The Cutting

by James Hayman

  ‘Now I want you to put your arms around my neck and press against me as if we were embracing. I have to check your body.’

  ‘The bloody hell I will,’ she snapped. ‘Who do you think you’re talking to?’

  ‘I know exactly who you are, Ms. Redmond. I know exactly who your father is and what his condition is. I know he was turned down for six different transplant programs because of his age. I know you want him to live. Which means I’m your only option. If you’d rather not proceed, that’s your choice. We can conclude our business and I’ll be on my way.’

  ‘And my father will die?’

  ‘Yes, your father will die. Then again, everyone dies. It’s only a question of when. Besides, look on the bright side. You’ll inherit a great deal of money.’

  ‘I already have more money than I’ll ever need. Strange as it may seem to someone like you, I love my father.’

  ‘Is that why you never married?’

  She didn’t answer. She simply turned toward him and, looking up into his face without emotion, placed her arms around his neck and pressed herself, like a lover, into his body. She could feel the bulge of a holster and gun under his jacket as he ran his hands over her in a feigned caress, up and down, back and front.

  ‘Enjoying yourself?’ she whispered.

  ‘Not really,’ he said. ‘You’re not my type.’ Apparently satisfied she wasn’t wearing a recording device, he added, ‘Okay, you can let go now.’

  They turned and started walking again down the path. The hotel was to their right, and the vivid green of the golf course fairways lay both to their left and in front of them.

  ‘What did you want to tell me?’ She began the conversation.

  ‘We have a healthy heart,’ he said. ‘Right blood type. Tissue is compatible. The donor is brain dead. Currently on life support.’

  ‘Who is the donor?’

  ‘An accident victim. The precise identity does not concern you. Does your father still want to go through with this? At his age there’s no more than a fifty-fifty chance he’ll survive even one year, and there’s an excellent chance he won’t survive the surgery.’

  ‘I understand that,’ she said. ‘He understands that. But without the surgery he won’t last more than another month or two. He’s a tough old man, and he wants to live. He thinks this will give him a shot. If that’s what he wants, that’s what I want.’

  ‘The procedure will cost five million dollars. In advance.’

  ‘That’s a lot of money.’

  ‘According to our sources, your father’s net worth is more than a billion. For the gift of life, for someone like him, five million dollars is pocket change. In any event, that’s the deal. Take it or leave it.’

  ‘Who is the surgeon? Is he capable? Competent?’

  ‘More than competent. One of the best. However, for obvious reasons, I can’t tell you who he is. Now, do you want to proceed?’

  ‘Yes. It seems I have no choice.’

  ‘Very well. From this point on there’s no turning back.’ Harry Lime handed her a slip of paper. ‘This is the routing number and account number at a private bank in Zurich. First thing tomorrow morning, I want you to wire five million dollars to this account. Then I want you to burn this note. When I receive confirmation from the bank that the funds have arrived, they will be withdrawn, the account closed, and the money placed in another untraceable account. When that has been accomplished, I’ll get in touch with you to arrange delivery of your father to the surgery site.’

  ‘Where is the surgery site?’

  ‘All I will tell you is that it’s in the United States. No passport required. When you are contacted, you will arrange a private ambulance to bring your father to a small airport to be named later. A private plane will pick him up. There will be a pilot, a doctor, and a nurse specializing in cardiac care on board. Other than these, he will travel alone.’

  ‘I want to go with him. Since my mother died, I’m the only one who really cares about him.’

  ‘I’m sorry, Ms. Redmond, that will not be possible. He will travel alone. During the trip a sedative will be administered to put him to sleep. He won’t be told where he’s going. An ambulance will meet him at the other end and transport him to the surgery site. The operation will take place as soon as medically feasible. When he is able, he will return home, hopefully in three or four days. He will travel home in exactly the same manner. We will arrange for a nurse to care for him at home and administer antirejection drugs as they are needed.’

  ‘Will you send prescriptions?’ she asked.

  ‘Your father will need to take antirejection drugs, primarily cyclosporine, for the rest of his life. It’s available in tablet form, and what is needed will be sent directly to you. There will be no trips to the pharmacy, no paperwork sent to any insurance company.’

