Shut Your Eyes Tight (Dave Gurney, No. 2): A Novel (58 page)

“See what I mean?” said Hardwick. “You read about that in the interview summaries, right? But now you’re picturing it as vividly as if you saw it.”

Gurney shrugged. “We do that all the time. Not only do our minds connect the dots, they create dots where there aren’t any to begin with. Like you said, Jack, we’re wired to love stories—coherence.” A moment later he had a sudden, seemingly unrelated thought. “Was the blood still wet?”

Hardwick blinked. “What blood?”

“The blood on the machete. The blood you told me a minute ago couldn’t have come directly from the murder scene, because the machete wasn’t the murder weapon.”

“Of course it was wet. I mean … it looked wet. Let me think a second. What I saw of it looked wet, but it had dirt and leaves stuck to it.”

“Christ!” interrupted Gurney. “That could be the reason …”

“The reason for what?”

“The reason Flores half buried it. Buried the blade. Under a coating of damp leaves and earth.”

“So the blood on it wouldn’t dry?”

“Or wouldn’t oxidize in a way noticeably different from the blood around the body in the cottage. The point is, if the blood on the machete appeared to be in a more advanced state of oxidation than the blood on Jillian’s wedding dress, that’s something you or the techs would have noticed. If the blood on the machete was older than the blood on the victim …”

“We’d have known that it wasn’t the murder weapon.”

“Exactly. But the wet soil on the blade would have slowed the drying of the blood, plus it would have obscured any oxidation, any observable difference from the color of the blood found in the cottage.”

“And that’s not something the lab would have picked up, either,” said Hardwick.

“Of course not. The blood analysis wouldn’t have been done until the following day at the soonest, and at that point a difference of an hour or two in the origination time of the two samples would have been undetectable—unless they were running a sophisticated test to examine that specific factor. But unless you or the ME had flagged it, they wouldn’t have had any reason to do it.”

Hardwick was nodding slowly, his eyes sharp and thoughtful. “It kicks the foundation out from under some basic assumptions we’ve been making, but where does it take us?”

“Hah. Good question,” said Gurney. “Maybe it’s just one more indication that
all
the initial assumptions in this case were wrong.”

The efficient female voice of Gurney’s GPS directed him to proceed another half mile, then turn left.

The turn was marked by a simple black-and-white sign on a black wooden post:
PRIVATE DRIVEWAY
. The narrow, smoothly paved drive passed through a pine copse with branches overhanging from
both sides, creating the feeling of a sculpted horticultural tunnel. Half a mile into this extended evergreen arbor they drove through an open gate in a tall chain-link fence and came to a stop at a raisable bar that was in its down position. Next to the bar was a handsome cedar-shingled security booth. On the wall facing Gurney, an elegant blue-and-gold sign read
MAPLESHADE RESIDENTIAL ACADEMY. VISITS BY APPOINTMENT ONLY
. A thickly built man with thinning gray hair emerged from the booth. His black pants and gray shirt gave the impression of an informal uniform, and he had the neutral, appraising eyes of a retired cop. His mouth smiled politely. “Can I help you?”

“Dave Gurney and Senior Investigator Jack Hardwick, New York State Police, here to see Dr. Ashton.”

Hardwick pulled out his wallet, extended his BCI ID toward Gurney’s window.

The guard eyed it carefully and made a sour face. “Okay, just stay right here while I call Dr. Ashton.” While keeping his gaze on the visitors, the man keyed in a code on his phone and began talking. “Sir, a Detective Hardwick and a Mr. Gurney here to see you.” A pause. “Yes, sir, they’re right here.” The guard shot them a nervous glance, then spoke into the phone. “No, sir, no one else with them … Yes, sir, of course.” The guard handed the phone to Gurney, who put the receiver to his ear.

It was Ashton. “I’m afraid you’ve caught me in the midst of something. I’m not sure I can see—”

“We only need to ask you a few questions, Doctor. And maybe someone on your staff could show us around the grounds afterward? We’d just like to get a feel for things.”

Ashton sighed. “Very well. I’ll make a few minutes for you. Someone will come to pick you up shortly. Please put the security man back on.”

