What surprised me was the wild landscape, acres of wooded hills, swamps, kettle ponds and corn stubble. Before today, when I heard the name Long Island, I pictured Brooklyn slums, not a hundred miles of glaciated seacoast, dunes and archaic farms.
I hoped Will Chaser was still alive and on the loose. There was space here to hide from men who had every reason to kill him. Seeing a roadful of cops might not lure a boy with his background from hiding. He had been arrested twice for dealing grass and was also suspected of growing it. And he’d almost gone to jail for stealing a quarter-million-dollar horse. I had discovered all that and more about William J. Chaser, J for Joseph.
The kid was a survivor. The more I learned, the more I wanted to meet him. Not just to save him—I am a rescuer by nature, or so I’m told—but to find out how the boy had managed to escape, if he had indeed escaped. He was unusual and I wanted to know how . . . and why.
“It’s because you see yourself in the kid,” Tomlinson had told me on the plane. “Or want to. Not all homeless kids are functioning, independent adults by the time they’re sixteen. You were. Maybe Will is, too. But it’s unfair to hang those kind of expectations on him, man.”
I had chided Tomlinson, accusing him of being in a foul mood because the plane didn’t serve booze. That’s what got him started. Maybe he read my refusal to debate as an admission of guilt. Or disinterest. Whatever the reason, it irritated him and he pressed the issue.
“If Will outsmarts the people who snatched him, it validates you, Doc. If he’s too tough for them to break, it validates your totally unsympathetic view of what makes a man strong. Of what constitutes ballsiness in a real man.”
When I replied, “Are you thirsty or just going through withdrawal?,” his irritation escalated a notch.
“I’m talking about your definition of manhood, not mine. You say you’re interested in the boy because he’s different? Baloney. You have no interest whatsoever in people who are really different: old souls with artistic sensibilities, a telekinetic awareness of other dimensions and previous lives.”
I shouldn’t have smiled, because he interpreted my skepticism as derision.
“Laugh all you want, but you’re too honest to say it’s not true. If the kid really is different, it’s not because he has unusual qualities. It’s because he lacks the common qualities that make people human. That’s what you’re hoping anyway. It fits with your Darwinian, no-emotion, no-excuses, start-thinking, quit-whining view of what constitutes a competent male. Competent: the ultimate compliment when you speak of a man. Did you realize that?”
I had almost finished the thought, “Next trip, I pack a pint of rum instead of extra socks . . . ,” but Tomlinson’s voice drowned me out.
“I knew you were hooked the moment you said the kid fired back at you, the way your eyes lit up. Then, on the phone, Otto Guttersen saying the boy was as fearless as an alley cat. Self-reliant, independent. Doesn’t take shit off anybody. What it sounds like to me is, the boy’s a certifiable thug if someone gets in his way or crosses him, because you two share the same simple rules of life: The weak survive only if the strong prevail. And all damn quitters should be eaten like breadsticks along life’s highway.
“You don’t think I know why you’re pulling for young Will Chaser, Doc? What you see as ‘different,’ others might define as ‘deviant.’ If the kid’s anything like he’s been described, you two are like peas in a fucking pod!”
Tomlinson calmed a little when I said, “He’ll need to be shrewder than I was at fourteen to survive. And a lot tougher to stay sane if they do what they’re threatening to do.”
It was unfair to play a rational, serious card while Tomlinson was on one of his irrational tirades venting because of the stress.
But he laughed when I added, “What might help you is attending a meeting. You stand up and say, ‘Hi, my name’s Sighurdhr.’ ”
I pronounced it correctly—Sea-guard-er—which was risky because few people know his first name. He thought the name was pretentious, he had once confided. Associated it with his aristocratic roots and the privileged, yacht-club society he had spent his adult life denouncing.
I knew Tomlinson was okay when he responded with a cheerful, “Screw you!,” then resumed his nervous finger drumming, twisting and gnawing at a strand of his hair.
He was right about a couple of things, though. The kid had his hooks in me. Whether he was different or deviant, I was interested. Science is fueled by anomalies. I am driven accordingly.
