[Lady Justice 25] - Lady Justice and the Spy Page 8

  “But I was goin’ to ---.”

  “Do it! Now!”

  “Y- Y – Yes, Sir.”

  Sarah heard the sound of splintering wood as the agents breached her apartment.

  “Not here,” one said.

  “Musta heard us downstairs with the old woman and took off. Sid was covering the back and she didn’t come out the front, so she must still be on the floor. We’ll have to search each room.”

  One by one, the men knocked on each door. If the occupant was there, they were ordered aside. If no one answered, there was more splintering of wood. When this was over, there would be a lot of repair needed on the Three Trails.

  Finally they came to bathroom #4 and knocked.

  “Whatcha want?” Feeney asked.

  “We need to come in.”

  “I’m doin’ my business.”

  “Sorry, but we still have to come in.”

  “Help yourself. The door’s unlocked.”

  The man opened the door, took one step inside and gagged. “Good Lord, Man. Smells like something crawled up your butt and died.”

  “An’ I suppose your shit don’t stink!” Feeney retorted.

  “Not like that,” he replied backing out of the room. “Max, you go in and take a look around.”

  “Oh, hell no! I’m not going in there. My suit would reek for a week. No way she’s in there. Let’s keep looking.”

  “Sorry to bother you, Old Timer,” the man said, pulling the door closed. “Hope everything comes out all right.”

  “That was gross,” one muttered as they moved on down the hall.

  Sarah listened as they went from room to room. When they were finished, she heard one of them say, “Our source was right. She was definitely here. We just missed her. We’ll keep an eye on the place. She doesn’t know we’ve been here, so maybe we can pick her up when she returns. Let’s go uncuff the old broad and make sure she understands that if she breathes a word, we’ll have to resort to more drastic measures.”

  Sarah waited until there were no more footsteps or voices. She slipped out of the tub and gave Mr. Feeney a hug. “Thanks, I owe you.”

  “Aw shucks, it warn’t nuthin’. I was just doin’ my business. Glad I could help.”

  She gave him another hug. “And thank you for your service to your country.”

  He gave her a smart salute.

  As she slipped out the door, she heard him mutter, “Well I’ll be damned. Never been hugged on the crapper before.”

  She returned to her room and peeked out the window. One SUV was still there, but farther down the block. She had no doubt the second one was watching the back of the building.

  She pulled out the burner phone and dialed. “Fosdick, Sarah here. They found me.”

  I had just finished dressing when the phone rang. I figured it was trouble when Sarah called me Fosdick. “They found me!” she said.

  “But how?”

  “I’m not sure, but I have an idea. I’ll check it out when I get out of here.”

  “Are you all right?”

  “I’m fine, but I’m stuck.”

  She told me about the four men who assaulted the hotel, and her narrow escape with the help of Mr. Feeney.

  “I’m safe for the moment. They think I was away from the building and are waiting for me to return. I can’t leave without them spotting me.”

  I thought for a moment. “I have an idea.”

  I told her my plan, she agreed, and I went to work.

  My first call was to Kevin. I explained the situation and my plan. We decided it would be best not to tell Veronica her mother was in danger until she was safely out of the hotel. He said he’d be at the apartment in fifteen minutes.

  My next call was to Willie.

  “Mornin’ Mr. Walt. How’s it hangin’?”

  “Depends on whether you can help me or not.”

  “Well, o’ course I will. What you need?”

  “Do you still have those old coveralls you bought at the Salvation Army that had ACME Trash Service on the back?”

  “Sho’ do.”

  “By any chance would you have two of them?”

  “Sho’ do. Dey was a good deal, so I bought me a couple of ‘em.”

  “Great! Get them and come up to my apartment.”

  While we waited for Kevin, I explained the situation to Willie.

  When I finished, I said, “After we get her out of the hotel, we’ll have to find a safe place for her to stay. Somewhere the Con Ops agents would never look for her. Any ideas?”

  “Jus’ might,” he replied. “Maxine has a fold out couch an’ I bet nobody would ever find her dere.”

