He stared down at his hands. He had never even fired his gun in anger until the evening when he killed Erin Dixon and her relatives, and now he had more deaths on his conscience than he could count on one hand. He had even fired the bullet that killed Harry Dixon. Bryan Joblin had offered to do it, but Morland wasn’t sure that Joblin could do something that was at once so simple yet so dangerous without botching it. He’d let Bryan watch, though. It was the least that Morland could do.
He should have been more troubled than he was but, Kayley Madsen’s final moments apart, he felt comparatively free of any psychological burden, for he could justify each killing to himself. By fleeing, Harry Dixon had given Morland no choice but to move against him. Eventually he would have told someone about Annie Broyer and how she had come to die in the town of Prosperous. The town’s hold on its citizens grew looser the further from it they moved. It was true of any belief system. It was sustained by the proximity of other believers.
A car pulled up outside and he watched Frank Robinson emerge from it. Morland wished that he could get in his own car and drive away, but he had come too far now. A line from a play came to him, or the vaguest memory of it. It had to be from high school, because Morland hadn’t been to a play in twenty years. Shakespeare, he guessed, something about how, if it were to be done, then it was best to do it quickly.
If Morland could get rid of Souleby, the board would be his.
The board, and the town.
The news of Hayley Conyer’s passing made the papers, as anything involving Prosperous now tended to do. The general consensus was that the old woman’s heart had been broken by the troubles visited on her town, although this view was not shared by everyone.
‘Jesus,’ said Angel to Louis, ‘if it goes on like this there’ll be nobody left for us to kill.’
He remained surprised by Louis’s patience. They were still in Portland, and no move had yet been made on Prosperous.
‘You think it was natural causes, like they’re saying?’ said Angel.
‘Death is always by natural causes, if you look hard enough.’
‘That’s not what I meant.’
‘I’d be surprised if she didn’t die kicking at something,’ said Louis. ‘Zilla Daund told us that the order to hit Parker came from the board of selectmen, and this Conyer woman in particular. Now she’s dead. If I was on that board, I’d start locking my door at night. It’s like that Sherlock Holmes thing. You know, once you eliminate the impossible, whatever is left, no matter how improbable it seems, is the truth.’
‘I don’t get it,’ said Angel.
‘Once everyone else in the room is dead, the person left standing, no matter how respectable, is the killer.’
‘Right. You have anyone in mind?’
Louis walked to the dining room table. An array of photographs lay upon it, including images of the town, its buildings, and a number of its citizens. Some of the pictures been provided by the Japanese ‘tourists’. Others had been copied from websites. Louis separated pictures of five men from the rest.
‘Souleby, Joblin, Ayton, Warraner and Morland,’ he said.
He pushed the photographs of Joblin and Ayton to one side.
‘Not these,’ he said.
‘Why?’ said Angel.
‘Just a feeling. Souleby might have it in him, I admit, but not the other two. One’s too old, the second’s not the type.’
Louis then separated Warraner.
‘Again, why?’
‘Makes no sense. If this is all connected to something in their old church, then Conyer and the board acted to protect it. The church is Warraner’s baby. He has no reason to hurt anyone who took measures for its benefit.’
Louis touched his fingers to Souleby’s picture. A file had been compiled on each of the selectmen, as well as Warraner and Morland. Souleby was an interesting man, ruthless in business, with connections in Boston. But …
‘Lot of killing for an old man,’ said Louis. ‘Too much.’ And he put Souleby’s photograph with the rest.
‘Which leaves Morland,’ said Angel.
Louis stared at Morland’s photograph. It was taken from the town’s website. Morland was smiling.
‘Yes,’ said Louis. ‘Which leaves Morland.’
54
Thomas Souleby tried to pack a bag while his wife looked on. Constance was growing increasingly disturbed at the casual way in which her husband was tossing his clothing into the big leather duffel. He never could pack for shit, she thought. She didn’t say this aloud, though. Even after forty years of marriage, her husband still professed to be shocked by what he termed her ‘salty’ tongue.
‘Here, let me do that,’ said Constance. She gently elbowed Thomas aside, removed the shirts and pants, and began folding them again before restoring them to the bag. ‘You go and get your shaving kit.’
Thomas did as he was told. He didn’t opine that there might not be time for the proper folding and placement of his clothing. She was working faster and yet more efficiently than he could have done anyway – he was all haste without speed – and there was little point in arguing with his wife, not when it came to the organizational details of his life. Without her involvement, they would never have achieved the degree of financial security and comfort that they now enjoyed. Thomas had never been a details man. He worked in concepts. His wife was the meticulous one.
When he returned to the bed, she had half filled the bag with shirts, a sweater, two pairs of pants and a second pair of shoes with his socks and underwear neatly fitted inside them. To it he added his shaving kit and a Colt 1911 pistol that had belonged to his father. The Colt was unlicensed. Long ago, his father had advised him of the importance of keeping certain things secret, especially in a place like Prosperous. As Souleby had watched the slow, steady ascent of Lucas Morland, he came to be grateful for the bequest. Thomas Souleby considered himself a good judge of character – he couldn’t have succeeded in business were he not – and had never liked or trusted Lucas Morland. The man thought he knew better than his elders, and that wasn’t the way Prosperous worked. Souleby had also noticed a change in Morland in recent weeks. He could almost smell it on him, an alteration in his secretions. Hayley had sensed it too. It was why, before her death, she had been planning to remove Morland from his post and replace him with one of his more malleable deputies. Souleby could still feel the old woman’s hand on his arm, the strength of her grip, as she had spoken to him for the last time the day before.
‘You listen, Thomas Souleby, and you listen good,’ she said. ‘I’m as healthy as any woman in this town. My mother lived to be ninety-eight, and I plan on exceeding that age with room to spare. But if anything happens to me, you’ll know. It’ll be Morland’s doing, and he won’t stop with me. You’re no friend to him, and he sure as hell doesn’t care much for you. He doesn’t understand the town the way that we do. He doesn’t care for it the way we care. He has no faith.’
And then the call came from Calder Ayton: Calder, who was everyone’s friend, but hadn’t been the same since the death of Ben Pearson. Souleby figured that Calder had loved Ben, and had Ben not been resolutely heterosexual, and Calder not a product of a less enlightened, more cloistered time, the two of them could have lived together in domestic bliss, protected by the amused tolerance of the town. Instead, Calder had settled for a sexless relationship of a sort, aided by Ben’s status as a widower and Calder’s share in the store, the two of them clucking and fussing over each other, snipping and sniping and making up like the old married couple that they secretly were. Calder wouldn’t last long now, thought Souleby. Morland wouldn’t have to kill him, even if Calder had the backbone to stand up to him, which Souleby doubted. Calder had been widowed, and without Ben to keep him company he would fade away and die quickly enough.