Chapter 16… Brother Bapple
“Based on what new evidence?” District Attorney George Wysocki gave Pruitt a withering scowl. “And I can’t believe you, of all people, are going along with this. Does Caruso know you’re spending time on this?”
Monica looked away, knowing this would be the outcome. Harry looked like he was going to burst a blood vessel. Pruitt said, “I’ve been pursuing it on my own time, primarily. It hasn’t taken time away any of my other investigations.”
Wysocki knew that was code for: Of course I haven’t told Caruso. He’d kick my ass all the way to China if he knew. He just shook his head and speared Monica with another of his crushing glares. Waving a finger between her and Pruitt, he said, “You know, even if either of you had the slightest bit of hard evidence as to how anything you just said relates directly to Hutchinson’s death... and even if that was enough for me to agree with you and authorize the investigation you are so desperately seeking, I’d have to seriously debate whether or not you could prosecute this.”
Monica said, “Are you suggesting that I’d have to recuse myself?”
“I’m not suggesting it,” said Wysocki. “I’m outright saying it. You’re way too close to this.”
“Are you saying I can’t be impartial?”
“I just said it.”
“You know, I don’t have to be impartial to prosecute a case. I just have to be able to prove it. What about what we just told you about Harry being stalked, about him being run off the road?”
“What about it? It might be enough to get someone to investigate it... in New Jersey... if you had an eyewitness, or a license plate number, but here... in Massachusetts... you don’t even have enough to file a complaint. I mean, were any laws broken? And even if you could file a complaint, can you prove that it was related to Hutchinson’s death? No? That’s what I thought. Now get out of here, the whole bunch of ya’.”
Outside Wysocki’s office, Monica crossed her arms and said, “I told you this was gonna happen. I don’t know how I let you all talk me into this. You’re damn lucky Officer Nekel let you slide. If he’d charged you with unlawful possession of a firearm—which he most rightly could have—I’d be prosecuting that case right now and you’d be facing two to five years in the state prison. Do you know how lucky you are, Harry?” She swung her eyes like cannons and laid into Pruitt. “And you! You knew that gun was in that car, and you did nothing about it?”
“What did you want me to do?” Pruitt shot back. “I knew it wasn’t his car.”
“Nekel said the gun was right there, in plain sight. If it wasn’t for the fact that the bartender chick happens to be his girlfriend....”
“I told him that I had a permit to carry,” Harry said weakly.
“Yeah, in New Jersey,” Monica fired back, mimicking Wysocki’s tone from moments earlier, “for which Massachusetts does not have a reciprocal agreement.” She hesitated for a brief second and then drilled Denise with a look. “Which brings me to you. What the hell were you thinking?”
“Hey,” Denise replied smartly, “I didn’t know this screwed up state didn’t honor Jersey concealed carry permits. And when do I get my gun back?”
Monica’s eyes turned into spear tips. “Whenever you get the hell out of my state!” she snapped back. “You know, I’m keeping all your assess out of the fire and I don’t need any fake righteous indignation. I’m not in the fucking mood.” Everyone looked at their shoes. “You’re all damned lucky I love my husband.”
“Thank God for Ducky,” said Harry. “By the way, do you know if he called Bapple yet?”
Monica pulled back on a right cross to Harry’s forehead, but Pruitt held her back.
* * * * *
“What the fuck did you say to Monica this morning at Wysocki’s office?”
“It was Pruitt’s fault.”
“Yeah, well, whoever’s fault it was, now she’s pissed at me. I’m not gonna get laid for a month.”
“You can’t get it up anyway.”
Ducky tipped his glass and said, “Viagra.”
Harry couldn’t help but chuckle. It was late Tuesday afternoon and they were back at Slick’s if only for the reason that Harry wanted to go back and apologize to Indigo for getting her in trouble with her boyfriend.
“Who knew?” he’d said to Ducky earlier. “She never said anything about her boyfriend being a cop, let alone that it was Officer Nekel. And besides, it was her who insisted that I take that .45.”
“You know,” Ducky said ominously, “the gun laws in this state are pretty strict.”
“How strict?”
“As in unlawful possession of firearm is a felony strict, and the way Monica described it you were stone cold guilty on every element of the law. The whole fucking bunch of you could have ended up in some serious shit.”
It was Ducky’s way of fishing for an apology from him. “Can you get me off the hook with Monica?” Harry asked meekly. “I know she saved our bacon on this and I want her to know how much Denise and I appreciate her putting herself out there for us.”
