“You want to do it?”
“No, I think you should. If you offer all the assistance you can up front, it might stand to us when you eventually convince our guy to come in with the boy. I know I’ll be hearing from Corriveau anyway, once she’s spoken to you.”
Moxie folded his hands over his belly. His suit, shirt, and tie were silk, and all were certainly expensive, yet they looked terrible on him. Parker had known Moxie Castin for years, and he still wasn’t sure whether the lawyer deliberately selected garments that were incompatible with his build, or the cut of any clothing began to deteriorate immediately upon contact with him. It was, Parker surmised, one of life’s great mysteries.
“And you’re worried about Maela Lombardi,” said Moxie.
“More than I was before Molly Bow told me about what happened in Cadillac, Indiana.”
Parker had the sense—not unfamiliar to him in the course of investigations—of being surrounded by a series of disparate pieces, some, none, or all of which might be linked. The challenge was to resist imposing a pattern where no pattern existed, because to do so was to follow a path that could take one further from the truth. Parker had learned instead to examine each piece of a puzzle in isolation, while also remaining cognizant of the places where the tabs and slots might join in the hope of ultimately creating a picture as yet unknown. In any given situation, this task was made more difficult by the fact that every piece was open to multiple interpretations. Each was a signifier, but could also be the thing signified. Practical investigation as semiology: perhaps, Parker mused, he might write a textbook on it, if he lived long enough, and was really bored.
“Do you want to go there?” asked Moxie.
“To Indiana?”
“Yes.”
“Have you ever been to Indiana?”
“Nope. I don’t think I even know anyone who’s been to Indiana. You’ll be the first.”
“I haven’t said I’ll go yet.”
“I didn’t ask if you were going; I asked if you wanted to go. That’s two different questions.”
“I don’t remember taking the stand, Your Honor.”
“Old habits.”
Parker really didn’t want to go to Indiana, but Leila Patton was incommunicado and he was worried that she might eventually run. The trip to Indiana could entail just a night or two away, if all worked out well. There were also direct flights from Boston to Cincinnati, marginally the nearest airport to Cadillac, which would save him a transfer. But it was still Indiana. He had nothing against the state; he just didn’t want to be there.
“You do seem impatient to be rid of me,” said Parker.
“Not at all. But if Lombardi’s disappearance is connected to the death of this man Dobey, and the disappearance of Bachmeier, then someone is working his or—given the Patton incident—her way toward the missing boy.”
“Which means our caller doesn’t just have the police and us to worry about.”
“Could be he already knows,” said Moxie, “which is why he’s reaching out.”
“All the more reason for you to reel him in as quickly as possible.”
“I’ll do my best. In the meantime, go home and get some rest. You look weary. I don’t like seeing you weary. You might force me to become distressed. I’ll let you know what Corriveau says.”
Parker was already at the door when Moxie shouted, “Just one more thing,” like some better-fed version of Columbo.
“Any more from Bobby Ocean or his idiot son?” he asked.
“Nothing.”
“Good.” Moxie returned to his papers. “That fucking kid is trouble.”
CHAPTER
LXX
The streetlights caught the mottled paintwork on the replacement truck that circumstances had forced Billy Ocean to drive. Every time Billy got behind the wheel of this used piece of shit, he was reminded of his departed Chevy. Since he was required to drive the second-hand truck in order to work, thereby justifying the salary his father paid him, he was constantly forced to recall what had been lost.
Bobby Ocean owned properties scattered over Portland, South Portland, Westbrook, Gorham, and Auburn. His son’s main task was to manage these properties, which Billy did with as little good grace as possible. He ignored at least one call in three to his business phone, since there were only so many complaints about damp, noise, plumbing, smells, trash, rats, and roaches to which a man could listen without wanting to break some heads. There was always some problem to be dealt with—or not dealt with, as the case might be.
