The Dead Room

by Chris Mooney

  ‘Darby,’ Coop said, ‘why don’t you give us a moment?’

  ‘She don’t got to go,’ Baxter said. ‘Ain’t nothing I’m going to say to you that I wouldn’t say in front of her. Just because you live here, Coops, doesn’t change the fact you’re a cop.’ She rolled her head to him with that dead expression in her eyes. ‘Makes things nice and easy for you now, don’t it?’

  Darby said, ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

  ‘I’m just busting Coop’s balls, is all,’ Baxter said. She checked her watch. ‘Can we wrap this party up? I’m bushed. I’ve been on my feet all night.’

  ‘I didn’t know Wal-Mart stayed opened so late,’ Coop said.

  ‘Don’t start in on me, Coops, okay?’

  ‘Did you quit or did you get fired again?’

  ‘I had to give it up,’ Baxter said. ‘All the people working there no hablo inglés. Since I don’t speak Spanish, I opted for early retirement.’

  ‘So you’re, what, back to stripping?’

  ‘Go home, Coops. I’m too tired and too old for another intervention speech. Better yet, why don’t you use it on yourself?’

  ‘Good seeing you, Michelle. Take care.’ He looked at Darby and nudged his head to the door.

  ‘Michelle,’ Darby said, ‘the man you were speaking to wasn’t a cop.’

  ‘Then why would he be carrying a badge?’

  ‘He’s pretending to be a cop.’

  ‘I don’t know what to tell you. I saw a badge.’

  ‘Then why did you speak to him? I thought you people lived and died by that whole code of silence thing?’

  Baxter laughed softly. ‘You people.’

  ‘Why did you speak to him?’

  ‘Didn’t have much of a choice. This guy can be very persuasive.’

  Can be, Darby thought. ‘How do you know him?’

  ‘Look, it doesn’t matter. Telling you ain’t going to change anything.’

  ‘Then go ahead and tell me.’

  Baxter took a long drag from her cigarette and stared into space, as if the life she had envisioned for herself was waiting for her somewhere on the other side of these flat roofs and dirty windows, a place light-years away from these historic streets where Paul Revere and other American Revolutionaries had successfully fought off wave after wave of invading British troops.

  Coop stepped up next to Darby and said, ‘This is a waste of time. Let’s go.’

  ‘My mother, God rest her soul, had a coke problem – a real bad one,’ Baxter said. ‘Towards the end, she started hocking pretty much everything we owned, which wasn’t much to begin with, and when Mr Sullivan –’

  ‘Michelle,’ Coop said, ‘you don’t need to go down this road.’

  ‘Why don’t you grab yourself a beer or something?’ Baxter said, flicking her cigarette into the air. ‘Better yet, go to my bathroom medicine cabinet and feel free to use the stuff I take for my periods. That should take care of your PMS or whatever’s crawled up your ass.’

  38

  Darby watched Baxter pull a bottle of Budweiser from the cooler set up next to her chair. Her attention – her concern – lay with Coop. For some reason the expression on his face triggered a memory of her mother – Sheila pacing the emergency waiting room while Big Red was being cut open on the operating table; her mother, a nurse, already knowing that the window of hope had slammed shut, that her husband of twenty-two years had lost too much blood and was brain dead.

  ‘Now I always knew my mom liked coke,’ Baxter said, tossing the beer cap on to the balcony floor. ‘I caught her snorting it a couple of times with one of her boyfriends, but I had no idea how serious her problem was until Mr Sullivan told me. Mr Sullivan is Frank Sullivan, by the way. Everyone in town called him Mr Sullivan, even the old timers. The man was big on respect, as I’m sure Coops told you. Coops, you remember that time –’

  ‘Let’s skip the trip down memory lane, okay?’ Coop said. ‘Do you know the name of the cop or not?’

  ‘Maybe Darby here would like to know what it was like growing up here in Chuck-town with Mr Sullivan,’ Baxter said. ‘I’m getting the feeling you haven’t told her about your own, you know, personal experiences.’

  ‘Let’s go, Darby. This is a waste of time.’

