The Truth of All Things (55 page)

G
rey and Lean stood just inside the doorway to James Farrell’s basement place. The leader of one of Portland’s Irish factions ran a cavernous hall that serviced almost every vice a man could ask for, provided the man in question wasn’t too imaginative and mostly liked to drink cheap whiskey and rum. The few narrow windows set high in the walls were too filthy to let in more than an ounce of sunlight. It was still afternoon, but the place was already well on its way to a good night’s business. The smell of whiskey, beer, new sweat, and piss almost covered up the stale versions of those same smells that had lingered from the night before.

A doorman with scars visible on his close-shorn scalp approached. He was wide enough across the chest that Lean almost didn’t see the man behind him. Jim Farrell hadn’t bothered to don his coat but looked dapper all the same in a light blue silk vest over a crisply starched shirt and navy cravat. His face was well lined, and his bristly hair was more than halfway given over to gray. He’d led a hard life and looked older than Lean knew him to be.

“Deputy. You shouldn’t be here. I have an arrangement.”

“This isn’t official business,” Lean said.

Farrell looked Grey over. The man made little effort to hide the threat of violence lurking close behind his eyes. “Well, I’m afraid you came down here for nothing, then. Tom Doran ain’t taking social calls right now. Sorry, gents.” He gestured toward the door.

“I think you should reconsider,” said Grey.

“Do you, now? And why’s that?”

“Because after so many years of loyal service, I suspect you’ve come to rely on the sturdy support of a man like Tom Doran. You might even, in your own way, consider him a friend. More important to you, it’s simply in your best interests.”

Farrell tilted his head slightly; there was a gleam in his eye. Lean could tell that the man was trying to figure whether there was a threat or a proposition coming from Grey.

“Doran’s started drinking again,” Grey continued, “heavily. Dr. Steig saved his life years ago. Cured him, in a manner of speaking. At least helped him keep his demons at bay. Steig’s dead now. Doran is a man standing at the edge of the abyss. If he goes over, he’s no use to you. Eventually he may even become too dangerous to keep around.”

“And what are you proposing to do about it?”

Grey slipped a manila envelope from his inside coat pocket. “I propose to pull him back. And I have here the one last thing in this world that just might save the man’s very soul.”

Lean struggled to contain his own surprise at what Grey was saying. He couldn’t tell if it was a ploy. For Doran’s sake, and their own, he hoped it was the truth. He knew that Farrell had managed to survive
and flourish in his own dangerous profession due, in large part, to his ability to know how much a man was lying to him.

“All right. You got five minutes. Any trouble and it’ll be your own souls you’ll need to worry about.” Farrell nodded toward the burly doorman, who proceeded to lead Lean and Grey to a semiprivate booth in a back corner of the hall. After a minute, the doorman reappeared, holding an unsteady Tom Doran by the elbow.

Doran slumped into the seat across from them. Even in this stench-filled room, Lean could smell the whiskey on the giant Irishman.

“Hello, Tom.”

“What do you fellows want?”

“We need your help,” Grey said.

“Hah, that’s rich. I can’t help no one.”

“We need to get out to Cushing’s Island tonight. Unseen, after dark,” Lean told him.

“So hire a boat.”

“We also need a couple of men who can be relied upon. Sure men.”

“You’re the cop,” Doran said. “Take some of your own.”

“This isn’t police business, officially. This is about the guy who killed Dr. Steig.”

Doran’s eyes flashed at the mention of the name.

“Right now, this is about Helen Prescott. The man who killed Steig has taken her,” Lean said.

“And her little girl,” added Grey. “If we don’t stop him, he’ll kill them both. Tonight.”

“You’re messing around with me now.”

“No, Tom. We need your help. Farrell’s got boats and men who know their way around every inch of these islands in the dark and can do it without being seen or heard.”

Doran was wavering. Lean could see that it was too much for him to consider in his current state. Grey slid the manila envelope across the table.

“Open it.”

Doran glanced back and forth between Grey and the envelope
several times before picking it up and fumbling with the opening, trying not to rip the thing in two. He managed to get a thumb inside and tore away the top. A photograph slid out. Lean caught a glimpse of a woman in the picture. Doran stared at it, and a knot appeared between his eyebrows. “She’s …”

“She goes by the name of Dunleavy now. Katie Dunleavy. The family lives over near Libby’s Hill. She’s engaged to a young man by the name of Mullen. A fine Irish lad. He’s a bank clerk.”

