Mercy Falls

by William Kent Krueger

  There she was, dancing in a large patch of dry grass that grew between the sumac and the pines. It was less a dance than a simple swaying as she sang. Her eyes were closed and she seemed to be moving inside her own small, safe world.

  Safe? Cork wondered. Where the hell was Stone?

  The rifle barrel that kissed the back of his neck was cold. Stone, in his coming, had been absolutely silent.

  “If you move, O’Connor, if you even twitch, your head is gone.”

  Cork felt a tug on the rifle in his hand.

  “Let go nice and easy,” Stone said. “That’s right.”

  The rifle slid from Cork’s grasp and he heard a soft rustle as Stone laid the barrel against a sumac bush.

  Stone said, “You had me confused. I couldn’t figure why you’d stop for breakfast or risk tipping me off with a fire. So I put Lizzie out there, thinking you’d come for her. I didn’t realize you were already here until I heard that squawk box on your belt. By the way, I’ll take that, too.”

  Cork handed it over his shoulder. “I’ve got people all around the lake, Stone. There’s no way you’re getting off this island.”

  “I’ll take my chances.”

  Lizzie looked up from her patch of yellow grass and smiled. The sun was not high enough yet to strike her face, but there was a kind of light dancing there nevertheless. She lifted her hand dreamily and waved.

  “What’s she on?” Cork asked.

  “What isn’t she? That girl’s a walking pharmacy.”

  “You brought her along just to use her?”

  “That’s what happens to the weak. They get used, preyed on, eaten. Basic law of nature.”

  “So what now?”

  “Now you die.”

  “Why?”

  “Are you afraid to die?” The question had a sneer to it.

  “It might help if I knew why.”

  “Why? Stupidest question you can ask. Never gets answered. Nobody ever told me why that son-of-a-bitch stepfather of mine beat me like a dirty rug. When they locked me up for killing him, nobody ever told me why. When my mother died alone and dirt-poor, nobody ever gave me a reason why. So I stopped asking a long time ago, and the question became how. How to survive.”

  “What did I do to you?”

  “You personally? Nothing.”

  “But this is personal.”

  “It is now.”

  Now, Cork thought. But not at first?

  “You have me,” he said. “You have what you want. Why not let Lizzie go?”

  “So that your death will have meaning and purpose? I don’t think so. I like the idea of you dying for no good reason at all.”

  “You want to know the only thing I regret, Stone? That I won’t see them shoot you down.”

  “You mean like I’m going to shoot you? You think that’s what I’m going to do? Hey, man, I tried that once. I’m glad it didn’t work. Too removed from the kill.”

  The rifle no longer pressed its deadly agenda into Cork’s neck. Behind him, he heard the ruffling of cloth. A moment later, Stone said, “Turn around.”

  A sharp, blinding edge of sun now cut into the blue above the trees, and Cork blinked against the glare. Stone had removed his shirt and stood bare chested, his prison tattoos dark green on his tawny flesh. They reminded Cork of parasitic worms that grow unseen inside a man but eventually reveal themselves through the skin. In the grip of Stone’s right hand was a hunting knife, its seven-inch blade glinting with an icy light.

  “When I was in Stillwater, I dreamed of the day I’d feel the twist of a blade in a cop’s heart. I’m going to like this. I’m going to like the look on your face when you feel it, too.”

  He lunged. It was a feint, really, not a killing thrust. He was testing Cork’s reaction. Perhaps he had expected Cork to retreat, jump back. If so, he was surprised. Cork met Stone’s outstretched arm with a quick knife-hand blow that drove the weapon down and away and made Stone stumble. Cork followed with a kick to the man’s knee. Stone bent but he didn’t topple. It was enough for Cork. He turned and fled through the sumac, a desperate swimmer in a crimson sea. He heard Stone huffing at his back, crashing through the brush behind him. Cork raced across the grass where Lizzie danced and he headed for the lake. With a long arcing dive that took him beyond the rocks of the shoreline, he split the surface. The shallows dropped away quickly to a jumble of stone slabs that littered the lake bottom ten feet down. Cork swam deep, planted his feet on the gray stone, and turned to meet his adversary.

