The Canary List: A Novel

by Sigmund Brouwer

  He was standing again, on the chair, chest heaving. His hands were free.

  The cigarette smoke was gone.

  Forty-Five

  en minutes past eight in the morning, Madelyne Mackenzie stepped out of a rented red Corvette, parked on the sidewalk in front of the address that Joseph O’Hare had given her for Crockett.

  Small bungalow, neatly trimmed lawn, neatly painted trim.

  She had to look like she’d disguised herself. O’Hare suggested a good distraction would be to dress as totally opposite from normal as possible to convince Crockett that she was a woman so terrified that she’d gone to great lengths to shake off any followers.

  O’Hare had also told her it wouldn’t be difficult to convince him something was happening, that he’d arranged for Crockett to get a good scare during the night and find a threatening note. He did not want to give details, stressing instead that it was crucial for Madelyne to get Crockett into the Corvette. She should tell him enough, tell him whatever it took, but make sure he didn’t have time to think things through. That would be another good thing about dressing like someone she was not. Wouldn’t hurt if her altered appearance distracted him, took some focus off trying to think through what she told him.

  Beside the Corvette, she pulled down on her skirt, feeling extremely self-conscious, still thinking about his thermostat remark that, childish as it was, had still managed to sting. She also thought, childishly, that now he’d see what he’d never get. She walked up the sidewalk and pressed the doorbell.

  Ready to be a distraction, but still tugging down the hem of her skirt.

  It was a couple of hours past sunrise already, and Crockett, in boxer shorts and a Disneyland T-shirt, was shivering on the chair, unable to get himself down from the rope around his neck. It wasn’t a noose, but a double wrap, with the knot secured too high for him to reach with his free hands.

  He could turn sideways just enough to better understand the situation. Above and behind his chair was the pull-down trapdoor that led into the attic of the small house. Where he’d stored the photo album of memories. Where cops had found the hard drive.

  Before getting into his lonely bed the night before, as usual, Crockett had set his coffee maker timer for automatic brew. Now, as he looked toward the kitchen, the teasing aroma of coffee filled his small house. It reminded him of Julie; so close, but so far away.

  Crockett looked up again. The pull-down door was open. The looped rope from his neck went up to the top rung, where it had been knotted. The rung also served as a makeshift pulley, with the remainder of the rope running diagonally downward to the front door, where the far end was tied to the inside doorknob.

  Why had this happened? And why had the intruder left Crockett alive?

  Crockett had spent the night listening to the sounds of the house, wondering again and again if each new sound was a warning that the intruder had returned to pull the chair away again.

  But the intruder never came back, not to Crockett’s knowledge. And now it was daytime. Crockett was shivering. The scent of coffee tortured him.

  Of equal importance was Crockett’s full bladder, which was increasingly dominating his attention.

  He knew it was ridiculous that he simply didn’t relieve himself where he was standing. Compared to the fact that someone had broken into his house while he was asleep, that he had been standing on a chair for hours, now acutely aware that losing his balance would kill him, compared to the fact that he had been accused by the legal system of pedophilia, compared to the fact that he was probably losing his son and his career, it should not matter that he just let go a stream of urine.

  But it was his last semblance of control.

  Maybe that’s what the intruder had wanted to take from Crockett. The sense of control.

  Hadn’t the sixteenth-century astronomer Copernicus died from a burst bladder? No. Crockett went through his memory, trying to distract himself from the urge, aware of the irony that he was thinking about a bursting bladder to stop thinking about a burst bladder. Not Copernicus. It was Tycho, another astronomer. Tycho, who loved beer and parties, at a banquet where to leave the table before the host baron left the table was so unspeakably rude that Tycho held back to the point that his bladder burst internally, and he died of infection a few days later, repeating deliriously, “Let me not seem to have lived in vain.”

  Stupid, Crockett thought, the things a person remembered from college science classes. But maybe that should be every person’s mantra. Let me not seem to have lived in vain.

  The mental efforts were not much of a distraction. On the chair, he began to do a little pee dance. Seconds stretched like hours.