I had learned something else while on the phone: William J. Chaser scared people. Ruth Guttersen had told me the boy sometimes made her nervous but sounded more than nervous when she explained, “He’s a completely different child when he gets mad. He’s so . . . silent!”
His teacher tried to hide it, too, but twice during our conversation paused to remind me, “This conversation is confidential, right? You’re not going to tell Will . . . Right? ”
The information provided me with a secret, speculative hope . . . until just before we landed when my phone rang.
It was Harrington. A security camera outside the Explorers Club had produced grainy images of the kidnappers. One was Choirboy. But the FBI couldn’t identify the other two.
Harrington’s sources could. No surprise. They had access to cross-reference files that included people the FBI had no reason to log.
“The Cuban Program,” Harrington said. “How much do you know?”
I knew enough to feel an adrenal charge.
“Castro trained three interrogators. All graduated from medical school, University of Havana. The staff that worked for them varied, but one of the three took on an apprentice late in the game. Vietnam, Panama, Iraq and Afghanistan—the team got around. Twenty years spent learning their craft.”
“Medical research,” I said. I meant “experiments”—an attempt at maintaining code protocol.
“The campers gave them nicknames. That’s never been made public.”
Campers were POWs.
Harrington asked, “Remember the Nestlé’s commercial, the ventriloquist—nice guy, seemed like—and Farfel?”
A floppy-eared puppet came into my mind, Farfel the dog. Snap a wooden ruler on a table, that was the sound Farfel made when his mouth slapped shut. “Choc-laaaate”—snap.
“One of the interrogators had the same mannerism,” Harrington told me. “He clicked his teeth to make a point. Farfel: His real name is René Navárro.”
Another interrogator was nicknamed Hump because of a subcutaneous horn growing from his forehead—a pathology less rare in the Caribbean than in other parts of the world.
“In the security photo, Hump should be a lot older,” Harrington said. “Either Hump hasn’t aged or Farfel is using Hump’s son. A relative maybe.
Or a Soviet special edition: part human, part something else. They tried that, you know.”
Yes, I knew.
Harrington had given physical descriptions to the FBI, minus details about the Cuban Program. There’d been rumors, but the information was still classified. “Not many POWs survived, but the few left don’t want it made public what Farfel and the other two did to them. The Americans called them Malvados, a Spanish word.”
Fiends. I didn’t have to ask why.
I said, “You’re sure about this.” I was thinking, They’ll torture the boy before he dies. Just for fun.
“I’m convinced. It’s their way of showing they’re serious about getting the library. It’s political.” Harrington’s warning tone again.
I said, “Screw protocol. A fourteen-year-old boy from Oklahoma is alone with Soviet-trained sociopaths.” Damn. “The gloves come off, right?”
Harrington said, “Rules are rules,” then switched subjects, his way of closing the door. He was asking, “Did you see the news story about the football player they thought drowned?,” as I hung up.
As we crossed the pasture, Frederick Gardiner, who managed the ranch and had trained horses for forty
years, told us, “Reason Long Island’s warmer here on the South Fork is ’cause the ocean pushes the snow up island. Gulf Stream sweeps close to the Springs, from away down by Florida—like you three.” He chuckled, surprised by the accidental irony, a man unaccustomed to making jokes.
The FBI agent told him, “I thought I mentioned that I’m from Boston, Mr. Gardiner. These men work for Senator Hayes-Sorrento, not the agency.”
The horseman stopped. He tossed a blanket over the shoulder of his Barbour jacket, gray hair showing beneath his wool hat. “Boston, eh?”
“Near Concord, like I told you. It couldn’t have been more than an hour ago.”
“Well, maybe so, but Boston’s Boston. And maybe you heard me mention I’d appreciate not hearing no smart comments about the Yankees, if you happen to be a Red Sox man. Don’t think I didn’t notice that sticker on your vehicle. Now here you are back again.”
When I started to laugh, Tomlinson elbowed me. Gardiner had already exceeded his joke quota. The man was serious.
