The River Killings

by Merry Jones

  She looked at Susan for a long moment. Susan stared back, eyes shining. Then Agent Ellis turned to me, her jaw extended, bullying.

  “This case is FBI now. You hear or see or remember or even think you remember something, you call me, for your own sakes.” She handed us each a card. “Someone contacts you, you call me. You even dream about the case, you call me. Understood?”

  Agent Ellis nodded, first at Susan, then at me. “Mrs. Cum-mings. Ms. Hayes.” When our eyes met, she winked. “Nice meeting you both.” Then she slid off the booth and vanished into the rear of the restaurant.

  THIRTEEN

  THERE WASN’T EVEN THE HINT OF A BREEZE, AND THE ASPHALT of the streets seemed to steam in the unnatural heat, sizzling almost as intensely as Susan. Dripping sweat, we stomped ahead without a destination.

  “Why didn’t you just deck her?” I asked. “Could you have been a little more belligerent?”

  “Screw her.” Susan was still mad. “I’m not going to be intimidated by some self-important female Eliot Ness wannabe.”

  “Susan, maybe you should pick your enemies. An FBI agent may not be someone you want to mess with.”

  “She was in my face. She thinks her badge is a license to bully people? Well, she picked the wrong victim.”

  Great. Susan was in her prizefighter mode. When she got upset, she started swinging; probably this reaction served her well as a criminal attorney. I wasn’t sure, though, that it was an asset outside of the courtroom.

  I looked over my shoulder to see if anyone was walking behind us, saw an elderly man, limping with a cane, about four steps back.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Looking around.” I faced forward and spoke softly, trying not to move my lips. “To see if someone’s following us.” “Nobody’s following us, Zoe.” “Agent Ellis was. She followed us to the deli—” “And she said what she had to say. Now she’s done.” “How do you know?”

  “The FBI can’t keep a tail on every person who might or might not know some tiny detail about every single case they’re investigating. They don’t have enough people. So she made her point, and now she’ll leave us alone.”

  We kept walking, and I kept looking behind us, ahead of us, across the street. Crossing Fourth Street, I looked to my left and right, straining my peripheral vision for anyone suspicious, anyone who might be stalking us. Didn’t that man in the denim cutoffs look just a little too casual? Wasn’t that woman’s handbag way too large? And why was she looking at us? Why, when I spotted her, did she look away? By the time we got to Three Bears park, I’d identified at least forty people who were probably on our tail.

  “Let’s sit a minute,” Susan suggested. “I’ve got to get to work, but first I need to think.”

  “It’s too hot to think,” I said. “My brain’s melted.”

  But the shade looked welcoming. We entered the park, passing the familiar concrete statue of The Three Bears, and settled on a shady bench behind the toddler swings. probably, without being aware of it, we’d been heading to the park all along, like homing pigeons returning to a safe place.

  We sat surrounded by the comforting shrieks of children at play, the commotion of little limbs running and climbing and chasing.

  “So. Look around. See anyone suspicious?” Susan said.

  “See anyone who isn’t?”

  “You mean, over the age of four?”

  “Obviously. Under four, they’re all suspicious.”

  A heavyset nanny pushing a little boy on the swings smiled at us. I eyed her suspiciously and looked away.

  “Okay, be honest.” Susan wiped her forehead. “Is it just me? Or was Agent Ellis really a butch belligerent bitch?”

  I had to concede. “Both. Agent Ellis could use some work on her people skills. But it’s just you who’d take her on.”

  “I don’t get it,” Susan said. “What does she think we know? What does she want from us?”

  “I have no clue. But I’m calling Nick. Maybe he’ll know what’s going on.” I took out my cell and punched his number on auto-dial.

  Nick’s voice mail invited me to leave a message, so I did. Then, hot and tired and not knowing what else to do, I sat in the shade beside Susan, watching a pair of determined toddlers climb the jungle gym where Molly and Emily had played only eye blinks ago. Now, Molly thought she was far too sophisticated for Three Bears, called it the “baby park.” When had Molly stopped being a baby? How had time passed so quickly? I looked around at the young mothers with their small children, feeling as if I were watching my own past. How many hours had I spent in this park watching Molly, pushing her on the swings? Suddenly, all the cliches about time fleeting and kids growing up fast seemed painfully accurate and un-cliche-like. A priest walked by, smiling gently as if reading my thoughts.