Billy’s dereliction of duty might have been more of a problem if his father was aware of it, if only because Bobby Ocean didn’t want any trouble with the city inspectors. But as the management company didn’t bear the family name, and most of the tenants were poor, or immigrants with only minimal English (the Stonehursts being happy to screw over non-natives for having the temerity to infest the United States to begin with), or mentally deficient, Billy was able to ride roughshod over them without having to worry about anyone making a complaint to a higher authority. The tenants had only the management company as their point of contact, and aside from a single secretary, Billy was the management company.
It helped that the rents were low, and the occupants lived in fear of finding themselves out on the street if they kicked up a fuss. They’d end up on the street eventually, Billy knew. Gentrification had caused rents in the city to rise 40 percent in five years, and a number of influential people, Bobby Ocean among them, were involved in stifling talk of stabilization. Ultimately even the apartments owned by the Oceans would become unaffordable to many. At that point, it might be worth putting some money into the units and finding tenants a couple of levels above the current intake, maybe ones who could carry on a conversation in English, or whose mouths didn’t hang open when they weren’t speaking.
But until that happened, Billy was reasonably content to manipulate a system that was purpose-built for the exploitation of the poor. His father paid little attention as long as the money kept coming in, and he wasn’t bothered by small shit. This left Billy free to levy cash fines for the smallest of infractions; regard security deposits as non-refundable, using anything from a stain on the carpet to a busted shelf as justification for retention; and turn his correspondence-school lawyer loose for contractual breaches, real or perceived, mainly in the form of regular threats of legal action over insufficient notice to vacate, because even if such notice had been given, it was hard to prove. These people hadn’t the resources to file a notice with their own lawyers or accountants because they were barely putting food on the table, albeit food that looked alien to Billy, and smelled like garbage. So it was that Billy was garnishing the wages and bank accounts of half a dozen individuals who had done nothing worse than sign a lease agreement with a venal company.
Billy hoped to leave all this behind someday. He hated dealing with busted toilets and overflowing garbage. Managing the Gull could be the first step to bigger and better things. His father was entrusting him with a new business, and it was up to Billy to run with it, thereby proving himself worthy of still greater responsibility down the line.
At the thought of his father, Billy found himself touching his left cheek, just where the slap had landed. It wasn’t tender anymore, but it still hurt deep inside. All because of some leaflets left under car wipers; all because Billy chose to take a stand.
Billy wondered if the Negro responsible for blowing up his truck might not be among his own current or former tenants. He had a couple of Somalis in a place in Gorham, some of whom undeniably had an attitude, but he wasn’t sure they even knew what the Confederate flag looked like—or if they did, what it signified. Then again, they might just have spotted his truck and decided to seek some payback for the dump in which they were living. But Billy decided that, on balance, this seemed unlikely.
Of course, it was also possible that someone had learned of his extracurricular activities, the kind that involved sticking racist pamphlets
under doormats and windshield wipers in the dead of night. Billy didn’t know much about the Klan beyond bedsheets and burning crosses, and cared even less to find out, but he understood the value of the brand.
Which brought him back to the flags.
Which brought him back, as ever, to the Negro in the bar.
Billy Ocean wasn’t about to let this go.
It was a matter of principle.
CHAPTER
LXXI
Angel was sleeping. A day had passed since his return to the Upper West Side apartment he shared with Louis, in the building they jointly owned, because all that was Louis’s was also Angel’s. This, Louis reflected, was probably not an unfamiliar situation for Angel: as a professional thief for much of his life, Angel was comfortable with fluid concepts of ownership, and associated transfers of the same.
