by Joël Dicker
“I never described or imagined Nola the way she was depicted in the press. They twisted my words, Harry!”
“But why the hell did you let Barnaski send that crap to the press in the first place?”
“It was stolen!”
He laughed cynically.
“Stolen? Don’t tell me you’re so naive as to believe whatever bullshit Barnaski is feeding you. I can assure you that he copied and sent those damn pages out himself.”
“What? But—”
“Marcus, I think it would have been better if I’d never met you. Leave now. You’re on my property, and you’re no longer welcome here.”
There was a long silence. The firefighters and policemen were watching us. I picked up my bag, got in my car, and drove away. I called Barnaski right away.
“It’s good to hear from you, Goldman,” he said. “I’ve just seen the news about Quebert’s house. It’s all over the TV. I’m glad you didn’t get hurt. I can’t talk for long—I have a meeting with the heads of Warner Brothers. They’re already considering various screenwriters to write a movie of The Affair based on your first pages. They love it. Imagine how much more money we’ll make if a movie gets made.”
I interrupted him. “There will be no book, Roy.”
“What the hell are you talking about?”
“It was you, wasn’t it? You sent my pages to the press! You’ve fucked up everything.”
“You’re fickle, Goldman. Worse than that, you’re a diva, and I can’t stand divas! You make a big deal of playing detective, and then, on a whim, you give it up. You know what? I’m going to put this down to the bad night you’ve just had and forget all about this phone call. There will be no book? For Christ’s sake, who do you think you are?”
“A real writer. To write is to be free.”
He forced a laugh.
“Bullshit! Who’s been putting that crap in your head? You’re a slave to your career, your ideas, and your success. You’re a slave to your condition. To write is to be dependent. Not only on the people who read your books, but on those who don’t. Freedom is complete bullshit. Nobody’s free. I hold part of your freedom in my hands, just as the company’s shareholders hold part of mine in theirs. Such is life, Goldman. Nobody’s free. If people were free, they would be happy. How many genuinely happy people do you know?” I didn’t reply, so he went on: “Freedom is an interesting concept. I knew a guy who was a trader on Wall Street, one of those golden boys, you know, rolling in money. One of those guys on whom fortune always seems to smile. One day he decided he wanted to be a free man. He saw a TV documentary about Alaska, and he decided he was going to be a hunter, happy and free, living in the open air. He quit his job, sold his apartment, and moved to southern Alaska. And guess what? This guy, who had always been successful at everything he’d done, was successful in this too; he became a genuinely free man. No attachments, no family, no house—just a few dogs and a tent. He was the only truly free man I ever knew.”
“Was?”
“Yes, was. The poor bastard was free for four months, from June to October. And then when winter came, he ended up dying of exposure, having first eaten all of his dogs to stave off starvation. Nobody’s free, Goldman, not even hunters in Alaska. We’re prisoners of other people and of ourselves.”
While Barnaski was talking, I heard a siren behind me: I was being chased by an unmarked police car. I hung up and pulled over to the shoulder, thinking I was about to be arrested for using my cell phone while driving. But it was Sergeant Gahalowood who got out of the car.
He came to my window. “Don’t tell me you’re going back to New York, writer,” he said.
“What gave you that idea?”
“You were heading in that direction.”
“I was just driving without thinking.”
“Hm. Survival instinct?”
“That’s more true than you could imagine. How did you find me?”
“In case you hadn’t noticed, your name is painted in red letters on the hood of your car. This is not the right time to go home, writer.”
“Harry’s house burned down.”
“I know. That’s why I came. You can’t go back to New York.”
“Why not?”
“Because you’re not a quitter. I have rarely seen anyone so tenacious in my whole career.”
“They pillaged my book.”
“But you haven’t written that book yet. Your fate is still in your own hands. You can still do anything you want. You have a gift for creativity. So get to work and write a masterpiece. You’re a fighter, and you know it. You’re a fighter, and you’ve got a book to write. And if you don’t mind my bringing this up, you’ve got me up to my neck in shit. The DA is responsible for this, and so am I. I was the one who told him he had to arrest Harry quickly. I thought that thirty-three years after the murder, a surprise arrest would show confidence. A rookie mistake. And then you turn up, with your patent-leather shoes that would cost me a month’s salary. I don’t want to turn this into a love fest, here on the side of the road, but . . . don’t go. We have to finish this investigation.”
“I have nowhere to sleep now. The house burned down.”
“You’ve just pocketed three million dollars, writer. I saw it in the newspaper. Just rent a suite at a hotel in Concord. I’ll put my lunches on your tab. Speaking of which, I’m starving. Let’s get going. We’ve got work to do.”
During the week that followed, I avoided Somerset. I moved into a suite in a hotel in the center of Concord and spent my days there working hard on both the investigation and my book. The only news I had of Harry came via Roth, who told me that he had moved into room 8 of the Sea Side Motel, and that he didn’t want to see me anymore because I had sullied Nola’s name. Then he added: “So, just out of curiosity, why did you tell the press that Nola was a depressed little whore?”
