Silent Son (5 page)

He had to act now. Still under the cover of semidarkness. Against the rules that he’d laid down. The cops had gone crazy.
The goddamn prosecutor’s kid! That’s what set them off ! It was all over the local news. “Lawson! Lawson! Lawson!” What rotten
luck! Of all the brats in the world who could have interfered, it had to be the prosecutor’s kid. So much for planning…

He cut in and out of the saplings at the edge of the woods, and found the entrance to the trail. The light was stronger now.
In no time the narrow strip of trees would be lit up and there would be nowhere to hide. He had to get in and out in a hurry.

The rocks and fallen logs began to look familiar. It had been a quick decision at the time to ditch the merchandise. If he’d
been caught with it, then it would have been over. “The fruits of the crime,” his lawyer said. “Never get caught with them.”

The big boulder with a Y-shaped indentation marked the exit point. He left the trail, trying not to stir the underbrush or
get snagged on the brambles. Then he saw it. An old oak with a rotted core. The bark was firm and the wood strong for six
inches all around, but there was a gaping wound on one side and the innards had crumbled to sawdust long ago.

He looked at the sky. Dawn was just moments away. He approached the tree and thrust an arm deep into the wound, up, high inside.

He grasped an object and twisted it from its niche within the hollow tree. If they got their hands on
this
it could be real trouble.

He grunted and pulled a 12 gauge shotgun from the dust. Attached to the trigger guard was a crudely marked tag: BOWERS SPECIAL
$189.95.

He checked the hole and smoothed the surrounding fallout with his foot. The sun had broken the plane of the far ridge. Time
to move. In twenty minutes, this link to the crime would be severed for good. Hidden where no one would ever look. He was
back in business.

Gardner and Carole sat in the doctor’s office awaiting the verdict. They had stayed with Granville all night, comforting and
soothing, holding his hands. Giving support as much for their own needs as his. But now it was morning. Granville had dozed
off peacefully, and they felt comfortable taking a break.

They were told to go to the chief neurologist’s office. He had made a complete examination of the child and could give some
answers to the parents. There were some other patients to check, but he would be with them soon.

The walls were bare, the furniture Spartan. This was obviously a part-time job for the doctor. With his background, he probably
had a plush private medical compound somewhere in the suburbs. The hospital work was pocket change.

Gardner and Carole sat in silence, each on the verge of exhaustion. Suddenly, the door swung open, and the doctor entered.
He was in his fifties, tanned and healthy looking. “Mornin’ folks, I’m Wilson Robertson.”

Gardner stood and shook his hand. “Gardner Lawson, and this is my—”

Carole extended her hand. “Carole. Granville’s
mother
.”

“Okay… okay.” The doctor was smiling. The news could not be too bad. He sat behind the narrow metal desk and laid a clipboard
out on the table. “Your boy is very lucky. There is not going to be any permanent physical damage. He’ll have some short-term
side effects, but in the long run he should be fine.”

The listeners broke into smiles. That was terrific news.

“How long does he have to stay in the hospital?” Carole asked.

“Another day or two,” the doctor answered. “We’d like to keep him under observation, just to be sure there’s no brain swelling.
And we’d like to get him started with the therapist—”

“Therapist?” Gardner interrupted. “You said he had no longterm injury. Why does he need a therapist?”

Carole’s face mirrored the same concern.

“I said no permanent
physical
injuries—there may be some mental problems…”

“What kind of mental problems?” Gardner’s voice sounded like a cross-examination.

“Too soon to say for sure,” the doctor said. “Violence-induced traumas in children can take their toll. All we know at this
point is that he’s begun disassociation…”

Gardner suddenly saw the full picture. This often happened in child abuse cases. A hurt is so overwhelming that the child
represses it deep in his subconscious mind. Unable to deal with the reality, the child makes it all go away. But it doesn’t
leave. It stays inside and festers. Gardner had been so caught up in the physical part he’d forgotten about this ominous aspect.

“He took a hard blow to the head,” Robertson continued, “and there was a weapon involved, but that’s not the problem.

…It’s what he
saw
that we have to deal with…” The doctor’s voice faded out, and the room went silent. They were waiting for him to continue,
but he had stopped.

Gardner caught his eye. “And what was that, Dr. Robertson? What did he see?”

