The Night Season (18 page)

CHAPTER

35

Something was happening.
Susan heard a raised voice coming from the task force office’s main room. Not yelling; more the sound of someone relaying urgent information. She got up from Archie’s desk and hurried out there.

Heil was doing something with his gun. He had the magazine out in his hand and he looked at it and then snapped it into the chamber. Ngyun and Flannigan were putting on dark blue windbreakers that said
POLICE
in all-caps white letters across the back.

The uniformed patrol cops they had tracking down tips were sitting at their desks talking on the phone or clicking through Web sites, but Susan could see their eyes following the detectives.

Susan looked around for Anne and saw her sitting at an empty desk, with a laptop open and stacks of files and notes around her.

“What’s going on?” Susan said.

Heil was reholstering his gun. “We’re going to check something out,” he said. “You’re staying here.”

“But—” Susan said.

“Not open for discussion,” Heil said.

Susan stalked over to Anne. “Do you know what’s happening?”

Anne kept her gaze firmly on her notes. “They have a lead on where the boy might be,” she said. “That’s all I know.”

“Ask if we can come,” Susan said.

“Nope,” Anne said.

“You’re not going to fight it?”

She looked up at Susan and sighed. “I have two kids,” she said. “When they say it’s not safe, I listen.”

Susan’s phone rang. It wasn’t the
Times
editor calling her back; she had already programmed in a ringtone for his number—“Big Apple Dreamin’” by Alice Cooper. This was just the default ring. She didn’t recognize the number.

Ngyun tossed a windbreaker at Heil. He tried to catch it but missed, and the windbreaker fluttered to the floor. Heil leaned over and picked it up.

“Hello?” Susan said into her phone.

There was a pause. “Susan Ward?”

“Yes,” Susan said slowly.

“This is Frances Larson. I’m Gloria Larson’s daughter. You wanted me to call?” Susan had nearly forgotten that she’d called Brad at the Mississippi Magnolia Assisted Living Facility and asked him to get a message to Gloria’s family.

Ngyun, Flannigan, and Heil were putting on baseball caps now. The same blue, the same white letters that spelled
POLICE
.

“Are you there?” Frances Larson said.

Susan returned her attention to the call. “Yes,” she said. “Yes, thank you.” She tried to figure out a simple way of explaining everything. “I wrote a story yesterday for the
Herald
about a skeleton that was found a few days ago in the Columbia Slough. The skeleton’s old, dating back to the forties or fifties. Your mother read my story and called me. She said she thought she knew the identity of the man.” Susan mentally crossed her fingers. “Someone named McBee?”

“I’m sorry my mother bothered you,” Frances Larson said. “But she gets confused. She likes to read the news, and it agitates her sometimes.”

Susan gave it another try. Just to be sure. “You never heard her mention someone named McBee?”

“I’m sorry, but no.”

“Did she ever live in Vanport?”

“No,” Frances Larson said. “She grew up in the Kenton neighborhood. Lived there until she moved in with me. She was a secretary at Portland Union Stockyards. After she and Dad got married, she stayed home.”

Susan looked around for a pen and paper. Her eyes settled on a ballpoint on Anne’s desk, and she snapped it up.

“Hey,” Anne said.

Kenton
, Susan wrote on her hand.
Portland Union Stockyards. Secretary
. She was grasping at straws. “Do you mind me asking when they got married?”

“Nineteen-fifty-four.”

Susan wrote that down on the base of her thumb. Gloria Larson would have still been single in 1948. “What was her maiden name?” Susan asked.

“Green. Gloria Green.”

Susan wrote the word
Green
across her palm. “And she never mentioned someone named McBee, or the Vanport flood?”

“The Vanport flood?” Frances Larson paused. “She talked about it. When I was growing up we knew a lot of people who’d lost their homes and moved to North Portland. A lot of them had conspiracy theories about how the Housing Authority let the city flood. Get rid of all the black folks.” She paused again and chuckled. “But my mother never believed it.”

