Silverfish Ch. 02

The chronological order of my stories is as follows:

Todd & Melina series, Interludes 1-5, Sperm Wars series, Russian Roulette series, Case of the Murdered Lovers series, Case of the Murdered Chessplayer series, The Swap series, Interludes 6-10, The Murdered Football Player Series, Case of the Black Widow series, Teresa's Christmas Story, The Case of the Black Badge series, A Case of Revenge series, Teresa's Summer Race, The Trilogy series, Dark Side Of The Force series, Caught In The Act series, Case of the Murdered Bride series, The Credit Card Caper series, The Hot Wives Investment Club series, Seriously Inconvenienced series, Case of the Paper Trail series, Christmas Mystery Theater, The Porno Set Mystery series, The Medical Murder Mystery series, The Eightfold Fence series, Pale Morning Light series.

Silverfish, Ch. 01-02

Feedback and constructive criticism is very much appreciated, and I encourage feedback for ideas.

This story contains graphic scenes, language and actions that might be extremely offensive to some people. These scenes, words and actions are used only for the literary purposes of this story. The author does not condone murder, racial language, violence, rape or violence against women, and any depictions of any of these in this story should not be construed as acceptance of the above.

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Part 9 - The Correlation

"This is Bettina Wurtzburg, KXTC Channel Two News!" shouted the lovely redhead reporterette as she stood in front of the local branch of County Regional Bank on the morning of Wednesday, March 11th. "Channel Two News is following up on the story of the bank robbery at the County Regional Bank branch in Coltrane County. Despite the cooperation with detectives from this County's Police Force, there are no new leads in the case. However, Channel Two News has learned that the bank robber may have been someone known to the FBI in the past as 'The Silverfish', who would leave a silver Christian Fish symbol at the scenes of his crimes."

"I'm beginning to feel like Chief Griswold." said Daniel Allgood, who was sipping coffee behind me and Cindy and the rest of the MCD team. "How the fuck did she get that information?" I shrugged, knowing I wasn't the leak, idly wondering who was.

"In other news," shouted Bettina, "The Reverend Robert Patterson has confirmed that he will be the guest speaker at First Baptist Church this Sunday! People in the Town and County are excited, as this is the first big appearance by the protégé of the Reverend Jonas Oldeeds in our County. Of course the murder of Reverend Oldeeds here nearly two years ago still remains unsolved by the Town & County Police!"

"Geez, nice little shot at us, there." said Joanne Cummings. "Commander, think you'll ever solve that one?"

"My red crowbar suggests that I will never get a conviction for that crime." I said. Joanne missed Cindy's pointed, almost glaring look at me, as Cindy knew the real meaning of my words and knew just where the metal of my first red crowbar had come from: the melted-down rifle that had been used to exterminate the late Evangelist.

I continued: "Okay, everyone will be coming to Classroom 'E' when our FBI friends arrive. I have some new information for you."

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

I swept Classroom 'E' for bugs, then allowed everyone to come in at 8:15am. I also had the device working that prevented I.A. and any other recording devices from working properly.

Present were the same persons as the meeting the afternoon before, with the addition of Vice Detective Julie Newton. The doughnuts disappeared quickly as Myron set up his laptop to make a presentation on the screen.

"Okay," I said as everyone settled in with their coffee and doughnuts, "here are the Silverfish bank heists, not including the one yesterday." Red discs filled the screen on the wall, which showed a projection of a map of the United States.

"Okay, Myron, have those dots appear in order of the crimes." I said. Myron had already prepared, and red dots began popping up one by one until they were all there."

"Okay, Myron, show the blue dots in chronological order." I said, intentionally cryptically. The map cleared, and then a series of blue discs began popping up.

"Virtually the same." Cindy observed. "What gives?"

I smiled as I said "Okay, Myron, have the blue and red dots appear together, chronological order." A blue dot and then a red dot appeared, very close together, followed by another blue dot then red dot next to each other, then another and another until 28 blue dots were there, and 30 red dots.

"The two extra red dots," I said, "are the two heists where cash was not stolen but the safe deposit boxes were burgled, and there was no correlating blue-dot event for them. I have to give Joanne and Myron a great deal of credit for this map, as what they said yesterday triggered some thoughts in my head, leading to these correlated red and blue dots."

