"Table for three for Smith, ready." "Thirty-nine." "Pastrami on rye to go." "Thirty-nine." "No coleslaw with that?" "Thirty-nine!" "That's me." "Who's got the fries?" "Hey, Mac, the usual?" "Number four club." "Easy on the dressing." "A man who knows what he wants." "Excuse me." "MAN:" "I've been waiting ten minutes!" "Excuse me." "WAITER:" "You gotta wait another ten." "Thank you." "Place gets pretty cutthroat in here, huh?" "Yeah, but the pastrami's worth it." "Looks serious." "Always is." "Here you go, Mac." "You, uh, sure you don't want to dine in?" "No, I-I gotta go." "I'll put it on your tab." "You know, look, here." "With this crowd, I always take two, just in case I forget something." "Thanks again." "Number 40!" "Pastrami sandwich, please." "Who found them?" "Don't know." "Anonymous call to 911." "According to the M.E. techs, both bodies were close to room temp." "Means TOD was roughly 24 hours ago." "According to his wallet, this guy over here... is Michael Paley, 28 years old." "He had a downtown address." "Small-caliber gunshot to the back of the head." "This is definitely what you call blunt-force trauma." "Got an ID on this one?" "Negative." "Got an impact mark." "Hey, Mac." "Take a look at this." "It's pure gold." "I can top that." "Just found this in a shoeprint." "A four-leaf clover?" "It's a natural genetic mutation." "There's only one for every 10, 000 three-leaf clovers." "Hang on a second." "Gold?" "Four-leaf clover right before St. Patrick's Day?" "Where the hell are we, at the end of the rainbow?" "Well, I'll you this much:" "Neither one of these guys had the luck of the Irish." "* Out here in the fields *" "* I fight for my meals *" "* I get my back into my living *" "* Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. *" "I wonder if our gunshot vic is the same Michael Paley who publishes that blog?" "It's possible." "It means our second vic could be Cam Vandemann." "Sorry, who are we talking about here?" "Paley and his partner,Vandemann are a couple of budding investigative journalists." "Local muckrakers is more like it." "Earlier this year they broke a story about homeless people being forced to hide in Battery Park." "Made the mayor look pretty heartless." "Didn't make the cops look too good, either." "Paley and Vandemann do have a knack for getting in people's faces." "So, maybe somebody returned the favor." "* *" "* I'm buried underneath a veil of lies *" "* Oh, and in this grave I place my confidence *" "* Oh, and your belief that I will rise again *" "* *" "* Whoa!" "*" "* But I can't control that... *" "* But I know not where I go *" "* But I can't control that... *" "* But I know not where I go... *" "* *" "Hmm..." "What's up?" "We got two bodies, right?" "But we got four sets of prints." "A couple of them match the tread patterns on our vic's tennis shoes." "They're easy enough to spot." "There's a third pair of dress-shoe prints that, based on their positioning, scuff patterns and high-velocity blood spatter, appear to be our killers." "Then there's a fourth, what look like work-boot prints." "That's where I pulled the clover from." "They start over there by the door, make their way over to the bodies, and then they end up over here." "So maybe our killer has an accomplice." "See that skitter pattern in the floor?" "How it goes underneath this old tank?" "It's positive for GSR." "So you think the gun got knocked beneath it?" "Wel, if it did, it's not there anymore." "So, maybe the fourth set of prints belongs to whoever retrieved it." "All right." "So, our two vics are over there at the table." "Mr. Dress Shoes comes in, boom, down goes Paley." "But before he can get another shot off, our second vic gets the jump on him, the gun skitters off..." "And that's when Mr. Work Boots comes in to the rescue, helps his buddy beat the hell out of Vandemann, he grabs the gun and they split." "So, if that's true, we're looking for two different people." "And two different weapons." "Okay, Stella, news flash." "That's definitely your blogger, Michael Paley, and here's the bullet that killed him." "But this is not his partner, Cam Vandemann." "Really?" "I did some detailed fluoroscopic analysis, then ran it through a photo imaging program to simulate e vic's facial features prior to trauma." "This is what he should look like." "And here's who he doesn't look like." "I pulled the second shot off the Paley and Vandemann blog site." "So, the real Cam Vandemann is still out there." "Maybe a target, maybe a suspect." "Either way, I'm afraid our second vic is still a John Doe, but I did discover a couple more things that might help clue us into his identity." "His blood work revealed high levels of antibodies for hepatitis A and B, typhoid, rabies and malaria." "These multiple doses are consistent with a vaccination for some type of international travel." "Meanwhile, your call of blunt-force trauma as COD was