Richard Montanari (50 page)

    Drummond
took a few seconds, looked at Inspector Mostow. Mostow nodded.

    Drummond
gathered a few papers, spirited them into his briefcase. 'Okay, we'll meet back
here in the morning,' Drummond said. 'Eight o'clock sharp.'

    Stansfield
piped in. 'Inspector, I really think that we should-—'

    Mostow
shot him a look. 'In the morning, detective,' he said. 'Are we clear?'

    For a
moment, Stansfield didn't answer. Then, 'Yes, sir.'

    Byrne
was out of Westbrook's office first. Every detective in the duty room had their
eyes on him.

    As
Byrne crossed the room to get a cup of coffee, Stansfield followed him.

    'Not
so much fun, is it?' Stansfield said.

    Byrne
stopped, spun around. 'You don't want to talk to me right now.'

    'Oh,
now you don't want to talk? It seems you couldn't keep your mouth shut the past
few days about me.' Stansfield got a little too close. 'What were you doing in
Fishtown that night, detective?'

    'Step
away,' Byrne said.

    'Doing
a little cleanup work?'

    'Last
time. Step away.'

    Stansfield
put a hand on Byrne's arm. Byrne pivoted, lashed out with a perfectly leveraged
left hook, his entire body behind it. It caught Stansfield square on the chin.
The impact sounded like two rams butting heads, echoing off the walls of the
duty room. Detective Dennis Stansfield spun in place, went down.

    And
out.

    'Ah,
fuck
,' Byrne said.

    The
whole room shut down for a moment, drawing a collective breath. Stansfield
didn't move.
Nobody
moved.

    After
a few moments Nick Palladino and Josh Bontrager slowly crossed the room to see
if Stansfield was all right. Nobody really cared all that much - no one in the
room would have denied that he'd had it coming - but it didn't serve the
department too well to have one of its own sprawled spread-eagle on the floor
in the middle of the homicide unit duty room. Witnesses, suspects, prosecutors,
and defense attorneys came through this room day and night.

    Jessica
glanced at Byrne. He rubbed his knuckles, picked up his coat, grabbed his keys
off the desk. When he got to the door, he turned, looked at Jessica, and said:
'Call me if he's dead.'

    The
row house on 19th Street, near Callowhill, was immaculate. Beneath the front
window was a pine flower-box. In the window was a candle.

    Byrne
rang the bell. A few seconds later the door opened. Anna Laskaris stood there,
apron on, spoon in hand, a look of confusion and expectation on her face.

    'Mrs.
Laskaris, I don't know if you remember me. I'm—'

    'God
may have taken my looks and my ability to walk more than three blocks. He
didn't take away my brain. Not yet, anyway. I remember you.'

    Byrne
nodded.

    'Come,
come.'

    She
held the door open for him. Byrne stepped inside. If the outside of the row
house was immaculate, the inside was surgically precise. On every surface was
some sort of knitted item: afghans, doilies, throws. The air was suffused with
three different aromas, all of them tantalizing.

    She
sat him at a small table in the kitchen. In seconds there was a cup of strong
coffee in front of him.

    Byrne
took a minute or so, adding sugar, stirring, stalling. He finally got to the
point. 'There's no easy way to say this, ma'am. Eduardo Robles is dead.'

    Anna
Laskaris looked at him, unblinking. Then she made the sign of the cross. A few
seconds later she got up and walked to the stove. 'We'll eat.'

    Byrne
wasn't all that hungry, but it wasn't a question. In an instant he had a bowl
of lamb stew in front of him. A basket of fresh bread seemed to appear out of
nowhere. He ate.

    'This
is fantastic.'

    Anna
Laskaris mugged, as if this was in any doubt. She sat across from him, watched
him eat.

    'You
married?' she asked. 'You wear no ring, but these days . . .'

    'No,'
Byrne said. 'I'm divorced.'

    'Girlfriend?'

    'Not
right now.'

    'What
size sweater you wear?'

    'Ma'am?'

    'Sweater.
Like a cardigan, a pullover, a V-neck.
Sweater.'

    Byrne
had to think about it. 'I don't really buy a lot of sweaters, to be honest with
you.'

    'Okay.
I try another door. When you buy a suit, like this beautiful suit you wear
today, what size?'

    'A
46, usually,' Byrne said. 'A 46 long.'

    Anna
Laskaris nodded. 'So then, an extra large. Maybe extra-extra.'

    'Maybe.'

    'What's
your favorite color?'

    Byrne
didn't really have a favorite color. It wasn't something that crossed his mind
that much. He did, however, have
least
favorites. 'Well, anything but
pink, I guess. Or yellow.'

    'Purple?'

    'Or
purple.'

