The Gift of the Darkness (20 page)

Brown drank from a bottle of water. Sorensen's office door was open, on her desk a copy of the
New York Times
. He picked it up and sat on a bench in the corridor, adjusted his glasses, and started reading. After a couple of minutes of Madison's pacing, he looked up.

“Will you sit down already?”

She obliged. He went back to the paper.

“What I said before . . .” she said.

“The Yoda thing,” he said crisply, still reading.

“Right.”

“Funny,” he said.

After that, they sat in silence for a while, Brown turning the pages from time to time and Madison leaning her head on the cool wall behind them, her eyes closed. It was past eleven when his phone rang, and they both knew there was just no way it was going to be good news.

It was a long call, and for most of it, he listened. Then it was done, and the only sound around them was the soft hum of the vending machine.

“That was Detective Finch, LAPD Homicide. They were called to a crime scene today—the house of a known dealer. Vice had him on their wish list for years, but nothing ever stuck. Anyway, they get there and find three bodies: the dealer and two bodyguards. Looked like an assassination. Good news for the civilized world, but they still have to work the case, so they look into friends and associates and check out who might want him gone.”

Brown paused.

“The guards died of blood loss from knife wounds to the neck, and the dealer was shot with his own gun. Shot through the right eye. The Los Angeles ME puts the time of death sometime on Tuesday. No prints. No witnesses. No trace evidence so far. But it turns out the guy had an associate in Seattle, name of Erroll Sanders.”

He let that sink in.

“And when they checked on him—”

“They're looking at Cameron for it?” Madison said.

“They have nothing that links him to the dead men, except for Sanders and how the guards were killed. They're going to e-mail Kelly the details of the blade for a comparison with the knife that cut Sanders.”

“It happened sometime on Tuesday,” Madison said.

“Yes.”

“That's before Sanders was killed.”

Brown nodded. Madison thought about it for a moment. There must be a chronology to this mess. “Cameron is here on Saturday
night—we have the Sinclairs' time of death to confirm it. He waits for two days. He meets Quinn Monday afternoon. On Tuesday he's in LA; he takes care of business there. In the early hours of Wednesday he's back here for Sanders. He speaks with Quinn after the first hearing, and yesterday at 2:20 p.m. he drops the Explorer at the airport.”

“Busy week,” Brown said.

Sorensen emerged after a while. “We have the partial of a thumb from inside the trunk; it's smudged as if a hand print got cleaned off. It might not be strong enough for court. The outside and underside are spotless. No surprise there.” She took a sip from a paper cup. “We have a couple of hairs from the backseat, but don't get excited—they were shed, not pulled. So, no follicle and no DNA. Also from the backseat, a very small amount of fibers that could be cotton or wool, black. But, best of all, there was a drop of blood under the steering wheel. Could be a cut to the palm of the hand. We're comparing it to the DNA from the Sinclair crime scene. Now, I beg you, go home.”

They walked out into the night, and Madison looked forward to her drive home, alone in her car, the music loud enough to go right through her bones.

Billy Rain had spent the rest of Wednesday in the garage, thinking about Tully's article and George Pathune lying dead on the concrete floor of a prison laundry. More than actually thinking about it, he had been in a state of constant recall. It had come between his brain and his hands, and he had cut himself twice. Something that had never happened before. His brother-in-law had noticed.

“Don't bleed on the seats,” he told him.

The day inched on, and at the end of his shift Billy left with the newspaper tightly folded in his coat pocket. He needed a bar where he knew no one and no one knew him. He found one off Fairview. A dim local enterprise one flick of the broom away from sawdust on the floor.

He finished his first beer, sitting in a corner booth, the paper untouched next to the bowl of peanuts. He ordered a second beer,
took a sip, and opened the
Star
. He read Tully's piece twice, feeling each time the same cold dread but getting through it nevertheless.

By the time he was starting on his third beer, he felt a little more in control. Enough to know that he needed to switch to ginger ale if he wanted to think straight.

He deliberately had not revisited that day since he'd been paroled; he had tried to leave the memory of it in his cell. No one knew, because he had never told. He had never needed to: the body of George Pathune had been added unofficially to the tally of a convict called Edward Morgan Rabineau who was already doing time for two counts of murder, and nobody was particularly surprised at his notching up a third.

Billy reflected briefly about the prison laundry on that day three years ago, and, if he had to be perfectly honest, he couldn't say whether the person he had seen was Rabineau. He was familiar with the man, sure, but they had never spoken; they moved in different circles, and within the prison hierarchy they were about as far apart as they could be and still belong to the same species. With one major difference now: Rabineau was still in jail. Billy was sure of that.

Tully's piece identified the prime suspect as someone called John Cameron. A name he had not heard in a long time and had seriously hoped not to hear again.

Billy drained his ginger ale. Something else he was pretty sure of was that no one named Cameron had been in jail at the time Pathune was killed. Which meant Tully might be wrong. It had nothing to do with Billy, of course—none of it had.

