one of them did. What about the goon Maggie killed last night? Was he part of the surgical team? Unlikely. Finally, there was the fact that Sophie said there’d been at least two other transplants. Jack Batchelder was supposed to be tracking down possible victims. He’d have to find out how much progress Jack had made. Yes, a lot of loose ends. Even so, he felt he was getting closer. What he needed to tie the loose ends around Spencer’s neck in a neat little bow might be waiting in the Lexus. They should have searched it already. Unfortunately, events kind of got out of hand. They’d search it today. They’d also bring Philip Spencer down to 109 for a chat.
38
Wednesday. 1:30 P.M.
The third floor at Cumberland Medical Center was an armed camp. Dick Cheney’s undisclosed secure location couldn’t have been closed down any tighter. Uniformed cops were stationed at each of the elevator banks and at the stairwell doors, checking IDs of anyone coming or going including staff. Two additional patrol officers sat at Sophie’s door, and a third was in the room. All doctors, nurses, and aides going in or out of her room were checked against an approved list of caregivers. Anyone not on the list didn’t go in. Period. Medications and food were double-checked against orders by the floor nurse and the chief resident. Security was as tight as it could be if the hospital was going to function at all. Some comedian put up a sign opposite the elevators, WELCOME TO THE GREEN ZONE. The cops didn’t bother taking it down.
Sophie was awake but glum when McCabe entered. Her arm was bandaged and immobilized, an IV inserted in her hand. She didn’t look up when he sat in the chair next to her bed. She seemed to be absorbed in an old issue of Cosmo.
‘How are you feeling?’ he asked. No answer.
‘You’re not talking to me, is that it?’ Still no answer.
‘Listen, I can’t help you if you won’t talk to me.’
She looked at him and then turned back to the magazine.
‘The guy who shot you is dead. He can’t hurt you anymore — but there are others who can. I need you to talk to me. If you don’t, it’s very likely another woman will die. It’s just as likely they’ll come after you again.’
‘You swore to me you weren’t followed.’ She didn’t look up from the magazine as she spoke.
‘I wasn’t. They attached a global positioning transmitter under your car. Another under mine. That’s how they knew where we were. Sophie, the only safety for you is if we catch the people responsible for all this. The only way we can do that is for you to tell me everything you know.’
‘I’m going home,’ she said. ‘Back to France. As soon as they let me out of here.’
‘You won’t be any safer there than you are here. The man you called Spencer knows where you live. He knows you can identify him. He knows you’ve been talking to the police, and for all he knows, you’ve already told us everything you know. For all he knows, you’re ready to testify against him in court.
‘I spoke to the prosecutor about getting you immunity in return for your testimony. He said he’d do what he can, but I can’t promise you that. All I can promise you is that if you don’t help us stop him here and now, he will follow you to France, or wherever else you may go — and when he finds you he’ll surely kill you.’
Sophie sat in her bed staring straight ahead. McCabe saw that she was quietly crying, and it made him feel like a shit. What he told her was the truth of the matter, though, and there was no changing that.
Finally she turned to him. ‘Alright, what do you want to know?’
He turned on his recorder and spoke into it. ‘This is an interview between Detective Sergeant Michael McCabe, Portland Police Department, and Sophie Gauthier, a French citizen, recorded at Cumberland Medical Center, Portland, Maine, at 1:30 P.M. on Wednesday, September 21, 2005. Ms. Gauthier, you are participating in this interview freely and of your own volition, is that correct?’
‘Yes, it is.’
With only a little prompting, Sophie repeated into the recorder everything she had told McCabe the night before on the quiet road in Gray.
When she finished, he handed her half a dozen photographs, including a picture of Philip Spencer he’d printed off Casey’s computer. ‘I am showing Ms. Gauthier six photographs of men who fit the description of the man who contacted her in France. Ms. Gauthier, have you ever seen any of these men before?’
She took the photos and looked at each of them for a minute or two. She finally shook her head. ‘No.’
‘None of these photos are of the man who called himself Philip Spencer?’
‘No.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘Yes.’
‘Imagine each of them with beards.’
‘This one looks like him a little.’ She picked up the picture of Philip Spencer. ‘More when I imagine him, as you say, with a beard, but really not so much when you look closely.’
He showed her another photo of Spencer, shot from a slightly different angle. ‘No,’ she said. ‘I told you. This is not the man I spoke to.’
Okay, so Spencer wasn’t the recruiter. He could still be the cutter. The killer. McCabe slid another series of pictures in front of her. ‘Have you seen any of these men before?’
She pointed at a postmortem photo of the shooter. ‘Yes. This one was the driver who came for me at the hotels and brought me to the operations. Is he the man who tried to kill me?’
McCabe nodded. ‘Did he come for you each time?’
‘Yes.’
‘Was he in the operating room during the heart transplants?’
‘No.’
Tom Tasco and Eddie Fraser were waiting for McCabe as he left Sophie’s room. Fraser jumped right in. ‘We ID’d the shooter, Mike. Jacobi found a couple of usable prints in the SUV, and the bureau came up with a match.’
McCabe interrupted him. ‘Let’s go and get some coffee,’ he said. ‘Too crowded to talk up here.’
They rode the elevator down to the big cafeteria on the ground floor. At two thirty, it was still pretty crowded with a late lunch crowd. They got three cups of coffee and went for privacy to an outdoor area where there were some chairs and tables. McCabe noticed, for the first time, it was a beautiful day. They sat where they could speak without being overheard.
‘Who is he?’ asked McCabe.
‘Name’s Darryl Pollock,’ said Tasco. ‘Ex-marine. Served as a sniper in the first Gulf War. Won a Bronze Star. Stayed in the marines after the war. Joined Force Recon. That’s Marine Corps Special Ops. Apparently he only quit because some of the homophobes in the Corps found out he was gay and made life uncomfortable for him.’
‘What did he do after the military?’
‘Record gets a little sketchy.’ Tasco was reading from some computer printouts. ‘Worked as a bouncer in some gay clubs in New York. Couple of assault arrests for getting too rough with some drunks. No convictions. Turns up next in Florida. South Beach.’
Tasco sorted through his notes. ‘In Florida, Pollock does a little time for beating the shit out of a couple of college jocks in a bar fight. He got pissed at them for gay-bashing some aging queen Pollock didn’t even know. He told them to lay off. Instead they start in on him. Football players,’ Tasco said with a snort. ‘Guess they thought they were tough. Pollock almost killed one of them. That was in ’96. He gets out in ’98 and disappears. End of story.’
Darryl Pollock. Duane Pollard. Initials DP. South Beach. Lucas Kane’s lover? McCabe was willing to bet on it. In 1998 Pollock changes his name and hooks up with Kane. He wondered what, if anything, Detective Sessions would know about that. Or be willing to tell him.
‘Mike, are you with me?’ Tasco was looking at him. ‘Hello? Is there something I’m missing here?’
McCabe shook his head. ‘No. I’m sorry, Tom. Any record of Pollock ever using an alias? Either before he was sent up or maybe after he got out of prison?’
‘Not that we’re aware of.’
