The Ambitious City (26 page)

“Shhh, the master’s at work,” Williams said.

“That’s right, be quiet.” MacNeice moved the rods about inside the keyhole, listening and feeling. A minute later he stood up, put the rods back in the briefcase pocket, retrieved his camera and closed the Samsonite. “Right. There’ll likely be a security system, so be prepared.” He turned the heavy brass knob.

The door opened and the beeping began. “I’ve got this one,” Williams said, sprinting down the hall and disappearing through the door to the basement. In fifteen seconds the friendly beeps turned into a loud
whurp-whurp-whurp
that continued for another three seconds before it stopped. Williams appeared at the doorway and took a bow.

“I’m not going to ask where you learned how to do that,” Vertesi said.

As they put their gloves on, MacNeice directed Williams back to the basement and Vertesi to the first floor. “I’ll take the second,” he said. “Aziz, you do the third. If and when the security company calls, I’ll answer. Take your time; be neat but thorough. Let’s find out as much as we can about Billie Dance before Forensics arrives.”

What he saw as he searched the second floor filled him with dread—not any specific horror, just the sheer banality leaching through the space and over every surface and object. There were framed images—decades of mother, father, son—that looked more like stock photographs than an authentically happy family of three. The furnishings were expensive and vaguely Edwardian but couldn’t be taken seriously as either antiques or family heirlooms. The place was like a hotel—a hodgepodge of fake respectability.

The house was a showpiece, in which the lives of the family who’d lived there appeared to play as much or as little of a role as a hall chair, or the photo that he imagined had graced the Christmas card from Sterling’s CEO—
From my family to yours. Season’s greetings and a prosperous New Year
. Had he time, MacNeice bet he would find the actual card somewhere in a drawer.

Of the three bedrooms and two baths on the second floor, only the master bedroom looked at all lived in. It still had the parent’s belongings—clothes, shoes, jewellery, brushes, bric-a-brac—and a fine layer of dust to reflect the months during which nothing had been disturbed. The drawers were neatly divided, the top ones hers, the bottom ones his. The contents of the walk-in closet—his clothes on the left, hers on the right—were all tastefully conservative. For him, a row of brown and black dress shoes, two pairs of tennis shoes and one pair of golf shoes. For her, flats, mostly blue, grey, brown and black, and two pairs each of sneakers and tennis shoes—but nothing for golf.

The study, which appeared to be his, had framed photos on almost every surface except the desk. They showed a man giving awards, presumably to individuals who’d met or exceeded their sales targets, and several more of him at company functions wearing a tuxedo and standing next to his wife—a handsome couple. As for the desk itself, nothing; the drawers had been cleared of everything but staplers, pens and pencils, a calculator and several
empty pads or notebooks. The correspondence, bills, cheque-book, legal papers and computer or laptop were gone, if they were ever there.

Certain there was nothing to find, MacNeice headed for the basement. On his way past Vertesi, he asked, “Anything?”

“Zip, zilch, nada. They were serious drinkers, but boring.” Vertesi was opening a drawer in the liquor cabinet. “It’s all like an upscale Howard Johnson’s—executive-level living.” The dining room had a large mahogany table and eight matching chairs; a sideboard filled with expensive stemwear, crystal tumblers and several decanters; and a rolling cart that boasted an array of spirits—heavy on Scotch—mostly half full. Next to the fireplace stood a sleek Bang & Olufsen stereo, with two tower speakers on either side of the front window. A quick scan of the music revealed someone’s passion for male crooners.

Aziz had climbed the stairs to the attic only to find it clean—“Who cleans an attic?” There were a few banker’s boxes of files and two more of awards bearing the father’s name. There were also two boxes of blue Christmas decorations and a trunk that contained what appeared to be Mrs. Dance’s wedding gown and veil lying on a cluster of mothballs. There were no boxes for William Junior—no yearbooks or pennants or school jackets or sports equipment, nothing to indicate that he had actually grown up there.

MacNeice descended the stairs and followed the sound of Williams humming “Amazing Grace.”

“Welcome to the kid’s room,” Williams said when MacNeice appeared. He was holding up a samurai sword. Pointing with it, Williams said, “On that shelf you’ve likely got damn near every samurai movie ever made, and over there—where the oil stain is on the exercise mat—are tools and bits for fixing his bike. The door down the hall leads to the garage. How’s it upstairs?”