He ordered some food and ate watching the sports on TV. He went home to his one-room rental—he hadn't sufficiently proven himself to go back and live with his family yet; he just had dinner with them a couple of times a week—and he watched television till he fell asleep in his chair.

By Thursday morning, the news of Nathan Quinn's reward was in all the major papers.

Chapter 24

It had been a hard winter. Michael and Harry Salinger had spent many afternoons at home, prisoners of the rain, the early dark, and their father's moods. They endured the seventh grade and prayed for spring and the release of summer.

One Saturday afternoon, as they were coming back from the grocery store, they saw their father waiting for them in the kitchen. Michael noticed him first and took one step back, away from the window. He hadn't seen them. He motioned to his brother to follow him to the back gate.

“He's waiting,” he whispered.

“I didn't do anything,” Harry said quickly.

“Let's go,” Michael said. “We might as well get it over with.”

They walked into the kitchen and put the bags on the table.

Richard Salinger looked at them. “Do you guys want to see
Back to the Future
or what?”

They were speechless. The film had just opened, and no one was talking about anything else.

They queued for tickets and bought popcorn, the boys still stunned, finding their way in the crowd.

They watched the film and heard their father laugh, an exotic sound. He took them for pizza afterward; they split a large salami and cheese and drank Cherry Coke. The place was full of parents with kids. The last thing Harry thought that night as he was falling asleep:
that
must be what it's like for everyone else.

Richard Salinger's mood lasted about a week. Then, one day, Michael's “Yes, sir” wasn't quite as snappy as it should have been, and his brother got a quick smack on the back of the head.

One summer evening the twins were sitting on the back steps, the sky above them turning purple. Their yard was lined by tall trees, and once their father had gone to work, nobody could see them.

They shared a cigarette, passing it back and forth between them and knowing how much every drag would cost them if their father knew.

“We could run away,” Michael said. “It's not impossible.”

They both knew that Richard Salinger would use every connection he still had at the police department to find them. They would last five minutes on the road.

They buried the cigarette pack and the matches in a small plastic bag under the roots of the farthest tree from the house, the stub next to it.

Two days later, Michael found the gun.

They were tossing a tennis ball as they were going down the stairs. Michael missed, and the ball rolled into their father's room. The boys looked at each other: it wasn't a good idea to go in there without an excellent reason, and a tennis ball didn't even come close. But Richard Salinger was out, and Michael gently pushed the door open wider.

“It's under the bed. Get it and get out,” Harry said.

Michael stood just inside the room and looked around. The bed, with the blankets hastily pulled up, was in the corner. A jacket and a shirt had been thrown on a chair. The room had not been aired in a long time and smelled of cough medicine.

“Come on,” Harry called out. The hairs were standing up on the back of his neck just knowing that Michael was in their father's room.

“Okay.” Michael got onto his hands and knees, lifted the bedspread, and looked into the darkness.

Two pairs of old leather shoes lay at funny angles, covered with such a thick film of dust, it was impossible to see their color. A shoebox was tied with a piece of string, and, wedged between that and the wall, was the tennis ball.

Michael wasn't all that happy about reaching into the dusty mess, but there wasn't much he could do about it.

Suck it up
, he thought.

He lay down flat on his stomach, trying to keep his face as much as possible off the floor, and reached for the shoebox. He felt it with the tips of his fingers and grasped it; he pulled it out and went for the ball. His eyes were squeezed shut; he could feel the dust going up his nose with every breath. He closed his fingers around the ball and straightened up. Still sitting on the floor, he wiped his hand on the front of his white T-shirt.

He started to push the shoebox back under with his foot. It was heavy.

“What's taking you so long?”

“Have you seen this before?” Michael pointed at the box.

Harry peeked into the room and shook his head.

Michael picked it up and felt its weight in his hands.

In that house of secrets, none was more closely guarded by Richard Salinger than their mother's death. The boys had no memories of her: he told them nothing, and they did not ask. Between themselves, however, they sometimes spoke of her and wondered.

Slowly, Michael began to untie the string. He did not know himself what he was hoping to find—maybe a scrap of paper, maybe a photograph.

Harry stood transfixed.

Michael laid the string aside and lifted the lid. His mouth dropped open. He looked up at Harry.

“What is it?”

“Come here,” Michael said, his voice dead serious.

“No.”

“Harry.”

Harry stepped into the room and saw it. The revolver was wrapped in a white handkerchief, next to it a small box of cartridges. Even concealed inside the fabric, there was no doubt about what it was.

Michael put the box on the ground between them, and they stared at it. Many times, when they were little and their father was still a police officer, he had shown them his duty piece, strapped in the holster and well out of the reach of their small hands.

Michael lifted the corners of the fabric one by one, his fingers barely brushing the gunmetal.

The weapon was polished to a shine.

After what seemed like forever, Michael picked it up by the butt. Harry was frozen on the spot. They had never thought for a second that their father might still keep a piece in the house. The cigarettes behind the tree were baby stuff. This was beyond trespassing; it was way beyond any rule they had ever broken.

