The Burning Soul

by John Connolly

  The bridge came into view, the slowly rotting pilings of its predecessor beside it like a shadow given substance. I was halfway across when the black-and-white Explorer emerged from a copse of trees on the far side of the water, lights flashing, and blocked the road. I had been expecting to see it ever since the kid at the coffee shop mentioned the chief of police’s edict. It was my own fault for overstepping the line.

  I kept going until I cleared the bridge, then pulled over and placed my hands on the steering wheel. A man in his late thirties, shorter than I was but with the build of a swimmer or a rower, climbed out of the driver’s side of the Explorer, his hand on his weapon and the body of the vehicle between us. His hair was black, and he wore a mustache. Chief Allan looked older in person than he did on TV, and the mustache didn’t do him any favors. He approached me slowly. I waited until he was close enough to see my entire body, then carefully shifted my left hand to roll down the window.

  ‘License and registration, please,’ he said.

  His hand hadn’t shifted from the butt of his gun. He didn’t seem nervous, but you never could tell with small-town cops.

  I handed over the documents. He glanced at them, but didn’t call them in.

  ‘What’s your business here, Mr. Parker?’

  ‘I’m a private investigator,’ I said.

  I caught the flash of recognition in his eyes. Maine is a big state geographically but a small one socially, and I’d made enough noise to be on the radar of most of the law enforcement community, even peripherally.

  ‘Who’s your client?’

  ‘I’m working on behalf of a lawyer, Aimee Price. Any questions will have to be directed to her.’

  ‘How long have you been in town?’

  ‘A few hours.’

  ‘You should have reported in to us.’

  ‘I didn’t realize I had that obligation.’

  ‘You might have considered it a courtesy call under the circumstances. You know where the police department is?’

  ‘Yeah, it’s where everything else is. Left at sanitation, right at the clerk’s office, then straight on till morning.’

  ‘It’s right at sanitation, but close enough. I want you to haul on back there and wait for me.’

  ‘Can I ask why?’

  ‘You can ask, but the only answer you’ll get is that I’m telling you to go. The next step is for me to put you in the back of my vehicle and drive you there myself.’

  ‘I’ll bet your cuffs bite.’

  ‘Rusty too. Could take a while to get them off.’

  ‘In that case, I’ll be heading back to town in my car.’

  ‘I’ll be right behind you.’

  ‘That’s very reassuring.’

  He waited for me to make a turnaround, and it was only when I was safely back on the bridge that he got into the Explorer. He stayed close behind me all the way, although he was kind enough to kill his lights. The kid with the tattoos was standing at the door of the coffee shop when I pulled into the municipal lot. I gave him a wave and he shrugged. No hard feelings, I thought. You did the right thing.

  The chief pulled in beside me. I got out and waited for him to join me. He indicated that I should head inside. There was a sprightly looking woman in her early sixties behind a desk just inside the door, surrounded by neatly piled files, a pair of computers, and a dispatcher’s radio. She smiled politely as I entered, and offered me a cookie from a plate on the desk. It seemed rude to refuse, so I took one.

  ‘You carrying?’ asked Allan.

  ‘Left-hand side,’ I said.

  ‘Take it off, and leave it with Mrs. Shaye.’

  I kept the cookie between my teeth, removed my jacket, and handed over the shoulder rig.

  ‘Thank you,’ said Mrs. Shaye. She wrapped the straps around the holster and placed it in a cardboard box, to which she appended a playing card: the nine of clubs. She handed another nine of clubs to me.

  ‘Don’t lose it, now,’ she said.

  ‘Likewise,’ I said.

  ‘Take another cookie,’ she said. ‘Just in case.’

  ‘In case of what?’ I said, but she didn’t get a chance to answer. Instead, Allan pointed to the left, although his office was to the right. He walked me to one of the town meeting rooms, one so small that I made it look crowded all by myself.

  ‘Make yourself comfortable,’ he said. ‘I’ll get Mrs. Shaye to bring you coffee.’

  He closed the door behind him, then locked it as well. I took a seat, finished my first cookie, and put the other one on the table. There was a window that faced onto the rear lot, and I watched a man in overalls working on a second police-department vehicle, a Crown Vic that had clearly been purchased used from another department, with marks on its door where the decal had been removed. Hard times in the city, hard times by the sea.

