Coldwater Revenge, James Ross [books for 9th graders txt] 📗

priest’s reach. “Maybe. But I’m pretty sure I’ve got you figured out.”

Gauss looked across the table at the envelope. “More phony letters?”

“A lab report. Comparing fibers from the bag Billy was found in with some I took from the front of your rowboat. Want to guess what it says?” Gauss looked at Joe and took a long last drag on his cigarette. “Or do we have a deal, Padre?”

CHAPTER 32

Moe Silverstein called first. He’d gotten through to the New York State Attorney General. No charges would be brought against Tom or his firm in connection with the Eurocon matter. The AG’s office would officially drop the case in a few days. “They’re waiting for the right spot in the news cycle so it doesn’t get too much attention,” he explained.

“Thanks, for getting through to the right people so fast.”

“No problem, Tom. Every level of state government is looking good right now. They’re anxious for it to stay that way through the November election. But it’s a shame that you and your brother aren’t going to get a medal or something. That was a hell of a thing you did, and no one is ever going to hear about it.”

“We got what we wanted, Moe.”

Tanner called next to say that the London office was Tom’s if he wanted it. Moe Silverstein had been circumspect about what had happened. But he made it clear that it was Tom’s doing and that the firm would be nuts if it let a Houdini like Tom Morgan get away. “We’re all proud as hell of you,” said Tanner. “Whenever you’re ready to come back, you’ve got your pick of assignments. Any office, any continent. There’s a mega-project in Russia that’s got your name written all over it.”

Tom knew he should feel flattered as well as relieved to know that he was no longer headed to jail or to the poor house. But he felt nothing. Susan was dead, and his capacity for feeling seemed to have died with her. Physically he was healing, but mentally and emotionally he was numb. Dr. Sayed said he could leave the hospital soon. But to do what? He no longer cared.

A voice at the door interrupted his gloomy musings. “Sorry about not returning your messages,” said Gauss. “Bishop’s orders.”

Tom sat up in bed and smiled at the priest. “I assumed as much. The Church’s defense fund must be scraping bottom these days. If you got stuck to the Billy Pearce murder, they’d be passing the plate for decades.”

“That’s more or less the way the Bishop put it.”

Tom waved a splinted finger at a plastic chair. “Pull that thing over. I have some questions.”

The priest moved the chair beside the bed and sat.

“You’re not so unkind as to pass along an eight hundred page tome on a whim. You had a message. I missed it.”

“You were busy.”

“I’m not now. And it’s bothering me.”

The priest placed his hand on Tom’s forearm. “I’m sorry about Miss Pearce. That was a tragedy. She was misled by her heart, I imagine.”

Tom shook his head. “By her genes, she would have said. I doubt that so-called terrorist told her what he had in mind.”

“No, that doesn’t seem likely. In any event, the last time we spoke you were intrigued by her work on emotions and brain chemistry. I sent you that book because its author made the connection between emotion and feeling three hundred years before Miss Pearce stumbled onto it. I thought you might be interested.”

Tom smiled through cracked lips. “I am. But I doubt precedence was your point.”

“No. I wanted to remind you that the quest for knowledge has been led by philosophy, not science: Heraclitus dreaming up the atom, Plato the modern fascist state. I thought the reminder might help you get back on track, that’s all.”

“What track is that?”

“Don’t be obtuse, Tommy. You’re floundering again. Not as badly as when I first met you. But you took a wrong turn after I let you out of my sight. You know it and anybody who knows you can see it. It’s time you put that first class mind of yours to work on something more worthy than mergers and acquisitions.”

Tom fidgeted as best he could, pressing his shoulders into the pillows. “My career is finished, Father. The firm is dangling goodies to get me back, but there’s no gas in the tank. I wouldn’t last a month in that scrum. As for what I’ll do once I get out of here…”

“Have you tried reflection?”

Ouch. “I haven’t been to church in a decade, Father.”

Gauss’s response was patient, but pointed. “I’m not talking about the Church, Tommy. Organized religion is one of many paths. It happens to be mine. But I’m not surprised, and certainly not offended, that it hasn’t turned out to be yours.”

Tom felt the telltale twitches of surprise and caution wrestle for control of his face.

“Catechism and ritual help some people lead better lives than they otherwise might. Others seem compelled by nature to seek their own answers. Like anything we’re designed by nature to do, if we don’t do it, we’re not healthy or happy. And no celibacy jokes, please. Depending on what it is we’re not doing, we can be wasting our lives.”

“Is that what you think I’m doing?”

“I do. And what’s more, you know it.” The priest paused to let the sting raise a welt. “Do you remember your Socrates? The Apologia?”

“An unexamined life is not worth living?”

“That’s right. If Frankie Heller or that terrorist had succeeded in ending yours… what would your own judgment be on the last ten years of it—excluding what you did here recently?”

“He wasn’t exactly a terrorist. But why exclude that?”

“Don’t be stubborn. When I saw you last, you’d already sensed the need to begin looking for a new path. Should I ask what you’ve done about it? And I don’t mean lying here brooding.”

Tom didn’t respond. He didn’t know how.

“You already know the answer’s not on Wall