  ‘So here’s Mr Sullivan coming up to me one day after school saying my mother’s been rushed to the hospital,’ Baxter said. ‘Overdose, he says. Naturally, I’m upset. My mom and me, we didn’t get along too well, especially after my old man split, but I was only thirteen and the woman, despite all her faults, she was my whole world, you know?

  ‘Mr Sullivan puts his arm around me while I’m standing there bawling, and the whole time he’s telling me not to worry. He going to take care of the problem, get this shit all straightened out, he says. I get in his car and he takes me to the mall to buy some new clothes, makeup, perfume – whatever I want, he says. No girl my age, he says, should look the way I do.

  ‘On the way home, Mr Sullivan tells me about all the money my mom owes for her coke problem – a figure that doesn’t include what she’s gonna owe the hospital since she don’t got no health insurance. So he takes me back to his house, tells me to go upstairs and get cleaned up ’cause we’re going over to the hospital so the three of us can sit down and have a nice little chat about how to fix the problem. I’m still crying and having this… this out-of-body experience I guess you could call it when Mr Sullivan decides to get into the shower with me. He tells me to be strong. I’ve got to be strong for my mother.’

  Baxter took a long drag from her cigarette. ‘I always wonder what would have happened if I hadn’t decided to try and fight him. Maybe then he wouldn’t have used the gun.’

  Coop pinched his forehead between his fingers. Baxter drank her beer. Darby stood stock still.

  ‘The girls I met were real nice,’ Baxter said. ‘They were around my age. They showed me how to get these guys off real quick.’

  ‘What girls?’ Darby said. ‘What are you talking about?’

  ‘Mr Sullivan threw these private parties at these ritzy Boston hotels. He rented out the suites twice a month. Me and the girls he brought there had full use of the bar. Top-shelf stuff. And there was plenty of coke, H, whatever we wanted. I snorted a little H to take the edge off some of the rougher ones.’

  ‘How many times did this happen?’

  ‘I stopped counting after the first month or two.’

  ‘Did you report this?’

  ‘You mean to the police?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  Baxter laughed. ‘Who do you think I was blowing at the hotel?’

  Coop said, ‘I think we’ve heard enough.’

  ‘I didn’t learn about the videotapes until later,’ Baxter said. ‘Mr Sullivan had set up video cameras in case some of these cops, I don’t know, didn’t cooperate with him or something. I think he ended up selling the tapes to some porno guys in China or Japan. They’re into that real kinky shit over there. Hey, Coops, didn’t you see one of the tapes at Jimmy DeCarlo’s bachelor party?’

  Coop didn’t answer. The sweat on his face had nothing to do with the heat.

  ‘What happened?’ Baxter asked. ‘To that tape, I mean?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ he said, strangled by the words.

  ‘Oh. I thought you might have destroyed it. Doesn’t matter, it’s probably already on some internet site.’

  Darby said, ‘Did you tell your mother what Sullivan did to you?’

  ‘She already knew,’ Baxter replied. ‘Mr Sullivan showed her the Polaroids at the hospital, the ones where he had a gun pressed to my head. The ones of me sucking him off – those really upset her.’

  ‘Your mother told you this?’

  ‘She didn’t have to. Mr Sullivan brought me with him to the hospital. I was there when he showed her the pictures. I think he wanted me there to drive his point home.’

  ‘Did your mother go to the police?’

  ‘Are you for real? She told me to ke
ep my mouth shut and do my time or else I might wind up like some of Mr Sullivan’s other lady friends. Since I’m sitting here talking to you, guess what decision I made?’

  Darby felt her head spinning, not knowing what was worse: the way the woman spoke in the emotionless tone of a lobotomy patient as she recounted the horrific details of her repeated rapes at the hands of cops and a former gangster; or how the horror had been sanctioned by her own mother.

  ‘Michelle,’ Darby said, ‘do you know the names of any missing women who dated Sullivan?’

  ‘Nothing’s coming to mind. Ask Coop. He dated a couple of Mr Sullivan’s young lady friends.’

  ‘No,’ he said, his voice raw. ‘I didn’t.’

  ‘That’s right, I forgot. You didn’t date them, you just screwed them. You and the other boys at the hotel parties.’

