“I’M SORRY,” THE POLICE RECEPTIONIST SAID. “THE CHIEF HAS A full calendar today. I can give you an appointment on Thursday.”
“I don’t want to see him on Thursday. I want to see him now.” Randi hated the cophouse. It was always full of cops. As far as she was concerned, cops came in three flavors: those who saw an attractive woman they could hit on, those who saw a private investigator and resented her, and the old ones who saw Frank Wade’s little girl and felt sorry for her. Types one and two annoyed her; the third kind really pissed her off.
The receptionist pressed her lips together, disapproving. “As I’ve explained, that simply isn’t possible.”
“Just tell him I’m here,” Randi said. “He’ll see me.”
“He’s with someone at the moment, and I’m quite sure that he doesn’t want to be interrupted.”
Randi had about had it. The day was pretty well shot, and she’d found out next to nothing. “Why don’t I just see for myself?” she said sweetly. She walked briskly around the desk, and pushed through the waist-high wooden gate.
“You can’t go in there!” the receptionist squeaked in outrage, but by then Randi was opening the door. Police Chief Joseph Urquhart sat behind an old wooden desk cluttered with files, talking to the coroner. Both of them looked up when the door opened. Urquhart was a tall, powerful man in his early sixties. His hair had thinned considerably, but what remained of it was still red, though his eyebrows had gone completely gray. “What the hell—” he started.
“Sorry to barge in, but Miss Congeniality wouldn’t give me the time of day,” Randi said as the receptionist came rushing up behind her.
“Young lady, this is the police department, and I’m going to throw you out on your ass,” Urquhart said gruffly as he stood up and came around the desk, “unless you come over here right now and give your Uncle Joe a big hug.”
Smiling, Randi crossed the bearskin rug, wrapped her arms around him, and laid her head against his chest as the chief tried to crush her. The door closed behind them, too loudly. Randi broke the embrace. “I miss you,” she said.
“Sure you do,” he said, in a faintly chiding tone. “That’s why we see so much of you.”
Joe Urquhart had been her father’s partner for years, back when they were both in uniform. They’d been tight, and the Urquharts had been like an aunt and uncle to her. His older daughter had babysat for her, and Randi had returned the favor for the younger girl. After her father’s death, Joe had looked out for them, helped her mother through the funeral and all the legalities, made sure the pension fund got Randi through college. Still, it hadn’t been the same, and the families drifted apart, even more so after her mother had finally passed away. These days Randi saw him only once or twice a year, and felt guilty about it. “I’m sorry,” she said. “You know I mean to keep in touch, but—”
“There’s never enough time, is there?” he said.
The coroner cleared her throat. Sylvia Cooney was a local institution, a big brusque woman of indeterminate age, built like a cement mixer, her iron-gray hair tied in a tight bun at the back of her smooth, square face. She’d been coroner as long as Randi could remember. “Maybe I should excuse myself,” she said.
Randi stopped her. “I need to ask you about Joan Sorenson. When will autopsy results be available?”
Cooney’s eyes went quickly to the chief, then back to Randi. “Nothing I can tell you,” she said. She left the office and closed the door with a soft click behind her.
“That hasn’t been released to the public yet,” Joe Urquhart said. He walked back behind his desk, gestured. “Sit down.”
Randi settled into a seat, let her gaze wander around the office. One wall was covered by commendations, certificates, and framed photographs. She saw her father there with Joe, both of them looking so achingly young, two grinning kids in uniform standing in front of their black-and-white. A moose head was mounted above the photographs, peering down at her with its glassy eyes. More trophies hung from the other walls. “Do you still hunt?” she asked him.
“Not in years,” Urquhart said. “No time. Your dad used to kid me about it all the time. Always said that if I ever killed anyone on duty, I’d want the head stuffed and mounted. Then one day it happened, and the joke wasn’t so funny anymore.” He frowned. “What’s your interest in Joan Sorenson?”
“Professional,” Randi said.
“Little out of your line, isn’t it?”
Randi shrugged. “I don’t pick my cases.”
