The city of Portland is filled with a treasure trove of historic and hidden places, some located far from the tourist haunts of the Old Port.

Last weekend Jeanne and I and a couple of friends decided to get a sense of what the city might be hiding from casual observers and signed up for the Maine Historical Society’s “Magical Mystery Tour”…an annual self-guided tour of some of some of the places tourists and residents alike rarely get to see.  We picked up our tickets at the Historical Society office located next door to Longfellow House, where Maine’s best-known poet, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow was born and grew up.

Our first stop, which I’d driven by a thousand times and never knew existed, was the beautiful St Joseph’s Convent, the Sisters of Mercy Mother House on Stevens Avenue.  Built in 1909 the Convent is topped with an elegant gold cupola and inside boasts a stunning hundred-year old chapel with marble columns, a beautiful painted ceiling, stained glass windows and doors depicting biblical scenes. Walking down the exceptionally wide center aisle one can imagine processions of novitiates prostrating themselves before the altar. Upstairs the corridors are lined with narrow doors opening onto tiny individual cells where as many as 250 nuns lived. Each has a now empty brass holder for the Sister’s name. But sadly, all the nuns are gone.

Today, this historic building is currently under reconstruction to make way for a mix of senior, affordable and market rate housing. New and partly finished one bedroom and studio apartments were open to be seen and even the smallest studios are about 10 times the size of the nun’s cells.

In the side chapel short pews are still lined up in rows. The organ is on an upper balcony with Byzantine style arches carved wood detail. One hopes the developers will at least keep remnants of the chapel for communal use by the new residents. I can imagine circles of people coming together for meetings or performances, or tea and coffee and gossip. Eighty apartments are planned.

We next stopped briefly at “Alumni Hall” on the

University of New England Campus, a few hundred yards down Stevens Avenue from St. Joseph’s. An elegant white building, with many Federal style details, Alumni Hall was built to house the Westbrook Seminary in 1834. The bell tower was originally part of Portland’s nineteenth century Market Hall-which was located downtown in what is now Monument Square. When Market Hall was remodeled in 1832, the bell and its tower were moved to the campus.

For a totally different flavor we drove to the end of Commercial Street to check out the old Boston and Maine Railroad tunnel. Built in the 1870’s the line carried shipments of grain, ice, lumber, meat and produce and line terminated at the foot of York Street under what is now the Casco Bay Bridge. Impressive granite stones form massive retaining walls to support the infrastructure of rail and road. Sadly, all that’s left of the tunnel is a fenced-in remnant which today houses occasional homeless people on the ledges around and above the tunnel. As I looked at this dark and gloomy place I could well imagine one of McCabe and Maggie’s murderers dumping a body or two at the far end.

After leaving the tunnel, we decided to make a quick stop to tour the 87foot Coast Guard Cutter Amberjack which was open for the tour. The Coasties use the Amberjack for their essential work of protecting marine resources, preventing drug smuggling and for search and rescue missions.

The young and gung-ho crew were thrilled to show us around. The engine room was small and frankly a little claustrophobic for me. In the pilot-house, the Captain showed us the most current technology and navigation computers, while charts and compasses and dividers were also laid out. All hands must still know how to navigate by the sun and stars.

Finally, we toured the galley which was about 12 feet long. Still, when the cook ran through his menus, they sounded a hell of a lot better than what I remember being fed in the army many years ago. Steak and lobster? No way back then. But that’s what they serve today.

After a quick lunch we moved on to the First Parish Unitarian Universalist Church to check out the clock and bell tower. First Parish, as it is called, was built in 1825 as a place of worship for a congregation that was first established in 1674. It’s the oldest church building in the city, and one of its finest examples of Federal period architecture.

Construction of the current granite building was completed 1826 and the 1802 Simon Willard clock tower and the internal gallery clock were transferred to the building along with 1810 steeple bell. The Simon Willard clock is the last remaining and functioning tower clock in existence. Climbing endless flights of stairs to see the clock turned out to be worth it. We were all fascinated by the simple beauty of the oiled cogs and wheels, and gears of the mechanics of the 116-year-old clock. After a further climb up steep timbered steps, with no handrail we got to the bell tower. Unfortunately, shutters obstruct what must be a terrific view and also shield witnesses from what might be another terrific place to dump a body.

The Maine Historical Society will run a similar tour of unseen and unknown places in May of next year so if you’re planning a trip to Portland, keep it in mind. And if you have time stop in at police headquarters at 109 Middle Street and say hi to Maggie and McCabe.

And please don’t forget to look for my latest McCabe/Savage thriller, A Fatal Obsession, coming out on August 21^st and available for preorder now!

