Sanctus

Chapter 62

Arkadian pushed through the large glass door of the Central District building and held it open. Liv emerged, squinting in the bright morning sun. A small group of uniformed cops and white-collar admin workers congregated around an ashtray rising from the pavement, a shrine to their shared addiction. Liv headed over to join the service.

‘Don’t suppose I could steal one of those?’ she asked someone in a white shirt and blue tie. The admin guys were usually a softer touch than the uniforms. He looked up and recoiled slightly at her bedraggled appearance.

‘It’s OK, she’s with me,’ Arkadian said.

He produced a soft pack of Marlboro Lights.

‘Thanks,’ Liv said, plucking one and tapping it on the back of her hand. ‘’Preciate it.’

The admin guy held out a light and Liv dipped her head to meet it. She sucked in the dry smoke, hungry for the nicotine hit. It tasted just as bad as the ones she’d had in the interview room. She shot the admin guy a smile anyway and turned to follow Arkadian down the street.

‘So when was the last time you saw your brother?’ Arkadian asked as she caught up.

Liv took another drag of the cigarette, hoping the familiar bliss would descend upon her soon.

‘Eight years ago,’ she said, blowing out the acrid smoke. ‘Right before he vanished.’

‘Any idea why he took off?’

Liv screwed up her face at the aftertaste. What was it with these foreign smokes? They all tasted like burnt tyres. ‘Long story.’

‘Well then, let’s walk slowly. The morgue’s only a couple of streets away.’

Liv took one more cautious drag on the cigarette then dropped it down a storm drain as discreetly as she could manage, hoping the nice man who’d given it to her wasn’t watching. ‘I suppose it started back when Dad died. I don’t know how much you know about it. .’

Arkadian thought back to the file he’d compiled on the dead monk’s past and the article outlining the tragic car accident in the frozen ravine. ‘I know the details.’

‘Did you know my brother held himself totally responsible? “Survivor Syndrome”, that’s what the doctors called it. He couldn’t shake the feeling that he’d been the cause of everything and so didn’t deserve to be still living. He spent a long time in therapy, trying to come to terms with it. In the end he turned to religion instead. I suppose it happens a lot. You start looking for answers. If you can’t find them in the here and now, you look elsewhere.’

She replayed the events of eight years ago in her mind: her trip to West Virginia; the sound of the crickets on Nurse Kintner’s porch as she told Liv what she knew; the clarity and sense it had all made to her; then the darkness that quickly clouded it again when she shared her discoveries with Samuel. ‘I should never have told him.’

‘Don’t be so hard on yourself,’ Arkadian said. ‘When Samuel blamed himself for your father’s death, did you feel the same way?’

‘No.’

‘And did you tell him it wasn’t his fault?’

‘Of course.’

‘Well, I’m telling you now: Samuel’s death wasn’t your fault. Whatever you said to him, whatever you think you did to drive him away, he was already on his own path. There was nothing you could have done, one way or another, to change it.’

‘How can you be so sure?’

‘Because if he’d harboured some lasting grudge against you, or held you responsible for any of it, why would he go to such great lengths to make sure we found you?’

Liv shrugged. ‘Maybe to punish me.’

Arkadian shook his head. ‘But that’s not the way it works. You must have reported on kidnapping cases, abductions, missing persons.’

‘Some.’

‘And what’s the worst thing about them? For the relatives, I mean.’

Liv thought of the people she’d interviewed: the haunted looks; the constant speculation on all the things that may have happened; the never-ending worry and uncertainty. She thought of the demons that she’d lived with ever since Samuel had vanished. ‘The worst thing is not knowing.’

‘Exactly. But you know what happened to Samuel because he made sure of it. He wasn’t punishing you by doing that. He was setting you free.’

The whoop of a siren startled them both as a large fire truck barged through the traffic and turned into the next street. Arkadian watched it disappear then broke into a sprint. Liv watched in surprise for a moment then hurried after him. She caught up as he rounded the corner.