Dr. Poesy looked at Kane for a long time. “And, of course, you were back at the mill today. Did you remember anything?”
“No.” It wasn’t a lie, but should he tell Dr. Poesy about the thing that chased them? How could he even begin to describe what happened without sounding even guiltier?
But Dr. Poesy moved on. “Why does a runaway return home, just to steal a car?”
Kane’s mind hiccupped. No one had asked him this yet. “I don’t know. I don’t remember doing it.”
“How does a mostly brick building catch fire in the rain?”
“The…the car must have exploded or something.”
“That’s cinematic, but not usually how cars work. There were, however, traces of gasoline found all over the crash site.”
Kane frowned. “Cars run on gasoline. Gasoline explodes.”
Dr. Poesy tapped the gold pen against his temple. “Clever.” Then he wrote something down.
“What are you writing? I didn’t set that building on fire on purpose.”
Dr. Poesy continued to write. “I didn’t say you set it on fire at all, but that’s a curious thought.”
Kane slumped backward, horrified. “I wouldn’t…I mean, I didn’t—”
Dr. Poesy held up a quieting hand once again. “I’m going to be honest with you, Mr. Montgomery, in a way that no one else will be honest with you, because I understand you, and I understand your misfortune. Know that I want what’s best for you, and so even if my honesty is harsh, it is not cruel.” He waited for Kane to give a consenting nod before continuing. “First, your story of your misadventure is clearly false. None of it quite works, does it? You attempted to vanish, but very poorly. You destroyed your cell phone, yet what little you posted online you didn’t bother to delete. You stole a car from your own family, but not cash or credit cards. You drove this car, miraculously, through several security perimeters in a very direct route to the river, before swerving at the last minute into a building. A crash of this sort would kill a person, normally, but the EMTs found you conscious and mostly unharmed, sitting in the river several yards away, so you couldn’t have been in the car upon impact. Do you know how they described you in the police report? ‘Polite and detached.’ Those are the exact words. The report says they found you sitting in the shallows, humming to yourself and picking apart flowers. And, only after you were safe, did you suddenly lapse into a coma. That’s odd, too, I think.”
Kane could feel the deep frown on his face, and he forced it away. It was too hard to look at the doctor, so he focused on his clenched fists instead.
“None of it works, does it?”
Kane shrugged. It was all he had.
Dr. Poesy sat back. “And here is where I will tell you the actual truth, Mr. Montgomery. My colleagues disagree with my decision to do so, but I feel it is important you understand the reality of the situation in which you find yourself. Or, at least, the reality so far.”
The lighthearted act was gone, replaced by an inscrutable, clinical stare. When Dr. Poesy smiled, it was like he had just learned how; all in the mouth, nothing in the eyes.
“What do you mean?”
“I mean that your story takes place within a much larger story, an ongoing case bigger than the scope of your small town’s police department. You’ve managed to attract the attention of some very powerful, very bad people, Mr. Montgomery, who will go to extraordinary lengths to keep you silent about what you witnessed. As fortune would have it, I reached you first. I can protect you.”
Kane squirmed. “Am I in danger?”
Dr. Poesy dipped a manicured hand into his bag and placed a small square of paper on the table between them. Absurdly, it was one of the postcards Kane had been thinking of before. The ones that showed the mill painted in wistful watercolor.
“Let me introduce you to the work of Maxine Osman,” Dr. Poesy said. “She was born in the year nineteen forty-six and has been a fixture of East Amity for seventy-four years. She married, but her husband died eons ago. She has no children. She used to head the East Amity Craft Guild. She is known for the watercolors she completes every year for the East Amity tourism board. In fact, she’s most known for her seasonal series of the Cobalt Complex, completing twelve every year for the official East Amity calendar. Her favorite subject was the old mill, which you blew up.”
Kane stared at the postcard. There was something he knew here. Something important he couldn’t quite grasp.
“You think a painter is going to come after me because I burned down the mill?”
Dr. Poesy pinched the bridge of his nose. “She was set to paint the mill the morning of your crash. She was set to paint it at sunrise, about when the crash happened.”
Kane tried again. “I’m really sorry. I can apologize to her.”
“No,” Dr. Poesy said. “You can’t apologize to her, Mr. Montgomery, because she’s dead.”
Kane’s eyes went wide, dry and unblinking. “She’s…what?”
“Dead. Deceased. Departed.”
“I know what dead is.”
And then Kane realized what Dr. Poesy was saying, and the air went out of the room. The doctor smiled wider, now speaking with deliberate easiness. “Maxine had a small box of supplies she brought with her to her painting sites. Aluminum, with clasps and a handle. In it would have been her paints and brushes. Other artists’ tools.” Dr. Poesy’s eyes were feline in nature. Kane felt that if the lights were to switch out, the cobalt of those eyes would turn to moony disks. “That box was found among the ashes of the mill, melted shut. What’s clear is that you were present for Maxine’s final painting. What is less clear is why.”
Kane’s eyes stung. He couldn’t resist the compulsion to run his fingers over his burns, to hide behind his white knuckles. Dr. Poesy leaned forward, intrigued by Kane’s reaction, as though he already knew Kane was guilty.
“Your parents do not know about Maxine Osman. The police do not know, either. I am not your appointed psychologist, as Thistler believes, nor do I answer to the East Amity Police Department. I answer to forces much more powerful. Those forces have an interest in Maxine’s disappearance. Those forces wish to keep this investigation a secret, and your involvement risks that secret, but I do not believe you are a risk yourself, Mr. Montgomery. I believe you are an answer.”
Kane thought he had known fear, but this new horror recalibrated all the bad he’d gone through so far. This was so much worse than he thought. It must have been a long time before Kane answered, or maybe he never answered at all, because the next thing he heard was a ringing, hammering laugh.
“Do not look so aghast, Mr. Montgomery. I do not think you murdered Maxine Osman. I’m not sure who did. That’s why we’re here, together.”