The Devils Teardrop

somebody. The lobby on Ninth. Didn’t you just come that way?”
    “I came in through the garage.”
    The doctor pulled the top off the thermos. “You know, Detective, the way you told everybody about the Diggers and Levelers? You made it sound like you didn’t trust me.” He turned toward Hardy.
    Evans looked down. He saw the black, silenced pistol Hardy was pointing at his face.
    “Trust didn’t have anything to do with it,” Hardy said.
    Evans dropped the thermos. Coffee splashed onto the floor. He saw the flash of yellow light from the muzzle of the gun. And that was all he saw.

IV
The Puzzle Master
    That handwriting was the worstest thing against me.
    –B RUNO H AUPTMANN, REFERRING TO THE EVIDENCE IN HIS TRIAL FOR THE L INDBERGH BABY K IDNAPPING

30
    The agent was young enough to still be thrilled at the idea of being an FBI employee. So he didn’t mind one bit that he’d been assigned the midnight-to-8 shift New Year’s Eve in the Bureau’s Security Center on the third floor of headquarters.
    There was also the fact that Louise, the agent he was working with, wore a tight blue blouse and short black skirt and was flirting with him.
    Definitely flirting, he decided.
    Well, okay, she was talking about her cat. But the body language told him it was flirting. And her bra was black and visible through the blouse. Which was a message too.
    The agent continued to gaze at the ten TV monitors that were his responsibility. Louise, on his left, had another ten. They were linked to more than sixty security cameras located in and around headquarters. The scenes on the monitors changed every five seconds as the cameras sequenced.
    Louise of the black bra was nodding absently as he talked about his parents’ place on the Chesapeake Bay. The intercom brayed.
    It couldn’t have been Sam or Ralph—the two agents he and Louise had replaced a half hour ago; they had total-clearance entry cards and would’ve just walked inside.
    The agent hit the intercom button. “Yes?”
    “It’s Detective Hardy. District P.D.”
    “Who’s Hardy?” the agent asked Louise.
    She shrugged and went back to her monitors.
    “Yes?”
    The voice crackled, “I’m working with Margaret Lukas.”
    “Oh, on the Metro shooter case?”
    “Right.”
    The legendary Margaret Lukas. The security agent hadn’t been with the Bureau very long but even he knew that Lukas would someday be the first woman director of the FBI. The tech pushed the enter button, spun around to face the door.
    “Can I help you?”
    “I’m afraid I’m lost,” Hardy said.
    “Happens around here.” He smiled. “Where you headed?”
    “I’m trying to find the document lab. I got lost on the way to get some coffee.”
    “Documents? That’s the seventh floor. Turn left. Can’t miss it.”
    “Thanks.”
    “What’s this?” Louise said suddenly. “Hey, what is this?”
    The agent glanced at her as she hit a button to stopthe video camera scan and pointed to one of the monitors. It showed a man lying on his back not far from where they were now, on this floor. The monitors were black and white but a large pool of what was obviously blood ran from his head.
    “Oh, Christ,” she muttered and reached for the phone. “It looks like Ralph.”
    From behind them came a soft thunk. Louise gave a sudden jerk and grunted as the front of her blouse disappeared in a mist of blood.
    “Oh,” she gasped. “What—?”
    Another pop. The bullet struck the back of her head and she pitched forward.
    The young agent turned toward the doorway, lifting his hands, crying, “No, no.”
    In a calm voice Hardy said, “Relax.”
    “Please!”
    “Relax,” he repeated. “I just have a few questions.”
    “Don’t kill me. Please—”
    “Now,” Hardy asked matter-of-factly, “your computers’re running Secure-Chek software?”
    “I—”
    “I’ll let you live if you tell me everything I ask.”
    “Yes.” He started crying. “Secure-Chek.”
    “What version?”
    “Six oh.”
    “And if you don’t log in at regular intervals a Code Forty-two goes out over the Inter-Gov System?”
    “That’s right . . . Oh, look, mister.” He glanced at the body of the woman beside him, which twitched twice. Blood flowed into the control panel. “Oh, God . . .”
    Speaking slowly, Hardy asked, “You started your shift at midnight?”
    “Please, I . . .”
    “Midnight?” he repeated, a schoolteacher coaching a child.
    The agent nodded.
    “What was your first