Free The Path of Silence by Edita A. Petrick Page A

reporting.”
    “Homicide?” I asked, without turning my head. I had to concentrate on driving. It was late spring, an ideal time of the year for the roadwork crews to start ripping apart all the access roads and major arteries, to make sure that the Baltimore commuters lived through another summer full of closed exits and detours.
    “It sounded like that.”
    I had to ask Mrs. Devon, my neighbor, to look after Jazz. I didn’t like that. She was the type who would ask for many favors afterward.
    “If it’s homicide, here and how, why were we invited?”
    “The Prince has a doctor on the premises. He was beside the security guy when he called 9-1-1. The doctor gave instructions to the dispatcher and the paramedics.”
    “What kind?”
    “His chest exploded. Bring a tarp.”
    I saw the pothole in the road but took my eyes off it momentarily, to stare at him. The Acura crunched as it landed in the respectable gouge and moaned when it climbed out of it. When Ken got his car back, I would have to take mine in for alignment.
    “Pay attention,” he admonished. “Clint and Jasper are coming, so is Joe and his forensic army. But if another foot soldier with a bomb in his chest was taken out of commission, it’s our case.”
    “I don’t want to work this alone. Clint and Jasper are welcome.”
    “We’ll probably need the help,” he agreed.
    “If it is another case like Brick, what do you think it’s about? Why are they suddenly executing their rank-and-file?”
    “Dissidents, maybe.”
    “Brick may have been a dissident, testing the device’s limits but a hotel waiter? There’s no connection…unless it was a part-time job. Was it?”
    “I don’t think so. His name was Peter Jeffries, age thirty. He was single and lived at 34 Lofton Terrace. That’s north of Clifton Park. It sounded like he was a regular employee, a night shift.”
    “What was he doing in the penthouse?”
    “Delivering someone’s food order.”
    “At one o’clock in the morning?”
    “It’s a penthouse in the Prince. The place must cost more than you and I make in a month, just for one night.”
    He was right. The Prince Excelsior was the cream of Baltimore hospitality residence. Their penthouse was always reserved, never for salaried people. The kind of guests who stayed at the Prince’s penthouse, had names that appeared in all the national and international news publications. They were the movers and shakers of the world, business, political, or entertainment.
    “Who is staying in there tonight?”
    He sighed. “I don’t know. The security didn’t say.”
    “Who found the victim?”
    “My impression is that it was the security.”
    “Security guards don’t normally accompany a waiter who’s delivering food to a guest’s room. Whoever would be allowed to the penthouse, would have been cleared.”
    “We’ll find out when we get there.” He motioned to make a left turn, to avoid the forest of flashing lights, police, fire department and ambulance.
    When we entered the grand lobby, awash in crystal sparkle and bathed in reflection from polished brass and mirrored opulence, we saw every homicide cop in there. The hotel staff was plentiful but surprisingly, there were no guests.
    Jasper saw us and came over. He motioned at the cathedral expanse lined with plants. I caught a glimmer of water. There had to be a fountain deeper in this grand station.
    “Up on the thirty-sixth floor,” he said. “Take the service elevators. The manager wouldn’t let us use the guest elevators in the middle of the night. Smeddin’s up there too and the paramedics.”
    The hotel staff was assembled off to a side, outside of their work registration area. I motioned at them. “Did you take down any information yet?”
    He grimaced. “The staff, yes. The rest is padlocked. They don’t divulge information on guests. We might have to bring down someone from the attorney’s office, to read the riot act. Clint will look after that. We don’t