After confirming Ashton’s authorization, the guard pointed to a small gravel area extending off the side of the pavement just past the booth. “Park over there. No cars beyond that point. Wait for your escort.” A moment later the bar across the driveway rose and Gurney drove through to the small designated parking area. From that position he could see a longer stretch of the fence than was
visible as he was approaching it. He was surprised to see that apart from the portion adjoining the road and the booth, the fence was topped with spiral coils of razor wire.

Hardwick had noticed it, too. “You think it’s to keep the girls in or the local boys out?”

“I hadn’t thought about the boys,” said Gurney, “but you may be right. A boarding school full of sex-obsessed young women, even if their obsessions are hellish, could be quite a magnet.”

“You mean
especially
if they’re hellish. Hotter the better,” said Hardwick, getting out of the car. “Let’s go shoot the shit with the man at the gate.”

The guard, still standing in front of his booth, gave them a curious look—friendlier now that they’d been approved for entry. “This about the Liston girl who worked here?”

“You knew her?” asked Hardwick.

“Didn’t
know
her, just knew who she was. Worked for Dr. Ashton.”

“You know him?”

“Again, more to see him than to talk to him. He’s a little—what would you say?
Distant?
”

“Standoffish?”

“Yeah, I would say he was standoffish.”

“So he’s not the guy you report to?”

“Nah. Ashton doesn’t really have anything to do with anybody. A little too important, you know what I mean? Most of the staff here report to Dr. Lazarus.”

Gurney detected a not-quite-hidden distaste in the guard’s voice, waited for Hardwick to follow it up. When he didn’t, Gurney asked, “What kind of a guy is Lazarus?”

The guard hesitated, seemed to be looking for a way to say something without saying something that could get him in trouble.

“I hear he’s not a smiley-face kind of guy,” said Gurney, recalling Simon Kale’s unflattering description.

Gurney’s mild encouragement was enough to put a crack in the wall.

“Smiley-face? Jeez no. I mean, he’s okay, I guess, but …”

“But not too pleasant?” Gurney prompted.

“It’s just, I don’t know, like he’s kind of in his own world. Like sometimes you’ll be talking to him and you get the feeling that ninety percent of him is somewhere else. I remember once—” He broke off the sentence at the sound of tires rolling slowly on gravel.

They all looked toward the little parking area—and the dark blue minivan that was coming to a stop next to Gurney’s car.

“The man himself,” said the guard under his breath.

The man who emerged from the van was ageless but far from young, with even features that made his face look more artificial than handsome. His hair was as black as only dye could make it, and the contrast with his pale skin was striking. He pointed to the back door of the van.

“Please get in, Officers,” he said as he slipped back into the driver’s seat and waited. His attempted smile, if that’s what it was, resembled the strained expression of a man who found daylight unpleasant.

Gurney and Hardwick got in behind him.

Lazarus drove slowly, gazing intently at the road ahead. After a few hundred yards, they rounded a bend and the dark pine woods yielded to a parklike area of mowed grass and widely spaced maples. The driveway straightened into a classical allée, at the end of which stood a neo-Gothic Victorian mansion with several smaller structures of similar design on either side of it. In front of the mansion, the road split. Lazarus took the right fork, which brought them around beds of ornamental shrubs to the rear of the building. There the split road came back together in a second allée that proceeded on, surprisingly, to a large chapel of dark granite. Its narrow stained-glass windows might on a cheerier day have given the impression of ten-foot-high red pencils, but at that moment they looked to Gurney like bloody gashes in the stone.

“The school has its own church?” asked Hardwick.

“No. Not a church anymore. Deconsecrated a long time ago. Too bad, in a sense,” he added, with a touch of that disconnection the guard had described.

“How so?” asked Hardwick.

Lazarus answered slowly. “Churches are about good and evil. About guilt and punishment.” He shrugged, pulling up in front of
the chapel and switching off the ignition. “But church or no church, we all pay for our sins one way or another, don’t we?”

“Where is everyone?” asked Hardwick.

“Inside.”

Gurney looked up at the imposing edifice, its stone face the color of dark shadows.

“Is Dr. Ashton in there?” Gurney pointed at the arched chapel door.

“I’ll show you.” Lazarus got out of the van.