  Coop pushed himself away from the railing. ‘I never took part in any of that shit, Michelle, and you know it.’

  ‘Hey, I’m not judging you for dipping your wick. That’s for priests, right?’

  ‘Fuck this – and fuck you, Michelle,’ he said. ‘I’m out of here.’

  Coop opened the sliding glass door, then slammed it back against the frame. Darby watched him go, wanting to follow, wanting to know what the hell had just happened.

  39

  Baxter picked up her pack of Marlboros and said, ‘I think I embarrassed him.’

  Darby, despite her shock and confusion, felt an undercurrent of anger at the woman. ‘I’d say you went out of your way to provoke him.’

  ‘Me and Coops got sort of a history together.’

  ‘What kind of a history? Did you two date?’

  ‘I wish. He’s got much higher standards, unfortunately, and he’s got his pick of the litter ’cause he’s so goddamn pretty. Every woman I know wants to get in the sack with him. I’m sure you’ve thought about it, am I right?’

  ‘What’s the deal between you two?’

  ‘That’s for him to tell you. And I think it’s time I called it a night.’

  ‘Sit down. I have some more questions about these cops you met at the hotel parties.’

  ‘I don’t know any of their names, if that’s what you’re asking. For some strange reason, they didn’t tell me.’

  ‘Would you recognize their faces?’

  ‘They wore Halloween masks. You can do all sorts of things when you wear a mask.’

  ‘Did you overhear any names? Did any of the other women mention anything to you?’

  ‘No and no. All I saw were their cocks. You got mugshots of pricks, I might be able to help you out.’

  ‘The man who was speaking to you earlier –’

  ‘He’s a cop,’ Baxter said, lighting another cigarette. ‘Don’t ask me for his name again because he’s never had one.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘I mean there are people who float in and out of here like ghosts. Ask Coop. He’ll tell you the same thing.’

  ‘Was this cop one of the men you met at the hotel?’

  ‘It wouldn’t surprise me.’

  ‘What about the girls at the hotel, did you know them?’

  Baxter leaned her head back and stared up at the dark sky as she smoked. ‘Most of them are dead or in jail.’

  ‘Did you know any of them?’

  ‘Some of them were from Charlestown. Mr Sullivan liked local girls. Town pride and all.’

  ‘Was one of these girls Kendra Sheppard?’

  ‘I don’t know anyone by that name.’

  ‘You sure? She grew up here. As a matter of fact, her parents were murdered about three blocks away. I’m sure you remember it. Her parents were shot to death while they were sleeping. Then Kendra mysteriously vanished.’

  ‘Lots of people died here. Or disappeared.’

  ‘Michelle, why did you tell me that story about you and your mother?’

  ‘Thought you might appreciate a history lesson, Doc.’

  ‘I think it’s more than that,’ Darby said.

  Doors slammed shut in the distance. Baxter acted as if she’d heard a gunshot. She jumped to her feet and, clutching the railing with both hands, stared wide-eyed down the dark street at a group of people armed with buckets, shovels and sifting equipment standing around a van. Darby could make out the pudgy outline of Dr Edgar patting down his tufts of wild Albert Einstein hair.

  ‘Who are those people?’ Baxter asked.

  ‘They’re anthropology students.’

  Baxter seemed confused.

  ‘They’re here to dig up the bones in the basement,’ Darby said. ‘We found three sets of remains. All women.’

  Baxter didn’t say anything. She watched the group of men filing into the house.

  ‘It going to be hard to identify these women,’ Darby said. ‘Someone removed their teeth along with their hands and feet. If you know something that could help us –’

  ‘Sorry, but I can’t help you.’

  ‘Can’t or won’t?’

  ‘You can’t find ghosts.’

  ‘I’m not following.’

  ‘I mean there are still some people who float through this town that don’t have any names. They just come and go. Like ghosts.’

  ‘Like the man you were speaking to earlier?’

  Baxter kept her eyes on the house. ‘You seem like a good person, but the thing is nobody here’s gonna talk to you. They do and they’re going to disappear or have an accident. That badge clipped to your belt? You might as well be smeared in dogshit.’