  Why not, he asked himself, just let go?

  That’s when the doorbell rang.

  Visitors were not a normal part of his life. The doorbell had recently become an ominous sound. He could see that the bolt was unlocked, no doubt the intruder had picked it while Crockett was sleeping. So maybe this time, someone was here to help him. No need for a doorbell if you’re an intruder.

  “Come in,” Crockett said as loudly as he could, the air scraping his apparently bruised vocal cords. He was very conscious of how the pulley was formed by the rope to the rung to the doorknob. “But open the door very, very slowly.”

  The door began to push inward, putting slack into the rope.

  All Crockett needed was a foot or two of that slack. Once he had enough, he didn’t wait to see who was coming inside but reached up and unlooped the rope from his neck. Too desperate even to glance back at the door, he hopped off the chair and dashed into the bathroom. He wasn’t sure there had ever been a time in his life when anything ever felt better. Tears rolled down his face through his closed eyes, and he told himself they were only because of the relief he felt, not because he was angry and afraid and bewildered and alone and depressed and happy that he wasn’t dead.

  After he finished, he turned on the faucet and looked up from the sink to see the handwritten note taped to the mirror.

  IF YOU LEAVE THIS ALONE IT WILL BE OVER IN A WEEK AND YOU WILL BE CLEARED OF CHARGES. IF YOU KEEP LOOKING FOR ANSWERS, NEXT TIME YOU WON’T LIVE.

  As he ripped the note away, he saw his reflection in the mirror. His purple lumpy face now glistened with tears. There was an angry slash across his throat from the rope.

  This was it. The second lowest point of his life. Ashley clutching his hand in those final moments. Lowest point, overwhelming sorrow.

  This point, becoming overwhelmingly angry.

  He looked again at the note. Even if he could believe its promise that charges might be dropped, the pedophile reputation would still smear him for the rest of his life. He had to beat this, on his terms. He needed more than some unknown marionette clearing the charges. He needed to expose whoever was doing these things to him and to prove not just his innocence but someone else’s guilt.

  Madelyne Mackenzie. It was centered on her. Yesterday, he’d provoked her as much as he could, hoping to stir up enough to know she was the hornet’s nest. Hours later, he was attacked in his home. No doubt both were related. He’d be going back there today.

  He wiped his face with a towel and stepped out of the bathroom, directly into the living room of his small bungalow—where a woman with blazing red hair gaped at his T-shirt and boxers.

  She wore a neon-pink tube top that struggled to hold in its contents, a black miniskirt, and to complete the streetwalker-style attire, fishnet stockings encasing legs worthy of attention.

  Crockett moved his focus to the woman’s face. She’d saved him a trip back out to her office.

  Dr. Madelyne Mackenzie.

  Forty-Six

  y breaking into an apartment some ten blocks north and east of the Vatican walls, Raymond Leakey was doing something to manage his huge headache.

  Previously, he had decided there was a degree of safety in remaining relatively ignorant of the vices of His Eminence Ethan Saxon. It had been enough for Leakey to be acting for
O’Hare, bringing information to Saxon about O’Hare and the girl and the psychiatrist.

  During those months, Leakey had been balancing a high wire act between Saxon and O’Hare, pretending to be a servant to O’Hare, and at the same time pretending to serve Saxon, assessing which side offered the best safety net when it was time to jump. O’Hare wanted one thing and Saxon another, but Leakey was determined to serve himself in the end.

  Now something about Saxon’s desperation alarmed Leakey. O’Hare hadn’t given any hints as to what was behind the machinations, so Leakey wasn’t going to find out for himself.

  First the cardinal had tried to eliminate the girl. Then he was willing to kill the teacher’s neighbor to ensure the teacher was in no position to be credible, and only because of the possibility the girl had talked. Now to want the psychiatrist killed?

  Leakey had known about the cardinal’s hideaway for a while—Saxon wasn’t the first bishop or cardinal to have a place to stow a mistress or boyfriend—and now he had the motivation to take a closer look.