“I’m afraid that’s the problem. At this point he’s unable, or
unwilling
to say.”

“So what can we do?” Carole asked.

“Start therapy as soon as he’s feeling better,” the doctor replied. “I’ve got several people on staff who can see him here,
then he can continue with someone local when you go back home.”

“But what can
they
do?” Carole continued.

The doctor smiled wanly. “Try to make him feel better. Deal with the shock. Ease him back to normalcy.”

Carole looked at Gardner, then at the doctor again. “But what about his memory? You said he can’t remember. Are the therapists
going to try to
make
him remember?”

The doctor glanced down at his chart. “He’ll be given a chance to get it all out,” he said.

“Why?” Carole asked suddenly. “So he can go to court?” She looked at Gardner. “Are you going to make him testify? Is that
what you’re trying to do?”

Gardner tightened his jaw. “No!” He hadn’t even thought about it. So far they had no suspects and no case. Court was the last
thing on his mind.

“Promise me you won’t make him testify,” Carole said.

“God, Carole—” Gardner answered.

“Promise me!”

The doctor stood up. The conversation had gone past him. “Unless you have other questions about the boy’s treatment…”

“Thank you for all you’ve done,” Gardner said.

“Yes, thanks,” Carole echoed.

The doctor left Gardner and Carole alone in the room. “Please tell me you won’t make him go to court,” Carole repeated.

“I’m not planning to,” Gardner said hesitantly.

“But you might?” Carole asked.

Gardner did not answer.

Brownie entered the main lobby of University Hospital. It was 10:15
A.M.
and he’d pulled an all-nighter. The Miller lead had
not panned out. Roscoe had stonewalled it in interrogation, and Brownie had to admit to himself that the link between the
shotgun shells and Bowers Corner was just speculation. They were not even sure that any shells had been taken from the store.
Even the preliminary forensic work came up negative. After several tedious hours at the station. Brownie had to let Roscoe
Miller go. Then he made the three-hour drive to Baltimore.

He had an 11:00
A.M
. appointment at the medical examiner’s office to observe the autopsies of Addie and Henry. But first,
he wanted to stop by the intensive care unit to check on Gardner and Granville. According to the doctor he’d spoken to earlier
on the phone, things were looking up.

The elevator carried Brownie to the ninth floor.

Brownie spotted Carole at the end of the long hall, and ran down. He spoke politely to her, and moved on to find Gardner by
Granville’s bed.

“How’re ya feelin’, young man?” Brownie asked.

“Head kinda hurts…” Granville replied.

“Think this might make it better?” Brownie pulled out a giant chocolate bar from his uniform coat pocket.

Granville’s eyes widened.

“Don’t know if he’s allowed quite yet,” Gardner said.

Brownie pretended not to hear. He began to peel the foil from one end.

Carole entered the room, and looked over his shoulder. “Maybe we should ask the doctor,” she said softly.

Brownie kept peeling, then broke off a small piece of milk chocolate and extended it toward Granville’s mouth.

Gardner and Carole looked at the child. His face was beaming, his eyes the brightest they’d seen since he woke up.

Brownie put the candy in Granville’s mouth. Then he looked at Gardner and winked. “This boy’s gonna be just fine.”

Brownie had now gone over twenty-four hours without sleep, and he was starting to fade. After the autopsy, he could get some
rest at the University Inn, where the county had reserved him a room. But until then he had to try to stay alert, to see if
the bodies contained any clues that might help him get the investigation back on track.

The medical examiner’s facility was located in the subbasement of University Hospital. As Brownie entered, the odors of chemicals
and death entered his nostrils, and revived him like a shot of ammonia. It was an eerie place, deep underground, lit by greenish
fluorescent tubes. On more than one occasion he’d picked up clues that the pathologists had missed. To complete the investigation
he had to observe the autopsy. But it always gave him the creeps.

Addie and Henry lay on parallel stainless-steel slabs, naked, their bodies gray with age and postmortem pallor. Their blood
had been drained, and their skins looked like candle drippings.

