24
The third anonymous text was waiting for me when I turned on my cell phone first thing that morning. It read:
CHIEF ALLAN THE PEDOFILE IS GETTING ANXIOUS. HE MISSES HIS COOZE.
I stared at the message. It didn’t take long to pinpoint what it was about it, apart from its contents, that bothered me. It was the spelling. ‘Pedophile’ was still misspelled, just as the word ‘preys’ had previously been misused. This time, it was the word ‘anxious’ that stood out, but only because it was spelled correctly. Perhaps I was trying to see a pattern where there wasn’t one, but it struck me that ‘anxious’ was a difficult word to spell. Someone who genuinely had difficulty with the word ‘pedophile,’ and who couldn’t make the distinction between ‘prays’ and ‘preys,’ would quite possibly misspell ‘anxious’ as well, or simply avoid using the word entirely. It raised the possibility that a smart individual was playing dumb in order to cast aspersions on Kurt Allan’s reputation, but to what end?
As it happened, Allan himself was standing near Aimee’s office building, drinking coffee and smoking a roll-up behind a tree, when I pulled into the lot before noon. His uniform shirt was sharply ironed, and his shoes were freshly shined, which made the sight of the roll-up more incongruous. I acknowledged him with a nod as I approached the door, but wasn’t going to speak to him until he raised a hand and asked if I had a minute.
‘Your mysterious client isn’t here yet,’ he said. ‘In fact, you and I are the first to arrive, Ms. Price excepted.’
He opened his tobacco pack and offered me one of the premade roll-ups inside.
‘You smoke?’
‘No.’
‘You ever smoke?’
‘Couple as a teenager. I never saw the point. I preferred to spend my money on beer, when I could get it.’
‘I wish I’d been that smart,’ he said. ‘I’ve tried quitting, but there’s nothing like that first one in the morning with a cup of coffee, except maybe the second.’
Despite his lean, muscular build, there was no glow of good health about Allan. He had a shaving rash on his neck, and bags under his eyes. Seen up close, his mustache was ragged and poorly trimmed. A missing-child case will wear a man down, I thought, but a guilty conscience would have a similar effect. Fairly or unfairly, I knew that I was now seeing Allan’s character refracted through the prism of the anonymous messages, but I had already taken steps to investigate the substance of the secret allegations being made against him.
‘Was there something in particular you wanted to discuss, Chief?’ I said. ‘I’d like some time to consult with Ms. Price before our client arrives.’
‘Sure, I understand. I just wanted to apologize for the way you were treated at the station. I think we started off on the wrong foot, and it just got worse from there on. We could have – I could have – been more civil. I hope you realize that we all just want to find Anna Kore.’
He sounded sincere. He looked sincere. Maybe he even was sincere, although one thing didn’t necessarily follow from the other.
‘I’ve been treated worse,’ I said.
‘Pat Shaye told me that you had some trouble with your car. He said that he helped you out. I was glad to hear it.’
Allan seemed anxious to ingratiate himself with me. I couldn’t understand why. Then it came.
‘You seen the newspapers this morning?’
I had. There had been some criticism in the Portland and Bangor papers of the handling of the investigation so far, with particular emphasis on the response of the Pastor’s Bay Police Department when it had first been alerted to Anna’s disappearance, as well as a perception that the authorities were not briefing reporters sufficiently on what progress, if any, was being made. It was mainly reporters blowing off steam, inspired in part by the closed nature of the community in Pastor’s Bay, but Allan’s response to the criticisms as reported in the articles made him sound defensive, and by pointing out that the Criminal Investigation Division was in charge of the investigation he seemed to be trying to pass responsibility for any earlier failings on to someone else. It wasn’t Allan’s fault that Anna Kore was still missing, but people don’t like it when young girls are abducted, and it was only natural that the blame game would start to be played. Allan needed a break, and he was hoping that Aimee and I might be able to provide it.
‘It’s frustration,’ I said. ‘Everybody wants a happy ending, but they’re sensing that it’s not going to come in this case. Don’t take it personally.’
‘But it is personal,’ said Allan. ‘I know Anna Kore. I know her mother.’
‘You know them well?’ I asked. I was careful to make the inquiry sound as casual as possible, but Allan still seemed to detect an undertone that he didn’t like. I could see his testing of the question reflected on his face. He considered it the way a man might hold a piece of food in his mouth before swallowing, uncertain if it tasted right.
‘It’s a small town,’ he said. ‘Part of my job is to know its people.’
I dropped the subject of how well he might have known the Kore family. There was no percentage in pursuing it further for now.
‘It’ll hit the town hard if the girl isn’t found,’ I said.
‘Worse than if she turns up dead?’
‘Maybe.’
‘You serious?’
‘If her body is found there can be a burial, a process of mourning, and there will be a chance of finding the person responsible, because with a body comes evidence. If she stays missing her fate will haunt the town, and her mother will never have a peaceful night’s sleep again.’
‘You’re talking about closure?’
‘No. It doesn’t exist.’
For a moment, I thought that he was about to disagree, but I watched him reconsider, although there was no way to tell if he did so because of his own experience of loss and pain or out of his knowledge of mine.
‘I get it,’ he said. ‘It’s better to know than not to know?’
‘I’d want to know.’
Allan said only ‘Yeah,’ and then was quiet for a time.
‘How long have you been chief of police?’ I asked.
‘‘Chief’?’ He picked a speck of tobacco from his lip and stared at it as though it had a deeper meaning in the context of his existence. ‘You had it right the first time we met. I share space with the town’s garbage truck and what we like to think of as our fire department. If there was a fire, I’d rather take my chances with spit and a blanket.’
He dropped what was left of his cigarette into the bottom of his coffee cup, where it hissed like a snake giving warning.
‘I’ve been “chief” for five years. My wife – my ex-wife – was looking to move out of Boston. She had asthma, and the doctors told her that the city air wasn’t good for her. She’d grown up by the Maryland shore, and I was raised in the Michigan boonies, so we kind of drew a line north from one place, and east from the other, and this is where they intersected. That’s what we tell people anyway: The truth isn’t as romantic. We weren’t getting along in Boston, I saw the job in Pastor’s Bay advertised, and took it in the hope that putting the city behind us might help. It didn’t. Now it fills the hours, and pays my alimony.’
‘How long have you been divorced?’
‘Just over a year, but we were apart for almost another year before that.’
I waited to see if he’d add anything, but he didn’t.
‘Kids?’
‘No, no kids.’
‘I guess that makes it easier.’
‘Some.’