The Absence of Mercy (8 page)

“All right, then,” Nickelback agreed ardently.

“But we have to be careful,” Sam continued. “I don't want to go after these parents with everything we've got until we're fairly certain that we're going after the right people. Keep in mind that they've just lost their only child. They're in a world of pain right now.”

“Or guilt,” the detective countered.

“Probably both. But we only have one chance to do this right.”

That was the thing that had impressed Ben the most about Sam: the delicacy with which he had handled the situation. He'd never mentioned it, but Ben thought that perhaps Sam had had an instinct about the case—somehow sensing that things didn't quite fit together in the way that they should, although he probably would've been hard-pressed to explain why. In the face of nearly overwhelming evidence, he had asked the detectives to wait, to suspend their judgment a bit longer. In the end, it had been the right thing to do. The forensic chemist's report that had landed on Ben's desk the following week had identified high levels of glutaric acid in the infant's organs, particularly in the brain and muscles. The abnormal levels raised suspicion for the possibility of a rare metabolic disorder, glutaric acidemia type 1, in which the body has difficulty breaking down various amino acids. The accumulation of the metabolic by-products, the report went on to explain, often results in multiple clinical manifestations, including mental retardation, alterations in muscle strength and tone, and hemorrhages in the brain and eyes that can be mistaken for child abuse. That explained the retinal hemorrhages and subdural hematomas Ben had discovered on autopsy. The forensic chemist's findings had changed everything, for it became clear that the infant had not been the victim of child abuse, after all, but rather had died from complications of a rare genetic disorder. Sam's instinct to wait, therefore, had been correct.

“—evenson?”

It had been a remarkable thing, that intuition, and—

“Excuse me. Dr. Stevenson?”

Ben looked up from his desk, his eyes clearing. The CO's secretary stood in the doorway of his small office, looking in on him.

“What is it, Tanya?” he asked.

“That was Detective Schroeder on the phone,” she said. “He's here with the boy's father. They're pulling into the parking lot now.”

Phil Tanner was a tall, lanky man with a weathered face and a darkened, sun-battered complexion. He still wore his work clothes from the night before—faded dungarees and an old navy blue button-down shirt that bore the unmistakable bulge of a pack of cigarettes (Marlboros, if Ben had to guess) in the front pocket. Detective Carl Schroeder stood beside him, wearing a dark suit with a maroon tie. His black gelled-back hair matched the color of his shoes perfectly. He was shorter than both Ben and Phil Tanner by several inches, but his build was lithe and wiry, the eyes cool and watchful, and Ben imagined that in a physical altercation the detective was a force to be reckoned with. Schroeder introduced the two men in a brisk, practiced manner.

“Mr. Tanner.” Ben greeted the boy's father, shaking the large, calloused hand extended in his direction.

The man nodded slightly, saying nothing. He stood tense and rigid in the hallway.

“Sir, I know this must be an extremely difficult time for you,” Ben continued. “You are welcome to come sit in my office for a moment until you feel that you're—”

“Where's my boy?” Tanner responded, looking over Ben's shoulder into the next room. His voice was deep and gruff, the product of too many years spent smoking too many cigarettes.

“Well, we were hoping you could identify—”

“Let me see 'im then.”

“Yes, of course,” Ben agreed. He led the two men into the next room. He had taken as much care as possible to prepare the boy's body—his face, anyway—for viewing. His injuries had been severe and disfiguring, and Ben was no plastic surgeon. Suddenly he wanted more time to work on the boy, especially that gaping bite wound across his left cheek. He'd been able to pull the wound edges together using a series of horizontal mattress sutures, but now it didn't seem nearly sufficient to withstand the eyes of the boy's father.

“The wounds were fairly extensive,” he explained to them, somewhat apologetically. “There's been some significant disfigurement to the face.” Ben carefully folded down the edge of a cloth blanket he'd placed over the body prior to their arrival. He tried to brace himself for the father's response.

Phil Tanner was quiet for a long moment, studying the boy's marred but placid appearance. He looked upon him with a surreal and uncertain fascination. In the front room the phone rang, and Ben heard Tanya answering it. “Coroner's Office,” she said, and Ben silently kicked himself for forgetting to have her put the phones on hold during the visit. The sound seemed to break Phil Tanner's trance, and he looked up at them with confusion.

