The Wolf in Winter

by Connolly, John

  He had been living in the basement of a run-down and gutted condo near Deering Oaks for a week or more. He was eating little, apart from what he could scavenge and what the shelters provided, trying to balance the need to save money with the basic requirements of staying alive.

  He would be of no use to her if he died.

  Was it genetic? Had he passed on his own flaw, his destructive love affair with the streets, to his only daughter? In his colder, more logical moments, he thought not. He had never had difficulties with drugs or alcohol. Substance addiction was not in his nature. His daughter, by contrast, started using shortly after Jude left home, or so her mother had told him before all communication between them ceased. His wife had died hating him, and he could hardly blame her. She would tell him that she did not know what she had done wrong, what grave offense she had given that caused her husband to leave her and their child, for she could not accept that she had done nothing. Something had broken inside him, that was all. He had walked away from everything—his job, his family, even his dog—because, had he not done so, he would have taken his own life. His was a psychological and emotional disturbance of untold, awful depth, mundane and yet tragic in its very ordinariness.

  He had tried talking to his daughter, of course, but she would not listen. Why would she? Why should she take lessons in life from a man who had been unable to come to terms with happiness, with being loved? She threw his failings back in his face, as he knew she would. If he had stayed, if he had been a true father, then perhaps she too might have remained where she was, and this beast would not have taken her in its clutches and slowly drained the life from her. You did this to me, she said. You.

  But he had done what he could for her, in his way. Just as he kept careful watch on those in his charge on Portland’s streets, so others did the same for his daughter, or attempted to. They could not save her from herself, for she had a self-destructive urge that was kin to her father’s fractured nature. Whatever had come from her mother’s estate went into her arm or the arms of others, or briefly lined the pockets of boyfriends who were one step above pimps and rapists.

  Now she had traveled north. He had heard reports of her in Lewiston, and Augusta, then Bangor. The news from an old homeless woman, traveling south, was that his daughter was clean and seeking somewhere to live, as a place of her own would be the first step toward finding a job.

  “How did she look?” Jude asked.

  “She looked well. She’s pretty, you know that? Hard, but pretty.”

  Yes, he thought. I know that. Pretty, and more than pretty.

  She is beautiful.

  So he took the bus north, but by then all trace of her was gone. There was talk, though. She had been offered a job. He learned that a young woman living and working at the Tender House, a shelter for homeless mothers and their children in Bangor, had spoken with her. His daughter had seemed excited, or so Jude was told. She had money in her hand. She was going to take a shower, buy some new clothes, maybe get a haircut. There was work for her. A couple, a nice older couple, needed someone to help maintain their house and their big yard, perhaps cook a meal or two as well, or drive them places when the need arose. For the sake of their own security, and to calm any concerns that the girl might have, they told her that they’d drop by the local police department on the way to the house, just so that she could confirm that they were on the level and meant her no harm.

  “They showed me a picture of their house,” Jude’s daughter told the young woman from the Tender House. “It’s beautiful.”

  What was the name of this town? Jude asked his informant.

  Prosperous.

  Its name was Prosperous.

  But when Jude traveled to Prosperous, and went to the police department, he was told that no such girl had ever passed through its doors, and when he asked on the streets of the town about his daughter he was met with professions of ignorance. Eventually, the police came for him. They drove him to the town limits, and told him not to return, but he did. The second time he got a night in a cell for his troubles, and it was different from the cells in Portland or Scarborough, because he was not there of his own volition, and the old fears came upon him. He did not like being shut in. He did not like locked doors. That was why he roamed the streets.

  They drove him to Medway the next morning, and escorted him onto the bus. He was given a final warning: stay out of Prosperous. We haven’t seen your daughter. She was never here. Quit bothering people, or next time you’ll be up before a judge.

  But he was determined not to stay away. There was something wrong in Prosperous. He felt it on that first day in the town. Living on the streets had made him sensitive to those who carried a bad seed inside them. In Prosperous, one of those seeds had germinated.

  He shared none of this with others, and certainly not with the police. He found excuses to remain silent, although one in particular came more naturally than others: his daughter was a drifter, an addict. Such people routinely disappeared for a while before turning up again. Wait. Wait and see. She’ll come back. But he knew that she would not return, not unless someone went looking for her. She was in trouble. He sensed it, but he could not bring himself to speak of it. His vocal cords froze on her name. He had been on the streets for too long. The illness that caused him to leave his family had left him unable to open himself up, to express weakness or fear. He was a locked box inside which tempests roiled. He was a man enshadowed by himself.

  But there was one whom he trusted, one to whom he might turn: an investigator, a hunter. He worked for money, this man, and with that realization came a kind of release for Jude. This would not be charity. Jude would pay him for his time, and that payment would buy Jude the freedom he needed to tell his daughter’s story.

  This night, his final night, he had counted his money: the handful of notes that he had hidden in a box in the damp earth of the basement; the small savings he had entrusted to one of the social workers, reclaimed that day; and a bag of filthy bills and coins, just a small fraction of the loans that he had given out to others and now repaid at a quarter on the dollar by those who could afford to do so.