“Hey, she did more than put herself out there. She could get disbarred if the wrong person ever finds out about this.” Ducky put his glass down and turned. “I hope that doesn’t happen, Harry.”
Harry felt a shiver run up his spine. Ducky wasn’t ever that threatening. “Yeah, Ducky, I got it. Thanks.” Ducky sipped his beer and didn’t say another word. “Did you get a chance to call Bapple?”
“We’re lined up for seven o’clock, but I’m not sure we should call him back.”
That didn’t sound good. “Because of Monica?” Harry guessed. Ducky didn’t respond but ordered another round. Ducky ordering beers but not talking: that wasn’t good. It meant he was working up the nerve. Harry looked at the clock and took the opportunity to ask the bartender what time Indigo was coming in.
The bartender was an older woman this time; could have been Betty White’s sister with a bigger ass. “She called out,” she said, clearly annoyed. “She’s got some sort ‘a trouble with her boyfriend. Damn young kids.” She left it there and toddled to the other end of the bar to serve a couple of fluffernutters that Harry recognized from the night before. She dropped down a couple of drafts and turned back to stare at him and Ducky when one of them whispered something in her ear. Suddenly, he didn’t feel welcome there.
“It’s more than just Monica being pissed,” said Ducky.
Harry snapped back into their conversation. “You have doubts,” he surmised.
“I do,” Ducky admitted.
“I thought you were in this all the way. Isn’t that what you said yesterday?”
“I’m rethinking my position.”
“If you’re rethinking and it’s more than Monica that’s on your mind, then tell me what’s got you all tensed up.”
Ducky gave him a look. “What if we’re wrong and Hutch fucked up? What if he was, like, embezzling money? We’re thinking about the Hutch we knew thirty-five years ago, Harry. People change over that length of time. They do all kinds of strange shit and get themselves into all kinds of trouble. What if Hutch got boiled in his own stew?”
Harry had never even considered the thought. To him, Hutch was Hutch, but Ducky had a point. Suddenly, the words Hutch had scrawled out on the envelope Pruitt had given him bubbled up to the surface inside his brain: Harry, use precaution. If Hutch had somehow stepped over to the dark side, then why would he issue such a warning? Why would he bring others, and in particular one of his best friends named Harry Curlander, intentionally into harm’s way? “I don’t think Hutch would ever stab us in the back like that,” he said to Ducky.
Looking straight ahead, Ducky said, “I admire your loyalty, Harry, but someday it might bring you down.”
“You’ve been living with Monica too long,” Harry said bravely, feeling hypocritical as hell. He’d had his own moment of doubt and introspection
the night before but he wasn’t about to tell Ducky that.
“Maybe I have,” Ducky acknowledged as he picked up a new beer, “but it’s served to educate me to a whole other side of human nature.” He sipped the beer and put it back down as if he smelled something bad in it.
Harry said, “I’ll respect your decision if you want out.”
His tone indicating that he’d made his point, Ducky said, “I’ll let you know.”
Harry sipped his beer, now knowing where to go next in the conversation.
“It’s in the car,” said Ducky. “Hutch’s laptop... I have it in the car. Pruitt gave it to Monica this morning at Wysocki’s office and I put it on a charger in case we need to fire it up when we call Bapple later.”
Harry smiled. Ducky was back in the game, for how long he didn’t know, but he was up at the plate and swinging away. “We?”
“Yeah, we. I called everyone in case they wanted to be here.”
“Maybe we should make sure it’s working,” said Harry.
Ducky took a sip of his beer and ambled out the front door to get the laptop, and Harry pulled out his cell phone—his new cell phone—to see if Denise had texted him. She was back at the Wallingham Inn taking a nap and she said she’d text when she woke up. No sooner had he pulled the phone from his pocket when one of the fluffernutters came over and sat next to him.
“You’s the fella was in here last night, ain’chu?”
Harry thought: what the fuck? The guy didn’t look real sociable. “Yeah, that’s right.”
“You was in here with all them other folks, right? Tryin’ to find out about that buddy ‘a your’n that died a while back, right out there up the street, right? Died inside that fancy Cad’llac car ‘a his. Ain’t that right now?”
Harry put the phone down on the bar.
“Walter, you leave that poor man alone now, ya’ hear?” the Betty White bartender hollered over. “He don’t need no old fool like you bothering the bejesus out of him.”