“Like nobody lives here anymore.”

“Yeah, well, this was lived in …” Williams said, fanning through the books on the shelves below the videos.

MacNeice scanned the spines. Math, computer science, the science of demography, chess, chaos theory, the Crusades, the Knights Templar, Dungeons and Dragons and a substantial number of video games that appeared to mirror the books’ subject matter.

“It’s
Fantasy Island
for geeks—oh, except for the ever-popular
Mein Kampf
.” Williams handed him the book from the bottom shelf.

MacNeice flipped through the pages, checking the handwritten notes in the margins, the twisted wisdom underlined with shockingly straight lines. The spine of the book told the story—so well worn it was close to breaking. He put it back on the shelf and opened the closet door.

It was a drill sergeant’s dream. Six pant hangers, each with a neatly hung pair of chinos, size 32 long. Next to them, four madras shirts, long-sleeved, in shades of blue, and next to those, eight pale blue button-down cotton shirts. On the shelf above were T-shirts in white, black and dark blue, all neatly folded and stacked. On the floor were several pairs of brown and black penny loafers and two pairs of white Converse high-tops—but no hiking boots.

In the adjoining room there was a large tatami mat and a small shelf with candles, incense and a ceramic Buddha. On the wall was an illustration—front and back—of a nude Chinese male with the pressure points, veins and arteries drawn as if they were surface-mounted on the flesh. MacNeice wondered how Dance squared this side of his personality with
Mein Kampf
.

He backtracked to open the door to an empty garage. There were tire tracks in the dust and old oil stains from an automobile. The garbage bins were empty and tucked neatly along the far side; a robin’s egg–blue bicycle with big fenders and white-walled balloon
tires leaned against one wall. Both tires were flat. Williams came up beside him and peered into the garage.

“Where’s the mother’s car?” MacNeice said.

“She had one?”

“We’re out in the middle of nowhere. She’d have to drive to buy groceries or gin.”

“I’ll get onto Motor Vehicles.”

At 8:17 p.m. the forensics team arrived. MacNeice and Williams stepped into the cool of the evening to find Aziz and Vertesi waiting on the stone path. Aziz held up a small plastic bag. “I picked up some of the mail, but Michael says there’s another stack of it in the dining room.”

“Forensics will bring it in for us,” MacNeice said. Someone cleared his throat off to the left, presumably to get their attention.

“Michael, that’s likely the next-door neighbour, wondering what’s going on over here. Get a statement from him. I’d like to know what kind of relationship William had with his parents and to see if the neighbour has any idea where we’d find him, or whether he knows someone who might.”

Vertesi walked between the trees and vaulted easily over the fieldstone wall. MacNeice carried his briefcase to the Chevy, locked it in the trunk and then stood staring into the woods again. Nothing.

Aziz and Williams soon joined him. “See anything, boss?” Williams asked.

“Just wondering if he was watching us.”

“I thought you were looking for birds,” Aziz said, looking up at him.

MacNeice smiled.

“You think he’d have the balls to do that?” Williams asked.

“I’m certain he would. I’d go so far as to say I thought I could feel him watching us earlier.”

“Well, in that case, let me check it out.” Williams made sure his sidearm was free and took out his Maglite. Stepping over a fallen branch, he sang softly, “If you go down to the woods tonight, you’re in for a big-motherfuckin’ surprise …”

“Straight ahead fifty yards or so, to where the ground falls off into the ravine,” MacNeice directed.

They watched Williams pick his way through underbrush and fallen branches, sweeping his Maglite back and forth. MacNeice wasn’t worried about his being attacked by Dance—even if he was the right colour, he was the wrong gender.

Watching the bright cone of light recede in the distance, Aziz asked, “What did you see in that house?”

“Feel, not see. I can’t define it … a vibe. Strange.” It wasn’t haunted, but the whole house had a sad quality, an absence of love. He had felt it outside, sitting in the garden, and everywhere inside. He could hear Vertesi making his way towards them over the unraked leaves of the mini forest.

“Where’s Montile headed?” Vertesi asked, as he hopped the wall again to rejoin them.

“Just checking. What’d the neighbour say?”