In the ground-floor apartment, Louis knew, Mrs. Bondarchuk would be watching TV surrounded by yappy Pomeranians, a watchdog among watchdogs. Mrs. Bondarchuk was the sitting tenant when Louis first bought the building, and he had seen no reason to alter that arrangement. Mrs. Bondarchuk paid a rent so small that even she was embarrassed by it, and provided a range of hearty stews and baked goods to make up for any perceived shortfall. She also maintained unceasing vigil over the building, its neighbors, its environs, and anyone who might pause on the street for longer than was necessary to tie a shoelace, take a phone call, or hail a cab. Her TV was positioned so that only a glance to her left was required to ensure all was well. She also chose to collude in the fiction that the two gentlemen occupying the upper floors were merely tenants like herself; and although her upbringing was Eastern European, Catholic, and deeply conservative, she was pleasantly scandalized by their sexuality. It made her feel exotic by association.
Louis took a damp cloth and wiped the sweat from Angel’s face. Angel did not react, but continued to breathe shallowly in his narcosis-induced sleep. Only the rise and fall of his chest disturbed the stillness of his form.
He will appear like this when he is dead, Louis thought. He is forcing me to look on him this way.
Behind Louis, the nurse appeared.
I do not want him to leave me. I will break.
“I can take over, if you like,” she said.
The team of three nurses that would alternately care for Angel, each overlapping with another for an hour each day, had been carefully sourced. Their agency was noted for its discretion, its staff having ministered to the needs of princes, dictators, and criminals. The criminals, according to the head of the agency, were always the most polite.
“Thank you,” said Louis. He returned the cloth to its bowl, adjusted the blanket over Angel’s chest, and smoothed away the wrinkles in the material.
“You have the number. Call me for anything.”
Louis knew that he should remain with Angel, but he could not. He was running away once again. He was a coward.
“I will,” said the nurse, “but he’ll be fine.”
She took the chair, and Louis closed the door softly behind him. When he woke, Angel would understand the reason for his partner’s absence. These periods of escape were the only means by which Louis could discharge the fear that built up within him, and so allow him to be strong for this man he loved.
The building housed three apartments, of which only two were ever occupied. The one on the second floor was variously used as a workshop, an office, and a place of retreat when either Angel or Louis—mostly the former, but occasionally the latter—was getting on his partner’s nerves. At the moment, it was home to the Fulci brothers, whose guardianship of Angel had now extended—very temporarily, Louis prayed—to the early period of his recuperation, thus facilitating Louis’s truancy. Mrs. Bondarchuk, for all her vigilance, did not own a gun.
On the other hand, Mrs. Bondarchuk was not crazy.
Then again, she did seem curiously fond of the Fulcis, and Paulie in particular, who was currently watching TV with her. Tony, meanwhile, was sitting in their living quarters, the door open while he worked on a massive kit of the USS Constitution. According to his brother, Tony’s therapist had recommended the building of model ships as a calming measure. Tony had calculated that the bigger the kit, the greater the therapeutic value, and so the U.S.S. Constitution would measure three feet in length when completed.
No, scratch that: if completed. This was, it seemed, the twelfth kit upon which Tony had embarked. The previous eleven had been destroyed in fits of rage at varying stages of construction. Tony’s therapist, Louis believed, was clutching at fucking straws.
Louis put on his suit jacket and picked up his overcoat. The car was waiting for him outside. When not driving himself, Louis employed the services of an Uzbek chauffeur named Alex. Louis did not trust many people, but Alex was one of them.
He said goodbye to the Fulcis, and to Mrs. Bondarchuk. He instinctively checked the street before opening the outer door of the building, although he knew that Alex would have done the same, or else he would not have been standing patiently by the car, his face a vision of Central Asian calm.
“Good evening, Alex.”
“Good evening, sir.”
“Is the family well?”
“Very well, sir, thank you for asking.”
Always the same conversation. Louis sometimes questioned if Alex would even admit if any member of his family was unwell. Perhaps, under Alex’s careful stewardship, it had ceased to be a possibility.
Louis had only a small leather satchel to carry with him on the flight to Portland. It contained a pen and a book. He had moved on to Montaigne’s Essays. Louis felt that he might have enjoyed meeting Montaigne, whom he found not just wise, but sensible.
