David Duffy - In for a Ruble

More to the point, Coryell didn’t leave any spending trail. I’d partly guessed the Internet entrepreneur story was bull. Now I was looking at the credit card records of a man who supposedly traveled frequently on business—who hadn’t paid for a plane ticket, hotel room or rental car in years. Nor were there any lunches, dinners, Broadway shows, operas, baseball or basketball games—none of the things you’d expect a successful businessman to be spending his, or his company’s, money on. He had his own car—a two-year-old leased Volvo—garaged near the family’s apartment. Gas purchases indicated he didn’t drive a lot, other than back and forth to their house in Ancramdale in Columbia County—and he didn’t go there much either.

“That’s it?” Victoria said.

“All there is,” I agreed.

“This thing’s a bust.”

“You weren’t listening. The Basilisk isn’t the threat. The Big Dick, the databases—they’re what’s evil. And the fact that the Dick has so little information on our man Coryell tells us something, quite a lot, actually.”

“Like what?”

“Like maybe he isn’t who he’s supposed to be. Like maybe the existence of another credit card in another name hooked up to another Social Security number, out of reach of preying eyes like mine.”

“You mean, Jekyll and Hyde?”

“Jekyll and Hyde with plastic.”

“Shit.” She got up and walked around the office. “We never thought of that. Why are you interested in this guy?”

“Client’s brother-in-law.”

“And if he leads a double life…?”

“Somebody bugged Leitz’s computers, maybe connected with the TV deal, I don’t know. But whoever did it knew the layout. Coryell’s the one member of the family I can’t get a fix on. It’s like he’s part of it, but not. Never around, didn’t go to Leitz’s wedding. No one in the family wants to talk about him. I bring him up, they change the subject. Even his wife.”

“That doesn’t mean anything necessarily…”

“True enough, but I saw the guy who beat me up outside Coryell’s office last night. He’s almost certainly involved in the bugging, and he had a key to the building.”

“But Coryell wasn’t there.”

“Right.”

“Still circumstantial.”

“The only reasonable doubt I have to satisfy is my own. And maybe Leitz’s.”

“You have motive?”

“Still working on that.”

“Show me what else this Big Dick can do. Christ, listen to me, I’m talking like you two.”

“You heard Foos. Strictly limited access for Feds.”

“I’m just kibitzing. Come on.”

She smiled, and my heart backflipped again, just as it had last night. I would have looked up anything or anyone she wanted.

“Let’s check something.”

I went back to work on the keyboard. In less than a minute I had the vehicle identification number for Coryell’s Volvo. A few minutes after that, the service records from the Manhattan dealership, appeared on the screen.

“What are we looking for?” Victoria asked.

“Mileage. The Volvo’s two years old. Say it gets twenty miles a gallon, average. Coryell’s gas purchases total eight hundred gallons, if we figure three bucks each. The car should have sixteen thousand miles on the clock. Service records say thirty-one thousand two-fifty at the last appointment, a month ago. Who’s buying fifteen-thousand-miles worth of gas? And who’s driving the car?”

“Wife?”

I told the Basilisk to rifle through Julia Leitz’s purchases and extract the gas charges. They totaled $1,172—maybe twenty-five tankfuls, one every other month.

“Add eight thousand miles for her, which is generous, and we’ve still got seven thousand miles, give or take, unaccounted for.”

“Someone used cash.”

“Maybe. Pattern suggests credit, but I can get the Basilisk to match that up with their ATM withdrawals if you want.”

“You can do that?”

“Take a few minutes.”

“Jesus, that thing’s pure poison.”

“Where do you think it got its name?”

“Okay, seven thousand miles. Still not all that much.”

“Twenty-two percent of the total on the car.”

“Then tell me this, smart guy: Why doesn’t his wife notice?”

“She’s not paying attention.”

“Oh come on! That’s just male…”

“Uh-uh. She’s smart. Tough too. But she’s totally focused on her work, family’s an afterthought. Her siblings told me that and I’ve met her. It rings true.”

“She got kids?”

“Two.”

“What kind of woman—”

“Spy school lesson—value judgments only get in the way.”

“You suggesting I butt out?”

“Not at all,” I said quickly. “Let’s look at phone calls.”

I worked the keyboard, and the Basilisk went back to its cave. It returned almost immediately with two lists of numbers—those Coryell called and those calling Coryell. They had one thing in common—they were short.

“Once again, not what you’d expect from a supposedly successful businessman,” I said.

“I’ll say. Can you tell…?”

“Patience.”

I sent the beast in search of the names the numbers belonged to. That took a few minutes longer. While we waited, I put my hand on Victoria’s knee and started up her thigh. She knocked it away.

“Stick to business,” she said with a smile. “You’ve got me curious now.”

“Curiosity wasn’t my goal.” I returned the hand to the knee. She let it stay there.

The calls came back up, with names this time, sorted by date, as the numbers had been, the most recent listed first. Most of the recipients of Coryell’s outgoing calls didn’t mean much to me. Incoming calls were another matter.

Victoria said, “Hey, that’s you!”

I was at the top of the list—my call from outside his office last night. Below it was an unlisted, disposable cell phone—Nosferatu’s, I was almost sure. I made a note of the number for future reference and told the Basilisk to group the calls by name. Thomas Leitz jumped off the screen. Eight calls over the last few years. I had a hunch about the timing. The Basilisk hissed—you know it, run with it. I went back to the keyboard.

“What are you doing?” Victoria asked.

“Maybe earning that million dollars.”

The detail on Thomas Leitz’s calls to his brother-in-law appeared. Sure enough, each call over the last four years coincided with the pay down a few days later of his credit card debt. The Basilisk had answered one question—where Thomas was getting the money—but it raised several others. Where was Coryell getting it? And why was he giving it to Thomas? And how much of this did Sebastian Leitz know?

Victoria said, “I’m still here, remember? What’d you find out?”

I told her.

“What is it with this family?” Victoria said.

“They’ve got more money than most. But once you start to dig into any family, you shouldn’t be too surprised by what you find. As I remember, your old man had you arrested for stealing his car. How normal is that?”

“My stepfather. And he was pissed that I wouldn’t put out.”

“See what I mean?”

She removed my hand, stood and walked around the office again.

“What are the chances,” she said from the window, “if I asked nicely and it was really important—stopping some truly evil bastards—your partner in crime would let me do a little research for a case I’m working on, with appropriate supervision, of course.”

“He’d rather swallow Pig Pen.”

“Yeah, I thought you’d say that.”

“You’ve got the entire United States Department of Justice at your disposal.”

“The goddamned Department of Justice is coming up short, if you want to know the truth. Your pal and that serpent of his produce more than a legion of FBI.”