how she got the idea that her son Peter should get the same special treatment.”
“She knows nothing about me personally. She didn’t mean it personally. You’re sure.”
“Why would you believe these negative things about you personally?” he says.
“I think you know why, John.”
“No damn way she was referring to anything specific. She’s an angry, militant woman and was just venting when she called you the same names she called me, called several other people at Dover. Bigots. Racists. Nazis. Fascists. A lot of staff got christened a lot of ugly names that morning.”
Briggs steps back away from the window and collects his laptop off the sill, his way of saying he has to go. He can’t have a conversation that lasts more than twenty minutes, and in fact the one we just had is lengthy for him and has tried his patience and gotten too close to too many things.
“One favor you could do for me that would be greatly appreciated,” he says. “Please stop telling people I thought MORT was the best thing since sliced bread.”
Benton, I think. I guess the two of them have gotten quite cozy.
“Not so, but I understand your remembering it that way, and I’m sorry we butted heads about it,” Briggs goes on. “However, given a choice of a robot dragging a dead body off the battlefield and a living person risking his life and limb to do it? That’s what I call a Sophie’s choice. No good choice, only two bad ones. You weren’t right, and I wasn’t, either.”
“Then we’ll leave it at that,” I answer. “Both of us made bad decisions.”
“It’s not like we hadn’t made them before,” he mutters.
He walks with me out of the sea captain’s house, passing through rooms I’ve already been in. Every space seems empty and depressing, as if there never was anybody home. It doesn’t feel that Fielding ever lived here, just parked himself as he worked demonically on his renovations and labored secretly in his cellar, and I just don’t know what drove him. Maybe it was money. He’d always wanted money and was never going to get it in our trade, and that bothered him about me, too. I do better than most. I plan well, and Benton has his inheritance, and then there is Lucy, who is obscenely rich from computer technologies she’s been selling since she was no older than the neuroterrorists Briggs just talked about. Thank God Lucy’s inventions are legal, as best I know.
She’s inside the CFC truck with Marino and Benton, and the yellow suits and hard hats are off, and everyone looks tired. Anne has driven off in the van again, making another delivery to the labs while more evidence waits for her here, white boxes filled with white paper evidence bags.
“There’s a package for you in your car,” Briggs says to me in front of the others. “The latest, greatest, level- four-A armor, specifically designed for females in theater, which would be fine if you ladies would bother with the plates.”
“If the vest isn’t comfortable,” I start to say.
“I think it is, but I’m built a little different from you. Problem’s going to be if it won’t completely close on the sides. We’ve seen that too many times, and the projectile finds that one damn opening.”
“I’ll try it out for you,” Lucy offers.
“Good,” Marino says to her. “You put it on, and I’ll start shooting, see if it works.”
“Or trauma from blunt force, which is what most people seem to forget about,” I tell Briggs. “The round doesn’t penetrate the body armor, but if the blunt force from the impact goes as deep as forty-four millimeters, it’s not survivable.”
“I haven’t been to the range in a while,” Lucy chats with Marino. “Maybe we can borrow Watertown’s. You been to their new one?”
“I bowl with their range master.”
“Oh, yeah, your team of cretins. What’s it called? Gutter Balls.”
“Spare None. You should bowl with us sometime,” Marino says to Briggs.
“Would it be acceptable to you, Colonel, if AFDIL sends in backup scientists to help out at the CFC, for God’s sake?” Briggs is saying to me. “Since it seems we have an avalanche of evidence that just keeps coming.”
“Any help would be greatly appreciated,” I reply. “I’ll work on the vest right away.”
“Get some sleep first.” Briggs says it like an order. “You look like hell.”
22
Massachusetts Veterinary Referral Hospital has twenty-four-hour emergency care, and although Sock doesn’t seem to be in any distress as he snores curled up like a teacup dog, a Chihuahua or poodle that can fit in a purse, I need to find out what I can about him. It is almost dark, and Sock is in my lap, both of us in the backseat of the borrowed SUV, driving north on I-95.
Having identified the man who was murdered while walking Sock, I intend to bestow the same kindness toward the rescued race dog, because no one seems to know where he came from. Liam Saltz doesn’t know and wasn’t aware his stepson Eli had a greyhound, or any pet. The superintendent of the apartment building near Harvard Square told Marino that pets aren’t allowed. By all accounts, when Eli rented his unit there last spring, he didn’t have a dog.
“This doesn’t really need to be done tonight,” Benton says as we drive and I pet the greyhound’s silky head and feel great pity for him. I’m careful about his ragged ears because he doesn’t like them touched, and he has old scars on his pointed snout. He is quiet, like something mute.
“Dr. Kessel doesn’t mind. We should just do it while we’re out,” I reply.
“I wasn’t thinking about whether some vet minded or not.”
“I know you weren’t.” As I stroke Sock and feel that I might want to keep him. “I’m trying to remember the name of the woman who is Jet Ranger’s nanny.”
“Let’s not go there.”
“Lucy’s never home, either, and it works out just fine. I think it’s Annette, or maybe Lanette. I’ll ask Lucy if Annette or Lanette could stop by during the day, maybe first thing each morning. Pick up Sock and take him to Lucy’s place so he and Jet Ranger can keep each other company. Then Annette or whatever her name is could bring Sock back to Cambridge at night. What would be so hard about that?”
“We’ll find Sock a home when the time is right.” Benton takes the Woburn exit, the sign illuminating an iridescent green as our headlights flash over it and he slows down on the ramp.
“You’re going to have a lovely home,” I tell Sock. “Secret Agent Wesley just said so. You heard him.”
“The reason you can’t have a dog is the same reason it’s always been a bad idea,” Benton’s voice says from the dark front seat. “Your IQ drops about fifty points.”
“It would be a negative number, then. Minus ten or something.”
“Please don’t start baby talk or gibberish or whatever it is you speak to animals.”
“I’m trying to figure out where to stop for food for him.”
“Why don’t I drop you off and I’ll run to a convenience store or market and pick up something,” Benton then says.
“Nothing canned. I need to do some research first about brands, probably a small-batch food for seniors because he’s not a spring chicken. Speaking of, let’s do chicken breasts, white rice, whitefish like cod, maybe a healthy grain like quinoa. So I’m afraid you’ll need a real grocery store. I think there’s a Whole Foods somewhere around here.”
Inside Mass Vet Referral, I’m shown along a long, bright corridor lined with examination rooms, and the technician who accompanies us is very kind to Sock, who is rather sluggish, I notice. He is light on his small feet, slowly ambling along the corridor as if he’s never run a race in his life and couldn’t possibly.
“I think he’s scared,” I say to the tech.
“They’re lazy.”
“Who would think that of a dog that can run forty miles an hour,” I comment.
“When they have to, but they don’t want to. They’d rather sleep on the couch.”
“Well, I don’t want to tug him. And his tail’s between his legs.”
“Poor baby.” The tech stops every other second to pet him.
I suspect Dr. Kessel alerted the staff of the greyhound’s sad circumstances, and we’ve been shown nothing but consideration and compassion and quite a lot of attention, as if Sock is famous, and I sincerely hope he won’t
