The Pretender's Gambit. Alex Archer

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ you.”

      Bart’s cell phone rang and he answered it, spoke briefly, then looked over at Broadhurst. “That was Palfrey. They’ve got the nephews downstairs. Turns out they live on the second floor.”

      Broadhurst nodded. “I’ll stay here with the body. Why don’t you question the nephews. Take Professor Creed with you. According to the old man’s daughter, the nephews had something to do with our vic’s business. Maybe they know something about this missing elephant she can help with.”

      Bart glanced at Annja. “You up for this? You’re still the only antiques expert I have on hand.”

      “Sure.” Curious, Annja followed Bart out of the room, but her mind was locked on the image of the war elephant and the mystery it represented.

Chapter 2

      Calmly despite the tension that ratcheted through him and the knowledge that the NYPD was across the street, Francisco Calapez knocked on the door to apartment 5E and checked the hallway again. At this late hour, no one was there, but in this city it seemed no one slept. People were always moving, always doing things. He did not like being here, and he especially did not like knocking on a stranger’s door in the middle of the night.

      Unfortunately, since he did not find the thing he had looked for in the old man’s rooms and he did not know where it had gone, he was forced to risk this to get more information. Fernando Sequeira did not take failure well.

      “Open up, please.” He knocked again, dropping his knuckles heavier this time. His pulse beat at his temples as he stared at the window at the end of the hallway. The elevated heart rate wasn’t the result of fear. It came from readiness. Whirling red and blue lights from the police cars parked out in the street below alternately tinted the panes.

      A few feet back from him, up against the wall and out of sight of the door’s fish-eye peephole, Jose Pousao stood waiting with a silenced pistol hidden under his hoodie. He was more slightly built than Calapez, and young enough to be his son, but he listened well and had a taste for killing. That was something that was hard to train into a man. Calapez had always felt that killing was in the blood, a talent a man either had or did not have. Calapez knew he was lucky to be partnered with the younger man. When things got dangerous, Pousao wouldn’t hesitate to kill someone. In fact, he wouldn’t hesitate to kill everyone who wasn’t Calapez.

      Just as Calapez was about to knock again, a man’s voice answered from the other side. “Hello. Can I help you?”

      “Police.” Calapez spoke with an American accent, hiding his native Portuguese. Doing something like that was not hard to do after watching bootlegged American movies. He had been a good mimic since he’d been a child.

      “I didn’t call the police.”

      “We know that, sir.” Calapez curbed his anger. Tonight had already been frustrating because he had not found what he had been sent for, nor did he know where he might find it. The easy thing Fernando Sequeira had asked him to do had turned out not to be so easy, and there had been only one location given. Killing a man—or a woman—was simple enough, but finding things was more difficult. If the elephant had been there, if the old man had not already been dead, the night would have gone more easily. As it was, he was stuck looking for the cursed thing. “We need to look out your window.”

      A moment passed and Calapez knew the man inside the apartment was studying him. Calapez wore a nondescript coat over a shirt and tie and slacks. A suit in New York City was urban camouflage, like a Hawaiian shirt in Florida around the beaches. Calapez had learned how to blend in while in many places doing Sequeira’s business over the years.

      “My window?”

      “There was a murder next door, sir.”

      “No one here saw a murder. I was asleep until all the commotion started outside.”

      “Yes, sir. But there are security cameras on this building that might help us in the search for the killers.”

      “How does getting into my apartment help you with that?”

      “Your apartment is close to one of the cameras. We want to see what the view would be from here before we get the necessary paperwork going.”

      “Can’t you do that from outside?”

      “Not from five stories up, sir. We haven’t taken the killers into custody yet. They might still be in the neighborhood. They could be in this building. We would like to prevent anyone else from falling victim to them. Your assistance will be appreciated, and your safety may hinge on your cooperation.”

      The man hesitated for a moment. “Could I see your identification?”

      “Of course.” Calapez dug the badge and wallet out of his pocket. He’d purchased both from a street dealer who specialized in such things. The dealer had sworn no one could tell the difference.

      Evidently the man in the apartment couldn’t. The locks snicked back one by one. He opened the door. Of medium height and pasty, myopic behind thick lenses and his gray hair in disarray, the apartment dweller looked like an accountant or a grade-school teacher.

      Calapez put away the fake identification, then took out a small notebook and flipped it open with a practiced flick of his wrist. This wasn’t the first time he’d pretended to be an official and he’d encountered plenty of the real ones in his line of work.

      “Could I have your name, sir?”

      “Montgomery. Felix Montgomery.”

      Calapez swept the living area with a glance. “Are you here alone, Mr. Montgomery?”

      “I am.”

      “Then if I can see your window, I will be only a moment.”

      Montgomery led the way to the window. Pousao stood nearby and kept watch over the man.

      Calapez pulled the drapes to one side and peered out the window. From his vantage point he could see the windows of the apartment where the dead man had lived, but curtains blocked the view inside the rooms.

      “Do you know what happened over there?” Montgomery asked.

      “A man was killed.”

      Uneasiness made Montgomery fidget. “Was it a domestic situation?”

      “No, sir. A break-in.” That much would be on the news in short order. Calapez continued watching.

      “That’s terrible. There haven’t been any break-ins that I’ve heard about.”

      “This sort of thing happens in the best neighborhoods, sir.” Calapez turned and looked at Montgomery. “Do you have a camera, sir?”

      Montgomery hesitated. “I do. I teach photojournalism.”

      “Would you mind if I used your camera? I left mine in the squad car.”

      Montgomery frowned. If he was a schoolteacher, that was probably the same frown he gave students who showed up to class without a pencil or paper. “It’s a digital.”

      “That’s СКАЧАТЬ