‘I need a ride to 23rd and Third.’
‘Get in.’
She opened the back door and sat down in a seat usually reserved for arrested people. But she was in too much of a hurry to register that.
‘Use the siren.’
Without asking for explanations, the driver switched on the flashing light and pulled out quickly, with a slight screech of tyres. She was so impatient to arrive that the journey seemed very long, even though it was only three blocks. When she saw the orange plastic barriers around the site, she relived the discovery of the body of Mitch Sparrow, which at first had seemed to be yet another case to be filed away in the records, but which had in fact given a whole new direction to this crazy business, and might even help to bring it to a conclusion. The madness of chance, as well as of human beings, was turning out to be the one thing connecting all the threads of this case.
The car had not yet come to a compete halt when Vivien opened the door and jumped out.
‘Thanks, boys. I owe you one.’
She didn’t hear the reply, didn’t hear the car drive off. She had already approached a worker who had just come out of the gap in the perimeter fence and took him aback with the urgency of her request.
‘Where can I find Mr Cortese?’
The man indicated a point beyond the fence. ‘He’s right behind me.’
After a moment, the figure of Jeremy Cortese appeared. He was wearing the same jacket as on the day they had first met. When he saw her coming towards him, he recognized her immediately. Difficult to forget someone who reminds you of the discovery of a corpse!
‘Hello, Miss Light.’
‘Mr Cortese, I need to ask you a few questions.’
Surprised, but realizing there was no way out, he said, ‘Go ahead.’
Vivien drew Cortese aside. The place where they were standing, between the fence and the barriers, was used by the workers and she didn’t want them to be disturbed, or for them to disturb her. She took up a position facing Cortese and spoke as clearly as possible, as if she and the man were speaking two different languages.
‘I need you to dig deep into your memory. I know it’s been a long time, but your answer’s important. Very important.’
He nodded to confirm that he had understood, and waited in silence for the question.
‘I know you worked for the company that constructed the building on the Lower East Side, the one that was blown up last Saturday.’
A hint of fear and alarm appeared in his eyes, as if she had just told him that the police were investigating him personally. His shoulders drooped a little and when he spoke, there was a distinct unease in his voice. ‘Before we go on, I’d like to ask you a question. Do I need a lawyer?’
Vivien tried to put him at his ease. ‘No, Mr Cortese,’ she said, as reassuringly as possible, ‘you don’t need a lawyer. I know perfectly well you had nothing to do with that. There are just a few things I need to know about.’
‘Go on.’
‘Among the men who worked with you on that building, do you remember if there was one with a heavily scarred face?’
The answer came without hesitation. ‘Yes.’
Vivien’s heart skipped a beat. ‘Are you sure?’
Now that his fears had been calmed, Cortese seemed reassured by the turn taken by the interview, and was eager to reply. ‘He wasn’t in my team but I do remember seeing the guy a few times. With a face like that, you couldn’t exactly miss him.’
Vivien’s heart was standing still in her chest. ‘Do you remember his name?’
‘No. I never even spoke to him.’
The disappointment Vivien felt at this lasted only a brief moment before it was wiped out by a new thought that suddenly occurred to her.
‘God bless you, Mr Cortese. God bless you a thousand times. You have no idea how helpful you’ve been. You can go back to work now, and don’t worry.’
The briefest of handshakes, and Vivien had already turned her back on him, leaving him standing there on the sidewalk, surprised and relieved. She took out her cellphone and dialled the captain’s number.
She didn’t even give him time to say his name. ‘Alan, it’s Vivien.’
‘What’s going on? Where the hell are you?’
‘You can call off the men. We won’t need to search through those names any more.’
She waited a moment, to give Bellew time to prepare for what she was about to ask him.
‘You need to send officers to the oncology departments of every hospital in New York to check if they had any patient with a strongly disfigured face who died in the last year and a half.’
Now that the cancer has done its work and I’m on the otherside …
Bellew, like the others, knew that letter by heart by now. Vivien’s excitement immediately became his.
‘Great work, Vivien. I’ll put the men on it right away. We’re waiting for you here.’
Vivien folded the cellphone and put it back in her pocket. As she walked briskly back to the precinct, surrounded by the crowd, she would have given anything to be just a normal person. Instead of which, every person she passed aroused the anxious question of whether this was one she would lose or one she would save. For them, too, there was still hope. Maybe the man who had left a trail of bombs behind him, like a trail of stones in a tragic fairy tale, had, at the time of death, also left behind him a name and an address.
CHAPTER 27
Father McKean reluctantly made his way through the crowd thronging the Boathouse Café. His face bore clear traces of his sleepless night, spent in front of the television absorbing the images on the screen with all the avidity of a thirsty man and at the same time dismissing them from his mind as too horrible to contemplate.
I am God …
Those words continued to echo in his head, like a ghastly soundtrack to the visions his memory continued to play back to him. The destroyed cars, the damaged buildings, the fires, the wounded and bloodstained people. An arm, torn from a body by the violence of the blast, lying on the sidewalk, pitilessly framed by the TV cameras.
He took a deep breath.
He had prayed for a long time, asking for comfort and enlightenment where he usually found it. Faith had always been his consolation, his point of departure and point of arrival, whatever the nature of the journey. It was because of faith that his adventure with the community had begun, and thanks to the results he had achieved with many kids he had allowed himself to dream. Other Joys, other houses spread all over the state, in which young people attracted by drugs would be able to stop feeling like moths drawn to a flame. After a certain point, the kids themselves had been his strength.