  He had just over a hundred and twenty dollars, enough to get him beaten up by some, or killed by others.

  Enough, he hoped, to hire the detective for a couple of hours.

  BUT NOW HE WAS dying. The rope, suspended from a ceiling beam, was tightening around his neck. He tried to kick, but his legs were being held. His arms, previously restrained by his sides, were released, and he instinctively raised his hands to the noose. His fingernails were ripped from his flesh, but he barely felt the pain. His head was exploding. He felt his bladder release, and knew that the end was coming. He wanted to cry out to her, but no words came. He wanted to tell her that he was sorry, so sorry.

  The final sound that he made was an effort to speak her name.

  CHAPTER

  IV

  It was left to Thomas Souleby to calm the girl down. He had four daughters of his own, and they, in turn, had so far gifted him only with female grandchildren, so he had more experience in placating women than anyone else in the room. This particular woman needed more placation than most: her first act, after they had let her in through the back door of the store, was to grab the nearest knife and keep them at bay. None of Thomas’s offspring had ever pulled a knife on him, although he wouldn’t have put it past one or two of them during their teenage years.

  “Easy, honey,” he said. He stayed out of range of the knife, and spoke as softly as he could. “Easy, now. What’s your name?”

  “Annie,” she replied. “Call the police. Please, just call the police.”

  “We will,” he said. “But we just—”

  “Now!” she screamed, and the sound just about busted Calder Ayton’s hearing aid.

  “Okay, we’re calling them,” said Thomas. He motioned to Ben, who already had his cell phon
e in hand. “But what are we supposed to tell them?”

  “You tell them that some bitch and her fucker husband locked me in a basement and fattened me up like a pig for slaughter,” she said. “That’s what you tell them.”

  Thomas looked at Ben and shrugged.

  “You maybe don’t have to use those exact words,” Thomas told him.

  Ben nodded, and started dialing.

  “Put it on speaker, Ben,” said Thomas. “Just so Annie here knows we’re on the up and up.”

  Ben tapped the screen on his phone and turned the volume to maximum. They all listened to it ring. On the third tone, a voice broke in.

  “Chief Morland,” it said.

  The girl seemed to relax at the sound of the voice, but Thomas could still see her casting glances over his shoulder, staring out the picture window in the direction from which she had come. She couldn’t know how long it would be before her captors noticed that she was gone and came looking for her. She didn’t trust four old coots to keep her safe.

  “Lucas, this is Ben Pearson over at the store. We got a girl here in some distress. She says her name is Annie, and that someone has been holding her in a basement. I’d appreciate it a whole lot if you could get here real soon.”

  “On my way,” said the chief. “Tell her to sit tight.”

  The connection was cut.

  “How far away is the police station?” asked Annie.

  “Less than a mile, but I called the chief on his cell phone,” said Ben. “He could be closer than that, or a little farther away, but this isn’t a big town. It won’t be long before he’s here.”

  “Can we get you something, honey?” said Thomas. “You want water, or coffee? We got whisky, if that helps. You must be freezing. Ben, find the girl a coat.”

  Ben Pearson moved to the rack to get one of the men’s coats. His motion brought him almost within reach of the knife, and the girl slashed at the air in warning.

  “Jesus!” said Ben.

  “You stay back!” she warned. “All of you, just keep back. I don’t want anyone to come near me—not until the police get here, you understand?”

  Thomas raised his hands in surrender.

  “Anything you say, but I can see that you’re shivering. Look, Ben will go to the rack and slide a coat across the floor to you. None of us will come near you, okay? Seriously, nobody here is in a hurry to get cut.”

  The girl considered the offer, then nodded. Ben took his big old L.L.Bean goose-down parka from the rack and slid it across the floor. The girl squatted and, never taking her eyes from the four men, slipped her left arm into the sleeve. She rose, and in one quick movement changed the knife from her right hand to her left so that she could put the parka on fully. The men remained completely still while she did so. The girl then moved sideways across the room to the poker table, poured herself a glass of the whisky, and tossed it back in one gulp. Luke Joblin looked slightly pained.

  “These people who held you captive,” said Thomas. “Did you get a look at them?”

  “Yes.”

  “Do you know their names?”

  “No.” The girl relented, and soon the words were tumbling from her lips. “They weren’t the ones who brought me here first, though. They were an older couple, David and Harriett Carpenter, if those were even their real names. They showed me some ID when we first met, but what do I know about IDs? As soon as we got to the outskirts of this shithole, they handed me over to another couple, younger than them. They were the ones who kept me in their damn basement. I know their faces. They didn’t even bother to keep them hidden from me. That’s how I knew they were going to kill me in the end. Others came too. I caught them looking at me through the slit in the door. I pretended to be asleep, but I saw some of their faces as well.”

