Chương 3
“On what basis?”
“On the basis that a dead officer’s missing camera was found in a wall and the first recoverable words on it were his warning that you should not be present.”
Collins’s eyes flicked to Harris again. “That isn’t a crime.”
“No,” Ortiz said. “It is a reason to slow down.”
She removed Collins from the chapel through the sacristy entrance. Rex watched from beside Officer Vega. The dog did not bark this time. Collins paused as he passed him, and for one moment Harris saw something beyond fear in the sergeant’s face. It looked like recognition.
By late afternoon, the funeral had been postponed, the coffin transferred back to the care of the funeral home, and the chapel corridor sealed behind temporary barriers. The mourners left in small groups through a line of reporters. Elena refused the department vehicle offered to her. She drove herself and Noah home.
Harris remained until the last evidence case was carried out.
The chapel looked abandoned without the people. White flowers surrounded the empty space where the coffin had been. A paper cup lay beneath the third pew. Someone had stepped on a funeral program, leaving the faint pattern of a boot across Daniels’s photograph.
Father Malloy picked it up.
“I will have the wall repaired when they release it,” he said.
Harris looked at the exposed bricks. “Leave it.”
The priest studied him. “As evidence?”
“For now.”
“That was not what I meant.”
Harris loosened his collar. The ceremonial uniform had become too warm hours earlier, but he had not removed the coat. “Did Daniels come here before he died?”
Father Malloy took his time answering. “Yes.”
“When?”
“Two evenings before.”
“Why didn’t you tell investigators?”
“They asked whether I saw him on the day of his death. I did not.”
“That’s an evasive answer.”
“It is.”
Harris waited.
The priest sat in the end of a pew and folded the damaged funeral program along its original crease. “Michael had attended services here from time to time. Not regularly. Usually after something bad had happened. He did not always stay for Mass. Sometimes he sat in the back and left.”
“What did he want that evening?”
“To be alone.”
“Did he go into the corridor?”
“Yes.”
“Did you see the bag?”
“No.”
“Did you hear him remove bricks?”
“I heard a scraping sound. I thought he was moving a chair.”
Harris looked toward the old wall. “Why keep that from us?”
Father Malloy ran a thumb across the folded paper. “Because he asked me a question I did not understand until today.”
“What question?”
“He asked whether a priest was obligated to protect a confession that had not been given during confession.”
Harris felt a pressure behind his ribs.
“What did you tell him?”
“That moral secrecy and sacramental secrecy are not the same thing.”
“And then?”
“He said, ‘Good. I may need somebody to tell the truth if I can’t.’”
“Did he give you anything?”
“No.”
“Did he name Collins?”
Father Malloy looked toward the doors through which the coffin had been removed. “He said he had helped a man become dangerous by being afraid of him too long.”
“That could mean Collins.”
“It could.”
“It could mean someone else.”
“Yes.”
Harris took out his phone and called Ortiz. When she answered, he told her everything the priest had said.
“You questioned a witness,” she said.
“I asked whether Daniels had been here.”
“You’re not leading this.”
“I understand.”
“No, you understand the words. I need you to understand the condition. Go home, Chief.”
Harris looked at the broken wall. “I’ll send you the priest’s contact information.”
“I have it.”
“Of course you do.”
“Harris.”
“Yes?”
“Did Daniels ever complain to you about Collins?”
The question arrived without accusation, which made it harder to resist.
“Not formally.”
“That wasn’t what I asked.”
“He sent me a message three days before he died. He wanted to discuss old vouchers.”
“What kind?”
“Confidential-informant payments.”
Ortiz was silent.
Harris continued. “Collins supervised the fund for six years.”
“And Daniels?”
“He was one of the officers authorized to submit payment certifications.”
“You saved the message?”
“It’s on my department phone.”
“Which you’re going to surrender tonight.”
“Yes.”
Another pause.
“Do not delete anything,” Ortiz said.
“I wasn’t planning to.”
“People rarely plan to panic.”
Harris went home to a brick ranch house he had shared with his wife until she died seven years earlier. He removed his ceremonial coat in the kitchen and hung it over a chair instead of carrying it to the closet. A dusting of chapel plaster remained on one shoe.
The refrigerator contained mustard, eggs, half a rotisserie chicken, and three containers of takeout he no longer trusted. He stood with the door open until the motor changed pitch, then closed it without taking anything.
His department phone rang twice. He let both calls go to voicemail.
On his personal phone, there were eleven messages. The mayor wanted to speak before the evening news. The police union president wanted confirmation that Collins had counsel. Grant wanted to know whether the postponed funeral would be rescheduled. Elena had sent nothing.
Harris poured water into the coffee maker, forgot the grounds, and watched clear water drip into the pot.
At eight thirty, Agent Ortiz came to collect his department phone.
She stood in the kitchen while he signed the property receipt. Her eyes moved once to the clear water in the coffee pot but she did not mention it.
“We recovered more audio,” she said.
Harris set down the pen. “What does it say?”
“I shouldn’t be telling you.”
“Then why are you?”
“Because part of it concerns your command decisions, and I need your immediate answer before memories start arranging themselves.”
She placed a small recorder on the kitchen table and pressed play.
Static filled the room. Daniels’s voice came first, low and unsteady.
“You shouldn’t be here.”
Collins answered. “You sent the message.”
May you like
“Not to you.”
“You think Harris is going to protect you?”
