“It looks cool,” Nikki said, once it was in place.
Returning inside the house, David asked Angela to call Robert Scali and tell him he would be stopping by. While David went upstairs to get ready to drive to Boston, Angela gave Robert a call.
“That will be interesting,” Robert said once Angela explained the reason for her call.
Angela didn’t know how to respond. She simply thanked him again for his help and hung up. Then she tried to call Calhoun. Once more she got his answering machine.
David came down wearing his blue blazer and gray slacks. He looked quite handsome.
“Do you have to get so dressed up?” Angela asked.
“I’m going to the VA hospital,” David said. “I’m not going in jeans and a sweatshirt.”
“I tried to call Calhoun again,” Angela said. “Still no answer. That man must have come in late and gone out early. He’s really involved in this investigation.”
“Did you leave a message?” David asked.
“No,” Angela said.
“Why not?”
“I hate answering machines,” Angela said. “Besides, he must know we want to hear from him.”
“I think you should leave a message,” David said.
“What should we do if we don’t hear from him by tonight?” Angela asked. “Go to the police?”
“I don’t know,” David admitted. “The idea of going to Robertson for anything doesn’t thrill me.”
After Angela watched David pull down their drive, she put her full attention on Nikki. More than anything she wanted her daughter to enjoy the day.
Motivated more by curiosity than anything else, David went to meet Robert Scali first. Hoping the man would look like a nerdy academic, David was crestfallen to discover that Robert was a handsome man with a tanned face and an athletic bearing. To make matters worse, he seemed like a genuinely nice guy.
They shook hands. David could tell Robert was also sizing him up.
“I want to thank you for your help,” David said.
“That’s what friends are for,” Robert said. He handed over another box full of information.
“There’s something new on the financial side that I should mention,” Robert said. “I discovered that Werner Van Slyke has opened several new bank accounts in the last year, apparently traveling to both Albany and here to Boston to do so. I hadn’t gotten that information yesterday because I’d been more interested in credit card history and debt.”
“That’s strange,” David said. “Is it a lot of money?”
“There’s less than ten thousand in each account, probably to avoid the rule that banks have to report movements of more than ten thousand.”
“That’s still a lot of money for a man running a maintenance department at a community hospital,” David said.
“This day and age, it probably means the fellow is running a little drug ring,” Robert said. “But if he is, he shouldn’t be banking the money. He’s supposed to bury it in PVC pipe. That’s the norm.”
“I’d heard from a couple of my teenage patients that marijuana was easily available in the local high school,” David said.
“There you go,” Robert said. “Maybe on top of whatever else you and Angela solve, you can do your part to help make America drug-free.”
David laughed and thanked Robert again for all his help.
“Let me know when you guys next come to town,” Robert said. “There’s a great restaurant here in Cambridge called Anago Bistro. It will be my treat.”
“Will do,” David said as he waved goodbye. On his way out to the car, David doubted he’d feel comfortable getting together.
After stowing the computer data in the trunk, David drove across the Charles River and out the Fenway. It took only twenty minutes to get to the VA hospital; Sunday midafternoon was a traffic low.
Walking into the hospital, David thought it was ironic how lives could intersect after years of separation. He’d dated Nicole Lungstrom for almost a year, starting in the last part of junior year of high school. But after graduation she’d gone off to the West Coast for college, medical school, and residency. At one point David had heard through friends that she’d married. When she’d called the previous year, David had learned she’d been divorced.