by J-F. Dubeau
“I got Randy’s autopsy report on Audrey,” he said, stretching the information, then paused for both effect and to twist the knife. “Heart failure.”
Relief. It went through Finnegan’s body like a reverse shock. Instead of tensing his body and muscles, the fact seemed to release him. For a moment his grip on the bars lessened. There might as well have been no jail, no cell. In that instant Sam was more free than he’d been in a long time. Perhaps decades. His was the easing of a man who’d found forgiveness or peace with his god.
“Thank God,” he whispered.
“What difference does it make, Sam? I have a twelve-page confession stating you’ve killed twenty-two people. You ended it by explicitly stating these are only the ones you remember. So what’s one little girl?”
It was infuriating to Stephen. This psychopath acting like he somehow cared about his friend’s daughter. The worry appeared genuine, of course, but that didn’t matter. He had no right to pretend, let alone feel honest remorse. Yet the inspector had to show restraint, which was not his specialty. He was here for information. To solve a problem. Not to vent his feelings about the old man.
“I ain’t no monster, Stephen,” Sam said, scratching at his face. “I know, I know . . . I’ve killed. A lot. But it was necessity! I ain’t got an ounce of malice in me, Stephen. World’s gonna remember me as the Saint-Ferdinand Killer, the beast who killed to steal people’s eyes. Their precious eyes.”
He looked up at Stephen, fingernails still digging into his short gray beard. Ever since his arrest, Sam had been little more than a whining, crying old sack of bones. He’d offered no resistance and spent the bulk of his time mumbling to himself. There was no threat left in him. He was ancient, weak, and incoherent. For the first time, however, Crowley saw the killer. There was something in Finnegan’s eyes, a focus and determination. This is the person his victims must have seen moments before their demise.
“I ain’t no child killer, Stephen,” Sam continued. “I ain’t no rapist, no sadist, and I ain’t no necrophile. Necessity, Stephen! I killed outta necessity!”
“All right. Settle down.”
Up to now, Finnegan had made himself at home in his cell. He’d gone in peacefully and had enjoyed his meals quietly and been cooperative in answering questions. While Crowley hadn’t visited his prisoner more than a handful of times, he’d always seen a placid old man resigned to his fate.
Not today.
Being alone with the murderer brought out a new side. Finnegan, no longer the obedient captive, paced his cage and fidgeted with the bars and his clothes. A picture of barely restrained panic.
“How about you tell me who you’ve been working with? Share the blame a little so you don’t have to shoulder it all yourself.”
“There’s no one else. Alone, Stephen! I was left alone with that thing. Alone to hold the keys and watch the door. To keep an eye, to keep as many eyes as possible, on that cave.”
Eyes. Always eyes with this village. Crowley wasn’t a native of Saint-Ferdinand. He’d moved here because of the job opportunity and because of his wife. He stayed for his family and the community. In time, he’d become such an integral part of the village, he might as well have been a native. Yet in all that time, he never got the fascination with eyes.
“Well, you don’t have to worry about that anymore.”
“Oh, I don’t, do I?” Sam said. “I ain’t bad people, Stephen. You and me? We ain’t the same. But our jobs? They might as well be the same.”
“Sam,” Stephen said, and smiled, trying to keep his tone from being too condescending, “you don’t have a job.”
“Mincin’ words, are we? Call it a responsibility, then. Whatever floats your boat. But these?” Sam hit the bars of his cell with an open palm. “These mean nothing! When it comes for me, and it will, a few metal bars ain’t gonna keep it out.”
Crowley frowned, walking to stand less than a foot from the cell door. He wanted to leverage his size and imposing frame to browbeat some answers out of Finnegan, but either the bars separating them or something in Sam himself made that impossible. The killer held his stare. Whatever agitated him was more threatening than the mild posturing from the inspector.
“What’s coming for you, Sam? Is it the thing from the cave?”
“You know what it is, Stephen. You ain’t no fool who don’t know the fox in your henhouse.”
“Humor me. The thing from the cave, where is it now?”
