Standing with Hayley Chill in the entryway of the redbrick mansion on Kalorama Road, the FBI agent regards her witness through eyelids that are half-closed not because of a lack of sleep the night before or for intimidation value, but because Helen Udall was born with congenital ptosis. In grade school, her nickname was “Sleepy.” In high school, it was “Droopy.” At the Hoover Building just off Pennsylvania Avenue, the moniker given her by other agents is “Half-Mast,” but never to her face.
“In your time at Mr. Hall’s residence, before arrival of MPD, did you notice anything out of the ordinary?” Helen asks Hayley. “Anything irregular?”
Hayley pauses before answering the FBI agent. When she was thirteen and earning extra money babysitting for the town’s general practitioner, the good doctor’s wife had made a hearty demonstration of treating Hayley like one of the family. The care of twin toddlers was a trial, requiring Hayley’s presence from the end of a school day until long after the doctor returned home from his office late in the evening. The doctor’s wife bought birthday and Christmas gifts for Hayley and insisted she sit with the family during meals. She confided in the teenager, relating the frustrations of her marriage and disclosing details of a mostly barren sex life. To friends, and in Hayley’s presence, the doctor’s wife would refer to their babysitter as being like an eldest daughter.
Late one evening, when his wife had run out to the store, the doctor cornered Hayley in the entryway, pressing his six-foot frame against her and forcing his tongue into her mouth. Forcefully pushing the slightly inebriated man off her, Hayley locked herself in a downstairs bathroom until she heard the familiar sounds of a car’s return. Hayley met the doctor’s wife in the driveway and, in tears, relayed everything that had just transpired. Instead of reacting with outrage or indignation directed at her husband, as the young teen undoubtedly expected, the doctor’s wife violently shoved her babysitter to the ground with a curse. Hayley struggled to her feet, and the wife pushed her down again, accusing the thirteen-year-old of viciously slandering a virtuous husband. Threatened with increasing physical assault, Hayley scrambled to her feet and ran all the way home.
Ever since that dismal night, whether she realized it or not, Hayley has embraced a more Emersonian attitude. “Wise men put their trust in ideas and not in circumstances.” The circumstances in which Hayley currently finds herself are exceedingly unreliable. Hall’s death by sudden heart attack in and of itself would not necessarily incite undue suspicion. His temper was volcanic and stress levels extreme. Leftover barbecue was his idea of the perfect breakfast, and he carried at least forty pounds of excess weight. By any medical analysis, the man was a prime candidate for myocardial infarction. But the boot print in the dusting of snow on the walkway next to Hall’s residence, long since vanished in the rising temperatures of the day, undeniably suggests a conspiracy of some magnitude. Even greater reason for caution was the chief of staff’s admonition to Hayley in the privacy of his office that continues to reverberate, “Trust no one.” What if Hall’s death was not from natural causes but the handiwork of a deep-state conspiracy? She makes her decision within moments of Udall’s most important question.
“No, ma’am. I saw nothing out of the ordinary until discovering Mr. Hall’s body,” Hayley informs the FBI agent.
Helen Udall has interviewed hundreds of witnesses and suspects. How a person says something is equally important to what is said. Hayley’s pause before speaking was noteworthy, blatant as the lipstick on her ex-husband’s collar. “Anything at all, Ms. Chill. No embarrassment in stating the obvious.” The words say one thing, but Udall’s hard expression says another. Hayley is being told in certain terms: “Stop screwing around, young lady, this is the F-for-fucking-B-I and you best tell me what you know because I am grieving here, inconsolable over the maple bacon I denied myself, so speak the fuck up!”
Hayley meets the FBI agent’s gaze, Udall’s brown eyes partially hooded and prison-yard lifeless. This isn’t the first time in her life Hayley has dealt with the law. There were at least six interactions with the sheriff’s department or state police back home in Lincoln County. Even during her honorable and lauded career in the army, Hayley had occasion to be questioned by military police, but always as witness and not possible suspect in wrongdoing. As long as she can remember, her world has been one of checkered reputation, frequently requiring police intervention or official investigation. Consequently, Hayley does not intimidate easily in contact with law enforcement personnel. In her experience, it’s no different than an exchange with the local baker.
“Ma’am, there was no answer at the door. I went to the side of the house, persisting because Mr. Hall demanded the briefing binder be hand-delivered to him every day without fail.” She pauses, waiting for Udall to catch up with her furious note taking, then proceeds. “Looking in, through the pantry room window, I could see the chief of staff on the kitchen floor, lying there motionless on his back. I called 911, returned to the front porch, and waited there for EMTs to arrive.”
Udall finishes jotting down on her notepad and then slides a look toward the scrum of investigators observing the interview from a few yards away. Her failure to gain anything of use from the witness, a mere intern, has soured her mood even further. “Enjoying the show?” she cracks to the spectating detectives, who take the hint and disperse. Udall looks back toward Hayley, unwilling to let go. “And what about before this morning?”
“Ma’am?”
“Your relationship with Mr. Hall, what was that like?” Again the FBI agent’s facial expression preloads her words with meaning beyond their dictionary definition.
“Nothing inappropriate, if that’s what you’re asking, ma’am,” Hayley calmly assures the FBI agent.
Udall releases Hayley from the interview with an emphatic slamming shut of her notepad. “Okay, well, obviously, I’ll be speaking with more people there, in the White House.”
* * *
GIRARD STREET PARK, in Washington’s diverse Columbia Heights neighborhood, has long resisted all attempts at gentrification. With shade trees, picnic tables, playground, and a full basketball court, it possesses the basic amenities of urban refuge and nothing more. The neighboring streets of Girard and Fairmont provide a reliable clientele of panhandlers, addicts, gangsters, and petty criminals in addition to a few brave, less subterranean types. “Public” in the extreme sense of the word, the park isn’t pretty.
Since a midday shootout cleared the playground a few years before, few parents allow their children to visit the area. On this chilly November morning, the sun rarely peeks through roiling, dark clouds. Even the bums and criminals have shunned the grimy square for a warmer and drier indoors. The only person in the park is a man sitting alone on a bench. Bearded and wearing a navy-blue duffel coat and astrakhan cap, the man watches a pair of sparrows tussle over a dead, desiccated beetle.
Sinatra materializes from behind the Bearded Man’s shoulder and takes a seat on the bench. The Bearded Man had been anticipating Sinatra’s stealthy arrival and doesn’t react in the slightest. The operative, dressed in jeans, wool shirt, and down jacket, smokes a cigarette and watches the birds in mild combat.