Some Like It Hawk(103)

“And what’s the third one?” I asked.

Phinny studied the third contract both through and over his glasses. Then he set it beside the second contract and began flipping the pages of each.

“It appears to be a signed version of the unfavorable contract,” he said.

“Signed by the county board.”

“Well, no,” Phinny said, looking over his glasses at me. “In my job, I tend to see a lot of documents with the board members’ signatures. These aren’t even good forgeries.”

“But if you sent these to someone who wasn’t familiar with the board members’ signatures, they’d have no idea it was a forgery.” I said. “He faked it. The mayor.”

“Ex-mayor,” Phinny corrected.

“Right. They wouldn’t sign, so he faked their signatures—he probably had plenty of examples in his files.”

“Incredible,” Phinny said. “And so obviously a forgery.”

“It’s not really such a bad forgery,” I said. “Most people don’t know the board members’ handwriting as well as you do. But I bet a handwriting analysis will back you up. We don’t just have proof of the real terms of the contract—we’ve got evidence of a crime. We definitely need to get all these to a safe place.”

“They’ve been in a safe place all along,” Phinny said softly. “A secure, climate-controlled environment in which the only people aside from myself who have had access have been persons well known to me and under my close supervision.”

“I stand corrected,” I said, throwing up my hands as if in surrender.

“But you’re right,” he said. “We need to get these out where Chief Burke and Mr. Hollingsworth can use them.”

“I don’t think so.”

We turned to see that Denton was pointing a gun at us. The seams of Horace’s gorilla suit had been ripped open at the wrists, and his hands were sticking out. The right one was holding the gun. The left one was fumbling at the gorilla head.

Then he pulled the headpiece off and I could see it wasn’t Denton.

It was Hamish Pruitt.





Chapter 42




“Oh, dear,” Phinny gasped. He looked as if he might faint.

“Into that small room over there,” Hamish said, pointing slightly with the gun. “Now.”

He was indicating one of the cells—one that wasn’t quite as chock-full of file cabinets as the others and had a key stuck in the lock.

Phinny stumbled obediently into the room. I followed more slowly. In fact, I lingered outside the door until Hamish snapped at me again.

“Inside!” he said. “This place is pretty well soundproofed, you know. Would you rather be locked up while I escape, or dead?”

I couldn’t see a way out of it, so I stepped into the room and sat down on a box of files. Phinny was already sitting on a nearby box, curled up as if trying to take up as little space as possible. Hamish slammed the door and I heard him turn the key in the lock.

“Now hand me your cell phone,” he said.

I blinked at him as if I didn’t understand.

He raised the gun, and I gave in. I handed the cell phone out through the barred window in the door.

He threw it on the desk beside Phinny’s computer and disappeared from view. I heard sounds of rummaging elsewhere in the basement.

“What’s he doing?” Phinny asked.

“No idea,” I said.

Phinny got up and came to peer with me through the cell door window.

Hamish reappeared. He had taken off the gorilla suit, revealing that he was wearing a navy blue track suit. He was carrying a can of kerosene. He unscrewed the cap, tossed it aside, and began pouring a trail of the liquid around the base of some of the nearer filing cabinets.

“Oh, my,” Phinny murmured.

“Do you keep a lot of kerosene here?” I whispered.

“Several cans,” he said. “I run a space heater on really cold days.”

Hamish finished and came to stand where we could see him through the cell window. He was holding the files we’d found in one hand, and a pocket lighter in the other.

“Shall I?”

Phinny closed his eyes and stifled a whimper.

“I wouldn’t,” I said. “At least not until I was sure I didn’t need them.”

Hamish looked puzzled, and then a look of cunning spread over his face.

“You’re right,” he said. “Properly used, these could be worth a lot of money. Thank you. In gratitude, I’ll give you a choice: smoke inhalation, or a bullet.”

He cocked his head as if waiting for an answer.

“Still thinking about it? Well, you have a little bit of time.”

He chuckled mirthlessly and disappeared again, this time in the direction of the barricade.