  “Well,” Susan said. “Want to go?”

  A hefty grandmotherly woman pushed a baby carriage over and planted herself on the bench right beside me, too close, especially in this heat. Odd, because there were plenty of vacant benches all over the park.

  “Mind if I sit here, dear?” she asked after she sat.

  “No problem. Actually, we’re leaving.” I began to stand.

  “Wait. Don’t go yet.” The woman spoke softly, sweetly. “Just sit still, as if everything’s fine.”

  The woman smiled and touched my arm with a surprisingly smooth, unfreckled hand. I looked at Susan, who looked back at me, baffled and a little alarmed. I tried to move my arm away, but the woman held on to it, as if to stop me. My cell phone was still in my free hand; I considered calling for help. But what would I say? Hello, 9-1-1? An old lady is touching my arm? I told myself that I was overreacting; the old lady might just be lonely, might be senile and not even realize that she was clutching me. Even so, I sat still, not calling 9-1-1, not turning around. Obeying a stranger.

  “Lovely afternoon,” the old lady mused, her hand beginning to feel like a bony vise. “But so hot. I think it’s supposed to rain later in the week.”

  Susan was on her feet, ready to go.

  “Sit down, dear,” the woman told her. “Both of you. Sit with me awhile.” Holding my arm with one hand, she reached inside the carriage with the other. I looked but saw no baby, only a lumpy bundle of blankets. Why was she pushing a carriage with no baby? Was she crazy? Or was she hiding something in the blankets? A gun? A bomb?

  “Come on, Zoe. We’re leaving.” Susan took hold of my free arm and pulled. The old lady pulled back with surprising strength. It was tug-of-war, and I was the rope.

  “Get up,” Susan grunted.

  “Sit down,” the old woman insisted.

  “Let me go,” I groaned.

  “Hush up,” the hedge behind us commanded. “And Mrs. Cum-mings, sit down.” The voice trembled, rumbling like thunder.

  Nostrils flaring, Susan let go of my arm and sat on the edge of the bench, poised to take off. The old woman released the carriage, but not my arm. We sat in tense silence for a moment until the priest who’d walked by moments ago emerged from the dogwood hedges behind us. Elderly and stocky, he walked with a stride too limber for his age and girth, and he perched on the edge of a concrete planter beside our bench.

  “Ms. Hayes. Mrs. Cummings.” He called our names as if starting a meeting. As he spoke, the rest of the park seemed to fade away, leaving only the four of us under the shady limbs of an oak.

  “Father Joseph Xavier,” the priest introduced himself. “This is Sonia Vlosnick.” The old woman nodded, smiling sweetly, her hand still on my arm.

  “We had no intention of startling you. We merely wish to talk.”

  “Then tell Ms. Vlasic to let go of my friend.”

  “Vlosnick,” Sonia corrected. “Vlasic’s the pickles. But please, dear, call me Sonia.”

  “Let her go, Sonia.”

  “Let me go, Sonia.” Susan and I spoke together, a fuming duet. The priest said something to Sonia in a language I didn’t recognize. Sonia released me, leaving an angry red
handprint above my wrist.

  “I’m so sorry if I hurt you, dear.” She patted the red marks. “But I had to make sure you wouldn’t run off before Father Joseph determined that we were safe here.”

  “Who the hell are you?” Susan was more than ready to run off anyway.

  “Let me explain,” the priest said. “I work unofficially with an immigration organization based in northeast philadelphia. Sonia represents a coalition of citizens concerned with illegal immigrants.”

  “What organization? What coalition?” I tried to sound authoritative. Who were these people? The priest paused, gazing across the park.

  “Actually, there are several. The pennsylvania Immigration and Citizenship Coalition.” The woman smiled. “And the Archdiocese and the Nationalities Service Center, and—”

  “We’ve come about the young ladies,” the priest interrupted. “The ones you found.”

  “We hope you can help us.” Sonia’s voice was high and birdlike. She began to roll the carriage back and forth as if rocking a baby to sleep. I rubbed my arm.

