two days, the face on television and in newspapers has been yours. It’s very much in our interest to have the newspeople stop putting it in front of everybody’s eyes. And they will, as soon as there’s something bigger, or odder, or more compelling to replace it. If the stock market crashes or an airplane blows up or the chief justice is caught soliciting an undercover cop, your picture will disappear and people will forget about you.”
“I wonder how long that will take.”
“We can’t know that. Of course, there are people who know it’s in their interest to prolong your notoriety as long as they can. The F.B.I. will probably try to release intriguing tidbits each day. Even if they know a lot, they’ll feed it to the reporters a pinch at a time. One day it’ll be places where somebody may have seen you, and the next day, inside details of your previous life. They’ll get people you operated on to say you did a great job but were not very friendly—”
“How do you know what people will say?”
“I don’t,” she said. “I’m guessing.”
“I’m extremely friendly,” he protested.
Jane shrugged. “I suppose I’m not seeing you at your best. It doesn’t matter. News articles aren’t statements of fact. They’re some writer’s attempt to flesh out very small bits of information into a full, coherent story. Lots of things about you will be twisted to fit a pattern of behavior, like a profile. If we’re lucky, they’ll concentrate on the things that aren’t true; those won’t help anybody recognize you.”
“But what about the trial? Any potential jury will have heard all this nonsense.”
Jane frowned at him. “No matter what we do, a jury would hear it from the prosecution. Let’s see what we can do to keep from having a trial.”
Dahlman stared at her. “I remember you said that it wouldn’t be wise to go to the authorities before I have a way of defending myself. But at some point, after they’ve studied the evidence and found it isn’t as neat and perfect as it sounded, why shouldn’t I?”
Jane could feel a headache developing behind her forehead. She closed her eyes for a second, then opened them and said, “I want this to end the same way you do. I thought at the beginning that we could slip you away for a short time, let the police catch the killer, and bring you home. But it hasn’t happened yet. I think we have to start thinking about the possibility that it isn’t going to happen soon.”
“I don’t think the situation has changed. What’s different?”
“What has changed is what we know. The killer isn’t some amateur, and it isn’t some psychopath. It isn’t even one person. There are some people making a good living doing what I used to do. They helped somebody disappear—this ‘Hardiston’ guy—and now he’s just about home-free. He has a new name, he’s in a new place. But there’s still one living person who saw the way he used to look and saw the way he looks now. Just one.”
Dahlman stared at her.
Jane waited. Then she asked, “Enough said?”
“Yes.” He began walking around the apartment again, looking closely at each piece of furniture, then at the four walls.
“I’ll only be gone for a week or two.”
He gave a reassuring little smile that vanished after he was sure she had seen it. “I’m not uncomfortable alone. I’ve lived alone for a long time. I was just thinking how much this reminds me of the place where the two policemen put me—only they weren’t policemen. I don’t mean it’s the same physically. There’s just something about spaces that have been closed up for a while …”
“It’s probably got the same feel because this is the way the game is played, and those men seem to know it. The best place to hide is where nothing in your daily life forces you to put your face where lots of people see it. Sometimes a farm is good. So is a small town, as long as it’s not small enough so people ask about you, and not a rich small town, where police check out newcomers.”
“When are you leaving?”
“Soon. Tonight.”
He came back into the kitchen. “Then in case I don’t see you again, I would like to thank you. I can see I haven’t been an easy companion, and it seems no advantage can come to you from helping me.”
Jane saw that he was telling her that he was ready. She slipped her purse strap onto her shoulder and stood up. “You’ll see me again.”
“You’ve taken me away from the police and away from the people who wanted to kill me. Now I’m in a place that seems to be safe. It wouldn’t be unreasonable to expect that this is the end of your services.”
Jane walked to the door and put her hand on the knob. “Don’t open the blinds, don’t answer the door. Don’t go outside unless you’re sure the building’s on fire, and even then, leave by the bedroom window. And don’t forget to take the rest of the antibiotics. When I come back for you, what I want to find in here is a man, not a body.”
Jane waited until Dahlman gave her a single nod. Then she slipped out the door. When she closed it behind her, Dahlman listened for a few seconds, but he heard no other sound.
15
It was nine o’clock in the evening when Carey McKinnon finished his rounds. The six patients he had operated on in the past three days were all doing extremely well. He wondered whether he had been somehow overcompensating for his anxiety, and therefore doing a better job. Maybe he had been concentrating on the clear, logical work of surgery as an escape from the unpleasant and unmanageable realities that were waiting for him outside the O.R. But maybe he had been unconsciously scheduling the easy ones for this week, and pushing the risky, demoralizing surgeries off for later. Both of these possibilities were, in different ways, disturbing, but at least he could test the last one. Mr. Caputi certainly was not an easy one. His pre-op physical exam had shown elevated blood pressure, he suffered from emphysema, and he had a history of complications in earlier surgery. Mrs. Trelewski had been rushed into surgery from the emergency room, so scheduling had nothing to do with it.
It was entirely possible that he had been focusing his mind more intensely on the practiced movements of his hands. Certainly he was doing something like that now, as he walked along the street in the dark. If things had been as usual, he would have been thinking about Jane. Maybe he would be on his way home to have a late supper in the kitchen with her, and he would be forming a picture of her in his mind. The picture was almost formed, but he pushed it away. Thinking about his work was safer, and it kept his features set and impenetrable—no worry lines, no frowns.
They would be looking for signs that he was weakening. Every moment when he was not in the operating room there seemed to be someone observing him. When he was out and on the move like this, sometimes he would see them. Tonight it would be the team of two big, benevolent-looking policemen who always worked in the evening. Usually one of them would be in a car parked near the back entrance of the hospital in sight of Carey’s reserved parking space. The other would be in one of the waiting areas or the gift shop off the main lobby.
He knew that behaving as though nothing had happened was the right thing to do. It was also completely insane. He was not trying to avoid creating suspicion: the police already suspected him. And the policemen weren’t pretending not to be policemen. Both sides were engaged in a long, silent face-off that had become like a dialogue … or an interrogation. It was as if he had said, “I know you think I had something to do with Richard Dahlman’s escape.” They would answer, “What makes you think that?” He would say, “Because you’re watching me.” And they would answer, “What makes you think we’re watching you?”
He was aware that, sooner or later, their patient immovability was going to end and someone was going to say, “Where is your wife?” They must have noticed by now. If they could devote policemen to sitting in cars and watching him, then they must have done a background investigation on him, or simply asked his colleagues at the hospital about him. They must know he had a wife.
The thought re-activated another bit of anxiety. Several of his colleagues had been questioned by the police, even a couple who had not been on duty the night Dahlman disappeared. A few of his close friends had said things like “Carey, what’s going on? Why are they asking so many questions about you?” The ones who made him anxious
