“It doesn’t matter,” he said, with his first smile of the morning. “I do. And I think Hashem wants you to find David. That was my feeling when your brother spoke of you and that’s my feeling now. Hashem wants you to go to Boston and find David for us. Or-and this he should forbid, and forbid it with all his koyach, all his strength-if something has happened to David, you find out what it was. And if someone did something to him …” His voice caught and he had to stop.
“Tell me,” I said. “Everything you know so far.”
According to a security guard at Sinai Hospital in Boston’s Longwood Medical Area, David Fine exited around a quarter to seven on the last day of February and walked north on Francis Street. It had been a mild night, by winter standards, but then again, David almost always walked home because it kept him in shape and saved money, according to Ron.
Home was Brookline, less than two miles northwest of the hospital. He should have arrived home by seven-fifteen, seven-thirty at the latest. “He wouldn’t have stopped to eat because he only ate kosher, and usually at home,” Ron said. “Also to save money.”
“But he never got home?”
“According to his roommate, no.”
“What’s his name?”
“Sheldon Paull. Also going to be a doctor.”
“You have his number and email?”
“Of course. Then David missed work Friday. Well, you know, he’s not a kid-he’s thirty, not married, you don’t want to crowd him too much. If he was falling in love, his mother and I would be thrilled. It’s time already. But then he didn’t call to wish us good Shabbos. That’s when I knew something was wrong. He always, always called Friday before sundown, when he knew we’d be home but not eating yet. Wouldn’t matter where he was or what he was doing, he’d call. His brother Micah, bless him, I wouldn’t hold my breath waiting for a Shabbos call. I’m not sure he always knows what day it is, but David? He could be at the North Pole in a snowstorm, if it was Friday afternoon he’d find a phone. So Saturday night, as soon as Shabbos was over, we called him. No answer. That’s when I spoke to Sheldon. And when he didn’t come back Sunday and didn’t come in to work Monday, that’s when I called the police.”
“What did they say?”
“Well, first I called the Boston police but they said David lived in Brookline, so I had to report it there. I called Brookline and they said I should make the report in person, if possible. Not that I had to, they would do it over the phone. But it would be better if they could assess my report face to face. In plain English, to make sure I wasn’t just some hysterical parent. So I didn’t argue, I went, I flew there the next morning. I went to Brookline and reported him missing.”
“And?”
“They assigned a detective named Gianelli. Mike Gianelli, I have his card somewhere. He seemed like a decent man. He said David’s picture would circulate to all the detectives and patrol cars. They’d interview Sheldon and people at work. With our permission, because we had co-signed his loans, they’d check his bank and credit card statements. And he’d report back to me as soon as he could.”
“Did he?”
“Yes. Three days later. And again a week after that. There had been no sightings of David anywhere in the Brookline area. No transactions at his bank or with his credit cards. No phone calls. And no …”
“Ron?”
His voice got tighter. “No human remains unaccounted for.” He swallowed hard and I waited for him to get back under control. “I’m sure Gianelli is doing his best, but this Brookline department, what expertise do they have? What resources? He admitted most of their cases are Amber Alerts and people with dementia wandering off. He said David was a consenting adult with no mental or physical disability. He said there was no crime scene, no evidence of violence or that David was in immediate danger or in the company of a known felon. Like he was reading from a list. Then he said maybe David was just blowing off steam somewhere. Taking a break from his responsibilities.”
“Is that possible?”
“Would you do that, Jonah? Would you take off without a word, let down your friends and the people you work with? Make your family sick with worry?”
“No.”
“Then you have your answer about David.” He took a deep breath, his eyes mournful like an abandoned hound’s. “By a freak of geography, by two city blocks, David’s house is in Brookline. If he lived just two blocks north, we’d at least have the Boston police involved. The Brookline station-there are bigger houses on my street. They can’t make it a priority.” His voice sounded as if it were going to break again. “So you’ll go. And it will be your only priority until you come up with something, some trace.”
“Yes.”
“Can you leave tomorrow?”
“Yes.”
I was almost at the office when the headache came back and with it a feeling of nausea. Maybe it was the glare of the sun on my windshield, maybe the stress of taking on a new case. Maybe the charleyhorse on my brain just hadn’t healed. As I had done so many times in recent weeks, I turned around and went home and lay down to rest. A portrait of the detective as a useless appendage. Unable to sleep, I took out the photo of David Fine his father had given me and looked at it. A nice-looking young man with warm brown eyes, dark curly hair cut short, glasses of course. The good Jewish boy who made his parents proud.
Ron Fine didn’t need me to find his son, I thought. After two weeks, the odds were he needed a cadaver dog.
CHAPTER 2
Micah Fine was two years younger than David, Ron had told me. David was the scholar, the brilliant student, at the top of his class from first grade to Harvard Medical School. Micah was the sensitive one, musical, edgy, still struggling to find his way. Running a cafe on Yonge Street, no interest in the professions.
“He thinks David is my favourite,” Ron had said. “And when I think of what David can accomplish in this world, the lives he can save, my heart almost bursts with pride. But David was a very serious boy from a young age-always a little remote. In some ways I’ve always felt closer to Micah. He may not be on a path I admire but he’s a very open boy. Always was. A hugger, a kisser, a musician, a comic. Secular, like you. Did a brilliant bar mitzvah, sang like a cantor, had everyone in stitches with his dvar Torah. But if he’s been in a synagogue in the past ten years, it’s been for a bar mitzvah or wedding. Can’t even get him to come for the High Holidays.”
When he told me Micah ran a cafe on Yonge, he had neglected to specify what kind. There’s a block between Bloor and Wellesley known as Yongesterdam, whose main attractions don’t show up in any official city guides. It’s where you go to partake in the city’s cannabis culture. You can buy pipes, bongs, papers, seeds and vaporizers, popular among those who want to feed their heads but spare their lungs. With the exception of one compassion club for medical users, it’s not necessarily a place to buy pot, but there are a couple of cafes where you can openly enjoy its vapours. You can’t smoke a joint or pipe-or even a cigarette-but the vapour lounges have somehow found a way to tiptoe along the legal wire.
Head Space was on the top floor of a three-storey building, above an upscale tattoo and piercing parlour and a museum dedicated to the history of hemp and its many uses, both commercial and recreational. It looked like a hundred other coffee shops or restaurants: a long bar on the left side where you came in, tables and chairs filling the rest of the space. Only instead of bottles behind the bar, there were a few dozen vaporizers for sale or rent. The prices ranged from two hundred dollars for a small machine to over a thousand for a bells-and-whistles type. There was also an impressive selection of bongs and pipes, from little chrome one-hitters to elaborate ceramic and glass affairs big enough to hold long-stem roses.
Loosely threaded trance music drifted through the air. Along most walls were framed concert posters of the Grateful Dead, Phish and the Dave Matthews Band.