* * *
Bored, Fiske meandered through the apartment when he felt someone at his shoulder.
“There’s a question I’ve been meaning to ask you.”
Fiske looked around. Agent McKenna was staring at him.
“McKenna, I’m seriously considering a lawsuit against you, so get the hell away from me.”
“Just doing my job. And right now I want to know where you were at the time your brother was murdered.”
Fiske finished his glass of wine and then looked out the broad bank of windows. “Haven’t you forgotten something?”
“What’s that?”
“They haven’t ascertained the time of death yet.”
“You’re a little behind in the investigation.”
“Is that right?” Fiske said, a little taken aback.
“Between three and four A.M. Saturday. Where were you during that time?”
“Am I a suspect in this case?”
“If and when you become a suspect, I’ll let you know.”
“I was working at my office in Richmond until about four in the morning on Saturday. Now you’re going to ask me if anyone can corroborate that, right?”
“Can anyone?”
“No. But I went to the Laundromat around ten that morning.”
“Richmond’s only a two-hour drive from Washington. You’d have plenty of time.”
“So your theory is I drove up to Washington, killed my brother in cold blood, dumped his body in the middle of a heavily black area, with such skill that no one noticed me do it, drove back to Richmond and washed my underwear. And the motive is?” As soon as Fiske said the last sentence, his next breath caught in his throat. He had the perfect motive: five hundred thousand dollars in life insurance. Shit!
“Motives can always come later. You have no alibi, which means you had the opportunity to commit the murder.”
“So you think I murdered Wright too? Remember, you told the justices that you think the two murders are related. I do have an alibi for that one.”
“Just because I said something doesn’t mean it’s true.”
“Fascinating. Do you take that same philosophy with you to the witness stand?”
“During the course of an investigation I’ve found it’s not always good to show your hand. The killings could be completely unrelated, which means any alibi you have for Wright’s murder means nothing.”
As Fiske watched McKenna walk off, a very unsettling sensation went down his spine. Even McKenna wouldn’t be so stupid as to try to pin the murder of his brother on him, would he? And why hadn’t Fiske known about the autopsy results ascertaining the time of his brother’s death? Fiske immediately answered that question: The information flow from Chandler had dried up.
“John?”
Fiske turned around and looked at Richard Perkins.
“Got a minute?” the man asked nervously. The two men went over to a corner. Perkins looked out the window for a moment as though preparing what he was about to say. “I’ve only been the marshal at the Supreme Court for two years. It’s a great job, prestigious, not too much stress, pays quite well. I oversee almost two hundred employees, everybody from barbers to police officers. I worked at the Senate before that, thought I’d probably retire there, but then this opportunity came up.”
“Good for you,” Fiske said, but he wondered why Perkins was telling him this.
“Even though your brother’s death didn’t take place at the Court I felt a real responsibility for his safety, for everyone who works at the Court. Now with Wright’s death, I’m just reeling. I’m not used to handling things like this. I’m a lot better at payroll issues and overseeing the orderly functioning of bureaucracies than I am being in the middle of a homicide investigation.”
“Well, Chandler is really good at his job. And of course you’ve got the FBI on the case too.” Fiske almost bit his tongue when he said this. Perkins picked up on it.
“Agent McKenna seems to hold some kind of grudge against you. Have you ever met the man before?”
“No.”
Perkins looked down at his hands. “Do you really think there’s some crazy out there with a vendetta?”
“It’s not out of the realm of possibility.”
“But why now of all times? And why target clerks? Why not the justices?”