Feast of Murder(24)

Gregor leaned forward, tapped the young man on the shoulder and said, “Excuse me. I’m Gregor Demarkian.”

“Gregor Demarkian,” the young man said blankly, and then seemed to snap to. “Oh. Yes. Oh. Excuse me. My name is Jeremy Bayles. I’m from the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Steve Hartigan sent me.” He plunged his hand into his hip pocket, pulled out a small square sealed envelope, and handed it to Gregor. Then he tried to smile.

Gregor held the envelope for a moment and wondered if he were really old enough for people named Jeremy to be old enough to be agents at the Bureau. He supposed he’d run into an agent named Tiffany next. He opened the envelope, pulled out a square of what was closer to cardboard than paper, and read:

    Gregor. I know, I know. I couldn’t help it. I was swamped and I didn’t have any other choice. Be nice to the boy. I need the information. Steve.



Gregor folded the card and put it in his pocket.

“Well,” he said.

“What are all the flags?” Jeremy Bayles asked. “I mean, everywhere I look, there are flags.”

“Armenian flags,” Gregor said. “This is an Armenian neighborhood. Armenian-American, at any rate.”

“But they’re not all the same flags,” Jeremy Bayles said reasonably. “Which one is the Armenian flag? What are the others? Why is everybody in the street? Is there some kind of international festival going on here or what?”

In a way, there was some kind of international festival going on every day on Cavanaugh Street, but Gregor didn’t think it was something Jeremy Bayles would understand. Gregor wasn’t even sure it was something he could explain. He got his key out and opened the front door instead, thanking God once again that this door, at least, was on automatic lock. He’d had the automatic lock installed himself, after his first Christmas in the neighborhood, when the old lock had never been on unless he put it on. The rest of them might want to court burglary like maidens at a dance, but he wasn’t that stupid.

He stepped back, let Jeremy Bayles enter the foyer before him, and brought up the rear.

“Armenia only declared its independence this past September twenty-fourth,” he explained. “I’m not sure anyone really knows what the flag will be like in the long run. Every time a new version comes out over there, a new version goes up over here.”

“What about the people in the street?”

“There are always people in the street.”

“Oh.”

“To be fair, we’re playing host to a lot of new immigrants these days. They like to be out and around. When they’re not, things get to be a little crowded.”

“I didn’t think cities were like this any more,” Jeremy Bayles said. “I thought they were all like Washington. Armed camps.”

“Even all of Washington isn’t an armed camp.”

“It isn’t?”

“Haven’t you ever been to Georgetown? Or Foggy Bottom?”

“Oh.” Jeremy Bayles looked confused. “But those aren’t really Washington,” he said. “They couldn’t be. Rich people live there.”

If Steve Hartigan had been forced to take this idiot on staff, he was more than swamped and the hiring freeze extended much farther into the Bureau than the Looney Tunes camp. Gregor took another look through the mail—you never knew when you might miss something—and then gestured to the stairs. Jeremy Bayles nodded, but he wasn’t really paying attention. He was looking at the enormous cardboard turkey that covered old George Tekemanian’s door, and the papier mâché Pilgrim’s hat that sat on the newel post at the bottom of the stair rail. The papier mâché Pilgrim’s hat was big enough to fit the Jolly Green Giant and had been made by Bennis, who had revised her latest sword and sorcery novel by making papier mâché copies of everything in the book. For weeks, Gregor’s apartment had been a mine field of papier mâché trolls, papier mâché dragons, papier mâché knights and papier mâché castles. It was only when the papier mâché unicorn stabbed him in the rear end that he finally put his foot down. Jeremy Bayles picked up the Pilgrim’s hat, admired it, and put it down again. Then he began following Gregor to the stairs.

“You people sure do like to celebrate Thanksgiving,” Jeremy said.

“Mmm,” Gregor said. They reached the second floor landing and Gregor saw that the ASLEEP UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE sign had been taken down from Bennis Hannaford’s door. In its place was a cardboard turkey even bigger than old George Tekemanian’s, but with a fan of (possible) Armenian flags for tail feathers. Donna Moradanyan was back and on the warpath.