“Smaller, I guess. Anyway, if we make an arrest, we’ll have some fingers to compare it to.”
“There’s always that,” Stone said.
“I think the print belongs to one of yours,” Dino said after a moment.
“One of my what?”
“Women. The fact that it’s a woman points to you.”
“First of all,” Stone said, “you don’t know it’s a woman’s print. Tell me that after you’re in possession of an actual finger that’s a match, one that’s attached to a woman.”
“You don’t believe in hunches, do you?” Dino asked.
“Only when they’re revealed to be true by means of actual facts.”
“Picky, picky, picky.”
“And even if they are, you’re going to be wrong at least half the time.”
Dino polished off his drink and stood up. “I don’t know why I bothered to come here and tell you this,” he said.
“Because you wanted to brag about something,” Stone replied.
“Vanessa, good evening, and my sympathies for having to put up with company like this.” He turned and walked out of the restaurant.
“You were very rude to Dino,” Vanessa said.
“That wasn’t rude; I was just keeping him in line. He was acting as if he’d cracked the case. Half a print!”
10
The following morning, Stone and Vanessa conducted one more inspection of each other’s physical properties, declared themselves satisfied, and put the equipment to work.
An hour later, shaved, showered, dressed, and just a little tired, Stone sat down at his desk and called Lance.
“Scramble,” he said.
“Scrambled. What is it, Stone?”
“A lady of my acquaintance wishes to cash a check.”
“Send her to a bank.”
“You are her bank.”
“What?”
“She has, let’s see”—he dug out the receipt—“two hundred and twelve thousand dollars, some of it in euros, on deposit with your firm. She’d like to cash a check in that amount and have it sent to her now.”
“The cash of which you speak is evidence,” Lance said.
“Come now, you’re not the police department; you said so yourself just the other day. You have no legal basis for confiscating her funds, and she wants them back.”
“They’re not her funds, they’re her mother’s.”
“You say that as though you think you have a right to her mother’s cash. It’s my client’s, by virtue of a probate-proof will and trust.”
“Her mother was an espionage agent for a foreign, unfriendly government.”
“Did you bring any charges against her?”
“We were about to when she started shooting at us.”
“Then she has never been charged with a crime, and you can’t demonstrate that the source of her funds is an illegal one.”
“We’re still processing that money,” Lance said. “It’s going to take some time, quite a lot of it.”
“Process it all you like,” Stone said. “My client will take your check.”
“You want me to issue her a CIA check for $212,000?”
“She’s not asking for a loan, Lance. It’s her money, remember?”
“This is highly irregular.”
“What’s irregular is your people barging into her office without a search warrant, breaking into her safe, and taking her money. That’s highly irregular. Refunding it is highly regular.”
“Hold on a minute; I need to speak to one of our drudges in accounting.”
Stone put his feet up on his desk and sighed deeply. Sooner than he had expected, Lance returned to the call.
“All right, the check will be on my desk in ten minutes, made out to . . . ?”
“To the Woodman & Weld trust account and to me.”
“When would you like to pick it up?” Lance asked.
“Allow me to introduce the Central Intelligence Agency to Federal Express,” Stone said. “They have a nifty little overnight delivery service.”
“And you’re paying for it?”
“No, the institution who appropriated the funds is paying the cost of restoring them to their rightful owner.”
“Oh, all right. Here’s the check now. I’m signing it.”
“Just send it to my office.”
“Lunch is on you next time, and I’m choosing the wine.” Lance hung up.
Stone buzzed Joan. “There’s a check for $212,000 coming from Lance tomorrow morning. Please deposit it in the trust account and issue a check on our account in the same amount to Vanessa Baker. Give her check to me right away.”
“Yes, sir, boss. Doing a little money laundering, are we?”
“It’s all legal and aboveboard,” Stone said. “Well, legal, anyway. Nothing those people do is aboveboard.”
Joan came in a couple of minutes later with the freshly minted check, waving it in the breeze, as if to dry the ink.
Stone accepted the check, looked at the amount, signed it, and placed it in an envelope.
“You think we could do a couple hundred grand for me like that?” Joan asked.
“Of course. All you have to do is to persuade Lance Cabot to send me another check in any amount that appeals to you, then you can write yourself a check, and I’ll sign it.”
“I was hoping we could eliminate the red tape,” she said, then went back to her office.
* * *
—
Vanessa came into his office a little later. “I’m going to do some shopping, and it’s starting to rain outside. May I borrow Fred and the Bentley for a couple of hours?”
“Of course. I’m having lunch in.” He handed her the envelope. “This might help with your shopping.”
She looked at it suspiciously, then opened it. “Holy shit!” she said.
“That was very unladylike,” Stone admonished.
“You mean I can just hand this to Bergdorf’s?”
“I think it might be less alarming and more convenient for both you and Bergdorf’s if you use your credit card, deposit the check, and pay the bill when it comes.”