Masked Prey (Lucas Davenport #30) - John Sandford Page 0,33
the caller was “Unknown.” He answered with “Yes,” and a woman asked, “Is this Marshal Davenport?”
“Yes, it is, who is this?”
“I’m Marcia Miller, the public representative for the American National Militia,” the woman said. “We understand you’ve been trying to get in touch.”
“Yes, I have. Where are you located?”
“Here in Washington—my office is actually across the river in Virginia, but the DC metro anyway.”
“Great. When could we meet?”
“Right now. I operate a small public relations firm and we normally keep regular nine-to-five business hours, but when I spoke with Charlie Lang, he suggested that your request might be somewhat urgent. I would be willing to meet with you tonight. I could come to your hotel.”
“I could come to your place . . .”
“I don’t think that’s necessary. I’m only a short distance from the Watergate. I could be there in fifteen minutes.” Miller said. “We could talk in the restaurant.”
Lucas wanted to deal with her on her home ground, but couldn’t immediately think of a credible excuse to avoid a meeting right then, in a restaurant virtually on the other side of his hotel door. “I’ll see you in fifteen minutes, then. I’ll be wearing a dark blue jacket and a checked shirt,” Lucas said. As he got dressed, he tried to remember if he’d told Lang that he was staying at the Watergate. He wasn’t sure.
Downstairs, in the restaurant, he got a beer and was halfway through it when Miller arrived. She was wearing a subdued women’s business suit, gunmetal-gray jacket with matching pants, and an icy blue, high-collared blouse. She carried a black leather satchel that could accommodate a full-sized automatic, if she felt the need for one.
She spotted him, nodded as he raised his glass, and strode over. She was a middle-sized woman, auburn hair off her shoulders, a square nose and chin with blue eyes and freckles. She all but sweated competence and focus.
She slid into the booth across from Lucas and asked, “Do you have a badge?”
“I do,” Lucas said. He showed her his ID case, with the marshal’s badge and the plastic ID card. She took it and actually read the card, then handed it back.
“I should tell you a few things before we get started,” she said, knitting her fingers together on the tabletop. “I can’t help you in identifying my clients. I repeat that: it’s not that I wouldn’t, it’s that I can’t. I was recommended by somebody, I don’t know who, to Old John. He interviewed me by telephone, hired me by telephone, and pays me in cash, which I carefully record so I can faithfully report it to the IRS. I get an envelope with two thousand dollars in it shortly after the first of each month, plus whatever expenses I’ve incurred, usually printing expenses. I have a series of ANM position papers that I send to people I’m told to send them to. They’re not recruiting documents, they’re arguments.”
“Two thousand dollars a month doesn’t . . .” Lucas shrugged.
“Sound like much? It isn’t. That’s because we don’t do much for them,” Miller said. She waved at a waitress, pointed at Lucas’s glass, and mouthed, “I want one.” The waitress gave her a thumbs-up, and went to get a beer.
Turning back to Lucas, Miller said, “As I mentioned on the phone, I run a small public relations group, oriented toward conservative causes. I have five associates and we represent thirty-two different groups—everything from nonprofit conservative advocacy groups to small businesses to alt-right organizations. We began by representing some lesser-known guns-rights groups and then some smaller gun manufacturers, then other general small businesses, and so on. A couple of the alt-right groups, over-ground groups, got in touch, and we took them on, and then Old John called. We have no information that the American National Militia is engaged in any kind of illegal activity. If we learned that they were, we would drop them immediately.”
“You say you don’t know who they are, but you must be able to get in touch—I assume you’re here with Old John’s permission.”
“I was asked to meet you. I can get in touch much of the time; other times, I can’t. Somebody will send me a Gmail address. It’s good for exactly one outgoing message, as far as I can tell. They always read the first email, but I’ve never gotten a response to a second one to that address. Then sometime later . . . sometimes days later . . . another address will pop