Absko nodded for a beat, gazing at Matt. Then he smiled and put on his sunglasses.
“Look me up when you’re in a better place, Matthew,” he said. “I have a sword you may wish to see, and I’d still like to chat.”
Absko turned and walked back up the trail, his men in tow.
“Harsh,” Paul said, climbing out of the bushes and brushing off his clothes.
Matt and Paul found several large palm fronds and used them to cover Rheese’s body. Paul picked up a long, tapering branch, tied a strip of red fabric to the top, and propped it up near Rheese for others to later find him. Not wanting to run into Absko again, they waited there on the trail for several minutes. Paul looked over Matt’s wounds and cleaned and dressed the worst ones, using swabs and antiseptic from his first-aid kit. In the process, he found several slivers of opal, which he pulled out with tweezers and deposited in a little plastic bag.
With each piece extracted, Matt waited for the frozen overlay of a fluorescent-lit Cuban lumber mill office to disappear. But there it remained, as if he were wearing glasses with painted lenses.
After hiking up out of the valley, they kept right on going until, an hour later, they were back at the mountaintop. Roger’s body was exactly as Matt had left it. The other man, Paul told him, was Chuck Kohl, the detective who had filled Roger’s position at the Newark Police Department.
Matt found his shirt and pulled it on, then got down on his knees next to his dad. Paul left them alone without being asked.
“I’m not going to tell you that I was wrong and you were right, or that you were the best father I could have ever wanted, or any of that other bullshit,” Matt said. He wiped a tear on his shirt. “But I did hold on to it for too long. I couldn’t let it go. I saw you as selfish, and that I do regret. I know you were the opposite of that, the whole time. It was always about other people. After that . . . well, I think I was right to be angry after that.”
Matt dried his face again and glanced around. Paul was well out of earshot, trying to reach someone on his walkie-talkie.
“I don’t remember the last time I said it . . . probably around thirteen, fourteen. But I love you, Dad. I really hope you can hear that. Sorry I . . . well, you know why I’m sorry.”
Matt looked his father’s body over one last time, then got up to go. He traveled a single step away and stopped, remembering the stone. Dropping back to his knees, he drew his father’s hand to him and pulled open the fingers. Picking up the smooth little rock, he almost expected it to throw him into the imprint, but, of course, it didn’t—one César González Machado held that honor at present. Matt dropped the rock into his pocket.
Paul called out, “Hey, we got guys coming up the hill.”
Matt sprang up. “What kind of guys?”
“Look like military. Real ones. Might want to put your hands up . . . they’ve got guns at the ready.”
FORTY-FOUR
Tuni took the cat from her neighbor’s hands, thanked him profusely, and turned the key and went inside. Then, letting the cat escape her grasp, she checked the place out from top to bottom. Satisfied, she wheeled in her bags from the hall and locked the door behind her. The familiar scent of old wood was comforting, but it didn’t fill the empty space or soothe her as she had anticipated.
She went down the hall and flopped onto the comfy white-linen-covered couch. She had already listened to the voicemail in the cab. Hidden deep among the political and non-profit solicitors, Dr. Meier at the museum, her mum, and various friends was a message from Beth Turner.
“Hi Tuni,” the voice said. “I don’t know what happened between you and Matty, but I’d like you at the funeral . . .” It was set for ten-thirty Saturday morning, in Newark.
She didn’t want to see Matthew yet. One cannot simply apologize for finally saying that which they had always wanted, nor could he simply take back what was said. There could be no “I didn’t mean it that way” or “It was the heat of the moment, the stress.” As he so coldly proclaimed, there could be no future for them.
Abel had been delicate, framed his sentences to make Matthew sound better, but it was pretty clear what had happened after Tuni had left. Matthew had snubbed his father just as he had Tuni, for he was clearly more interested in chasing treasure with the very man who had kidnapped him. So many people died as a result—his own father, for God’s sake! It made her sick inside just to think of it. How blind she had been during their time together. It was crazy, the things one could overlook while in the thick of a relationship. The things she had ignored, minimized, dismissed, excused.
Her phone vibrated and chirped. It was a text message from Abel: In NYC Sat before home. Brunch?
She plopped the phone onto her lap. The funeral was Saturday. She really should go. She didn’t want to, though. Perhaps a private lunch instead—just herself and Beth on Sunday. Beth would understand. They both had been through hell, though Beth was still very much in hers. She would understand.
Tuni texted back: Sarabeth’s West. 423 Amsterdam. 11:00?
* * *
Beth and Iris Turner rode from the church to the cemetery with Jess and his wife in their car. As they pulled up alongside the grassy field, Beth saw the honor guard of men in uniform waiting beside the plot. No Matty. He had told Iris he wouldn’t be at the funeral but would come to the graveside service, where he wouldn’t have to talk to anyone.
“He’ll be here, Mom,” Iris said.
Jess grumbled, “He’d better be.”
“You’re not going to go at him,” Beth said. “Jess? Promise me. Say it now, or so help me, I’ll call him right now and tell him not to come. And you know how much it means to me . . .”
“Trust me, I won’t even look at him.”
