I learned that he then spent some time making sure that it was going to be damned difficult for anyone to follow us up to the roof. He had barricaded the final interior doorway to the roof access stairs and put a heavy-duty locking bar on the door to the roof itself.
I called the hospital for an update. Nicholas Parrish was in critical condition with severe injuries, especially to his head and neck. If he died, I wondered if anyone other than his helper would mourn his passing.
“Ben,” Travis asked, “with all of his weight on your prosthesis, why didn’t the whole socket just pull off sooner?”
“It’s held on by suction,” he explained. “Unless I roll it off, it’s not coming off. For obvious reasons, the socket is designed to stay on until I want to take it off. Which, to be honest, I’d love to do as soon as possible.”
I filed the story and we left. Stinger stayed with Jack, Travis slept on the couch, Ben in the guest room with Bingle.
Frank and I didn’t sleep much at first, but not because of nightmares. There was some drive in both of us that Dr. Robinson probably has some fancy name for, a syndrome or something, but we didn’t need to name it. We had to be a little quieter than usual with such a houseful, but that was no big deal — we had already learned on a previous occasion that Bingle felt inclined to raise an alarm when he heard certain noises issuing from behind a bedroom door.
“I wonder if that’s what first earned him the name Bocazo?” I asked Frank now.
“Who knows?” Frank said, concentrating on other matters. We slept just fine after that.
But the next morning, I awakened with an unwelcome idea in my head, a suspicion I despised and yet no matter how I tried, I could not rid myself of it.
“Frank,” I finally said, “I have a terrible favor to ask of you.”
60
WEDNESDAY, LATE AFTERNOON,
SEPTEMBER 27
Las Piernas
The staff at St. Anne’s had been wary of me at first. After all, I was the person who had put their patient here. But they had been reading about their patient for several months now, and knew who he was, so that when, after two hours, I had not tried to suffocate him, I began to overhear remarks about my amazing capacity for forgiveness.
A mistaken diagnosis if I’ve ever heard one.
I held a copy of Parzival, but I wasn’t reading it. I was thinking about a search that was carried out that morning.
It hadn’t taken me as long to convince Frank of my ideas as it had taken me to convince myself. While Frank made some calls, and Travis made breakfast, I scanned videotapes of Bingle and David working with their SAR group. I found what I was looking for, and showed it to Frank, which resulted in a few more calls. I made one of my own.
Ben woke up and joined us for breakfast; I asked him what time he had to teach his first class.
“I have a lab at two o’clock, but Ellen might be able to cover it if you need my help. What’s up?”
“Frank received a report about a house where remains may be hidden. Can you bring Bingle?”
“Yes, of course. But we should have more than one dog to confirm it.”
“Can you get Bool’s new owner to join you?”
“I can try.”
“If he can do it, here’s the address where you’ll meet.”
“You aren’t coming with us?”
“No, I have to be somewhere else this morning.”
I could see that he wanted to ask more questions, but he seemed to sense my mood, and held off. He called Ellen Raice, and the bloodhound handler. This second call took a while, and when he hung up, he was smiling.
“What?” I asked.
“He said he’s been meaning to call me. He thinks he may have been wrong before, and that Bool does miss ‘that obstreperous shepherd’ after all. He’s having second thoughts about keeping him.”
“Something tells me you’ve missed Bool, too.”
“I have,” he said. “In a lot of ways he’s just a big silly dog, but he’s very affectionate. A great tracker, too. David always said, ‘If it’s there to be found, then Bool will find it.’ This handler said he’d teach me how to work with Bool if I wanted him back.”
Frank called me at the hospital to say that the initial search with the dogs had been successful, and that they’d probably do a more thorough search that afternoon.
“One other thing,” he said. “As soon as Ben gets the dogs settled in together, he’s going to be coming by to see you there.”
“He’s upset?”
“Yes. I told him it was up to you to tell him what was going on.”
“Thanks a bunch.”
He laughed. “I’ll come by as soon as I can.”
“What are you doing here?” Ben half-shouted at me when he came into the ICU room where I sat next to Parrish.
“Lower your voice, Ben,” I said. “They’ll think you wish to harm poor little Nicky here.”
“I do! I want to unplug the bastard!”
I sighed and closed the book. “You, Ben, are far more merciful than I am.”
“Merciful?!”
“Think about it. He’s trapped in the ultimate prison.”
Ben’s look of rage changed in an instant. He looked at Parrish and said, “He’ll live?”
“Yes, it seems he will. He won’t be able to move, or speak. They think he can hear and understand us, and he can open his eyes. He makes gurgling noises every once in a while. I like to think he’s trying to say something.”
“You like to . . .”
“Yes. Cruel of me, isn’t it? I’m a little surprised at myself. Maybe someday I’ll stop being angry at him for what he’s done, and, like you, I’ll wish him dead.”
He took a seat, studied me. “You won’t convince me that you’re here to gloat.”
“No,” I said. “But as long as I have to be sitting next to him, I find I don’t mind saying terribly mean things to him.”
Parrish made a gurgling sound. Ben, hearing it, made a face.
“Awful,” I agreed.
“Why are you here?” Ben asked again.
“I’m waiting for somebody.”
“Who?”
“I’ll tell you later.”
“Irene—”
He was distracted by a slightly different sound from Parrish, a sort of a humming noise.
“What do you suppose he’s trying to say?” Ben asked, looking at him warily.
I set the book down, stood up, and looked into Parrish’s eyes. “What was it, Nicky?”
“Mmmaaah.”
“Maybe he’s calling for his mommy,” I said, and sat down again.
Ben stared at me, then said, “Have you thought of calling Jo Robinson?”
I laughed. “I’ll probably need a long session with her later. But don’t worry, I’m not here to hurt Nicky or anyone else.”
“Do you mind if I wait here with you?” he asked.
“No, at least — well, no, not at all. Mr. Nick’s conversational abilities are rather limited.”
Ben glanced at him, then said, “I wanted to have that conversation we keep putting off, but I don’t want to talk about it in front of him.”
“What’s he going to do about it?” I said wearily. “Fantasize? Let him. He’s finally in a condition where it’s safe for him to do so.”
“Irene—”
“Sorry, Ben,” I said. “I’m feeling a little cynical today. Let me ask you about something else entirely — if you don’t mind talking about this in front of Nick, here.”
“What?”
“You said that David sometimes talked about—” I glanced at Parrish, and amended what I was going to say. “You said that he rarely talked about certain aspects of his childhood.”
“That’s right,” he said, a little stiffly.
“Except to others who might have experienced the same thing.”
“Right.” He glanced toward Parrish.
“Did David ever tell you the names of people he talked to?”
“No. He would talk to me in general terms, or tell me about someone without mentioning a name. He felt that while . . . such a background should not be a source of shame, he worked hard to gain their trust, and so he would not betray their confidences. He had this ability to identify people who might have been through similar things, but David approached people gently, slowly. He didn’t push them to tell him things. He earned their trust first.”