Chapter 7: Crazy Tony

The offices of Top Notch Catering were designed to impress its clients. They were decorated in pastel colors and furnished with comfortable, plush couches and chairs. The pictures on the walls were of lavish meals and fancy cakes, which made Lee hungry. Fortunately, Olivia Durbin offered him a few samples of some freshly-made cookies as they sat down for their talk.

Olivia was in her mid- to late-twenties, much younger than Lee had expected at first, given that she was Max's friend. Lee hadn't learned much during his surveillance of the company the night before, but by chatting casually with a couple of the staff who were on a smoking break, he had found out that Olivia's aunt owned the company and that Olivia was partly responsible for buying supplies. Her aunt was the one who had introduced Olivia to Max, recommending him as a supplier of fresh vegetables.

"He's always been really nice to me," Olivia said when Lee introduced himself as a friend of Max and explained that Max was missing and that his family was concerned about him. "I hope he's alright. Whenever he comes by, he stays awhile to talk. That's why I confided my . . . my problem to him. Are you the friend that he said he was going to talk to about that?"

Lee wasn't quite sure what she was talking about, but he decided to play along for now.

"That's right," Lee said. "But I'd like to hear the story from you."

"Well, like I told Max, I went on a date with this guy named Tony. He'd done some handyman work for my aunt, and he seemed nice enough at first . . . Well, okay, I admit what really decided me was that he had tickets to a concert that I wanted to see."

Lee tried to keep from grinning.

"Tony turned out to be kind of weird, and I didn't plan to go out with him ever again," Olivia continued, "but he still kept hanging around, bragging about how he was going to be a big man someday and flashing his money around."

"If he worked as a handyman, where did he get all that money?" Lee asked.

"He said that he had this electrician friend who got him other jobs. I kept trying to ignore Tony, hoping that he'd go away. Still, he kept showing up. I was trying to be polite about it, but recently, I told him that I was busy with my work and didn't want to see him anymore."

"What did he do then?"

"He said that he had some important work to do, too. This friend of his was going to get him another job, and he said it was the biggest one they'd had yet. He said that when it was over, they'd have a ton of money."

"Did he tell you what the job was?"

"Well . . . yes, but it's crazy. I think that's just what Tony is, a crazy person."

"What did he say that was so crazy?"

Olivia shifted uncomfortably in her seat and said, "He said that he was hired to kill the president."

"The President?" Lee asked, with raised eyebrows. Maybe Olivia was right, and Tony was crazy.

Olivia shrugged. "That's what he said. I thought he was just crazy. He was always saying weird stuff. I didn't take it seriously. I just hoped he'd go away. But when I told Max about it, he was really interested."

"What made you decide to tell Max about Tony?" Lee wondered whether or not Max had told Olivia anything about his work with the Agency.

"Well, as I said, Max is a good person to talk to, and we talk often when he visits. Tony tried to see me one day when Max was here, and I had one of the others tell Tony that I was too busy to talk to him. I explained the situation to Max, and he asked me to tell him all about Tony."

"What did he think about Tony?"

"He told me that he had some friends who would be interested in hearing about Tony and would look into it. I guess that you would be one of them?"

"Yeah, that's right," Lee said. "I would be very interested to hear more about Tony."

"Why?" Olivia asked suddenly.

"Why what?"

"Why are you interested in hearing about a crazy guy like Tony?"

Lee thought quickly. "Well, people like Tony can be dangerous if they're unsupervised. I'm part of an organization that deals with people like him."

"You deal with crazy people?"

"Quite a lot, actually," Lee said with a sigh.

"If you can get Crazy Tony to leave me alone, I'd be grateful."

"I'll see what I can do," Lee said. "Is there anything else that you can tell me about Tony?"

"Not really. I guess his address and phone number would be in the personnel records, but I really don't know much about the guy."

"If you could get me his address and phone number, that would be great. Did he say anything about when and where he was going to kill the President?"

"All he told me was that I shouldn't accept any catering jobs for Halloween parties because that's where it would happen. But I already told that to Max. The last time I saw him, he said that he'd figured out which party Tony was talking about. He said that he had passed along a message to you about it."

"A message? I didn't get it," Lee said. He was starting to feel uneasy. That keychain of Amanda's . . . "When did he tell you this?"

"It was a couple of days ago," Olivia said. "Then Tony showed up, and Max wanted to get out of there in a hurry."

"Did Tony overhear your conversation with Max?" Lee asked.

"I'm not sure," Olivia said. "I sometimes feel like Tony's spying on me, but I don't know if he really notices or cares about Max."

The conversation must have taken place shortly after Max gave the keychain to Amanda, Lee thought. Then, Max had disappeared shortly after talking to Olivia. The question foremost on his mind was whether or not Tony knew who Max had given the message to.

"I have to go soon," Lee said to Olivia, "but I'll be in touch. If you see Tony again, give me a call at this number." He scribbled his number on a sheet of Top Notch Catering stationery and gave it to Olivia.

"Thanks," Olivia said. "Let me get Tony's information for you."

A quick talk with Olivia's aunt provided Lee with Tony's contact information.

"I hope you find Max soon," Olivia said. "And, like I said, if you can get Tony to stop bothering me, I'd really appreciate it."

Lee said, "Could I borrow your phone for a moment? There's someone I'd like to call."

"As long as it's a local call, it's no problem," Olivia said.

Olivia returned to work while Lee placed a quick call to Billy, telling him about Crazy Tony and his apparent role in a plot to kill the President.

"That is crazy," Billy said. "The President is out of the country. He's attending a conference in London as we speak, and he isn't due back in the country until after Halloween. He certainly won't be attending any Halloween parties."

"I don't know what to think of it, either," Lee said. "This Tony might be a nutcase, but Max seemed to take him seriously. I'm going to find Amanda. I want to take another look at that keychain of hers. From what Olivia told me, it might be important after all."

"Alright. I'll have someone follow up on Tony's address and see if they can track him down for questioning. I'll also have someone see if they can learn anything about Halloween parties that might involve prominent people in the DC area and see if they can turn up anything significant."

After Lee got off the phone with Billy, he tried to call Amanda. He wasn't sure what time she would be going to that carnival thing at the school, but she ought to be warned about her keychain. He couldn't shake the feeling that they'd missed something. If he could just get hold of Amanda and arrange to meet her . . .

The phone rang several times, but no one answered. Lee hung up and hurried out to his car. He hoped that nothing was wrong, but he had a bad feeling that something was. Was Amanda at home and just too busy to catch the phone or had she already gone to the carnival? He'd check both places.

As he drove toward Amanda's neighborhood, he ground his teeth and wondered what had possessed him to give that stupid keychain back to her. True, no one had found anything unusual about it, but there must be something that they'd missed. If anything happened to Amanda because of this . . . Lee shoved the thought out of his mind and concentrated on getting to her as quickly as possible.