“You’re too good to waste your life snooping around motels,” Urquhart said. It was a sore point between them. “It’s not too late to join the force.”
“No,” Randi said. She didn’t try to explain; she knew from past experience that there was no way to make him understand. “I went out to the precinct house this morning to look at the report on Sorenson. It’s missing from the file; no one knows where it is. I got the names of the cops who were at the scene, but none of them had time to talk to me. Now I’m told the autopsy results aren’t being made public either. You mind telling me what’s going on?”
Joe glanced out the windows behind him. The panes were wet with rain. “This is a sensitive case,” he said. “I don’t want the media blowing this thing all out of proportion.”
“I’m not the media,” Randi said.
Urquhart swiveled back around. “You’re not a cop either. That’s your choice. Randi, I don’t want you involved in this, do you hear?”
“I’m involved whether you like it or not,” she said. She didn’t give him time to argue. “How did Joan Sorenson die? Was it an animal attack?”
“No,” he said. “It was not. And that’s the last question I’m going to answer.” He sighed. “Randi,” he said, “I know how hard you got hit by Frank’s death. It was pretty rough on me too, remember? He phoned me for backup. I didn’t get there in time. You think I’ll ever forget that?” He shook his head. “Put it behind you. Stop imagining things.”
“I’m not imagining anything,” Randi snapped. “Most of the time I don’t even think about it. This is different.”
“Have it your way,” Joe said. There was a small stack of files on the corner of the desk near Randi. Urquhart leaned forward and picked them up, tapped them against his blotter to straighten them. “I wish I could help you.” He slid open a drawer, put the file folders away. Randi caught a glimpse of the name on the top folder: Helander. “I’m sorry,” Joe was saying. He started to rise. “Now, if you’ll excuse—”
“Are you just rereading the Helander file for old times’ sake, or is there some connection to Sorenson?” Randi asked.
Urquhart sat back down. “Shit,” he said.
“Or maybe I just imagined that was the name on the file.”
Joe looked pained. “We have reason to think the Helander boy might be back in the city.”
“Hardly a boy anymore,” Randi said. “Roy Helander was three years older than me. You’re looking at him for Sorenson?”
“We have to, with his history. The state released him two months ago, it turns out. The shrinks said he was cured.” Urquhart made a face. “Maybe, maybe not. Anyway, he’s just a name. We’re looking at a hundred names.”
“Where is he?”
“I wouldn’t tell you if I knew. He’s a bad piece of business, like the rest of his family. I don’t like you getting mixed up with his sort, Randi. Your father wouldn’t either.”
Randi stood up. “My father’s dead,” she said, “and I’m a big girl now.”
WILLIE PARKED THE CAR WHERE 13TH STREET DEAD-ENDED, AT THE foot of the bluffs. Blackstone sat high above the river, surrounded by a ten-foot-high wrought iron fence with a row of forbidding spikes along its top. You could drive to the gatehouse easily enough, but you had to go all the way down Central, past downtown, then around on Grandview and Harmon Drive, up and down the hills and all along the bluffs where aging steamboat Gothic mansions stood like so many dowagers staring out over the flats an
d river beyond, remembering better days. It was a long, tiresome drive.
Back before the automobile, it had been even longer and more tiresome. Faced with having to travel to Courier Square on a daily basis, Douglas Harmon made things easy for himself. He built a private cable car: a two-car funicular railway that crept up the gray stone face of the bluffs from the foot of 13th below to Blackstone above.
Internal combustion, limousines, chauffeurs, and paved roads had all conspired to wean the Harmons away from Douglas’ folly, making the cable car something of a back door in more recent years, but that suited Willie well enough. Jonathan Harmon always made him feel like he ought to come in by the servant’s entrance anyway.
Willie climbed out of the Caddy and stuck his hands in the sagging pockets of his raincoat. He looked up. The incline was precipitous, the rock wet and dark. Steven took his elbow roughly and propelled him forward. The cable car was wooden, badly in need of a whitewash, with bench space for six. Steven pulled the bell cord; the car jerked as they began to ascend. The second car came down to meet them, and they crossed halfway up the bluff. The car shook and Willie spotted rust on the rails. Even here at the gate of Blackstone, things were falling apart.
