Episode 118 · The Order on Paper

Kerr had written after changing his statement. At first he did not explain why he had said something else. He went back to the night Kale and Mary died, to the things he had done and the things he had been ordered to do. The port fraud existed, but it was not why he had been sent to their house.

Soles read the paragraph again. The paper trembled slightly in his hands. He lowered it to the desk without letting go.

— Castell said he didn’t order that, Maxim said quietly.

— He did say that, the investigator replied.

He did not add that they had not believed him. Enough people had been in that room when Castell said it, and Soles remembered every answer he had received then.

Farther down, Kerr described the man who hired him: slim, narrow-faced, chestnut hair, straight eyebrows. Soles read the line again. Varren’s face came to mind. The features matched; he could still hope they matched someone else too. There was no name written there. The investigator took a blank sheet from the file and noted that the description had to be checked against the people they could identify. Soles stopped at the end of the paragraph and looked for a moment at the white space after it, as though the name should have followed there.

— He didn’t ask him? he said.

— It doesn’t say that he did, the investigator replied.

Soles moved to the next lines. Maxim leaned slightly closer, but not enough to read over his shoulder. It was easier to look at the paper than at everyone else’s faces.

Kerr came to the boy. The writing crowded together again. Soles remembered the yard as he had seen it from the path, not as it looked in Krista’s photographs: the open gate, the light above the back door, the man beside the kitchen door with the pistol held against his thigh. He remembered lying on the paving and waiting for the second shot. It had not come.

On the page, Kerr had written that he fired out of fear. The boy was not to be touched.

Soles looked up.

— He knew I was there?

— Not before he saw you, the investigator said. At least that’s what it says here.

Soles read the line again. He realized he had been pressing the paper with his thumb and pulled his hand away. He smoothed the sheet across the desk, from the center to the edge, until the crease he had made disappeared.

— If he’d been told not to touch me, why did he have the gun ready? he asked.

— That’s a question for the lawyer, the investigator said. Kerr only wrote why he fired.

— Out of fear.

Tesa pushed away from the cabinet. She was about to say something, but Soles had already taken the second page. He turned it to the written side and kept reading. There was not much text left. The last lines had been crossed out in one place, then started again below.

The investigator set his pen down. Maxim saw that Tesa had stopped by the window, her good hand tight around the edge of the cast. No one moved to ask Soles for the page.

At the bottom, Kerr had written the words he remembered from the order he had been given:

The boy is to arrive afterward. He must not be alone when he finds them.

Krista entered headquarters with the folder tucked under her arm and found Maxim on the bench in the corridor. One sleeve was torn at the shoulder. A streak of white dust clung to the other sleeve from elbow to wrist.

— Where’s Soles?

Maxim pointed toward the office door. Krista took one step, then stopped.

— What happened to you?

— We went to get some papers.

He tried to smile at her. He managed only half of one. Tesa came out of the office, closed the door behind her, and remained with one hand on the handle.

— They brought them, she said.

Krista loosened her grip on the folder.

— And?

Tesa looked toward the end of the corridor, where an officer was speaking on the phone.

— Did you see Varren?

— Yes. I told him before I came.

— What did you tell him?

Krista looked at the closed door.

— What Soles told me. That the lawyer had the pages and would trade them for immunity.

Tesa moved aside when the door opened. Soles came out with his coat unfastened. Someone had taped a fresh dressing over his palm, but the cuff was still stained. He stopped in front of Krista.

— Does he know we got them?

She shook her head.

— When I left him, you didn’t have them.

— Have you spoken to him since?

— No.

Soles nodded. He leaned his shoulder against the wall, very slowly.

— Don’t call him yet.

Krista looked at him without answering. That morning, Varren had asked whether Soles was all right before he knew why she had come. He had set the screw on the table to listen to her. She could still see it there beside the toolbox.

— What does it say, Soles?

He looked toward the investigator’s door.

— Kerr had orders not to touch me. I was supposed to arrive after he was done. And I wasn’t supposed to be alone when I found them.

Krista lowered the folder. Its corner struck her knee.

— When you woke up, Varren was there.

— Yes.

Maxim looked up at them. Tesa did not move from beside the door.

— That’s not all, Soles said. There’s a description too. No name.

Krista looked at Tesa. She saw her open her mouth, then close it again. She recognized the movement. They had both kept putting off this choice, and now they could not put it off any longer.

— Soles, Tesa said. At the slab, it was Varren.

He turned his head.

— What?

— He held it. While you got Krista out.