  His instincts told him that the safety net was on O’Hare’s side of the wire, but it seemed sensible to go further and learn even more about Saxon before committing one way or another.

  Upon entering the two-bedroom apartment, Leakey noticed the expensive furnishings. No surprise there. Thick curtains hung from ceiling to floor covering the windows, putting the apartment in near darkness.

  Leakey moved softly from room to room, scanning each with a flashlight. It had been years since he’d engaged in operational work like this, but the instincts were hard to lose. He expected that it might take up to an hour to find a clue pointing toward Saxon’s real vices, but the cardinal was so arrogant, he hadn’t bothered to hide anything.

  The evidence lay in a leather-bound trunk along the wall in the second bedroom he checked. The walls of that room were painted black, something it took Leakey a moment to realize with his flashlight. There were shelves with black candles, but no other furniture occupied the room except for the trunk.

  It wasn’t locked.

  Leakey opened the lid. He wouldn’t have been shocked to find the toys or masks that went with the hidden and twisted desires of men, but instead, he found a heavy polished silver chalice, like a communion cup.

  For a moment, he wondered if Saxon’s greatest sin had been to steal the chalice from a church. A closer look quickly changed Leakey’s mind.

  There was nothing holy about the chalice. It had stylized symbols and pornographic etchings. Its ornate handles were elaborately shaped with a Christ-figure on an inverted crucifix.

  Latin words were engraved around the rim.

  In nomine Magni Dei Nostri Satanas. Introibo ad altare Domini Inferi.

  Leakey set aside the chalice and pulled out a box he immediately recognized as a pyx, which in a church setting contained the Eucharist, the communion wafers.

  This pyx matched the chalice in its unholy art. Same horrible, lurid etchings, same Latin engraving.

  And beneath these were dozens of Polaroid pictures. Oddly old-fashioned and yet graphic in a way that had an impact on Leakey. He had prided himself on being as cynical and world-weary as any of his colleagues.

  In itself, the trappings of Satanism gave Leakey no sense of horror or fear. He didn’t look around the room and shiver as if demons might attack him at any moment.

  Leakey wasn’t a believer in the supernatural. In any other setting, he would have found the décor of the room to be as laughable a vice as discovering—which he had in the past—photos of the owner dressed like a baby and being spanked by a mistress.

  But today Leakey couldn’t find the cynicism to laugh off the obscenities. The photos in themselves weren’t enough proof. Too easy for anyone to claim they’d been planted.

  But the degradations in the pictures needed to be stopped.

  Forty-Seven

  ang,” Crockett said to Mackenzie. “Who knew a thermostat adjustment could make such a difference.”

  Holding a shopping bag, standing just inside the house, she was obviously working hard to keep her focus on his face. “I’d like you to put on pants before we talk.”

  “You need advice about the process if you expect to make much money. You see, the pants should—”

  “You wanted help, didn’t you?” she snapped, interrupting him. “I’m here to give it, but not until you’re wearing pants. Otherwise, I walk.”

  In direct contrast to the way she was dressed, her manner held no hint of flirtatiousness.

  “Pants. On. Now.” She hefted her shopping bag. All business. “While you are doing that, I’m going to change too. That’s the bathroom, right?”

  “You’re fine the way you are,” Crockett said.

  “I don’t even think a drunk person would find you funny.”

  Then Crockett heard his favorite word in the world. One that normally filled him with joy, but now filled him with panic.

  Daddy.

  Mickey had pushed through the front door.

  It was a frozen tableau. Crockett stood beside a chair, beneath a rope, in a T-shirt and boxers. Mackenzie squirmed in her scandalous outfit. Mickey gaped at them both.

  Mickey spoke first. To Mackenzie, who was pulling at the hem of her miniskirt.

  “Hi,” Mickey said. “I’m Mickey.” He stuck his hand out as he introduced himself, the way Crockett had taught him. He was waist-high to Mackenzie. His blond hair was cut short and the gap in his teeth accentuated a lisp that never failed to lift Crockett’s spirits.