Noting the steadiness of the man’s eyes, Harry motioned to her and said, “It’s okay ma’am. Not a problem.” The bartender shrugged and turned away, and Harry looked back into the man’s eyes, deep, dark, and unwavering eyes, eyes one wouldn’t expect given the man’s scruffy exterior and beer-laden breath. “What can I do for you....” He was about to say old timer, but instead he said “... buddy?” The man smiled, and Harry said, “Call me Harry.” He shook the man’s hand. “What can I do for you... Walter?”
Walter leaned in so that he was literally talking into Harry’s collarbone. “Back in ’61 and part of ’62, I worked as a security guard at the Los Alamos National Laboratory. You know what that is, don’cha Harry?”
Harry did a quick scan of the place, noting that none of the five other patrons were paying any attention to old Walter. “Los Alamos? Yeah, sure. Atomic bomb, Manhattan Project, all that. You were there?”
“After all that stuff. By the time I worked there, they were doing a lot more than that. They were working on all kinds of shit, mostly figuring out ways to kill the Ruskies before they killed us.”
Walter eyed Harry’s beer and Harry ordered one for him. “And you were a guard there? Were you in the military?”
“Oh fuck no,” said Walter. “Los Alamos worked on shit for the government but it was a private gig; still is, I think. Back then, the University of California ran the place and hired eggheads from all over to come in and play with their chemistry sets. There was fuckin’ thousands of ‘em there.”
Harry handed Walter his beer. “But you weren’t a scientist.”
“Like I said, I was a security guard.” Walter swigged his beer. “I hate to say it, but it didn’t take much to land the job and the pay was real good if you could stand livin’ in that shithole.”
Ducky came back from outside and Harry suggested the three of them take a table in the back where they could speak more privately. Walter was only too happy to oblige.
“You’s Ducky, ain’chu?” Walter asked. “You’s married to that hot tamale lady lawyer, right?”
Ducky shot Harry a sharp look and Harry just shrugged. “Ducky, say hello to Walter.” He turned back to Walter. “And you’re telling us this, why?”
“Well, it’s like I said. They was workin’ on all kinds of shit at that time, and one of the things they was workin’ on was how to make a gun with no bullets.” Walter swigged his beer. “It was all top secret, ya’ know.”
Harry and Ducky locked eyes. “A gun with no bullets,” Harry repeated. “How would that work?”
“How the fuck do I know?” Walter shot back. “I was just a lousy security guard. All I know is that they was workin’ on the thing for a long time.”
Walter swigged his beer and Harry swigged his. “Tell me more,” he said.
“Like what?”
“Like how you know this.”
“Well, my job was to guard access to this building, see. I didn’t know what they were workin’ on inside, just that only certain people with certain passes were allowed in there.”
Harry swigged his beer.
“But even though most of those pinhead scientists who went in and out of there wouldn’t piss on me if I was on fire, we all went to the same bars after work. You see, the whole fuckin’ town had thirty-five churches but only had two bars and people tended to bump into each other a lot when they went there. For the most part, they stayed with their friends and we stayed with our friends, but we recognized each other and everything and we were polite and waved hello and shit.”
Harry swigged his beer and said, “So?”
“So sometimes they’d see me nearby and they didn’t get all bent out of shape when they was talkin’ shop. I minded my own business, but I heard stuff, ya’ know?”
“And you heard that they were making guns with no bullets.”
“Thaaaa...t’s riiii...ght,” Walter sang out. “They weren’t guns, exactly, but they were working on some sort of weapon—or weapons,” he added quickly. “I think maybe they were working on different things, but I remember overhearing that whatever they was cooking up worked with waves.”
Harry took a moment and gave Walter a once over. Who was this guy? Once again, Walter’s eyes were rock steady, and they were looking right through him. “Waves,” said Harry.
“Yeah, some kind of fuckin’ waves—frequency waves, or radio waves, some kind of shit like that. I imagine it was some kind of fuckin’ spy thing so that they’d be able to kill people from far away and no one would suspect anything. No bullet holes, no blood, like someone just up and died from a heart attack or something.” Walter waited a long, dramatic minute and asked, “Ain’t that how your friend died?”
Harry just swigged his beer.
* * * * *
Ducky’s cell phone was set on speaker and Bapple was coming through loud and clear. “Expertise in modern cryptography requires significant knowledge in the disciplines of mathematics, computer science, and electrical engineering,” said Bapple.
