The Burning Soul (30 page)

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Authors: John Connolly

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BOOK: The Burning Soul

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I poured him a generous measure, and he put a twenty on the bar.

‘It’s on me,’ I said. ‘Take it as a reminder of what common hospitality looks like.’

‘Still sore about your time in the Pastor’s Bay visitors’ suite?’

‘Psychologically and physically. Those chairs weren’t made for comfort.’

‘It could have been worse, although I hear the county jail is nice.’

‘Maybe we could arrange a tour.’

‘Even without one, I guarantee that it’s nicer than a federal holding cell.’

‘Is that a threat, Agent Engel?’

‘I prefer Special Agent Engel, although I admit that it’s a mouthful. And, no, it’s not a threat. I don’t believe you respond very well to threats. With you, I reckon it’s carrots all the way, not sticks. Is there a place where we can talk?’

I nodded to Dave to let him know that I was done. Already, the bar’s clientele was starting to drift home. I gestured toward one of the booths in the corner, as far away from Angel and Louis as possible, then poured myself a cup of coffee from the pot and joined Engel.

He was probably my age but his face was unlined, and if there were gray strands in his blond hair, they were well hidden. His mouth was very thin, his lips a horizontal cut in his face, his eyes a washed out gray-blue. In an adversarial situation, he would cut a forbidding figure. My guess was that he didn’t have many friends.

Boo-hoo.

‘So,’ he said, ‘it appears that despite your driving a flash muscle car around a small Maine town Chief Allan has yet to discover the identity of your client. He is dogged, though. Pretty soon he’ll be down on his hands and knees examining tire tracks.’

I could have told him there and then that Randall Haight was about to make himself known to the police, but there would have been no percentage in it for me. It was better to listen, and wait, and see what I could get him to reveal for little or no cost.

‘I had no reason then to believe that my client’s difficulties were linked to the Anna Kore case. I explained that during my conversation with Detective Walsh, the details of which I’m sure he passed on to you.’

‘Most of them. He was distinctly rattled when he left. I got the impression he might have said something to you that he subsequently regretted. You do have a way of getting under people’s skin, I’ll give you that. I imagine it makes you good at what you do, although at some risk to your own personal safety. I bet you’ve picked up some cuts and bruises along the way.’

‘I’m a fast healer.’

‘Lucky for you. Some of those who crossed you have been less fortunate. Do you know that you’re flagged on our system?’

‘Yes, I do. And you knew that I was aware of it, otherwise you wouldn’t have asked the question.’

‘It’s very interesting. You’ve led a charmed life.’

‘Really? You know, sometimes it doesn’t seem that way to me, and the FBI is not blameless in that regard.’

Engel made a minute adjustment to his features in an approximation of sorrow. ‘That was an unfortunate choice of words. I apologize. What I do recognize is that, your occasionally lawless nature and periodic poor judgment apart, your actions have generally contributed to the removal of certain unwanted elements from our society. We have that in common, even down to the sometimes lawless nature and errors of judgment. I have some questions for you. They’re general, and they shouldn’t impinge upon any requirements of client confidentiality, but they’ll enable us to move forward in our conversation and, indeed, in our relationship.’

‘Do you talk like that to all of your dates?’

‘Yes.’

‘How’s that working out for you?’

‘Not so well.’

‘Hard to believe.’

‘Isn’t it?’

He took a sip of his whisky and bared his teeth at the taste, like a rat testing the air.

‘Is your investigation ongoing?’ he asked.

‘It is.’

‘Are you likely to be a continuing presence in Pastor’s Bay as a consequence?’

‘Probably.’

‘How convinced are you that your client’s interests are not connected to the Anna Kore case?’

I paused. The bargaining was about to begin.

‘Uncertain.’

‘That’s not what you told Detective Walsh.’ He practically wagged his finger at me and added ‘tut-tut.’

‘I’ve modified it since then. That’s why I used the past tense when you brought the subject up earlier. I
had
no reason to believe there was a connection. I’ve become more open-minded since then.’

‘On what basis?’

‘Pastor’s Bay is a small town. My client’s difficulties are, well, personal rather than professional in nature. They pertain to an incident in his youth. I’m starting to think that it might be wise for him to approach the police about them. By doing so, he may at least rule out one avenue of investigation for you, and perhaps even point you in a useful direction. But I base that only on a dislike of coincidence, and nothing more.’

‘Have you made this opinion known to the client and, indeed, to his lawyer?’

‘My change in position is relatively recent, but I feel that both would be inclined to listen to me, and to act on my advice, if I made it known.’ I’d been hanging out too much with Aimee Price. I sounded like an attorney. ‘There is also the matter of ensuring that the client’s right to confidentiality is respected, and his safety is assured.’

‘Why would his safety be in question?’

‘A young girl is missing. There are newspaper reporters around, and TV cameras. Sometimes people jump to conclusions.’

‘We’re talking to a lot of people. Their faces haven’t appeared on TV, or in the papers. No harm has come to them. Local residents have been interviewed, and no suspicion has fallen on them among their neighbors.’

‘Well, maybe it’s not the locals that concern me.’

Engel bared his teeth again, but this time there was no whisky involved.

‘What do you know?’ he said.

‘I know that there’s a connection between Anna Kore and Tommy Morris, late of Somerville, and possibly an associate of “the Hill.”’

‘Well, well. You have been busy.’

‘You gave it away by your presence in Pastor’s Bay. You should have worn a mask.’

‘Noted,’ said Engel. ‘Anna’s his niece, as you may or may not be aware by now. Valerie Kore, née Morris, is Tommy Morris’s significantly younger sister and only sibling. He took care of her after their parents died in a car accident when she was four, assisted by assorted aunts and relatives, but they’ve been estranged for a long time.’

