Blood Passage (3 page)

“
We’d like to ask you a couple of questions about the assault yesterday,” Waverman said. “I understand you suffered a mild concussion. Are you feeling okay this morning?”

Josh nodded. “Yeah, I guess. My head still hurts, though. They gave me something to take for it. I feel pretty woolly.”

“
I’d imagine,” Waverman said, looking at the bruise on Josh’s cheek and the cut on his eyebrow which had taken four stitches to close. “What were you doing down in that part of town?”

According to the report, Josh was 24 years old, which made him only two years younger than Waverman. He was African-American, about two inches shorter than Hank, maybe ten pounds lighter, and had a build like a basketball point guard. There was a definite athleticism to him that could not be missed beneath the shoulder-length dreadlocks and casual clothing, but Hank was a little surprised by the nervousness, betrayed by a difficulty in making eye contact and the way he held his knapsack close to his chest.

Josh hesitated before answering Waverman’s question, and that was all Karen needed.

“
Got a problem with authority, kid? Don’t feel like answering questions today?”

“
No, no, not at all. Please, ask anything.” Josh touched the side of his head. “I just feel a little woozy.”

“
We understand,” Hank said, “but Detective Stainer’s right, Josh. The answer to Detective Waverman’s question is pretty important to us. What were you doing in Chinatown asking questions about Martin Liu?”

“
It’s part of my responsibilities. I’m investigating a report of a previous life.”

“
A previous life?” Waverman repeated. “I’m afraid I don’t understand.”

“
Yeah, I know. Most people think it’s a lot of bunk.”

“
You’re a student, Josh?” Hank asked. “From Memphis?”

Josh nodded. “Thomas Gaines University. I’m a Ph.D. student specializing in child psychiatry. I’m an assistant researcher with the Division of Supplementary Studies.”

“
Who’s your research advisor there?”

“
Dr. Maddy Walsh.” Josh made eye contact with him for the first time. “She’s the Director of the Family and Child Psychiatry Clinic at the university.”

“
Uh huh. And you do research for her, is that it? Research that brought you up here to Glendale?”

“
Yeah. Dr. Walsh and I were here last month to interview the family of a child whose case we’ve accepted. Now I’m here to investigate the previous personality.”

“
Previous personality.”

“
Uh huh,” Josh nodded. “Martin Liu.”

Karen cleared her throat. “You sure the doctors said you were okay to leave?”

“
We don’t understand the connection between you and Martin Liu,” Waverman said.

Josh shook his head. “The connection’s between Martin and the child whose case we’re investigating. The child who said he was Martin Liu in his previous life.”

“
What child are we talking about here?” Karen asked.

“
I’m not sure if I can say right now,” Josh replied uncertainly.

Karen looked at Hank. “Well, this isn’t making a hell of a lot of sense.”

“
Detective Stainer has a point, I’m afraid.” Waverman removed his BlackBerry and glanced at it. “I have to get back for a one o’clock meeting. Can you come by the station a little later and give a complete statement?”

“
I guess so,” Josh said. “Sure.”

“
Where are you going now?” Hank asked. “Back to your hotel?”

Josh nodded.

“
Which one?’

“
Airport Inn.”

“
Not exactly walking distance. How about if I spring for a taxi and you let me ride with you. You can tell me a little more about your work at Thomas Gaines.”

“
Okay, thanks,” Josh said, managing a small grin. “They took all my money.”

“
I know. Karen, can you come up and get me in about an hour?”

She sighed as though it were the end of the world. “Yeah, sure.”

“
Give me a call when you get back, okay?” Waverman asked Hank with a meaningful look that said,
It’s my case and I want any information you get from this person
.

“
Sure, no problem,” Hank replied.

As they watched Waverman and Karen file out of the room, Josh turned to Hank. “I didn’t know cops attended meetings and stuff. I thought it was all just riding around in cars and arresting people.”

Hank smiled. “Actually, police departments can be just as bureaucratic as any other organization. You’d be surprised at all the time-wasting nonsense we have to put up with.”

“
I had no idea.”

“
Got everything?” Hank watched Josh ease down from the side of the bed and pick up his knapsack. He was obviously sore from the beating he had taken.

“
Yeah.” Josh held up his knapsack. “Not that they left me much.”

“
Mind if I take a look?” Hank held out his hand. Josh gave him the knapsack without hesitation. It felt empty. Hank unzipped the top and looked inside. Couple of pens, a pencil, a Sharpie marker, a wad of yellow Post-It notes, a small metal pencil sharpener and a few wood shavings from the pencil. Hank held the bag up close to his face, as though trying to see into the bottom, and inhaled slowly. Nothing. He lowered the bag and quickly unzipped the side pouches. Empty.

“
Cleaned it out, didn’t they?” He handed the knapsack back and decided that he wasn’t being protective of the bag; he was being protective of himself.

They left the room and slowly walked down the corridor to the nurses’ station.

“
This patient has been discharged and is ready to leave,” Hank said to the nurse on duty.

“
Oh, you can’t just walk out,” she said to Josh, standing up. “What’s your name?”

“
Joshua Duncan,” he answered politely.

She consulted a sheaf of papers on a clipboard and nodded. “Yes, I have your signature, but you have to be taken down in a wheelchair.”

“
A wheelchair?” Josh looked embarrassed.

“
Hospital policy. Wait here a moment.” The nurse disappeared through a doorway into a back room and a moment later a volunteer came out with her, a white-haired African-American in jeans and a plaid shirt with a name tag that said
Bob
. He grinned at Josh as he brought a wheelchair around into the corridor.

“
Ready to go, are you? Have a seat.”