“Red Sox people, they always got some damn smart remark. A way of being clever, I suppose, to those b’low the bridge, but they’ll get no smile from me. Which I think you should be aware of, Mr. . . . Mr. . . .” He’d lost the name. “Oh, here we are. Why you gotta take another look at the saddest thing that ever happened here, it don’t make no sense to me.”
It was a little after six but felt later because of a waxen light that blew off the North Atlantic. We had stopped at the broken fence. Death creates its own silence, a silence with boundaries that extend beyond the body mass of the corpse. We stood without speaking for a minute. I got the feeling Gardiner would have been offended if we’d scrambled over the fence to get closer.
Maybe Sudderram had tried earlier, because he was taking his time. “Would you mind telling these men what you told me? About horses jumping fences, Mr. Gardiner—this horse, I mean.”
Gardiner replied, “If I could pronounce your name, I’d use it.”
“Uhh . . . it’s Egyptian. Jah-bah-reel,” the agent began, then gave up as he watched the trainer shaking his head impatiently.
“I’m not talking about you, I’m talking about him.” Gardiner gestured toward the horse. “The registered name’s Alacazar-Alacazam, but he answered to Cazzio. A horse as fine as Cazzy, you ought to at least call him by name.”
Sudderram sighed. “My apologies,” he said, but with a false deference that told me he and the trainer hadn’t gotten along earlier in the day and their relationship wasn’t going to improve.
“We wouldn’t of sold Cazzy for a million dollars, and that there’s an accurate dollars-and-cents figure. How many folks can claim they’re worth half as much? FBI agents, doctors, politicians”—the trainer glanced at me and Tomlinson—“I’d take ol’ Cazzy back alive before any of ’em.”
Tomlinson spoke for the first time. “It’s got to be a pain in the butt for an old hand like you, Fred, dealing with summer people in January.” He glanced at the agent, then me, to confirm he’d surprised us calling Frederick Fred. “Winter’s the only time this man gets a break from dealing with outsiders. I don’t blame him for being upset.”
It was obviously meant to be ingratiating, but it meant something to the horse trainer. “You hit the nail on the head with that one, bub. First night since Christmas I went up-street for beers and the place goes all catty-fucked. When the nine-one-one woman called, I should’a known and come home right away. Vandals, is what did this. City-idiot kids looking for drugs. Rich little fucks with nothin’ better to do than cause a workingman more work.”
Tomlinson, who looked respectable but cold in jeans and a black sports coat I’d loaned him, said, “Summer people! Like the old saying, huh? Some are people, summer not,” his shrug adding What’re you gonna do?
Gardiner liked that but didn’t want to show it. “You’re from Florida, someone said?” Talking as if Sudderram wasn’t there.
“West Coast, not Palm Beach.”
“Not all summer people goes to Palm Beach nowadays,” Gardiner told him. “Sarasota, that’s become big with the money families.”
“I’m about an hour south,” Tomlinson said as if I’d vanished, too. Local knowledge. He had it and was making the most of it.
On the plane, I had asked Tomlinson about growing up in the nearby Hamptons, which may have fueled his irrational rant. It wasn’t the first time I had asked and it wasn’t the first time he’d dodged the question, switching subjects after a long silence spent twisting and tugging at his hair. Just before landing, though, he’d tried to explain, telling me, “I have friends in the Hamptons who’d be very bummed if they heard I was hanging with cops. You mind introducing me as Thomas?”
If he wanted to keep his past a secret, I didn’t mind. He knew the area and understood how to interact with locals. That was obvious when Gardiner began speaking only to Tomlinson.
“I’d think even people who didn’t know nothin’ about horses would see it’s more likely Cazzy would jump a fence with a rider than without.”
“Seems obvious, when you think about it,” Tomlinson said.
“Yes . . . yes, sure does. But that doesn’t mean there weren’t something else that caused him to do it. He wouldn’t have jumped just to leave what he knew was his home.”
“That’s the way you trained him,” Tomlinson offered.
“Damn right, I trained him! Like you said, I shouldn’t have to explain what’s pretty goddamn obvious.”
Tomlinson told him, “Well, Fred, I don’t know much about horses, but I know the best way to learn from an expert is keep my ears open and my mouth closed.”
