The Burning Soul (29 page)
Authors: John Connolly
Tags: #Mystery, #Azizex666, #Horror, #Fantasy, #Suspense, #Thriller
Suddenly the stakes had been raised, and I was glad of the impending arrival of Angel and Louis. In the meantime I called Aimee and told her of what I had found. More than ever, we needed to protect Randall Haight, if and when he came forward, because I had the feeling that the rule of blood was about to be invoked. Engel was in Pastor’s Bay because he believed that Anna Kore’s disappearance might be a consequence of her uncle’s criminality. Even if it wasn’t, he would expect her uncle to try to involve himself regardless. That was the rule of blood: Blood came before everything. I also repeated to Aimee my earlier ultimatum, based on the pedophiliac nature of the photos received by Haight and on Anna Kore’s age: Haight needed to confirm that he was willing to talk to the police, and he needed to do so quickly. Aimee was angry at having a gun put to her head. She asked me to give her a couple of hours, and I agreed.
‘And what about those text messages?’ said Aimee.
‘There have been no more,’ I said.
‘Are you going to tell the police about them? They contain serious allegations about one of the principals in the investigation.’
I noticed that she was careful not to use names.
‘Not yet,’ I said.
‘One rule for our client, and one rule for you, right?’ she said, and hung up.
Tommy Morris had taken a bus from Logan after killing Joey Tuna, and stayed the night at an inn in Newburyport, eating in his room, watching television, thinking of what he had done to Joey, of what he had ordered done to Oweny Farrell and how it had not come to pass. He couldn’t figure out how the cops had got to Oweny so fast, but it didn’t matter. Joey Tuna was dead, and it was only in the quiet of the inn that Tommy felt the impact of the enormity of what he had done. There would be no forgiveness, no possibility of a rapprochement. He was a doomed man now, and they would unite to hunt him down. Joey’s uncle would demand it. Honor would demand it. Sound practice would demand it.
But his niece was still missing. In a way, this had begun with her. Not only was he a man whose business had collapsed, and who now faced a hostile takeover from a competitor; he could not even protect his own family. His sister had fled from him. He had driven her away. He loved her, but he had forced her from his sight. She and his niece were the only surviving blood that meant anything to him. He would not leave it to the cops or the hated feds to search for the lost girl. He knew now that Joey and Oweny had not been responsible for her disappearance. She had not been a pawn in the game that they were playing.
Tommy liked chess, so the analogy pleased him. He had only three pieces left on the board but he refused to concede, even as all potential for movement was being limited by the forces arrayed against him. He had his knight, Dempsey; his rook, Ryan; and himself, the trapped king. He played with combinations of moves on the little travel set that he carried with him everywhere, deliberately allowing his own forces to be routed until he was reduced to these three – king, knight, rook – and he took his inability to secure victory not as a rebuke but as a challenge. He stayed awake all night, moving and thinking, and only when dawn came did he allow himself to sleep.
He had a throwaway cell phone, and with it he stayed in touch with Dempsey. He didn’t tell him where he was, just advised him to take Ryan and get out of town. He needed more time to think, to play, to test the moves.
Later that evening he summoned Dempsey and Ryan to him, and the three men headed north.
At the same time, two other men were also drawing nearer to their northern destination. Music played in the car, a subdued yet intricate classical piece that at first hearing appeared to consist only of the same extended phrase repeated, but on closer listening gradually revealed tiny yet significant differences and developments. It was a song of humility and wonder, a wordless ode to the Divine.
‘How much longer?’ asked the passenger. Angel’s dark curly hair had less gray than his years merited, and his face had fewer lines than his sufferings might have earned. He wore a
Big-Bam-Boom
era Hall & Oates T-shirt, boot-cut jeans that were a size too big for him, and a pair of designer yellow-and-turquoise sneakers that he had bought for almost nothing in an outlet. The sneakers had a certain rarity value, mainly because the company responsible for their design had realized its terrible mistake in creating them almost as soon as they saw the light of day, and quickly discontinued them when it became clear that their likely customer base consisted solely of the mentally ill, blind people with cruel friends, and, had they been able to put a name on him, this man, who was neither mentally ill nor blind but merely unusual in a great many ways.
