'Are you with me, Mitch?'
'I'm listening.'
'I'll call you again at seven-thirty—'
'More waiting? Why?' Impatience gnawed at him, and he could not cage it, though he knew the danger of the infection proceeding to a state of foaming recklessness. 'Let's get on with this.'
'Easy, Mitch. I was about to tell you what to do next when you interrupted.'
'Then, damn it, tell me.'
'A good altar boy knows the ritual, the litanies. A good altar boy responds, but he doesn't interrupt. If you interrupt again, I'll make you wait until eight-thirty.'
Mitch got a leash on his impatience. He took a deep breath, let it slowly out, and said, 'I understand.'
'Good. So when I hang up, you'll drive to Newport Beach, to your brother's house.'
Surprised, he said, 'To Anson's place?'
'You'll wait with him for the seven-thirty call.'
'Why does my brother have to be involved in this?'
''You can't do alone what has to be done,' said the kidnapper.
'But what has to be done? You haven't told me.'
'We will. Soon.'
'If it takes two men, the other doesn't have to be him. I don't want Anson dragged into this.'
'Think about it, Mitch. Who better than your brother? He loves you, right? He won't want your wife to be cut to pieces like a pig in a slaughterhouse.'
Throughout their beleaguered childhood, Anson had been the reliable rope that kept Mitch tethered to a mooring. Always it was Anson who raised the sails of hope when there seemed to be no wind to fill them.
To his brother, he owed the peace of mind and the happiness that eventually he had found when at last free of his parents, the lightness of spirit that had made it possible for him to win Holly as a wife.
'You've set me up,' Mitch said. 'If whatever you want me to do goes wrong, you've set me up to make it look as if I killed my wife.'
'The noose is even tighter than you realize, Mitch.'
They might be wondering about John Knox, but they didn't know that he was dead in the trunk of the Honda. A dead conspirator was some proof of the story Mitch could tell the authorities.
Or was it? He had not considered all the ways that the police might interpret Knox's death, perhaps most of them more incriminating than exculpatory.
'My point,' Mitch said, 'is that you'll do the same to Anson. You'll wrap him in chains of circumstantial evidence to keep him cooperative. It's how you work.'
'None of that will matter if the two of you do what we want, and you get her back.'
'But it isn't fair,' Mitch protested, and realized that he must in fact sound as ingenuous and credulous as an altar boy.
The kidnapper laughed. 'And by contrast, you feel we've dealt fairly with you? Is that it?'
Clenched around the pistol, his hand had grown cold and moist.
'Would you rather we spared your brother and partnered you with Iggy Barnes?'
'Yes,' Mitch said, and was at once embarrassed to have been so quick to sacrifice an innocent friend to save a loved one.
'And that would be fair to Mr. Barnes?'
Mitch's father believed that shame had no social usefulness, that it was a signature of the superstitious mind, and that a person of reason, living a rational life, must be free of it. He believed, as well, that the capacity for shame could be expunged by education.
In Mitch's case, the old man had failed miserably, at least on this score. Although the thug on the phone was the only witness to this willingness to save a brother at the expense of a friend, Mitch felt his face turn warm with shame.
'Mr. Barnes,' the kidnapper said, 'is not the sharpest knife in the drawer. If for no other reason, your friend would not be an acceptable substitute for your brother. Now go to Anson's house and wait for our call.'
Resigned to this development but sick with despair that his brother must be imperiled, Mitch said, 'What should I tell him?'
'Absolutely nothing. I'm requiring yon to tell him nothing. I am the experienced handler, not you. When I call, I'll let him hear Holly scream, and then explain the facts.'
Alarmed, he said, 'That's not necessary, making her scream. t promised not to hurt her.'
'I promised not to rape her, Mitch. Nothing you say to your brother will be as convincing as her scream. I know better than you how to do this.'
His cold, sweaty grip on the pistol was problematic. When his hand began to shake, he put the weapon on the passenger's seat once more.
'What if Anson isn't home?'
'He's home. Get moving, Mitch. It's rush hour. You don't want to be late getting to Newport Beach.'
The kidnapper terminated the call.
When Mitch pressed the end button on his phone, the act felt grimly predictive.
He shut his eyes for a moment, trying to gather his unraveled nerves, but then opened them because he felt vulnerable with them closed.
When he started the engine, a flock of crows flew up from the pavement, from the shadow of the steeple to the steeple itself.
Chapter 19
Famous for its yacht harbor, its mansions, and its wonderland of upscale shopping, Newport Beach was not home exclusively to the fabulously wealthy. Anson lived in the Corona del Mar district, in the front half of a two-unit condo.
Shaded by a massive magnolia, approached by a used-brick path, with New England architecture as interpreted by a swooning romantic, the house did not impress, but it charmed.
The door chimes played a few bars of Beethoven's 'Ode to Joy.'
Anson arrived before Mitch pressed the bell push a second time.
Although as fit as an athlete, Anson was a different physical type from Mitch: bearish, barrel-chested, bull- necked. That he had been a star quarterback in high school testified to his quickness and agility, for he looked more like a middle linebacker.
His handsome, broad, open face seemed always to be anticipating a reason to smile. At the sight of Mitch, he grinned.
'Fratello mio!' Anson exclaimed, embracing his brother and drawing him into the house. 'Entrino! Entrino!'
The air was redolent of garlic, onions, bacon.
'Cooking Italian?' Mitch asked.
'Bravissimo, fratello piccolo! From a mere aroma and my bad Italian, you make a brilliant deduction. Let me hang up your coat.'
Mitch had not wanted to leave the pistol in the car. The gun was tucked under his belt, in the small of his back.
'No,' he said. 'I'm fine. I'll keep it.'
'Come to the kitchen. I was in a funk at the prospect of another dinner alone.'
'If you're immune to funk,' Mitch said.
'There is no such thing as funk antibodies, little brother.'
The house featured a masculine but stylish decor, emphasizing nautical decorative items. Paintings of sailing ships portrayed proud vessels tossed in storms and others making way under radiant skies.
From childhood, Anson had believed that perfect freedom could never be found on land, only at sea, under