“By God, ain’t that the truth? Pay attention, don’t make me do twice the work. You said your name was Thomas?”
“Call me Tom. I don’t like all the formal crap.”
When Sudderram saw that Tomlinson had bridged some invisible social barrier, his relief was apparent. He took a step back, content to let Tom serve as interpreter. Maybe we would learn more.
Gardiner looked at the dead horse and spit. “Cazzy was one of the country’s finest hunters and jumpers. It’s the rare horse that can do both. He was a prime actor in the dressage ring, too. A warm-blood, just full of music.”
When I said, “He looks like an Appaloosa,” the old trainer made a sound of irritation, then continued talking as if he hadn’t heard me.
“Eight years back, maybe you saw Cazzy in the Olympics—a bitch from the Jerseys, a woman whose name I won’t say, she leased him for the trials, then again for the Games. He was on the television ten, fifteen times. We figured he could win the next Olympics. Age didn’t bother him. Sorta like that mare Fein Cera. Hell, she won the World Championship when she was sixteen!”
As Gardiner explained why Cazzy hadn’t retired even though he’d been put out to stud, I was trying to auger my heel into the frozen pasture. I had a question but wanted to time it right. In January, how do you bury a valued horse . . . or an abducted teenager of great value?
I ducked through an unbroken section of fence, but only after Tomlinson, then Sudderram, gave me private nods telling me it was okay.
14
I waded through the grass, then cleaned my glasses before taking a close look. Big horse, with a back as long and broad as a couch. His coat was the same dappled gray as the horse in the painting of Robert E. Lee, the Confederate general, on his gelding, Traveller.
A backhoe would have to be brought in—no problem punching through the frozen ground or digging a hole big enough for more than just the horse.
Alacazar-Alacazam had been shot at least twice. There was a pock hole the size of a quarter on the rib cage, another on the neck just below the ear. Blood had coagulated into patches of ragged amber, a carpet of red on the bloated belly, probably because the bullet had punctured a lung.
Otherwise, the body was unmarked. The mane was articulately braided, as was a portion of the tail. The horse had been recently shod, the farrier’s nails still shin
y.
I had more questions now but waited for Gardiner to finish talking about the horse’s stud fee. “A hundred thousand dollars a shot,” he said, sounding proud and giving it a bawdy edge as if he’d been in on the fun. But there wasn’t much fun involved because the horse was so valuable. His owners seldom allowed natural cover. When they did allow it, Cazzy and the mare were released into a padded stall floored with rubber brick. Video cameras recorded it all.
I said, “It looks like he was ready for a show: the braids, fresh shoes. Or was he always groomed this way?”
“One of the summer girls who takes lessons does the braiding. Cazzy enjoyed the attention, and it was good practice for her. He wasn’t scheduled for another show until spring.”
All outsiders were summer people, I realized, even if they lived in the Hamptons year-round. The potential for resentment on both sides was implicit.
Gardiner resumed talking with Tomlinson as I circled the body. My wild-tempered uncle, Tucker Gatrell, had kept horses. Preferred his gelding, Roscoe, over a pickup truck for short trips. I had mucked enough stalls and done enough riding to distrust the animals—they were moody and manipulative—especially stallions. But I could also appreciate the marvel that is a horse with superb conformation. I had never seen one as heavily muscled or as well proportioned.
There was no bridle or saddle to hang on to. I couldn’t have handled a stallion like this, never mind trying to make him jump a fence. I paused, waiting to ask another question, then realized that Gardiner was in the process of answering it.
“The thing about jumping horses is, they don’t jump fences just to jump. It doesn’t come natural, not like deer or dogs. If there’s no rider, something’s gotta be chasing ’em. Or scaring the hell out of ’em. Fire a gun a couple of times and even a great one like Cazzy would jump. That’s what I think happened. Some of those rich city assholes got drunk and came out here because I was uptown.” The man’s voice faltered, getting emotional.
Sudderram risked another question. “But you don’t know for sure someone wasn’t riding him. You said that earlier.”
Dead Silence Page 13