“Heh.” Sam shrugged, then pinched his thin skin. “I ain’t dead. So I suppose it must still be there. Or maybe trapped somewhere else? One of your friends, maybe?”
That cave. Someone would need to go in there eventually. Crowley could only stall that part of the investigation for so long. For now, it was easy to simply request that the cave be left alone. Stephen’s superiors up the chain of command somehow had enough confidence in his judgment that they trusted his instincts. If he waited too long, however, he’d have to start throwing red tape over the process like so much tinsel on a Christmas tree. Better to have it be done with sooner rather than later, but first he had to make sure no one would find anything they shouldn’t.
“So the lock is still on the door? The thing is in there.” There was hope.
“You didn’t take my eyes away, did you? Them eyes are what’s keepin’ it in the cave. It’s the thin line keepin’ me alive right now. Without those eyes—“
“I had the forensic team take those as evidence. The eyes of your victims? We removed those. They’re gone, and you”—Stephen pointed a finger in Finnegan’s face—“are still alive.”
Sam was a bit shocked. If Crowley could trust his instincts about the man, the surprise was genuine.
“Then maybe somethin’ else is keeping it there? Or it’s stayin’ there on purpose. Plannin’. Plottin’.”
“Or maybe it’s trapped in the cave. Maybe it just doesn’t dare come out into the sun. How long has it been in there, Sam? Almost two decades? More? It’s gotta be weak at this point.”
Gleaming white but crooked teeth peered out from between Finnegan’s cracked lips as he smiled without humor. It was a knowing man’s grin. The kind of expression one had when realizing one spoke with someone who was at a disadvantage.
“You have no idea what yer dealin’ with, do you?” Sam said, fingers dancing on the bars as he explained. “This is a god, Stephen! Not just a fancy name for something mystical and magical. It don’t get weak. Do you know how lucky we are that there’s a way to keep it trapped at all?”
“Then, since you’re still alive, maybe it’s not as evil as you make it out to be.”
“Oh, you damn fool, Crowley.” Finnegan shook his head. “This ain’t no bear. It’s a vessel. A container in which we’ve been pissin’ our greed and hate for decades. This ain’t just no random god no more. It’s a god of death. A god of hate and death.”
DANIEL
UNLIKE MOST BOYS his age, Daniel Crowley usually woke along with the sunrise, even during summer vacation when nights were already short. Being raised by a single father who was also head of the town’s law enforcement had bred in him a sense of discipline that few teenagers understood, let alone practiced. Not only did he wake up early and follow a strict exercise regimen, Dan also ate a surprisingly healthy diet and displayed impeccable grooming habits. While his buddies were discovering the joys and pains of alcohol abuse, Dan was content to nurse a single beer for the whole evening. Because of this, he was often asked to be the designated driver, or to cover for his friends whose parents wouldn’t let them drink.
Dan also took it upon himself to earn his own spending money. For the past three years, he had spent summers and weekends at Luke Howard’s grocery store, bagging purchases or hauling inventory. It wasn’t the best salary in the world, but it covered his gas and the upkeep on his old Honda Civic, the cornerstone of a healthy social life in Saint-Ferdinand.
Thankfully, he wasn’t scheduled to start work for another two weeks. This gave
Dan plenty of time to catch up on a few things. There was a lot that needed to be done during those empty days. For starters, his Civic could use a little maintenance. It wasn’t in bad shape for a used car, but it was beginning to show its age. Some amount of time would also have to be dutifully wasted by the lake. Summer demanded it. Then there was Sasha Lindholm, his longtime girlfriend, who would monopolize as many hours as she could before his job swallowed him whole. Finally, he wanted to hang out with his dad.
Dan genuinely enjoyed his father’s company. The two had built a strong relationship after Dan’s mother had abandoned them both when he was still in diapers. Stephen relied on his son to maintain the household while he kept up the odd and demanding hours of a high-ranking police inspector. In return, Dan counted on his dad to fill in the roles of both parents, a task he was usually very capable of.