  ‘What about side effects?’

  ‘Some side effects are likely. There may be kidney dysfunction. Possibly less output when he is urinating. His hands or feet may swell. He may get tremors in his hands. Swollen gums. Bleeding gums. The list is long, but most are not life-threatening. The nurse will know what to do. If there are any indications of organ rejection, the nurse will let us know and we will arrange for a transplant cardiologist to perform a biopsy. If he needs further treatment, you will be contacted to discuss the options.

  ‘I cannot emphasize strongly enough that you must tell no one of these arrangements. Not your doctor. Not your lover. Not your Aunt Ethel. If you talk in your sleep, sleep alone. If anyone asks why he seems better – if the surgery works – tell them only that’s he’s had bypass surgery. The scars will look similar enough. If he dies, then contact us at the number you’ve been given. We will make arrangements for a physician to sign a death certificate and for the body to be cremated.’

  ‘Is that all?’ she asked.

  ‘One last thing. By accepting these arrangements, both you and your father become complicit in breaking the law. If we discover that you have spoken of it before the fact – and we will be watching and listening – the arrangements are off. We will keep the money, but there will be no surgery. If we find out that you have spoken of it after the surgery, to a doctor, to a hospital, to the police, or to anyone else, the contract, and both you and your father, will be terminated.’

  Harry Lime spoke these words in a flat businesslike tone, without threat, without emotion of any kind. In spite of the Florida heat, Vanessa Redmond found herself shivering. She knew nothing of this man or the people he worked with. She was taking what he said and what he promised entirely on faith. Yet, because she wanted her father to live, even if only a little longer, she said simply, ‘I understand.’

  27

  Tuesday. 5:00 P.M.

  It was late Tuesday afternoon. Four days since Katie Dubois’s body turned up in the scrap yard and Lucinda Cassidy disappeared from the Western Prom. Tom Shockley was starting to bitch about the lack of results. Bill Fortier was beginning to worry about the cost of overtime. McCabe was increasingly haunted by the hours ticking down on Cassidy’s life.

  He spent most of the day huddling with his Crimes Against People unit, reviewing the results of endless interviews, virtually all of which led nowhere. Working round the clock, Tasco and Frazier and four teams of detectives narrowed the so-called Lexus List down from nearly five hundred to fewer than a dozen. Each of these so-called possibles – three surgeons, four other MDs, one nurse-practitioner, and a professor of biology at a small college in New Hampshire – had the requisite skills to remove a human heart. Each lacked an alibi that could be corroborated by a third party. Each was brought in to 109 Middle Street and placed in an interview room equipped with microphones and hidden video equipment. Each was questioned intensively, sometimes for hours, by teams of detectives skilled in ferreting out the slightest inconsistencies in their stories. In Tom Tasco’s opinion, the most promising ‘suspect’ was a fifty-five
-year-old retired gynecologist from North Berwick. He seemed promising only because he’d lost his license in ’02 for allegedly fondling half a dozen patients while their feet were in the stirrups. One was a fourteen-year-old girl.

  Unfortunately, the man was only five foot ten, not the six foot plus seen in the surveillance tape and later corroborated by Tobin Kenney. Reviewing the video, McCabe knew there was no way that this man would have been strong enough to carry Katie’s body to where she was dumped.

  The hunt for Lucinda Cassidy hadn’t gone much better. Searches organized in ever widening circles from an epicenter in Portland turned up no leads. Divers explored the waters of Portland harbor and found nothing. Advanced mapping techniques used successfully by Maine Forest Service rangers to find the body of a murdered girl a few years earlier were tried again. This time they failed to produce results. Bill Bacon and Will Messing were running out of places to look.

  Perhaps the most promising development came in a report from the state lab in Augusta, which said that Lucinda Cassidy’s dog, Fritz, had definitely bitten her attacker and that traces of human blood and hair were found in his mouth. Both samples had undergone DNA analysis, and the results were in. Unfortunately, there was no suspect DNA available to check for a match.