Near the top of the bluff, they passed through a gap in the wrought iron fence, and the New House came into view, gabled and turreted and covered with Victorian gingerbread. The Harmons had lived there for almost a century, but it was still the New House, and always would be. Behind the house the estate was densely forested, the narrow driveway winding through thick stands of old growth. Where the other founding families had long ago sold off or parceled out their lands to developers, the Harmons had held tight, and Blackstone remained intact, a piece of the forest primeval in the middle of the city.
Against the western sky, Willie glimpsed the broken silhouette of the tower, part of the Old House whose soot-dark stone walls gave Blackstone its name. The house was set well back among the trees, its lawns and courts overgrown, but even when you couldn’t see it you knew it was there somehow. The tower was a jagged black presence outlined against the red-stained gray of the western horizon, crooked and forbidding. It had been Douglas Harmon, the journalist and builder of funicular railways, who had erected the New House and closed the Old, immense and gloomy even by Victorian standards; but neither Douglas, his son Thomas, nor his grandson Jonathan had ever found the will to tear it down. Local legend said the Old House was haunted. Willie could just about believe it. Blackstone, like its owner, gave him the creeps.
The cable car shuddered to a stop, and they climbed out onto a wooden deck, its paint weathered and peeling. A pair of wide French doors led into the New House. Jonathan Harmon was waiting for them, leaning on a walking stick, his gaunt figure outlined by the light that spilled through the door. “Hello, William,” he said. Harmon was barely past sixty, Willie knew, but long snow-white hair and a body wracked by arthritis made him look much older. “I’m so glad that you could join us,” he said.
“Yeah, well, I was in the neighborhood, just thought I’d drop by,” Willie said. “Only thing is, I just remembered, I left the windows open in the brewery. I better run home and close them, or my dust bunnies are going to get soaked.”
“No,” said Jonathan Harmon. “I don’t think so.”
Willie felt the bands constricting across his chest. He wheezed, found his inhaler, and took two long hits. He figured he’d need it. “Okay, you talked me into it, I’ll stay,” he told Harmon, “but I damn well better get a drink out of it. My mouth still tastes like Diet Chocolate Ginger Beer.”
“Steven, be a good boy and get our friend William a snifter of Remy Martin, if you’d be so kind. I’ll join him. The chill is on my bones.” Steven, silent as ever, went inside to do as he was told. Willie made to follow, but Jonathan touched his arm lightly. “A moment,” he said. He gestured. “Look.”
Willie turned and looked. He wasn’t quite so frightened anymore. If Jonathan wanted him dead, Steven would have tried already, and maybe succeeded. Steven was a dreadful mistake by his father’s standards, but there was a freakish strength in those scarred hands. No, this was some other kind of deal.
They looked east over the city and the river. Dusk had begun to settle, and the streetlights were coming on down below, strings of luminescent pearls that spread out in all directions as far as the eye could see and leapt across the river on three great bridges. The clouds were gone to the east, and the horizon was a deep cobalt blue. The moon had begun to rise.
“There were no lights out there when the foundations of the Old House were dug,” Jonathan Harmon said. “This was all wilderness. A wild river coursing through the forest primeval, and if you stood on high at dusk, it must have seemed as though the blackness went on forever. The water was pure, the air was clean, and the woods were thick with game…deer, beaver, bear…but no people, or at least no white men. John Harmon and his son James both wrote of seeing Indian campfires from the tower from time to time, but the tribes avoided this place, especially after John had begun to build the Old House.”
“Maybe the Indians weren’t so dumb after all,” Willie said.
Jonathan glanced at Willie, and his mouth twitched. “We built this city out of nothing,” he said. “Blood and iron built this city, blood and iron nurtured it and fed its people. The old families knew the power of blood and iron, they knew how to make this city great. The Rochmonts hammered and shaped the metal in smithies and foundries and steel mills, the Anders family moved it on their flatboats and steamers and railroads, and your own people found it and pried it from the earth. You come from iron stock, William Flambeaux, but we Harmons were always blood. We had the stockyards and the slaughterhouse, but long before that, before this city or this nation existed, the Old House was a center of the skin trade. Trappers and hunters would come here every season with furs and skins and beaver pelts to sell to the Harmons, and from here the skins would move downriver. On rafts, at first, and then on flatboats. Steam came later, much later.”