The car pulled away from the curb. Louis opened the Essays, but instead of reading anew, he returned to a page he had marked earlier in the week, as he listened from outside the hospital room while a young nurse helped Angel shift position to prevent bedsores. From the introduction to the volume, Louis had learned that Montaigne was close to a poet named Étienne de La Boétie, whose death plunged Montaigne into grief. Of their friendship, Montaigne wrote: “If you press me to say why I loved him, I can say no more than because he was he, and I was I.”
Louis touched his fingers to the page.
Yes, he thought. Yes.
CHAPTER
LXXII
Billy Ocean pulled into the parking lot behind the three-unit rental in Auburn. The building was temporarily empty due to an ongoing damp problem that technically rendered it unsuitable for human habitation, although Billy knew people who’d pay good money to live in it, even at risk to their health. It smelled some, and only a fool would have chanced putting any significant weight on a couple of the boards, but it was better than sleeping under the stars.
Billy was holding off on getting the necessary work done because his usual handyman—who worked cheap but billed high, enabling Billy and him to split the difference—was languishing in the Cumberland County Jail for failing to pay child support. He was unlikely to be breathing free air anytime soon either, since he owed $15,000 for his kids, who lived with their mother in New Jersey. Under federal law, it was a crime for a person to maintain a residence in a different state from his children if that person owed more than $5,000 in child support, which meant Billy’s handyman was looking at two years in prison and a fine of up to $250,000. Even with a sympathetic report from the federal probation office, he still wasn’t going to be in a position to deal with Billy’s damp problem before parts of the building started caving in. This left Billy with the problem of locating a sufficiently crooked contractor to replace him, and good men were hard to find.
Billy opened the lockbox in the bed of the truck and removed a plastic bag of groceries, a case of Silver Bullets, and a bottle of Johnny Drum Black. He put the bourbon in the pocket of his overcoat to save himself another trip, and headed for the building. As he stomped to the back door, a drape twitched in one of the windows on the second floor.
E
ach of the units contained its own kitchen, but Billy had taken the precaution of having the gas cut off until the maintenance work could be completed. The power was still on, though, so his guest could cook with the microwave, and watch DVDs on a crappy TV. None of this lessened the bitching, as though everything that had occurred was Billy’s fault—which it wasn’t, but Billy was in the shit now, right up to his chin, with no choice but to keep paddling. He couldn’t see how the whole business might possibly end well. He could only hope that when the end came, it happened far from Auburn, and far from him.
Billy took the stairs carefully, sticking to the side closest to the wall, and avoiding the fourth and fifth steps entirely. He’d already put his left foot through the lower one on a previous visit, resulting in a mildly sprained ankle and a jagged hole in the wood like a toothed mouth, and only a warning crack from the fifth step had saved him from further injury. This time he reached the second floor without harm, and kicked the door in place of knocking, his hands being otherwise occupied. Eventually, after a certain amount of shuffling and swearing, the door opened to reveal the form of the most wanted man in the state of Maine.
“Well,” said Heb Caldicott, “you took your fucking time.”
* * *
PARKER HEADED HOME TO shower after he was done with Moxie Castin, but didn’t bother making dinner. He knew that Louis was on his way back to Portland, and they’d arranged to meet for a late burger at Nosh on Congress. In the meantime, Parker spoke with Kes Carroll, who confirmed that the Silver Alert had generated a few calls, but none of the sightings appeared to be of Lombardi. Parker didn’t know if Moxie had yet managed to tell Solange Corriveau of the Karis lead, or of the events in Indiana, but he saw no reason why he shouldn’t share what he knew with Carroll. The information didn’t make Carroll any happier, but it did help focus her mind. It also increased the likelihood of Lombardi’s disappearance being taken off Carroll’s hands and absorbed into the Jane Doe investigation—or the Karis investigation, as Parker had now begun to think of it—assuming Corriveau accepted the possibility of a connection.
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