  Finally, around six o’clock, McCabe called Burt Lund to find out if Judge Washburn had returned and if Lund had had any luck setting up a meeting with her.

  ‘She just got back,’ Lund told him. ‘Meet me in her chambers in ten minutes.’

  Before leaving, McCabe gathered the exhausted cops in the detectives’ conference room. First he encouraged them all to keep their spirits up and to keep going. He told them every suspect eliminated brought them one step closer to success. Looking into their tired faces, he knew they’d heard it all before. He considered telling them about the note in his mailbox, about the meeting set for tonight with the possible witness, but he was afraid to risk a leak either to the press or to Shockley’s office. However, he did mention he was on his way to ask a judge for a warrant to search Spencer’s car and home. Then he told them to go home and get some rest. Start fresh in the morning.

  Judge Paula Washburn’s chambers were on the second floor of the Cumberland County Courthouse on Federal Street, less than a five-minute walk from police headquarters. McCabe and Lund were admitted immediately. Washburn was a tall, extremely thin woman with cropped gray hair. She didn’t bother with the formality of a greeting, though she did ask them to sit.

  ‘Well, gentlemen, what do we have that’s so all-fired urgent it just couldn’t wait another minute?’ she asked.

  ‘A request for a search warrant in the Dubois case,’ said Lund. He handed her McCabe’s affidavit.

  She took several minutes to read it silently. ‘Well, isn’t this interesting,’ she said finally, peering up at him over the tiny reading glasses perched on her long nose. ‘I hope this isn’t a fishing expedition, Sergeant McCabe. If so, you’re going after a pretty big fish.’

  ‘No, Your Honor, it isn’t. I believe we have sufficient reason to investigate Dr. Spencer further.’

  ‘There are other doctors with green Lexus SUVs.’

  ‘There are, but so far, at least, Spencer is the only one who is physically similar both to the person seen in the video and the man described by the soccer coach.’

  She asked several questions about the reliability of Starbucks’s video enhancement and Tobin Kenney’s memory. McCabe answered them as best he could. Judge Washburn nodded, considering his responses. Then she asked, ‘Is Dr. Spencer aware that he’s about to become a suspect in a murder case?’

  ‘I think he may have an inkling. He called Chief Shockley and complained about my questioning his wife.’

  ‘Does Shockley know you’re seeking this warrant?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘You realize, of course, he’s going to be less than pleased.’

  ‘I do.’

  ‘And you’re not bothered?’

  ‘I’m not.’

  ‘Are there any other considerations I should be aware of?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Lund. ‘Ordinarily, Your Honor, we might wait a little longer, amass a little more evidence, before seeking this warrant. In this case we’re rushing it a bit because there may be another life at stake.’

  ‘The woman who disappeared?’

  ‘Yes, Your Honor.’

  ‘Very well, Mr. Lund, I’m going to grant this request, though I do wish you had some evidence that was slightly more compelling. I’m doing so in the belief that I would have no hesitiation issuing a warrant if the suspect were less prominent in the community. However, I do hope this is not going to backfire in all our faces.’

  ‘Yes, Your Honor. I hope not as well. Thank you.’

  Washburn signed the warrant and handed it back, and Lund and McCabe left the judge’s chambers.

  He called Maggie’s cell from the sidewalk. ‘Let me buy you a beer.’

  ‘No can do. I’ve got company coming. I’m at home in the middle of cooking dinner.’

  ‘It’s important.’

  ‘Okay. Why don’t you come over here? You talk. I’ll cook.’

  Maggie had a small two-bedroom on Vesper Street only a couple of blocks from McCabe’s own place on the Prom.

  ‘Who’s your company?’ he asked as she handed him a cold bottle of Shipyard and an opener. She told him tonight was date number three with her new ‘maybe, might be, might not be’ boyfriend.

  He popped the top, leaned back against the fridge, and took a long swig. ‘Whatever you’re cooking, it smells great.’

  ‘Thanks. Coq au vin.’

  ‘Interesting menu selection for a romantic evening at home.’ McCabe grinned, pleased with his joke.

  ‘Fortunately, my friend doesn’t share your sophomoric sense of humor.’

