Calling Card Capers

  CALLING CARD CAPERS

  Daniel Kelly

  Copyright © 2014 by Daniel Kelly

  Smashwords Edition

  PUBLISHER’S NOTE:

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

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  Dan Kelly

  CALLING CARD CAPERS

  Chapter 1

  The man is dressed to the nines. The suit alone had to cost at least five grand, the shoes another grand and the silk shirt and tie maybe another five Cs. Unfortunately, the man can’t confirm my estimates of his attire because he’s lying on the floor in his office with a bullet hole in his forehead.

  My name is Chet Dawson. Ostensibly, I’m an independent researcher for businesses and politicians and have a small office on the outskirts of D.C.; small meaning four people, two research assistants, an admin and me. The name on the door is Dawson Inc. Mr. Originality that’s me.

  In reality, I also have a private investigator’s license which allows me to legally be nosier than your average neighborhood snoop and I work for the President of the United States. My name appears nowhere on any government payroll that is open to public scrutiny because my relationship with the man is very well hidden in the shadows of the Capitol bureaucracy and even government personnel with top secret clearance don’t know about my relationship with Uncle Sam’s CEO. I report only to him. There are no go-betweens.

  I have a very special set of credentials that afford me access to just about anywhere I need to be and I use them only when it’s absolutely necessary. I can usually talk my way into where I want to go. It also helps to be 6’4” tall, weigh a lean 220 pounds, have a nose that’s been broken a few times and have the experience of growing up on the streets of New York and learning at an early age to talk my way into or out of all kinds of situations, including getting my butt kicked. I’m not ugly, but I’m not going to win any pretty boy contests either.

  The man on the floor is Edmund Baker, a lobbyist for an international uniform manufacturer based in the mid-west and, judging from his home, his wine cellar in particular, his home office and his clothing, a bon vivant of the first order.

  I’ve seen dead bodies before, but never one with a calling card displayed on its chest.

  COMPLEMENTS OF THE CRUSADER

  HUMAN TRASH REMOVAL MY SPECIALITY

  NO NEED TO CALL ME.

  I’LL FIND THE NEXT ONE ON MY OWN!!!

  I assume the red background symbolizes bloodletting. It appears someone left the door unlocked at the nuthouse again.

  Over the years, I’ve developed relationships with local law enforcement officials both in Washington D. C. and in the communities surrounding it. I even have a few contacts at the Federal level that make me feel a little better about the clowns running the show in our nation’s capitol. At least they occasionally hire folks with brains, insight and are good at what they do.

  One of those Federal contacts, FBI agent Don Ericson, is the reason I’m here on Foxhall Road in the Phillips Park community of the very exclusive Northwest Section of the Capitol staring down at a dead body.

  “Thanks for coming over, Chet. Isn’t this the guy you called me about a while back? If I remember right, you were doing a background check for one of your clients and you had a bad feeling about him. We had nothing on him, but you weren’t going to let it lie there. You said something about the man being a little too cool for your tastes. Too standoffish for a legitimate businessman. You said something about anyone that cool is like an iceberg with 90 percent of the package out of sight. Did you ever come up with anything on him?”

  “You’re welcome, Don, and yes this is the guy and no I wasn’t able to dig up anything on him. Hell, I couldn’t even chip off a few ice cubes.”

  “Well, it looks like you weren’t the only one who had a bad feeling about him. When it comes to the motive for this, that calling card pretty much says it all. There are no signs of forced entry, so Mr. Baker must have allowed the killer access to his home. There are no signs of anything obvious being taken. The house hasn’t been ransacked. There’s a wall safe behind that picture of Mr. Baker taken with the Secretary of Defense and it doesn’t appear to have been fiddled with. Apparently Mr. Baker’s killer is also a cool customer as there are no signs of anger, of pent up rage being released through the senseless destruction of anything in the house.

  “As you can see, the forensics people have done their thing, dusted for prints, vacuumed the carpeting and furniture in the office, taken pictures of everything from every conceivable angle, etc., etc. All I can do is wait to see if they are able to discover anything that might give us a hint as to where to start looking. I’m hoping you’ll be willing to lend a hand in that regard. From working with you in the past, I know you have access to some very unusual albeit prolific resources when it comes to getting a close look at other people’s dirty laundry and I have a feeling I’m going to need all the help I can get on this one.”

  “I’ll be glad to lend a helping hand, but who’s going to be filling it with the required greenbacks?”