Ducky said, “Oh. I thought you were a poly sci major at John Adams.”
“I was for a while,” said Bapple. “Then I figured out that I didn’t want to be a teacher or homeless so I changed my major in the middle of my junior year. I went from being an expert in b-s to getting a B.S. degree.”
“Poly sci to algorithms and computer code?”
“Quite the about-face, right? Lucky for me it was the early days in computer science and I managed to squeeze through.”
Harry suddenly didn’t feel very confident about Bapple’s ability to ascertain the information on Hutch’s laptop. “And you’re now the head of the computer science department at Purdue?” he questioned.
Bapple responded, “Only in America, right guys?”
Those who could make it for the phone call were all gathered in Harry’s room at the Wallingham Inn. After his and Ducky’s little chat with Walter back at Slick’s, he
thought it best to make the call to Bapple in the relative privacy of the room. “If we have any more meetings at Slick’s the whole damned town will know what we’re up to,” he’d said.
Detective Pruitt couldn’t make it because she was on duty and would be for the next few days. After the bloodbath at Wysocki’s office that morning, it figured that her boss would have her on a short leash for a while. Monica was prepping for a rape case that went to trial the next morning. “I doubt seriously that she’ll leave her office before nine,” Ducky had said. Fighting Al didn’t return any phone calls with regards to his attendance, and Fish showed up with someone from his company’s IT department named Sally Westerman who supposedly knew a lot about computer security. Harry wasn’t too sure about that move at first, but after listening to Bapple for the last few minutes he was starting to think it was a good idea. Denise sat in the corner reading a travel guide.
Suddenly very serious, Bapple said, “Listen, I’ll do anything you ask if it helps you find out how Hutch died.”
“We were hoping you’d say that,” said Ducky. “What do you know about the situation?”
“Only that you suspect there’s information on that laptop that will reveal why he was killed.” Bapple paused. “You still think he was killed, don’t you?”
“Absolutely,” said Harry.
“You need to know that if the laptop is encrypted as you suspect, it might require some heavy duty analysis to make sure it’s not booby-trapped or something. That might be hard to do over the phone.”
“Bapple, this is Fish. I brought along an associate of mine who might be able to help with that. Her name is Sally.”
“Hello Sally.”
“Hello... Bapple, is it?”
“My real name is Billy Apple. Only these jokers call me Bapple.”
Harry said, “Listen, Bapple, if need be, my wife and I will deliver this laptop to you in Indiana.”
“We’ll see if that’s necessary,” said Bapple. “Has anyone attempted to get into the laptop up to now?”
“No,” Harry and Ducky said at the same time.
“Why not?”
“Several reasons. Not important right now,” said Ducky.
“Okay, so you really don’t know if it’s encrypted or not.”
Everyone in the room looked at each other. “Uh, I guess not,” said Ducky, and Sally’s eyes rolled back in her head.
“Well,” said Bapple, “maybe we should cross that bridge first. Sally, would you take that computer from whichever of those geniuses has it and start the thing up.”
“Got it,” said Sally, and she took it from Ducky as he made a face at Bapple’s comment.
“Now, I assume we’re dealing with a Windows setup here, so there is probably going to be a login. Does anyone know what that is?”
Blank faces all around. “Evidently not,” Sally said loudly.
“Well, there are several ways to obtain that,” said Bapple, “but most people simply use something they can remember. Let’s go that route first before we mess with the administrator files and password stuff.”
Sally said, “Things like birthdays, kids’ names, things like that, right?”
“Exactly. Does anyone have any suggestions?” Bapple asked, but no one came up with anything. “Okay, what about his wife? Where is she located right now? People often let their spouses know their login information in case of emergency.”
“Suzanne is in Chicago visiting her son,” said Harry.
“Do you have her cell number? We could call her right now and ask her what Hutch might have used as a login and password.”
“I have it,” said Harry. Pulling out his cell phone, he punched up Suzanne’s number and she answered right away. After taking a minute to explain what they were doing, he said to the others while Suzanne stayed on the line, “Suzanne said to try this: March17,1986—capital M and no spaces. She said it’s their wedding date and she knows he used it as a login for other stuff on their home computer.”
Sally typed it in and said, “Holy shit, we’re in.”
“I told you,” said Bapple. “Now, let’s go to a couple of files and see if this puppy is really encrypted. Sally, would you go to the File Explorer or the Program Files on the C drive and see if any of the folders will open up without another password. Pick something amusing.”