  Mrs. Shaye arrived with coffee and sugar and another cookie, even though I had yet to eat the second one. A long hour went by.

  And the sun set on Pastor’s Bay.

  Randall Haight sat at his kitchen table, his hands palm down on the cheap wood, staring at his reflection in the window. He did not know the man before him. He did not know Randall Haight, for there was nothing about him to be known. He did not know William Lagenheimer, for William had been erased from existence. The face in the glass represented an Other, a pale thing marooned in darkness, and an Otherness, a realm of existence occupied by unbound souls. The setting sun burned fires in the sky around his visage. His diary lay before him, the pages filled with tiny, almost indecipherable handwriting. He had begun writing down his thoughts shortly after his release. He had found that it was the only way to keep himself sane, to hold his selves separate. He kept the diary hidden in a panel at the base of his bedroom closet. He had learned in prison the importance of hiding places.

  There were locks on the windows and locks on the doors. He would usually have started cooking his evening meal by now, but he had no appetite. All of his pleasures had dissipated since the images started to arrive, and the latest batch had turned his stomach. What kind of person would do that to a child? He was grateful to the detective for taking them away with him. He did not want them in his house. The girl might get the wrong idea about him, and he did not want that to happen. The balance between them was precarious enough as things stood.

  Randall now understood why the detective had reacted so strongly to him back at the lawyer’s office. Randall hadn’t liked the sense of revulsion that came off the detective at that first meeting, the way he didn’t seem particularly sympathetic to the threat that the messages posed to Randall’s peace of mind, to his life in Pastor’s Bay. It had led him to search for more information about the detective, and what was revealed was both interesting and, Randall supposed, moving. The detective had lost a child to a killer, but here he was working on behalf of another man who had killed a child. Randall struggled to put himself in the detective’s position. Why would he take on such a task? Duty? But he had no duty to Randall, not even to the lawyer. Curiosity? A desire to right wrongs? Justice?

  It came to Randall: Anna Kore.

  A chicken breast sat defrosting on a plate by the sink. Regardless of his absence of appetite, he had to eat. He would get weak and sick otherwise, and he needed his strength. More than that, he had to be able to keep a clear head. His very existence was under threat. His secrets were at risk of being discovered.

  All of his secrets.

  The TV was playing in the living room behind him. Cartoons, always cartoons. They were the only programs that seemed to keep her calm. He heard a sound behind him, but he did not turn.

  ‘Go away,’ he said. ‘Go back to your shows.’

  And the girl did as she was told.

  12

  Sometimes good things happen to those who wait. This wasn’t one of those times.

  Shortly before eight p.m., after I’d been cooling my heels for so long that my feet had gone to sleep, I heard the door unlock and a massive figure entered
the room. His name was Gordon Walsh, and he was primarily a homicide specialist with CID. Our paths had crossed in the past and I still hadn’t managed to alienate him entirely, which counted as a miracle on a level with the dead rising up and walking. He had previously worked out of Bangor, one of what was, until recently, three CID units in the state, but a reorganization of the division had reduced this to two, Gray and Bangor. I had heard that Walsh had transferred to Gray, and was working out of the Androscoggin DA’s office. It wasn’t too much of a burden for him to bear. He lived in Oakland, virtually equidistant from both Gray and Bangor. Pastor’s Bay fell under the authority of CID in Gray as it lay in the northern part of Knox County, although in a case like this, such territorial definitions tended to be fluid, and Gray’s complement of sixteen detectives could be supplemented by some of their peers in Bangor if necessary.

  Now here was Walsh, looking like a man who has just been roused from a deep sleep in order to rescue an unloved cat from a tree. He took in my black suit, and my dark tie, and said, ‘The undertaker called. He wants his clothes back.’

  ‘Detective Walsh,’ I said. ‘Still field-testing the tensile strength of polyester?’

  ‘I’m an honest public servant. I wear what I can afford.’ He rubbed the hem of his jacket between his fingers and winced slightly.

  ‘Static?’

  ‘Uh-huh.’

