Page 11 of The Instruments of Darkness

“AlterRealm Consulting, but AlterRealm is an anagram of Mara Teller, so it may have been a one-woman operation. There was some bullshit slogan about ‘a new world of business opportunities,’ but that was all.”

“What about a phone number or an email address?”

“There was neither.” She watched me writing all this down. “Wouldn’t it be easier to use a recording device?”

“Easier,” I said, “but harder to recall. Writing helps keep things fresh in my mind. Also, some people might become alarmed if I started recording them. Not everyone wants their comments preserved in that way.”

The only sound for a time was the whispering of pen against paper.

“Do you think Mara Teller could have taken Henry?” said Colleen.

I stopped writing.

“Do you have any reason to believe she might?”

“No, but you’re going to talk to her anyway, aren’t you?”

“I will, if I can find her, but I wouldn’t go reading anything into that.” I put down my pen. “I don’t know how familiar you are with my background, but I was a detective with the NYPD before I became a private investigator. When a serious crime is committed, a machine clicks into operation. It has established processes, and those processes require a great deal of manpower to complete. Huge numbers of people may have to be interviewed, and while virtually none of them will have anything useful to offer, they have to be spoken with anyway, if only to cross off a name and prevent any more time being wasted on lines of inquiry that go nowhere. The rest, that very small group of individuals with something worthwhile to contribute, have to be found through those same processes.”

“Needles in haystacks,” said Colleen.

“It’s not quite that bad, but close.”

“And you’re just one man.”

“I can call on others for help, if necessary, but I prefer not to. Reading someone else’s account of an interview isn’t the same as conducting it myself. Individuals are books to be interpreted, but their words are only part of the story. Right now, my resources are limited and I only have so much time to read. That’s why I made it clear to you earlier that I have to be careful not to become distracted from my primary role, which is to aid your defense. The resources of the police and prosecutors are greater than mine, but they also have their limitations. One is that they believe they now have a culprit for your son’s disappearance. Their focus has shifted from searching to proving, and their attention will be fixed on you. I have more latitude.”

“But given the choice,” said Colleen, “I’d still prefer you to be looking for my son.”

“If it’s any consolation, he will be in my thoughts at all times. If I find anything that might reveal the truth, I’ll follow it to the end.”

“Thank you.” She scratched at the hair on her arms, the evidence of her body’s efforts to compensate for her fragility by keeping itself warm. She blinked hard and said, “There was so much blood on the blanket.”

“I haven’t seen it.”

“But you’ll want to.”

“Not ‘want,’ but I’ll need to—the pictures, at least.”

“One of the detectives told Stephen that, with all the blood, there wasn’t much hope for Henry. Being found alive, I mean.”

Her voice didn’t tremble. She fixed her gaze on me, and I saw near-unfathomable pain.

“And your husband shared that information with you?”

“?’shared’ might be too kind a way to put it.”

A flash of anger at last. Good, I thought.

“The police may be operating on the basis that Henry is no longer alive,” I said, “but we aren’t.”

“I have to hold on to hope,” she said. “If I don’t, I may as well crawl off and die.”

“If there wasn’t hope of some kind,” I said, “I wouldn’t be here.”

“Okay,” she said, before repeating the word, as much to reassure herself as to indicate agreement. “Okay.”

“Can we talk about relations between you and your husband after Henry was born?” I said. “You mentioned depression.”