"Okay, Don," said Cindy, "you're going to be seeing red and blue crowbars swinging at you if you don't tell us what this means." Everyone laughed.

"Okay, okay." I said. "Apologies for the dramatics. The blue dots... are appearances by the Reverend Jonas Oldeeds at large religious events and rallies during the three year time period of the bank heists. The money was the offerings given and collected at the events, which were stored in the banks that were robbed."

"Oh my God! you got it!" Tanya Perlman exclaimed. Applause followed, which candor compels me to admit that I enjoyed; indeed, I'd nailed this one to the wall.

"Thank you." I said. "Again, Myron saying that no bulk money deposits nor sequential bill numbers were on hand showed that the deposits were likely cash gathered at some big event, and Joanne mentioning rock concerts got me to thinking about just what events might be correlated. Joanne and Martin also mentioned about the Silverfish name, and that despite the insect name the silver fish symbol might indeed be Christianity-related. And that led me to thinking about the late Reverend Jonas Oldeeds."

I continued: "Oldeeds would go on speaking tours in bites at a time, and he did them more often in the days of the Silverfish crimes than he did in his last few years. In fact, when he came here that time he was shot dead, that was more of an exception than the norm for him; he'd not been touring nearly as much during the last five years of his life."

"Oldeeds would appear at events, and of course they took up offerings." I said. "If you think about it... fifteen thousand people at an event, which is about the average Oldeeds would get, giving an average of twenty dollars each... would yield about $300,000, give or take."

"The average amount of the bank heists." said Lindy, awe and admiration in her voice.

"Yes." I said. "And while sometimes Oldeeds spoke at sports arenas or stadiums that could handle that kind of cash, he also spoke at places that couldn't... so they had to deposit that much cash in a local bank's safe, then they'd have some mechanism to transfer the deposits to their own bank accounts. But during these three years, those banks would be burgled the very night after the rally offerings were counted and deposited, before the banks could get the cash to a more secure location."

"Four hundred years ago, you'd have been burned at the stake." said Jack Muscone, in the form of a quotation. "Why do I keep having cause to say that over and over? God, that's good work, Don! So you think this is someone within the Oldeeds organization?"

"Quite possibly." I replied. "In each case, the Oldeeds people never lost their money, they usually had a cashier's check beforehand, or a wire transfer. In the cases they hadn't been secured by the completion of the deposit, they were made whole by the banks, who were then made whole by their insurance and/or the FDIC. Ultimately, neither the bank nor the Oldeeds Group were harmed; the insurance or the taxpayer footed the bill.

"It is possible that the Oldeeds Group never knew that someone was following them around, but knowing what we know about them, I suspect that someone within the organization, if not the full organization itself, knew full well what was happening." I said with a slight amount of sarcasm in my voice.

Cindy patted me on the shoulder. "No crowbar beatdowns today." she said. "Wow."

"So where do we go from here?" asked Martin Nash. "I have a feeling the Oldeeds people might not be very forthcoming with who worked for them at the time."

"True." I said. "We also need to know how the mechanism worked. Obviously the Oldeeds people had to arrange with a bank to count and deposit the cash.

"Sir," said Julie Newton, "I can get that information within a few hours, or at least a place to ask. I'll check and see who the financial officers of the Oldeeds Group were from their corporate filings and tax filings, and also see how they worked their cash offerings."


"They're still likely not going to cooperate with us nor the FBI." said Tanya Perlman.

"Let's burn that bridge when we get to it." I said. "Do the research Julie, and let me or Lt. Ross know what you find- yes, Sergeant?"

The Duty Desk sergeant had just knocked on the door then peeked inside. "Sorry to disturb your meeting, sir, but we just got an urgent call from Second National Bank. They're saying that one of their bank officers may be missing."

"One Mr. Harkins, the assistant manager?" I asked.

"Uh, yes sir." the Sergeant said, gaping. "How did you know?"

"Not much gets by this man, Sergeant." Cindy Ross said as we all started getting up. "Not much at all."

"Not all that hard, Crowbar 2." I said. "I suspect he's connected to the leak leading to this latest Silverfish heist. Funny how that happened after our Detectives interviewed Mr. Harkins..."

"Four hundred years ago, Don..." Jack Muscone said, awe in his voice. "Four hundred years ago..."

