screen. Eventually I gave up worrying about errors and pressed SEND.
Lucas Sewall’s yellow notebook lay in front me on the table, where I’d first put it down. The kid’s drawings were positively grotesque. One picture showed an owl with its wings extended and blood dripping from his parted beak; another image was of a scary-looking woman wearing a wimple and gown made entirely of feathers. Lucas must have a strange bird phobia, I decided.
There was some sort of code on the cover:
DORT OSNZ CNAP IOZZ
Usually I enjoyed riddles and thought of myself as having an aptitude for solving all manner of puzzles, but I was too exhausted to play word games. I returned to the couch and unbuttoned the top buttons on my shirt. After a while, I closed my eyes.
The phone woke me. I snapped awake with a start, not knowing where I was. The room had grown almost completely black. How long had I been asleep?
“Hello?”
“Warden Bowditch?” It was a man’s voice.
“Yeah. Who’s this?”
“Detective Lieutenant Zanadakis of the state police’s Criminal Investigation Division. They’ve given me the Randall Cates mess to clean up. I read your report, and I wondered if you can come into Machias to talk with me about what happened. You’ve given us the play-by-play, but I’d like to hear the color commentary.”
I leaned forward and rubbed my eyes, trying to wake up fast. “Just tell me where and when.”
“We’re running this investigation out of the sheriff’s office. Can you be here at ten o’clock?”
It was nearly 7:00 P.M. now. “Tomorrow?”
“Tonight.” He paused. “Is that going to be a problem?”
“No, sir.”
“I appreciate the cooperation,” he said, and hung up.
At least I had a few hours to take a shower and guzzle coffee. I yawned and stretched my arms above my head, experiencing once more all my exertions of the previous day in my aching joints and sore muscles.
The phone rang again.
I thought it might be the detective calling back, but this time it was a woman. “Mike? This is Jamie Sewall. You gave me and my son a ride home from the hospital.”
How had she found me? Had I given her my business card? I couldn’t recall.
“Hi, Jamie. How are you doing? Is everything OK?”
“This is going to sound funny, but you know how you offered to drive me back to the hospital? My friend said he can’t do it, and it would be like sixty bucks for a taxi from Machias, and I really need my car to go to work in the morning. I hate to ask and all, because you were so nice before, and I feel embarrassed for losing my keys, but can you possibly give me a lift?”
I glanced at my watch again, making quick calculations. If I left in ten minutes, that would give me fifteen minutes to get to her house, half an hour for us to ride into town, some time together at the hospital. Yes, it was totally doable.
“It’s no trouble,” I said. “I’ll be right over.”
“You’re my hero.”
I took the fastest shower of my life and put on the last clean uniform in my closet.
It was a crystal-clear night-the kind you only get far from the light pollution of the big cities. The sky was as hard as an obsidian desert. The Milky Way flowed across it like a river of light.
Someone had done a half-assed job of shoveling a parking spot in the Sewalls’ driveway. A narrow path wound through the snow to the house. Above the wheelchair ramp, a weak porch light glowed like a dying star. I stayed in the truck with the engine going until it became clear that Jamie wasn’t waiting in the window for me to arrive. I needed to knock, in other words.
The subzero air was bracing as I pulled it into my lungs. I never felt more alive than when I was outdoors on a Maine winter night. The cold made me hyperaware of my existence as a hot-blooded animal, part of and yet apart from the natural world. I pushed the glowing orange doorbell and waited with excitement for an answer.
There was no response.
I tried the bell again, this time with more persistence.
Finally the knob turned and I found myself looking down at a haggard woman in a wheelchair. She had shoulder-length brown hair that looked freshly washed, brown eyes that seemed to have trouble focusing, and a cleft chin I recognized as a Sewall family trait. She wore a faded gray-and-red flannel shirt, stonewashed jeans, and white tennis shoes.
“Hello,” I said.
“Wow,” she said, giving me a lopsided smile. “Jamie didn’t tell me you were a hunk. I’m Tammi. Come on inside.”
She wheeled herself in reverse away from the door. I stepped over the threshold.
I knew another woman who lived in a wheelchair; Ora Stevens, the wife of my friend Charley, had broken her spine in a plane crash, but although she could no longer walk, she radiated good health and good cheer. I didn’t know Tammi’s affliction-multiple sclerosis or cerebral palsy? — but she seemed broken in a way that went beyond malfunctioning nerves and muscles.
Outside, the house looked to be a wreck, but inside there wasn’t a hint of dust or disrepair to be seen. The hardwood floors gleamed beneath the overhead light fixture. The air had a pleasant floral smell, as of a scented candle flickering in some distant bathroom. Framed family photos hung neatly on the walls.
“You want a Moxie or something?” Tammi asked me. “We don’t have any beer in the house anymore.”
“I’m on duty anyway. But no, thank you.”
“Jamie says you’re the one who found Prester.” She twitched her nose like a rabbit. In her hollow lap was a clump of wadded tissues. She dabbed the corner of an eye with one.
“I just helped get him to the hospital,” I said.
“Jamie says Randall is dead, too.” She framed the sentence as a statement, but I sensed that she’d hung an invisible question mark at the end.
“Yes.”
“Good fucking riddance.”
Brain injury, I decided. It was the uncensored way Tammi had of speaking aloud every thought that came into her head.
There was a creak at the top of the stairs. I glanced up, expecting to see Jamie, but instead, I caught a glimpse of her son’s pasty face poking around a corner. I sensed that he had been watching me in secret since I’d arrived. As soon as we made eye contact, he pulled his head back, like a turtle disappearing into his shell.
“Lucas, what are you doing?” I heard his mother ask him.
His response was muffled, but her reply carried down the drafty staircase. “He’s taking me to the hospital to get the van. It has nothing to do with you,” she said. “How did you get to be so paranoid?”
I became aware that Tammi was still speaking.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “What did you say?”
“I was asking how much you can bench. I used to work at Down East Fitness, and I could always tell whether a guy was really strong or whether he just had balloon muscles. I’m guessing you can bench three hundred pounds.”
“It’s been a while since I lifted. Mostly I just do push-ups and sit-ups.”
“Go to your room, Lucas!” A moment later, Jamie came hurriedly down the stairs, carried along by gravity. “I see you met my sister.”
“We were discussing bench presses,” I said.
“That’s one of Tammi’s favorite subjects.”
She had taken a shower, and her hair still shined wetly under the overhead light. She wore a pumpkin-toned fleece pullover and burnt ocher corduroys that flattered her legs. Her eyes were luminous. “I really, really, really appreciate this.”