  Mackenzie’s face softened as she smiled. It was the first smile Crockett had seen on her, and it looked good.

  “Mickey,” Mackenzie said, bending as modestly as possible to match his height and accept the handshake. “I’m Madelyne Mackenzie.”

  “Madelyne,” Mickey repeated, to learn the name. Crockett had taught him that too.

  Mickey pointed at the rope and the chair. “What’s that, Daddy?”

  Crockett wrestled briefly with the answer, then spoke. “A game.”

  “A game? Cool! How do you play?”

  “Mickey …” Suddenly, Crockett’s boxers didn’t feel so comfortable. Pants seemed like a great idea. Because if Mickey was here, someone else was close behind. She had probably parked the car and let Mickey run ahead up the sidewalk. “How about I meet you outside?”

  Too late.

  Julie stepped into the house. Hair tied back, form-fitting blue sweater, black slacks, Starbucks in hand. This might have been the only time since their separation and divorce that Crockett wasn’t overwhelmed by longing and regret and happiness to see her.

  It became another frozen tableau. Crockett, Mackenzie, and Julie. The fourth, Mickey, was oblivious of the tension.

  “Hey, Mom,” he said. “Dad’s got a friend over. I think she has cool stockings. You can see right through those stockings, can’t ya? And you could use them as a net to catch fish, right? Why don’t you get stockings like that, Mom?”

  Julie stared at the rope, then shifted her gaze to Crockett. Then to Madelyne, back to Crockett, and to the rope.

  “Nice,” Julie said. “Funny how you didn’t mention your … friend … when I agreed to give you weekends with Mickey.”

  “It’s not what you think,” Crockett said.

  “Just like the rope mark around your neck is not what I think?”

  “Hey,” Mickey said, brightly. “Mom’s right. There’s a mark, Dad. Is that part of the game you were going to explain to me? And your face. What happened to it?”

  “I had a change of heart,” Julie said. “I realized that I shouldn’t presume that you are guilty. I felt sorry for you. Thought maybe if you weren’t busy, you could have a zoo day today with Mickey, but I should have listened to Dave.”

  She took Mickey’s hand. “Let’s go. Daddy’s busy right now. Busy with his games.”

  “Julie … give me a minute to explain,” Crockett said. “This is Dr. Madelyne Mackenzie. She’s a child psychiatrist.�
��

  “Yes, I’m a doctor,” Mackenzie extended a hand, straightening into a professional posture. “Nice to meet you.”

  “Quite,” Julie answered, ignoring the hand. “House calls are how much an hour?”

  “Come on,” Crockett said. “She’s helping a student of mine.”

  Julie shot Crockett a look of scornful pity that made him realize how ridiculous it sounded.

  “The rope,” Mackenzie interjected. “Look at his neck again. You don’t get a burn like that from, ahh … games.” She cleared her throat. “You get a burn like that from someone—”

  Crockett cut Mackenzie off before she said too much in front of Mickey. “I want to tell you what happened, Julie—but later, over the phone. I’ll call you. All right?”

  “Good-bye, Crockett,” Julie said, pulling Mickey with her. “Enjoy your morning.”

  Forty-Eight

  ’ve seen that knife before,” Nanna said to Nathan. Although she continued to use the friendly grandmother voice that seemed to keep the disturbed young man serene, maintaining the tone took discipline. It was becoming exhausting, in fact. “That knife came from my neighbor’s house, didn’t it?”

  Nathan had just been talking to his invisible demon. He seemed aggravated that the demon was, as he put it, treating him like an idiot. The conversation had been disturbing to Nanna. The demon had apparently been instructing Nathan to wear rubber gloves when he carried the knife. Nathan had replied that he knew the importance of not getting fingerprints on the knife.

  Nanna had been a big, big fan of the old television show Murder, She Wrote. Part of the appeal was the clean and wholesome approach to crime, an irony that wasn’t lost on Nanna. Another reason was because of how often people commented that she looked so much like Angela Lansbury, although Nanna privately held that she looked more like the sexy one on The Golden Girls. Except Nanna wasn’t so man hungry.