“I didn’t tell them anything at all! I had written a few notes, and I gave them to Barnaski so he could see that my work was progressing. He faked a robbery and leaked them.”
“If you say so . . .”
“For fuck’s sake, I’m telling the truth!”
“In any case, bravo! I couldn’t have done it better myself.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Turning the victim into a culprit. That’s the surest way of dealing with an accusation.”
“Harry was freed because of the handwriting analysis. You know that as well as I do.”
“Come off it, Marcus. As I told you before, judges are just human beings. What’s the first thing they do when they drink their coffee in the morning? They read the papers, like everyone else.”
Roth was very down-to-earth, but not necessarily unpleasant, and he tried to comfort me by explaining that Harry was undoubtedly upset by the loss of Goose Cove, and that he would begin to feel better once the police had arrested the perpetrator. And there was a lead on this: the day after the fire, having methodically searched the property, they discovered a can of gasoline hidden in the undergrowth—and had managed to get a fingerprint from it. Unfortunately the print did not match any that the police had on file, and Gahalowood believed that, without more evidence, it would be difficult to catch the culprit. According to him, it was probably someone with no previous police record. Nevertheless he thought we could narrow down the search to locals—someone from Somerset who, having committed the crime in broad daylight, had hastily gotten rid of the incriminating evidence out of fear that he or she might be recognized by a passerby.
I had six weeks to turn the tide and make my book great. It was time to fight, and to become the writer I had always wanted to be. Every morning I devoted myself to the book, and in the afternoon I worked on the case with Gahalowood, who had transformed my suite into an extension of his office, using the hotel bellboys to cart around boxes containing witness reports, newspap
er clippings, photographs, and forensic reports.
We started the whole investigation over again at the beginning, rereading the police reports, examining the interviews with all the witnesses at the time. We drew a map of Somerset and its environs, and we calculated all the distances: from the Kellergans’ house to Goose Cove, and from Goose Cove to Side Creek Lane. Gahalowood personally verified all the traveling times, on foot and by car, and he verified even the response time of the local police back then, which turned out to be very fast.
“It is difficult to criticize Chief Pratt’s work,” he told me. “The search was carried out with great professionalism.”
“There’s another thing,” I said. “We know that Harry didn’t write that message on the manuscript. So why was Nola buried at Goose Cove?”
“Because no one was there, I guess. You told me that Harry had been telling everyone he was going away for a while.”
“That’s true. So you think the murderer knew that Harry wasn’t home?”
“It’s possible. But you have to acknowledge that it’s kind of surprising that when Harry came back, he didn’t notice that someone had dug a hole on his property.”
“He wasn’t in a normal state of mind,” I said. “He was devastated. He spent all his time waiting for Nola. That would be enough to distract him from a small pile of overturned earth. Especially at Goose Cove: As soon as it rains there, the ground turns to mud.”
“All right, so the murderer knows that no one will disturb him there. And if the body is ever found, who will be accused?”
“Harry.”
“Exactly.”
“But then why write that message?” I asked. “Why write ‘Good-bye, darling Nola’?”
“That’s the million-dollar question, writer. Well, it is for you, anyway.”
Our main problem was that there were so many divergent clues. Several important questions remained unanswered, and Gahalowood wrote them on large sheets of paper.
Elijah Stern
Why did he pay Nola to pose for a painting?
What motive did he have for killing her?
Luther Caleb
Why did he paint Nola? Why did he hang around Somerset? What motive did he have for killing Nola?
David and Louisa Kellergan
Did they beat their daughter to death?
Why did they hide Nola’s suicide attempt and the fact that she ran away for a week?
Harry Quebert
Guilty?
Chief Gareth Pratt
Why did Nola initiate a relationship with him?
Motive: Did she threaten to talk?
Tamara Quinn states that the page she stole from Harry’s house disappeared. Who took it from the safe at Clark’s?
Who wrote the anonymous letters to Harry? Who knew about him and Nola for thirty-three years and never said anything?
Who set fire to Goose Cove? Who wants to prevent us from finding out the truth?
When Gahalowood had tacked these papers to a wall in my suite, he gave a long, despairing sigh.
“The more we find out, the murkier this gets,” he said. “I think there is some central piece of evidence that would connect all these people and these events. That’s the key to this investigation! If we find the link, we’ll find the murderer.”
He collapsed into an armchair. It was 7 p.m., and he was too tired to think anymore. As I had done every evening for the past several days, I got ready to box. I had found a boxing gym a fifteen-minute drive away—the hotel concierge, who went there himself, had recommended it—and had decided to make my return to the ring.
“Where are you going?” Gahalowood asked.
“Boxing. You want to come?”
“Absolutely not.”
I threw my things in a bag and waved good-bye. “Stay as long as you like. Just close the door behind you.”
“Don’t worry, I got them to give me another room key. Are you really going boxing?”
“Yes.”
He hesitated, and then, as I crossed the threshold, I heard him call out.