  He’d done all this without thinking, but somewhere in his brain was the knowledge that water would equalize them, slow Stone’s hand as it wielded the knife, handicap them both equally in their need for air.

  Stone came with a splash, trailing a wake of bubbles and white water. He swam straight for Cork, using both arms to propel himself. Cork watched the knife hand, and when it was drawn back at the end of a stroke, he thrust himself from the bottom and caught Stone before he could bring the blade into striking position. Without hesitation, he went for the man’s eyes, driving the fingers of his right hand into a socket. Even in the muffle of deep water, Stone’s bellow was a roar. He curled, kicked out, landed a boot in Cork’s ribs.

  Once more, Cork used the opening to retreat. He clawed to the surface and stroked hard to shore. Hauling himself onto the island, he sprinted past Lizzie, who watched him fly by with her eyes wide, as if he were some mythic creature or spirit, a manidoo that had sprung from the lake. He hit the sumac and made for the hilltop and the rifles there. He didn’t look back to see if Stone was at his heels, but put all his energy into the race for a weapon. When he grabbed his rifle, he spun around.

  Stone had not bothered to pursue him. He’d stopped where Lizzie, in her clouded state, had watched the struggle. His big bare left arm pinned her to him with an iron grip, and in his right hand the blade of the knife pressed against her throat. Her eyes were no longer dreamy but full of terror as she comprehended that her death was no farther away than a twitch of Stone’s hand.

  “She’ll go first, O’Connor. You know I’ll do it. Drop the rifle.”

  Cork did.

  “Come down here. We still have business, you and me.”

  Cork descended, brushing aside the blood-red sumac leaves. He stepped onto the grass.

  Stone’s left eye socket was a raging red and already swollen nearly shut. “You try to run again, I’ll kill her.”

  Anger like acid pulsed through Cork, rage that Stone would use the girl this way. The hell with all the reasons Stone was the man he was. He would be a better man dead.

  “Turn her loose and let’s get to it, you son of a bitch,” Cork said.

  Stone flung Lizzie aside. She tumbled to the ground with a small cry. Stone set his mouth in a line that showed teeth—a grin or grimace, Cork couldn’t say. Stone’s hard body tensed and the muscles swelled under his taut skin. His good right eye, the pupil dark as an empty grave, regarded Cork intensely. Cork readied himself. Stone let out a scream, a kind of war cry, and charged, galloping across the grass, his knife lifted high, gleaming in the morning sun as if white-hot.

  Then his chest opened, a portal that spouted blood, and he fell, collapsing far short of where Cork stood. At the same instant, the crack of a rifle shot broke over the island. Cork looked toward the lake. In the bow of a canoe, paused midway between the campsite and the big island, sat Henry Meloux. In the stern knelt Dina Willner, cradling a rifle and still squinting through the scope. In the heat of the battle, neither Cork nor Stone had seen them coming.

  Blood wormed from the entry wound dead center between Stone’s shoulder blades. Cork turned him over. The exit wound in his chest was the size of a man’s fist, the edges ragged with fragments of white bone. His mouth hung open and his eyes looked stunned. It was illusion, for Stone felt nothing now, not surprise or bitterness or betrayal. He was dead. Simply dead.

  Cork sat down, suddenly too weak to stand. He watched Meloux and Dina Willner paddle toward
the island. Lizzie lay in the grass, crying softly. Cork thought he should go to her, offer comfort, but he couldn’t move. The canoe touched shore. Meloux climbed out and after him came Dina. The old Mide went to the girl and spoke to her in a low, gentle voice.

  Dina sat down beside Cork.

  “Thanks,” he said.

  “I told you. It’s what I’m good at.”

  The whack-whack-whack of chopper blades came from the distance. The critical response team.

  Meloux left Lizzie, who’d ceased her weeping. He walked to the body, sat cross-legged beside it, and in his ancient, cracked voice began to sing, guiding Stone along the Path of Souls.

  Cork was soaked and shivering now.

  “Cold?” Dina asked.

  “Freezing.”

  “Here. Let me help.”

