Chapter 7 - THE MAN WHO HAD ALREADY BEEN BURIED
Dead men were difficult to question.
Especially when half of Boston believed they had attended the funeral.
Anthony Caruso had been Vincent’s father’s younger brother.
He helped build the family shipping business.
He taught Vincent how to drive.
He gave Emily her first bicycle.
And four years earlier, he supposedly died of a heart attack while staying at a private property in Vermont.
The casket had been closed.
Vincent had never questioned it.
Until now.
“Who identified him?” I asked.
Vincent looked at Paul.
Paul answered.
“Dominic.”
Of course.
Dominic.
Anthony’s son.
Suddenly Dominic’s role looked very different.
Maybe he hadn’t masterminded Emily’s disappearance.
Maybe he had been protecting his father.
Or obeying him.
Vincent called every number Dominic used.
Nothing.
Then Camille spoke quietly.
“I know where he goes when he wants to disappear.”
Vincent looked at her.
“A house in Gloucester.”
“How?”
“Dominic and I knew each other before you and I were engaged.”
There was history in that sentence.
Another secret.
But there wasn’t time to open it yet.
The Gloucester house overlooked a rocky stretch of Atlantic coastline.
We arrived just before sunset.
Dominic’s car was parked behind it.
Vincent went inside first.
Dominic sat alone at the kitchen table.
He looked exhausted.
No expensive coat.
No polished confidence.
Just a man who had been running out of places to hide.
Vincent placed Anthony’s ring on the table.
Dominic stared at it.
Then closed his eyes.
“He told me you’d find out eventually.”
“Your father is alive.”
“Yes.”
Vincent’s hand tightened around the back of a chair.
“You buried an empty coffin.”
“Yes.”
“You helped him take Emily.”
Dominic looked up sharply.
“No.”
The answer came too fast to be fake.
Vincent’s eyes narrowed.
“Then explain.”
Anthony discovered Julia had uncovered his scheme.
For years he had been using Caruso shipping routes to move private cargo without Vincent’s knowledge.
Julia threatened to tell Vincent.
Then Julia became sick.
Her death, Dominic insisted, was natural.
But Anthony became convinced she had hidden evidence.
He believed Emily knew where.
After Julia died, he began manipulating the child.
Telling Emily Vincent was dangerous.
Telling Mara that enemies were coming.
Then the night Emily disappeared, Anthony wore Vincent’s coat, borrowed a company car, and entered through the private garage.
A seven-year-old girl saw what she expected to see.
Her father.
By the time she realized it wasn’t him, they were gone.
Dominic had helped create the false documents afterward.
“Why?” Vincent asked.
Dominic looked ashamed.
“Because he was my father.”
Vincent’s reply was immediate.
“She was my daughter.”
Dominic looked away.
“I know.”
“No. You know now.”
Dominic gave us Anthony’s last known address.
A former summer estate outside Rockport.
“But he’s moving Emily tonight,” Dominic said.
“The stitched date said Friday.”
“He moved it up when the box reached you.”
That was why Emily said not to return home.
Anthony had people watching the house.
He knew the messages had worked.
We left immediately.
The Rockport estate was empty.
Recently empty.
Warm tea in a mug.
A half-finished sandwich.
A pink sweater folded over a chair.
Vincent picked it up.
“Emily’s.”
Mara nodded.
In the bedroom were drawings taped to the wall.
More than fifty.
I studied them while Vincent searched drawers.
Most were ordinary.
Trees.
Ocean.
Mara.
Camille.
Then I found one showing a train.
Another showed a clock.
Another showed a building with a huge letter H.
Emily had been leaving a trail.
“She knew she might be moved,” I said.
Vincent came beside me.
“What does H mean?”
Mara looked at the drawing.
“I don’t know.”
But I recognized the clock.
“South Station.”
The large clock over the main concourse.
Boston.
Emily had drawn a train beneath it.
Paul called someone at the station.
Then he looked at Vincent.
“A private passenger service leaves from a platform connection at nine forty.”
“For where?”
“New York first.”
Vincent checked his watch.
8:52.
We were more than an hour away.
“We won’t make it.”
Camille stared at the drawing.
“Maybe we don’t need to.”
She pointed to another detail.
A ferry.
Emily had drawn water beside the train.
South Station didn’t have ferry service.
But another Boston terminal did.
Long Wharf.
Vincent looked at Dominic.
Dominic suddenly understood.
“My father hated trains.”
“Then why create the South Station clue?” I asked.
Dominic gave a bitter smile.
“To send Vincent the wrong way.”
But Emily had drawn something Anthony had not noticed.
On the tiny ferry were three red flags.
Mara covered her mouth.
“What?”
She reached for the drawing.
“Emily and I made a code.”
Three red flags meant:
NOT THIS.
The train was false.
The clock was false.
The H meant something else.
I looked at the music-box pattern again.
Six.
Four.
Three.
Then at the letter H.
And I remembered my father’s ledger.
A serial number.
643-H.
An old movement he had repaired for a hotel.
“The Harbor House.”
Camille stared at me.
“What?”
“A hotel in Marblehead. My father serviced their lobby clock for years.”
Mara stood.
“That’s ten minutes from the church.”
We raced back south.
The Harbor House had been closed for renovation for nearly a year.
No guests.
No staff at night.
Perfect.
Vincent entered through the side doors.
We found the lobby clock first.
It was running.
Beneath it sat the second music box.
Vincent opened it.
No melody.
Only a recording.
Emily’s voice.
“Daddy, if you found this, I remembered what Mom told me.”
Vincent stopped breathing.
“She said when people lie, they always hide the truth somewhere boring.”
A pause.
“She told me the boring place was under Grandpa’s name.”
The recording ended.
Dominic looked horrified.
Vincent turned toward him.
“What did my father leave Anthony?”
Dominic whispered, “Not money.”
“What?”
“A warehouse.”
“Where?”
Before Dominic could answer, a sound came from the second floor.
A door closing.
Vincent ran toward the stairs.
We followed.
At the top of the landing stood a small girl with long dark hair and a pink sweater.
For one impossible second, nobody moved.
Vincent whispered:
“Emily.”
Her eyes filled.
“Daddy?”
Then a man’s voice came from the dark hallway behind her.
“Don’t come any closer, Vincent.”
Anthony Caruso stepped into the light.
May you like
Alive.
---