Part 10 - Disappearing Banksters

I arrived at Second National Bank with Detectives Parker and Cummings. The president of the bank, one Mr. Wilson, met us in the lobby and brought us to his office.

"Mr. Harkins left Monday morning." said the bank president. "Not very long after you police officers interviewed him about the previous robberies. He told his assistant that he had an appointment with the dentist that he'd forgotten to tell her about, and she didn't think much of it when he didn't return for the day. Yesterday morning, his assistant had a phone message for him, barely intelligible, saying he was still recovering from the dental surgery and would not be in for the whole day.

This morning, he didn't come in, so we called his cell phone and to his home; no answer on either line. I sent a teller over there, but no one answered her knock, and she peeked into the garage and found that his car was not inside the garage."

A quick interview of Mr. Harkins' assistant showed that Mr. Harkins had left almost as soon as my Detectives had left the bank. We listened to the tape of his voice message, and it sounded like a guy who could hardly talk as he said he wouldn't be coming into the office.

Obtaining Harkins' cell number, I called Myron and had him run a check on the number, a lack of a warrant notwithstanding. Myron said that the number had been used only once Tuesday morning, pinging from a tower near where his home was, and the number that was called was his own office number, which went to the assistant's recorder. I told Myron to research hard and get the information of any vehicles Harkins owned, and the GPS and other tracking devices therein.

I then called Paulina to get a warrant to enter Harkins' home, based upon his disappearance and my assertion that his life might be in danger.

The warrant met us, along with Sergeant Rudistan and Sr. Patrolmen Morton and Hicks, at the banker's townhouse, a new development northwest of Town near the road that led to the bypass and also near the River. All the doors were locked, but my red crowbar pried open the garage window on the side of the home, and I scrambled inside. As I'd hoped, the door to the house from the garage was unlocked. I opened the garage door, letting the other officers inside.

The uniformed officers made the first sweep of the house, clearing the rooms. "It's empty, Commander!" Rudistan finally called out. "Looks like our boy left in a hurry."

Indeed. The bedroom was torn up, clothes everywhere as Harkins had obviously packed in a hurry. Papers were scattered around his desk in the side room; and if he had a personal computer, it was nowhere to be found in the residence.

"No clean underwear anywhere." I said as I searched through the chest of drawers and the bedroom closets. "That suggests he left on purpose with the intent of not coming back for a while."

"He packed his razor, toothbrush, and any medicines in the cabinets, too." said Joanne Cummings as she surveyed the bathroom, her words confirming my theory. "Nothing left in there."

"No blood, no signs of struggle: no furniture displaced, no broken lamps." said Teddy Parker.

"Here's his cell phone." I said as I went into his office room, seeing the device mounted on a small square block that was some electronic device. "What is this thing? Speakers?"

"No sir." said Parker. "Some kind of clock timer." He pressed a button on it. The cellphone suddenly came to life, dialed a number, and then we heard the same garbled message that had been left on his assistant's phone at the bank.

"Wow." I said. "Call Barry Oliver and asked him to consult with us as an Auxiliary Crime Lab Officer on this piece of equipment." Parker got out his cell phone to make the call.

"Something's bothering me..." I said, trying to make my memory work. "Oh, that's it. Come this way, Cummings!" I led her back to the garage. "Yes, there's a trickle charger there against the back wall, not being used. What's important is the clean spot amidst the collected dust on the floor next to it. You see that? What do you think that means?"

"He recently took something that was next to the trickle charger?" said Joanne. I nodded. She then said "Rectangular shape. A box, maybe?"

"C'mon, Joanne," I said, trying to sound humorous, "what do trickle chargers charge?"

"Oh, a battery!" Joanne said, her voice almost a squeal. "He took a battery with him!"

"Absolutely." I said. "All right, guys... call in a Crime Lab team, though I suspect you won't find anything to go on. Put out APBs on Mr. Harkins at the local, State and Federal levels, emphasize that he might have crossed State lines and that he's in extreme danger."

"You think he's in trouble, sir?" asked Sergeant Rudistan.

"Worse." I think. "If we don't find him quickly, I fear for his life."

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

"Unbelievable." said the Deputy Director of the FBI as we sat in the FBI's offices in the Federal Building off the Courthouse Square in Town, with Jack Muscone, Lindy Linares and Cindy Ross sitting in the room with us.

