Feast of Murder(32)

Julie put her hand to her forehead and rubbed. For a split second, Calvin noticed that she did not look well, that she looked almost green, and the terrible thought came to him that she was going to back out on him too. Then she murmured something about being right back and walked out of the office, and he realized she was going to get the others and come back.

Back in his own office, Calvin sat down in front of the computer printouts and smiled. He’d been behaving like a prima donna out there, of course, and like a weak and petulant man. He was none of those things, but he didn’t mind being perceived that way. There were men who set great store by their dignity and others who wanted to believe in their own integrity, but Calvin had only ever cared about one thing. You went into a fight to win it any way you could. The outcome was the only thing that mattered.

Calvin just wished Jon could have been here, to see how he had turned them all around, and made them do what he wanted.





3


Five hundred and fifty miles away, lying in a high-sided bunk in the captain’s cabin on the Pilgrimage Green, Jon Baird put down the file he had been reading and closed his eyes. It was early yet, and he was alone. The crew had gone into town for dinner and Sheila had gone off with some friends from MacLean. He had hours yet to do the things he wanted to do, without being bothered by anyone. Then, tomorrow, the whole pack of them would arrive together and he would be on stage all the time. Sheila would try to crawl into bed with him and when she found out that would be impossible she would cry.

There was a cold stiff wind blowing out on the water, rocking the Pilgrimage Green in its berth. To Jon Baird the motion was like the swaying of a cradle and made him feel he had to go to sleep. Instead, he opened his eyes again, sat up a little straighter, and turned his attention one more time to the file. It was a file he had no business being in possession of, or even reading. His access to it was prohibited by law. For Jon Baird, that was the best of what it meant to be himself, a man with more than a billion dollars, a man with power and connections from one end of the globe to the other, a man who couldn’t be turned down. The deals were fun and the toys were nice and being able to order a dozen suits custom made at Brooks any time he got the urge was a definite kick, especially after a childhood spent wondering if he’d ever be able to buy anything at all. None of that compared with the simple access he had, and the being privy to secrets.

He wore glasses when he read, with real glass in them, so they lay heavily against his nose. He took them off now and rubbed his forehead a little. There was no electricity on the Pilgrimage Green. He had been reading by candlelight, and he had given himself a fair case of eyestrain.

He also had no reason to go on with what he was doing. He had read this file fifteen times since he had first gotten it, and it always said the same things, it always made the same points. He kept rereading it because it gave him comfort. It convinced him he was doing the right thing.

He put it down on the table next to his bed, thought better of that—he could doze off and Sheila could come in—and opened the cabinet under his bunk to put it in there. Just before he let it go he looked at the cover of it one more time, and smiled.

    AGENT REPORT: FEDERAL BUREAU OF INVESTIGATION, BACKGROUND.



it said, and under that, the name of the agent whose background had been checked:

    GREGOR DEMARKIAN.



Jonathan Edgewick Baird had never in his life allowed himself to depend on anyone relying on reputation alone. He required facts and he required proof and one way or the other he always got both.





Four


1


GREGOR DEMARKIAN HAD TOLD everyone on Cavanaugh Street that he was traveling on the Pilgrimage Green because Bennis Hannaford had asked him to—and, in a way, it was even true. It had certainly been Bennis Hannaford who had first brought Jon Baird to Gregor’s attention, first by relaying his message through her brother Bobby and then by digging through Lida Arkmanian’s near-complete set of People magazines to find the articles on Baird’s indictment and the rise of Baird Financial. Since Bennis had been born and brought up on the Main Line, middle daughter of one of its most socially prominent families, her take on Baird and the people he represented was invaluable. Bennis always seemed to know someone’s aunt’s second cousin’s husband or to have gone to camp with somebody else’s first wife’s sister. Gregor sometimes thought she had come out with the entire female population of the Greater Philadelphia Metropolitan Area. However tenuous the connection, Bennis would be able to find it. She would also know enough gossip to fill in the gaps.