“Okay, then,” Susan said, trying to hide her disappointment. “Thanks anyway.”

“Sorry I couldn’t help.”

Susan hung up. The detectives were gone. Anne was holding out her hand, palm up. Susan put the pen in it.

“I couldn’t go with them anyway,” Susan said. “I have too much to do.”

She went back into Archie’s office and slumped into the chair facing his computer.

It was true. She did have too much to do. She had sent the
Times
the info about the killer’s most recent victim, but she had a lot of work yet to do on the actual story. The Word document she was working on was open on the screen. The cursor blinked at her insistently.

Susan minimized the window, opened Archie’s Internet browser, and Googled “Gloria Larson.” Over twenty-six thousand hits came up. So she tried “‘Gloria Larson’ Vanport.” Nothing. “‘Gloria Larson’ ‘Portland Union Stockyards.’” Nothing. “‘Portland Union Stockyards’ Vanport.”

Bingo.

The first hit was a PDF from the Oregon Historical Society documenting the flood. Susan scanned it for highlights. W. E. Williams, the president of the Portland Union Stockyards, had been the first one to call and report the levy break. One of his employees, Floyd Wright, had been patrolling the railroad fill and had seen the roadbed give way. He’d raced back to his stockyard and alerted Williams, who immediately called the Housing Authority.

Williams and Wright waited, but didn’t hear an evacuation siren, so Williams had called back. “For God’s sake, alert those people!” he was reported to have shouted into the phone. And the siren sounded not long after. Thirty-five minutes later, Vanport was under fifteen feet of water.

Gloria Larson had worked for the Portland Union Stockyards.

It was a stretch, but it was a connection.

Susan clicked print.

She’d told the national editor that she’d cover the press conference. That gave her two hours. She Googled “‘Vanport Flood.’” It was worth a shot. Sometimes the best research happened when you didn’t even know what you were looking for.

CHAPTER

36

Archie’s watch was
a Timex. It had a titanium band with a black face, numbers that glowed in the dark, and Swiss movement—whatever that was. He had paid $14.99 for it. Archie was looking at it while he was walking down the ICU hall, which was why he didn’t see his ex-wife until he was standing right in front of her.

She was growing out her hair. She had always worn it very short, and now it fell in curls below her earlobes. Archie was still getting used to it. Her freckles glowed brown in the hospital light. She had only looked happier and younger since they’d finally broken up.

“It’s you,” he said dumbly.

“You should have called me,” she said. “I had to see it on the news.”

She was right. Debbie had known Henry as long as he had. Henry had been there for her every day when Archie was missing, and then for the long month in the hospital after. He’d been to their kids’ birthday parties. She’d deserved to hear it from him. “I’m sorry,” Archie said. How many times had he said that to her? “I was trying to protect you.”

“Well, stop,” Debbie said with a gentle smile.

Archie craned to look around her, into the room where Henry lay like a sarcophagus in a tomb. Claire was still in the chair she’d claimed, reading a book. “How is he?”

Debbie looked away. “The same.”

“Where are the kids?” Why did it seem like a personal question?

“With Doug, at home,” Debbie said. “I can help Claire. I’ve done this before, you know.”

Before. When Archie had been in a medically induced coma. When she had sat in a chair by his hospital bed. Before Archie had confessed everything.

“Her sister’s here,” Archie said.

“Her sister is an idiot,” Debbie said.

“Claire’s handling it pretty well.”

“You’re an idiot, too.”

“Only emotionally,” Archie said.

“Yes,” Debbie said. “There’s that.”

She waited, and they were quiet. He could tell she was working out how to say something.

“One of the doctors came and talked to Claire,” she said finally. “They told her that Henry might have suffered cerebral hypoxia.” She paused. “It’s caused by lack of oxygen to the brain.”

Archie had to look away for a moment, to keep it together. “What are we talking about?”