“Katie?”

“Yes, Tom, your daughter.” Grey let the news sink into Doran’s whiskey-clouded brain for a moment longer. “She’s living a very happy life. Dr. Steig helped set her on that path twenty years ago. Back when you were in no condition to help her. Your little girl, all grown up and happy. Maybe you could meet her someday, if you were up to it.”

Lean’s mind was racing. Steig had kept Doran’s jail sentence down after his drunken rampage over his wife’s death. The child was to be taken to the Female Orphan Society, but Dr. Steig instead made arrangements for a favorable adoption. Had he kept tabs on her ever since, without ever mentioning it to Doran, and then told all this to Grey? Or had Grey ransacked the doctor’s papers and found the information? Then the image flashed into Lean’s brain. Grey copying down a name and slipping it into his pocket that day in the records room, when they’d been searching for the orphaned son of Old Stitch. He’d been looking for Doran’s child. Since then he’d held on to the information that could free Doran from the pain of not knowing that his only child was safe and happy. Grey had kept it up his sleeve until it was needed. But what if it hadn’t been needed for another year, or five, or never? Lean wondered how long Grey would have waited to ease Tom Doran’s burden.

Doran looked up at them, tears in his eyes. “She’s beautiful. Looks just like her mother.”

Lean felt a vicarious stab of guilt and glanced at Grey. There was no sign of remorse on the man’s face, no shame at having just seen the pure joy on Doran’s face and knowing he could have delivered the news earlier.

“Tom, Dr. Steig’s niece is going to die tonight. Her little girl is going to be murdered. She’ll never grow up and turn into a beautiful, happy young woman. Don’t let that happen to her. You can help this little girl. Right now.” Grey was staring into the massive Irishman’s eyes.

“Cushing’s?” said Doran.

“Tonight,” Grey said. “Just after sunset.”

“What time is it now?”

“Four,” said Lean, and then, remembering Doran’s condition, he added, “p.m.”

“Meet me at the bottom of Clark Street in two hours. We’ll take the bridge. There’s a house on the shore in Cape Elizabeth we can leave from.”

Making their way back through Farrell’s place, Lean could feel many eyes on them, men staring like salivating dogs awaiting their master’s order. When they reached the street, Lean took several deep breaths, the fresh air like a bit of redemption.

“That wasn’t right in there. Holding that all back from Doran until now. You know that, don’t you?”

“Right? I fear there’s very little right in all that’s about to happen. But ask me again come sunrise—if we’re both still living.”

The fourteen-foot rowboat scraped onto the rocky gravel of the unlit beach. Tom Doran and his two men dropped their oars so that the handles fell into the bottom of the boat, leaving them leveraged in the oarlocks, the heads lifted high out of the water. Lean did likewise. Doran’s rowers were men who didn’t look like they spent much time sober or out of doors, but they were adept at handling the boat, and Lean didn’t have to ask why. With only four oarlocks, there was plenty of space left for cargo. Tonight, with the four of them manning the oars and the boat not hauling a single barrel of smuggled whiskey or beer, they’d made good time from the mainland. Lean scrambled over the side, splashing down in ankle-deep water. Doran single-handedly drew the boat up onto shore. They left one man there to stand guard, with
explicit orders to shoot anyone—particularly a short, dark-haired man—who tried to gain passage on the boat. Two hundred yards north along the shore, they spotted a small dinghy, hidden under a tarp. Doran ordered the second man to stand watch there, with similar orders to the first.

Moving away from the rocky shore, with its cluster of summer cottages, Lean led Doran north. The island was more or less level, with scattered stands of woods in front of them, allowing a decent view of the landscape, though it was dark beneath the new moon. As they moved closer to the point, still unable to make out any clear details, Lean felt his heart begin to thump louder and louder in his chest. He was trying to move through the tall grass and brush quietly but was struggling to restrict his pace to a brisk walk. His eyes scanned the dark horizon, searching for any spark or sign of flame. There was nothing, and his gaze drifted northwest to the lights visible across the water in Portland. Grey was there, still analyzing the evidence, searching for anything they had missed, guarding against the possibility that they had once again misjudged their man and left him alone in the city to wreak havoc as he’d done with the murder of Dr. Steig.

