The Hanged Man's Song

Bill Clinton, here, Rosy—I know what you do,” I said. “Now, I would suggest, for your own health, that you stop chasing us innocent computer folks around the country, and find out who killed Bobby. If you don’t, we’ll start fucking with you again. Remember the last time we did that? How your Keyhole satellites went nuts and all the GS-80s started pooping in their Italian pants? You don’t want that again.”
    “Listen, Bill,” she said earnestly. “Do you have any proof . . . ?”
    “Nothing you would believe,” I said. “But if you check out the dead black man in Jackson, it won’t take you long to figure out who he was, all on your own. The FBI are already involved; all you have to do is give them a hint.”
    “Bobby DuChamps?” she asked. That surprised me. They’d actually gotten a name.
    “Almost,” I said. “His name was Robert Fields. Get it? And listen, Rosalind, really: have a nice day.”
    I hung up feeling that I’d been mean to her, but sometimes, with security people—she was NSA internal security—it’s the only thing that works. Hate will wake you up, if not set you free.
    >>> “YOU do it?” John asked, when I got back to the motel. He and LuEllen were watching the end of a movie called XXX, about a boy and his GTO.
    “All done. Can’t tell what will happen next, but maybe some of the feds will . . . what?” I looked at LuEllen.
    “Reorient themselves,” she suggested.
    “That’s good,” I said. “Reorient themselves.”
    >>> JOHN was in one room, LuEllen and I in another. We were beat. We’d been flying, driving, hacking, and getting shot at for twenty hours and needed some sleep. We arranged to meet at eight the next morning, and LuEllen and I said good night to John and crawled into bed.
    Just before we went to sleep, LuEllen said, “Think about Carp’s trailer. Ten o’clock in the morning is the best time to hit an open target like that. Think about it in your sleep.”
    I did that.
    >>> THERE’S no better source for burglary supplies than your local Target store. You can get cheap, disposable entry tools, plastic gloves, Motorola walkie-talkies, backpacks, and everything you need to change your appearance. Like khaki shorts.
    Everybody knows what a burglar looks like—an ethnic minority, probably, lurking in the bushes until the coast is clear. After dark, on a moonless night. Wearing a ski mask. Which is why most professional house-breakers go in at ten o’clock in the morning or two o’clock in the afternoon, during the workday, when school is in session and the house is probably empty. And they always knock first.
    We synched the walkie-talkie channels on the way over to Carp’s, and I changed into the shorts, tore the price tags off a pairof wraparound sunglasses and put them on, along with a Callaway golf hat.
    We first made a pass outside the park, but could see no activity over the wall near Carp’s. Then we went in and cruised down his street. There was a door on the back end of the Carp mobile home, the one we hadn’t seen the night before, that Carp had gone through, and it was hanging open an inch or two.
    The front door, where John and I had spilled out onto the lawn, was closed, as we’d left it. Just around the corner, and about four houses up, an old guy was mowing his tiny lawn with a tiny electric lawn mower. He glanced at us as we went past and LuEllen said to John, “When we pull into the place, go straight ahead and get out on another street, so you won’t drive past that guy again.”
    John nodded. “All right.”
    LuEllen looked at me. “Ready to try it?”
    “I didn’t see anything that said no.”
    John would be waiting outside the park. If we called and said, “Dave, come on,” he’d come in through the park, taking his time. If we said, “Hey, Dave, hurry it up,” he’d come down the outside street, and we’d jump the wall.
    >>> IN OUR shorts and golf shirts and over-the-shoulder pack, LuEllen and I were an unremarkable, almost invisible, couple knocking on Jimmy James Carp’s door, knocking just loud enough to attract somebody inside. There was no answer and I tried the door. It opened and we waved at John. As he left, we stepped inside as though we’d been invited.
    The place was dark, with curtains and shades on all the windows. I hit the lights and found that we were in the kitchen. The place was a mess, with dirty dishes stacked around a sink. An overflowing garbage bag sat on the floor between