New Mexico."
I did a double take.
"Sir?"
"You went there for a reason. I'm hoping you didn't come up empty-handed."
"Well," I said, clearing my throat, "I was able to identify the murder weapon as a Winchester rifle, model 1873. That model is extremely rare, considering Winchester discontinued the gun a hundred years ago. There are barely a few dozen still in working condition."
Hillerman's eyes widened.
"I figured the gun had to have been stolen from either a private collection or a museum. Had a gun with that value been stolen from a collector, they would have filed the requisite insurance claims. There are less than twenty museums in North America with records of a Winchester 1873. Every museum still had the Winchester in their possession, except for one."
"Let me guess. It was in New Mexico," Hillerman said.
"That's right."
"And did you find this museum?"
"Yes, sir, I did. The Museum of Outlaws and Lawmen in
Fort Sumner."
"And?" Hillerman said.
"After getting railroaded at first by the manager, he eventually confessed that the model they were currently displaying was a replica, that the real one had been stolen several years back.
They couldn't afford the insurance or security measures and couldn't risk losing tourist dollars by simply closing the exhibit."
"So the weapon this man has been using was stolen from a New Mexico museum and then brought to New York where it's killed four people," Hillerman said. "That's an awful long schlep, just to use a certain gun."
"Not for this killer. He stole that gun for a reason," I said.
"And why is that?"
"Because the gun he stole used to belong to Billy the Kid."
Hillerman sat back in his chair. The cigar was still hanging from his mouth, but he seemed to have forgotten about it.
"What you're saying is, this killer is using Billy the Kid's old gun-as in the Billy the Kid-shoot-'em-up Billy the
Kid-to kill people in New York City."
"Not just random people. He's got a motive, a pattern.
The killer has some sort of connection to either the gun itself or the Kid."
Hillerman cocked his head and looked at Wallace. The editor-in-chief hadn't said a word in minutes. Wallace was between a rock and a hard place: attempting to keep control of his paper while having to account for his reporter being eviscerated in articles by their biggest competitor.
"Wallace," Hillerman said. "What do you think?"
Wallace seemed to come to life. "We've already gotten three calls from Louis Carruthers's office about Jack's ballistics article. Apparently they knew about the similarities and were hoping to withhold information until further notice."
"But you're saying Henry beat them to the punch."
"That's right."
"And this new information, the possible link between the killer and the Kid, what have you heard on that?"
"Complete silence from the NYPD," Wallace said. "And they haven't been silent about anything."
"Which likely means they weren't aware of it," Hillerman added.
"That's right."
Hillerman again leaned back in his chair, gnawed on the end of his stogie, then threw the soggy mess into a trash can.
"Here's what we do." His voice was angry, passionate. My heart was beating faster, my resolve growing stronger. "We report the living hell out of this story. Henry," he said, "I want you to chase this down like a goddamn shark smelling blood. I want you to get Lou Carruthers's office on the line and get the
NYPD's cooperation. Since you seem to have scooped them on this, they'll give you a big wet one in return for the intel. I want copy for tomorrow's national edition about both the stolen Winchester and link to Billy the Kid. Just imply there might be a relationship, I don't want anyone jumping to conclusions, but we need your museum manager to go on the record. You got me?"
"Absolutely," I said.
"Right. Parker, get yourself home and clean up. You look like you just got mugged in the Gobi desert or something. Hell of a fucking job, Henry."
"What about Paulina Cole's story?" I asked.
"Fuck Cole," Hillerman said. "Good, honest, unbiased reporting beats out tabloid bullshit any day of the week. You give our readers something new about this case the Dispatch doesn't have, Paulina can pen hatchet jobs until her cooch defrosts, we'll sell more newspapers. Now get to work."
Wallace and I were out the door before he could fish out another cigar.
29
I got out of the subway and walked toward my apartment.
The last hour had been a whirlwind of debriefing, notes jotted down with the penmanship of someone born without opposable thumbs, and the sketches for what I knew would be a terrific and stunning article.
Jack filled me in on David Loverne's murder, which was nearly unbearable to listen to. I had to distance myself, look at the situation objectively, try not to think that the murdered man we were discussing had once hugged me, shook my hand, even told me he expected great things from me. Had things turned out differently, the man might have been my father-in-law.
I tried not to think about how it would leave Mya without a father.
I tried not to think about Paulina's article, written before
Loverne's death. The two had to be related. I was still stunned by the audacity and hatred steaming from Paulina's article, but
Wallace assured me that I would face no repercussions from Gazette management, and if need be they would defend me, publicly. I declined. They'd done enough of that already. After the debriefings, Wallace and I met with the Gazette' s legal team to draft a response for any reporters looking for a quote.
The letter was brief. It said that Paulina's story was careless and inflammatory, and any more attempts by this allegedly balanced news organization to libel without facts would be met with legal reprimands from the Gazette, and moral reprimands from readers who wouldn't tolerate muckraking.
That part was BS. Readers loved muckraking and, as much as it pained us, we knew Paulina's article would sell newspapers.
The details of David Loverne's murder were gruesome in both their brutality and efficiency.
After Paulina's story ran in the Dispatch, in which she alleged that Loverne's history of infidelity would soon come to light, the press corps descended on the man's apartment building eager to take photographs of drawn curtains, berate cleaning ladies and doormen, and try to scrape up the scraps
Paulina had left under the table. When a person was accused of wrongdoing, people didn't try very hard to photograph their good side.
Around five o'clock, Loverne left to attend a previously scheduled fund-raiser. He was swarmed by dozens of reporters. In what would be viewed as a colossal blunder, Loverne had no private security, and the elderly doorman was easily overmatched. As Loverne attempted to push his way through, a lone rifle shot shattered the commotion, blood splashed against the glass doors, and David Loverne died.
The photographers spent their entire rolls shooting Loverne's body, the blood pouring from his chest, as well as the rooftop where it seemed the shot had come from. Several photographers even tried to bully their way into that very building to either catch the culprit or take photographs of the crime scene before the police arrived. Thankfully that doorman was a former cop, realized what was going on and locked the doors.
The shooter was long gone. But by the time the police arrived, hundreds of photos of Loverne's body were circulating among newsrooms, tabloids and the Internet.
I called Curt Sheffield to get the lowdown. He told me one of the investigating officers mentioned that another note had been left by the killer, but it was being kept quieter than a mouse fart. He didn't find it amusing when I asked him if he could hold a megaphone to the mouse's ass to hear it better.