FICTION
It Never Starts With A Body Part 7
A Sunny Alexander-Johnson and Henry James Series By P.G. & Sharon Barnett
My name is Sunny Alexander-Johnson, and I’m Henry James, and we’re writers for Dark Sides of the Truth magazine.
Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6
As Manny had requested several times in the past, we called in advance. This time, Manny didn’t keep us waiting, and in a matter of minutes, we were sitting in the computer room with Donnie Martin and Rebecca Wu.
“Okay, you two, we’ll make this quick. I know you have lives outside of work. We need to find out something, and we don’t know what it is or what we’re really looking for. And we need you two to find it fast.”
“Uh, Henry, you have to do better than that. Throw us a bone here.”
“Donnie, what my partner is trying to say and failing miserably at it, is all that info you two dug up on Richard Carlson? We need to see it all.”
“Why didn’t you say that in the first place? Give me a second. Becca? Can you toss what you found up on the big screen?”
“Sure.”
“Okay, there you have it, the entire life…”
“And death.”
“Yes, Henry, and death, of one Mr. Richard Carlson.”
“Is this everything Donnie?”
“Everything we could find yeah.”
For several minutes we stared at the screen, hoping something would catch our attention, looking for any bread crumbs that could move us forward.
“Damn, I’m not seeing anything. You Henry? Henry?”
“What?”
“I said, do you see anything that can help?”
“That square in the bottom right-hand corner of the screen. What is that?”
“Uh, not sure, let me blow it up.”
“Thanks, Becca, that’s good. Okay, it’s a piece in the Austin Reporter dated almost thirty years ago. The Austin Reporter? That rag hasn’t been in business for almost fifteen years.”
“Maybe not Henry, but read it. The reporter wrote very detailed information about Richard’s embezzlement. Right down to providing redacted copies of Richard’s signature on several deposits into an unnamed bank account. Detailed information he stated he got from an inside source at Crowly and Alcot.”
“So someone worked at the same company as Richard at the same time and was feeding this journalist information? Whoever it was, was either trying to report a crime anonymously or had a bone to pick with Richard.”
“Well, I’m afraid we don’t have anything on Crowly and Alcot. At least not a list of people who worked there, sorry. I suppose we could try casting the net wider and start looking at any mention of Crowly and Alcot, like on credit applications, loans, and things like that, but that’s going to take days, maybe weeks.”
“Thanks, Becca, but I’ve got a better idea. The journalist who did the piece. He still alive?”
“Nathan Bertram? Not sure, give us a minute.”
“Okay, we’re going to grab some coffee…”
“Hot chocolate.”
“Whatever, Johnson. We’ll be in Manny’s office.”
“Okay, shouldn’t take too long, Henry.”
We left the two to their own computer devices and headed for the break room then Manny’s office. He was working at his computer terminal when we walked in. Paying us little attention, he continued typing, then surveyed the screen in front of him for a moment and tapped a button on his mouse.
As he pushed back and swiveled to face us, he picked up a mug, took a sip, then peered at us over the edge of the cup.
“Find anything?”
“Maybe so. We should know something soon. How’s Victoria and Gorgie?”
“Couldn’t be better Sunny. Victoria loves working for your mother, and since that thing with your brother Dante, Gorgie’s pretty much gotten back to normal.”
“Good to hear. We hope…”
Donnie’s voice crackled into the room from Manny’s intercom, “Manny, tell Henry that journalist is still kicking. He started freelancing after the Austin Reporter went belly up. Here’s his home address…”
“Hang on Donnie, let us grab something to write on. You got your notebook, Johnson?”
“No, it’s in the car, you?”
“Nope.”
“Oh, for the love of God, you two, here’s a freaking notepad. Use it.”
“Thanks, Manny. Okay, Donnie shoot.”
After writing down the address of Nathan Bertram, we said our goodbyes and headed to the car. Something told us it was going to be a long night, and each of us made our own calls to our significant others.
It was easy to tell from each of the phone calls neither of our partners was too happy to hear of our late arrivals home. Just not for the same reasons.
“Henry, take Hamilton then go under the bridge to Bluebonnet. It’ll shave off some time.”