  Maxine was a friend of Willie from his days on the street. Although she was a hooker and worked Independence Avenue, she was really a sweet person and had helped us on several cases in the past. She even had Thanksgiving dinner with all of us a few years back. Willie was right. If Maxine would take her in, Sarah would be safe in her apartment.

  “I like it. Make the call.”

  When Kevin arrived, I outlined our plan. “The two of you will show up in Kevin’s truck with rakes, a dolly and large trash bags. The first thing you’ll do is rake the front yard, fill a trash bag, and toss it into the truck. The agents will be watching. That will establish your cover. Then, take the dolly and the bags into the hotel, fill one of the bags with trash and bring it down. I wouldn’t be surprised if one of the agents stopped and checked you out. On your next trip upstairs, Sarah will crawl into the next bag first. Load as much trash as possible on top of her and tie it shut. They may or may not stop you on that second trip. Either way, you should be covered. Load her into the truck and head to Maxine’s place.”

  “What are you going to do?” Kevin asked.

  “Well, I am the owner of the hotel. I just happened to drop by. I really need to check on Mary and make sure she’s OK. As soon as I finish there, I’ll meet you at the Maxine’s.”

  Our plan worked like a charm. As I suspected, an agent checked the first bag, but didn’t bother with the second.

  I waited ten minutes before driving up.

  Before I could knock on the door, Mary dragged me inside. “Mr. Walt! Somethin’ terrible’s happened!”

  “Calm down, Mary. I know all about it”

  “Calm down! Four bozos came bustin’ in here looking for Sarah. I took a swing at one of them with my bat, but he ducked. Then they cuffed me and I heard all kinds of commotion upstairs. I don’t think they found Sarah. When they left they told me to stay put and keep my mouth shut or they’d be back. I saw Willie and Kevin outside, so I figured you all were up to something.”

  “We were, and you’ll be pleased to know that Sarah made her escape in one of those trash bags. Here’s what I need for you to do. Do exactly what those men said. They think Sarah was out of the hotel when they came, and they’re waiting for her to return. We don’t want to arouse their suspicion. She won’t be coming back here, and eventually they’ll give up. We just have to bide our time until they go away. Can you do that?”

  “Yes, but I’d like to have another shot at that guy’s head.”

  “I know you would, but that just can’t happen. Promise?”

  “Well, OK. But I’m still pissed!”

  I headed to Maxine’s and found Sarah just getting settled in.

  “I want to thank all of you,” she said. “Great plan! Are you sure you guys aren’t covert operatives?”

  “No,” I replied. “We’re just a bunch of old farts who get lucky once in a while.”

  She turned to Maxine. “And I want to thank you for taking me in. I really appreciate it.”

  “Glad to do it,” she replied. “Walt and Willie are good friends and I’m always glad to help when I can. The couch makes into a bed, and there’s fresh linens.” She turned up her nose. “I don’t mean to offend, but it smells like you could use a nice hot bath.”

  “No offense taken. I just spent a half hour hiding in the bathroom while
Mr. Feeney was doing his business, then I was stuffed in a trash bag with three day old Colonel Sanders thrown on top of me.”

  “That explains a lot. There’s clean towels on the rack. Enjoy!”

  Before she left, Sarah pulled me aside. “Walt, we need to talk!”

  From the tone of her voice, I knew it wasn’t going to be a pleasant conversation.

  CHAPTER 16

  As soon as Maxine was out of the apartment, Sarah picked up her burner phone.

  “Was it you? Please tell me it wasn’t you!”

  “I’m so sorry!” Pandora replied. “I turned your material over to my superior, and less than two hours later he summoned me to his office and demanded to know the origin of the material. I tried to resist, but they threatened my family. MY FAMILY! Sarah, I’m not a spy like you. I’m just a journalist. First amendment rights don’t mean squat when you’re dealing with stuff like this.”

  “I understand. That’s exactly why we spies can’t have a family. If I were in your shoes, I would have done the same thing. So I gather WikiLeaks isn’t interested in the story.”