They followed him up the granite steps and through the door into a wide, dimly lit vestibule that smelled to Gurney like the parish church of his Bronx childhood: a combination of masonry, old wood, the age-old soot of burned candle wicks. It was a scent with a strangely dislocating power, making him feel a need to whisper, to step quietly. From beyond a pair of heavy oak doors that would lead presumably into the main space of the chapel came the low murmur of many voices.

Above the doors, carved boldly into a wide stone lintel, were the words
GATE OF HEAVEN
.

Gurney gestured toward the doors. “Dr. Ashton is in there?”

“No. The girls are in there. Settling down. All a bit volatile today—shaken up by the news about the Liston girl. Dr. Ashton’s in the organ loft.”

“Organ loft?”

“That’s what it used to be. Converted now, of course. Converted into an office.” He pointed to a narrow doorway at the far end of the vestibule, leading to the foot of a dark staircase. “It’s the door at the top of those stairs.”

Gurney felt a chill. He wasn’t sure whether it was the natural temperature of the granite or something in Lazarus’s eyes, which he was sure were fixed on them as they climbed the shadowy stone steps.

A
t the top of the cramped stairwell was a small landing, weirdly illuminated by one of the building’s narrow scarlet windows. Gurney knocked on the landing’s only door. Like the doors off the vestibule, it looked heavy, gloomy, uninviting.

“Come in.” Ashton’s mellifluous voice was strained.

Despite its weight and promise of creakiness, the door swung open fluidly, silently, into a comfortably proportioned room that might have passed for a bishop’s private study. Chestnut brown bookcases lined two of the windowless walls. There was a small fireplace of sooty fieldstone with old brass andirons. An ancient Persian rug covered the floor, except for a satin-polished border of cherrywood two feet wide all the way around the room. A few large lamps, set atop occasional tables, gave the dark, woody tones of the room an amber glow.

Scott Ashton sat wearing a troubled frown at an ornate black-oak desk, placed at a ninety-degree angle to the door. Behind him, on an oak sideboard with carved lion-head legs, was the room’s major concession to the current century—a large flat-screen computer monitor. He motioned Gurney and Hardwick vaguely to a pair of red velvet high-backed chairs across from him—the sort of chairs one might find in the sacristy of a cathedral.

“It just keeps getting worse and worse,” Ashton said.

Gurney assumed he was referring to the murder the previous evening of Savannah Liston and was about to offer some vague words of agreement and condolence.

“Frankly,” Ashton went on, turning away, “I find this organized-crime
angle almost incomprehensible.” At that point the sight of his Bluetooth earpiece, along with the oddness of his comments, told Gurney that the man was in fact in the middle of a phone call. “Yes, I understand … I understand … My point is simply that every step forward makes the case more bizarre … Yes, Lieutenant. Tomorrow morning … Yes … Yes, I understand. Thank you for letting me know.”

Ashton turned toward his guests but seemed for a moment to be lost in contemplation of the conversation just ended.

“News?” asked Gurney.

“Are you aware of this … criminal-conspiracy theory? This … grand scheme that may involve Sardinian gangsters?” Ashton’s expression seemed strained by a combination of anxiety and disbelief.

“I’ve heard it discussed,” said Gurney.

“Do you think there’s any chance of it being true?”

“A chance, yes.”

Ashton shook his head, stared confusedly at his desk, then back up at the two detectives. “May I ask why you’re here?”

“Just a gut feeling,” said Hardwick.

“Gut feeling? What do you mean?”

“In every case there’s some common point where everything converges. So the place itself becomes a key. It could be a big help for us just to take a walk around, see what we can see.”

“I’m not sure that I—”

“Everything that’s happened seems to have some link back to Mapleshade. Would you agree with that?”

“I suppose. Perhaps. I don’t know.”

“You telling me you haven’t thought about it?” There was an edge in Hardwick’s voice.

“Of course I’ve thought about it.” Ashton looked perplexed. “I just can’t … see it that clearly. Maybe I’m too close to everything.”

“Does the name Skard mean anything to you?” asked Gurney.

“The detective on the phone just asked me the same question—something about some horrible Sardinian gang family. The answer is no.”