Simple Genius

Horatio glanced over at Alicia, who seemed to have been holding her breath. “I told you she’d be a hard nut to crack. Did you learn anything useful?”

He said, “I know her better than I did an hour ago. That’s something.”

“Well, the next time you meet her she could be someone else entirely.”

After Alicia left with Viggie, Horatio called Sean and filled him in on the session.

“So is Viggie autistic?” Sean asked.

“Autistism is a broad term,” Horatio replied. “But even so, I don’t think she is.”

“What then?”

“I think in certain ways she’s so much smarter than the rest of us, that she can’t relate. In other ways she’s not very intelligent, or mature, I should say. It might be a perception problem. Our perception problem. We expect her emotional abilities to match her intellect, but she’s still a little girl. And I got some strange vibes from her about her father.”

“Like what?”

“Monk apparently treated her like an adult, at least sometimes. But other times he treated her, well, like a… device.”

“A device?”

“I know I’m not making much sense. I wished I knew something about her mother. Viggie apparently doesn’t believe that she even had one.”

“So where does this all leave us?” Sean asked.

“Not much further, I’m afraid.”

“Well, at least our results are consistent. Meaning nil.”

“So what are you going to do?”

“I’m going to swing at a pitch and see if I can get on base.”

CHAPTER 50

SINCE THE WOMAN HADN’T GIVEN SEAN her phone number he checked the phone book and the Internet with no luck. Sean finally decided to head back to Williamsburg that evening and the same bar where he had seen her the previous night. Michelle wanted to tag along but Sean vetoed that idea as they sat in his room at Alicia’s cottage.

“I’m not sure Valerie would appreciate your presence as much as I would.”

“Sean, think about it, a guy like Ian Whitfield is not going to let his wife screw around on him. He probably has her followed 24/7.”

“Well, then they’ve already seen me with her. And if they spot me a second time they might just get rattled and make a mistake that will trip them up.”

“That’s a little bit of a long shot, isn’t it?”

“We don’t have a lot of other options. The bodies are burnt to a crisp, Ventris is stonewalling us, nobody at Babbage Town knows anything and the only person who might be able to help us, Viggie, doesn’t speak a language any of us can understand.”

“I thought Horatio was meeting with her.”

“He did.” Sean quickly recounted what Horatio had reported to him about his session with Viggie.

“So apparently Monk did tell his daughter something, but it’s in code.”

“If she’s to be believed. Codes and blood. What’s that supposed to mean?”

Michelle shrugged. “No clue.”

“That’s the thing about this case. There are a few clues but they keep disappearing. And there don’t appear to be any to take their place.”

“Speaking of, any word back from the pit bull in a skirt?”

Sean pulled a piece of paper out of his pocket. “Monk traveled to England.

Joan managed to track down his itinerary. He visited several places. London, Cambridge, Manchester and a place called Wilmslow in Cheshire. And one other place that makes the other locations make sense.”

“Which was?” she prompted.

“Bletchley Park,” he replied. “It’s where his relative Alan Turing worked during World War II and, according to Champ Pollion, saved the world.”

“And the connection to the other places?”

“Except for three years at Princeton, they basically track Alan Turing’s life. He was born in Paddington in London, went to college at Cambridge, Ph.D. at Princeton in the U.S., back to Cambridge, on to Bletchley Park, then to Manchester University after the war, and died by his own hand in Wilmslow, Cheshire, in 1954.”

“So the guy was related to Monk and he decided to take a little stroll down history lane,” Michelle said. “Or it could be more than that.”

“Possibly.”

“So while you’re dallying with a married woman, what do you want me to do?”

“Tonight you have Viggie duty, but before that Horatio wants to talk to you. And if you can squeeze it in, it would great if you could look around for a secret room in the mansion.”

“And what if I don’t want to talk to Horatio?”

“I’m not forcing you to do anything. But he sincerely wants to help you.”

“You mean by talking behind my back to my family and snooping into my past?”

“Here’s the address of the place where he’s staying.”

“And what will you be doing in the meantime?”

“Getting ready for my date.”

She scowled. “You really piss me off sometimes.”

“Really? I wouldn’t know how that feels.”

CHAPTER 51