“He was curious, all right. Hadn’t seen the news, but unlike Braithwaite, he always thought the kid was weird. His name is Howard Matheson, a wealth manager. He has no idea where Dance has gone.”

Matheson had described the parents as pleasant but not social; they’d moved in about twelve years before, after Dance retired as CEO of Sterling. He had stayed on as chair of the board, but other than coming in for board meetings, he and his wife spent most of the year up north, leaving the house to their only child.

“At least the guy was honest,” Vertesi said. “He told me he learned much of what he knew about them from their obits.”

“Dance Senior was—what, an actuary?” MacNeice said, watching
as Williams made his way back through the forest towards them.

“How’d you guess?” Vertesi said.

“Dance Junior—extraordinary skills in mathematics and data. Just a guess.”

When Williams emerged from the forest, he switched off the flashlight. “Someone has been there,” he called. “The ground five feet or so below the ridge is torn up. I can’t say whether it was an hour or a day ago, but recently.”

P
ENNIMAN BACKED HIS
twenty-year-old grey Suburban behind the 24/7 pizza stand on the corner and waited. Ten minutes after he had left the bar, two heavies came out of Old Soldiers and climbed on their Harleys. They turned south up the service road, riding slowly side by side. Penniman waited till they were almost out of sight, then followed them. A half-mile later he could see Wenzel walking along the gravel shoulder on the opposite side. Penniman eased onto the shoulder without hitting the brakes and rolled to a stop. He reached into the glove compartment, retrieved an M9 Beretta and snapped in the clip.

Up ahead, the bikers had pulled a U-turn and stopped so that they hemmed Wenzel in. Unsure what to do, the kid backed down into the ditch as if he was going to make a run for the bush. Then, maybe realizing how futile that was, he stopped. Caught between them, he stumbled back onto the shoulder, his hands raised. As the bikers climbed off their machines and came towards him, Penniman
put the truck in gear and moved off the shoulder. When he was within fifty yards, he crossed the road, driving towards them on the gravel shoulder. He stopped as one of the bikers grabbed Wenzel and held him so the other could punch him hard in the face. Wenzel’s nose exploded and blood ran down the kid’s chin. The biker was about to hit him again when Penniman hit the horn. The biker spat in the dirt towards him and threw another punch, to Wenzel’s stomach. Penniman stepped on the gas and rammed the bike then drove over it, grinding the machine under his front wheels. Inside the Suburban it sounded like a beer can being crushed by hand.

The biker holding Wenzel screamed, dropped the kid and rushed towards Penniman, swearing and waving his arms as if he needed oxygen. The second biker headed for his saddlebag, presumably for a weapon.

Stepping out of the Suburban, Penniman pointed his sidearm at the nearest of the bikers and fired a round into the gravel between his legs. Both men stopped dead. Wenzel stumbled to his feet, squatted and puked into the dirt. Groaning, he sat down on the ground, spitting a mixture of blood and vomit.

The one whose bike lay crushed and leaking fuel into the ditch screamed, “You are a fucking dead man! You are so fucking dead!” Up close Penniman could see that both of these men had been sitting with the bartender at the end of the bar.

“Get up, Wenzel. Into the truck—now,” Penniman ordered. Wenzel staggered towards the passenger side, climbed in and slammed the door behind him.

“You fucking shit, you’ll pay for this,” the second biker threatened, his eyes on Penniman’s gun.

“Get whatever you were going for out of the saddlebag, now. Move.”

The biker hesitated.

“The next round will be into your gas tank, so either go get it now or stand clear.”

“I’ll get it. Fuck, I’ll get it!” He unbuckled the strap and removed a .44 Magnum. For a fraction of a second he was clearly considering taking the chance; then he dropped the gun on the ground.

“Not on the ground, grunt. That is a precision instrument. You’ll hand that to me, and I think you know how.”

The biker picked it up by the barrel and walked slowly to within arm’s reach, then passed it to Penniman butt first. “You boys were having fun back at the bar, I think at my expense.”

“We spotted you as a faggot—a fucking army faggot.”

“So let me get this straight. Here are the two of you—dressed in black leather with little fringes on your pants and your motorcycles all dolled up with bags, more fringes and shit—and you think
I
look like a faggot? You truly are sorry fucks. I’m going to head back home now. I’ll drop off Wenzel somewhere safe. Do I have your approval to do that?”