  “It’s terribly important that we learn everything we can about the women. What you saw. What condition the bodies were in. Who else was on the scene. And what was in the water with them.”

  Why? Who were these people that they should want to know about nineteen dead women? I leaned closer to Susan, jabbing her lightly with my elbow, hoping she’d take my cue and run with me screaming out of the park. But Susan didn’t notice my jab. I leaned forward, trying to catch her eye, but she didn’t look at me.

  “We’ve already given statements to the police,” she said. “We don’t know anything else. There were a bunch of them and they were all dead; that’s all we know.”

  “Not quite all, dear.”

  The priest looked over Sonia’s shoulder, scanning trees and rooftops. His gaze never rested in one place. When he spoke, his voice was soft and gritty, like pouring sand. “pardon my lack of eye contact. What Sonia and I do is quite dangerous. We have to be aware of who’s around at all times.”

  Sonia nodded. “We’re dressed this way to conceal our identities.” She leaned close, whispering. “Father’s mustache isn’t real.”

  “Sonia—” The priest scowled and muttered foreign syllables.

  “My bosom isn’t either,” Sonia continued undeterred. I looked at her more closely. A fine cloth seam peeked out along her hairline; her gray twisted bun was a wig. Oh, Lord. Who were these people? I clutched the phone, ready to speed-dial the police.

  “Our work is risky, so we need to keep our relationship confidential—”

  Relationship? We had a relationship?

  “He’s right, dears. You mustn’t tell anyone about us.” Sonia looked at me. “Even your policeman friend.”

  They knew about Nick? How? I examined their faces, wondering what about them, if anything, was real. Their noses? The color of their eyes? Would Susan or I be able to recognize them if we saw them again?

  The priest turned and faced the park, looking around, smiling at the nanny by the swings. “My group is dedicated to rescuing the captives and destroying the traffickers. Sonia’s assists those who’ve been rescued or who’ve managed to escape.”

  Susan squinted, suspicious and angry, maybe about to explode.

  “Well, I don’t see what we can do for you.” I spoke so Susan wouldn’t. “The women we found were beyond saving.”

  Father Joseph Xavier watched a little boy careen down the slide. “Let me clarify. The women you found were but a small part of a much larger shipment by a particular dealer. That dealer handles dozens of such deliveries each year. philadelphia’s a transit point for their northeast and mid-Atlantic regions.”

  The slave trade was divided into regions. Like soft-drink distribution and automobile dealerships. In this century. In America.

  “And the authorities don’t stop them, dears—”

  “Sonia, be quiet. Let me finish.” The priest spoke firmly, clasping his rough, unpriestlike hands. “The INS, the FBI, the police— all the authorities who are supposed to apprehend these criminals are completely inept. Useless. In fact, we know for certain that several of those agencies have been infiltrated by the cartels. Others—like the Archdiocese, the Farmworkers and so on—they try to help, but they’re limited legally and financially. So, Sonia and I have come to represent a different group . . . less restrained than formal organizations. We conduct discreet rescue missions. We free captives and destroy traffickers by any means necessary, without regard to bureaucracy.”

  Oh dear. Sonia and Father Joseph looked elderly and harmless. Apparently, though, they were neither. Who were they? Who funded them? Who provided their information? Susan’s brow was furrowed.

  “But really, we don’t know anything,” I repeated.

  “Just tell us exactly what you told the police,” Sonia said.

  “No. We’re not telling them a damned thing, Zoe,” Susan snapped. “Why should we? Who the hell are they? We’re going to confide in strangers wearing disguises? Please. I’m not talking to some clown in a costume. This is bullshit.”

  Oh, excellent. Here we go, I thought. Susan was openly defying, even insulting them. Two disguised potential hit men with a possible bomb in their buggy had all but abducted us, and Susan was challenging their authority to ask us questions.

  The priest’s eyes darted around. “I advise you to keep your voice down, Mrs. Cummings.”

  “Look, dears. We have reason to believe that the cartel is in an uproar, and not just because of the loss of those poor women. Apparently, other materials were lost as well. Materials that contain critical information—”

  The priest interrupted, blinking rapidly, urgent. “Just tell us one thing. Did you find anything—anything at all—in the water besides bodies?”

