twice a week, once alone and once with their son.”
“Did Ricky visit after she died?”
“No, but James Benson did.”
“That could be another reason for Paul acting up-Benson not bringing his son to visit.” Sean thought back to Ricky’s letters from his mom. Sean had only skimmed most of them, but he had the impression Abigail was constantly apologizing for her husband to her son. Had she been trying to fix a bad relationship before she died?
“Benson visited the first Saturday of every month like clockwork,” Patrick said.
“Any other regular visitors?”
“After Abigail Swain died-Reverend Carl Browne visited twice a year, until a year ago last March. That was his last visit.”
“March? That’s when Swain’s behavior took a dramatic turn for the better.”
“He had another visitor in March. A week before Browne.” Patrick paused. “Joe Hendrickson.”
“
“Stayed for ten minutes.”
Neither Tim nor Adam knew about a connection between their father and Swain. His sudden visitation was of definite interest.
“Who else that month?”
“Other than Benson, no one.” Patrick looked at the months before and after. “Except Jon Callahan. The last week of February, ten days before Hendrickson. Wait-” Patrick flipped through his notes, “Callahan also visited twice during the first year of Swain’s incarceration.”
If Callahan was as involved with Bobbie Swain as Sean thought, what was he doing meeting with Paul Swain? Were the brother and sister back on good terms? Perhaps Callahan was a messenger.
Sean’s phone vibrated. It was a text message from Dillard.
“They found Benson’s body,” he told Patrick. He hadn’t known the guy, but he was saddened by the news.
He responded to Dillard.
Dillard sent back:
Suicide? Sean hadn’t expected that. “Why would Benson protect Ricky Swain for years, then kill himself when things in town started heating up?”
Patrick didn’t have an answer.
“Anything else on Callahan?” Sean asked.
“He’s visited Swain two more times,” Patrick said. “February, two months later at the end of April, and again just after New Year’s.”
Sean frowned. Those dates seemed important. He pulled out the calendar on his cell phone. He’d already plugged in the important dates in the case. When Joe Hendrickson died, his funeral, when Tim and Adam moved back to Spruce Lake, their town hall meeting about the resort, each vandalism attack. And when Sheffield went missing.
“Let me see that,” Sean said, grabbing the visitor logs. He input Callahan’s recent visits and Hendrickson’s lone visit. “Look. Don’t tell me this is a coincidence.”
Patrick stared at the calendar. “Well, fuck.”
Last year, Callahan spent the full visitor’s hour on a Saturday with Swain ten days before Hendrickson came for his one and only ten-minute visit. Three days later, Browne came for his last visit. The next morning, Joe Hendrickson was found dead of a heart attack.
“Did Swain put a hit on Hendrickson?” Sean wondered out loud.
“Didn’t he die of a heart attack? He was in his sixties, right?”
“Sixty-four. And there was no autopsy. Tim said something about how he’d been under a doctor’s care. If it was the quack who stitched up my leg, I wouldn’t trust him with a Band-Aid.”
Patrick said, “Look here-Callahan came the day after Tim Hendrickson had that town hall meeting, end of last April.”
“When was his last visit? January of this year?”
“January third.” Ten days after Agent Sheffield disappeared. “Sean, you’re going to have to be extra wily with Swain. We’ve got nothing but theories, so the choice is between taking this information and running with it, and attempting to get something more out of him.”
Sean looked closely at the log. “What’s this?” he slid the file back over to Patrick. There was a five-digit number, not a name, on the printout. 19881. “No matter how I slice it, I can’t make a date out of it,” Sean said.
“I have no idea,” Patrick said.
Sean noted the date on the log. December 23. “Do we have phone records, Patrick?”
“They’re still printing those out for us.”
“When you get them, see if there’s anything on these dates.” He circled the meetings. “And maybe you can ask the warden what this number means. Text me when you find out.”
“Do you know who’s
Sean stared at his partner blankly. Then it hit him. “Swain’s brother.”
“Bingo.”
“That
“Ready for Swain?” Patrick asked.
“Absolutely.” He sounded more confident than he actually was as they left the assistant warden’s office and walked through additional security.
“I’m confident you’ll get inside his head,” Patrick said. “Ten minutes and I’ll bet he’ll lose his temper.”
“Am I that annoying?”
“You can be.”
Paul Swain was not what Sean expected.
Sean faced the prisoner in a private interview room usually reserved for lawyers and their clients. Patrick and a senior guard were on the other side of the window, unseen, but Sean felt their presence. He had to play this right.
If Swain knew what he needed, he wouldn’t just hand it over. Sean’s only ace was to make Swain think he was looking for something completely different.
Forty-four, Swain had a handsome face and neatly trimmed dark hair. His palms and fingers were rough from labor, and there were scars on the back of his hands from fighting. A faded scar starting behind his ear and ending at his chin looked like it might have been serious at the time. There was a more recent scar at his temple, still red and raised.
Except for the physical scars, there was nothing about Paul Swain’s demeanor that said
“They told me you’re not a cop.”
“That’s correct.”
“Who are you?”
“Sean Rogan. Private investigator.”
“Cop lite.”
Sean shrugged and acted disinterested in Swain’s approval. “I don’t like cops as a rule. Good cops have their hands tied because of a system that favors pricks like you, and bad cops are worse because they abuse their power under the color of authority.”
