Mark Smith - The Inquisitor

A wet cough popped out of Hall, and Geiger and Harry turned to see one of Hall’s legs move, shifting from a ninety-degree angle to about forty-five. Geiger crouched beside him.

“Geiger,” Harry said, “have you even begun to think this through?”

Geiger undid Hall’s tie and began lashing his ankles with it.

“For starters,” Harry said, “you broke your own first commandment: Never let the outside change the inside. I’m not saying I think you were wrong-he’s just a kid-but I don’t know where the hell that leaves us.”

Geiger finished tying up Hall’s ankles and pulled the knot tight.

“Second, maybe there’s still a chance we could finesse this thing- maybe — but if you snatch that kid, then you’ve just retired yourself. Do you get that? Word gets out and we’re done, man. Finished. Not even Carmine would touch us. Jesus-did you think about any of that?”

Geiger rose and faced Harry. “No. I didn’t think about any of that.”

“Well maybe you’d better-”

“Harry, listen to me.”

“I cannot fucking believe you just-”

Geiger grabbed his partner and slammed him up against the doorjamb. “You’re not listening to me, Harry. Stop talking, take a deep breath, and listen to me.”

Harry felt completely incapable of taking a deep breath, but he nodded. “Okay,” he said. “Okay.”

Geiger’s pupils flared. They were like two shotgun barrels in a gray mist aimed at Harry.

“This,” Geiger said, “is not about a painting.”

He let go of Harry, walked to the bar, and poured another glass of water and began to drink. Harry’s shoulder blades ached from the impact with the wall. It was the first and only time Geiger had ever touched him. Clearly, this was going to be a night full of firsts-and probably lasts. He watched Geiger’s Adam’s apple bob up and down until he lowered his empty glass.

“Mr. Hall,” Geiger said, “is not a private detective working for a rich man with an art collection.”

“How do you know?”

“He said he came to me because he knew I was more ‘understated’ than Dalton, but if I turned the job down he’d take Ezra to Dalton anyway, knowing he could end up a bloody mess, a norell. Would you do that if you were looking for a stolen painting?”

“Then who is he?”

“I don’t know.” He turned back to Harry. “But whoever he is, I don’t think he’s going to stop-and his job description may include murder as an acceptable option.”

“Can I ask you one more thing?”

Geiger waited, his fingers coming alive at his sides.

“What happened, Geiger?”

“What happened?”

“To you. Something’s happened.”

“I don’t know what you mean,” Geiger said.

Harry shook his head. “Yeah, well… neither do I.”

And that’s that, thought Harry. No more questions, because Geiger had no answers. There had been a massive sea change inside this room, and now Harry was in the drink, head barely bobbing above the waves, no sign of land, no sense of which way to swim, no assurance that someone wouldn’t blow his head off as soon as he crawled onto the shore, if he was lucky enough to reach one. The only thing he was sure of was that if he ever did set foot on land again there’d be no more attaches full of cash waiting for him. The aftershock of that thought-that there might be a certain righting of cosmic scales at work, that some renascent sense had spurred Geiger into an act of spontaneous grace-made him smile, sadly, as one might when cleaning out a cluttered desk drawer and finding an old photograph of someone dear and long departed.

“You’re smiling, Harry. Why?”

“Not important.”

“Then go get the car.”

“Okay.”

Harry allowed himself a final glance at Hall’s attache case and walked out.

Geiger watched him step into the elevator and descend. Interacting with Harry had tightened him back up. The acts of listening and responding had been a truss wrapping around him, closing cracks and giving him a footing in time again.

Hall’s limbs moved in small, lazy shifts with the gradual onset of consciousness. Geiger walked into the session room and went over to the boy.

“Ezra?”

The boy turned stiffly, as if the spell in the chair had tightened his joints and made even casual movement an effort.

“We’ll be leaving soon and going someplace safe.” The boy nodded slowly. “I’ll leave the tape on until we’re there.” There was no nod this time, just a brief whimper.

Geiger walked to a wall, pressed back flat against it, and closed his eyes. He felt like someone who’d been driving a road with no end. As if observing the driver from a great distance, he thought: You’ve been behind the wheel so long that the hum of it in your hands has numbed your senses. Your head droops, you’re nodding out, and suddenly you jolt awake and hit the brakes. You pull over onto the shoulder. You look out the windshield, in the rearview mirror, out the side windows, and you discover that you’re in a perfect blind spot, one where trees and humpbacked hills and bends in the road ahead of you and behind you are a veil to every perspective. You’re not exactly sure when you nodded off, or for how long, but now you have no idea where you are.

You could be anywhere.

When Geiger got Harry’s call announcing his arrival in the alley, he checked on Richard Hall; he was semiconscious but his pulse was steady. Geiger wheeled the boy into the elevator and pulled the gate closed. Through the steel latticework, he saw the violin case lying on the session room floor. He came back out, picked up the case, returned to the elevator, and went down to the basement and alley door. He’d had the door installed in case a clandestine departure was ever necessary-lockless and knobless on the outside, the door was solid steel with internal hinges, manual slide bolts, and an interior handle.

Before leaving the building, he told the boy what to expect: he’d be getting into the backseat of a car, lying down, and going for a ride that would last about half an hour. When getting in and out of the car, he was not to try to run away-there would be no punishment for an attempt, but it would be a waste of time, and time was important now.

Geiger slid the bolts back and opened the door. A Taurus four-door sat in the unlit alley with the motor running. Standing beside it, Harry’s silhouette glistened slightly with a coat of drizzle.

“Can I say something?” Harry said.

“What is it?”

“We could drop him off at a police station. He’s never seen us. We just keep the tape on, pull up at the station, point him toward the door, and leave.”

“Bad idea, Harry. No cops.”

“I’m just trying to help out here.”

“This has got nothing to do with you.”

Harry felt heat rise beneath his skin. “No? How the hell do you figure that?”

“Harry, no more talking now. Go home.”

“I’m not coming with you?”

“No. Leave the van in case Hall has eyes out here, and stay off Ludlow Street.”

“What if Hall tries to get in touch with me?”

“I expect he will. I don’t think Mr. Hall is the type to just call it a day. The safest thing to do is go home and stay there-until we see how this plays out. And if Mr. Hall tries to contact you through the website, don’t answer.”

Geiger went back inside. Harry had the disconcerting sensation that his position in the physical world was going off kilter. Either the landscape was receding from him or he was growing smaller, shrinking.

Geiger came out leading the blinded boy by the hand. His ankle ties had been removed. Geiger opened the Taurus’s back door and tossed the violin case on the floor.