Chapter Ten
The Apple Doesn't Fall
/His name is Luther Rybak Junior; son, coincidentally enough, of Luther Rybak Senior./ Claudia had pronounced it rib-back, but in any way the name is familiar. /I'm sending a picture of Junior to your phone./
"As dirty as they come," Myka says, "if I remember right."
/You remember right. Multi-millionaire father and every dollar dirty. He inherited his fortune, which was made originally in South Carolina in the 18th and 19th Centuries in the 'Triangle Trade'; Africa, New England and the Carolinas, importing and selling, well, a nice word for polite company was 'blackbirds'.
/They were reputed to have strong ties to the KKK, and Senior is known to be a member. Quite proud and unapologetic, as I understand it.
/He came up north over two decades ago and has a house near millionaires' row, that part of Brooklyn they call 'Bay Ridge', on the high westernmost streets. It's not on the shore, about a block or so in, but close enough. The houses on the Shore Road date back to the Revolution and many still have openings in the natural stone walls surrounding the properties where the cannons could fire on ships passing through the Narrows near where the Verrazano Bridge now stands. Fort Hamilton Army Base is the only remaining fort of six that formed two huge triangles any ship had to cross to reach New York City. You can't touch any of those properties for less than five million./
The image of the son could be from a College Yearbook. "Doesn't look like the same guy," Pete concludes, though it definitely is.
"Looks like he's fallen on hard times."
/Looks more like he fell in front of a truck,/ is Claudia's opinion as she consults her own copy of the Crime Scene photograph.
x
Pete looks to Myka. "Are you getting a vibe as to where a diamond, ruby, emerald and sapphire golden bow could be picked up?"
"Vibes are your specialty, but I am getting a hunch."
"But it doesn't look like sonny boy has seen a valet or stylist in a while. Probably hasn't seen a manicurist either."
"Think we should go down, have a chat with daddy?"
"Plug in your Tesla, we're going to visit High Society."
She looks down at her tee shirt and jeans. "I'm not exactly dressed for it."
He taps the badge still clipped to her belt. "All the fashionable agents are wearing gold."
xxx
It turned out to be as difficult talking their way into the Brooklyn Mansion which bears the odd moniker of the 'Gingerbread House', though Pete would gladly admit it's the home of a Warlock, as they had expected. In fact, he would not put it past Rybak Senior to have many artifacts, not just the one, tucked away within these walls
The maid who answered the door, clad in the black and white accoutrements for which French Maids are justly (in)famous, including the sudden halt below the hips, was polite but quite firm - at least as firm as one can be while using a faux French accent that had undoubtedly required a lot of practice.
Myka had prayed that Pete would behave himself while talking with this walking Gallic Fantasy but, wonder of wonders, he had been cool and professional.
When the unnamed maid, to whom Myka's mind had affixed the moniker 'Fifi', got it clearly that they were not going to go away without speaking to 'the Master', she closed the door and Myka is able to address her partner.
x
"I am stunned."
"What, that next to my favorite lady love, I can behave?"
"Favorite lady love?" she asks broadly.
"This one is so… phony," he finishes in what she senses is a sought-for kindly word, "that it's insulting. I'd be more turned on by Amanda in her uniform."
"Careful." They'd had two memorable encounters with the Marine Colonel… the married to someone else Marine Colonel.
The door opens on anything he could say.
xx
Luther Rybak Senior is five-eight, sixty-plus, bald but looks like he'd moved all his gray hair from head to face where the foliage could use some pruning, and carries self-importance like other men carry heavy luggage, ponderously and ostentatiously.
"So, what does the Secret Service want with me?"
"Not quite with you." Pete clarifies. "With your son."
"What's the bastard done this time?"
Not quite the response he had been expecting. "We think he's gotten into something, something he may not be able to handle."
He has been trying to elicit concern, or at the least surprise or curiosity, but he hadn't expected to strike out on a single swing.
"I haven't seen him since he stole from me, and if I did see him, I'd lay the bastard out at my feet."
'Ohhhh kay,' Myka thinks. 'This is getting interesting.' "What did he steal?"
"Fourteen million dollars."
x
The pictures she has seen of Rybak fils are not those of a multi-millionaire, certainly not like Rybak pere. Of course, they may not be, probably are not, talking about sacks of cash. "What exactly did he steal?"
"An ancient, jewel lined archer's bow," the man says, pointing to a vacant spot on the long wall between Giorgione's 'Adoration of the Shepherds' and VanGothe's 'Self Portrait', both of which she recalls seeing in DC's National Gallery. She has serious doubts that these two are copies, and if they are not, she truly does not want to consider the implications. "Right from there. A month ago, I woke up and it was gone. I put word out to every Collector, every Dealer, every Fence, every Pawn shopkeeper."
Myka's impressed; if her life had depended upon it she doubts she could put together such a list, and that speaks much about this man's lifestyle and resources.
"There is no way," Rybak concludes, "that he can sell or in any way move all or even part of that bow or even the quiver without my knowing."
"I don't believe he intends to sell it," Pete says.
"Mister Rybak," Myka tries, "have you been following the News lately?"
xxx
When they leave the house fifteen minutes later it is after the end of the most useless conversation either agent can remember since prior to their recruitment over five years ago.