“Okay, okay, I’m comin’…” A voice emerged from the office, followed by a white-uniformed figure. “Grandma and grandpa, you’re
next…”

Dr. Gladys Johanssen was known for her nonstop witticisms. The pathologist was too abrasive for live patients, so she had
buried herself in the ME’s office for twenty years. Whenever she autopsied, it was one wisecrack after another until the job
was done. Penis size. Cause of death. Even stomach contents were grist for the joke mill. She always laughed in the reaper’s
face.

“Mornin’, doc,” Brownie said.

Gladys frowned when she saw his expression. “Know these two, huh?”

Brownie nodded. “Real, real good.”

“Okay, I get the picture.” She dropped her smile and picked up a scalpel.

Brownie moved into his observation position behind her. All in all, Gladys Johanssen was a pretty good technician. Quick,
efficient, and keen-eyed. And on the right day, amusing as hell.

The procedure moved swiftly through the internal organ phase. The Bowers each had a list of congenital ailments associated
with age, but none was life-threatening. In fact, their bodies had held up remarkably well. A lot of years left on the meter,
Brownie sadly noted.

Doc Johanssen moved to Henry’s wound, and Brownie edged closer. She turned his head to the side, and exposed a hole on the
back of the skull. “Contact shot.”

Brownie could see where the exhaust gases of the gun barrel had blown a star-shaped pattern of gunpowder into the skin around
the hole. “Large caliber,” he said.

“At least nine millimeter,” Gladys replied. “Maybe larger.” Then she went to Addie and checked the same area. Another star.
Same size hole.

“Identical,” Brownie said.

“Same gun. Same point of entry—”

“Same shooter,” Brownie cut in.

“That’s my conclusion. A precise calculated act…”

Brownie sensed a theme. “You sayin’ it was premeditated?”

Gladys gently put down Addie’s head and turned to face the officer. “Was it a robbery?”

Brownie bunched his brow. “Don’t know yet. No money gone from the register. Maybe a shotgun taken. Possibly some shells. Not
really sure…” He looked at Addie’s hand. She still had on her diamond ring.

“This wasn’t a robbery, Sergeant Brown.” That was two decades of autopsies talking. “It was an execution.”

Brownie had been thinking the same thing. It was a clean shot to the head each time. No last-minute act of desperation. Whoever
did it went to Bowers Corner to kill. The robbery, if any, was secondary.

“Check for fragments,” Brownie said, pointing to the wound. The crime scene boys had not found any intact bullets at the store.
Only minute fragments, as if the bullets had disintegrated on impact.

Gladys inserted her forceps and drew out a slender piece of lead, then held it under a mounted magnifier. “Incredible,” she
whispered.

The greenish glow of the overhead lights was picked up by the blood-stained metal. “Shredded,” Brownie said.

Gladys put that fragment on a dish and extracted another one. It was bent and twisted in the same way. “No way you’re gonna
get a ballistics ID on this,” she said solemnly.

“That must’a been the whole idea,” Brownie responded.

“Huh?”

“He customized the ammo, so it’d come apart when it was fired,” Brownie said. “I think you’re right. The son of a bitch went
there to kill…”

It was late in the afternoon, and Gardner was still at Granville’s bedside. He hadn’t slept for two days, and had barely moved
from a twenty-foot radius of the boy’s room since he’d arrived at the hospital. Carole had gone to see her mother in the Baltimore
suburbs. Father and son were alone.

“Dad?” The boy was propped up against a massive puff of pillows. “When can I go home?”

Gardner shifted in his chair and patted Granville’s knee. “In a day or two,” he said. “Doctors have got to be sure your noggin
is okay. Then mom’ll take you home.”

Granville squinted, as if he was in pain.

“Son?” Gardner sensed a problem.

“Am I going to die?” the boy asked suddenly.

Gardner winced. Death was a subject they’d never really discussed. It was always “Grampa or Grandma went to heaven.” No one
ever
died
.

“No,” Gardner said with a nervous laugh. “You’re not gonna die. You’re gonna live to be a hundred…”

But Granville didn’t respond. He was lost in thought.

“You’re not going to die, son,” Gardner repeated. No force in the universe was going to harm the boy. Not now, or ever.

Joel Jacobs looked out the thirty-third-story window of his Manhattan law office. The sun was low in the west, and deep shadows
now lay in the parallel canyons below. There was a layer of smoke across the Hudson, and soon it would cut the light in half
and bring dusk to the island before its appointed time.