William Krueger - The Devil's bed

Bo glanced toward Jorgenson’s room. “How’s he doing?”

“Seems okay now. They had a scare when he first came to. He went ballistic. Disoriented, I guess. The nurses had to restrain him. The doctor asks him if he knows where he is. Jorgenson looks at him like the doc’s the devil himself and says, ‘Are you no man?’ Doc tells him he’s a physician and that this is a hospital. That settled him right down. He’s been fine since.” The sheriff shook his head. “‘Are you no man?’ What kind of question is that?”

Bo went to the physician who was deeply engrossed in reading Jorgenson’s chart, and he interrupted gently, “I’m Special Agent Bo Thorsen, Secret Service.” The two men shook hands. “I know Tom Jorgenson’s condition isn’t good, but I’d like to talk with him.”

“Can’t it wait?”

“It’s important or I wouldn’t ask.”

The doctor considered, then said, “All right. But keep it short.”

Tom Jorgenson’s eyes were closed. His face was sallow, his cheeks and sharp jaw grizzled with white stubble. A tube was attached to one arm, and another came out a nostril. He was hooked to electrodes connected to an EKG monitor. He reminded Bo of a puppet abandoned by whoever it was that usually pulled the strings. The shades over the windows were open to let in sunlight, but the glass was tinted, and what came through was subdued. The tint turned the blue of the river and the sky to deep gray. Bo drew up a chair next to the bed. Tom Jorgenson still wore a turban of gauze, and his eyes still looked as if he’d been pummeled in a prize-fight.

“Bo?” he whispered.

“Hello, Tom.”

He spoke slowly. “What are you doing here?” He thought a moment, then answered his own question. “Oh, Kate.”

“I’m only going to stay a moment, Tom. I need to ask you a couple of questions, okay?”

Jorgenson gave a faint nod.

“Does the name David Moses mean anything to you?”

Tom Jorgenson closed his eyes. Bo thought he might be drifting off, then his eyes opened again. “No,” he replied.

“It might have been a long time ago.”

“Sorry, Bo. Not so easy to think.”

“That’s okay. Tom, do you remember anything about your accident?”

“Getting on the tractor. Nothing else. Tree limb hit me, they say.” A weak smile touched Tom Jorgenson’s lips. “How’s that for clumsy?”

Bo told him to rest, then he left the room. Outside Quinn-Gruber was waiting.

“You ask him about Moses?”

Bo nodded. “Nothing. But he’s tired. I didn’t want to push it.”

He left the medical center and walked outside into the late afternoon sun. He stood beside his Contour and used his cell phone to contact Agent Russell in the Op Center at Wildwood.

“How are things there, Jake?”

“Quiet.”

“Have you and Manning discussed informing the First Lady about David Moses?”

“We discussed it. He wants to know exactly what you have first.”

“Is he there?”

“He’s out looking at the equipment we’ve got along the bluff. He’s not convinced the perimeter there is secure.”

“Maybe he’s right to be concerned. I’ve been thinking, Jake. If Moses did attack Tom Jorgenson in the orchard, it may indicate a good knowledge of Wildwood. I think we should put additional agents on the perimeter. Maybe call Diana and request-”

“Bo,” Russell cut him off, but didn’t go on. Bo understood the meaning. The security of Wildwood was no longer Bo’s responsibility.

“Sorry, Jake.”

“No problem, Bo. Just keep me informed.”

“You’ve got it. Have Manning call me when he gets back to the Op Center. I’ll fill him in on everything.”

“Ten-four.”

Bo stood blinking in the sun, wishing he could let go of the feeling that responsibility for so much rested on his shoulders. But it was a feeling as old as any for him, and if he lost it, who would he be then?

St. Jerome’s Home for Children was a vast rectangular structure of red brick set at the edge of an alfalfa field. When Bo drove up, the playground beside the parking lot was full of laughing children. It was a fine setting, there in the country, but Bo knew firsthand that even in the finest of settings an institution was no substitute for a home and a family.

Sister Mary Jackson ushered him into her office. She wore a brilliant red skirt and matching jacket. Her dark hair was coifed short and stylish. There were lines at the corners of her eyes and mouth, smile lines deeply etched. Her eyes were warm brown and welcoming. Her office overlooked the playground, and as they spoke, the sound of children’s voices floated in like music. Bo explained his situation. She turned to her computer terminal and entered the name of David Moses. The program searched for a moment, then reported it found no matches. No problem, she explained. While all recent files were in the system, anything older than fifteen years probably hadn’t been entered yet. She led Bo downstairs into a cool basement room full of green filing cabinets and the musty smell of time. She turned on a dismal light, quickly found the cabinet she wanted, and pulled out a drawer. She began to flip through manila folders brittle with age.

Bo’s cell phone broke the quiet of the basement. “Thorsen, here,” Bo answered.

“This is Manning. You wanted to talk to me.”

“Chris, can I call you back? I’m in the middle of something here.”

“If you think it can wait.”

“Hmmm,” Sister Mary Jackson said.

“It can wait.” Bo flipped the cell phone closed. “What is it?” he asked the nun.

“I can’t find one for David Moses. It would have been approximately twenty years ago?”

“Approximately.”

“And you’re certain he was one of ours?”

“I’d pull up just short of certain.”

“That’s very odd. We should have a file somewhere.” She accompanied Bo back upstairs and discussed the situation with a couple of the office staff. They looked in several places and came up empty-handed. “It’s possible,” she finally conceded apologetically, “that it’s been misplaced. These things happen. If you’d like to talk to someone who may remember the boy, I’d suggest you speak with Father Don Cannon. He was the director here for nearly thirty years. He’s retired now, but he’s a wonderful resource.”

She gave Bo a telephone number and an address in River Falls, a small town in Wisconsin, just the other side of the St. Croix River. As he was leaving the parking lot, his cell phone beeped. It was Stuart Coyote.

“I was beginning to think you’d gone on vacation,” Bo said.

“It was a bastard finding a judge, or more precisely finding a judge who wasn’t a bastard. First guy looked at me like he wondered how the hell I escaped from the reservation. We finally got the warrant this afternoon and went into Luther Gallagher’s house.”

“What did you find?”

“Nothing that relates in an obvious way to David Moses. But we stumbled onto some interesting appliances in the basement. Complicated wood and leather devices. The place looked like a dungeon. Luther Gallagher appears to have a fondness for rough foreplay of the medieval variety.”

“What do you bet David Moses convinced Luther Gallagher he’d be his dungeon buddy if Gallagher helped him after his escape?”

“My guess, too. We found an address book, and the sheriff’s people here are doing a rundown of the names to see if anyone knows Gallagher’s whereabouts or has knowledge of any connection with David Moses. We found a telephone number for Gallagher’s father in Arizona. The old guy says his ticker’s never acted up, and he claims he hasn’t seen his no-account son in almost a decade.