A Song of Shadows Read Free

Bloom’s friendship with his ex-wife also had to be taken into account, which meant that Cory Bloom would be more likely to date a piece of gum that she’d peeled off the sole of her shoe than Bobby Soames, but a man could dream. So far, nobody had figured out a way to police fantasies.
    Walsh hadn’t exactly set Soames’s fears to rest. He’d made it clear that Parker remained vulnerable, and stressed, like Aimee Price before him, how important it was that the detective’s presence in Boreas remained as unpublicized as possible. But Bloom assured Walsh that one of the advantages of Boreas – at least until tourist season began in earnest, which wouldn’t be for another month to six weeks – was the virtual impossibility of anyone being able to stop in town for longer than five minutes without being noticed. If strangers demonstrated unusual curiosity about any of its residents, someone would pick up on it. Bobby Soames could have confirmed the perspicacity of the town’s residents from personal experience, had he chosen to do so, given that his marriage had come to an end precisely because Eve Moorer from the florist’s shop had spotted him coming out of a motel on Route 1, accompanied by a woman twenty years his junior, a gamine who might even have been mistaken for his daughter, if he had had a daughter. But Walsh didn’t need to know that story, and Cory Bloom already did.
    Bloom suggested that, while it might seem counterintuitive to do so, it would be best if a handful of the town’s more prominent and sensible citizens were quietly informed of the detective’s impending residence. She named a number of bar owners; the town’s Lutheran pastor, Axel Werner; and Kris Beck, who owned Boreas’s only gas station, along with a few others. Walsh didn’t object, and left it in her hands. A couple of other minor details were batted around, but otherwise Walsh’s visit to Boreas boiled down to the kind of warnings dotted around train stations and airports: if you see something, say something.
    ‘What I don’t understand,’ said Soames at last, ‘is why he picked here.’ It had been bothering him ever since Aimee Price signed the lease on the detective’s behalf.
    ‘You know the Brook House Clinic?’ said Walsh.
    Soames did. It was an upscale private medical center about ten miles west of town, and more like a resort than a hospital. A couple of Hollywood actors, and at least one ex-president, had been treated there, although their presence at Brook House had never made it into the newspapers.
    ‘Well, he spent time there as part of his rehabilitation, and they’ll be taking care of his physiotherapy.’
    ‘He must have money, but he won’t have much of it left once that place is done wringing him out,’ said Soames. He wasn’t sure that he could even afford to have his temperature taken at Brook House.
    ‘My understanding is that they struck a rate,’ said Walsh.
    ‘Brook House? I heard they billed you just for breathing the air.’
    ‘You, maybe. Not him. You mind if we take a look at the house?’
    Soames didn’t mind at all. Bloom drove them out in her Explorer, and Soames found himself instinctively dropping into Realtor mode, pointing out interesting features of the landscape, and the proximity of stores and bars, until Walsh informed him that he was only here for an hour, and wasn’t actually planning on relocating, which caused Soames to clam up and sulk the rest of the way to Green Heron Bay. Walsh made a single slow circuit around the house before entering. He then examined the interior thoroughly, opening and closing doors and windows, and testing locks and bolts.
    ‘What about the other house?’ he asked Soames, as all three of them stood on the porch, watching the waves break and the sands spiral.
    ‘It’s empty,’ said Soames. ‘Has been for a while, just like this place.’
    ‘Anyone makes any inquiries about it, you let the chief here know,