An Absence of Light

“Yeah, four days later. Guy just laughed. He said we’d worked a lot faster than he’d thought we would.”

“What happened then?”

“Art finally went out on a limb. He told the guy we wouldn’t be able to work with him. Told him he wasn’t reliable, that we couldn’t deal with him because we had to have a dependable relationship in order to assemble a proper investigation. Art gambled and just walked away from it, which was pretty gutsy considering how much he wanted this to work. He was betting the guy wanted it as bad as we did.”

“And when was that?”

Burtell calculated. “Ten days ago, I guess.”

“That was a fourth meeting. Why wasn’t that meeting recorded in the folder? There’s no contact report on that.”

The question was disingenuous. Graver knew exactly what was happening, or he would have known if any of this had actually taken place. Contrary to by-the-book regulations, the working relationship between analysts and investigators commonly involved a mutual agreement to relax the rules of the game. This was especially likely when a new investigation was being developed and an investigator, and/or the analyst, wanted to massage a reluctant contributor long past the time when a prudent superior would have advised them to walk away from it.

Such was the situation here. Tisler’s source was proving to be reliable as far as the information he was providing was concerned, but his actual identity was crucial, and if he wasn’t willing to provide it, working with him was going to be difficult to justify. Tisler and Burtell wanted more time to try to bring the man around. It was a cat-and-mouse game everyone was used to playing. To buy more time, they agreed to pretend the last meeting never happened.

At least, this was the scenario Burtell was offering. Despite a growing disgust at Burtell’s egregious lying, Graver was fascinated. Burtell was incredible. If he was in fact fabricating all of this to cover for the nonexistent investigation-which Graver was sure he was doing-then he was even inventing a subtext for Graver to discover, knowing that as an old hand Graver would know how these things “really” worked. This was a deception within a deception within a manipulation. The full realization of the sophistication of Burtell’s betrayal began to work its way to the surface of Graver’s understanding, and for the first time he sensed something eerie creeping into the equation.

“We thought we could work it out,” Burtell continued. “Art didn’t want to file another daily report that would reflect that he’d come up empty-handed again. I agreed to go along with it” He looked at his coffee and decided not to drink any more of it. It was probably cold. “Art waited a week, and sure enough the guy called him. He was ready to do it Everything. He swore. They were supposed to have met Saturday night.”

“Do you know if they did?”

Burtell shook his head. “No, I don’t know.”

“Jesus Christ, Dean,” Graver said, making his voice portray disappointment now, rather than impatience or anger. “And Tisler was the only one who knew what he looked like?” This was the central point of the entire game here; this was going to be Burtell’s “explanation.”

Burtell looked at him. “That’s right.”

Even in this, Burtell was playing his role perfectly. His eyes met Graver’s as though he was admitting his fault like a man. He would courageously swallow the medicine, admit that he had let the investigation get away from him. Graver felt like he was in a theater group. His next question was calculated to see if Burtell could keep this up.

“Did Ray know you were pushing this?”

At this there was a slight bobble in Burtell’s demeanor and in what had been, up to this point, a smoothly-played hand. Now Burtell had to ask himself some quick, tough questions. Should he drag Besom into the deception? Should he expand the cast of characters? Burtell’s answer demonstrated how well he could balance on the wire.

“No, he didn’t know. Art and I were skating this on our own.”

Graver reached out and gave the cobblestone a few thoughtful turns.

“Did you ever get the impression from Art that there was anything… sinister about Nieson? Do you think there’s even the slightest reason to suspect that he killed Art?”

“No, honestly I don’t,” Burtell said. “I’ve been over and over that too, Marcus, don’t think I haven’t But… I just can’t see it.”

“Did he ever call Art here?”

“Yes.”