“That ain't my boy,” he said, and Ben exchanged a surprised look with Detective Schroeder.

“That's not your son, sir?” Schroeder asked.

“No,” the man answered. He shook his head as if to clear it. “Wait. That's not exactly right. What I mean to say is that, yes, it
is
my son, but it . . . it's just that he don't
look
like my son.” He searched the faces of the two men standing before him, attempting to make himself understood.

“He's sustained some injuries that alter his appearance,” Ben explained again.

“I can see
that
for myself, Doctor.” Phil Tanner's eyes flashed at Ben, who took an involuntary half step backward. “I'm not an idiot.”

“Take it easy, Mr. Tanner,” Detective Schroeder interjected in a calm and level voice. “Something like this always comes as a great shock. I can assure you that Dr. Stevenson was not implying—”

If Phil Tanner heard him, he didn't seem to notice. His left hand groped beneath the blanket, finding the boy's cold, insensate hand. He grasped it tightly.

“Kevin?” he asked, puzzled and unbelieving. “Kevin?
Kevin?
” His voice rose steadily in pitch and urgency each time he spoke the boy's name. The words echoed slightly off the room's concrete walls. They had a hollow, lonely sound, like a knock at a door that will never be answered.

At last Tanner looked up at Ben, his eyes pleading. “That ain't my boy, is it, Doctor? I mean . . .
Jesus
. . .
Tell me this ain't my son lyin' here on this table with his face torn to pieces! Tell me that, won't you, Doctor
?!”

“Mr. Tanner, please,” someone said without much conviction. Ben wasn't certain if it had been Detective Schroeder or himself.

“
Kevin?
” the boy's father went on, his voice continuing to escalate. “Kevin?
Son?! Kevin?? Tell me this ain't you!! Kevin, are you dead?! ARE YOU DEAD, BOY?!!”

There was no answer from the form beneath the blanket.

“
What did they
do
to you
?!” he asked the dead boy lying pale and mute before him.
“WHAT . . . DID THEY DO TO YOU?!!
”

At that last tortured utterance, Phil Tanner's feverish eyes leapt up at Ben and fixed themselves upon him as if Ben, himself, had been responsible for the boy's death.

“
I WANT TO KNOW WHAT THEY DID TO MY BOY!!
” he said again, only this time it wasn't a question but an accusation. Ben took another step backward. His left hip bumped into a small metal table supporting an electronic scale. The scale skittered to the edge of the table, hung on precariously for a brief moment, then went crashing to the tiled floor below. The sound was thunderous in the small room, and Ben could hear Tanya's voice calling from the front desk, “Dr. Stevenson? Is everything okay?”

“That's
enough,
Mr. Tanner.” Carl Schroeder took the man by the arm and tried to lead him away.

“
FUCK YOU!! I WANT TO BE WITH MY SON!!
” Tanner protested wildly, trying to shake off the detective's grasp.

“You will spend the night in jail if you don't get a hold of yourself,” Schroeder said quietly but sternly. “
That's enough!
”

Phil Tanner looked from the detective, to Ben, to the body lying on the table before him. His eyes were wide and uncomprehending. The muscles of his neck and forearms bunched and jerked beneath his blue shirt, and Ben thought to himself in a strangely detached way that if Tanner leapt for him across the table, he would break to his right and make for his office. If he could get the office door closed, he'd be out of harm's way long enough for Detective Schroeder to subdue the man.
Fight or flight,
Ben thought randomly. Let Schroeder do the fighting; he was trained for it. Ben would opt for the latter.

Suddenly, as quickly as it had come, all of the struggle within Phil Tanner was gone. His eyes appeared to clear a little, but the inner strength he had brought with him when he arrived was gone. His shoulders slumped forward, his body bending at the waist as if he'd been sucker-punched low in the gut. A calloused hand touched the table where his son lay supine beneath the sheet, but Tanner would not look at him. For a long time he said nothing, staring at the broken remnants of the tattered scale splayed out across the floor. When he finally spoke, his voice was barely more than a whisper.

