Ridley Pearson - Pied Piper

A strong hand knocked on the door-Flemming-LaMoia knew this before the door opened.

LaMoia repeated, “It’s a free country. I can’t tell you what to do. They can’t tell you what to do. No one can make you say anything you don’t want to.” He shouted toward the door. “Yeah?”

Flemming threw the door open. In his strong, rich baritone, he addressed the parents, “Mr. and Mrs. Kittridge, I’m terribly sorry for your loss.” He glanced over at LaMoia venomously, for not waiting, and then back to the parents. He introduced himself and his two special agents. “I’m sure Detective LaMoia-”

“Sergeant,” LaMoia corrected, interrupting. He said, “You still don’t know my rank?”

“-has asked you a few questions. We’d like to start all over if you don’t mind. The sooner we get this information, the better our chances of getting your daughter back.”

“Trudy,” Kay Kalidja supplied.

“Trudy,” Flemming repeated.

David Kittridge glanced over at LaMoia and then complained to Flemming, “Just like you’ve gotten all the other children back?”

LaMoia felt the warm rush of success as Flemming flashed him another angry look.

David Kittridge lifted his right hand, holding it out for everyone to see. Gripped tightly between white, bloodless fingers was a tin penny flute.

“Do you know the aquarium well, the big viewing room that is under all the fish?” the creamy female voice inquired.

“Yes,” Daphne answered.

“Can you be there in fifteen minutes?”

“See you there.”

The walk to the aquarium felt good, in part because it was nearly entirely downhill. Daphne worked herself up to a good heart rate, past cranes and Caterpillars and jackhammers all busy making the population deaf. The city refused to stop growing. Unable to spread out, it grew up now, the new buildings pushing higher and higher into the sky, winning views of the bay and blocking the view of others. The streets closed in around the pedestrians. The town of Seattle was gone, a city having replaced it.

Elliott Bay’s restless, wind-scuffed green waters caught the sunshine in highlights, like Italian marble with flecks of mica angled to the sun. Freighters and ferries, their white wakes flowing behind them like wedding veils, called out in deep-throated cries. A jet rocked its wings on final approach, its wheels like tiny talons reaching for the ground.

On its best day, no city was as beautiful, no city held her heart as this one. She knew she would never leave, although she had considered doing so-distance would force a fresh start. She also knew that if she stayed she would likely marry Owen Adler. Fear had led to her breaking off the engagement the first time. Fear of being filthy rich, of attending fund-raising dinners and ribbon-cutting ceremonies instead of working psych profiles and would-be suicides. Fear of losing her identity, not a fear of her love for this man. She trusted her love. She appreciated his humor, the attention he paid her, his intelligence, confidence and determination, the way he put others first, especially Corky, his adopted daughter. She loved Corky nearly as much as he did.

She walked right past the aquarium before she realized what she had done. Owen was like that-he could occupy her in ways no other man ever had.

The aquarium was crowded with tourists and a busload of students on a field trip. Most of the display areas were kept dark, the visitor’s attention focused on the fish tanks in the walls. She navigated her way through the throng and made her way to the descending ramp that led down into the center of an enormous tank, where the humans became the observed, surrounded on all sides and overhead by coral, water and fish of a dozen varieties.

Special Agent Kay Kalidja occupied one of the two viewing benches, her purse and sweater set beside her holding a spot for Daphne, who sat down. The glass arched above them, fish swimming directly overhead, passing from one side of the tank to the other. Kalidja did not look at Daphne but at the fish. She pointed out a sand shark with a suckerfish attached. “I feel like that sometimes,” she said in her pleasing island lilt, “the one attached.”

“Yes.”

“Made to follow, to stay close.”

Kalidja’s choosing a neutral site forewarned of the significance of the meeting. Excitement filled Daphne, as she nudged, “You ran the tattoo.”

“The contents of many of the Bureau’s databases are classified. As you must know, we track everything from violent offenders to suspected double agents in the State Department. For this reason there are levels of access imposed, levels of security, pass codes, log-in records. It is extremely well-protected data. Hackers have fooled with our Web site before, but no one-to my knowledge-has ever come close to compromising these databases.” Kalidja found it difficult to share the information. She struggled to admit, “Yes. The tattoos.” She then said, pointing out a pair of blue and yellow fish, “Spectacular.”

“The system tracks access,” Kalidja continued. “It maintains a computerized log. Not only can internal investigators see who has been working what information, but it also allows agents to see who else has worked the information, to share that information. An agent in Chicago can call an agent in Dallas who has been requesting the same information. Perhaps they are pursuing the same suspect and were unaware of the connection. The database actually alerts them. Those alerts are automatic now, offering a kind of investigative bibliography.”

“Impressive,” Daphne said, suppressing her anxiety over where Kalidja was headed.

The agent faced Daphne for the first time and spoke quickly but extremely softly, “Special Agent Dunkin Hale requested any and all information on eagle tattoos-photographs of those on file, tattoo artists known for wrapping the wings around the bird like a cape. Everything he could think of.”

Daphne had expected nothing like this. She had a dozen questions to ask, but held her tongue. Kalidja was not finished.

“Special Agent Hale has never mentioned any such tattoo in any of our meetings. Never. Not once.”

“And you had said nothing to him about it?”

“Absolutely not.”

“Perhaps he saw it on your desk-”

“Never! I accepted this information from you in the strictest of confidence. I’ve told no one! Shown no one!”

Daphne tried to make sense of it. The schools of fish swimming over, above and around her added to her sense of confusion.

“VI–CIM, our Violent Criminal Identification and Markings database, has produced two hits, two similar tattoos,” she said, producing photocopies and showing them to Daphne. “One of the tattoos was shown on the biceps, the other on a pectoral.” They were, in fact, both unmistakably similar to the rendition drawn by Tommy Thompson: a bald eagle looking straight ahead, the wings wrapped around like a cape. “One is dead. The other is two years into serving a life sentence. Mind you, we only show federal offenders in the database, and only a limited number of them. It is by no means complete.”

“It’s not our boy. His was on the forearm.”

“No, but the same artist perhaps. Special Agent Hale pursued the name of the artist. I can tell that from the database requests.”

Daphne sniped, “Imagine calling this artwork.” Studying the photos, she asked, “Wait a second! Are you saying these two cons are from the same region?”

“The same city ,” Kalidja answered. “Both arrested and convicted in New Orleans, Louisiana.”

“The tattoo shop is in New Orleans.”

“Exactly.”

Because of Boldt, Daphne knew a great deal about the investigation that Kay Kalidja and the FBI did not, including that the Pied Piper had used a 911 telephone scam to convince the day care center into handing over Sarah to the two uniformed cops. Con artists were continually arrested and even occasionally convicted. Using this new information, she wondered if she couldn’t work the New Orleans police or prosecuting attorney’s office to ID any con artists using 911 telephone scams. The location was a huge find. It would shift the entire investigation. Boldt often spoke of an investigation gaining momentum, that there came a time when the evidence outweighed the mystery, when the huge rock of knowledge assembled by a squad in an uphill manner suddenly crested that hill and began the journey down. She believed that combined with Kalidja’s information, the Pied Piper investigation had just crested. It would pick up steam now, and eventually that rock would crush the Pied Piper in its path.