I skip around, but it all feels futile. I start blowing up photographs, trying to look in the deep background, because that, I figure, is where the gold lay. The files are so large that I can magnify and see pretty much every detail in every shot. At one point, I spot a little boy who might have been about the same age as Matthew, but when I zoom in, the similarities are only on the surface.
I hear a phone buzz. It is coming from Rachel’s burner. She checks the number and picks it up. She signals for me to move closer so I can listen.
“Hello?”
“Can you talk?”
“Yes, Hester.”
Hester Crimstein, I know, is Rachel’s attorney.
“You’re alone?” Hester asks. “Just say yes or no. Don’t say any names.”
She means my name, of course. In case someone is listening in.
“I’m not alone,” Rachel says. “But it’s safe to talk. What’s up?”
“So the FBI just paid me a visit,” Hester says. “Guess who is now considered a ‘person of interest’？”
Rachel looks over at me.
“You, Rachel,” Hester says. “You.”
“Yeah, I kind of guessed that.”
“They have you on video from your sister’s hospital walking with an alleged escaped convict, so your cute new hair? It isn’t a good disguise anymore. I told the FBI it’s not you on the video. I also told them it’s a photoshop. I also told them if it is you, you’re clearly under duress. I told them some other stuff too, but I don’t remember it all now.”
“Any of that help?”
“Not a bit. They’ve issued an APB on you. A photo featuring your new do will be on the news any minute now. Fame awaits.”
“Terrific,” Rachel says. “Thanks for letting me know.”
“One last word to the wise,” Hester says. “To the world at large, your brother-in-law is an escaped murderer. The worst kind. A child killer. He stole a gun from a prison warden. He assaulted a police officer who remains hospitalized. Do you understand what I’m telling you?”
“I think so.”
“So let me make it clear then. David Burroughs is considered armed and extremely dangerous. That’s how he’ll be treated. If he’s found by law enforcement, they won’t hesitate to shoot. You’re my client, Rachel. I don’t want any of my clients caught in a crossfire. Dead clients don’t pay their legal bills.”
Hester hangs up. I stare down at the computer screen at a picture of three men in their early thirties on a Ferris wheel. The men are all smiling. Their faces are red, and I wonder whether it’s from sun or drink.
“You should let me do this on my own,” I tell her.
Rachel says, “Shh.”
I smile. She won’t listen and I’m not going to push it hard anyway because I need her. My fingers are still fiddling with the screen, zooming in close, and then a thought comes to me.
“The picture of Matthew,” I say.
“What about it?”
“You said your friend Irene showed you a bunch of photos?”
“Yes.”
“How many?”
“I don’t know. She probably blew up ten, fifteen of them.”
“I assume after you saw Matthew, you looked through them all?”
“I did, yeah.”
“How did she take them?”
“What do you mean?”
“Film, digital, phone—”
“Oh, right. Her husband Tom is a photo buff. But I don’t know. I asked Irene about other photos, but she said that’s it.”
I turn toward her. “Can we reach Pretty-Funny Irene?”
“I tried right before I visited you, but they were in Aspen for a wedding. I think they came back last night. Why?”
“Maybe she or Tom can blow the picture up. Or other photos. Like we can do here. Get a better look. Or whoever brought Matthew there, I don’t know but it seems they kept him away from the professional photographers. The only person we know who got a shot of him is Tom.”
“So maybe we can find some other clue in his photos.”
“Right.”
Rachel mulls that over. “I can’t just call Irene.”
“Why not?”
“If I’m on the news as a person of interest and Irene sees that…”
“She may call it in,” I finish for her.
“I would say it’s likely. She’s certainly not going to welcome me with open arms.”
“She might not be here at all.”
“We can’t take that chance, David.”
She’s right. “Where do the Longleys live?” I ask.
“Stamford.”
“That’s only about an hour from here.”
“So what’s our plan, David? We just drive up and I ring her doorbell and say I want to look at the photos?”
“Sure.”
“She might call the police then too.”
“If she heard the reports, you’ll see it on her face and we can run.”
Rachel frowns. “Risky.”
“I think it’s a chance we have to take. Let’s head up that way and then we can decide.”
*
The orphanage in the tiny Balkan nation called the baby Milo.
Milo had been left for dead in a public bathroom. No one knew who his parents were, so he was brought to the orphanage. He looked healthy, but he cried all the time. He was in pain. A doctor diagnosed him with Melaine syndrome, a rare but fatal inherited condition caused by a faulty gene. A child rarely survives past the age of five.
Under most circumstances, a boy like Milo would be dead within weeks. Reaching the age of five and living in any kind of comfort would require a massive amount of money, and even this orphanage, one of many funded by a generous American family, wouldn’t use that much of its limited resources on a child who had no chance. One would have to use extreme measures at great cost to prolong a life that would be miserable and painful in any event.
Better, most would agree, to arrange for a peaceful, even merciful, death.
Except that wasn’t what happened.
Hayden Payne, a member of the generous American family, heard about this boy’s plight. Why a scion of the Payne fortune would hear about this particular case or take such a strong interest no one was certain. People gossiped, of course, but unbeknownst to most working there, Hayden had put in a request that if a boy matching this general size and physical description was located, he should be notified. When Hayden heard the boy was also in ill health, his interest became more acute. Why such a man would care to find a boy fitting this specific profile was a question no one at the orphanage dared to ask.
Why? Simple. Because the Paynes funded the orphanage.
Whatever their shortcomings, the facts were the facts: No Paynes, no orphanage, no saved children, no jobs.
To everyone who witnessed Hayden with the little boy, however—and that wasn’t a great number of people—Hayden Payne was a godsend. He did all he could for Milo. This was so important to Hayden. He did all in his power to make certain that the little boy’s short life would be rich with pleasure. No expense was spared. Nearly every day, Hayden took the boy on exciting adventures. Milo was a fireman for a day and got to ride on a big truck. He was a policeman on another and loved pressing the siren button as they drove. Hayden took the boy to football matches where he got to suit up with the players and watch from the field. Hayden took Milo to horse races and car races and town fairs and zoos and aquariums.