  Darby leaned her elbows on the railing, next to Baxter, and said, ‘Kendra Sheppard was living in Vermont with her son.’

  No reaction.

  ‘Kendra was living under another name – Amy Hallcox,’ Darby said. ‘She and her son came to Belham a few days ago.’

  ‘How old is her son?’

  ‘Twelve. A man pretending to be a Federal agent came into his hospital room, and Sean – that’s Kendra’s son – Sean was terrified at the thought of going away with this man and do you know what he did?’

  Baxter didn’t answer.

  ‘Sean tried to commit suicide,’ Darby said. ‘Shot himself in the head. It seems he was carrying a gun with him for protection. Before he tried to kill himself, he told me that his mother was afraid of these people finding her. And they did. In Belham. Want to know what happened to Kendra?’

  ‘Not really.’

  ‘Someone tied her down to a chair and slit her throat.’

  Baxter looked down at the railing and picked at a paint chip with a long fingernail decorated with fake diamonds, moons and stars.

  ‘Do you know why anyone would do something like that?’ Darby asked.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Did you know Kendra Sheppard had changed her name and run away?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘You willing to say that under oath?’

  ‘Sure, why not? You can swear me in right now if you want. There’s a Bible underneath one of the kitchen chair legs. I need something to keep the table from wobbling.’

  ‘If you’re scared, I can put you into protective custody.’

  ‘With the Feds?’ Baxter laughed. ‘Thanks, but no. I’ll take my chances here in the real world.’

  Darby tried another way in. ‘Michelle, what you went through… I can’t tell you how sorry I am.’ She hoped her true feelings came across in her voice. ‘You didn’t deserve that. Nobody does.’

  ‘Wasn’t looking for your pity. I just wanted to explain the lay of the land here.’

  ‘I can give you the name of some counsellors who can work with you on a pro bono basis.’

  ‘Talking isn’t going to change what happened. It don’t erase what you carry around inside your head.’

  ‘It can help.’

  ‘Thanks, but I think I’ll stick with Ambien and Percocet. They work wonders.’

  Darby placed her business card on the railing. ‘Tomorrow, when you’re sober, give me a call and we’ll talk.’

  Baxt
er pushed herself off the railing and stubbed out her cigarette on the card. ‘Feel free to help yourself to some beers on your way out.’

  40

  Darby closed the door to Baxter’s apartment and stood alone in the dark hallway, feeling dizzy, wobbly on her feet. Not from the woman’s story. Baxter’s repeated victimization and humiliation by a sexual predator and possible serial killer… that story and all of its variants had been around since the dawn of time. Darby had a collection of them dating back to her early days at the crime lab, when she’d be called to the hospital to administer yet another rape kit to a female victim – always young, always vulnerable. Hearing these stories and witnessing first-hand how each of these women had been abused and assaulted had inoculated her against the myriad ways in which men inflicted pain, fear and degradation (and then later, out in the field, death). See it often enough, listen to the same stories over and over again, and a normal, healthy mind has no choice but to protect itself. Much like the person nailing boards across the windows of his home to protect the vulnerable areas from yet another unpredictable hurricane, you had to batten down the hatches or risk permanent damage.

  But every castle, no matter how well fortified, always has vulnerable areas. It doesn’t matter how many hurricanes it has endured or survived, each storm is different, unique in its own way. What had penetrated Darby, had made her legs feel boneless as she walked down the steps to the front door, was the way Baxter had spoken in a lifeless – no, soulless – tone about her personal horrors. It was as if God himself had whispered her fate against her ear. Sorry, but you don’t have a choice here, you’re just going to have to accept it.

  And that was exactly what had happened. Baxter couldn’t turn to the police. And her mother, the single person on the planet entrusted with the responsibility for protecting her, had told her daughter to keep her mouth shut and do her time. Jesus.

  Darby opened the front door and spotted Coop pacing across the street. He was on his mobile. He saw her coming, said something to the person on the other end of the line and hung up.

  He stepped out from the thinning crowds and met her in the middle of the street. In all her years of knowing him, she had never seen him this angry. Or hurt.