35
Kurt Allan pulled up a short distance from the entrance to the department building, and killed his engine. The department’s Explorer was parked up, which meant that Ken Foster, Allan’s senior officer, was inside. Knowing Foster, he probably already had a cup of coffee in his hand, and was scavenging for sweet foods. Allan was right. When he entered, Foster’s large ass was facing the door as he poked around in the closet beneath the coffee machine.
‘Quiet night?’ said Allan.
‘Hungry night,’ said Foster’s voice from inside the closet. ‘And the staties have cleaned us out. I think they even ate the bugs.’
‘Why didn’t you pack a sandwich?’
‘I did pack a sandwich. Then I left the sandwich on the kitchen table.’
Allan liked Foster. Hell, Allan had hired him, so he supposed that he must have known what he was doing. Foster wasn’t about to solve a great mystery anytime soon, but his heart was in the right place and he managed to combine an inability to take shit from anyone with a gentle hand, which was no mean trick. The big man emerged from his foraging and took a seat behind the empty reception area.
‘You’re out late,’ he said.
‘I find it hard to relax lately.’
‘Yeah, me too.’ Foster toyed with his coffee cup, and watched Allan take some papers from his in-box. ‘Detective Walsh left those,’ he said.
It was the report on the analysis of the envelopes sent to Randall Haight. From what Allan could tell, it contained nothing of note: no hairs, saliva, or DNA. There was something about organic matter, but it was complicated and he was too distracted to take it all in. If it had been important, someone would have called him.
‘Anything?’ asked Foster.
‘Nothing.’
‘Chief, you think she’s still alive?’
It was the first time Foster had asked him that question. Allan knew that it had been on his mind, because it was on everyone’s mind. He’d found Mrs. Shaye looking up newspaper reports on the Internet of girls who’d been missing for years and years before they turned up, like that girl in the basement in Austria, or the kid who’d been found living in a makeshift home of tents and sheds at the back of her abductors’ property. They were the exceptions, though, and what they went through during the period of their captivity didn’t bear thinking about. Too often, snatched girls turned up dead, and that was only if their captors were careless, or unlucky, or just didn’t give a rat’s ass either way if they left trace evidence or not. The smart ones made sure that their victims were never discovered.
‘She’s still alive,’ said Allan. ‘She’s still alive until we find out otherwise. Look, why don’t you go get something to eat? Buddy’s is still serving food, right?’
‘Yeah, bar snacks.’
‘Go eat. I’ll take care of things here.’
‘You sure?’
‘I don’t have anything better to do. At least I won’t be worrying about your delicate constitution.’
Foster didn’t argue. Allan watched him drive away. When he was sure that Foster was safely gone, Allan checked the time once more. His cell phone rang twice, stopped, then rang twice again. The number, in each case, was blocked.
Allan sat back in his chair. It had begun.
Angel and Louis watched the station house from the shadows off Main. Both were uneasy about Allan but uncertain of how to act beyond simply staying with him. If Allan did have Anna Kore, then she wasn’t on his property. Similarly, a search of his girlfriend’s apartment while Allan bought her and the kid an ice-cream down the street had revealed no trace of her, which meant that if Allan was involved in her disappearance Anna was either being looked after by another party or she was dead. Randall Haight might have provided an answer to that question by now, but there had been no word from Parker, and when they tried his phone it had simply rung out.
‘What do you think?’ said Angel.
‘I think Allan’s staying in there until fat boy comes back,’ said Louis.
‘We have him tagged.’
‘Yes, we do.’
‘So if he moves, we’ll know where he went.’
‘That we will.’
‘Wouldn’t hurt to swing by Randall Haight’s place, just to make sure all is copacetic.’
‘Wouldn’t hurt at all.’
Louis started the car, and made a U-turn so that they wouldn’t have to enter the main street. They headed east. About half a mile from Randall Haight’s house, they saw night hunters heading into the woods. Three of the five men had shotguns in their hands. It was not an uncommon sight during hunting season.
Except it was Sunday, and hunting was illegal in the state of Maine on Sundays.
I never lost consciousness entirely. I was aware of the sound of fists slapping flesh, and I heard snatches of questions and fragments of answers. At some point I managed to turn my head, but my vision was blurred and I could barely make out Lonny Midas’s form in the chair. I could see the blood, though, for his face and shirt were stained red.
Eventually I was lifted to my feet. I struggled to stand. The pain in my head was ferocious, and I felt dizzy and nauseated. I seemed to be deaf in my right ear. I was allowed to fall back to the floor. Somebody grabbed my legs and began dragging me. My head banged against the kitchen step, and then there was wet grass under my back, and stars peered coldly through the gaps in the clouds. The grass turned to dirt and leaves, and the sky was fractured by the branches of bare trees. The cold and damp of the night air cleared some of the fog from my mind. I lay on my side and watched what was about to occur, powerless to prevent it.
Lonny Midas was on his knees in the clearing. His face was ruined. I wasn’t even sure that he could see anymore. A long thread of viscous blood hung from his mouth, and his breath whistled through the mess of his nose.
Two men stood over him, one young and redheaded, the second older, with long dark hair. To one side, a third man in his sixties watched them. He was bald, and heavyset. I thought he might be Tommy Morris, for I had seen pictures of his younger self in the documents sent from my Boston source.
‘Ask him again,’ said the oldest of the three.
‘He doesn’t know anything, Tommy,’ said the dark-haired man.
‘Martin, I told you to ask him again.’
The one named Martin leaned over to talk to Lonny Midas.
‘He just wants to know where the girl is. Tell him, and we’ll let you go.’
Lonny shook his head, but said nothing.
‘We’re losing him,’ said Martin, but Morris didn’t reply.
Martin tried again. ‘If you know where she is, just nod. We’ll clean you up, and we’ll go and get her. It’ll be for the best.’
But Lonny just shook his head again.
‘I swear, Tommy, he doesn’t know. If he knew, he’d have told us by now. I couldn’t stand up to the punishment he’s taken.’
‘What about him?’ said Tommy, pointing at me. ‘You didn’t ask him what he knows.’
‘He’s a private detective, Tommy,’ said Martin. ‘He doesn’t have your niece.’
‘Maybe he knows where she is.’
There was something robotic in the way Tommy Morris was speaking. Looking back, I believe he could think only of Anna Kore, for she was all that he had to keep himself moving forward.
‘Tommy,’ said Martin, and he spoke as gently as he could, ‘if he knew where she was he’d have told the cops. I’ve heard of this guy. He doesn’t screw around.’
The redheaded man had drawn his gun. He was pointing it at the back of Lonny Midas’s head.
‘Frankie,’ said Martin. ‘What are you doing?’
‘He killed a little girl,’ said Frankie, and a kind of sob caught in his throat. ‘What kind of man does that?’
‘It was a long time ago,’ said Martin. ‘He did it when he was a kid himself.’
‘It doesn’t matter,’ said Frankie. ‘None of it matters. I just want it to end.’
‘He’s right,’ said Morris. ‘Kill him. Kill them both.’