Page 38 of The Instruments of Darkness

“Was?”

“His parents died shortly after he graduated high school. I never got to meet them.”

“May I ask how they died?”

“They were overtaking a truck hauling logs somewhere up in the County. One of the support ropes broke. The rest you can picture for yourself.”

She drank some of the wine. When she put the glass back down, it was a lot emptier.

“I’ve spoken with your husband,” I said.

The fork paused at her lips.

“How was he?”

“Unyielding.”

She scowled in mock disapproval.

“I meant in general. Is he okay?”

“I’d say he remains… resilient, under the circumstances.”

“He was never very good at expressing his emotions. He keeps everything bottled up.”

I was tempted to inform her that he’d shown no difficulty with expressing his feelings about her, but I didn’t think it would help, or be appreciated. The Clarks’ relationship was both unsettling and peculiarly toxic. Colleen Clark’s loyalty to her husband might have been considered admirable had he not been so committed to seeing her imprisoned, and had the fate of his child seemingly mattered less to him than the prospect of punishment for his wife.

I forced myself to recalibrate. I realized I had already evaluated both Colleen and Stephen, concluding that one was, in all likelihood, innocent, and the other guilty, if only of a deficit of character. Neither verdict was going to make my work any easier. It might even lead to the same errors that I felt had resulted in Colleen’s arrest and impending trial.

The officers and detectives of the Portland PD were not foolish or venal, but there often comes a point in an investigation when locked-in errors begin to determine the course of inquiries. In the event of the death or disappearance of a child, the police will look first at the parents, because so many of these cases turn out to be instances of domestic harm. We typically hurt those we are closest to, and the young are particularly vulnerable. For the police, the bloodied blanket in Colleen’s car had confirmed a suspicion present from the start, and they were now fulfilling the role for which they believed they were being paid: to close cases and help secure convictions. If they were in error, the reasons were comprehensible.

Paul Nowak and Erin Becker represented a more nebulous proposition. They, too, were paid to close cases, but those cases would also determine their political futures. In the choice between a potentially unsafe conviction or no conviction at all, elected officials like Nowak and Becker were under pressure to pursue the former. It could take years for a wrongful verdict to be overturned, by which time they would have moved up the ladder, leaving to someone else the task of clearing up the mess. But a lack of convictions, especially in high-profile trials—of which Colleen Clark’s was destined to be one—would damn them. It was the great flaw in a system that depended on elected officials to implement justice, because it would always be easier just to enforce the law.

Colleen was speaking again, but so lost was I in my own thoughts that I had to ask her to repeat herself.

“I said, ‘What now?’?”

“For you, or me?”

“For both of us.”

“I’ll have to ask you to remain on the property for a few days,” I said. “I’d prefer if you didn’t go walking on the road or beach because it won’t take much to connect a sighting of you to me. If you do go outside, stick to the back of the house, as it’s not overlooked. I have books, music, and streaming services, but mostly you should take the opportunity to rest. You’ve been through a great deal, and the trauma is ongoing, though you don’t need me to tell you that. Also, you may be surprised at what you remember upon reflection—anything, anything at all, you should feel free to share with me or Moxie, however minor. We can chase it down, and if it turns out to be a dead end, we’ll cross it off the list.”

“But won’t that be wasting your time?”

“If you recall our first conversation, that’s not how an investigation works. Think of this as a grid that has to be searched, a finite series of possibilities to be explored. With every square we check, even if we find it empty, we’re narrowing in on those that may contain something useful: in this case, the truth of what has happened to your son. Sometimes, you get lucky and hit the right square first time out, but that’s very rare. Typically, you have to comb a lot of empty ground first.”

I didn’t add that this was why investigations sometimes went on for years, or that finite could also mean near infinite.

“So that’s what you’ll be doing while I’m here?” she said.

“And also when you return home, because it could take a while. But as I told you before, Moxie hired me to ensure that he has all the information required should this case go to trial. I’ll balance those duties—to you, to him, and to Henry—as best I can, but if they become overwhelming, and I require help, I won’t hesitate to ask for it.”

She’d eaten about a third of the food on her plate, along with half a piece of flatbread, but had finished her glass of wine and was twisting the stem between the thumb and forefinger of her right hand.

“I’ll trade you more wine for more eating,” I said.

“I don’t have much of an appetite.”