The Hunter’s Oath

by Jason Dean

‘I’ll come to you first,’ Bishop promised.

  TWENTY-TWO

  Bishop was approaching one of the side entrances to Allerdyne Hospital when he saw Gerry puffing on a cigarette about thirty feet from the entrance doors. Which was a first. Three other people, a female nurse and two men, were also smoking near a pedestal ashtray.

  Gerry looked up and his lips parted when he saw Bishop coming towards him. He looked like a kid caught by teacher.

  ‘Didn’t know you smoked,’ Bishop said.

  Gerry’s smile looked strained. He jammed the lit end of the cigarette into the sand and said, ‘I quit in high school. Now I know why.’ He jutted his chin at the small box Bishop was carrying. ‘What’s that?’

  ‘Amy’s bonsai tree. I got it from her work. Apparently, it’s her favourite. Maybe you could place it next to her bed for her.’

  ‘Can’t hurt, I guess,’ Gerry said, taking the box from Bishop.

  As gracious as ever, Bishop thought. He briefly considered mentioning Willard’s presence on the ward, but decided against it. Gerry didn’t need to know the details. Instead, he said, ‘So have they let you in to see Amy yet?’

  ‘About half an hour ago. Seeing her face all beat up like that was something I don’t think I’ll ever forget. Those scummy bastards really did a job on her, didn’t they?’

  Bishop said nothing. He had a feeling the question was rhetorical anyway.

  ‘Look, Bishop, about, uh . . . what happened earlier. You were right. It’s done now. I think we should just forget it and move on, like you said. My family’s all that matters now.’

  ‘That’s good.’ Just a shame you didn’t feel that way earlier.

  ‘Yeah, well,’ Gerry said, puffing out his cheeks. ‘You gonna look in on Amy while you’re here?’

  Bishop checked his watch. 17.13. It would start to get dark pretty soon. And he still had things to do. ‘I don’t think so,’ he said. ‘Maybe later.’

  ‘I get it,’ Gerry said. ‘Got more important stuff to do than check in with your own family, huh?’

  ‘Look, save it for another day, Gerry. I don’t have the patience right now. Are Pat and Lisa still upstairs?’

  Gerry shook his head. ‘No, my folks saw how beat they looked and took them back to the apartment. They’re probably there already.’

  ‘Okay. I’ll go check in with them now.’

  Without another word, Bishop turned and made his way back to Broadway. Once again he wondered how his sister had ended up with such a dickhead for a husband. Knowing Amy as he did, the guy had to have some virtues or he would never have gotten past the starting gate. But if so, they were very well hidden.

  He considered walking the mile to Amy’s, but decided to take a cab instead. As he stood on the sidewalk and waited for one to come along, he thought about Artemis again.

  That Roger Klyce interested him greatly. Bishop couldn’t put his finger on it, but there was definitely something shady about the guy. For instance, while Bishop was no expert on antiques, that oak furniture in his office had looked as though it could fetch a fair few bucks. Not the kind of stuff you generally saw in places financed by donations. Not if the threadbare offices of Equal Aid were any kind of benchmark. And with an information network stretching across the globe, there seemed to be a lot of scope for using that information for personal gain. He’d definitely like to know a little more about Artemis and Roger Klyce. It was just a matter of where to start.

  But first he wanted to check Amy’s home office. He knew his sister better than anybody else on this planet, and one thing he could guarantee was that she never did anything without having some kind of back-up in place. They were similar in that way. So his next task was to take a good look around her PC and see if he was right.

  Bishop saw an on-duty cab approaching and flagged it down. When it stopped, he gave the driver Amy’s address and got in. Four minutes later, the driver pulled into Audubon Avenue. When they reached Amy’s building, Bishop signalled for him to stop. It was a six-storey walk-up tenement like most of them on this street, with its entrance set back from the sidewalk. Bishop walked down the short path, entered the building and took the stairs up to the fourth-floor landing. He walked to the end of the hallway and knocked on the door to apartment 23. He had a key, but he preferred not to use it unless absolutely necessary. A few seconds later, he heard the deadbolt being released from the bolt casing and Arnie Philmore appeared in the doorway.

  ‘Oh, hello again, Bishop,’ he said. ‘I wasn’t expecting you. Come in.’