Usually. The events of the previous week had already sabotaged several planned activities between father and son. Dan understood that the situation with Sam Finnegan and the shocking death of the city’s most beloved child took precedence over a fishing trip. But now that Finnegan had confessed to everything and they were waiting for a lawyer to be appointed for his defense, Dan was hoping he and his father could get back to their normal routine.
The teenager rolled out of bed and made his way downstairs to the kitchen. They shared a two-story Colonial, large enough that both men could go all day without seeing each other if they so desired. So Dan wasn’t surprised when he didn’t cross paths with his father during his morning rituals. It was only when he sat at the kitchen table to eat a breakfast of eggs and bacon that he noticed his father’s Ford Explorer was missing from the driveway.
“You can’t be serious,” he muttered. He dropped his fork and stood to have a better look through the window.
The situation was far from unprecedented. Often, Stephen Crowley was called upon to work through the night or leave before dawn on some emergency. Which was why Daniel had made sure his father was prepared for any and all eventualities. He had even gone through the trouble of pulling out a cooler, buying some crushed ice, and preparing sandwiches for the trip. The Finnegan case would be stagnant for the next few days, and any other situation could easily be handled by Matt Bélanger for twenty-four hours. No radios, no cell phones, no interruptions: that had been the arrangement.
Furious, Dan called his father for an explanation. Of course, his cell phone was out of service range, but that didn’t stop the boy from leaving an angry message he’d probably regret later. Still seething, Daniel abandoned his breakfast, grabbed his keys, and made for the door.
Saint-Ferdinand was a small town, but the territory surrounding it was significantly larger. Composed of wheat and cornfields, orchards, and a couple of dairy farms, the municipality radiated far around the village. For such a small populace, it was an inconveniently huge area to cover when looking for someone. These circumstances had likely kept Sam Finnegan’s dark secret hidden for the last twenty years, and now Stephen Crowley was benefitting from them as well. Hence, Daniel had no choice but to make his way to the station and see if anyone knew his dad’s whereabouts.
With just under two thousand permanent residents, Saint-Ferdinand didn’t require more than nine or ten full-time police officers, and only the most rudimentary of facilities. Located at the edge of town on the main road, it boasted three floors of very limited square footage. The ground floor housed a reception area, where three dispatchers shared shifts throughout the week. There were a handful of desks and three offices, the largest of which was Stephen Crowley’s. The basement had a couple of offices that were, to Dan’s knowledge, used for storage, most of it for files related to the Saint-Ferdinand Killer. There were also a couple of prison cells that were primarily used to shelter farmers who weren’t in a condition to drive. Finally, the top floor was reserved for archiving and booking.
When Dan walked in, he was politely greeted by the dispatcher, Jacqueline Tremain. He’d known her since he was a boy, and she’d treated him like a favored nephew for a long time. Now that he was six-foot-one, square-jawed, and had respectable stubble, her demeanor toward him had become more professional. Were he the manipulative type, he could have exploited that to get away with just about anything, but Dan barely gave it a second thought.
“Morning, Jackie. Have you seen my dad anywhere?” he asked as he crossed through the doorway.
“Good morning, Dan. He dropped by ’bout an hour ago.” The dispatcher looked up from a hunting magazine. “I assumed he’d be back home by now. Want me to page him to see where he’s at?”
The notion had its appeal. It would be expedient and cut out the guesswork. But Dan’s anger and resentment demanded that his father be given no warning.
“Nah. Do you know if he was stopping off anywhere before heading home?”
“He was supposed to check out something at the Finnegan place.”
Dan barely had time to thank her before storming out the door.
“I thought we’d agreed: no work.”
Daniel Crowley was busy reapplying a layer of sunscreen. After spending half of the morning driving around Saint-Ferdinand, he had found his old man’s car right where Jackie had told him it’d be. However, when Dan had arrived at the Finnegan property, a patch of land located deep in the woods behind the Peterson farm, his father wasn’t there.
