Chapter 1

I had been looking forward to this vacation for nearly a whole year. My name is Donald Bradly, "Don" to my friends and "that vindictive SOB" to my enemies. I was about as ordinary looking as you could expect to meet: the kind of guy who would be lost in a crowd even if you were trying to find him. That was perfect for my job as PI (Private Investigator). I could go almost anywhere and not arouse suspicion.

My best friend, Andrew Hatfield, "Andy" to me and a very few other people had let me use his camp for two weeks. His father had built it back before he was killed in Panama. All I knew about the man was that he was a SEAL. This camp fit about halfway between the extremes, it was single-sheathed and no place to be in a New England winter, but it had a kitchen and bathroom with running water. There was a sitting room and two bedrooms: one for the parents and one for the kids.

Naturally, as a PI, I had to know everything about the place, since it was new to me. It was just my nature to spend one whole day going everywhere there was to go in and around the house. I was amazed when I ran across a cubbyhole that was well concealed: inside was a Colt .45 1911A1, fully loaded and with four extra full clips. I had to know, so I field stripped the automatic and found it to be in perfect condition. The condition was so good that I knew that it could not have been in hiding more than about six months. Now, my question was, should I mention it to Andy?

I figured that there must a good reason for the gun being where it was, so I returned it and went about my business. I was at the camp to fish, something that I had once been very skillful at, but my skill had dropped off as I had spent so much time at my work. Oh, well, I had everything there from cane poles for drowning earthworms to the fanciest of fly fishing equipment, and everything in between. This equipment was not mine, but belonged to Andy, and was a part of the furnishings of the camp.

The first few days, I lazed about and only went fishing to try to get my hand in. However, after those two days, I was bitten by the fishing bug, and I was back to seriously chasing the big one that consistently got away. On my fifth day at the camp, I was out in the lake in Andy's rowboat where I had been looking for likely spots for lake trout. I was slowly paddling toward the camp when I heard a woman scream and a single gunshot that had to come from a hand gun.

That certainly was enough to get my attention, and I began to row as fast as I could back to where I had heard the scream originate. Okay, I'll admit it: I am kind of the Sir Lancelot-type who has to rescue any damsel in distress, and to hope for a little loving in appreciation for my timely arrival. Yes, I had my .40 caliber S&W pistol with me, though it was in my tackle box and not in the shoulder holster where I keep it when I am working. I learned long ago not to wander too far from a handy weapon.

It appeared that the woman was still alive as I got close to the dock because I could hear her crying in what I assumed was in pain. I tied up the boat and grabbed my pistol as I ran toward where the crying was coming from. It was in front of the cabin and could not be seen from the dock. I was not a complete fool and did look before I ran around the corner of the house into what potentially could be a spray of bullets.

A man was lying on the ground near the steps up to the porch, and a crying woman was kneeling beside him. The first thing I saw when I looked closely was that the man had been holding an unfamiliar pistol that I thought must be a 9mm automatic, but it was no longer being held in his hand. The other thing I noticed was the large exit wound in his skull! There was no question that he was dead, and further observation showed that he was my friend Andy, the owner of the camp.

The woman did not appear to be injured, but she was carrying on like she had lost the love of her life. It didn't seem likely, but I did not chance that she, too, was armed, so I stepped back enough to be protected by the corner of the house and called out to the woman, "WHO ARE YOU, AND WHAT HAPPENED?"

As I expected, she jumped from being startled. Her answer was, "DON'T SHOOT! I DON'T HAVE A GUN! WHY DID YOU SHOOT ANDY?"

I stepped out from the side of the house and said, "I didn't shoot him! I'm his friend, and he loaned the house to me for a fishing vacation. I'm Don Bradly. Who are you?"

"I'm Sue Hempsted. Andy was my boyfriend. You are the man we were coming to see."

"Okay, we'll talk about that later. Right now, I need to know where the shooter went. Did you see him?"

"Not really. All I saw was a man jump into the passenger side of a Dark Blue Chevy Caprice and roar off after he shot Andy. He was wearing a Fedora pulled down over his face, and all I know is that he was White."

"Why did Andy have a gun in his hand?"

"I'm not real sure. We heard a car drive up just as we left that Ford over there. For some reason I don't understand, Andy pulled the gun from under his arm and pushed me to the ground. I screamed in surprise when Andy pushed me. He was turning toward the Chevy when he was shot. That's all I know."

"Okay, you go inside and have a seat in the sitting room. I'll call the cops with my cellphone. There's no phone in the camp." The woman went inside, and I made the call to 911. The woman who answered my call was reasonably on the ball and said that she would notify the cops and the morgue personnel. I gave directions on how to get here and went to sit on the steps while I waited for the cops to show up. Andy was my friend, so I was very concerned about catching whoever had shot him, but I figured that I would let the cops handle this part of the investigation. If they didn't cooperate with me, I would have some friends in the county DA's (District Attorney's) office lean on them.

The cops showed up in about 20 minutes and the people from the county morgue were not far behind. The detective sergeant, Sgt. Harold Bains, was very professional about the whole thing, and even asked me to help him hunt for the fatal bullet. He found it buried in a tree trunk and cussed because it was so distorted that forensics was probably going to have a hell of a time doing anything useful with it.

Sue came out of the camp and gave Det. Bains her version of what happened. What she said to him was essentially identical to what she said to me. Bains made sure that he had every piece of physical evidence that he could get from the scene of the murder, but he left shaking his head. He didn't even have a license plate number to work with, so he was doubtful of ever coming up with a solution to the crime.

Now that the details were taken care of and the body removed, I asked Sue why she and Andy had come to talk to me. Sue's answer was a vague as the rest of the case. She claimed that all she knew was that Andy was being bothered by some people, and he wanted to hire me to help him "get them off his back."

We talked for a while, but I did not get anymore useful information. She did give me the address of her apartment in NYC (New York City) and her telephone number. The car they had arrived in was a rental she had picked up at the Nashua airport. She drove it back to the airport and caught a flight to LaGuardia. That left

me at loose ends for a few days until I heard from Det. Bains.

My fishing was interrupted when Det. Bains showed up with some interesting information. Namely, Andy had been shot with a bullet of Russian design. It was a 9x19mm armor piercing slug used by the Russian military and special police units. Furthermore, the pistol that Andy had was a Russian GSh-18 9x19mm automatic pistol that used that type of ammunition.