handle. Locked. Well, that was a good sign. Maybe there was something inside worth hiding. Not wanting to wait for Anita, Hannibal drew a small plastic kit from an inside jacket pocket. The case was about the size of a credit card and no thicker than a computer floppy disc. From it he drew two slender bits of spring steel. He slid the metal slivers into the filing cabinet’s lock and five seconds later, pulled the top drawer open.
The file folders were all neatly labeled, and most of the labels meant nothing to Hannibal. Chemical compounds, he guessed, or abbreviations for them, except for the folder at the very back whose label read, “rules.” Curiosity drew his hand toward it, then past it. In the dark in the back of the drawer a sparkle had caught his eye. It was the glint of metal on what appeared to be a leather strap.
Hannibal pulled the unexpected object from the drawer. A dog’s collar, he thought, but for a good sized animal. It was a simple black leather strap about fourteen or fifteen inches long, with a square silver buckle. Odd that the collar would be locked in a file cabinet, he thought, and stranger still that he had seen no evidence of a dog or even a cat in the house. He had seen no food, water bowl, pet toys, or any of the usual telltale signs.
The collar made him curious, but didn’t seem relevant to his investigation. Idly, he pulled the “rules” folder out with his free hand, dropped it on top of the filing cabinet, and flipped it open. It appeared to contain only five or six sheets of paper, with several lines handwritten in a very fine and precise script, with gold ink. Not a man’s hand, more likely Anita’s. The hair on the back of Hannibal’s neck rose to attention as he scanned the first few numbered lines.
#1. I worship my Master.
#2. I worship my Master’s body.
#3. I will serve, obey and please my Master.
The numbers went up to ninety, but that was enough for him. Hannibal flipped the folder closed and just managed to get it back where he found it when he heard a gasp behind him, followed by another sound, like a partial sob. He turned to see Anita, her mouth open and her face flushed bright crimson. Her eyes darted left and right, as if she would run off if not for the tray she was holding. The tray held a coffee pot, cup, sugar and creamer set, and a plate of muffins. After a moment of paralysis, she appeared to buckle at the knees. Hannibal moved to help her, but she carefully placed the tray onto a chair and knelt in front of it, facing down at the tray as if the empty cup was endlessly fascinating. Hannibal suddenly felt like an intruder. He also felt very slow, having not realized at first that the object in his hand was a symbol of shame for the woman he was trying to help.
“This is yours,” he said slowly, before realizing how pointless that comment was.
Anita squeezed her knees with her hands, and nodded her head.
Hannibal was treading into unfamiliar waters, but some things seemed to string together. “Rod?”
Her head moved up and down again, and he saw a tear drop to her skirt.
“Please,” he said aloud, “please stand up.” In his mind he was screaming, “For God’s sake, get off your knees.”
Anita rose and turned to face him with unexpected grace. She seemed to be staring at his navel, but for the firs time Hannibal wondered if her downcast gaze was the result of shame or training. He let the silence hang, quite sure that she knew the questions that needed answers. When at last she spoke it was in a voice so well controlled that it surprised him.
“When Rod got here my life had no direction, no purpose. I had dedicated much of my life to my father, and he to me. When he died I had nothing. No one. Life just happened to me. It was all spinning out of control. Rod, he explained my purpose, gave me a role in life. Mostly he was good to me. Gave me direction and trained me.”
“Trained you?” Hannibal’s stomach twisted tight, like a knotted dishrag. “To do what, to be his servant, his slave?”
Silent tears began to slide down Anita’s face. “I needed guidance. He showed me how to behave and what to do.”
The water on Hannibal’s skin wasn’t tears, but sweat, sending a chill up his spine. “Did he,” no easy way to ask, he decided. “Did he beat you?”
“He didn’t want to,” she said. “Only when I made him do it. Only when I was bad. Or if I wasn’t learning.”
Hannibal suddenly remembered the collar in his hand, black leather that matched his glove. He dropped it on the filing cabinet. “Learning what, I wonder,” he said, mostly to himself.
Anita’s tears flowed more freely and she gave a soft sob before answering this time. “He made me do things. Things I never did before. But it made him happy for me to do these things and I needed to learn the joy of making him happy.”
She sounded as if she was giving a memorized speech. Hannibal’s hands trembled with rage and he clenched his fists to stop them. She stood still, as if waiting for something. His reaction? Condemnation? Her next order?
Hannibal reached slowly forward, to place his hands lightly on her shoulders. “Look at me.” No reaction. He raised his left hand to whip his glasses off. She flinched when his hand moved. He pointed to his own eyes. “Look at me.”
Anita raised her face slowly, as if fighting against some invisible hand pressing down on her head. When she made eye contact, Hannibal thought he could see all the way down into her fractured soul. He clenched his teeth, but it did not stop his breath from hissing through them.
“Listen to me. I know this man did things that damaged your spirit, maybe some things you’re very ashamed of. But none of this is your fault. You hear me? This man turned you, twisted you in ways you couldn’t possibly defend against. But believe me, I will find him, and I will make sure he pays you back for everything he took from you. I swear to you he will pay.”
Anita broke down completely, crying aloud, her face twisted into that mask that looks so much like laughing if you could turn off the sound. Sobs rocked her body and she leaned close enough for her tears to dampen Hannibal’s shirt.
“Please,” she gasped out, in rhythm with her crying, “Please, sir. Please don’t hurt him.”