  She put her arms around him, offering her warmth, for which he was grateful. He was even more grateful for the gift she’d already given him. His life.

  42

  FIRST THING, Cork called Jo.

  “Hey, gorgeous.”

  “Cork!” she said, her voice full of joyous relief.

  “Bos told me you’d talked to her.”

  “Oh, Cork. Thank God. I was worried.”

  “I knew you would be. That’s why I didn’t tell you I was going.”

  “Did you get Lizzie?”

  “She’s fine.”

  “And Stone?”

  “We brought him in. Not alive.”

  “Does that mean it’s over?”

  “Not entirely. I still think someone hired Stone to kill me, and I still don’t know who.”

  She was quiet. “So they may try again?”

  “It’s certainly a possibility.” He wanted to give her more, an absolute reassurance, but that wasn’t something he could offer. “How are the kids?”

  “Fine. Rose and Mal took them all to South Bend today to visit Notre Dame. I stayed. I didn’t want to miss this call.”

  “You mean if it came.”

  “I knew it would. Cork, when can we come home?”

  “Soon, I hope. We’ll be interviewing Lizzie shortly. Maybe we’ll know more after that. I have to go, sweetheart. Things still to do.”

  “I know. I love you, cowboy.”

  “I love you, too.”

  Lizzie Fineday had been fed a decent meal and coffee, and was coherent. Although she distrusted cops, she was grateful for what Cork and the others had done and was willing to talk. She waived her right to counsel but asked that her father stay with her during the questioning.

  Stone, she said, had enlisted her help to play a joke on the local cops, something she didn’t mind doing. He told her that afterward they’d do a little Ecstasy. The afternoon of the shooting, they’d parked his Land Rover at the bridge over Tick Creek. He got out and told her to wait five minutes, then follow him on foot to the Tibodeau cabin. She’d wondered about the rifle he took with him, but not much. On the Iron Range, everyone seemed to have a rifle. Just as she started for the cabin, she heard two shots. She didn’t know what that was about.

  “The dogs,” Cork said. “He shot the Tibodeau dogs.”

  She started crying, and they waited to go on until she’d calmed down.

  She made the call from the Tibodeaus’, imitating Lucy’s voice, not a difficult thing. Almost anyone could do a decent impersonation of Lucy. After that, Stone had her climb the hill with him and they waited. She’d asked about the Ecstasy. He told her to be patient, gave her some grass to smoke in the meantime. She lay down on the top of the hill. It was evening by then, and she remembered staring up and thinking how soft the sky looked, like a big bed with dark blue silk sheets. She was tired and was almost asleep, when she heard the car from the Sheriff’s Department coming down the road. She got up and saw that Stone had the rifle to his shoulder and was sighting. He started shooting. She freaked and ran. She barely remembered stumbling down the backside of the hill, and then she was standing in the dry bed of Tick Creek, crying uncontrollably, with no idea where to go. Stone came charging down the hill, grabbed her arm, yanked her after him, and they ran for the Land Rover. After they drove away, he told her if she said anything to anybody, she’d go to jail for sure. She was confused and scared.

  “Did he tell you why he shot at the sheriff and deputy?” Simon Rutledge asked.

  He’d said a guy paid him.

  “He didn’t tell you the guy’s name?”

  He hadn’t.

  “Did he say anything at all about him?”

  Nothing she could remember.

  Rutledge asked a few more questions about Stone, then Ed Larson said, “Tell us about your relationship with Eddie Jacoby.”

  She met him in her father’s bar when he went there to see Stone. Jacoby made passes at her, the usual kind, and she didn’t pay much attention. He gave her a business card, one with a Hollywood logo, and told her he could get her into movies. She still didn’t want to have anything to do with him. She got weird vibes from him, creepy.

  “But the night he was murdered, you went looking for him at his hotel. Why?”

  Because after the shooting at the Tibodeaus’, she was scared. She’d decided it was best to get out of town, and she thought maybe Jacoby was being straight with her and could get her to Hollywood. She left him a note saying if he was interested in partying to meet her at Mercy Falls.

  “Why Mercy Falls?”