  ‘Thanks.’

  Bishop followed Arnie down the hallway, past the kitchen and diner on the left, and into the large living room at the end. The three-bedroom apartment hadn’t been much to look at originally. That all changed once Amy and Gerry refurbished it. Now it was all polished wood flooring, exposed brick walls and modern furniture. It had cost, but in Bishop’s opinion it was well worth it. The place felt like a family home. All that was missing was Amy’s warming presence.

  Bishop saw the TV was tuned to a football game. There was nobody else in the living room. ‘Where is everybody?’ he asked.

  ‘Janice went out for some groceries and Pat begged to go along. Lisa’s in her room.’

  ‘Okay, I’ll go and say hello. I need to talk to her about something, anyway.’ He looked at the TV and said, ‘Who’s playing?’

  Arnie walked back to the easy chair. ‘No idea. I was just taking forty.’

  ‘Well, I’ll let you get back to it then,’ Bishop said, and moved to the entranceway on the left. It was another hallway, containing two doors on each side. He rapped a knuckle against the second one on the right. There was no response. He tried again and said, ‘Lisa?’

  Still nothing. Bishop opened the door and saw his niece sitting cross-legged on her bed, listening to her iPod. She was marking a page in a large book as she made notes on a pad. Then she looked up, saw Bishop and removed her earbuds.

  ‘Don’t you ever knock first?’ she asked.

  ‘I did,’ Bishop said. ‘Twice.’

  ‘Oh.’ She glanced at her iPod. ‘Okay.’

  ‘What’s that? Homework?’

  Lisa closed the school book. ‘English Lit. Helps keeps my mind off Mom.’

  ‘Sure, I understand.’

  She gazed levelly at him. ‘So did you want something?’

  ‘Yes. I’m hoping you can help me out.’

  ‘What, like you helped out Mom, you mean?’

  Bishop winced. ‘That again? Want me to get a knife from the kitchen so I can commit ritual suicide in front of you? Think that would help my case at all?’

  ‘I dunno. I guess it would prove you’re good for something.’

  ‘Look, I really hate arguing with you, Lisa. I much preferred it when we were friends.’

  Lisa swept a hand through her long hair. ‘So did I. But Mom always told me real friends look out for each other. Know what I mean?’

  ‘And that’s what I’m trying to do now. I just need your help to do it.’

  ‘What are you talking about?’

  ‘Come next door and I’ll show you.’

  TWENTY-THREE

  Lisa opened up the Internet Explorer browser, clicked on the Hotmail link in the Bookmarks folder and waited for the page to load.

  Bishop sat next to her. Computers had never been his strong suit and he generally preferred to let others do the work. He also took forever to type. They were in a corner of Gerry and Amy’s bedroom that had been set aside for use as a home office. It consisted of a large, L-shaped wooden desk bearing a PC, a printer and a scanner. Underneath was a cabinet with three drawers, and a wastepaper basket. On the wall in front of them were numerous photos of Pat and Lisa at various ages.

  There was also a framed colour shot of Bishop’s parents up there. One he hadn’t seen in a long time. It was of the two of them on a park bench somewhere, laughing at the camera. They looked young – early thirties, maybe – and full of life. The shot was at a low angle
and at a slight tilt, which made Bishop think they’d gotten Amy to take it. That was probably why they were laughing. She would only have been a toddler then. Bishop would have been nothing more than a glint in his father’s eye.

  But looking at the photo now, he was surprised to see how much he took after his old man. He’d never really noticed before, or maybe he’d simply grown into it. But they had the same dark hair, the same light blue eyes, the same strong jawline. And his mother was just as beautiful as he remembered, too, with her long brown hair and dazzling smile.

  Bishop felt himself strangely affected by the photo, which was unlike him. He wasn’t the sentimental type, never had been. No doubt it was brought on by Amy’s current condition. But that was no excuse. He had work to do, and needed to stay objective. He mentally shook himself out of it and came back to the here and now.

  ‘How many personal email accounts does your mom have?’ he asked.

  ‘Two I know about,’ Lisa said. ‘Although there could be more, I guess. Look, you wanna tell me why I’m doing this at all?’

  Bishop thought about what to say. He had to be careful. Telling his niece too much would only worry her even more. Best to keep things as simple as possible.

