Chapter 72

CHAPTER 72

MARPLE CRACKED OPEN her door even before Virginia came to a full stop in front of One Police Plaza.

“Thanks for the lift,” Marple said as she jumped out.

“Any time,” said Virginia, revving the engine loudly.

Marple heard the car peel away as she headed into the lobby. She half expected to be stopped or asked for ID, but instead the cop in front of the elevator pressed the Up button for her.

“Your buddies are with the task force,” he said.

Marple nodded. Her head was still spinning with the news about Rebecca Tran.

According to Dodgett, Tran was found dead in her Fulham apartment, mere hours after Marple had left. No blunt-force trauma. No penetration wounds. No strangulation marks. Dodgett suspected poison, but the full tox report wouldn’t be in for another twenty-four hours. Margaret wondered if they’d made a fatal mistake by hacking into MI5 files. Maybe she and Tran had turned over the wrong stone.

When the elevator door opened, Marple could see right through the glass wall into the war room. Holmes and Poe were standing with Captain Duff, who was gesturing emphatically toward a screen at the front of the room. At the long tables, detectives and FBI agents were tapping furiously on laptops and shouting into their phones. The energy seemed through the roof. As Marple reached for the handle of the glass door, Holmes spotted her and rushed over.

“Margaret!” As soon as he caught the look on her face, he put a hand on her shoulder and stooped slightly to bring his eyes even with hers. “What’s wrong?” he asked. “What happened?”

“Not now,” said Marple, brushing his hand away. “Tell me what’s going on here. Who is Oliver Paul about to kill?”

Holmes waved an arm toward where Poe and Duff were standing. “Impossible to know,” he said. “We need to find him before it happens. I got Duff to put out an APB on an of-interest basis. Like pulling teeth. In the meantime, we’ve finally got some insights on the kidnappings upstate.”

“Such as…?”

“The school bus driver.”

“Bill Barnes?” Marple noticed the commercial driver’s license enlarged in a rectangle at the top of the screen.

Holmes nodded. “Closet alcoholic with money problems.”

Marple pursed her lips. “You think a drunk bus driver masterminded a flawless kidnapping?” She glared at Duff. Her frustration was showing. “If he’d only allowed us to talk to the parents up there…”

“Hold on,” said Holmes. “Auguste has a theory.”

As they reached the center of the room, Marple noticed that the screen everybody was staring at was crisscrossed with fluorescent-green lines.

“Aircraft tracking patterns?” she asked.

Poe turned, noticing her for the first time. “Margaret! Welcome home.” He nodded toward the screen. “After our little visit to the cornfield, I did some checking with a friend at the FAA. This is every recorded helicopter flight over Putnam County on the day the bus disappeared.”

Duff scowled. “And like I’ve been saying, every single pass has been accounted for.” He thrust a finger toward the screen, where the borders of Putnam County were outlined in red. “Two traffic units, two local news crews, one training flight, three state police flyovers, and an Army formation from Camp Smith. That’s it!”

“Doesn’t prove anything,” said Poe. “A chopper doing under 86 knots 15 meters above ground level wouldn’t throw off a detectable signal.”

“How the hell would you know that?” asked Duff.

“Because I do my research,” said Poe. “The only plausible explanation for their supposed disappearance is that those kids were airlifted out by helicopter, then carried off at low altitude to a transfer point. Farm country. No witnesses.”

Across the room, a detective slammed down a phone headset. “The baby wrangler from the TV studio!” he called out. “She wants to talk!”

“Megan Robinson? Where is she?” asked Marple.

“Downstairs in holding,” said Duff.

She started for the door. “I’ll talk to her.”

“Are you nuts?” bellowed Duff. The room went quiet. Marple turned around. Duff lowered his voice. “You really think I’m letting a PI interview a prime suspect?”

Marple walked up to him until her chest practically bumped his bony torso. “Look, Captain,” she said, “I’m hungry. I’m dehydrated. I’m jet-lagged. A colleague of mine in London was just found dead, probably murdered for investigating this case on the UK side. We’ve still got a total of fifteen missing children that we know about, and this girl could be the link. Without me on that FaceTime call, you might still be in a standoff at Silvercup, and you wouldn’t have her to interview in the first place. And you’d have three more babies gone. Megan Robinson won’t talk to you. But I guarantee she’ll talk to me.”

Holmes leaned in. “Margaret was just with Megan’s sister in London.”

“That’s right,” said Marple, her eyes fixed on Duff. “I’m practically family.”