All that they carry from it is that the father doesn't care about any news not covered in the Wall Street Journal and is vastly more concerned with a multi-million dollar possession than he is with his son. He reminds her more of Shylock than a real person (though the irony isn't lost) including his wish for his son's fate being that of the Merchant's wish for his daughter, that he be laying dead at his foot and the quiver in his ear, that he were hearsed at his foot and the bow in his coffin.
Sometimes, Myka thinks, a Literary background can have its drawbacks.
One thing they are certain of is that the son has no intention of letting go of the most useful and deadly tool he's ever had in his campaign to rid the world of all but WASPs (does anybody beside Rybak even use that word anymore?); that the son is a terrible marksman because even though he'd bulls-eyed every victim, his targets had been so randomly chosen that he'd made no progress in accomplishing his goal; that when it came to stereotypical prejudice the apple had fallen well under the tree, most likely right in its roots and finally, that they'd wasted a long detour in hopes of getting a clue as to where the bowman will strike next.
x
"Let's try to apply logic to this," Myka says as they reach the last step to the sidewalk. The building itself seems a conglomeration of architectural styles that are quite evident of the thoughts of both the builder and the current occupants.
Altogether, the building is as realistic as the maid, well deserving of a fanciful name like 'Gingerbread House', and neither Agent had been keen on asking for a tour.
"We might as well," he agrees about the logic as they walk back to their car, "because he sure didn't. I mean the guy had the ultimate weapon hanging on his wall and had absolutely no idea that it worked."
"Even more than that, who hangs a fourteen-million-dollar artifact on a wall in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn?" she gripes.
"Someone whose ego needs a lot of stroking."
x
"The family made a fortune, probably several, in the Slave Trade for nearly two hundred years, eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, yet he's up here instead of in a mansion in South Carolina. The son grew up in an atmosphere of intolerance against anyone who didn't fit –."
"Guy makes Archie Bunker seem like Gandhi or Martin Luther King."
"There's a heady mixture," she agrees.
"In fact, Rybak, having his maid go around like something from a comic book, reminds me more of a warped Lex Luthor."
"No!" She throws her hands out to halt him and the speculation. "What if, not just misogynistic, what if that maid is the latest in a long line of French Maid archetypes?"
"I wish I could have gotten some time alone with her."
"I'd've broken your arm."
"No, I'm serious."
"So am I." She thinks for a moment. "Well, maybe if you solve this case, I'll see what I can do."
"Whoo ho-oo."
"IF you solve this case."
"Talk about incentive. Okay what've we got? Prospect Park, 12 women and men looked like a good mix of victims. Barclays Center, 17 women and men still looked pretty random."
"Or were they?" she has a very bad feeling that she's missing something.
"We need the details from Union Square Park."
"And we shut that tirade down, but apparently it needs another listen."
"After dinner. I'm starved."
"You're always starved."
"I hear Bay Ridge is a good place for souvlaki."
She can't argue with the need for a meal if they're going to out-think a misogynistic Bunker-Class bigot with ambitions of breaking the record for serial killing. That record is presently held by Harold Shipman with a contested count of either 218 or 250. If they can't bring Rybak, with his silent and unusual weapon, down, the breaking of that deplorable record is possible.
She hopes she can keep her food down when listening to his rant.
xxx
Dinner had been good, there was no denying that, but it took until they were a block away from the restaurant on 4th Avenue before they'd found a secluded enough spot for a conference.
Myka reaches to activate her Farnsworth when it buzzes in her hands. She opens it to find a greyscale Steve Jinks looking out at her.
/What is this we just read about a Rally taking place tonight at Times Square?/
"Lately, whenever I hear the word Rally I cringe," Pete quips.
She doesn't blame him, but hates to say "I don't know."
/We've been monitoring New York City events, and in Times Square this evening there's a 'Peace Rally for Black Lives Matter', 2100 hours./
"That was shut down. We heard about it when we were at Barclay Center. The NYPD pulled the plug when the second 'mass shooting' took place in Brooklyn."
/Well somebody didn't get the Memo, because crowds are gathering now./
She checks her watch; it's 1923. A psychotic shooter using a weapon as silent as it is deadly, whose opinions of black lives have been emblazoned on his chest all day, someone already in Manhattan while they're in the southern part of Brooklyn…. "Oh, no."
x
"What 'oh no'?" Pete asks. "Is this a general 'oh no' or are you on to something?"
"What does your Viber tell you?"
He considers the question; his 'viber' has been screaming at him all day, to the point that he'd pushed it into background noise, otherwise he wouldn't be able to pay attention to anything around him. But once he starts paying attention to it, the yell jumps to a shriek. "Oh, no."
"Right. Those three cases were test runs."
/The Police are shutting down this Rally,/ Claudia says off screen, /but these people are not the kind to back down./
"They're going ahead with it."
Myka returns her attention to Steve. "See what can be done to get them to pull the plug harder."
She deactivates the device, closes it and pushes it back into her jeans pocket.
"An hour and a half to get to what's normally the busiest pedestrian spot in the city," she says, adding up the challenges. "A couple of years ago they shut down Times Square Broadway and a lot of 7th Avenue to traffic, set up tables, chairs, planters –."
"And when it gets filled," Pete says, "it's going to be a silent shooting gallery."
She pulls out her cell phone and presses 911.