  Thomas shook his head in disbelief, and sat down heavily. Ben Pearson looked toward the woods, just as the girl had done, waiting for figures to appear out of the gloom, hell-bent on dragging her back to captivity. Luke Joblin watched the young woman, his expression unreadable. Calder Ayton’s attention was drawn to the wrinkles on his hands. He traced them with the tips of his index fingers—first the left, then the right—as though surprised to find this evidence of his aging. No further words were spoken, no more reassurances given. This was Morland’s business now.

  Annie walked over to the register, where she could keep an eye on the parking lot outside the store. Blue lights shone in the distance. The police were on their way. She watched the four men, but they seemed stunned into inaction. She was in no danger from them.

  An unmarked Crown Vic pulled into the lot, a flashing blue light on its dashboard. Although Ben had killed the outside spots when he closed the store, there were motion-activated lights above the porch. Those lights now illuminated the lot, bathing Chief Morland in their glow as he stepped from the car.

  “I feel sick,” said Annie. “I need to go to the bathroom.”

  “The chief has just arrived, honey,” said Thomas.

  “It’s the whisky,” said the girl. “It’s done something to my stomach.”

  She bent over, as if in pain.

  “I need to puke or shit—I don’t know which.”

  Ben didn’t want her to do either in his place of business, so he directed her to a door at the rear of the store. It led into his private quarters, where he sometimes stayed the night, particularly if he was working late in the gunsmithery. His house was less than a mile away, but since the death of his wife it had felt too big and empty for him. He preferred the store. That was his place now.

  “It’s the second door on the left,” he said. “You take your time. You’re safe now.”

  She headed toward the back of the store, her hand over her mouth, seconds before the chief entered. He was a big man, six feet three and topping out at about two hundred pounds. He was clean-shaven, and his eyes were gray, like the cold ashes of old fires. He had been Prosperous’s chief of police for nearly a decade, and had taken over the job from his father. Before that, he served his apprenticeship in the Maine State Police. That was how he always described it: “my apprenticeship.” Everyone knew that Prosperous was the only place that mattered. He walked with the slightest of limps, a consequence of a car accident near Augusta back in the day. No one had ever suggested that his injured limb might affect his ability to carry out his job, and the chief had never given anyone cause to do so.

  “Where is she?” he asked.

  “In the bathroom,” said Ben. “She wasn’t feeling good.”

  Morland had been in Pearson’s store often enough to know it nearly as well as he did his own house. He went straight through to the bathroom and knocked on the door.

  “Miss?” he called. “My name is Lucas Morland, and I’m the chief of police here in Prosperous. Are you okay in there?”

  There was no reply. A cold breeze flipped the ends of Morland’s trousers against his shoes and legs. It was coming from under the bathroom door.

  “Shit!” he said.

  He stepped back, raised his right foot, and kicked hard against the lock. The lock held, but the jamb broke on the second attempt. The door opened to reveal an empty bathroom. The small window above the toilet gaped open. Morland didn’t even waste time trying to look out. The girl would already be seeking the cover of darkness.

  Thomas Souleby had followed behind the chief, and was almost bowled over by him as he moved back into the store.

  “What is it?” he asked, but Morland didn’t answer. He was trying to hide the pain in his left leg. This damn weather always played hell with it, and he’d be glad when summer came. He stomped into the parking lot and turned left at the corner of the store. Pearson’s was close to the intersection of two roads; the front faced north on the main road into Prosperous, while to the west was the highway. Morland’s eyesight was good, even in the dark, and he could see a figur
e moving fast between two copses of trees, making for the highway. The road crested a hill at Prosperous’s western boundary. As he watched the girl, the lights of a truck appeared on the hill.

  If she reached it, he was lost.

  ANNIE RAN.

  She’d been so close to safety, or so she’d thought, and then the cop had appeared. She’d recognized him at once: the shape and size of him, but most of all the way that he limped. She’d seen him twice before. The first time was just after the handover, when she was brought to the basement. She’d fought against them as they carried her from the truck, and the cloth across her eyes had slipped a little. The cop had been there, supervising the operation, following behind as they took her to her cell. The second was on one of the occasions when they permitted her to shower, although they always kept her hands and feet manacled. She had glanced to her right as she left her basement cell, and caught a brief glimpse of the man with the gray eyes at the top of the stairs before the door closed. On neither occasion had he been in uniform, otherwise she would have known better than to let the old geezers call the cops.

  The couple had kept her well fed. That, at least, was something. She had strength, perhaps more than she’d had in many years. There was no alcohol in her system, and she was clean of drugs. Her own speed surprised her.

  Annie saw the truck at the same time that Morland did. If she could get to the highway in time, she could stop it and beg for a ride to another town. There was a chance that the cop might come after them, but any truck driver in his right mind would be able to see her bare, bloodied feet and her tattered nightgown, and know that something terrible had befallen her. If that wasn’t enough to convince him, she was sure that her story would do the rest. He—or she, if she was lucky enough to be picked up by a woman—could take her to the cops in Bangor, or to the nearest state police troop house. The truck driver could haul her to the FBI in Washington, DC, for all Annie cared. She just wanted to get away from this godforsaken town.