“
Yes, sir.” Josh sat down in the wheelchair.

Hank followed Bob and Josh into the elevator and they rode down to the ground floor.

“
Here you go,” Bob said, stopping just short of the sliding front doors.

“
Thanks very much.” Josh got out of the wheelchair with a wince.

“
No problem. You take care of yourself now, son.”

There was a bank of pay phones along the wall inside the front doors. The one at the end connected directly to the largest taxi company in town. Hank called for a taxi and then strolled back over to join Josh at the door. The kid didn’t have a problem with authority, he decided, because he had been deferential to the nurse and the volunteer. He seemed polite, well-mannered and respectful. Not a problem with authority; more likely a problem with police.

“
Have you dealt with the police before in any of the other cases you’ve researched, Josh?”

“
No.” He shook his head. “This is only my second case. In the other one, the previous personality was in his fifties and died of a heart attack. Which is unusual, actually, because the age of previous personalities at death tends to average about 34 to 38 years old.”

“
I see. You seem nervous around police.”

“
No, I’m okay.”

“
Have you ever been arrested?”

“
No, I haven’t.”

“
Okay, that’s fine. I’m not trying to hassle you.”

“
I understand that.”

“
You seem a little nervous.”

“
I’m okay.”

“
Some kind of problem before?”

Josh hesitated, then nodded. “Yeah, I suppose.”

“
When was that?”

“
Last summer, outside a bus station in a town not far from Rayville, Louisiana. I was visiting a friend in Shreveport and was waiting for a connection back home.”

“
And?”

“
Sheriff saw me leaning against the wall of the bus station while he was waiting for a stoplight. I saw him look over, then come around the corner into the parking lot and right up in front of me. Got out and asked me what I thought I was doing in his parish.”

Hank waited.

Josh looked at him. “He had a problem with my hair and the color of my skin. Said he didn’t need my kind of trash coming up from New Orleans into his parish. I tried to tell him I was in transit, but he wasn’t interested in listening. Said if I was going to hang around the streets of his parish with dreadlocks or whatever you call that druggie hairstyle I could expect a visit from one of his deputies. Said if I wasn’t gone in half an hour his deputy would be back to arrest me.”

“
Bothered you, did it?”

Josh frowned. “Of course it did, it scared me. I’ve never had any trouble before in my life. I grew up in Knoxville and I’ve lived in Memphis for a while now and never had any trouble with the police. But that was definitely a wake-up call. It reminded me of how much intolerance there is out there and how powerless we are when the police decide they want to make our lives hell.”

“
The guy sounds like a pretty big asshole to me,” Hank said.

“
Well, yeah.”

Hank stared until Josh made eye contact with him. “Lot of assholes out there.”

“
Yeah, I guess so.”

The taxi arrived and they got in. The hospital was located in Granger Park and Josh’s hotel was at the north end of the city in Bering Heights, so the taxi ride was going to be somewhat long. The city of Glendale was divided into districts in a hub-and-spoke configuration with the river dividing it diagonally from northeast to southwest. The ocean was five miles downstream from the city limits. Midtown was the hub and Bering Heights, Granger Park and Springhill were the spokes on the west side of the river, with the heavily industrialized districts of Strathton and Wilmingford on the east side. Glendale’s international seaport was located in Wilmingford. The districts of South Shore East and South Shore West straddled the river at the south end of the city. Bering Heights, in the north, contained a college and an international airport that serviced the national headquarters of a number of large corporations. Granger Park, where Hank had been born and raised, housed the upper class on large estates on the edge of the municipality and morphed into suburban sprawl farther south. Springhill, having once been a separate municipality that amalgamated with Glendale forty years ago, was a mixture of residential, commercial and municipal properties that included State University and the stadium of a Class A baseball team currently affiliated with the Pittsburgh Pirates.

As the taxi ground its way north through heavy traffic Hank asked Josh a few questions about his studies. Josh explained that he liked to work with children. As an undergraduate he took courses in early childhood education and worked part-time in the day care center on campus. In his senior year he attended lectures delivered by Dr. Walsh and learned about the research being conducted by the Division of Supplementary Studies into reports by children of past life memories, but he shifted first into child psychiatry before seeking admission into the Division.

Hank noticed that as Josh talked about himself and his career interests his body language became less tight and self-protective, and his face showed more expression.

At the hotel he badged the clerk, explaining that Josh had been mugged downtown and had lost his room keycard along with his wallet. The clerk expressed his concern but explained that there would be a nominal charge to replace the keycard which would be added to the final bill. Josh nodded and the clerk produced a duplicate. They went up to Josh’s room on the eighth floor, where Josh found his laptop, Personal Digital Assistant and other belongings undisturbed. Breathing a sigh of relief, he slipped his PDA into his pocket and thanked Hank for the taxi ride.

“
I’ll arrange for replacement travelers checks and pay you back for the cab fare,” he said.

“
No, don’t bother,” Hank said. “Come on, let’s go downstairs and I’ll buy you lunch in the restaurant. I want to hear more about this case you’re researching.”

“
All right,” Josh said, gratefully. “I guess I am a little hungry.”

They rode the elevator back down to the main floor and went into the restaurant just off the front lobby. They were seated at a table along a wall of tinted windows that gave them a clear view of the lobby and elevators without being seen by anyone in the lobby while they ate. Josh ordered a chicken Caesar salad and unsweetened iced tea while Hank asked for a club sandwich with extra mayo and a large Coke.

Josh glanced at the time on his PDA and took another of the painkillers given to him by the doctor at the hospital. Hank asked him about his movements after arriving in town.