    Anna Laskaris
glanced at her huge knitting basket, back at Byrne. 'Green, I think. You're
Irish, right?'

    Byrne
nodded.

    'A
nice green.'

    Byrne
ate his stew. It occurred to him that this was the first time in a long while he
was not eating in a restaurant or out of a Styrofoam container. While he ate,
Anna stared off in the distance, her mind perhaps returning to other times in
this house, other times at this table, times before people like Byrne brought
heartache to the door like UPS. After a while, she stood slowly. She nodded at
Byrne's empty bowl. 'You have some more, yes?'

    'Oh
God, no. I'm stuffed. It was wonderful.'

    She
rounded the table, picked up his bowl, brought it to the sink. Byrne could see
the pain in her eyes.

    'The
recipe was my grandmother's. Then her grandmother's. Of the many things I miss,
it's teaching Lina these things.'

    She
sat back down.

    'My
Melina was beautiful, but not so smart always. Especially about the men. Like
me. I never did too well in this area. Three husbands, all bums.'

    She
looked out the window, then back at Byrne.

    'It's
a sad job what you do?'

    'Sometimes,'
Byrne said.

    'A
lot of times you come to people like me, give us bad news?'

    Byrne
nodded.

    'Sometimes
good news?'

    'Sometimes.'

    Anna
looked at the wall next to the stove. There were three pictures of Lina - at
three, ten, and sixteen.

    'Sometimes
I am at the market, I think I see her. But not like a grown-up girl, not like a
young woman. A little girl. You know how little girls sometimes go off on their
own, in their minds? Like maybe when they play with their dolls? The dolls to
them are like real people?'

    Byrne
knew this well.

    'My
Lina was like this. She had a friend who was not there.'

    Anna
drifted away for a moment, then threw her hands up. 'We have a saying in
Greece.
The heart that loves is always young.
She was my only
grandchild. I will never have another. I have no one left to love.'

    At
the door Anna Laskaris held Byrne for a moment. Today she smelled of lemons and
honey. It seemed to Byrne that she was getting smaller.
Grief will do that
,
he thought.
Grief needs room.

    'It
does not make me happy this man is dead,' Anna Laskaris said.

    'God
will find a place for him, a place he deserves. This is not up to you or me.'

    Byrne
walked to the van, slipped inside. He looked back at the house. There was
already a fresh candle in the window.

    You
know.

    He
thought about Christa-Marie, about the night he met her. He thought about what
she had said to him. He thought about his dreams, about waking in the night at
2:52, the moment he placed Christa- Marie under arrest, the moment everything
changed forever.

    
You
know
.

    But
it wasn't
you know.
He had played back the recording he'd made of
himself sleeping, listened carefully, and it suddenly became obvious.

    He
was saying
blue notes.

    It
was about the silences between the notes, the time it takes for the music to
echo. It was Christa-Marie telling him something for the past twenty years. Byrne
knew in his heart that it all began with her. It would all end with her.

    He
looked at his watch. It was just after midnight.

    It
was Halloween.

    Sunday,
October 31

    
I listen
to the city coming to the day, the roar of buses, the hiss of coffee machines,
the clang of church bells. I watch as leaves eddy from the trees, cascading to
the ground, feeling an autumn chill in the air, the shy soubrette of winter.

    
I
stand in the center of City Hall, at the nexus of Broad and Market streets, the
shortest line between the two rivers, the beating heart of Philadelphia. I turn
in place, look down the two great thoroughfares that cross my city. On each I
will be known today
.

    
I
put up my collar, step into the maelstrom, the killing instruments a
comfortable weight at my back.

    
What
a saraband.

    
Zig,
zig, zag.

    The
massive stone buildings sat atop the rise like enormous birds of prey. The
central structure, perhaps five stories tall, one hundred feet wide, gave way
at either end to a pair of great wings, each of which bore a series of towers
that fingered high into the morning sky.

    The
grounds surrounding the complex, at one time finely manicured, boasting Eastern
Hemlock, Red Pine, and Box Elder, had fallen fallow decades earlier. Now the
trees and shrubs were tortured and diseased, ravaged by wind and lightning. A
once impressive arched stone bridge over the man-made creek that ringed the
property had long ago crumbled.

    In
1907 four of the sisters hanged themselves from a beam in the bell tower. The
church, having trouble attracting novitiates to the nunnery, sold the buildings
and property to the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania.

    Five
years later, with four new wings built onto the original building - including
two tiered lecture halls, a pair of autopsy theaters, a state- of-the-art
surgery, and a non-denominational chapel built into one of the apple groves -
the Convent Hill Mental Health Facility opened its doors. With its two hundred
beds, sprawling grounds, and expert staff, it soon gained a reputation as a
thoroughly up-to-date hospital throughout the eastern United States.