Jess’s wife put her hand over his, and they all got out of the car. With Jess on his crutches, they walked up onto the small green hill, treading carefully between rows of flat headstones. In front of the plot stood a row of black chairs. Other people got out of cars parked along the quiet lane: Beth’s sister and her family, Roger’s cousins, all the men and women from the precinct, including some who had never even met him. Still there was no sign of Matt.
Beth turned to Iris with pleading eyes.
Iris glanced around and said, “He texted he was leaving the hospital forty-five minutes ago.”
“Is he driving?” Jess asked.
“No, he . . . can’t,” she replied. “He got a cab.”
A taxi rolled up and double-parked, and a moment later, Matt got out, wearing a charcoal suit and sunglasses—no gloves, no cap. He hurried up the hill as the mourners began to gather around the flag-draped coffin. Jess and his wife went to join the masses as Matt walked straight to Beth and leaned over to hug her.
“Hey, Mom . . .”
She recoiled a little. “Careful, hon!”
“No,” he said. “It’s okay now.”
He bent and put his arms around her. She was bewildered for a second, not used to her Matty being so accessible. They held each other for a long while the other guests looked on, some brought to tears by the tender moment.
Matt let go and moved on to Iris.
“Hey, Buster,” she said.
“Hey.”
As they walked to the chairs and sat down, Matt spotted Jess and Paul standing with a short Latina in a pantsuit. Her hand was in a cast. He hadn’t met Núñez—only heard about her from Paul on their drive to Havana. All three of them wore sunglasses and stared straight ahead. Matt was fairly sure that at least Jess’s hidden eyes were firing daggers at him.
The priest began speaking.
Iris leaned close to Matt’s ear and whispered, “Tuni couldn’t make it.”
He whispered back, “I noticed. Not surprised. She probably blames me for everything that happened . . . as she should.”
Iris chided him with a squeeze of his hand and a shake of her head. Beth leaned forward and glared at them, and the siblings straightened in their seats, eyes forward.
They split off on the way back to the car, and Matt rode back to the house with his Aunt Denora and her husband, Andy. As they drove, Andy told him of when he first met Roger, and how intimidated he had been by the big, burly policeman. It was only as he got to know Roger that he figured out he was just a “big ol’ softy.”
Andy went on, and Matt half listened, staring out the window at the passing trees and houses and cars, all a few shades darker than real life and sprinkled with tiny dots of white. The bright dots were stars on a clear night over the Atlantic. Haeming was lying on his back, head resting on his hands, watching the sky nod back and forth as the knarr rode the waves from trough to crest, to trough again. He and Atli and Finn were leading their people to a new land across the Atlantic—a promised land, where society would begin anew, with God watching over them.
EPILOGUE
Dr. Jon Meier pulled his rental car into the looping driveway at 312 Kaspar Avenue. Brown leaves lay in neat windblown mounds on the lawn. The only car parked in the driveway was an old Volkswagen Jetta that looked as though it hadn’t been driven in years.
Dr. Meier parked, grabbed the bag from the passenger seat, and walked up the brick steps. The porch was piled high with local newspapers but also littered with packages, black-wicked candles, and framed photographs of people: children and adults, male and female. It looked almost like an altar that had fallen into neglect. The ornately carved door was almost completely covered in flyers, like the bulletin board of a community center. He scratched at his trim white beard and scanned the bold-printed titles, glancing at the black-and-white photos of various smiling faces.
Missing: Kylie Dunn
HAVE YOU SEEN ME?
Matthew Turner, PLEASE help find our boy!
MISSING!
*WILL PAY FOR YOUR HELP*
Mataji White is only 7 years old . . .
There were hundreds, small and large, tacked or taped to his door. A hundred more littered the bushes and planter areas on either side of the porch, having blown away over time. It had been three years since Matthew went “viral.”
He stepped onto the porch, taking care not to tread on the sad pleas for help, and rang the doorbell. No answer came, of course, but he knew that Matthew was home. He knocked.
“Matthew, it’s Jon Meier,” he called, figuring that Matt had long since learned to tune out the doorbell and knocks. Still nothing.
He made his way down the cluttered steps to the first window. It was covered, but he could see in through a tiny sliver at the side, just as Matthew’s parade of visitors had no doubt also tried to do. Nothing to see there. He called out again.
The side fence was locked from the inside. Dr. Meier sighed. I’m not leaving, Matthew. I didn’t fly down here for nothing.
“What do you want, Doctor?” a hollow, scratchy voice said. It sounded like someone awakened in the middle of the night.
Dr. Meier turned and saw a head peering out the doorway, squinting with a pained expression. The ghostly figure looked plucked from a place stricken by famine: cheekbones protruding, raccoon eyes, square, pointy shoulders. He couldn’t weigh more than a hundred pounds. He wore a tattered T-shirt and sagging pajama pants. Meier blinked himself out of his transfixion and put on a happy face.
“There you are! It’s good to see you! I called—several times, in fact . . . Wouldn’t just show up out of the blue, you know . . .”
“Okay, okay,” Matt said. “Just what is it you want?” He didn’t sound angry so much as exhausted.