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James Hayman:  Anyone who’s read my third McCabe/Savage thriller, Darkness First, knows the story opens with a bad guy named Conor Riordan smuggling 40,000 80mg oxycontin tablets stolen from a Canadian pharmaceutical distribution center in Saint John, New Brunswick back into Eastport, Maine.  In the book, these tablets have a street value in Maine of nearly five million dollars.  They also are ultimately responsible for the murders of nine mostly not so innocent people.

The idea for Darkness First was initially triggered by a newspaper article I  read about prescription drug abuse in Maine and most particularly in poor rural areas like Washington County.

To research the book, I spent a day talking with Sheriff Donnie Smith of Washington County. In our discussion Sheriff Smith estimated that, at that time, nearly half the teenagers and young adults in Washington County were addicted to “ox.”  I was stunned by the number and asked where all these pills came from. He told me most were bought and sold in small quantities, some initially stolen from pharmacies,  others sold by people who had legitimate prescriptions they hadn’t finished, still others purchased by “doctor shopping”, which means getting multiple prescriptions for pain relief needs from a number of different doctors.

When I pressed for more information,  Smith referred me to his liaison with the Maine Drug Enforcement Agency. In discussions with this agent, I learned that the usable supply of “Ox” in Maine was dwindling and that, as a result, prices were going up.  The tightening of supply was due, in part, to more energetic enforcement policies and stricter limits on the number of tablets doctors were allowed to prescribe.  

It was also due to changes in the manufacturing process. To fight abuse of its product, Purdue Pharma, the number one American manufacturer, had developed a harder time-release coating that made it much more difficult, if not impossible, for addicts to crush and snort the tabs for an instant high.  Melting for use in hypodermics was also more difficult.  Due to the more limited supply, street price (at the time I talked to him) had risen to $120 for an 80 mg tablet.  Far more than most addicts could afford.

I asked if such high prices might not tempt professional drug dealers to import tablets from somewhere else.  He agreed that this was indeed possible.  He suggested one likely source might be Canada since Canadian manufacturers had yet to adopt Purdue’s new process. In his mind, a worst-case scenario was the one I used in the book, the large-scale theft and smuggling of Canadian 80’s by boat into Eastport.

Unfortunately, the real worst-case scenario turned out to be heroin.  Confronted with stricter enforcement policies and sky-high street prices, oxycontin addicts in Maine and elsewhere in New England simply turned to a cheaper and more plentiful alternative.

Over the last three years the supply and use of heroin in Maine and other Northern New England states has skyrocketed. Dr. Mark Publicker, an addiction specialist in Portland, was quoted in a Bangor Daily News article as saying  “We had a bad epidemic (before), and now we have a worse epidemic.  I’m treating 21-, 22-year-old pregnant women with intravenous heroin addiction. It’s easier to get heroin in some of these places (in Maine) than it is to get a UPS delivery.”

Most of the heroin used in Maine is grown and processed in Colombia and then crosses the border through Mexico. From there substantial quantities flow up through New York to Lowell or Lawrence, Massachusetts and from there on into Maine.  Instead of $120 for a single oxycontin tablet, a gram of heroin might cost $45 in Lowell or Lawrence and a single dose $5. An addict can cover his own heroin needs and make a profit selling to others by making the drive. Small time dealers from Maine can find even cheaper prices in Boston and New York.

According to an article by Katharine Q. Seelye in the New York Times, “a $6 bag of heroin in New York City fetches $10 in southern New England but up to $30 or $40 in northern New England. The dealer gets a tremendous profit margin, while the addict pays half of what he might have to shell out for (oxycontin)…”

Today, heroin is not only cheaper and more readily available than oxycontin, the high is stronger.  And smack, as its called, is also more addictive. New users who start by injecting small amounts find they quickly need larger and larger doses to get the same high and satisfy the craving. 

All too often the results of heroin addiction can be tragic. Heroin killed 21 people in Maine last year, three times as many as in 2011. Sadly, those numbers are likely to rise further.

Katharine Seelye’s piece in the Times describes one case. She writes: “Theresa Dumond, 23, who lives on the streets of Portland, said she sells her body three times a day to support her heroin habit. She lost custody of her two young children about a year ago (“I can’t keep track”), and their father died.

“I’ve lost everything,” she said as she and a companion, Jason Lemay, 26, walked to an abandoned train tunnel, littered with old needles and trash, to shoot up. “The heroin numbs the pain and makes you not care about life,” she said.

Her only concern now is scoring more heroin. She pays no attention to food and sleeps where she is or in a shelter.”