  He said, ‘I think it’s possible what happened to your mom might have had something to do with her work.’

  Lisa gaped at him. ‘Her work? Are you serious?’

  ‘I said it’s possible. I could be on the wrong track altogether, but I have to know for sure. That’s why I’m here now. To see if she left anything that tells me one way or the other.’

  She frowned at him for a couple more seconds, then turned back to the screen. The page had loaded and Bishop watched her quickly key Amy’s email address into the space. Then she filled in the password slot.

  ‘PATLISA?’ he asked.

  Lisa shrugged. ‘Yeah. Pretty lame, huh?’

  Bishop said nothing. It seemed doubtful Amy would send sensitive information to an account with such an easily decipherable password. The inbox appeared and Bishop saw seven new messages today. They came from a wide variety of sources. Amazon, eBay, Mastercard, plus a few others that looked personal.

  ‘So what are we looking for?’ Lisa asked.

  ‘I’m not sure,’ Bishop said. ‘Possibly a file that your mom sent to herself for safekeeping. Can you check each message for me?’

  ‘Sure,’ Lisa said, and started going through each one. Bishop could tell she was becoming absorbed with the problem at hand despite her ambivalent feelings towards him. As he’d hoped. But a few minutes of searching was enough to tell them there was nothing of interest there. Lisa then navigated to another email site. She typed in a new address and the same password and pressed enter.

  Bishop saw only one new message in this one, from a Pauline. Sent yesterday. Lisa opened it up and Bishop saw it was merely a message from a friend. Nothing more.

  ‘They’re the only two I know of,’ Lisa said. ‘Course, Mom might have sent this file to an online storage service. Let me check her bookmarks and history.’ She scrolled through them both and clicked on several sites that looked like possibles, but each one came up empty. She finally slumped back in her seat. ‘Nothing.’

  Bishop rubbed his palm over his scalp. Something was tingling at the back of his neck. Something to do with his visit to Artemis earlier. But what was it?

  Lisa leaned forward again and started looking through the Applications folder. Bishop watched her highlight the Firefox icon and smile to herself. ‘Thought so. Mom downloaded another browser.’

  ‘She uses more than one,’ Bishop said. ‘Now why didn’t I think of that?’

  ‘Because you’re old,’ Lisa said, and opened it up. She clicked on the drop-down Bookmarks menu and produced a long list of sites.

  ‘To you, everyone’s old,’ Bishop said. ‘That Hushmail link. Try that.’

  Lisa clicked on it. The home page appeared and Bishop was pleased to see the first field was already filled out. Amy745, followed by the Hushmail address. But the password field remained blank. ‘I don’t think your mom would have used PATLISA for this one,’ he said.

  Lisa tried it anyway, and got an ‘incorrect password’ message in return. She tried variations, adding or subtracting various letters, all with the same result.

  ‘Ideas?’ Lisa asked.

  ‘Let me think,’ Bishop said. He looked down at the cabinet at his feet and then slowly pulled open the top drawer. It contained various items of stationery. Lying on top was a small package from Amazon. Opened, from the looks of it. He pulled it out and opened the flap. Inside was an obscure Sinatra CD he’d never heard of before. That was something else Amy had inherited from Mom. ‘Still into Frank, I see.’

  Lisa nodded. ‘Yeah, still buys everything. I tell her she can get it all off iTunes, but you know how old school Mom is. She likes having the actual CD in her hand.’

  Bishop could sympathize, but then he was of the same generation. But seeing the CD, it occurred to him that while he loved his sister unconditionally, it was this younger version of her that always came to mind. The version before the husband and the kids. He’d seen so little of the person she’d grown into. Did he really know her as she was now? Or was he just transposing his own feelings onto her? He didn’t know. But he did know now probably wasn’t the best time to start analysing it too deeply. Maybe once this was all over.

  He looked at the CD again. He could still remember Amy’s favourite album of Sinatra’s. It was the bossa nova one he did back in the sixties with that Brazilian guy, Jobim. Amy had made him listen to it enough times. Bishop had never particularly liked the genre, but he had to admit it was a pretty good album, with Frank’s voice at its silkiest. And he also recalled Amy’s favourite song on the album. Which would logically put it into contention for being her favourite song of all time.

