It was the internet, years later, that brought Hathorne to the attention of the New York State Office of Mental Health once his prison time had drawn to a close. Hathorne was quiet, a model prisoner in most respects. There was an Achilles’ heel, though. Hathorne, who never drank or smoked and showed no other addictive tendencies, nevertheless became addicted to child pornography in prison. He found ways around corrections-imposed content blockers, and he mastered online platforms. He posed as dozens of different people: some were children, and some were public figures. He became involved, for a second time, with the infamous North American Man/Boy Love Association, or NAMBLA. He communicated and traded in foreign countries, as he was multilingual. Hathorne covered his internet traffic well from prison, but not well enough. He was caught in repeated violations of internet use as his release date approached. Now he faced indefinite confinement in a psychiatric facility.
“This should be a barrel of laughs, then,” Joe said to Aideen. He flipped Hathorne’s photo so that it wasn’t staring up at him. Rain, turning to sleet, slashed against his office window. “Drinks after work if this weather lets up? I think a few of us want to take you out before you leave on Friday.”
“Maybe. I’ll see how Ben’s feeling. He may be fine just hanging with the kids tonight.”
“I hope to see him again soon,” Joe said. “Please give him my best.”
Joe wouldn’t see Ben alive again, though. Aideen’s and Ben’s lives would become shrouded in hospital care and then hospice care, and Ben would be dead that October, just before the presidential election.
“I will.”
“And thanks for the tip, Aid.”
She offered a slight grin. “I’m always looking out for you.”
CHAPTER 13
Saturday, July 15, 2017
St. Lawrence Psychiatric Center
Ogdensburg, New York
11:59 p.m.
Aaron Everett Hathorne was in perfect health, right down to his hands and fingers, which suffered no arthritis, even though he was sixty-eight. It had always been that way; Hathorne had a brilliant constitution and was never seriously ill. He remembered one of the mothers of his child victims lamenting that fact to a judge during his criminal trial in 2000. Her son, whom Hathorne had victimized while he was practicing medicine, had died of leukemia. The mother, Hathorne remembered, had made quite a scene before the judge at sentencing, crying and carrying on about how unfair it was that he, Dr. Hathorne, was in such perfect health when her own son had died just before the trial. Hathorne remembered being amused by it. As if his health and that of the boy were somehow cosmically connected. As if God cared.
Because he had no arthritis, Hathorne had adapted very well to the screen keyboards on the so-called smartphones （sometimes borrowed, sometimes purloined） he used to communicate with the outside world. He had been at St. Lawrence Psychiatric Center for a year, but he had quickly identified and recruited two individuals to assist him. One was a family member of another patient, the other a staff member. These two individuals, separately and unbeknownst to each other, would bring things in for Hathorne or smuggle them out.
The staffer, easily bribed, had power and access. The family member was liked and trusted within the facility, so she was also valuable. An aging mother with a son confined as a psychiatric patient, she was a needy, stupid woman whom Hathorne could readily manipulate. It was as simple as pretending to understand what afflicted her son and then promising to help him in a way that the doctors apparently could not. Through these two people, Hathorne could obtain things such as additional computer hardware and concealed packages from his contacts on the outside.
A few of his contacts were ex-cons like him or undetected criminals. Some, though, were part of an ongoing legal and investigatory team Hathorne paid a pretty penny for. His family loathed him, but they were rich, and he still had access to a hefty trust fund. He paid for things such as practical goods and information and surveillance. So far, few things had proven more valuable than a simple smartphone, in this case an iPod Touch, with which he could connect to an internet signal. The hospital didn’t allow this, of course, but Hathorne had devised a way to connect to a virtual private network, or VPN. He could explore the whole internet with the VPN, including its very dark side, and he could communicate with anyone he wanted. He still used regular computers for illicit communication at the psych center, but it was more difficult to get away with than it had been in prison. Hathorne was unimpressed by any of the St. Lawrence staff, be they educated or not, but they were head and shoulders above the idiots he had encountered in the DOC.