  ‘It’s the air.’

  He was still leaning against the wall, and his mood didn’t seem to be improving. If anything, he was growing more and more unhappy as the seconds ticked by. Walsh wasn’t one for hiding his feelings. He probably wept at calendars with pictures of puppies, and howled at the moon when the Red Sox lost a game.

  ‘They send you in to soften me up?’ I said.

  ‘Yeah. We’re hoping you’ll respond to a mellow tone.’

  ‘You want a cookie? They’re good.’

  ‘Had one. They are good. I have to watch my weight, though. My wife wants me to live long enough to collect my pension. Not any longer than that. Just until the check has cleared.’

  He detached himself from the wall before it started to crumble under the pressure and dropped into a chair at the opposite end of the small table. Outside, the man in overalls had finished working on the Crown Vic. He’d kept going even after the light faded, turning on the garage illumination so that he could finish the job. He was packing away his tools and his lights when Allan came out to talk to him. The mechanic took a pack of cigarettes from the pocket of his overalls, and he and Allan had a smoke while they circled the car, the mechanic presumably pointing out its flaws as they went. Pretty soon, I’d know how the car felt.

  ‘What do you think of him?’ said Walsh.

  ‘Allan? I don’t know anything about him.’

  ‘He should be someplace else instead of out here in the williwigs. He’s smart, and he’s committed. He’s been good on this Anna Kore thing so far.’

  He left her name hanging like a hook. I didn’t bite, or not so hard that the hook stuck.

  ‘Are you the primary?’ I asked.

  ‘That’s right. If you dressed for a funeral, you’re too early.’

  ‘Who’s the DS?’

  Each investigation had a primary detective who, in turn, reported to a detective sergeant who acted as supervisor.

  ‘Matt Prager.’

  I knew Prager. He was good, even if he did have an inexplicable fondness for show tunes and musical theater. It made sense to have him and Walsh working together on the Kore case. They were two of the most senior detectives in the Maine State Police, and they generally played well with others.

  ‘So,’ he continued, ‘while I’m sure you’re royally aggrieved at being forced to sit here and watch the world grow dark when you could be off dispensing your own brand of justice someplace else – that, or cleaning up behind the bar you work in when times are tough and the world has temporarily tired of heroes – you should recognize that this is the center of an ongoing investigation into the disappearance of a young girl, and Allan did right to haul you in and let you steam for a while.’

  ‘I don’t have a problem with what he did.’

  ‘Good. So, back to the suit. Your client suit, I take it?’

  ‘On occasion.’

  ‘We need to know.’

  ‘You’ll have to call Aimee Price and put your request to her. I’m working on her behalf. I can’t tell you anything unless she clears it first.’

  ‘We did talk to her. She makes you seem reasonable.’

  ‘She’s a lawyer. They’re only reasonable on their own terms.’

  ‘Well, then you have that much in common. I know you: If there’s trouble, and you show up, then you’re involved. Coincidences go out the window where you’re concerned. I’ve no idea why that is, and if I were you I’d worry about it, but for now what it tells me is that your reason for being here probably intersects with the Anna Kore case at some point, and I want you to tell me exactly where that point lies.’

  ‘This is a circular conversation. I’m employed by Aimee Price, which means that any client information is privileged.’

  ‘There’s a girl’s life at stake.’

  ‘I understand that but—’

  ‘There is no “but.” It’s a child.’

  His voice was raised. I heard scuffling outside the door, but nobody else entered.

  ‘Listen, Walsh, I want Anna Kore brought home safely just as much as you do. All I can tell you is that, as of now, I don’t believe my client had anything to do with her disappearance, and I’ve found no evidence of a connection between my inquiries on the client’s behalf and your investigation.’

  ‘That’s not good enough. You don’t get to make that call.’

  ‘My hands are tied here. Aimee’s solid, and I like and trust her, but I know that if I breach the rules of client confidentiality she’ll have me hauled over hot coals, and that’s aside from any further action her client may take. I’ll tell you again: As far as I’m aware, the client’s case is unrelated to the disappearance of Anna Kore, but I have advised the client to contact the police about the matter with which we’re dealing, just so there’s no confusion.’

