Even before the ‘Woman in the Woods,’ as the newspapers and TV shows were already calling her – which gave Holly the creeps, because it was almost as though they’d read the story she’d written for Daniel, the one she should never have committed to paper.
She dialed Owen’s number, put in the total required for three minutes, and listened as the phone rang at the other end, over and over, until her father’s voice came on the line requesting that she leave a message; and she almost lost it then, wanted to scream and shout, but somehow she held it together for long enough to recite the pay phone number and ask him to call her back right away. She returned to the car because the rain was still falling and the wind had picked up, but she kept the window down and the radio off for fear of missing the phone ringing, even though Daniel complained about the cold, and the boredom. She snapped at him, and he began to cry, and she didn’t want him to cry, not ever, and she didn’t want him to be sad, not ever. All she wanted was for him to be happy, and to know he was loved, and to call her ‘Mom’, always.
The phone started to ring. A man emerged from the restroom, and Holly caught him looking at the phone even as she stepped from the car. She waved at him to show that the call was for her, but she wished he could have just stayed in the damn can for a few seconds longer. She didn’t want anyone to remember her face, or the make and license number of her car, or the child crying in the back seat. It was why she’d held herself apart for so long; why she lived in a little house out by the woods; why she didn’t mix with the other mothers at Daniel’s school; why she hadn’t slept with a man since before Daniel’s birth; why she was alone.
So she wouldn’t be noticed, so she wouldn’t have to answer any questions.
She picked up the phone.
‘Holly?’
‘Yes, it’s me.’
‘What’s wrong? What number is this?’
‘It’s a pay phone. Listen, I need you to come home, just as soon as you can.’
‘Why? Has something happened to you, to Daniel? Are you both okay? Are you hurt?’
‘No, it’s nothing like that. Dad, please take a look at the local news up here. Can you do that?’
Holly knew that her father never went far without his iPad. It kept him company on his trips. He watched movies on it, read books, everything.
‘Sure. I’ll pull it up right now. I’m going to put you on speaker to free up my hands.’
‘I’ll hold on.’
Holly heard the sound of movement, followed moments later by what might have been an intake of breath, and the voice of a news anchor familiar to her from Channel 6 in Portland. It was the same report she’d watched barely two hours earlier. She let her father absorb it without interruption, until the segment ended, to be replaced with silence.
‘You understand?’ she said, at last.
‘Yes.’
‘I’m scared.’
‘Don’t be.’
Holly looked at her car. She could see Daniel monitoring her through the windshield. He was no longer crying. He just seemed as though he were concentrating very hard on what he was witnessing in an effort to interpret it, the way he did when they played animal charades.
‘I’m not going to let them take him from me,’ she said.
‘Holly—’
‘I’m telling you, that’s all. It’s not going to happen.’
‘It won’t. I’ll start for home first thing in the morning.’
‘Drive carefully.’
‘I will. And Holly?’
‘Yes.’
‘Everything will be all right. What we did—’
Holly hung up. She didn’t want him to say it aloud.
In case they were listening.
24
Parker’s relationship with Detective Gordon Walsh of the Maine State Police was no longer as amicable as before, in large part because Walsh believed Parker to have colluded in the killing of a man in the town of Boreas almost a year earlier.
This was not entirely true: Parker would have preferred if the man in question had lived, if only so he could have faced trial for his crimes, but circumstances dictated that Parker’s preferences didn’t much enter into it. The soon-to-be decedent had arrived with a gun, and every intention of using it to end Parker’s life. This was a course of action to which Parker, not without some justification, had certain objections. As it turned out, Louis shared these objections, and had therefore been forced to put a rifle bullet in the man’s head from long range before drifting back to New York in order to avoid any awkward questions that might otherwise have been directed at him. Meanwhile, the extent to which the victim had been lured into a trap remained a matter for moral philosophers – well, moral philosophers and Detective Gordon Walsh of the MSP’s Major Crimes Unit.
So it was that Parker was not entirely surprised to see Walsh’s face cloud as the policeman emerged from Ruski’s on Danforth just as Sunday afternoon was fading into evening. It hadn’t been difficult to find him: Ruski’s was a popular spot for cops, both local and state, and Sunday afternoons often saw the creation of an informal bullpen at the bar, mostly to talk and let off steam, but also to facilitate the discreet exchange of information. Parker generally avoided Ruski’s on Sundays – it wasn’t the day or place for a private investigator to arrive seeking assistance – but he knew Walsh was one of the regulars, and buttonholing him on the street would save Parker a trip. Perhaps he also hoped that a couple of beers might have mellowed Walsh a little. If so, he was destined to be disappointed.
‘Go away,’ said Walsh, as soon as Parker drew near.
‘But you don’t know why I’m here.’
Walsh spoke as he walked, but Parker kept pace with him, which didn’t seem to bring Walsh any obvious joy.
‘I do know why you’re here: it’s because you want something. You always want something.’
‘Everybody always wants something.’
‘Who are you now, Plato?’
‘I don’t think that’s Platonism, just reality.’
‘I get reality the other six days of the week. Sundays I keep for dreaming – and not talking to you, although I’m considering extending that prohibition to the rest of the week as well.’
‘Individual desire is inferior to the higher ideal.’
‘What?’
‘I think that may be Plato. Or it could be Socrates. I’m no expert.’
Walsh stopped.
‘You’re ruining my day by being philosophical. And also just by being.’
‘You work for a law enforcement agency that quotes Voltaire on its website.’
This was true. ‘To the living we owe respect, to the dead we owe the truth’ was the ethos of the MSP’s Unsolved Homicide Unit, complemented by the motto ‘Semper memento.’
Always remember.
‘Yeah?’ said Walsh. ‘Well I didn’t put it there.’
‘Walsh,’ said Parker, quieter now, ‘just give me a few minutes.’
Some of the air went out of the policeman.
‘I need coffee,’ he said.
‘Arabica?’
‘Okay, but the one on Commercial.’
It would mean that they were farther from Ruski’s, and therefore less likely to encounter any of Walsh’s cop buddies looking for a caffeine pick-me-up.
‘I’ll meet you there,’ said Parker.
‘I can hardly wait.’
Only a handful of tables were occupied when Parker arrived. It was an hour to closing, and most people with sense had headed home to avoid the forecast rain, just as Walsh had probably intended to do until he was waylaid by Parker. It looked as though it was going to be wet on and off for the rest of the week, but at least it would put paid to the last of the city’s accumulated ice.
Walsh was seated at a table to the very rear, facing the front door but concealed by the gloom. Parker went to the counter, ordered an Americano for himself and, from memory, the sweetest, most calorific coffee on the menu for Walsh. To be safe, he also picked up enough packets of sugar to cause cane shares to rise.