  “Sarah, this is way bigger than WikiLeaks. We’re not talking about a few emails from the DNC or even NSA’s snooping. We’re talking about global annihilation.”

  She was stunned. “Are you sure we’re talking about the same thing? Those fluffy trails in the sky? I don’t get it.”

  “I really can’t say any more. I shouldn’t even be talking to you. If they find out ---.”

  “Who exactly is ‘they?’”

  “You would know better than I would. I’ve gotta go!”

  “Wait! What about the material I sent? Where is it now?”

  “I have no idea. Probably destroyed. This is one story that will never see the light of day.”

  “Come on! Give me something!”

  “The Paris Agreement. That’s all I can tell you. Don’t call me again.”

  The phone went dead.

  She thought for a moment, then dialed again. “Fosdick, can you come over?”

  Twenty minutes after I received Sarah’s call, I was in Maxine’s living room.

  “It was Pandora,” she said. “He gave me up to the agency. They threatened his family, the bastards. I really can’t blame him. I’ve made the same threats myself. We can be very convincing.”

  “So, I’m guessing WikiLeaks isn’t going to run with the story.”

  “According to Pandora, they’re scared to death. Wouldn’t touch it with a ten foot pole. It’s way bigger than any story they’ve ever run. He used the words, global annihilation. I thought all along, we were talking about weather manipulation and the devastation caused by the fallout of the chemicals that were being sprayed. That’s serious stuff, but global annihilation?”

  “Did he give you anything else?”

  “Just before he hung up and told me never to call him again, he said, ‘The Paris Agreement.’ Ring any bells?”

  I thought for a moment. “It just might. The advertised reason for the 2015 summit in Paris was to address the greenhouse gas problem and find ways to limit emissions to slow climate change. I’ve talked to a lot of people who believe that was a ruse, and that the real reason was to come to an agreement on weather manipulation. Up till the time of the conference, every nation was doing their own thing with Mother Nature, causing all kinds of problems like droughts, floods and hurricanes. In light of what Pandora told you, maybe that wasn’t the real reason either.”

  “So what are you thinking?”

  “Remember the manuscript by Frank Katz?”

  She nodded.

  “When I was interviewing Frank, he talked about the use of the chemtrails for national defense. Let me think ---. I remember him using an example. He said that most people think of an Intercontinental Ballistic Missile as a kind of big rock or arrow. You just lob it from here and it lands on a target over there. Apparently, that’s not the case. An ICBM is a space vehicle. It must take off using a large booster rocket, travel at near orbital speed in the vacuum of space until it’s over the target, then it must re-enter the atmosphere. He said that to survive re-entry, the missile must use retro rockets or a heat shield to keep from burning up in the atmosphere. If the missile’s computer controls are destroyed, it will simply burn up like a piece of space junk.”

  “Very enlightening, but what does that have to do with the chemtrails?”

  “According to Katz, the planes spray barium and aluminum powders into the atmosphere. When these chemicals are zapped with an array such as HAARP, it forms a barrier that disrupts the missile’s computer controls.”

  “I think I’m beginning to get the picture,” she said. “This chemtrail thing isn’t just in the U.S., it’s all over the globe.”

  “Exactly! And if you remember the world map that Carson had, there are arrays like HAARP on every continent.”

  “The Paris Agreement,” she said. “If I remember correctly, there were 195 countries in attendance. Talk about détente! As long as every country agrees to continue the spraying and the zapping, everyone is safe from nuclear annihilation by ICBM’s. That’s why we don’t hear much about them today. They’re obsolete. Now the nuclear threat is on the ground through terrorist groups.”

  “The government is between a rock and a hard place. If they tell the public they’re being sprayed, all hell would break loose, but if they don’t spray, it leaves us vulnerable to attack. What a mess!”

  “So, it’s easier to just pretend like nothing is going on. Keep the public in the dark. After all, it’s for their own good. Anyway, ordinary citizens can’t be trusted to make such momentous decisions. As a famous person once said, ‘the governing of a nation is too important to be left to the people.’”