  McCabe flashed his least sincere smile. ‘Thanks.’

  ‘You’re welcome. Anyway, so much for small talk,’ said Maggie. She poured herself a glass of red wine, sat down at the small kitchen table, and sipped. McCabe pulled out a chair on the other side.

  ‘What’s so important we had to talk about it now?’

  First he told her about the warrant. She nodded approvingly. ‘Anything else?’

  He showed her the note, saying he was sure it was from the woman he chased down Exchange Street and then saw again at Katie’s funeral. He said he was going to meet her alone tonight as requested.

  ‘Why does she want you to drive the T-Bird? Even a Crown Vic would be less conspicuous.’

  ‘I don’t know. Maybe because she can recognize it easily. Maybe because it doesn’t look like a police car.’

  Maggie said ‘hmmm’ a couple of times as she examined the note, a different intonation on each ‘hmmm.’ She drummed her fingers on the table. ‘Do we know anything about this woman?’ she asked. ‘I respect your instincts, McCabe, but maybe she’s a nutcase who just wants to get involved in the case. Or maybe get involved on a lonely country road with a big, handsome hunk of a cop.’

  ‘Like me, you mean?’

  ‘Yeah, but don’t let it go to your head.’

  He turned serious. ‘No. I think it’s for real. At the funeral she implied she was being watched. Said if she was seen with me she might be killed.’

  ‘She still could be a nutcase.’

  ‘I don’t think so. I don’t know what information she has, but I do think she knows something. I think it could be something important.’

  ‘I don’t think you going alone is such a good idea. Why don’t I follow discreetly in a separate car, give you a little cover? Y’know? Rule number one? Never go anywhere without backup? Aside from anything else, if something did go wrong and you were out there alone, the department’d put your ass through a wringer.’

  ‘I guess. The thing is, when she said alone, I think she meant it. She’ll spook if she sees anything that look
s remotely like a police car. If Cassidy’s still alive –’

  ‘Big if.’

  ‘Maybe, but if she is, time’s running out, and I’m in no mood to lose what could be our best lead yet.’

  ‘So fuck rule number one?’

  ‘I guess. Anyway, I don’t see why things should get all that hairy. I just wanted you to know where I was going.’

  ‘You gonna take a recorder?’

  ‘Yes, but I may not turn it on. Right now she’s like a deer in the headlights. One false move and she’s gone.’

  ‘Mike, I don’t like it. I think I should be there.’

  ‘Look, you’ve got a nice evening planned. Go finish making your dinner. And have fun with … uh … what’s his name?’

  ‘Einar.’

  ‘Einar? Really?’

  ‘Yes, Einar, really – and no, I don’t need any gratuitous wisecracks from you, thank you very much.’ Maggie stood up and showed him to the door. ‘Good-bye. I love you. Don’t get your ass shot off.’

  Later, at home, McCabe made a salad and nuked a frozen lasagna for Casey. He nibbled at it himself. Afterward, Casey cleared the dinner stuff and McCabe retired to the living room, where he opened his DeLorme atlas of Maine to the page that included Gray. He located the roads the note instructed him to take, the spot where he was supposed to park. Working outward from the meeting place, he pored over the intricate web of back roads until the entire map was committed to memory. It took ten minutes.

  Though he doubted he was going to need it, he pocketed an extra eight-round magazine for his service weapon, a Smith & Wesson 4506. As an afterthought, he also took out the Mossberg 590 pump-action riot shotgun with its eight-round magazine that he kept locked in a case at the back of his closet. He couldn’t dismiss the possibility he was walking into a trap. If necessary, he wanted sufficient firepower to blast his way out.

  He called Jane Devaney to see if she could come over and stay with Casey. Her machine picked up after four rings. He didn’t leave a message. Kyra was in Boston, going to the MFA and having dinner with friends. She wouldn’t be back until morning. Reluctantly, McCabe convinced himself Casey would be fine. He didn’t think he’d be home all that late. Besides, as Casey often reminded him, other people paid her ten bucks an hour to babysit their kids. She’d be fine for a few hours.