Dakota’s was yet another example of a new downtown business that had sprung up overnight. It was located at the far end of Main Street, where Alexander’s Shoes used to be, and had a parking lot full of high-end cars: Saabs, BMWs, even a Mercedes. Dakota’s: Belham’s first yuppie bar.
The inside sure looked like it. Lots of dark paneled wood and low lighting. A long bar filled with bottles that sparkled in expensive tract lighting and just off to the right of the bar, a small dining area with white-linen tablecloths and votives on each table, the perfect place for trading and sharing secrets over dry chardonnay and overpriced gourmet appetizers. To the left of the main entrance, accessed by a glass door,was a cigar room with burgundy-colored leather chairs and couches and coffee tables holding copies of the Wall Street Journal, the Financial Times, and magazines like Sailing and Vanity Fair. Merrick sat in one of the leather couches that faced the bay windows overlooking Main Street, a snifter of port or some other high-priced booze cradled in one hand, the other flipping the pages of a magazine spread across his lap. His black suit and the drawn, haggard look on his face gave him the appearance of an undertaker relaxing after a long, hard day.
Mike plopped himself down in the leather chair across from Merrick and took out his pack of cigarettes. Merrick folded the magazine and gently placed it and his snifter back down on the glass coffee table between them. Wine Spectator. Jesus.
“It was definitely a suicide.” Merrick said.
“As opposed to what?” Mike had seen the log lying sideways under Jonah’s feet. It didn’t take a brain surgeon to figure out that Jonah had stepped up on the log, tied the noose around his neck and then jumped.
“With suicides, you have to pay close attention. More often than not it’s a homicide; a person is strangled and the body is moved to another place and hung to make it look like a suicide. When that happens, you always find two sets of ligature marks, and then you know you’re dealing with a homicide. Jonah only had one set of ligature marks, and the marks matched the rope. He also had what’s called paetrical hemorrhaging—burst blood vessels you find in the white lining of the eyes. It’s the distinctive evidence that someone died of asphyxiation. And fortunately, a lot of the snow was damp because of all the melting we’ve been having, and with air as cold as it was that night, it preserved some footprints. We were able to find several prints that matched Jonah’s boots. We didn’t find a note. But if you consider the audiotape with your daughter’s voice …”
Merrick’s face changed. He carried some unsettling piece of news and was now trying to figure out how to say it.
Here it comes,Mike thought, squeezing the ends of the armchair.
“The crime scene techs finished up with Jonah’s house yesterday,” Merrick said. “Underneath Jonah’s bed we found a loose floorboard. We tore up the floor and found a decent-sized space underneath the boards. Sarah’s snow pants were in there. So was a comb with some of Caroline Lenville’s hair. Ashley Giroux’s doll we found in Jonah’s bed. His fingerprints were all over it.”
“Bee-Bee Pretty,” Mike blurted out, the doll’s odd-sounding name popping into his head out of nowhere. Rose had shown him a picture of Ashley and the small doll with red plastic hair and one foot chewed off by her dog. Ashley had the doll in her backpack the day she disappeared.
“Jonah kept a Walkman next to his bed. We found an audiotape in it.” A kink of sadness tainted Merrick’s otherwise emotionless voice. “The others were in the drawer next to his nightstand. Sarah, Ashley and Caroline.”
“You listen to them?”
Merrick nodded, and Mike again squeezed the edge of the armchair.
“What did Sarah say?”
“All three tapes were pretty much the same—the girls sounded lost, like they were in the dark and couldn’t see.” He spoke slowly, thoughtfully. “The one you heard out in the woods was spliced from the original Jonah kept.”
Mike thought back to what Lou had told him about Jonah mentioning Sarah’s name in his sleep. Jonah wasn’t sleeping; he was making his … his what? His suicide tape?
“There were some sounds we didn’t recognize, so we sent the tapes to the FBI for enhancement and analysis,” Merrick said. “My guess is that Jonah had … I think he took them to someplace other than his house. Something could still turn up. If it does, I’ll let you know.”
“What about the dogs?”
“I don’t understand.”
“The morning after I found Jonah, I saw you guys with search dogs.”
“Those were cadaver-sniffing dogs.”
Mike fumbled for a cigarette, a part of him floating above himself, looking down at him and watching while some other part of his brain was painfully aware of what was being said and was busy searching through Merrick’s words for possible holes.
“The dogs didn’t turn anything up,” Merrick said. “We’re still searching through Jonah’s house for anything that might give us an idea where he might have … buried her. I’m sorry. I wish there was an easier way of putting it.”
“What about Jonah’s house? What’s going to happen to it?”
“Jonah’s estate will be turned over to St. Stephen’s. Father Connelly’s the executor of Jonah’s will. He wanted the money to go to a charity of Father Jack’s choosing. The house is in terrible condition, so my guess is someone will come along, buy it and tear it down, build a nice Colonial or something. It will be cheaper than trying to fix it up.”
All those rooms, all those possible secrets, waiting to be torn down and forgotten.
“I’d like to search the rooms. I might see something you guys wouldn’t notice.”
Merrick stared at him like he was lost and didn’t have a clue as to how to get home.
“It’s possible,” Mike said. “And I want to listen to a copy of Sarah’s tape.”
“So you can punish yourself?”
“I want to hear it. There could be something there. You don’t know my daughter the way I do. She’s smart. She might have been trying to tell us something, you know?”
“I have the name of an excellent grief—”
“It can happen,” Mike said. “Look at Elizabeth Smart. The police wrote her off for dead and the whole time she was alive, and if at any point the family had listened to the police and stopped believing, she would never have been found. But she was. She was found because the family kept on believing.”
“I’ll arrange a visit to Jonah’s house if that’s what you want. Give me a few days.” Merrick glanced at his watch. “Unfortunately, I have to get going. Would you like me to call someone?”
It occurred to Mike that the last remaining member of his original family was a dog. That the only person he could call was Bill, his lifeline to the real world.
“I think I’m going to hang out here for a bit,” Mike said. “Call me when I can go through the house.”
“I will.”
Merrick paused, then stood up and walked away, his shoes clicking against the hardwood.
“Merrick?”
“Ed told me about your father. I’m sorry.”
“Take care of yourself, Michael.”
Four o’clock now and the sunlight was hanging around longer, Main Street bright and busy. Mike remembered—this was years ago—he would stand right where he was now sitting and look out the window as his mother tried on shoes, the salesman smiling politely, trying not to stare at whatever lump or bruise was on her face. She was gone, dead, murdered by Lou. Sarah was gone too, most likely dead, killed by Jonah.
Mike saw himself on the morning of Sarah’s anniversary date placing the lilacs on top of the Hill.
The act wasn’t about remembering Sarah. It was about denial, his refusal to acknowledge the truth and let her go.
But let her go to where?
A waiter came inside the room, a young guy in his early twenties and dressed to the nines in a suit and a diamond stud earring in each ear. “The man who was just in here said dinner was on him,” he said. “You mind me asking who he was? His face looks familiar for some reason.”
“You know who Sarah Sullivan is?”
“No.”
“Why would you? She’s not on MTV.”
“I’m sorry, did I say something wrong?”