clearly on the mark." "And while we're on the topic, there is something else we should take a closer look at." "I found a series of faint wound impressions along the victim's scalp." "Looks almost alpha-numeric with some kind of fine-line detail." "But it's gonna take some more work to make sense of them." "Whatever these marks are could lead us to a murder weapon." "* *" "What you gawking at?" "I think it's some kind of blue green algae." "I found it on our John Doe's shirt." "What's with the junk pile?" "I don't know; thought it all looked new to the scene so I thought maybe the vics brought it in there with them." "So I took it back here." "What was in the container?" "Nothing but water." "Did you get anything more exciting?" "Confusing, maybe." "I just ran the four-leaf clover I found in the work-boot print." "Now, according to EDNA and a little DNA analysis, it's not just any clover." "It's hop clover, which is indigenous to Ireland." "So you tell me, Linds-- how the hell did it wind up in a shoeprint in New York City?" "Reed." "Hey." "I got your message." "Sounded urgent." "You all right?" "Yeah." "I'm okay." "It's a..." "It's actually a friend of mine that I'm worried about." "Who's that?" "Cam Vandemann." "What do you know about him?" "Well, I know that we're both bloggers interested in breaking stories the media's too spineless to touch." "That's not what I mean, Reed." "I know he's not guilty of murder." "And how do you know that?" "Because he reached out to me." "He knows the cops are looking for him." "He's afraid, Mac." "Well, then tell him to come to me." "Look, I did, but he says the story's too big." "He's asking you to come to him." "Reed, do you really want to put yourself in the position of possibly aiding and abetting a suspect in a double homicide?" "No, I don't." "But you know what?" "I don't have any other choice." "All right, Cam Vandemann- he didn't kill anybody." "He's in way over his head." "I can hear it in his voice." "He's, he's, he's desperate, Mac." "I'm reminded every day of what it's like to go after a headline without the right kind of help." "Okay, so will you please just go talk to him?" "Alone?" "When?" "Tonight." "I'll text you with the details as soon as he sends them." "You know, you're asking me to take a little bit of a chance here." "Yes, I know." "But you know, sometimes you got to take chances, Mac." "If only so you can give one to somebody else." "Hey, Mac." "I got something for you." "I memorized the takeout menu ten years ago, Phil." "Read the back." "The pretty brunette you were talking to in here last night-- she asked me if I'd give it to you next time you were in." ""Dear Number 39..." "I just wanted to say thank you." "I had a really long day." "Actually, I've had a few months worth of them, to be honest." "So when I came into the deli," "I was thinking hard about leaving Manhattan." "But then I told myself if at least one stranger could show me some tiny shred of kindness, it would mean I should stay." "And suddenly, there you were, talking with me, looking me in the eye, smiling at me like you meant it." "Anyway, I just wanted you to know that it felt really good." "And thanks to you, I'm staying right where I am." "Yours..." "Number 40." "Can I get you anything else?" "No." "I'm good." "Thanks." "* *" "Thanks." "Hey." "You're not gonna believe this." "You know our John Doe's head injuries?" "Sid and I got a much better picture of those wound impressions by using subdermal photography." "Then I was able to use the image files to crunch all the numbers and letters." "And this is what I got." "Hawkes, this looks like the markings on gold bullion." "A ten-thousand gram gold delivery bar, to be exact." "Current value-- half a million dollars." "And we found a pure gold impact mark on the warehouse floor right next to the second vic's head." "And get this:" "According to the treasury agent I just spoke to, a gold bar matching those exact numbers was deposited at the Federal Reserve just this morning." "Okay, what kind of killer goes from the crime scene to the bank?" "Detectives, this is a secure vault, closed to the public, with over $200 billion worth of gold in storage." "What exactly is it you're looking for?" "A very expensive murder weapon." "So this is what all the money in the world looks like, huh?" "So pretty." "Come on." "The bar we're looking for just came in as part of a local shipment for international trade." "It can't be too deep in the pile." "Huh." "* *" "I got a golden ticket." "Let me see it." "You see those scratches?" "Positive for blood." "It arrived at our facility yesterday morning as part of a private transfer in a purchase made by the Chinese government." "And who's had access to the bar since then?" "No one but vault security." "All of whom are thoroughly screened upon every entry and exit." "Trust me, once it got here, there's no way it left." "Then where