  “Sounds like Hitler, Stalin or Karl Marx.”

  “Actually, it was Thomas Jefferson.”

  I thought about all that had been written and posted about chemtrails. “Maybe he was right. People are more interested in Pokemon, the Kardashians, their cell phones and their video games, than they are in the air they breathe and the food they eat. People can’t control their kids or their jobs. How are they supposed to control something as massive as the government?”

  “So where does that leave us?” she asked.

  “Out in the cold, I’m afraid. If this is too big for WikiLeaks, I don’t know where else to turn.”

  “Kind of a moot point anyway,” she sighed. “Our material has probably been destroyed.”

  There was no way I was going to tell her I had another copy in my safe. The damnable stuff had already cost five lives and had almost taken hers.

  “So are you leaving soon?”

  “I’m going to lay low for a few days. There are just too many eyes out there right now. If they don’t find me soon, they’ll pull some of the muscle away. Besides, I promised Veronica I’d say good bye. I plan to keep that promise.”

  As I drove home, I noticed that the beautiful blue sky was fractured by white streaks. I couldn’t help but wonder whether they were keeping me safe --- or slowly killing me. Maybe it was both.

  CHAPTER 17

  To say I was bummed would be an understatement. I was counting on WikiLeaks to blow the lid off this chemtrail thing, but it wasn’t going to happen. The planes would keep on spraying, people would continue to ignore them or remark how pretty they are when they reflect the rays of the setting sun, and poisons would continue to fall to the earth.

  I had the proof in my safe, but there was no way to spread the word without endangering myself and those I love.

  I was pondering this conundrum when the phone rang.

  “Walt, Dr. Pearson here.”

  “Dr. Pearson, so good to hear from you. It’s been a while since we’ve talked. I hope everything is well with you and Katherine.”

  “It is, but ----.”

  “Ahhh, so this isn’t just a social call.”

  “No, I’m afraid not. I understand you’ve retired from the police department and have your
own P.I. firm now.”

  “Yes, just a little over a year now. How can I help?”

  “It’s complicated. May I come to your office?”

  “Of course. If this is business, do you mind if my partner sits in?”

  “Not at all. I --- I just didn’t know where else to turn.”

  I called Kevin and thirty minutes later, he was in my office.

  “So who’s this Dr. Pearson?” he asked.

  “A few years ago, a colleague of his, Dr. Martin Mitchell, was doing a study comparing a regimen of natural ingredients to the drug, Rolotor, for the treatment of high cholesterol. He found that the natural ingredients reduced cholesterol just as much as the drug without the damaging side effects, at a fraction of the cost. He was about to publish the results of his study when he and his secretary, Violet Jenkins, were murdered.”

  “Don’t tell me. Let me guess,” Kevin said. “It was the pharmaceutical company.”

  “You got it. Putnam Pharmaceuticals. They would have lost billions in statin drug sales.”

  “So what happened?”

  “The doctor and I partnered with the FBI in a sting operation that uncovered collusion between the drug company, the FDA, and a handful of corrupt politicians. After it was over, Maggie and I became friends with Edgar and his wife, Katherine. We did a few things together socially, then we each kind of went our own way. It’s been a couple of years since we’ve been together.”

  There was a knock on the door. Doctor Pearson had arrived.

  After introductions, we got down to business.

  “So, Edgar, how can we help you?”

  “Actually, it’s not for me. It’s for a friend of mine, Dr. Nathanial Briles, another holistic physician like myself.”

  “Hold on a minute,” Kevin interrupted. “At the risk of sounding stupid, what’s a holistic physician? Is that different from a M.D.?”

  “Not a stupid question at all. We’re all medical doctors, but there are two schools of thought with regards to medical treatment. Conventional doctors are trained to do two things, prescribe drugs and cut out parts of a person’s anatomy. Holistic physicians believe that the human body was created in such a way, that under the proper conditions and with proper nutrients, it can resist disease and remain healthy without the use of drugs.”