  It was isolated and easy to find. She didn’t want anyone to know she was seeing Jacoby, didn’t want it to get back to Stone. When he showed up, she got into his SUV. They snorted a little coke. He gave her a beer. They drank, talked. He touched her. She didn’t like it, but she wanted to get out of Tamarack County and she thought he might be her ticket. She felt trapped in the SUV, so she got out and went to the overlook. She was feeling woozy, light-headed. Jacoby joined her, began going at her again with his hands. She got tired of it and tried to push him off. He seemed to like that and began getting rough. He hit her, then he hit her again. She tried to make him stop, begged him. He pushed her down, fumbled with her jeans, worked at pulling them down. She fought him, and then he really laid into her. She remembered the blows, but she didn’t remember any pain. Everything seemed to go kind of distant.

  She stopped talking, and Cork and the others waited. Will Fineday’s eyes were hard as agates, and deep hollows ran beneath his cheekbones. The scar on his face had turned bone white.

  “Did he assault you sexually?” Larson asked gently.

  She cried again, huge sobs that wracked her body, but she managed to say yes.

  They took a break from the questioning. Cork asked if she’d like something to drink, a Coke maybe. He got one from the machine in the waiting area. She drank a little, and when she seemed calmer, they continued.

  She didn’t remember him leaving, but she remembered being alone at the overlook, hearing the water of the falls, feeling the ground very cold under her. Then a strange thing happened. An angel spoke to her.

  “An angel?”

  That’s what it had seemed like because of her voice. Gentle, kind.

  “Her voice? It was a woman?”

  Yes.

  “What did she look like?”

  She didn’t know. The night was dark, the moon gone, and she wasn’t thinking clearly.

  “But a woman, you’re sure?”

  She thought so.

  “What did she say?”

  It sounded like “Poor vaceeto.”

  “‘Poor vaceeto’? Vaceeto, is that a name?”

  She didn’t know.

  Larson looked at the others. “Vaceeto?”

  They shook their heads.

  “What happened after the angel spoke to you?”

  After a little while, she roused herself. Her pants were down and she pulled them up. She could see Jacoby’s SUV still parked in the lot. She was afraid, so she ran like crazy to her own car, locked the doors, and got out of there fast. She drove straight home.

  “Edwar
d Jacoby was stabbed to death. Do you know anything about his murder?”

  She said she didn’t.

  “Did you see him again before you left the parking lot?”

  No.

  “When we tried to locate you for questioning, you’d gone to Stone’s place. Why did you run to him?”

  She’d gone to Stone because she didn’t want to talk to the police, and Stone promised he’d keep them away. He also promised to keep her high. That was something she very much wanted. To be high and to forget.

  She broke down again. This time she couldn’t stop crying.

  Cork said, “Let’s call it a day.”

  “An angel?” Rutledge said.

  They sat in Cork’s office. Larson, Rutledge, Willner, and Cork. It was almost noon. Cork had changed into his spare uniform, and he’d eaten a ham-and-cheese sandwich and had drunk some coffee. He was tired. The food and the coffee helped a little, but sleep was what he needed most. Days of uninterrupted sleep.

  “‘Poor vaceeto.’ Mean anything to anybody?” Larson asked.

  “A name? An endearment?” Rutledge said.

  “Not a personal endearment, apparently. It didn’t mean anything to Lizzie.”

  “It was a woman, yes?” Rutledge said.

  Larson cleaned his glasses with a small soft cloth he kept in his wallet for that purpose. “Between the beating and the drugs, Lizzie was pretty far gone, so who knows. Think Jacoby slipped a little Rohypnol into her beer?”

  “That would be my guess. It’s what you found in the glove box of his SUV.”

  “A woman,” Larson said. “A passerby?”

  “Who just happened to be there at midnight, and who just sympathized and left her?” Rutledge shook his head. “I don’t think so.”

  “How about a prostitute, then? Maybe beating and raping Lizzie Fineday wasn’t enough and Jacoby brought in some extra entertainment.”

  “That’s a possibility. And maybe it was the prostitute who killed Jacoby, defended herself with a knife.”

  “There’s another possibility,” Dina Willner said quietly.