was it before it got here?" "Deposit records state it came straight from its place of manufacture:" "Elemental Precious Metals." "Gentlemen, I hope you appreciate the value of that evidence." "More than you know." "Hey." "Hey." "I found out where that stain on our John Doe's shirt came from." "Blue green algae, right?" "Arthrospira maxima." "But I ran it through GCMS, and I found three other ingredients:" "barley, hops and yeast." "Ah." "Are we talking about what I think we're talking about?" "Turns out there's one pub in New York that uses algae to microbrew its own green organic beer." "Ah." "Bottoms up." "* *" "Wow." "Yeah, I know." "Always this crazy in the middle of the day?" "They're part of a citywide St. Patty's Pub Crawl." "Trying to set a world record." "Three days, a hundred bars and 5,000 people!" "Care to join in the fun?" "No, actually." "We're on the clock, pal." "You ever seen this man?" "Unbelievable." "What, he finally fall off his last barstool?" "You know him?" "Yeah." "His name is Charlie Cooper." "I've kicked him out of here a few times." "Should have kicked his ass while I was at it." "Why is that?" "I met a girl a few months ago." "I told Charlie I was thinking about popping the question." "Said he was gonna hook me up with a great diamond engagement ring for cheap." "Turned out to be cubic zirconia." "Then she breaks up with me and sleeps with him." "Oh." "You have any idea why this guy would be hanging out with two journalists?" "Aside from the fact that he's a blowhard?" "No clue." "I can tell you this much." "The only thing Cooper liked more than the sound of his own voice was making a fast buck." "So if he found someone who let him get away with both, hey, two for one." "Chug!" "Chug!" "Chug!" "Chug!" "Chug!" "Chug!" "Chug!" "Chug!" "Chug!" "Chug!" "Chug!" "Chug!" "Chug!" "Chug!" "Chug!" "Chug...!" "It was ransacked?" "Totally." "Somebody tore the hell out of Paley and Vandemann's apartment." "You put out an alarm?" "I did." "And I got guys sitting on the place just in case Vandemann comes back." "We're gonna find this guy." "Hey, guys, as soon as we got Cooper's name from Danny and Lindsay, I ran a Customs check on all his international travel." "Let me guess." "He's been in and out of China." "And the antibodies we found in his blood match the CDC recommended travel vacs for the Far East." "But here's the kicker." "Before we found his body lying next to Paley's in that warehouse, guess where Cooper was working." "Where is that?" "Elemental Precious Metals." "That's the firm that made our gold bar." "They made a mint on reclaimed gold." "Reclaimed?" "We're talking jewelry, dental fillings, circuit boards-- you name it." "They melt it, then turn it into bars for sale on the open market." "Or to use as murder weapons." "The firm is owned by a third-generation broker." "His name is Thom Weir." "So, if he could tell us who wanted Paley and Cooper dead..." "We're golden." "Exactly." "Right." "I'll bring Weir in." "Thank you." "Hello?" "REAL ESTATE AGENT:" "Come on in." "Are you here for the open house?" "Yes." "Oh." "It's you." "I'm sorry." "Have we met before?" "No, but I'm guessing you're the beautiful brunette woman in the green coat." "Dear Number 40," "I hope this note reaches you and you won't find me too forward in sending it." "But someone I know recently reminded me that sometimes you have to take chances-- if only to give one to someone else." "So, if you'd like to discuss your decision to stay in Manhattan in a little more detail," "I know a great deli." "Tomorrow at 8:00?" "Number 39." "We're not the only gold reclamation firm in the city, but we're certainly the most profitable." "$1,200 an ounce, it's hard not to be." "Mr. Weir, tell us about Charlie Cooper." "Oh, Charlie-- he was an account representative." "It was his job to help coordinate the sale and trade of our products to overseas markets." "China, primarily." "Was Mr. Cooper at odds with any of your other employees?" "Charlie?" "No." "He got along with everybody." "Including you?" "Especially me." "He just brokered a very large deal for me to Beijing a few days ago." "Is that the shipment that was moved to the Federal Reserve?" "It was." "FLACK:" "And all that gold was manufactured at your firm?" "That's correct." "Detectives, are you aware there's now more gold being produced by reclamation firms like mine than there is coming out of the world's mines?" "The point being?" "I just think you're digging in the wrong place." "My firm didn't have a hand in Charlie Cooper's death." "Except for the fact that he was beaten to death with one of your gold bars." "You know, I came down here without an attorney out of respect for a late colleague." "So, if there's anything else I can do for you..." "Well, actually, there is." "Since Mr. Cooper was already dead by the time that bar was included in your firm's shipment to the Reserve, we're going to