Okay, here’s how I feel about what went down. If only I’d pulled the trigger a heartbeat sooner and a little more to the right. Jack says I shouldn’t let myself think that way, but I can’t help it. Just because Kathy Mancero died doing a great good thing doesn’t make it right that she’s no longer in the world. I mean, it’s a miracle that she managed to save both Joey and Shane, and maybe me, too, because it turns out that Robert James Killdeer had been trained as a sniper, and was notably adept with a pistol, and as you know, I’m not and probably never will be.
That was Kidder’s real name, Robert James Killdeer, and there’s ample indication that he was employed by Gatling Security Group, although no direct evidence, none that we can find, proving that Taylor Gatling, Jr., personally knew what Killdeer was up to within the company. Before he took his own life, apparently out of shame for what he’d allowed to happen, Gatling claimed that both the kidnapping of Joey Keener and the execution of Jonny Bing were parts of a rogue operation directed by Killdeer alone. Everything in the records points that way. That’s the maddening thing. Gatling may be gone, but the company lives on, doing pretty much what they’ve been doing all along. Unfortunately there doesn’t seem to be much we can do about that. The Pentagon is the Pentagon and money is money, and Naomi says I just have to accept the fact that some things can’t be fixed, because justice, like humanity itself, is never perfect.
All we can do, she says, is the best we can. Which brings me back to me missing my shot and Kathy sacrificing herself. Shane thinks it means something that she died with a smile on her lips, secure in the knowledge that Joey was safe, but I’m not convinced. Dead is dead. I wish I believed in heaven the way Kathy Mancero obviously did, but I don’t. If God wants to pay me a visit, explain how all the bad and terrible things in the world are part of the cosmic plan, the door is always open, and I’m willing to listen. Until then, I’ll stick with believing the greatest miracle of all is life itself, and hope that will be enough to sustain me.
Just so you know, Kathy had made her wishes known to an estate lawyer in Olathe, Kansas, and her ashes are to be scattered over a playground in Kansas City, where she and little Stacy had happy times. Shane has promised to make it happen, even though there’s some ordinance about remains being dispensed in public places. We all figure any kid that comes in contact with a molecule of Kathy Mancero will be the better for it, no matter what the rules say.
As to the Randall Shane legal situation, that gets a little more complicated every day. He’s been released, no longer an active suspect in Professor Keener’s murder, but may eventually face charges for escaping from custody, should D.A. Tommy Costello be willing to endure the bad publicity for punishing a genuine American hero. For the moment, the million-dollar bond remains in effect, which, as Dane Porter says, tends to concentrate the mind, meaning we have to tie up the loose ends.
It’s great—fabulous—that Joey has been reunited with Ming-Mei—believe me, there wasn’t a dry eye when that little scene unfolded, but the question of who killed who, and why, is still up for grabs. Naomi has strong views on the matter, but the D.A. has yet to sign off on the theory that the man who ordered the hit on Professor Joseph Keener was, in all probability, the late Jonny Bing himself. Turns out—and this was well hidden, so deep that even Teddy had trouble finding it—Mr. Bing’s entire fortune was in peril. On paper he was still a billionaire twice over, but it turns out Jonny was obsessed with chasing higher-than-normal interest rates and had invested hundreds of millions in offshore certificates of deposit with Sir Allen Stanford, the Texas swindler and cricketer, and when all the phony dust settled, Jonny Bing came up close to empty. For the last year or so the lucrative development contracts for QuantaGate had been his only source of revenue, and the prospect of the company admitting defeat and closing up shop may have been more than he could face. Maybe he was desperate enough to kill a man he undoubtedly had once called a friend. Or maybe his fellow travelers in the Chinese espionage business, who had helped him snare Keener in the first place, decided to end his involvement in single-gated photon communication, the impossible-to-hack quantum computers that are the current Holy Grail of cybernetics.
Whatever happened, we know from the anonymous surveillance tape that the man coming out of Keener’s house minutes after his murder was a thug and trigger-man well-known to Jonny Bing. Did Bing really order the hit? Apparently that’s one of the sordid little details that will never be known to civilians like us.
Forget it, Alice, it’s Chinatown. Jack actually said that to me. He loves those old movies, does dapper Jack.
And what about Taylor Gatling, Jr.? Did he really kill himself or did he have help? It may not make any difference to the late Mr. Gatling, but I really want to know, Chinatown or not. I’m the chief factotum around here and would like to set the record straight. Call it housekeeping if you like.
Naomi says, in her maddeningly remote way, that I need to develop more patience, and that despite our best intentions, sometimes the bad guys get away with it, even after they’re dead and buried.
Oh, speaking of bad guys getting away with it, consider the case of that snake-in-the-grass Glenn Tolliver. At this point I can barely stand to write the creep’s name, so I’m just going to include a transcript of Piggy’s last interview with Jack Delancey, duly recorded at Cigar Masters without the Pigster’s knowledge. Such undisclosed recordings may be against the privacy laws, but as Piggy himself might say, in his ever-charming way, tough titty.
JACK: Hey. Looks like you started without me.
TOLLIVER: Hope you don’t mind. Couldn’t resist the Padron. [sound of puffing, groan of pleasure] Ah! Scotch tonight, though, not the cognac. Figured your boss would spring for the single malt, considering.
JACK: Yeah? Considering what?
TOLLIVER: My continued cooperation.
JACK: Oh yeah. That.
TOLLIVER: You sound a bit snippy, my son. What’s got you down? I hope it’s not having to shoot that low-life Killdeer. You did the world a favor, Jack. You should stand proud on that one.
JACK: I’m fine with that. Just wish I’d hit him sooner. I’d have been there in time if you hadn’t decided to haul me in for questioning that morning.
TOLLIVER: Can’t be helped. How was I to know?
JACK: Naomi has a theory about that. Gatling’s outfit picked up Shane’s cell phone call to me, from his end, and let you know.
TOLLIVER: [laughing] That’s crazy talk.
JACK: Is it? Quite a coincidence, you having me picked up minutes after Shane called requesting backup.
TOLLIVER: That’s all it was, a coincidence.
JACK: Really? My boss has a theory on that.
TOLLIVER: Full of theories, ain’t she?
JACK: Yeah, and this particular theory is, if something impossible is supposed to have occurred, look very deep, because the impossible doesn’t happen. That’s why it’s impossible.
TOLLIVER: Very profound. Almost as deep as that old wisdom dude in The Karate Kid.
JACK: Excuse me?
TOLLIVER: Pat Morita. Popular character actor. Probably croaked by now. Great movie.
JACK: We’re discussing movies?
TOLLIVER: Don’t get your boxers in a twist. Have a malt. Relax. Damn, these are great cigars!
JACK: As I was saying, we looked deep. And guess what we found?
TOLLIVER: Go on, astound me.
JACK: The bloody shirt. It was completely impossible for Shane to have returned to his motel room and left the bloody shirt behind, because by the time he got back to the motel it was already under surveillance.