Page 39 of Bitter Falls

It’s a scam, and I’m slightly ashamed to use it, but it works. The young man’s eyes widen, he opens the door wider, and he looks over his shoulder at someone I can’t see. He must get permission, because he steps back.

I give him a grateful smile and go into the office. It’s suffocatingly small, crowded with a battered old desk. A clunky, ancient desktop computer takes up much of the space on top. Cheap metal utility shelves hold stacks of paper and printed materials. There’s an avocado-green landline telephone perched on the desk’s corner that dates from about the same period as the computer, and a collection of porcelain angels occupies the rest of the available space. The gray carpet underfoot feels threadbare, and looks worse.

The desk has no one behind it, and I realize it must belong to the young man facing me; there’s another narrow doorway to my right, and beyond that a slightly larger office with a nearly identical desk, minus the angels and computer.

And an older man rises from the chair behind it as I go that way.

“Ma’am,” he says, and extends his hand not to shake mine, but to indicate the visitor chair set opposite. “Sorry about that—we were just closing for the night. I’m Pastor Dean Wallace, how may I help you?”

I’m reading him the second I see him. He fits the southern-pastor profile: dark hair swept back in a stiff style that hasn’t been popular anywhere else since the 1980s, milk-pale skin, a sober dark-blue suit. No tie, but then, he’s not at the pulpit today, so this must be his version of Casual Friday. He seems to be genuinely welcoming, if a little frustrated at staying late. I sit down in the visitor chair; it’s a stiff, wooden thing with no comfort but a lot of structure. I’m careful to keep my jacket from gaping to show the gun, and I fold my hands primly in my lap. Body language is everything when you’re trying to play to preconceptions. “I’m sorry, could we...shut the door?” I only meet his gaze in fast glances.

“Ma’am, I’m about to head home,” he tells me, and I can see he’s a little doubtful. “Maybe we could take this up tomorrow...”

“It can’t wait,” I tell him. “Please? I promise, I just need to talk for a few minutes. It would mean so much to me.”

I think I might lose him, but then he nods and forces out a smile. “All right,” he says. He steps around me and goes to close the door, and I have a chance to study him as he passes. The light’s not great in here—the window faces east, so darkness has already descended on this side of the building, and there’s only a single, weak desk lamp illuminating the room. He has a jowly face that falls naturally into an expression of disapproval; he’s fighting to look engaged, and I think he’s telling the truth that he’d like to be out of here and on his way home.

I don’t know what I think about him. Not yet.

He looks at the young man in the other office and says, “You go on home, Jeremy. I’m fine here, I’ll be along shortly. Tell your ma to keep dinner waiting.”

“Yes sir,” the young man—his son?—says, and the pastor closes the door. He looks around and, as if realizing how dim it is, turns on an overhead fixture. That’s too bright, and it reveals shabby carpet curling in the corners, dust on shelves. He goes back to his desk and regards me from the safety of the barrier between us.

“And what’s your name, young lady?”

He probably means that to be complimentary, but I have to control the urge to bristle. It’s a diminishment; I’m not that damn young. “Gwen,” I say. I don’t volunteer a last name.

“Well, Gwen, you can talk to me about what’s troubling you, and we can pray about it. Would that be all right?”

I wait until I’ve heard the door shut to the outer office. His son’s gone now. It’s just the two of us. I relax my posture, open it, tilt my head up, and look him right in the eyes. The scared little wife is gone, and I see him sit back in his chair in surprise. “You might not want to pray with me after we talk, I’m afraid. I spoke with you on the phone early today. About Remy Landry. You hung up on me.”

He looks like I’ve punched him, and his eyes go so wide I can see white all around.He’s scared.That’s a surprise. Somehow I’d expected him to be aggressive. He rallies and makes a run at that a few seconds later as he stands. “You need to go,” he says. “Right now, ma’am. I don’t mean to be rude, but I’ve got nothing to say about that.”

“I’m not going anywhere,” I tell him, and when he tries to head for the exit, I scoot my heavy chair back until it blocks his path and, as a bonus, holds the door firmly shut. “Not until we have a conversation about Remy. If you want to get home to your dinner, let’s do this quickly.”

“Who are you?” he barks, and his hands are in fists now. I watch him carefully. I stay seated. It’s not likely he’s going to come at me, but he’s trying to loom and intimidate. He’s not very good at it. “You got no business here in the house of the Lord, coming in here with lies!”

I produce my private investigator identification and show it to him. “I’ve been hired by Remy’s family,” I tell him. “And that gives me business with you, because Remy was a member of your congregation. Why wouldn’t you want to help us find him, Pastor?”

He doesn’t like that. It’s his turn to bristle, and also to retreat. I sit calmly and let him decide what he wants to do. His glare doesn’t disturb me at all.

“I’ll call the police,” he says, and makes for his desk. “You’re trespassing.”

I don’t answer. I just watch. He picks up the receiver, punches in a couple of numbers, and then eases the receiver back onto the cradle without completing his call. That tells me quite a lot. “You really need to leave,” he tells me. “Right now. I’m asking you.” His moral authority is melting like butter in the summer.

“Remy Landry was a member of your church,” I say. “And you owe it to that young man who put his trust in you. He’s been missingthree years. His parents deserve answers.”

“I don’t know where that boy might have gone! Why, he might have just run away. You don’t know what these kids get up to these days, all the drink and drugs...” His voice trails off because I’m not responding. And I can hear the hollow core of what he’s trying to say. He doesn’t believe it himself. “You’re not going to find anything here to help. I’m sorry for his folks, I truly am. But I don’t know anything. I’d have told the police if I did.”

“Are you sure about that?” I lean forward, hands clasped. “Because it sounds to me like you have something you need to get off your chest, Pastor. Do the right thing. You want to, I can see that. You know how much his family is suffering. And you know God doesn’t want that to continue when you have the power to help them.”

He sinks down in his chair as if I’ve cut his legs out from under him. “I don’t know,” he says. It sounds weak now. “I don’t know where he is.”

“But you do know something,” I say. “Maybe about the girl he met at this church. Carol.”

It’s like I’ve stuck a red-hot pin in him. If he was scared before, he’s definitely terrified at the sound of that name on my lips. Enough that his lips part, but he doesn’t have an answer for me.

“You know who I’m talking about, Pastor. She’s very conservative. No makeup. Long hair that she doesn’t cut. Very plain clothes.” I take a leap of faith. “You’re protecting her, aren’t you? You think if you talk to me about Remy, you expose her to danger.”

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