“Oh, it’s an eclectic menu,” Debbie said. “Shortened attention span, loss of short-term memory, poor judgment, uncoordinated movements. People can recover. To varying degrees. Then there’s the severe cerebral hypoxia. The patient enters a prolonged vegetative state. They can breathe on their own. They can open their eyes. They sleep. But they don’t respond to their surroundings; they don’t know you’re there.” She looked him in the eye. “They usually die within a year.”

“Not Henry,” Archie said.

She squeezed his arm. Her mouth formed the word
No
, but no sound came out.

Archie coughed. The effort of it hurt. Sputum filled his throat and rattled around in his lungs. He sounded like he belonged in the ICU himself. He wiped his forehead with his sleeve.

Debbie’s brows furrowed. “Are you sick?”

Archie looked away. “It’s just a cold.”

She appraised him for a long moment. “O-kay,” she said slowly. “I’m going to get some food. Do you want anything?”

He hadn’t eaten since morning. “Yeah.”

“What?”

Archie’s phone rang. “You know what I like,” he said. He got out his phone and glanced down at the caller ID. “I have to take this,” he said, looking up. But Debbie had already turned and started down the hallway.

He brought the phone to his ear. “Go ahead,” he said.

“We found it,” Heil said excitedly. “They were right. The opening is small. But we snaked a camera in and it widens up a little once you get in there. Looks like a kid was definitely up there. We found more
Star Wars
figures, bags of dried fruit, a flashlight. No sleeping bag or blankets, though. So maybe he cleared out.”

“Take the sleeping bag and leave the
Star Wars
figures,” Archie said. “You don’t have kids, do you, Heil?”

“No, sir.”

So the kid was staying under the bridge during the day. Which begged the question, where did he go at night? Archie knew the answer. Patrick Lifton went back to his captor—just as he had returned to him from the hospital. The boy had been under the kidnapper’s control for a year and a half. Children were especially vulnerable to Stockholm syndrome. Giving Patrick room to roam, and always having him come back, was probably part of the killer’s whole power trip.

Wherever the kidnapper was staying, it was close enough to the river for the boy to come and go by himself.

“Oh,” Heil added, “and we found some more of those keys. Like the one under the hospital bed. Six more so far. All the same size. Look old. All look like they fit different locks.”

CHAPTER

37

Archie woke up
coughing, stiff and sore in a chair in the ICU waiting room. His feet were on the coffee table next to a half-eaten burrito. He felt clammy and cold. His muscles ached. He remembered Debbie leading him in there to eat and take a nap, but he had no idea how long it had been since then. He checked his watch.

“You’ve only been asleep an hour,” he heard a voice say.

He glanced up and found Anne was sitting in the chair across from him. He didn’t know how long she’d been there.

“Henry?” he asked.

“No change,” Anne said. “I picked you up some things from the pharmacy downstairs,” she added. She lifted a white paper bag off the floor by her purse, set it on the coffee table, and started emptying it, setting each item on the table. “Cough syrup. Cherry lozenges. Decongestant. Tylenol. Vitamin C.”

“Can you write me a prescription for Vicodin?” Archie asked.

She ignored him, her lips pursed with concern. “You have a fever. Still low-grade. For now.”

“You can tell that by looking?”

“I’m a mother.”

“How did you know I’d be here?”

She raised an eyebrow at him, as if it were obvious.

Archie opened the bottle of Tylenol and washed down two pills with a swig of cough syrup.

“Nice,” Anne said.

“I have a lot of experience taking pills.”

She lifted a hand and gestured vaguely to the hospital. “How does it feel to be here?”

“In the ICU? It’s a walk down memory lane.”

“What room were you in?”

“Ask Debbie. I was unconscious for most of it. You have a profile for me?”

“I didn’t just come to bring you cough syrup.” She waved a notebook. “I have some idle thoughts and observations.”

Archie had learned a long time ago that Anne’s idle thoughts and observations were more reliable than most people’s academic dissertations.

He sat up.

