M Sellars - The Law Of Three

“What about Mister Kasprzykowski?” she asked, stumbling over the name. “He wasn’t a Witch.”

“Okay, I’ll give you that,” I replied. “But even then, he killed him with a blow to the back of the head with a hammer.”

“Yes, and he killed this homeless man with a gunshot to the back of the head. I’m certain you know that Porter has a criminal history, Mister Gant,” she continued. “Several of his earlier crimes involved handguns.”

I closed my eyes and started rubbing my forehead. My perpetual headache was working its way around the inside of my skull. The pain was thick and just the other side of normal. As usual, I couldn’t put my finger on the cause other than to say that it was coming from a source beyond the physical realm.

“No. No way,” I said. “Porter doesn’t have a gun.”

“Mister Gant.” Agent Kavanaugh took on a concerned tone. “I really don’t understand why you are having such a problem with this.”

“Twilight Zone,” I muttered.

“Excuse me?”

“Twilight Zone,” I said a bit more clearly as I re-opened my eyes and looked up at her.

She shook her head as a mask of obfuscation passed over her features. “I don’t understand.”

“Ask the big Indian outside,” I told her. “He’ll explain it to you.”

“What did he say to you during the first conversation this morning?” Agent Kavanaugh asked.

We had been sequestered in the back of the panel van for something close to half an hour by now. She had all but dismissed my objection to the idea that Eldon Porter was using any type of firearm, as well as my suggestion that she talk to Ben for an explanation as to how I could be so certain. Of course, I don’t suppose that his answer would have been any more convincing than mine.

“Which part?” I asked, still trying to temper my impatience at the “hurry up and wait” overtone of the current situation.

The order of the moment was taking the form of an in-depth interview of yours truly. The questions that comprised the Q amp; A ranged from the expected to the seemingly non sequitur. She had already made several queries that appeared to come from far left and well over the horizon, leading me at times to simply stare back at her with a dumbstruck gaze.

She gave me a quick shake of her head. “Any details you can remember. Any at all.”

“Let’s see,” I sighed heavily. “He quoted a few Bible verses to me, then informed me that he intended to rape my wife. Is that what you want to know?”

The abruptness in my voice was unmistakable. Any attempt at disguising my anxiety was effectively rendered null and void by my rapidly hardening attitude.

Kavanaugh stared back at me for a moment, wagging the ballpoint pen back and forth between her thumb and forefinger as she drummed it on the legal pad in her lap. The rhythm of the nervous tick wasn’t helping my headache in the least. If anything, it was simply reminding me that it was there. I was just about to reach out and snatch the pen from between her fingers when she stopped.

“Mister Gant,” she began. “I know this is hard, and trust me, I realize this doesn’t seem important to you, but each detail gives us something more to work with.”

“Forgive me,” I told her. “But some of your questions really haven’t made much sense to me.”

“On the surface, to most people, they don’t,” she agreed. “But we aren’t in a normal situation here. Specific details are important to the overall profile of both the individual and the situation.”

“Maybe I’m dense, but I don’t see how some of the things you’ve asked can relate to all of this.”

“Believe me, Mister Gant, you would be amazed by what seemingly insignificant details can sometimes mean the difference between peaceful resolution and tragedy.”

“Maybe so, but ten minutes ago you asked me what color coat he was wearing earlier today. I mean, come on…”

“Do you play chess, Mister Gant?”

“Yes,” I answered. “And will you please call me Rowan? I’ve been getting ‘Mistered’ and ‘Sir’ed’ to death today.”

“All right, Rowan,” she continued. “As a chess player, you are certainly familiar with the concept of a stalemate, correct?”

“Of course.”

“Well, that’s exactly what a hostage scenario is. A stalemate. A big, hairy, no-win situation. The thing is, the hostage-taker doesn’t know this. We do, but he doesn’t. His mental state usually places him in one of two frames of mind. Either he believes he has the upper hand and will be able to force his demands on us, or he is in such a state of desperation that he believes he cannot win.

“The second state is the worst because that is usually when he will start killing hostages in an attempt to regain perceived control of the situation. Our job is to make an end run around the stalemate by convincing him that we are as concerned for his well being as we are for the hostage or hostages.”

“I understand that,” I said. “But the color of his coat?”

“Sometimes, even when you think it is going well, something that appears wholly unrelated can make everything go sour.” Kavanaugh sighed. “Let me give you an example. I worked a hostage negotiation three years ago in Nashville, Tennessee. It was a bank robbery gone bad. The gunman had five hostages, but things had stayed fairly calm. We were in the ninth hour, and everything was going by the book. It really looked like we were going to be able to bring on a positive resolution with no casualties, not even the gunman.

“As a good faith move for the release of one of the hostages, we gave in to a request for soda. A specific brand of root beer actually.” She paused for a moment. There was a distant look in her eyes that bespoke of repressed sadness and maybe even a modicum of self-blame. She looked down at the notepad in her lap then back to me. “Two minutes after we sent it in, the gunman went berserk, and without warning he killed the hostage he had told us he would release. He shot her point blank in the back of the head as he shoved her out the door.

“Her name was Becky, and she was a twenty-three-year-old teller-trainee with a husband and a one-year-old daughter.” She paused again as if taking a moment to force the memory from her mind, and then asked, “Do you know why he killed her?”

I simply shook my head.

Her expression moved in the direction of controlled anger for a pair of seconds and then blanked to a professional, matter-of-fact countenance as she looked me in the eyes. “Because the soda was in a can instead of a bottle. We had missed a detail.”

I couldn’t think of anything to say that I was sure hadn’t already been said. I let out a heavy breath and closed my eyes. I had been able to feel the burst of anguish that came from Agent Kavanaugh as she relayed the incident. To be honest, when she had first started, I wasn’t entirely sure the story was going to be anything more than a textbook example. That thought proved itself to be wrong within the first few sentences.

Still, had it not been for the empathic connection now presenting itself, I’m sure I would have believed she had fabricated the whole thing simply to benefit her explanation. I think maybe Ben’s jaded attitude had done more than just begun to wear off on me. It had become an integral part of my personal makeup.

“So…” She stopped short. I watched as she consciously took a deep breath herself, and then she began again. “So, I know that some of my questions might seem off the wall to you, Rowan, but there is a reason for them. Everything matters even if you don’t think it does.”

“I’m sorry,” I muttered.

She shook her head. “Don’t be. I didn’t tell you that story to make you sorry. I want you to understand. As long as you do, that’s all that counts.”