‘Ever since someone put Ronald Doheny in the ground, and then forgot where he was buried?’

Engel shrugged. ‘Doheny was a runner for Morris, who was trying to carve out his own patch after Whitey went on the run. Doheny screwed up. He was a loudmouth, he crossed a customer, and the aggrieved customer sold him out to the cops. He was facing a long stretch inside, and pressure was put on him to cut a deal and turn informant. He made bail, then vanished. Missing, presumed crab food.’

‘Did Morris know that Doheny was seeing his sister?’

‘Not at first, but it didn’t take him long to find out who had impregnated her. At that point, he probably wanted to kill Doheny, but would have settled for him doing the right thing.’

‘And then Doheny gets pinched, and someone decides that he’s unreliable and needs to be silenced.’

‘Tommy Morris killed him, or had him killed. That’s what we heard, although the killing would have been sanctioned from higher up. Soon after, his sister left Boston. She drifted around, but she kept straight. She is, by all accounts, a good citizen. No drugs, no booze, no contact with her brother and his people. She worked in Philly for a while, met a guy there, married him on the quiet. Her brother didn’t know.’

‘Alekos Kore.’

‘Right again. They’re now separated, but she hasn’t sought a divorce.’

‘She wanted to hold on to his name,’ I said. ‘If her brother comes looking for her, she’d be Valerie Kore, not Valerie Morris. It wouldn’t keep her safe if he started digging, but it would be enough to evade casual inquiries.’

‘Even if he did find her, and we think he’s been keeping tabs on her, psychologically she’d left the Morris name behind.’

‘And you knew who she was because
you’d
been keeping tabs on her all this time.’

‘That’s right.’

‘Does her brother know that his niece is missing?’

‘Her brother is in trouble. He’s made some bad business decisions, and we’ve been fortunate in some of our efforts against him. His days are numbered.’

‘You haven’t answered the question. Does Tommy Morris know?’

I could feel that Engel wanted to look away, but he managed not to break his gaze. Still, he was a mass of ‘tells.’ Engel was concealing truths.

‘We’ve tried to keep the girl’s relationship to Morris quiet, and her mother says that she hasn’t been in contact with him.’

‘Do you believe her?’

‘We did at the start. Now we’re not so sure. She’s desperate, perhaps desperate enough to turn to her brother for help.’

‘So he knows?’

‘He knows. Do you read the papers? A man named Joseph Toomey, known to his friends as Joey Tuna, was found shot to death in a fish market in Dorchester yesterday. One of his employees left his car keys at work, went back to retrieve them, and saw the office light burning. There was a lot of blood. Two shots, fatal but not immediately so – he’d been left to die. Joey was the ambassador for the Irish mob in Boston. He was the go-between, the kingmaker, the problem solver. He was untouchable. On the surface, he was neutral. In reality, he sided with the status quo; all that mattered was the efficient running of business, which was good for everybody. As Tommy Morris became more of a liability, he threatened that stability. A decision was made that it might be best if he were to keep Ronald Doheny company, except Tommy went to ground. Most of his men have abandoned him, but he still has a couple of loyal followers. They met with Joey on the day of his killing. Apparently, they wanted to know if he had sanctioned the kidnapping of Anna Kore in order to draw her uncle out. Joey denied it. Then he was killed.’

‘You know who pulled the trigger?’

‘Officially, no. Unofficially, we believe it was Tommy Morris himself.’

‘Unusual. You’d think he’d palm off a job like that to his people.’

This time, a response flickered. It was like the briefest ripple on the surface of an otherwise smooth pond where an unseen creature had flicked a fin. There was something there, something interesting.

‘I told you, he doesn’t have many people left,’ said Engel. ‘It could be that it was personal for him. The ones who’ve been around for a while, they learn to bury their feelings deep. They hold on to the grudges, then wait for a time when they’re justified in making a move.’

‘You seem very well informed. You have a wire somewhere?’

‘We have lots of wires. That’s why we’re the Federal Bureau of Investigation, not the Local Bureau of Supposition.’ He was settled again. That brief flash of uncertainty was gone. ‘It’s also why, if you’re concerned for the safety of your client, we can guarantee that he’ll be looked after. We can put men on him, or move him out of town for a while. It is a “he,” right?’

I did a little cheek-puffing and imitation weighing up of potentially grave consequences, then allowed that the client was indeed male.

‘He doesn’t want to leave town,’ I said. ‘In fact, that’s something of a deal breaker for him. He has a nice life in Pastor’s Bay. He wants to hold on to it. And I don’t want federal agents on him. Half the people in here probably smelled you as law the minute you arrived, and the other half didn’t have to because they were lawmen themselves. If someone like Tommy Morris is going to be sniffing around this, then I want as little attention as possible drawn to our client. If it comes down to that, I’ll look after his protection myself.’

‘You sure about that?’

The straight line became a jagged scar: a smile, assuming you didn’t look for warmth or reassurance in a smile, or anything resembling a decent human emotion.

‘Go on. I’m listening.’

‘Tommy Morris has left the reservation, and we believe he’s heading this way.’

‘All the more reason to keep my own client safely off the board.’

‘It’s your call. When can we expect to talk with this elusive gentleman?’

‘I want more.’

‘Really?’

‘I want freedom to investigate on his behalf. In return, I’ll share any information of relevance with Walsh.’

‘He won’t like you being on his turf. Neither will Allan.’

‘They’ll just have to hold their noses.’

‘I’ll talk with them and see what I can do.’