Sally punched a few buttons and said, “Oh.”
Bapple said, “What does that mean?”
“That’s interesting,” she said. “There are no document folders on the desktop. Let me try this again. File Explorer, then go under This PC... let me look at the Documents folder.” A moment later she went, “Uh-oh.”
Harry said, “That doesn’t sound good, Sally.”
“I don’t think it is,” she responded.
Fish slid over and looked over her shoulder. “How about the C Drive or Program Files like Bapple said? Maybe Hutch had stuff buried in there for some reason.”
Sally clicked away but everywhere she went she came up empty. “Ah, Mister Bapple sir?” she said.
“Find something?”
“Just the opposite. I don’t think you need to worry about this thing being encrypted. I think this computer has been wiped clean.”
* * * * *
Deflated and fatigued, they let Bapple off the phone and sat there looking at each other. Saying what they all wanted to say, Harry said, “Fuck.”
“Honey? Language?” Denise called from across the room. “Getting ticked off at the world isn’t going to make you feel any better.” Harry gave her a scowl that said I don’t wanna hear it. “All right then, but acting like an eight-year-old isn’t very flattering for you.”
“Sally, are you absolutely sure about this?” Harry asked. “I mean, is there any chance you could be wrong?”
“C’mon Harry,” Fish cried back. “The woman is a professional. Don’t be a dick, huh?’
Ducky stood up and said, “Hey, both of you. It’s shut the pie-hole time.”
Picking up his stuff, Fish said, “C’mon Sally, it’ll be after ten by the time we get back to Hartford. I’m sorry I ever got you into this.”
Almost cheerfully, she responded, “Hey, this is no big deal. I got three brothers that fight more than this at Thanksgiving.” She closed up the laptop and said, “Who does this go to?”
“Just leave it,” Fish said with a snarl and he headed for the door. Just as he was about to open it, someone knocked.
“Hey, are you guys in there?” It was Fighting Al. Entering, he said, “Sorry I couldn’t get back to you about the call to Bapple, but you could’ve let a guy know you changed the location. Good thing the guys at Slick’s had an idea where you went....” He stopped and did a once over on all the sour faces. “What happened?”
“The fucking hard drive on Hutch’s laptop has been erased,” Harry answered angrily.
“Honey? Language,” Denise barked out again.
Al said, “As in everything? We were banking on that thing giving us clues to a lot of unanswered questions.”
“Gee, Al, thanks for the update.”
Al shot a glance at Ducky and did a palms up.
“He’s just pissed,” said Ducky. “He’s being an asshole with all of us.”
Harry wheeled angrily and Denise was on him before he said something he’d regret. “It’s not their fault,” she said calmly, but Harry speared Al with a venomous glare.
Living up to his nickname, Fighting Al said, “So?”
“What kind of stupid question is that?” Harry fired back. He brushed Denise aside, but knowing her husband’s temper when he got like this, she tried to stand between him and Al.
Sally took Fish’s arm and whispered, “This is getting good,” and he pulled her out of the way before she got swatted like bug.
“So... what else ya’ got?” Al spit through his teeth.
Harry tried to shorten the distance between them, but there
wasn’t any.
“Harry, you’re not listening. What else ya’ got?” Al repeated. “If you want to get close to your adversaries, you can’t go at them head-on or they will see you coming. You’ve got to go at them from another direction.”
It took Harry a second to realize what Al was trying to tell him. He blinked.
“Maybe you could even get to them from the inside,” Al went on. “You’ve got something they want.”
A long moment passed and Fish said, “Holy shit. Al is right.”
Ducky was the next to get it. “It’s all about this stupid computer.” He went up and pulled Harry out of Al’s space. “Harry, if they knew the laptop has been erased, they wouldn’t be going after it.”
Harry’s eyes bounced from face to face, his anger receding as he was starting to realize what the others were trying to tell him. “The laptop,” he said weakly. “We can use it to set them up.”
“Precisely,” Al quipped as he gave Harry a couple of stern love taps on the cheek. “If you want to catch these bastards, you’ve got to turn the tables and get them coming to you so that you can see them coming. Badda-bing, badda-boom.” Al smiled. “Not only do I know how to fight, I’ve learned how to fight smart.”
From across the room, Sally called out, “Fighting smart is good, but it would be better if you had someone who fights dirty.”