I had just showed him the graphics of the correlations I'd found between the Silverfish bank heists and the Oldeeds Group tours. I'd emailed him earlier this morning with my findings. What I did not know was that he was in the City, and had helicoptered to Town while I was meeting with my Team and investigating the Harkins disappearance.

"So," said the Deputy Director, whose aura of power and competency I could still feel, "I gave this to you thinking you might find a connection to your 'real Moriarty', who I think is Henry Wargrave and that you might find something to connect this to him. I also thought you might get a connection to the industrial espionage. But now it's the Oldeeds Group, eh?"

"Well, sir," I said, "I'm not ready to count out anyone just yet. We've just asked the FBI to help us look for the Second National Bank assistant manager that disappeared. I suspect that it is no coincidence that he decided to leave just as soon as my officers talked to him about the Silverfish crimes."

"And even I can see that he had an exit strategy planned for some time." said the Director, whose self-deprecation fooled no one present. "Jack, anything on his car?"

"Yes sir." said Muscone. "Mr. Milton of the TCPD got us the information on the car and the tracking devices. Harkins went west, crossing State lines, so now the Bureau is the lead in the case. The car is pinging from Hammondsville, the county seat of the county in the next State west of us. We're sending agents to it now." Just then Muscone's cell phone rang, and he left the room to take the call.

"Well, Commander," said the Deputy Director, "I know what you think about coincidences. The Coltrane County burglary, and now Harkins disappears. Can't be a coincidence, can it?" I knew he was asking just to get me talking and share my thoughts, and I was okay with doing so:

"Actually, sir, it is a coincidence." I replied. "Harkins left yesterday, immediately after my Detectives interviewed him. He ran west immediately. I think your agents are going to find his car in a parking garage in Hammondsville, and another car, an older car without tracing devices, will have left shortly after Harkins's car arrived, having in it a battery that was kept charged by a trickle charger at Harkins' home. He's been on the run for nearly 48 hours now, and he could be anywhere. And as a corollary to that, I do not think he burgled the County Regional Bank, nor is he The Silverfish."

I continued: "And that is why I think Silverfish is more than just the Oldeeds Group. Sure they're involved in some way, or at least someone within them is involved, but this recent Coltrane County job suggests to me that the 'real Moriarty' is indeed involved in some way... and was back then."

"Why is that?" the Director asked.

"He did this last crime just to tweak me." I said. "And in doing so, he may have made a tiny slip."

The Deputy Director nodded as he considered my words. Just then Jack Muscone came back in the room. "They found Harkins' car in Hammondsville, on the top deck of a three-story parking garage next to their Farmer's Market complex. The garage did not have a camera covering the entrance and exit, and a street camera a couple of blocks down caught his car being driven in yesterday. A few minutes later a black car exited, but it's too fuzzy to get a good idea of the make and model. It's an old car, though."

"If he's not part of this Silverfish gang," said Lindy Linares, "why is he running away?"

"Oh, I never said he was not part of any of this." I said. "In fact, his actions suggest a most very guilty conscience on his part. But let me suggest that he may be more involved in the recent robbery, where Luisa Gomez was abducted, than the Silverfish burglary years ago. And I doubt he's part of the Coltrane County job, though he may have alerted someone of police interest in the old heists, which led to the recent crime."

"He's part of your Moriarty's gang?" Lindy asked.

"Yes, possibly... except I don't think my Moriarty has a 'gang', as we use the word. He's somewhere in the shadows, directing a few people such as Wargrave, who then do the real work for him."

"So you say. And now you think this Moriarty is evacuating Harkins?" asked the Director. I saw a gleam in Cindy's eye.

"Lieutenant Ross?" I asked. "What's your take on that?" Cindy met my look.

"Sir, I suspect Harkins is running from Moriarty as much as anything else." Cindy said. "He was Moriarty's 'boy' in the Second National Bank, probably helped with both crimes nearly a decade apart. But he always knew the shit might hit the fan, and that he might be made the fall guy. At the least, he's taking no chances. So he's long prepared an exit strategy, and we're seeing that exit strategy now. We just happened to stumble on it, our officers just happened to interview him, but he not believing in coincidences either. He panicked and has taken off."