  Susan and I exchanged silent glances.

  “Do try to trust us, dears,” Sonia cooed. When she reached into her diaper bag I thought she was going to pull out a gun. Instead, she took out two business cards and handed one to each of us. “This is the phone number where you can reach us. Day or night. Sometimes, the smallest detail can be important. Things they wore, like lockets or rings, can help us identify them. Or things they held on to, like photographs. Or things floating in the water with them—”

  Like a Humberton hat? No, Sonia couldn’t have known about that. Nick said nobody knew.

  “Or marks on their bodies. Some of the larger cartels mark their people with logos.”

  I swallowed and said nothing, recalling what Nick had told me that three wavy lines had been tattooed on each woman’s shoulder.

  “They brand them,” Sonia explained, “so, if one escapes, she’ll be identified and returned to the cartel.”

  “We didn’t see anything like that.” Susan was adamant.

  The priest took out his handkerchief and wiped sweat from his forehead. In the heat, his dark, collared costume must have been unbearable.

  Sonia rocked the carriage back and forth. “Well, it gets quite grisly, dears. More so than you want to know.”

  “You’re right. We don’t know and we don’t want to know—”

  “How callous of you, Mrs. Cummings.” The priest’s voice was raspy and cold. “They were poor and helpless. Uneducated. Desperate. Risking everything to come here in hopes of jobs or marriage or just chances at survival. Instead, they were brutalized, taken into slavery. They lived in fear of the cartels and the INS. Fear that their families would be punished or killed. Fear of being deported home and imprisoned, tortured or killed. Fear ruled their lives, so they’d become quite docile.”

  Susan’s eyes fired up and she shook her head. I knew she was girding for a debate. “It’s hard for us to imagine,” I blurted, swinging my leg and kicking Susan to shut her up.

  “Ouch,” Susan yelped.

  “Shush,” I whispered.

  Sonia conferred with the priest in their tongue. “Why’d you kick me?” Susan rubbed her leg, irked. “So you’d be quiet.”


  “Really. Didn’t it occur to you to say ‘Be quiet’? Or did you see no alternative to breaking my leg?”

  “Please, Susan. I didn’t kick you that hard.” “I’ll be limping for a week.”

  “Okay,” Father Joseph said. “Since you apparently have trouble accepting what we’re telling you, we’re going to show you. If these women are seen talking to the police or the government, or trying to run away, they are tortured and disfigured, maybe killed. By the time they get here, they know this. They’ve seen what their captors will do.” The priest’s eyes had hardened to shining steel. He pulled an envelope out of his pocket and held it out to us. “Look. See for yourself.”

  Neither of us reached for the envelope, so he opened it and took out some photographs. I looked away, but not before seeing shiny globs of red and black. Oh, Lord. Charred flesh?

  “You can see why it’s important, dears,” Sonia urged. “Tell us everything you saw. Even the FBI might not know what to make of the information, but we will. Tell us, for your own good.” So-nia’s voice was soft and melodic, but her words sounded chilling.

  “We have nothing to tell you.” Susan shoved the pictures back at the priest.

  My cell phone began to ring. Maybe it was Nick calling back. Or Molly with a problem at school. Or the FBI agent warning that two psychos might ambush us in the park. I began to reach for it, but Sonia intervened, pushing my hand away, shaking her head, no. The priest was still talking, looking grave.

  “. . . And, in that case, you’ll need our help.”

  In what case?

  “This is an international multibillion-dollar, multitiered enterprise involving millions of women. Its tentacles reach everywhere— into governments, into law enforcement, into communities—”

  “He’s right, dears. And you can’t count on the authorities; they may have been compromised. So don’t talk to them—especially about us.”

  “Mrs. Cummings, Ms. Hayes.” Father Joseph’s eyes remained focused on the playground. “The people who run this operation …human life is nothing to them. They don’t care if you really know anything about them or not. It’s enough for them that you might. If they suspect that you might give a tidbit of information to the authorities or to us, they won’t risk it. They’ll eliminate you without hesitation.”