need to see a detailed accounting of where all your inventory has been stored," "along th every employee who's had access to it." "That may take a little while." "Sooner the better, Mr. Weir." "Thank you." "Thank you." "You believe him?" "No." "He's involved in this somehow." "But his hands are way too soft for murder." "Thanks for coming, Mac." "Where is he?" "I'm here." "Just tell him what happened, Cam." "Paley and I were working a big story on international gold fraud." "Got a tip from a Chinese source, and we spent months following it back to Manhattan." "All we had to do was meet one more contact." "We could have posted the whole damn thing on our blog." "I'm much less interested in your story than I am about who killed Michael Paley and Charlie Cooper." "I was running a little late for our meeting." "Damn crosstown bus I was on had a flat." "And just as I was coming in..." "I saw them murdered right in front of me." "And all I could do was watch." "That's not entirely true, is it?" "There's something you're leaving out." "The killer had a gun, remember?" "What happened to it, Cam?" "Can you tell me that?" "Now, hey, look." "I did what you asked me, man." "Now you got step up and tell him the truth." "I thought he was gone." "I didn't know whaelse to do, so I went in." "I saw where the gun fell during the fight, so I went to get it, but then he came back." "Back off!" "You hear me?" "I swear to God, I will blow your freaking head off." "And then I ran." "And I didn't stop until I lost him." "Okay, okay." "Lost who?" "Who was in the warehouse with you?" "You didn't tell him?" "No." "He's got to hear it from you." "He doesn't care about me." "All he wants is this." "Whoa, whoa." "Hey." "You listen to me." "I want you to slowly remove that weapon and carefully put it on the ground right now." "No, I'm not going to do that, man." "Not till I know that you can help me." "Come on." "What the hell are you doing here, Cam?" "This gun is all I have to prove that I didn't kill anyone." "All I have to protect myself." "You put it down right now!" "For God's sakes, Cam, will you do what he says?" "No." "Freeze!" "No!" "Wait." "Wait." "You don't understand." "Okay, he was in uniform." "The killer was a cop." "There's no way your shooter's one of us, Mac." "That round that Sid pulled out of Paley was from a .22." "It's not exactly police issue, nor is it the caliber of weapon a cop would use to take somebody out." "You check patrols around the crime scene?" "I did." "On the 4:00-to-12:" "00 tour that night, there were only two cars working that sector." "One was at the station house with a collar, and the other one was jammed up with jobs." "Look, that warehouse is dark by day." "By night, who knows what Vandemann saw?" "I swear to God, man, he didn't tell me anything else." "What about that gold fraud he and Paley were investigating?" "You got some inside scoop on that?" "Look, Cam is a friend of mine." "He's not my partner." "I have no idea what he was working on." "But you got to believe me, Mac" " I'm only trying to help." "I think you just did." "There was a battery with leads and a metal spoon at the crime scene." "A container of water as well." "You think it was all there to test the gold bar's authenticity?" "Reverse electroplating." "Any gold present in the container would have been transferred via electrical charge to the spoon." "Only they never got a chance to test it." "So, we will." "So, what do we have?" "A little bit of gold and a whole lot of something else." "It's counterfeit." "This bar is only cheap, dirty tungsten." "Same density as gold but only ten bucks a pound." "Hey, Stella." "So, you remember the four-leaf clover that I found that turned out to be impossibly Irish?" "Yeah, some sort of indigenous species." "Why?" "When Lindsay was in the alley this morning running fresh prints on Vandemann, she found this." "Okay, this is Kilkenny limestone." "300 million years old, and it's made of fossils from the ancient Irish seabed." "Oh, come on." "How is all this stuff making it across the Atlantic?" "Trust me." "That's what I've been wondering." "And then I found this." "The Irish Hunger Memorial- small site in Battery Park devoted to raising public awareness about the Great Irish Famine." "According to the info here, it was pretty much brought in seed by seed and stone by stone from the Old Country." "You said Battery Park, right?" "Yeah." "Why?" "Okay." "See that building right next door to the memorial?" "Paley and Vandemann live there." "Flack's got unis posted there right now." "Yeah, but while we're looking for Vandemann, he might be looking at us." "See anything interesting, Vandemann?" "We got Vandemann locked up tight in protective custody." "He tell you any more of the story?" "Not yet, but once he has a hot meal and realizes we're not out to kill him, he'll come around." "Where have we gotten with the gun?" "Well, we