The ELI Event B007R5LTNS

could or would do such a thing.”
    “It was Bird, Mrs. Faraday!” Mike shouted from the balcony.
    “Hush, Michael. Go back to bed!”
    “What was that, son? Bird? ”
    “Sure! It had to be Bird. Who else is that much of a geek?”
    “Michael, I said go back to bed.”
    “No,” Pettis ordered. “Come down here. Maybe you can help us.” Mike bounded down the stairs, loving the attention. “Now,” Pettis said, kneeling in front of the boy, “Who is this Bird person?”
    “Just one of the kids here. His real name’s Robin, but he’s such a ’tard we just call him Bird. Don’t we, guys?” Muffled laughter issued from the balcony.
    “Go on.”
    “Well, he’s real strange. He has these fits, see, and sometimes he meets this spooky-lookin’ old man over by the fence and gets stuff from him.”
    Mrs. Faraday’s eyes widened. “What? Robin? Robin Kirkland?”
    “Oh, yeah! He’s always gettin’ stuff from the old man.”
    “What old man?” Her head was starting to hurt.
    “You know, the one from the TV shop over on Davis.”
    “I see,” Pettis said. “And what does he do with this stuff?”
    “Not sure, but I’ve seen him take, like, TV screens and electrical parts and shit, I mean, stuff, you know?”
    Pettis and Grochonski exchanged a glance. “What else?”
    “Well, last night I got up to take a leak, and just as I was going back to bed, I saw him coming out of the closet here.”
    Mrs. Faraday was stunned. “What? The broom closet? In the middle of the night?”
    Pettis grabbed the boy’s arm. “What was he doing?”
    “I don’t know.” Mike jerked free of his grasp. “What do I look like, the friggin’ answer man?”
    Grochonski had already tried the closet door. “Locked. Mrs. Faraday, would you please open the closet?”
    They were all looking at her. She suddenly felt very, very uncomfortable. “I, um, I’m afraid I can’t.”
    “Why not?”
    “Because there’s only one key, and I don’t carry it.”
    The big sergeant snorted. “Three guesses who does,” he said to Pettis.
    She nodded.
    Pettis stood. “Groucho, lose that door.” Grochonski spun and delivered a powerful side kick next to the doorknob. Wood splintered and the door burst inward. Grochonski motioned to Davies, who stepped in and began to rummage through the junk.
    “Now wait just a minute,” Mrs. Faraday protested. “You men can’t just come in here and start tearing up the place! Who do you think...” Pettis gave her an icy glare. She decided to be quiet.
    Davies emerged from the closet carrying the typewriter case. He placed it on the oak table in the foyer and opened it. “Looks like we hit the jackpot, sir.”
    Pettis nodded, frowning. “What do you think?”
    Davies examined the contraption. “Here’s the CPU, Major. An old 486. A small CRT, chiclet keyboard. The motherboard has a bunch of mismatched memory chips, and there’s an RJ-11 port for telephone communications. This is definitely it. But there’s no storage on this thing; the data can’t possibly be here.”
    Pettis turned to Mrs. Faraday. “Did you know about this?”
    “I never saw it before! Are you suggesting that this thing belongs to Robin Kirkland?”
    “That’s it,” Mike offered. “I seen some of that stuff before. It’s the junk the old man’s been giving Bird.”
    Grochonski said, “It makes sense, Major, except for the boy himself. What possible motive could he have...”
    Mrs. Faraday suddenly remembered something. “Oh my goodness—the telephone call.”
    “What’s that?”
    “Just before you men arrived, there was a call for Robin. The voice was strange, maybe foreign. He said he had to talk to Robin right away. Said it was very important. Imperative, he said.”
    “Foreign? Did he give a name?”
    “Yes, yes, he did. Um, E-something. Emo, Elias, Eli. That’s it—Eli!”
    Pettis nodded. “There’s your motive, Groucho. An accomplice, using the boy as cover. This is not an isolated case of hacking—it’s conspiracy! Mrs. Faraday, take me to the boy.”
    “Yes, all right.”
    Pettis followed her upstairs and through the group of excited youngsters to Robin’s room. They reappeared in seconds. “Gone,” Pettis reported from the balcony. “Room’s empty, window’s open. There’s a knotted sheet, but it’s not tied to anything. Strange. Anyway, he can’t be far.” He roughly pushed the boys aside and descended, leaving Mrs. Faraday at the top of the stairs, completely