  ‘And how did your client respond to this magnanimous gesture on your part?’

  ‘The client is thinking about it.’

  Walsh threw up his hands.

  ‘Well, that’s just great. That’s set my mind right at rest. Your client is going to think about a duty to share information that may be pertinent to an ongoing investigation. Meanwhile, there’s a fourteen-year-old girl missing and, in my experience, the people who abduct fourteen-year-old girls don’t tend to have their best interests at heart. And you, you spineless son of a bitch, are shifting your moral responsibilities on to a lawyer. You’re right down at the bottom of the swamp now, Parker, mired with the weeds and the parasites. You, of all people, should know better. Have you seen the news? Have you watched Valerie Kore crying for her child? You know what she’s going through, and there’ll be worse to come if we don’t find her daughter in time. You want that on your head, a man who lost his own child, who understands—’

  It was the mention of Jennifer that did it – that, and the fact that I knew Walsh was right. Immediately I was on my feet, and Walsh was on his. I heard myself shouting at him, losing control, and I wasn’t even aware of the words that I was saying. Walsh was shouting back at me, spittle flying from his mouth, his finger jabbing at my face. The door behind us opened, and Allan entered along with another older patrolman I hadn’t seen before, and in the background were faces staring at us: Mrs. Shaye; the mechanic; Walsh’s partner, Soames; two state troopers; and a pair of men in suits.

  Even in my anger and self-pity, in the self-righteousness that I was using to mask my shame, I recognized one of them, and I knew that the game had taken another turn. I stepped back from Walsh, and from my own worst instincts.

  ‘I want a phone call,’ I said. ‘I want to call my lawyer.’

&n
bsp; The door was locked again, and once more I was alone. I wasn’t under arrest, and I hadn’t been charged with any crime. Neither had a telephone yet materialized. It was possible that they could hold me for obstructing the course of justice, but Aimee would swat that one out of the sky with a flick of her wrist. The problem, as I simmered in the chair, was that I felt the truth of Walsh’s statement. I knew better than to behave the way that I was behaving. I knew because I carried the memory of a dead child with me wherever I went. The weight of her loss was heavy on my heart, and I would not and could not wish that pain on another person. Legally, I was within my rights to withhold what I knew about Randall Haight; morally, I was beneath contempt, for Haight’s right to privacy was subordinate to a child’s right to life.

  Yet while I felt that Haight was engaged in an act of misrepresentation, a manipulation of the truth for his own ends, I still did not believe he was involved in whatever had befallen Anna Kore. At the same time, despite my assurances to Walsh, I could not be certain that his troubles and the girl’s disappearance were not connected simply because I had not yet found any evidence to link them. But if they were linked, then I could not believe that the person who was sending photographs and discs to Haight would be careless enough to leave evidence on the contents of the envelopes, or even on the envelopes themselves. Still, that was not my call to make. I didn’t have a forensics lab in my basement, and who knew what trace evidence or DNA evidence might be found if the envelopes and their contents were submitted for examination?

  But I was also troubled by the man I had seen staring back at me from the doorway of Chief Allan’s office. We had never met, but I knew his face: I had watched him hovering around the outskirts of a RICO trial in Augusta earlier in the year, and while I was being interviewed in the aftermath of a smuggling operation that had made the newspapers during the summer. His name was Robert Engel, and he had the nebulous title of Deputy Supervisor of Operations in the Organized-Crime Squad of the FBI’s Boston Division. In effect, he had a roving brief, and acted as a conduit for information and resources between the New England divisions and the three units of the Organized-Crime Section at FBI headquarters in Washington – La Cosa Nostra and racketeering; Eurasian/ Middle Eastern crime; and Asian and African criminal enterprises – as well as working with the Joint Terrorism Task Forces to uncover potential sources of terrorist funding through the medium of organized criminal activity. Engel was an accomplished diplomat, carefully navigating his way through the FBI’s own cutthroat world of internecine warfare as well as its ongoing feuds with sister agencies – in particular the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives. In addition, he had worked to rebuild the Bureau’s reputation in Boston following revelations of collusion between some of its agents and leading organized-crime figures in the city.