The Devils Teardrop

hesitated, looked at her cool eyes. Then nodded at a winding path that led into an alley. “This way.”
    * * *
    The man was about five feet tall.
    He had a wiry beard and bushy hair. He wore a ratty bathrobe and Parker had obviously wakened him when he banged fiercely on the rickety door.
    He stared at Parker and Lukas for a moment then, without a word, retreated quickly back into the apartment, as if he’d been tugged back by a bungee cord.
    Lukas preceded Parker inside. She looked around then holstered her weapon. The rooms were cluttered, filled to overflowing with books and furniture and papers. On the walls hung a hundred signed letters and scraps of historical documents. A dozen bookshelves were chockablock with more books and portfolios. An artist’s drawing table was covered with bottles of ink and dozens of pens. It dominated the tiny living room.
    “How you doing, Jeremy?”
    The man rubbed his eyes. Glanced at an old-fashioned windup alarm clock. He said, “My, Parker. It’s late. Say, look at what I’ve got here. Do you like it?”
    Parker took the acetate folder Jeremy was holding up.
    The man’s fingertips were yellow from the cigarettes he loved. Parker recalled that he smoked only outside, however. He didn’t want to risk contaminating his work. As with all true geniuses Jeremy’s vices bent to his gift.
    Parker took the folder and held it up to a light. Picked up a hand glass and examined the document inside. After a moment he said, “The width of the strokes . . . it’s very good.”
    “Better than good, Parker.”
    “Okay, I’ll grant you that. The starts and lifts are excellent. Also looks like the margins are right and the folio size matches. The paper’s from the era?”
    “Of course.”
    “But you’d have to fake the aging of the ink with hydrogen peroxide. That’s detectable.”
    “Maybe. Maybe not.” Jeremy smiled. “Maybe I’ve got something new up my sleeve. Are you here to arrest me, Parker?”
    “I’m not a cop anymore, Jeremy.”
    “No, but she is, isn’t she?”
    “Yes, she is.”
    Jeremy took the sheet back. “I haven’t sold it. I haven’t even offered it for sale.” To Lukas he said, “It’s just a hobby. A man can have a hobby, can’t he?”
    “What is it?” Lukas asked.
    Parker said, “It’s a letter from Robert E. Lee to one of his generals.” He added, “I should say, purporting to be from Robert E. Lee.”
    “He forged it?” Lukas asked, glancing at Jeremy.
    “That’s right.”
    “I never admitted anything. I’m taking the Fifth.”
    Parker continued. “It’s worth maybe fifteen thousand.”
    “Seventeen . . . If somebody were going to sell it. Which I never would. Parker arrested me once,” Jeremy said to Lukas, tweaking his beard with his middle finger and thumb. “He was the only one in the world who caught me. You know how he did it?”
    “How?” she asked. Parker’s attention was not on the excellent forgery but on Margaret Lukas, who seemed both amused and fascinated by the man. Her anger had gone away for the moment and Parker was very pleased to see that.
    “The watermark on the letterhead,” Jeremy said, scoffing. “I got done in by a watermark.”
    “A few years ago,” Parker said, “Jeremy . . . let’s say, came into possession of a packet of letters from John Kennedy.”
    “To Marilyn Monroe?” Lukas asked.
    Jeremy’s face twisted up. “ Those? Oh, those were ridiculous. Amateurish. And who cares about them? No, these were between Kennedy and Khrushchev. According to the letters, Kennedy was willing to compromise on Cuba. What an interesting historical twist that would have been. He and Khrushchev were going to divvy up the island. The Russians would have one half, the U.S. the other.”
    “Was that true?” Lukas asked.
    Jeremy was silent and stared at the Robert E. Lee letter with a faint smile on his face.
    Parker said, “Jeremy makes up things.” Which happened to be the delicate way he described lying when he was speaking with the Whos. “He forged the letters. Was going to sell them for five thousand dollars.”
    “Four thousand eight hundred,” Jeremy corrected.
    “That’s all?” Lukas was surprised.
    “Jeremy isn’t in this business for the money,” Parker said.
    “And you caught him?”
    “My technique was flawless, Parker, you have to admit that.”
    “Oh, it was,” Parker confirmed. “The craftsmanship was perfect. Ink, handwriting attack, starts and lifts,