I gestured toward the oxygen machine. “How are you, sir? You seem quite—” I stopped myself.
“Composed?” His smile was without humor. “Years of training. What did you find in my son’s office?”
I lifted my chin and braced myself. “Not much.”
“Relax, Agent Parnell. I’m not going to fire you. I did consider it. But I believe you broke into Ben’s office in order to help find my granddaughter. It would be harsh of me to punish you when your intent was honorable.”
I let go my breath. “Why did you forbid the police access?”
“Let me guess what you found. Locked in his desk or maybe in a cabinet, was a bottle of scotch. Or cheap whiskey. Could have been either with Ben. His tastes aren’t always the most discerning.”
I said nothing.
“And a gun. And . . .” He shifted his gaze to some middle distance. “His medals. Because he couldn’t decide if he was proud of them or ashamed.” His gaze came back to me. “Is that about right? Is that what you found?”
“The police have their warrant now, sir. You can ask them.”
“That is answer enough. I should have asked you to remove them. That’s precisely what I didn’t want the world knowing—that Ben could be weak. That he had considered taking his own life. Have you felt that way? Been tempted to end your life because of what you suffered in the war?”
I bit down on the response I wanted to offer. Something along the lines of, None of your damn business. Or maybe, You have no fucking idea what war is like.
I said, “I have a few questions for you.”
“Of course. We’ll get to that. You visited my son last night.”
“Yes.”
“When I heard you went to the hospital, I asked myself why. Was it because you’re working this case and wanted to see one of the victims for yourself? Or was it because you’re a former Marine and wanted to pay your respects? You served two tours in Iraq, I believe. Mortuary Affairs.”
“How—?”
“I make it my business to learn at least a little about my employees. The important ones. And since you protect my property, that includes you. So. Mortuary Affairs. That couldn’t have been pleasant. But look at you. None of this post-traumatic stress bullshit for you. You did your job and now you’ve returned to society, a healthy, contributing member.”
Stiffly, I said, “Ben was investigating your 1982 takeover of the T&W short line.” Maybe not too much of a stretch. “What can you tell me about it?”
“What?” Hiram barked a laugh. “I thought you were here to ask about my family. My granddaughter.”
“Bear with me, sir. I’m trying to understand Ben’s interest, and the details about that merger. Alfred Tate fought you for years. It looked like he would win. The ICC was poised to disapprove the merger. Then suddenly he capitulated.”
“And you think I know why.”
“Do you?”
A darkness stirred in his pale eyes, like ink leaching into paper. “You believe this might have something to do with what happened to my family?”
“It’s possible, sir.” I reached into my jacket pocket for the copy of the article. “This was locked in Ben’s desk.”
Hiram took the article, skimmed through it, then handed it back to me. His gaze went far away, presumably traveling back twenty-eight years, all the way to when he’d announced to the world that he would do his best to never let another person die on the T&W train tracks. The look in his eyes carried a nostalgic mix of satisfaction and melancholia.
Then a sudden fury edged out the other emotions, and his return to the present came with the suddenness of a steel-jaw trap snapping closed.
Interesting. Was the anger defensive? Had Lancing been right when he claimed Hiram used illegal tactics to persuade Tate?
Staring out the window, Hiram said, “I cannot pretend to understand why Tate suddenly chose to see things my way. Or to know what he was thinking at the time.” The anger sparked off him like a blade against a whetstone. “Maybe he realized it was for the best.”
“Why was that?”
“If I hadn’t taken T&W off his hands, his entire company would have gone under. He was poised on the brink. He turned crybaby in public—poor SFCO, beaten up by the big bad bully next door. But secretly he was glad. I saved him from ruin. He was operating so far in the hole that I was his only glimpse of daylight.”
“So there wasn’t anything . . . questionable in his change of heart?”
“Are you asking if I put some sort of illegal pressure on him?”
“It’s been suggested.”
His sigh was exaggerated. “People assume the worst. But whatever pressure Tate might have felt to let go of the T&W, it came from him. Not me.”
“You knew Tate well?” I asked.
He snorted. “Well enough to know he was a coward. If you offered him the brass ring, he’d say he needed to go home and think about it.” His gaze came back to me. “Tell me what you’re thinking. If you suspect the Tates in what has happened to my family . . . surely that’s ludicrous. What possible reason could they have to hurt me like this?”
“According to the article, after several fatal accidents at a crossing on Potters Road—a crossing owned by T&W—you promised you would upgrade the crossings if you won the merger.”
“I remember.”
“And you said it was because Tate’s railroad put profits above safety.”
“I might have said something like that. We were at war. Do you suspect him of murder because of that?”
“Was it true?”
“Knowing Tate, probably. He was as much a skinflint as a coward. Certainly, I had my suspicions. But I also admit to pandering to public fears. Teenagers had died there. So I vowed no one else would die at that crossing. And I decided to go one better than simply installing gates, which seem to be more of a temptation than a barrier. I wanted that crossing obliterated.”
“But that wasn’t your call to make. It was the state’s.”
“Your na?veté is showing, Agent Parnell.” He crossed to a bar cart near the sofa and poured several inches of amber liquid from a decanter into a tumbler. “Care for a bourbon?”
Eight in the morning was too early for the hard stuff, even for me. I gave the obvious excuse. “I’m on duty.”
“Of course.” He came back to the window, took a sip of his drink, and held it in his mouth a moment before swallowing. “While upgrading that crossing wasn’t something I could do on my own, that didn’t mean I was without influence.”
“Politics.”
“It’s how the world works.”
“According to the FRA, there weren’t any accidents at that crossing.”
Hiram raised his eyebrows. “Now isn’t that interesting. There most certainly were accidents there. I guess Alfred Tate is more of a skank than I realized.”
“And you didn’t know back then that the accidents weren’t being reported?”
Amusement gleamed in his arctic eyes. “I did not.”
I put the article back in my pocket and took out the photo. “I also found this locked in Ben’s desk. With the article.”
Hiram took the picture. He stared at it for a moment, unmoving, then set his drink down on a nearby table and stepped close to the wall of windows to tilt the photograph in the light.