“Is there going to be a pop quiz on this?” Willie asked.
“We’ve fallen a long way,” he said, looking pointedly at Willie. “We need to remember how we started. Black iron and red, red blood. You need to remember. Your grandfather had the Flambeaux blood, the old pure strain.”
Willie knew when he was being insulted. “And my mother was a Pankowski,” he said, “which makes me half-frog, half-Polack, and all mongrel. Not that I give a shit. I mean, it’s terrific that my great-grandfather owned half the state, but the mines gave out around the turn of the century, the Depression took the rest, my father was a drunk, and I’m in collections, if that’s okay with you.” He was feeling pissed off and rash by then. “Did you have any particular reason for sending Steven to kidnap me, or was it just a yen to discuss the French and Indian War?”
Jonathan said, “Come. We’ll be more comfortable inside, the wind is cold.” The words were polite enough, but his tone had lost all faint trace of warmth. He led Willie inside, walking slowly, leaning heavily on the cane. “You must forgive me,” he said. “It’s the damp. It aggravates the arthritis, inflames my old war wounds.” He looked back at Willie. “You were unconscionably rude to hang up on me. Granted, we have our differences, but simple respect for my position—”
“I been having a lot of trouble with my phone lately,” Willie said. “Ever since they deregulated, service has turned to shit.” Jonathan led him into a small sitting room. There was a fire burning in the hearth; the heat felt good after a long day tramping through the cold and the rain. The furnishings were antique, or maybe just old; Willie wasn’t too clear on the difference.
Steven had preceded them. Two brandy snifters, half-full of amber liquid, sat on a low table. Steven squatted by the fire, his tall, lean body folded up like a jackknife. He looked up as they entered and stared at Willie a moment too long, as if he’d suddenly forgotten who he was or what he was doing there. Then his flat blue eyes went back to the fire, and he took
no more notice of them or their conversation.
Willie looked around for the most comfortable chair and sat in it. The style reminded him of Randi Wade, but that just made him feel guilty. He picked up his cognac. Willie was couth enough to know that he was supposed to sip but cold and tired and pissed-off enough so that he didn’t care. He emptied it in one long swallow, put it down on the floor, and relaxed back into the chair as the heat spread through his chest.
Jonathan, obviously in some pain, lowered himself carefully onto the edge of the couch, his hands closed round the head of his walking stick. Willie found himself staring. Jonathan noticed. “A wolf’s head,” he said. He moved his hands aside to give Willie a clear view. The firelight reflected off the rich yellow metal. The beast was snarling, snapping.
Its eyes were red. “Garnets?” Willie guessed.
Jonathan smiled the way you might smile at a particularly doltish child. “Rubies,” he said, “set in 18-karat gold.” His hands, large and heavily veined, twisted by arthritis, closed round the stick again, hiding the wolf from sight.
“Stupid,” Willie said. “There’s guys in this city would kill you as soon as look at you for a stick like that.”
Jonathan’s smile was humorless. “I will not die on account of gold, William.” He glanced at the window. The moon was well above the horizon. “A good hunter’s moon,” he said. He looked back at Willie. “Last night you all but accused me of complicity in the death of the crippled girl.” His voice was dangerously soft. “Why would you say such a thing?”
“I can’t imagine,” Willie said. He felt light-headed. The brandy had rushed right to his mouth. “Maybe the fact that you can’t remember her name had something to do with it. Or maybe it was because you always hated Joanie, right from the moment you heard about her. My pathetic little mongrel bitch, I believe that was what you called her. Isn’t it funny the way that little turns of phrase stick in the mind? I don’t know, maybe it was just me, but somehow I got this impression that you didn’t exactly wish her well. I haven’t even mentioned Steven yet.”