“Hang on, writer. Maybe I’ll come with you, after all.”
“What changed your mind?”
“The temptation of beating you up.”
• • •
On Thursday, July 17, we went to visit Neil Rodik, the police captain who had been jointly in charge of the 1975 investigation with Chief Pratt. He was now eighty-five years old and wheelchair bound, and he lived in a nursing home by the ocean. He still remembered the search for Nola; he said it was the biggest case of his career.
“That girl who disappeared . . . what a crazy story!” he told us. “What surprised me most was the part about the father playing music. That always bothered me. I always wondered how he could fail to notice that his daughter had been abducted.”
“So you think she was abducted?” Gahalowood asked.
“It’s difficult to say. No proof either way. Could the girl have gone for a walk outside and been picked up by a maniac in a van? Yeah, sure.”
“Do you, by any chance, remember what the weather was like while you were searching for her?”
“It was terrible. It was raining, very misty. Why do you ask?”
“We were wondering how Harry Quebert could have failed to notice that someone had been digging in his yard.”
“It’s not impossible. It’s a huge property. Do you have a yard, Sergeant?”
“Yes.”
“How big is it?”
“Small.”
“Do you think it would be possible for someone to dig a small hole while you were away that you wouldn’t notice when you got back?”
“Actually, I guess it’s possible.”
On the way back to Concord, Gahalowood asked what I thought.
“The manuscript proves to me that Nola was not abducted from her home,” I replied. “She went to meet Harry. They had arranged to meet at that motel. She left home discreetly, taking with her the only thing that mattered, Harry’s book, which she had kept with her. She must have been abducted on the way to the motel.”
Gahalowood smiled. “I think I’m beginning to like that theory,” he said. “She runs away from home, which explains why no one heard anything. She walks along Shore Road to reach the Sea Side Motel. And it is here that she’s abducted. Or picked up by someone she trusted. The murderer wrote ‘Darling Nola.’ So he knew her. He offers to give her a ride. And then he starts to touch her. Maybe he pulls over to the side of the road and puts his hand up her dress. She puts up a fight. He hits her, and tells her to stop struggling. But he hasn’t locked the car doors, and she manages to escape. She wants to hide in the forest, but who lives close to Shore Road and the Side Creek forest?”
“Deborah Cooper.”
“Exactly. The assailant runs after Nola, leaving his car by the side of the road. Deborah Cooper sees them and calls the police. While that’s happening, the assailant catches Nola in the spot where her blood and hair is later found; she defends herself, and he beats her severely. Perhaps he even rapes her. But that’s when the police arrive. Officer Dawn and Chief Pratt start searching the forest and gradually move closer to him. So he drags Nola into the depths of the forest, but she manages to escape again and gets back to Deborah Cooper’s house, where she takes refuge. Dawn and Pratt continue searching the forest. They are too far away to realize what’s happening. Deborah Cooper lets Nola into the kitchen and rushes to the living room to call the police. When she comes back, the assailant is there; he has entered the house to get Nola back. He shoots Cooper in the heart and takes Nola with him. He takes her to his car and throws her in the trunk. She is maybe still alive, but probably unconscious: She has lost a lot of blood. It is at this point that he passes the deputy sheriff’s car. A chase begins. Having eluded his pursuers, he goes to hi
de out at Goose Cove. He knows the house is empty, that nobody will disturb him there. The police are searching for him farther away, on the Montburry road. He leaves his car in Goose Cove, with Nola inside; maybe he even hides it in the garage. Then he goes down to the beach and walks back to Somerset. Yes, I’m sure he lives in Somerset: He knows all the roads, he knows the forest, he knows Harry is away. He knows everything. He goes home without anyone noticing him. He showers, changes his clothes, and then, when the police arrive at the Kellergan house, where Nola’s father has just announced her disappearance, he mingles with the crowd of onlookers on Terrace Avenue. That’s why the murderer was never found: because, when everyone was searching for him in the area around Somerset, he was actually in Somerset, in the center of the action.”
“Goddamn it,” I said. “So he was there?”
“Yes. I think he’s been there all this time. All he would have to do is return to Goose Cove in the middle of the night, getting there via the beach. By this point, I think, Nola must have been dead. So he buries her on the property, at the edge of the forest, where nobody will notice that the ground has been dug up. Then he picks up his car and parks it in his own garage, where he leaves it for quite a while so as not to awaken suspicions. The perfect crime.”
I was blown away.
“What does that suggest about our suspect?” I asked.
“A single man. Someone who was able to act without anyone asking questions, without anyone wondering why he no longer took his car out of the garage. Someone with a black Chevrolet Monte Carlo.”
I let myself get carried away. “All we have to do is find out who in Somerset had a black Chevy at the time, and we’ll have our man!”
Gahalowood instantly calmed me down.
“Pratt thought of that back then. Pratt thought of everything. His report includes a list of people who owned Monte Carlos in and around Somerset. He went to visit each of them, and they all had solid alibis. All but one: Harry Quebert.”