  “I’ll get the okay to bring you on board as a consultant to assist in the investigation and apprehension of this Crusader character. You’ve helped us on a gratis basis in the past. I don’t think I’ll have any trouble selling it to the bosses.”

  “Don, I don’t come cheap. The average hourly rate for a PI is $50 and for the more experienced ones up to $100. I charge $300 an hour plus expenses. You’ll have to trust me and give me discretionary leeway when it comes to incurring them. If something unusual comes up, I will run it by you first. I do not want to expose myself to the U. S. Government paper mill, being forced to wait for a decision by committee to be made.”

  Apparently to lighten the mood a little Ericson says, “Understood. Geez, making that kind of money, how come you’re still wearing off the rack suits?”

  Thankful for the opportunity to join in I quickly respond with, “You better get your eyes checked mister. This is not an off the rack sack of threads, man. This is an original Jimmy Kong hand tailored masterpiece. He comes right to my office, fits me, I select the material and style and in two weeks, presto, Mr. GQ in the flesh at a fraction of the cost.”

  “Chet, do these GQ quality Chinese suits come with anything else besides fortune cookies? Egg rolls? Tubes of won ton soup? Noodles?”

  “Huh?”

  “GQ quality suits don’t come with fortunes sticking out of their pockets, Chet.”

  Looking where Don is looking I’m surprised to indeed see the fortune from the fortune cookie I had eaten at lunch. I had stuffed it in the handkerchief pocket of my suit jacket and forgotten about it. It had worked its way up and was sticking out of the pocket.

  “Hey maybe we’re onto something here.” We both begin to laugh and head for the front door of the house.

  When we enter the living room our laughter is quick
ly squelched by the tongue lashing of a petite woman in her sixties who is enraged by our joviality. “Your behavior is inexcusable for the scene of a murder with the body still lying where it has fallen.” Looking at the badge hanging around Ericson’s neck she adds, “I will be talking to your superior about your demeanor the first chance I get.”

  Looking at me she says, “I see no badge hanging around your neck. What are you doing here?”

  “My name is Chet Dawson and I’m here as a consultant at the request of Agent Ericson, Ms.???”

  Knowing who and why I’m here seems to have somewhat mollified her, but she’s not about to put me on her BFF list. Ignoring the implied query about her identity she asks, “What kind of a mess did Eddie get himself into this time that warrants an FBI investigation with the help of an outside consultant no less?”

  Don takes control of the situation with, “Ma’am, that’s one of the things we’re trying to determine. How do you know Mr. Baker? Are you an employee, a friend, a relative?”

  “I’m his grandmother, Eleanor Baker, and I live here with Eddie. I’ve been away for a few days visiting my sister in Philadelphia. I’m the one who found him lying on the floor in his office and called the police.”

  Don voices what I’m thinking, “Mrs. Baker, were you close to your grandson? Did he confide in you? Did he say anything to you about being in any kind of trouble with anybody? Was he worried about anything?”

  “My grandson was a very secretive person when it came to both his personal and business lives. We’ve lived together in this house for over ten years now and except for the occasional meal or evening at the theater we lived separate lives. We liked it that way. We gave each other a lot of space to do our thing.”

  My curiosity always gets the better of me so I ask, “What is your thing, Mrs. Baker?”

  With a glare so intense I’m waiting for sparks to start flying out of her eyes she hisses, “Minding my own business and expecting others to do the same.”

  Hit the dirt! Incoming!! Wow! Eddie’s not the only one in the Baker family who likes to keep secrets.

  After another five minutes goes by without eliciting anything useful from Grandma Baker, Ericson ends his interview with her and leaves her to do her thing.

  Walking over to me where I’ve been examining some Hummel displayed in a cabinet in a corner of the living room Don says, “That is one strange and very cold woman. It’s easy to see where the grandson got his personality from. She’s exhibiting no signs of grief whatsoever. Anger? Confusion? Yes. Sorrow? Not a trace.”

  “Well, there’s nothing else to be learned here, Don. I’m going to split and take another look at what I dug up the last time I tried to look into this guy’s personal and business affairs. Maybe I overlooked something. It’s a starting point anyway.”

  “Okay, Chet, and thanks again for coming out today.”

  Chapter 2

  Walking into my office at any given time on any given day is an adventure into the unknown.

