Papa Jack Chapter 32
"Are we going to see Artie Matthews?" Richard asks as Kate drives south.
"Not yet. I want to scrub the video on the DVDs to check out who stole Mildred Romney's van."
"Are you going to pull in the retired cops again?"
"I may not need to," Kate considers. "If your theory about the obit and funeral holds up, then the van would have been stolen shortly after Mildred passed away. If we look around that time, it won't be that much video to zip through. And maybe by the time we finish, the lab results on the wax will be back."
The writer holds up crossed fingers.
"Beckett!" Richard calls from behind the screen of a computer at an unassigned desk in the bullpen. "I've got it! Someone is picking the lock on 12C. Looks like they're good at it, too. They got it done in less than 30 seconds."
Kate quickly covers the distance between her desk and the one where Richard is stationed. She gazes over his shoulder. "That's not Buttridge. Height, weight, hair color, everything is wrong."
"That's why I said it is someone," Richard returns. "The question is who?"
Kate rakes her fingers through hair she's letting grow out from its short cut. "I have a pretty good idea who would know."
"Artie Matthews?" Rick questions.
"Uh-huh. Time to go see him."
After Kate holds her badge up to the peephole, Artie Matthews opens the door of his apartment in a well-kept building in Manhattan's increasingly popular West Seventies. "I'm sorry, you can't be too careful. The city is full of predators. How can I help the NYPD?"
"I'm interested in an incident in which you got a crashed computer up and running again."
A hint of self-satisfaction edges Artie's chuckle. "For me, that's a daily occurrence, Detective. You'll have to be more specific."
"Of course," Kate acknowledges. "I can give you the details. Can we come in?"
Artie shrugs. "Why not?" He waves Kate and Richard to seats on a leather upholstered couch. "So, whose computer are we talking about?"
"One belonging to the U-Store-it storage facility on East Tremont. "As I understand it, you were there with a friend to attend an auction and stepped in to help out in an emergency." Kate smiles. "That was very kind of you, Mr. Matthews."
Artie warms under Kate's gaze. "It really was no big deal. I see the problem a lot. Mary, the aunt of my friend George, who brought me to the auction, opened a virus-infected email. It made a mess of things, but nothing that hard to fix. I uploaded some anti-virus software and cleaned it out. I don't think the whole thing took me more than an hour."
"You would have had to have admin status to do that, wouldn't you?" Richard inquires.
"Yes," Artie confirms, "not hard to get if you understand the underlying code."
"And once you have it, you can do anything on the computer," Richard continues.
"That's right. It was necessary to make sure the virus hadn't planted any time bombs. I always check for that."
Kate flashes another smile. "Good to hear that someone is that thorough. Some people can leave loose ends that really screw up the works. And I'm sure anything that happened after that had nothing to do with you. But," Kate holds up a picture of the thief on the video, "we believe this man was involved in a theft at U-Store-It. When you were there, did you happen to see him?"
"To tell you the truth, Detective, I wouldn't know if I did," Artie confides. "I never forget a number, and I'm pretty good with names, but I'm terrible with faces. My loss, but I could run into you tomorrow and not recognize you."
"All right, let's go with names then," Kate offers. "How about William Buttridge?"
Artie chuckles again. "No, and that one I'd definitely remember."
"How about Lionel Marcus?" Kate asks.
"Sorry, never heard of him," Artie claims.
"Vulcan Simmons?" Richard queries.
Kate almost misses Artie's fleeting flinch. "Funny name, but it's not familiar."
"How about WH Enterprises?" Richard quickly returns.
Artie swallows. "I'm sorry, no, and if you'll excuse me, I have an appointment. I need to leave. I wish I could have been more help."
Nodding at Richard to follow, Kate stands to leave. "Then thank you for your time, Mr. Matthews. I appreciate it."
"Did you believe Matthews, Castle?" Kate asks as they return to her parking spot. "His thing about not recognizing faces was weird."
"That was the part I did believe," Richard muses. "Not recognizing faces is a real thing. It's called prosopagnosia or face blindness. Oliver Sacks, the neurologist, put it in a book. The man can write, and sometimes, I use the stuff he writes about to add interesting quirks to my characters. And I believe Matthews didn't know Buttridge. He had the same reaction to the name that everyone else seems to. But I think he was lying about Simmons and WH Enterprises. I'm guessing he's higher in the organization than Buttridge. He's got skills it can definitely use. He might even know Bracken. He could have introduced a virus to U-Store-it's computer in the first place to give him an excuse to gain full access. He could be helping Bracken's organization tunnel into all kinds of places where it doesn't belong. And with a bunch of crooks, Matthew's face blindness might even be a plus. If you don't remember what someone looks like, you can't identify them."
Kate nods slowly. "You could be right. It's worth doing a deep dive into Mr. Artie Matthews to find out. Castle, from what I've seen so far, you have a better search capacity than the department does. I was wondering…."
"If we can do our diving into Matthews at my loft?"
"Yeah, if you don't mind."
"To sit in my own well-broken-in desk chair and tap on my own familiar keyboard with a savvy detective at my side? What's to mind? But we're going to need to make a stop before we get there."
"Why?"
"To pick up more of my special blend of coffee. I'm running low, and I figure we'll need it."
"OK," Richard says, handing Kate a warm mug of coffee and putting one, safely distant from his keyboard, on his desk for himself. "Arthur 'Artie' Matthews. He's got a LinkedIn page, and if this is to be believed, he has quite an impressive background. He graduated from your exalted high school alma mater, Stuyvesant, and went on to MIT. He got a bachelor's in computer science there and moved on to Champaign-Urbana for his master's. From there, he went to work for Google. Then, he went out on his own as an independent consultant. He has a notable list of clients here, but strangely enough, doesn't list Vulcan Simmons or WH Enterprises among them."
Kate guffaws. "I wonder why. What else, Castle?"
"He says he specializes in malware protection and removal."
"To do that, he'd have to understand how it works and how to…."
"Plant it?" Richard fills in. "Just think of what someone like Bracken or even Simmons could learn about friends and enemies alike."
A chill sweeps through Kate. "I don't want to think about it. It scares the hell out of me."
"Yeah," Richard agrees, covering her hand with his own. "Me too."