“GPS says, take Bluebonnet.”
“Dammit, James, are we going to have to go through this again?”
“Whatever, cool your jets, Johnson, I’m taking the damn exit.”
Twenty minutes later, we pulled into an older subdivision in South Austin and found Nathan Bertram’s house. After taking the stairs to the man’s porch, we rang the doorbell. We heard the soft padding of footsteps from inside the house.
“Who is it?”
“Mr. Bertram? Mr. Nathan Bertram?”
“I’m not interested. Go away.”
“Let me try Henry. Mr. Bertram, we’re here to talk to you about Richard Carlson. We thought you’d like to know, but he was found dead in an abandoned warehouse this past Saturday.”
“Oh, that ought to work, princess.”
“Put a sock in it, old man.”
We stepped back a couple of paces on the porch, waiting in silence, then blinking against the glare of an overhead light when it flickered on. The face of an elderly man appeared as the door parted slightly. Possessing bristles of white stubble on his jowls and cheeks and streaks of gray running through an unruly shock of hair, Nathan Bertram stared at us.
“You two the police?”
“No sir. My name’s Sunny Alexander-Johnson, and this is Henry James. We’re writers for Dark Sides of the Truth magazine.”
“Well, isn’t this a treat? The real Sunny and Henry at my house.”
The man swung the door open and stepped back.
“Come in, come in. It’s an honor to meet you both in person. I’ve read all your stories. You two are a pair of damned, fine journalists in my opinion. Come in.”
The grizzled looking man wore a pair of faded blue jeans and a tattered pullover shirt with the barely distinguishable logo “writers do it with soliloquies” across the chest. As he shut the door and locked it, the fabric ends of a loose belt of an even more threadbare housecoat twirled and flapped against his legs.
We followed him into his living room, which to us resembled the inside of a paper reclamation center. Stacks of paper were everywhere. The couch, a pair of lounging chairs, even end tables had been repurposed as desks.
The lamps which should have been on the end tables were sitting on the carpet. We stood in silence as the man began to mutter to himself, grasping stacks from a pair of chairs and flinging them on the floor.
“Sorry, it’s the maid’s week off. Here sit here.”
“We won’t stay long, Mr. Bertram. We just need to ask you a few questions.”
The man took the couch opposite us, pushing mounds of paper aside to make room and then perched on the edge gazing at us expectantly.
“Ask away.”
“We’d like to ask you about the write up you did on Richard Carlson.”
“Yes. I remember that one clear as a bell. It was my first big break. Too bad none of it was true.”
For several seconds we stared at the man as if what he’d just said wasn’t registering.
“Beg pardon? Did you just say your story was false? You do realize your story played a huge part in sending Richard Carlson to prison for ten years, right?”
“Look, you two, I was young and just getting started in the business. This inside information I was being fed seemed legit, so I corroborated what I could and rolled with the rest of it. It wasn’t until a month ago Richard and I met, and he forgave me and asked for my help. You know, I’ve still got every note I took on that story, and I let Richard have copies of them. The last time we met, he told me he figured it out and was going to take care of it straight away, and now you two are telling me he’s dead. That’s all I know.”
“Nathan, can we have a look at your notes?”
“Uh, yes ma’am, but it’s going to take a bit to find them again. Like I said, it’s the…”
“Maid’s week off. Yes, we know. So, here’s the address to Dark Sides. Meet us there around nine tomorrow with the notes. Then we’ll go from there.”
“Will do Sunny. This is exciting. I’m getting to do a story with the great Sunny Alexander-Johnson and Henry James. Can I get a byline?”
“First the note tomorrow, then we’ll talk. Uh, we’ll let ourselves out. It looks like you have a lot of uh, digging, to do before tomorrow.”
“I’ll be there. Don’t you worry, Sunny.”
As we walked back to the car, we were reeling with this latest bit of information. This entire story was now resting on the hands of a somewhat eccentric ex-journalist whose filing system left a whole lot to be desired.
“Henry, do you think he’ll find them?”
“In all that mess? Not a chance in hell.”
Read On — It Never Starts With A Body Part 8
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