Harry went cold. “Put it away,” he said.

Michael stood up; he held the weapon toward the window, his arm outstretched and one eye shut, taking aim. “In a second,” he replied.

Harry didn't know why he was sick with fear. They couldn't possibly get caught; their father would be out for hours. He could see Michael working the loader and looking inside. It was empty. It was his brother's ease with the gun—how he cradled the butt in the palm of his hand—that intrigued him most.

“Put it away.”

“In a second.” Michael held it out to him, the muzzle pointed at the floor. “Do you want to hold it?”

Harry Salinger took the .38 from his brother's hand, surprised and delighted by the weight of it. It was the strangest thing. He stretched his arm out and took aim at the falling sun. It felt better than good; it felt right.

They knelt together and put it back in the box, carefully folding the kerchief around it. Michael pushed it back where he had found it, and they left the room. Without having to explain, they went to the tree and dug out the cigarettes. They took one each and sat on the
kitchen steps smoking, as scared and thrilled as they had ever been in their lives.

“It's not impossible,” Michael said quietly.

The rest of the summer was about nothing else but the gun: why their father had it, why he was hiding it, and how they could use that precious discovery. Around their father they were as quiet as mice, but at every occasion they would resume the same conversation.

“I think we should go before school starts,” Michael said one day while they were folding laundry. “I don't think I can stand another winter here.”

Harry nodded. He was used to Michael doing most of the talking anyway. This time, though, Michael's ramblings were different—they were
specific
. He listed dates and ways of getting out of town; he mentioned big cities where two kids could get lost and no one would find them. Somewhere warm, where they could do small jobs to keep them going. Most of all, they'd be traveling with the gun. They'd be as safe as they could be. Harry nodded.

He started to wake up more often during the night; he would lie in bed listening to the tiny creaks and clicks in the house, feeling squashed between his father's oppression and his brother's will to run.

The touch of the gunmetal against the palm of his hand had projected cool blue right in front of him, and the word itself, gun, being a rich, deep purple. Harry could see it with his eyes closed as it glowed against a black background. It came to him whether he liked it or not, ready or not.

One Sunday morning, their father was still asleep, and the day shone with all the sweetness of summer's end. Michael turned to Harry at the kitchen table.

“Let's go to Mount Baker Beach,” he said.

They took the bus, and the farther they got from the house, the better they felt. It was Labor Day weekend, and the beach was busy with families and kids splashing everywhere. The boys bought two
bottles of Cherry Coke and sat at the water's edge. After a while Harry got up.

“I'm going in.”

The sun had been hot on their shoulders, and Lake Washington was so cool, it made him almost dizzy. He went under headfirst and came out shaking water off his hair.

“It's great! You've got to come in.” Harry splashed Michael hard with his hand.

They got into a water fight and then swam underwater until their feet could not touch the bottom anymore. They came out for air and dog-paddled, spitting jets of water at each other. They swam and they lay on their backs, letting the water take them where it would.

After an hour or so, Harry started to swim back to shore.

“I'm staying for a little while,” Michael said.

Harry found their clothes and lay down in the soft breeze. He fell asleep, and when he woke up, his hair was dry, and Michael was still gone. Harry got to his feet; the sun was lower in the sky, and most of the crowd had left. He looked around, all around. The lake was flat and still, and he stepped into the water, turning to look at the shore, turning back to the water.

“Are you all right?” The lifeguard put his hand on the boy's shoulder, and Harry jumped. The sun had just set when they brought Michael's body out of the water.

Harry couldn't stop shivering. He sat in the back of the patrol car as they drove him home. The two officers spoke to him kindly, but their words did not get through. One second the police radio was crackling, a second later it was dead quiet and they were parked by his father's car, the officers knocking on the door. His father appeared. One officer looked at his feet, and the other put his hand on Richard Salinger's arm. His head moved back, and he turned slowly and stared at the car.

A month later Harry watched from the kitchen window as his father picked a fight with their neighbor. When the neighbor's cat was found dead, its throat cut, no one noticed the scratches on Harry's hands and
arms. That day his father smiled briefly. “Sometimes the world is just, boy. Not often, mind you. Gotta enjoy it when it happens.”

In his basement, Harry Salinger wraps the metal wire twice around the glass fragment. It is a clear piece the shape of a water drop that wouldn't look out of place on a chandelier; when the light is right, it throws colors onto his hands and onto a small wooden box on the table. Michael would have liked it.

The work is soothing. The television monitors are muted, and Salinger lifts his eyes from time to time to check if the news has started.

Detective Alice Madison's voice, indigo, is still frozen at the crime scene: it has filled the silence in his house in a way he didn't think possible.

. . . he came at them, and they never even knew it . . .

She was describing his work in such detail, with such understanding. It was almost intimate. Plans are made, and they can be unmade; it was time to improvise, to go with the flow. What a blessing she was.