Big-Bam-Boom
era Hall & Oates T-shirt, boot-cut jeans that were a size too big for him, and a pair of designer yellow-and-turquoise sneakers that he had bought for almost nothing in an outlet. The sneakers had a certain rarity value, mainly because the company responsible for their design had realized its terrible mistake in creating them almost as soon as they saw the light of day, and quickly discontinued them when it became clear that their likely customer base consisted solely of the mentally ill, blind people with cruel friends, and, had they been able to put a name on him, this man, who was neither mentally ill nor blind but merely unusual in a great many ways.
Beside him, driving with his eyes barely open, was Louis, who had long been shaving tight his own graying locks, but not in any effort to hide the aging process, not if his beard was taken into account. His suit was gray, his shirt white, his knitted wool tie black. His shoes gleamed.
‘How much longer?’ said Angel again.
Louis checked the dashboard. ‘Another hour.’
‘Of this? You have to be kidding me. The tune hasn’t changed since it started. It’s like a really quiet car alarm for nervous people.’
‘No, another hour to Boston.’
‘Great. In the meantime, can we play something else?’
‘No.’
‘I’m bored.’
‘What are you, nine years old? Shut the fuck up. Go to sleep.’
‘I did sleep. This put me to sleep. Then I woke up, and it was still playing. I thought I’d died and gone to hell’s waiting room.’
‘It’s not the same piece.’
‘It sounds like the same piece. This guy Arthur Part is running a scam.’
‘That’s Arvo Pärt. You are a philistine, man.’
‘Yeah, the Hungarian.’
‘Estonian.’
‘Just turn it off. I swear, the hillbilly shit was better than this.’
‘You complained that that all sounded the same too.’
‘It did, but at least it had words, and it was too annoying to be dull. I hear any more of this and we’ll have to get an elevator put in the car.’
‘Maybe some of those inspirational pictures as well, like they have in the offices of companies that are about to go under,’ said Louis. ‘You know, “Let Your Imagination Soar,” with a photograph of an eagle, or “Teamwork,” with those meerkat rat things.’
‘A dung beetle,’ said Angel. ‘A picture of a dung beetle, and “Eat Shit: You’ve Been Retrenched.” I hate that word “retrenched.” At least “redundant” is honest. “Let go” is honest. “Fired” is honest. “Retrenched” is just a way to sugar the pill, like undertakers refusing to use the word “death” and talking about “passing on” instead, or doctors telling you that you have a “condition” when what they really mean is you’re riddled with cancer.’
‘It’s from the French,’ said Louis. ‘Retrenching is digging a second line of defense. It means that you’ve been cut off again.’
‘What does that have to do with being fired?’
‘Literally? Nothing, I guess.’
‘See?’
‘No. Why, you worried about your future?’
‘Yeah, it gets shorter every day. That fucking music makes it seem longer, though.’
‘It’s nearly done.’ The piece concluded. ‘There, see? You want to spoil anything else?’
‘Why, you got something else worth spoiling?’
‘I put a load of discs in the player before we left.’
‘What’s up next?’
‘Brian Eno,
Music for Airports
.’
Music for Airports
.’
‘I don’t know it. Is it loud?’
‘Louder than Arvo Pärt.’
‘Silence is louder than Arvo Pärt.’
They drove on. The music commenced. It was not loud. It was not loud at all.
‘You’re killing me,’ moaned Angel. ‘You’re killing me softly . . .’
The hunters were gathering.
Boston’s war was moving north.
Hunting season was about to begin.
21
L
ouis and Angel came to the Bear shortly before closing. I hadn’t worked there for a while, and Dave Evans, the owner, seemed to be getting on fine without me, a fact that I tried not to take personally. Also, Aimee was paying me well, and like a good squirrel, I’d been carefully storing away enough nuts to see me through winter and beyond. But I liked the buzz of the place, and I’d never felt that working behind a bar was a dishonorable profession, particularly somewhere like the Bear where there was little tolerance for jackasses, and enough cops and repo men dotted around to ensure that any misbehavior would be frowned upon, if not actively discouraged if it persisted. Even without the presence of the law, the Bear was well able to handle the rare difficulties that arose. This was a neighborhood bar, an escape for a couple of hours, and the rules, though unwritten, were understood by nearly all.
ouis and Angel came to the Bear shortly before closing. I hadn’t worked there for a while, and Dave Evans, the owner, seemed to be getting on fine without me, a fact that I tried not to take personally. Also, Aimee was paying me well, and like a good squirrel, I’d been carefully storing away enough nuts to see me through winter and beyond. But I liked the buzz of the place, and I’d never felt that working behind a bar was a dishonorable profession, particularly somewhere like the Bear where there was little tolerance for jackasses, and enough cops and repo men dotted around to ensure that any misbehavior would be frowned upon, if not actively discouraged if it persisted. Even without the presence of the law, the Bear was well able to handle the rare difficulties that arose. This was a neighborhood bar, an escape for a couple of hours, and the rules, though unwritten, were understood by nearly all.