“Damn!” Doran roared past him in the second it took for Lean to detect the source of the giant man’s sudden outburst. One hundred yards ahead, a red spark appeared, flickered out, then reappeared. The small dot of fire rushed sideways in both directions and quickly began to climb.

Lean sprinted forward, arms pumping. His gaze was fixed on the spreading flames, though Doran partially blocked his view. He was amazed at how quickly the Irishman’s massive strides were outpacing his own. Ahead, in the light of the building flames, Lean saw the form of a small body supported a few feet above the ground. Panic seized his mind, but he clung to one thought, inarticulate but all-encompassing: Delia herself was not yet on fire.

A shot exploded from straight ahead, and Tom Doran went down, tumbling violently head over feet in the tall grass. Lean instinctively threw himself down on the ground, rolled, and got to one knee, pistol
in hand. In the fleeting seconds it had taken him to rise, he saw that Doran had regained his own feet and was sprinting forward again.

Lean heard a furious scream pierce the darkness. A woman in a long white dress appeared in the light of the flames. She grabbed a stick of wood from the fire and bolted forward, swinging the flaming brand at Tom Doran. He flung an arm out, knocking the blow aside and sending the woman tumbling. Three more strides and Doran was rushing into the fire, madly kicking both legs, sending flaming branches in every direction. He reached in and swept Delia’s limp form from the center of the blaze. The hem of the little girl’s dress had caught fire, but Doran extinguished it as he engulfed the small figure within his own massive bulk.

“She alive?” Lean shouted.

“Yes! Yes, she’s good!” Doran sank to his knees, still cradling Delia.

Lean exhaled, part of the horrible weight falling from him in an instant. His eyes darted all around the rocky point. Helen was nowhere. He dashed off again, veering to his left in pursuit of the woman in the white dress. She was easy enough to follow; she still clutched the burning torch that she had used to attack Doran. The woman was not a fast runner, and Lean quickly closed the gap between them. As he approached, he saw the flame rise higher. He momentarily thought that she was raising it over her head before he realized that she was scampering up a short rise of smallish, sharply angled rocks.

They were very near the ocean now; the craggy outcropping on which the woman stood stretched a short way out into the water. Lean quickly bounded up the rocks in pursuit. The woman reached the end and turned to face him. In the light of the torch, standing just twelve feet away, she bared her teeth in a twisted, furious snarl. Her red hair was pulled back, and her eyes were sheer hatred. He recognized her as the woman who had chastised Peter Chapman on the rail platform in Salem. He raised the pistol, aiming directly at her chest.

“You’re under arrest!”

Her snarl eased and spread into a menacing grin.

“Give it up. I won’t think twice of killing you after what you tried here tonight.”

“Tried?” the woman hissed. “Fool—the Master is rising even now. You can’t stop him.”

“The girl’s alive.”

“He doesn’t need her”—the woman spit out the last word—“that useless rag doll. Any life will do. And the stronger the spirit offered up, the brighter the flame calling him back to us.” The woman dropped her arm.

“Don’t!” Lean made it one step forward before the torch flame touched the bottom of the woman’s dress, then blazed upward.

Lean whipped his coat from off his back, thinking to tackle the woman and smother the flames, but her hair was already burning. She screamed, and her arms shot skyward like two fiery pillars. Lean tried to move closer, but the woman was stumbling backward, still shrieking in horrific pain and trailing a strong scent of burning oil. She must have doused the wood when she planned to sacrifice Delia and stained her own dress in the process. Lean swung his coat, striking the woman’s side. He was about to attempt a tackle when she turned and ran headlong off the rocks. She dropped down into the ocean, leaving a sickening hiss in her wake. After several seconds, the charred form drifted back to the surface. The dead body, and with it the knowledge of Helen’s whereabouts, lay in the dark water, motionless except for the bobbing of the waves.

Lean’s knees started shaking as the rush of the immediate danger faded. He sat on the rocks and glanced out over the water at the lights of Portland. Grey was there. There was still hope for Helen.