Page 37 of The Instruments of Darkness

“Well, too late now, I guess,” said Mrs. Gammett, as she closed the door. “However much it hurt pushing them out, it would hurt a shit load more trying to push them back in…”

CHAPTER XXII

The pickup from the jail nearly went without a hitch, but nearly is never good enough.

Mattia Reggio arrived at the Cumberland County lock-up ahead of time, was waiting by the door when Colleen Clark was released, and they were on the road before she even had the chance to take more than a few breaths of evening air. Reggio, who had spent a lifetime looking in rearview mirrors, spotted immediately that they had been followed out of the lot by another vehicle—a blue Chrysler driven, he thought, by a woman. Reggio wasn’t taking any chances, so instead of heading straight for the freeway, he lost his pursuer at the St. John intersection before cutting back toward the river and continuing on to Scarborough. He tagged the would-be tail for a reporter with better-than-average contacts at the jail, and memorized the plate. Regrettably, he elected not to share that plate detail with either Moxie or me.

Reggio dropped Colleen at my door, and he and I exchanged a few words. Reggio was aware of how I felt about him, but I believed it was more cause for sadness than outright resentment on his part. He wanted me to like him, and I couldn’t bring myself to do it, yet I wasn’t above acknowledging my own hypocrisy where he was concerned. He might once have hurt men, or worse than hurt them, but I had certainly done so. Reggio could at least claim the benefit of the doubt.

I showed Colleen to her room. It was the one my daughter Sam used when she came to stay. She’d occupied it for all of her early childhood, before she and her mom moved to Vermont. Her belongings, including books, games, and even a couple of old dolls and soft toys, were on the shelves, and she still kept clothes in the closet and dresser. It was only as I stood on the threshold with Colleen that I realized how inappropriate it might be to ask a woman with a missing son to sleep in the room of someone else’s child. She must have seen something of this on my face, because she touched my arm and said, “I’m happy to be here. In fact, I’ll take comfort from it.”

“If you’re sure.”

I left her to freshen up while I went to prepare dinner. It was a while since I’d had company for a meal at home, Angel and Louis excepted, so I made peperonata with rice, and prepared some flatbreads while Colleen showered. Moxie called as I was taking the bread from the griddle. He was making sure that Colleen was settling in as best she could.

“Did Matty tell you about being followed from the jail?” he said.

“That’s the first I’ve heard. Is it something we should pursue?”

“There’s no need. He lost the tail well before he left Portland, and the story is already on the Net. The driver must have been Hazel Sloane. She’s a reporter out of Bangor. Either she failed to read the memo about the release time, chose not to believe it if she had, or was tipped off by someone at the sheriff’s office. Whatever the reason, it looks like she was cooling her heels a couple of vehicles away when Colleen Clark came out, because the footage is already on the website of the Bangor Daily News.”

This meant Moxie’s ploy to convince everyone that Colleen was holed up in her home had failed. He went on to reveal that one of Sloane’s colleagues had been waiting at the Clark house when a vehicle different from the one that had made the pickup arrived to disgorge a woman with her head covered by a jacket—a woman, what’s more, dressed in clothing different from whatever Colleen had been wearing when she emerged from incarceration. On the other hand, no one had yet discovered where Colleen was currently sequestered. As long as she kept her head down, there was a chance we’d be okay. The local media knew better than to come knocking on my door asking questions, and Scarborough residents valued the privacy of others in return for their own being respected.

“Well, Reggio managed to lose Sloane,” I said, “which is the main thing. I may not relish his company, but he knows how to drive.”

“Are you aware that you feel compelled to reiterate your dislike of him whenever his name comes up?”

“I feel you need reminding of my reservations.”

“You’re not always around when I need you. Even if you were, donkey work doesn’t do justice to your particular skill set.”

“Then we’ll have to agree to differ on Reggio’s finer qualities.”

“If God judges sinners as harshly as you do,” said Moxie, “we’re all going to hell.”

Colleen Clark entered the kitchen. Her hair was wet from the shower, and she’d changed into a T-shirt and track pants. They made her appear even less substantial than ever, as though the night behind bars had contrived to shrink her still further.

“Colleen’s here,” I said. “Do you want to talk to her?”

“Sure.”

I told Colleen she should feel free to speak in the next room if she didn’t want me to overhear her conversation.

“I’ve got nothing important to say,” she replied. “And if I did, you’d need to hear it anyway.”

She made some small talk with Moxie while I put the food on the table. By the time she hung up, I’d opened a bottle of red wine and poured her a large glass, with a smaller one for myself out of politeness. I rarely drank at home, or alone.

“You made all this yourself?” she said, as she took in the spread.

“I have about four dishes in my repertoire. I was going to make chili, but it has unfortunate jailhouse connotations. This struck me as more elevated.”

I let her serve herself. She took barely enough food to fill half the plate, which wasn’t large. She tried the peperonata and managed not to make the elaborate choking noises in which Angel liked to indulge when confronted by generous amounts of garlic and onion.

“Stephen wouldn’t eat something like this,” she said.

“He doesn’t like Italian food?”

“He doesn’t like any food that doesn’t include meat. His father was the same way, or so he says.”

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