‘How’s the Denny Kraus thing working out?’ Dave asked me, as I juggled separate checks from a bunch of genial New Yorkers who had left their capacity for simple division at the state line.
‘He’s still denying that he’s crazy.’
‘They have met him, right? Denny Kraus came out of the womb with an extra hole in his head. When he stands in a draft, you can hear it whistle.’
‘The judge knows he’s crazy. The prosecution knows he’s crazy. Even his own lawyer knows he’s crazy.’
‘What did you tell them?’
‘That he was crazy.’
‘It’s unanimous, then.’
‘Except for Denny.’
‘What does he know? He’s crazy. Thank God he didn’t shoot anyone in here.’
‘Why, you want to be the first one who does?’
‘Absolutely. On the day I retire, I’m taking some of the chefs down. The wait staff I’ll spare. I always liked them.’ He looked over my shoulder as I sorted the checks. ‘Split check?’
‘Yep. Five of them.’
‘It’s a hundred bucks. It divides evenly.’
‘I know.’
Dave scowled at the New Yorkers. ‘We need a stricter door policy,’ he said, and trotted off to see if any of the kitchen crew needed to be reminded of how Dave hoped to celebrate his retirement.
Aimee had left a message on my cell phone informing me that Randall Haight had finally decided to come clean about his past and its unwelcome intrusion into his new life. He would present himself at Aimee’s office the next day, and she planned to inform the state police of her client’s availability before she left the office, although she had decided not to give them his name in advance. I agreed that we should meet up to discuss our plans for the interview after the Bear closed for business.
Haight’s decision to talk to the police was still the right one, in my view, even leaving aside any concerns about Anna Kore. As a sole operator, I didn’t have the resources to do what he wanted me to do, not under the circumstances. The furor surrounding Anna meant that I couldn’t do what I would usually have done, which was to talk to people, including, as discreetly as possible, Haight’s clients, local folk, even the cops. It could have been done without letting them know the specific nature of the harassment, and in time I was confident that I could have closed in on the person or persons responsible.
But, as the coffee shop incident had revealed, Anna’s disappearance meant that anyone nosing around Pastor’s Bay would immediately attract the attention of the police, and no independent investigation would be permitted. In a way, it was possible that by speaking to the police Haight would free me up to work more effectively on his behalf, assuming I could cut a deal with law enforcement that would allow me to nose around as long as I fed back any relevant information to them.
Angel and Louis appeared shortly after we called last orders. I had warned Dave that some friends might be arriving late in the evening, and he’d promised to make sure they were looked after, but even he seemed a little taken aback when they arrived. Maybe it was Angel’s sneakers, or Louis’s beard, or a combination thereof, but Dave froze for an instant, as though he had somehow been assigned the role of greeting the first extraterrestrial visitors to Earth and had just realized the possible personal consequences involved. Angel raised a hand in greeting, and I was about to acknowledge it when a figure appeared at the bar. I allowed my raised hand to rest just below my neck, two fingers pointing to my shoulder. It was a sign that Angel, Louis, and I had agreed upon shortly after they first began helping me out: Keep your distance. They disappeared into one of the back rooms, but not before Angel had a quiet word in Dave’s ear, presumably to say that he was not to remind me of their arrival, and to bring some beer.
Three stools had freed up at the bar, and the center one was now occupied by Special Agent Robert Engel. He wore a jacket and jeans, and a crisp white shirt open at the neck.
‘Dress-down day at Center Plaza, Agent Engel?’ I said.
‘I’m trying to blend in with the locals.’
‘I could find you a Portland Pirates shirt, or a moose-antler hat.’
‘Or you could just get me a drink: Dewar’s, on the rocks.’
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