  It could be quiet as outer space and neat as an anal retentive’s, it could be as noisy as a rock concert and look like a bomb had just been detonated in the middle of it or the confines could appear quite normal with things in mild disarray and people talking quietly on the phone and tapping away on their computer keyboards. However, there is no such thing as a normal atmosphere at Dawson Inc. New cases, new clients, new challenges and new surprises are always showing up and I wouldn’t have it any other way.

  My team though small is the best I could ever hope for. Felicity Carson, my admin, is my right arm and keeps things running smoothly even when it looks impossible to do so. No, she is not in the know about my relationship with the President, but she’s a very sharp lady and I wouldn’t be surprised if she suspects that I’m into something that I’m not sharing with her but trusts me enough to believe whatever I might be doing behind her back is not illegal. Her name suits her as she is always upbeat, always has a smile for you and she wasn’t standing behind the door when good looks were being handed out either. That doesn’t hurt where the clients are concerned. She’s thirty eight years old, has a master’s degree in public affairs from George Washington University and has never been married.

  Bob Forsythe and Shirley Simpson are my researchers and possess investigative instincts and computer like memories that never fail to amaze me. They’re both in their early thirties, single, and are junk food addicts with no apparent side effects. Bob aspires to be a freelance journalist and is attending night classes to get his degree in journalism. Shirley wants to be a home wrecker just like her dad…. That got my attention too when I first asked her the question. She loves to broadside people with that little tidbit. In reality, her father owns and operates a demolition company that razes office buildings, homes and other structures and hauls the debris away. Initially, her employment with me was only to be for as long as it took her to get her bachelor’s in business administration, but she’s accomplished that and has been working for me for going onto five years now and shows no signs of wanting to leave. I’m letting sleeping dogs lie.

  As I open the door to the office, I’m surprised to find it empty. There’s the usual daily clutter on everyone’s desk, but no bodies sitting in the chairs. “Hi Honey, I’m home. What’s for dinner?”

  This witticism gets no response, so I start a room to room search which takes all of a minute as there are only four rooms, the main office, a small supply room, a break room and a bathroom. Glancing at my watch and seeing that it’s only a little after four in the afternoon, I’m about to call Felicity on her cell when she comes rushing into the office all out of breath.

  “What’s going on? Where have you been? Where are Bob and Shirley and how come you’re puffing like you just ran a marathon?”

  “This has been an afternoon from hell. Our service provider’s servers and other equipment have developed some glitches and we can’t get on line or check or send emails. Our phones are out due to some dimwit running into the telephone pole in front of the building and I had to run across the street to FEDEX to mail some research reports to Billings and Billings because I couldn’t arrange for pickup over the phone. I left the office door open because I knew I wouldn’t be away for more than ten minutes. I left a note on my desk explaining where I was and when I would be back.”

  “I didn’t see any note.”

  Felicity walks over to her desk and not seeing the note begins looking around for it. It is lying on the seat of her chair. Holding it up so I can see what she has in her hand she says “Ta da. When you opened the door, a draft must have blown it off my desk.”

  “Are there any estimates on when our communications will be restored?”

  “The phone company says our phone service should be back up by eight tonight. There is no estimate as to when our computers will be back on line. Bob and Shirley went over to the library to use their computers to complete some research they are putting together on Samuelson and then they were going over to the Washington Post to do some research in the paper’s archives on those former presidential hopefuls you are so curious about.”

  “Okay, that clears things up. Why don’t you knock it off for today? I’m sorry your day wound up in the crapper. When everyone’s back at their grindstones tomorrow morning, I want you to put all assignments on the back burner and devote all of your time to an old case. Do you remember the Edmond Baker background check I was working on a while back?”

  “Yes, I remember. You thought there was something wrong about the man, but we couldn’t dig up any dirt on him. What’s up with him?”

  “He was murdered sometime last night. One bullet in the forehead did the trick. Don Ericson is bringing us on board as consultants to help him determine a motive for the killing and find the killer.”

  I give Felicity a rundown on what I have learned at the crime scene and finish up with, “Pull our file on this guy and have it on my desk when I come in tomorrow. Make copies for you, Bob and Shirley too. I want all
of us working on this full time. Let’s start out by reviewing everything we did the first time around. We might have overlooked something. After we’ve all had a chance to do that, I’ll want to have a confab to determine a plan of action. Baker was into something that really ticked this Crusader character off. Knowing what that was could open a lot of doors for us.”