“I'm sorry. I shouldn't have reacted like that.”

Schroeder placed a hand on the man's shoulder. “You're under a great strain, sir,” he observed. “Under similar circumstances, I don't know if I would've behaved any differently.”

“Well, I'm sorry anyway. It's just . . .” For a moment his face struggled for control. “It's just that I . . . well . . . I don't
want
him to be dead.” This last part came out so softly that, if there had been any other noise in the room, Ben would not have heard it. Phil Tanner's eyes filled with tears. “When I got home this morning and he wasn't there . . . and then they told me that a boy had been found in the woods . . . I just . . .”

“It's okay,” Schroeder said. His voice was calm and empathic. Ben stood in silence, studying a thin strip of grout between the floor's tiles as if it were the most interesting thing he'd ever seen in his entire life.

Tanner looked up at the detective. “I just didn't want it to be
him
. I thought . . . you know . . . I thought maybe I'd come here and it wouldn't be him. I wanted it to be someone else's son. Not Kevin. Not
my
boy. That's what I was hoping for. I wanted it to be someone else's goddamn son. Can you . . . can you believe that?”

“Yes, I can,” he answered.

Phil Tanner stood next to the table, head low, as if waiting for someone to tell him what to do next. He stood like that for a minute or two, and none of them spoke. Then, suddenly, he looked up as another realization occurred to him. “Oh my God,” he said. His eyes revealed a sickening dread. “What will I say to his mother?
She doesn't know
.
How am I going to tell my wife that our boy is dead?
”

The intrusive ringing of the phone at the front desk had finally stopped, and the CO was quiet and still, at least for the time being. The only sound in the room was the shushing cadence of breath that slid slowly in and out of each chest but one.

There was nothing else.

“You're not going out tonight, Thomas. End of discussion.” Ben was tired of arguing, and he was through being reasonable.

“
Fine, Dad!
” his son yelled back, throwing up his hands in frustration. “
Whatever you say!
” He stormed out of the kitchen and up the stairs toward his bedroom. Six seconds later came the sound, and the subsequent reverberation, of Thomas's bedroom door being slammed shut hard enough to make the pictures in the downstairs hallway rattle.

Joel sat quietly at the kitchen table, pushing string beans around the perimeter of his plate with his fork. He'd wisely decided to stay out of the fray. His father looked down at the remaining vegetables. “You planning on eating those?”

“No,” Joel replied honestly.

Ben continued to look at him, eyebrows raised. Joel stared back, mentally preparing himself for the stand-off.
Nobody told the Punisher—
his favorite comic book hero—
to eat his vegetables,
he thought crossly. You'd get so far as “Pardon me, sir, but are you planning on eating—” Then,
blam
! You'd be staring down the barrel of a 0.45 long-slide.

“I guess you're prepared to sleep in the kitchen tonight then?” Ben asked. “You want your pillow?”

Joel sighed, rolling his eyes. Alex looked up at him from where he lay on the floor next to Joel's chair. Two abandoned string beans also lay on the floor next to the dog, Joel's failed attempt to feed the beans to his canine companion. Apparently, Alex didn't care much for string beans, either.

“Dad, I'm full. This is my second helping.”

“That's your
first
helping,” his father responded. “And don't think I didn't notice those two beans on the floor next to Alex, too.”

“I dropped them. Honest. It was an accident.” He looked over at his mother for support.

Ben shook his head. “Give me at least
some
credit, son.”

“How about if I eat three beans?” Joel suggested.

“How about if you eat
all
of them?” his father responded.

“Okay, I'll eat half,” Joel agreed, and shoveled the appropriate number of beans into his mouth, chewed them up, and swallowed them in one giant gulp followed by a milk chaser. “Now, may I be excused?”

“Yes, you may,” Susan said. “The rest of those beans will be waiting for you at breakfast.”

“Thanks, Mom.” He jumped out of his chair and darted from the room. Alexander the Great immediately got up and followed him, the boy's 180-pound shadow. Joel's parents watched him go. For a moment they sat in silence at the table, enjoying the sudden tranquillity that their son's departure had left in its wake.