Darren Shan - Hell's Horizon

“But you don’t move up. A man of your ability and experience should have been promoted by now. I know you’ve been approached, by both Mr. Tasso and Mr. Weld, but each time they’ve offered you more responsibility you’ve turned them down.”

“I’m happy as I am.”

“Or afraid to advance?”

“I’ve seen what happens to those who slip while scaling the corporate ladder. Cleaned up after a few of them. Never seemed worth it to me.”

“What if I handed you a promotion on a plate, if I said I was getting rid of Frank Weld and wanted you to take his place?”

I stared at him.

“I’m serious,” he said. “Not about getting rid of Mr. Weld — I have no intention of dismissing such a valued employee — but maybe moving him to some other branch of the organization, where he won’t clash with Mr. Tasso all the time. I’ve been working on a list of possible replacements. Would you care to be added to it?”

“I couldn’t fill Frank’s shoes,” I mumbled. “I know nothing about management or leadership.”

“Mr. Weld didn’t either when he started. Few men do. Leaders aren’t born — they grow.”

“I don’t know what to say. I thought you wanted to talk about Nic. This is…” I searched in vain for the words.

“I’ve had my eye on you for some time,” The Cardinal said.

“On me ?”

“Did you never wonder why Mr. Tasso spent so much time on you when you joined the Troops? Why he took you under his wing?”

“I thought he liked me.”

The Cardinal laughed. “Mr. Tasso’s interests and friendships are mine. I asked him to keep an eye on you.”

“Why?” I was dumbfounded.

“Because I knew your father.”

“Tom Jeery?” I gaped.

He nodded. “A fine man. Someone I was able to rely upon. I thought if the son turned out to be half as valuable, he’d be a good man to have on the books.”

“I barely knew my father,” I said. “He wasn’t around much when I was growing up. Disappeared for good when I was seven. I had no idea he was involved with you.”

“He asked me not to mention it. Didn’t want his image tarnished.” The Cardinal turned over a sheet of paper. “Did you kill Nicola Hornyak?” he asked, as if still discussing old friends and family.

“No!” I shouted, bewildered by his change of pace, momentarily losing my cool. “I wasn’t even here. I was out of town. On a—”

“—Fishing trip. Yes. Mr. Weld told me. But that may have been a clever piece of subterfuge. It’s convenient that your girlfriend’s brutal murder coincided with your absence.”

“I was with a friend,” I growled. “Bill Casey. He’ll vouch for me. He was with me the entire time. We even shared the same tent.”

“I know.” The Cardinal smiled. “I just wanted to see how you react when riled. You can learn a lot about a man by the way he responds when subjected to slanderous accusations.”

There was a knock on the door and Ford Tasso entered. “Algiers,” he greeted me. “Heard about the mess. How you holding up?”

“Quite remarkably,” The Cardinal answered for me. “He takes loss firmly on the chin. Barely fazed by it.”

“I’m fazed,” I said sourly. I didn’t like what he was doing. I hadn’t been especially close to Nic but I was hurting from what had happened. The Cardinal was acting like it was some big joke. That pissed me off.

“Look at his face,” The Cardinal chortled. “He’d love to throttle me.”

“Go easy on him,” Tasso said. “Finding a partner in the Fridge would have knocked the wind out of the most seasoned of us. Frank told me he didn’t even know she was missing.”

“You two are back on speaking terms?”

“For the time being.” Tasso joined The Cardinal on the other side of the desk and glanced at the notes in his employer’s lap. “The cops don’t know about Al,” he said. “Want us to keep him under wraps?”

The Cardinal sniffed. “Makes no difference whether they know or not.”

“How about you, Algiers? Want us to hush things up?”

“Bill knew I was seeing her,” I said.

“Bill?”

“Bill Casey,” The Cardinal explained. “The pair were away fishing when the incident occurred.”

“And he knows about you two?” Tasso frowned. “Then we can’t keep it to ourselves. Howard Kett’s handling the case.” Kett was Bill’s superior officer. Bill didn’t have much time for him — Kett was a grade-A prick — but would feel compelled to reveal information as important as this.

Tasso and The Cardinal discussed other business for a couple of minutes, while I sat there like a stuffed squirrel. When their discussion came to an end, Tasso departed. He offered his condolences one final time and slipped out.

“You weren’t listening, were you?” The Cardinal challenged me as soon as his right-hand man was out of earshot.

“What?”

“While I was chewing the cud with Mr. Tasso, I kept an eye on you. You tuned us out.” He tutted. “You shouldn’t be so courteous, Al. Have you any idea what certain people would pay to be where you are, to have been present while I was in congress with my number one aide? These are the types of opportunities one should seize, not turn one’s nose up at.”

“I’m not interested in seizing,” I responded. “That’s why I’d be no good as a replacement for Frank. I’m not an organizer.”

“A pity. I had high hopes for you. Your father was far more ambitious.”

I shifted my chair a couple of inches closer to the desk. “What did my father do for you, exactly?”

“Collected debts. Encouraged stubborn shopkeepers to see things my way. This was thirty, thirty-five years ago. We were still quite primitive back then.”

“Do you know what happened to him?” I asked. “Why he vanished?”

“Your mother never told you?”

I shook my head. “She never spoke about my father. I think she was afraid of him. Whenever I asked, she said he was a bad man and I was to forget him. She died when I was a teenager, before I could make more mature inquiries.”

“You never tried tracking him down?”

“I asked about him but nobody knew anything. Bill did some checking for me but came up blank. I always assumed he ran off with another woman.”

The Cardinal rose and crossed the room to the huge window that afforded him a bird’s-eye view of the city. He stood looking down in silence. I stared at his chair and waited for him to speak. I had a good idea what he was preparing himself to say.

“Tom Jeery was killed in the line of duty.” He glanced over his shoulder to check how I’d taken that, noted my neutral expression and continued. “One of those stubborn shopkeepers pulled a knife on him. Cut deeper than he intended. Severed an artery.”

“So he’s dead.” I’d thought, over the years, that he must be, but had always held out hope that one day he’d walk back into my life, even if it was just so I could deck him for cutting out on me and my mother.

“Your mother knew,” The Cardinal said. “I informed her personally, as I did in those days, before I started delegating. A hard, cold woman, if you’ll allow me to say so. Kept her emotions to herself. Refused my offer of financial assistance. Wouldn’t even let me pay for a decent burial.”

“Where was he buried?” I asked, head spinning.

“He wasn’t.”

“Then where…?” I winced. “The Fridge.”

“He was one of the first occupants. You can retrieve the body if you wish to lay it to rest. I only held on to it because your mother showed no interest.”

“After all these years, what would be the point?”

The Cardinal smiled. “My thoughts exactly.” He beckoned me over to the window. “See those cranes off to the right?” I pressed against the glass and searched the horizon until I found the cranes in question. “That’s where they’re building the Manco Capac statue.”