know it was jammed." "Clearly, it hadn't been cleaned in a while." "After the first shot, the casing backed up in a recoil shield and the cylinder bound up." "Would explain why Cooper was beaten to death instead." "What about the registration?" "Unfortunately, this ishe part of the gun that the killer did take care of." "The serial numbers are toast." "We steel-wooled it." "Acid-etched it." "Yeah, I even hit it with a little of the hot sauce, and no go." "Well, let's try something else." "Ferrofluid?" "Yeah." "Sometimes ferromagnetic shavings will align over nanoscale imperfections that still exist..." "where a gun was stamped." "Take a magnet." "How does he do that?" "I'm running the serial number now." "Hey, looks like we got something." "That is, that's the bartender we talked to at the pub." "Looks like it's time for another round." "Hang on, ladies, I'll be right with you." "Here you go, Debbie." "Thanks, Fin!" "Hey!" "All right, who's next?" "Two green beers?" "Two shots!" "Finnegan!" "We want to talk!" "Get out of the way!" "Police!" "Get out of the way!" "Move!" "Move, move, move!" "Get out of the way!" "Move!" "Move!" "Move, move!" "Police-- move, move!" "Detectives in pursuit of suspect heading west on 44th towards 5th." "We need backup right now!" "Move, move, move, move!" "Come on, move, move, move!" "Move!" "Move!" "Police!" "Get out of the way!" "Coming through!" "Move!" "Get out of my way!" "Erin Go Bragh." "You know the old stereotype about Irish temper?" "It's not really a problem for me." "But those bagpiping cops out in the bullpen having to file reports instead of knocking a few back at the Knights of Columbus... they're ready to boil you like cabbage." "How long do you think it'll be before Finnegan finally gives you up?" "I told you I have nothing to say until my attorney is present." "Well, that's fine." "Between the evidence and what Vandemann already told us, we got the whole story." "Yeah, it's called salted gold." "Turns out when you plate tungsten with gold, you can fool pretty much any X-ray or scale and a whole lot of investors-- but not our lab." "And not a pair of bloggers who heard about salted gold showing up in China, then followed the story all the way back to its source" "Elemental Precious Metals." "Even found a contact onhe inside." "Unfortunately, when they first met Charlie Cooper, he was not among friends." "Finnegan told you about the shyster who was selling your secrets." "And when you couldn't convince" "Paley and Vandemann to put a lid on the story, you hired him to do the job for you." "He already had a gun, so you just gave him one of your firm's security guard uniforms and sent him on his way." "And it seemed like a pretty easy hit." "Put a bullet in each of their heads, make it back in time for last call." "Till your gun jams, and it turns out it's Cooper, not Paley." "And hell hath no fury like an Irishman scorned." "Dark warehouse at night." "Scared out of his mind over seeing what happened." "Vandemann thought you were a cop." "Back off!" "You hear me?" "I swear to God, I will blow your frickin' head off." "But we know better, don't we?" "I'm not going down for this alone." "Two counts of conspiracy to commit murder." "You really have nothing to say?" "Probably thinks he can pay a lawyer to clean up this mess, too." "What can I say, Detectives?" "Silence is golden." "Fair enough." "But just in case you beat the murder rap..." "I'm sure our friend here from the Treasury Department has plenty of ways of making you talk." "Mr. Weir," "I'm Agent Pangle." "I'm here to charge you under U. S. Code Section 485 with the following federal offenses:" "counterfeiting and forgery of precious metals, sale and distribution of same, violation of international trade agreements governing the sale and distribution of precious metals, fraudulent manufacture..." "Hey, Mac." "Hey." "So, Cam's trying to put his apartment back together-- not to mention his whole life- but he asked me to, uh, stop by and show you something." ""NYPD helps Paley and Vandemann Melt Down Gold Scam."" "Oh, nice." "Cool, yeah?" "Look, I'm sorry if I played this one wrong." "I really was trying to do right." "I know." "And, Reed... believe it or not I appreciate you convincing me to take a chance." "So, you, uh..." "you done for the day?" "Yeah." "Hey, do you want to go grab, like, a green beer or something?" "Uh, can we take a rain check on that?" "Somewhere I gotta be." "Yeah." "Yeah, man." "We'll do it next time." "All right." "Cool." "I look okay?" "Yeah." "You look good, man." "I'll see you." "* Through my whole life I told my, told my heart *" "* Don't you never let me go... *" "So, how exactly did you find me?" "I'm a police detective." "I was duty-bound to investigate." "Mind if I join you?" "I was kind of hoping you would." "Hi." "I'm Aubrey Hunter." "Mac Taylor." "Uh, menu?" "Yeah." "So, what's good?" "Everything."