  Why the hell not? ‘Try DINDI,’ he said, and spelt it.

  Lisa keyed it in and pressed enter.

  ‘Incorrect password.’ Lisa sat back in the chair and looked at him.

  Well, it had been worth a shot. Then he remembered something else. About how Amy had almost been angry at the song’s spelling on the cover. ‘Frank sings it as Jinji,’ she’d said to him once, ‘so why can’t they just spell it right?’

  ‘Try J-I-N-J-I,’ Bishop said.

  Lisa typed it in and pressed enter. And then a new page suddenly came up. ‘Hey, cool,’ Lisa said. ‘I’m in.’

  Bishop smiled, then caught sight of the inbox notification and groaned. There were no new emails listed at all. Another dead end. ‘We’re gonna have to think of something else.’

  He looked down at the packaging he held in his hand. And then it suddenly came to him. The mailbox he’d seen when he visited Klyce, right there on the 32nd Place and 48th Avenue intersection. Just a few steps away from the Artemis building. And Amy with her old school mentality. To a person like that, what could be more natural than making a copy of whatever she’d taken and dropping it in the mailbox, addressed to herself? Perhaps with an additional touch of subtlety to ward off any suspicion.

  ‘Lisa,’ he said, ‘has any mail arrived for your mom today?’

  ‘Uh, I think there was some stuff next to the phone in the living room. Want me to go get it?’

  ‘If you could.’

  She got up, left the room, and returned a few seconds later carrying two envelopes and another small package similar to the one he’d just opened. She came over and handed it all over to Bishop.

  He checked the unopened envelopes. One was an advertising mailer from a credit card company. The other was from the WSPA, Amy’s favourite animal charity. He put them down and looked at the package. Another one from Amazon. The company name was printed in big type across the middle of the packaging. Above it was a row of stamps. Underneath was a printed label with a barcode and Amy’s name and address.

  ‘That’s interesting,’ he said.

  ‘What?’ Lisa asked.

  ‘Well, big co
mpanies like Amazon use pre-paid address labels. Yet this one’s got a whole row of stamps on it.’

  He raised an eyebrow at Lisa, then carefully opened the package. There was another CD case inside. He pulled it out and saw it was the album he’d just been thinking about: Francis Albert Sinatra & Antonio Carlos Jobim. The cover photo was a moody shot of Frank in the studio, smoking as he consulted his music sheets.

  So after all these years, Amy had only just gotten round to buying her favourite album on CD? Bishop didn’t believe it.

  Opening the jewel case, he saw the disc was the correct factory pressing. And the booklet was just an eight-page thing with nothing else hidden inside. He pulled the disc out and turned it round. And then he looked down at the jewel case and frowned. The weight was all wrong. It felt too heavy for what should have been an empty case. Carefully, he pulled the black plastic tray away from its housing.

  ‘Hey, look at that,’ Lisa said, wide-eyed.

  There was a second disc hidden underneath. A recordable Sony CD-R.

  TWENTY-FOUR

  Bishop handed the CD to Lisa. Without a word, she opened the disc tray on the hard drive and inserted the CD. After she double clicked on the disc icon a dialog box instantly appeared, asking for a password.

  She turned to him and said, ‘JINJI again?’

  ‘Try it,’ Bishop said, and watched her key in the five letters. She pressed enter and the dialog box immediately disappeared. Another folder opened up, containing a single file.

  ‘Excellent,’ Lisa said. ‘Looks like we’re in.’

  The file was merely called Untitled. From the avatar, even Bishop could tell it was some kind of Word document. Lisa double-clicked on it and the program started up. Within seconds the screen was filled with a page showing what looked to be a basic audio surveillance log.

  ‘This what you meant?’ Lisa asked.

  ‘I’m not sure,’ Bishop said, leaning in closer to look.

  It was a two-page document listing calls made from a New York phone number to a 202 number, and gave the date, the time, and the exact length of each call down to the second. They started on September 29 of this year and ended on October 16, two weeks ago. Bishop counted thirty-seven separate calls in total, all originating from the New York number. There were no outgoing calls from the DC number. Or if there were, they were on another list. The shortest call was twenty-three seconds long. The longest was just over six minutes.