“Well, I wanted to show you something, for one. But I also wished to sit down and just chat—hear how things are going, and all that. I’m guessing you haven’t been back to the hospital in a while?”
Matthew sighed and gazed out from under drooping eyelids, but the eyes didn’t quite line up with Dr. Meier’s.
“The place is a mess . . .” Matthew began, but his visitor quickly waved it off. “No, it’s probably worse than you can imagine. I didn’t have trash service for a while, power went out, then the water. That was a few months . . . I don’t know, maybe longer. Time’s . . . time’s sort of gone to shit . . .” He got lost in thought for a beat, then said, “My sister showed up and was pissed. She fixed all that, has the bills sent to her now, but . . . I haven’t really been able to, um . . . Can we just sit out there?” He pointed to a wicker sofa in the gazebo at the far end of the yard.
“It’s fine, fine—whatever you like, son.”
“Let me grab some sunglasses . . .”
“Perhaps grab a small snack while you’re in there.”
Matthew stopped and looked back at him. “I eat, Doctor, okay? That’s not my problem. I ate . . . yesterday. Once or twice. I eat.”
Dr. Meier put up his hand. “Just a thought.”
As they crunched through the leaves to the gazebo, Meier watched Matthew’s feeble gait with some concern. They sat.
“Well, first I have some good news for you,” Dr. Meier said with a smile. He tugged at his beard. “For both of us! The book’s already a bestseller, a full week before its release.”
Matt nodded absently.
“You’re not impressed?”
“No, no, it’s good, sure.”
Nonplussed, Meier forged ahead “Well, that’s a huge deal, so you know. It means the advance we received is already paid back and we’ll have royalties coming in six months or so. I know you’ve had financial . . . difficulties since your return from Cuba, and this will be quite the windfall.”
“Cool.”
Meier sighed. “Well, on that subject, any headway on recovering the lost money?”
“No, all the accounts were drained. Transferred to some other accounts, then transferred again. They pretty much told me I was screwed and to move on.”
“I know you thought that, er, that you suspected—”
“It was Tuni, yeah. She’s the only one that had all the passwords and access codes used for the transfers. But whatever, I’m over it. Not going to pursue it. What else?”
As Matthew’s focus drifted across the mounds of leaves Meier debated whether to tell him. Perhaps if he asked directly.
“Well, here’s what I wanted to show you!” He pulled the hardcover book from the bag and handed it to Matt. Looking at it, Matt seemed a little more animated than before.
In a bold, weathered typeface, the title filled the top quarter of the matte dust jacket.
SOUTHLAND
The Stunning True Story of Cuba’s
Norse Settlement
by
Jon Meier, PhD
M. Turner
The cover image was a photograph of the excavated mountain village, overlaid with the artist’s rendering.
“The artist did a great job,” Matt said.
“High praise, coming from you! High praise indeed! I’ll let him know. You should flip through and see the interior art.”
“I will, yeah. Definitely. Can I buy this one from you, or should I order it online?”
Meier scoffed. “It’s yours, son! That’s why I brought it to you.”
A subdued smile, but Meier decided it was probably the best he could muster.
Matthew studied the cover some more, then said, “How’s the Rhode Island dig going?”
“Pretty much done, actually. Construction on the visitors’ center begins in a few weeks. Everything’s going fantastically, thanks to you. These are all quite significant finds. Now . . . on to you. Tell me what’s going on with you—physically, mentally, and otherwise.”
“I’m fine.”
Meier grunted and frowned.
“I’m fine as I can be. Sleeping pills keep me alive. I just don’t get to dream; that’s apparently the problem. Imprints keep my brain ac
tivity in a waking state all day, every day. Doctors say I should be completely whacked out by now. I think their words were more along the lines of ‘long-term, persistent, debilitating neural hyperactivity inevitably degenerates function,’ or something to that effect. ‘You will go insane,’ was the message. They wanted me to stay in the hospital—IVs, monitors, all that crap I’m not interested in dealing with day to day.”
“What about the fragments? Any more found?”
“I told you before that the shotgun BB’s were easy—those were all out in the Cuban hospital. Same Cuban docs that repaired my spleen. As for the opal, I think the total now is two hundred and thirteen pieces. Anything visible on an MRI or CT scan has been extracted. The main doctor I deal with thinks there are microscopic particles they’ll never find but that might reabsorb into my body over time. He says they’re nothing to worry about. Obviously, he didn’t put two and two together on who I am. But reabsorb? Who knows what the hell that’ll do? Might make no difference at all, or maybe I’ll piss them out one day and suddenly be free. I’m not holding my breath.”
“Well, I’m certain something can be done,” Meier countered. “We just need to find you the right specialist.” A car slowed to a stop in front, its occupants staring at the house. They didn’t seem to notice the two figures in the gazebo, shaded by the giant maple, and after a moment they drove off. “How has that been for you?”
“Less of it lately, but people are still putting stuff up over there. I had my house phone disconnected after changing it a bunch of times—they always seemed to track down the new numbers. People don’t understand that I couldn’t help, even if I wanted to.”
The Opal (Book 2 of the Matt Turner Series) Page 30