She didn’t open her notebook. She didn’t have to. “The killer watches them die,” she said matter-of-factly. “Immobilized, powerless. No threat. The killer has all the power. This is a person who wants the victim to know what’s happened to them, wants them to know what he’s done. Wants them to experience death.”

“Why an octopus?” Archie asked.

“Why not?” said Anne. “It’s worked pretty well so far.”

“What kind of people keep aquariums?” Archie asked.

“You mean besides psychopaths and sushi restaurants?” Anne said. She rolled her eyes. “All sorts of people have aquariums, Archie. Many of us find them very soothing.” She raised a finger. “Saltwater aquariums, though, take a special enthusiasm. They’re high-maintenance. Keeping a cephalopod tank is a whole other level. They’ve got a life span of two, three years, if you’re lucky. You’re not going to experience a huge level of emotional attachment. They’re not dogs.”

“So how does he feel about the kid? Is he another specimen? Something to keep and observe?”

“I think he finds the kid useful.” She crossed her boots at the ankles, leaned forward. “I’m interested in the killer’s ability to get so close to victims. Even Henry. Even after suspected poisonings. You had warned that street kid specifically about an octopus. This killer blends in, appears trustworthy. In cases like this, we’d consider someone disguised as law enforcement, except that the street kid wouldn’t have trusted a cop or someone in a National Guard uniform. A woman. Someone feigning jeopardy. She needs help. The victim goes to her aid, and she pushes the octopus into the victim’s hands. It’s dark, the person takes the thing reflexively, before they even know what they’ve got. They’re bitten instantly. The poison enters their system. They’re disoriented. The killer retrieves the octopus. Watches as the victim dies. Then pushes the victim into the water.”

“He’s using the kid as bait,” Archie said.

Anne nodded. “If so, the child has watched at least four people die. It explains why he left the hospital, why he’d try to find his way back to this person. He’d be entirely dependent. And terrified.” She thought for a second. “This person has been in chat rooms, exchanged information with other cephalopod fans online,” she said. “And talked the ear off aquarium store clerks. There’s a trail. If you can find it.”

Chief Eaton poked his head in the room. “The parents are here,” he said to Archie. “They want to meet you.”

Archie cleared his throat. “Of course,” he said. He stood, thinking the parents were downstairs, that he would be following Eaton to find them, but when Eaton opened the door wider Archie saw that Patrick Lifton’s parents were right there.

They stood in the doorway, Eaton behind them. They didn’t come in. They seemed almost physically wary of Archie. He’d seen that before. Crime victims sometimes associated cops with grief and anxiety. Everything had been fine before the cops had showed up.

“I’m Detective Sheridan,” Archie said. He held out a hand and Daniel Lifton took it. He had a firm handshake and he looked Archie in the eye from under the bill of his baseball cap. “We appreciate all you’re doing,” he said.

“I wish I could do more,” Archie said. He extended his hand to Diana Lifton. She wrapped her hand around his, but she didn’t shake it. She just held it for a moment. Her palm was smooth and warm.

“How did he seem?” she asked. “When you saw him?”

Archie didn’t know how to answer that. It was dark. And Patrick Lifton had been drowning. How had he seemed? He’d seemed scared and wet and lost.

“He’s a fighter,” Archie said.

Diana nodded.

“Thank you,” Daniel Lifton said.

Why weren’t they livid? Why hadn’t they gotten in Archie’s face and demanded how he’d had their lost child only to let him walk off alone into the night?

“Okay,” Chief Eaton said to the parents. “Let’s go.” He looked at Archie. “I’ll give you a few minutes to prepare yourself,” he said.

The door closed, and Archie and Anne were alone.

“I’m not okay,” he said before she could ask.

“I didn’t think you were,” she said.

They were waiting for him. It was time to parade the parents in front of the TV cameras. Archie’s eyes settled on Anne’s purse. “Press conference,” he said. “Do you have enough tools in there to make me look human?”

“Honey,” she said, “I’ve been waiting to brush your hair since we met.”