Dan had slipped under the yellow tape that delineated the borders of the crime scene, a line he knew took him into a restricted area. Everything and anything of importance had been removed, sent to a lab out of town, leaving the area cleaner than it had probably been in ages. Yet, even with the property picked clean, Inspector Crowley was nowhere to be seen.
Eventually Dan did find his father. Following a trail that led deep into the woods, he’d spotted his old man crouched next to a cave entrance. Daniel had heard about the cave. It was there that Sam Finnegan, the Saint-Ferdinand Killer, had been arrested, and where some of his most gruesome pastimes had taken place.
They’d had a huge fight in front of the cave. Daniel accusing his father of forgetting their fishing trip, and the inspector admonishing his son for potentially contaminating a crime scene. The argument was one for the books. A rare occasion when Dan was so sure of the righteousness of his position that, as his dad had taught him, he refused to back down. It took a while, but eventually he was able to do what no one else in Saint-Ferdinand could: wear down his old man.
So they struck a deal. Crowley would make good on his promise, and the two of them would go fishing. In return, the inspector would forget that his son had essentially broken the law by walking through a crime scene. Now, a little more than two hours later, they were on the waters of the lake in Magog, fishing rods in hand.
“What work?” said Crowley, taking mock offense.
“That rock you picked up back at Finnegan’s place.” Dan pointed with a bottle of sunscreen at the stone in his father’s hand. “Isn’t that evidence?”
Crowley turned it over a couple of times. “Nah. If it were, one of the eggheads would have bagged it.”
It was a peculiar stone. Smooth and round, it belonged in a riverbed, not near a cave entrance. More interesting was the symbol sculpted into its surface. An eye with a spiral iris.
“I’ve never seen one that old,” Dan said. “The symbol, I mean.”
The teenager cast his line into the lake. After their fight, they’d taken the boat out and driven to Lac Memphrémagog. The day was old, and any fishing would have been better done at the crack of dawn, but catching fish wasn’t the point of these trips. These little escapes were for the Crowley boys to spend time alone. Stephen needed the break before diving back into his investigation, and the coming days would likely offer few opportunities for this kind of relaxation.
“All right,” said Daniel. “Put that thing away before I skip it across the lake.”
With a smile and a nod, Stephen Crowley tossed the stone in his hands a couple of times before stowing it
in his coat shirt pocket. He leaned backward, letting his face bathe in the hot summer sun. He even allowed himself a brief smile of contentment. This would come to bite him in the ass during the next few days, but he was too proud to put on sunscreen. The burns on his features would turn his already-red skin a vicious shade of crimson, and his temper would be made even more volatile by the accompanying irritation. Even as the light turned his vision a bloody orange red through his closed eyelids, Stephen knew all that, but at this moment, he was fine with it. It was worth the sacrifice.
The inspector exhaled in satisfaction. “Thanks.”
“What for?”
“Twisting my arm and forcing me to do this.”
Daniel loved his father’s boat. Twenty feet long with a powerful outboard motor, it was quite luxurious and roomy for two people to go fishing on. They could have comfortably been six on board with room to spare, but on most occasions it was just the two of them and a cooler filled with drinks and sandwiches. For as long as Daniel could remember, this had been the teenager’s favorite thing to do with his old man.
Stephen, however, looked tired in a way that his son hadn’t seen in a long time. Year after year, he’d seen his old man work himself half to death after each Saint-Ferdinand murder was confirmed. Sleepless nights, absent clues, and evidence that would constantly lead to nothing but disappointment pushed the inspector to his limits, but always he’d been able to get back on his feet. Usually a day off and a long, uninterrupted night of sleep were enough to undo any of the damage.
This time, even though the case was, for all intents, solved, it seemed like the toll had been deeper and had left a more permanent mark on the man. Between smiles and short bouts of serenity, Stephen would get a strange look on his face. A rare combination of worry and frustration. Daniel might have been tempted to call it fear had he not known that his father was incapable of that particular emotion. Besides, the inspector would dance in and out of it so fast that there had to be something more to this new state of mind.