James Hayman:  My next McCabe thriller, Darkness First, is coming out October 1^st as the lead title in Harper Collins’ brand new Witness imprint that plans on featuring mysteries and thrillers initially in Ebook format and, in most cases, later on in print.

I decided to go with Harper Collins’ after learning that, while roughly 25% of all books sold in the U.S. are sold in Ebook format, in genre fiction such as mysteries, thrillers and romance, the number is closer to 60% and rising.

Darkness First is the first novel in the McCabe/Savage series to feature Detective Maggie Savage, McCabe’s partner, as the key protagonist.  Most of the story is told from her point of view.  As a male writer I wanted to try writing a novel primarily from a female point of view which turned out to be interesting, especially when it came to describing the sex scenes. The book is also the first of the series that takes place primarily outside of Portland.

In Darkness First Maggie goes home to Machias in Washington County, where she was born and raised, to help Maine State Police CID detectives and DEA agents track down a murderous oxycontin dealer who has viciously killed a young woman who worked with him. In the process, the murderer came perilously close to killing Maggie’s oldest and dearest friend, Emily Kaplan, a doctor who was trying to help the murdered woman. Eventually (naturally) the hunt for the killer takes a number of unexpected turns and draws Mike McCabe, into the case.

I drew the title Darkness First from the fact that Washington County is the easternmost county in the continental United States where, as many have noted, the sun rises first in America.  I found it interesting that far fewer people had made the point that Washington County is also where darkness  arrives first.  As Hemingway might have said, the sun also sets. And, of course, bad things happen when it does.

The book introduces a number of new characters I like and who may appear again in future McCabe/Savage novels.

These include Maggie’s father, John Savage, the four term sheriff of Washington County who, “a lean six-four, with a gray mustache and a weathered face, Savage looked more like a sheriff in a John Ford western than one in a rural county in Maine. He was even armed like Wyatt Earp with his pride and joy, an original 1873 long-barreled Colt .45 Peacemaker, strapped to his waist. All he needed was a horse and a Stetson hat to complete the image.  And somewhere at home Maggie was pretty sure he had the hat.”

Another of the characters I like in this book and may use again is Maggie’s best and oldest friend, Dr. Emily Kaplan.  In addition to being a doctor, Emily, at six-foot-three and one hundred and eighty pounds, is a former all-star basketball player and a one-time world-class amateur boxer. She is also something of an idealist. Emily practices medicine out of her childhood home, “a small but pretty colonial farmhouse set at the end of a country road on the outermost edges of the village of Machiasport…It was, she liked telling the few friends from med school who bothered to visit, the global headquarters of Machiasport Family Medicine.  They would smile at her small joke and tell her how much they admired her decision to work here, among the people of the poorest and most underserved county in a poor and underserved state. A few told her they were sometimes tempted to do the same sort of thing. But, as far as she knew, none ever had. Her classmates had richer fields to till.”

In the book we also meet Maggie’s ne’r do well brother Harlan, an ex-marine who suffered serious wounds serving two tours in Iraq and who is still suffering from the effects of  PTSD.   Harlan makes much of his living, such as it is, playing pool for money in a bar, The Musty Moose, in Machias. “The pool tables in the side room at the Moose were crowded with the usual assortment of players and hangers-on. Maggie spotted Harlan in a game at table three and leaned in against the wall under the head of a long-dead bear some taxidermist had stuffed with its mouth open and fangs exposed, in full roar. The creature looked like it was seconds away from leaping off the wall and gobbling up the nearest player.

She watched her kid brother sweep the table till all that was left was the eight ball pressed against the far rail about a foot from the pocket. He had a good eye, that was for sure. Probably why they’d made him a sniper in the Corps.”  That good eye comes in handy later in the book.

The last of the characters to mention is Tabitha Stoddard, the murder victim’s eleven-year-old sister. Tabitha is a nerdy, bookish, semi-fat kid with big round glasses, who, improbably, sets herself the task of tracking down her big sister’s murderer and who, in fact, ends up being a key part of catching him. We first meet Tabitha shortly after she learns that her sister Tiffany has been murdered.

“Tabbie had a hard time thinking of Tiff as dead. Everything about her big sister had always seemed so alive. Tiff was everything Tabitha always wanted to be but knew she never would. She was beautiful. Smart. Fun and funny. The idea of someone like Tiff being dead seemed crazy. Ridiculous.

Tabbie told herself to stop being stupid. Anybody could be dead and, at eleven years old,  a person really ought to understand what being dead meant. Dead was dead. Just like Terri was dead and had been for three years. Just like Grammy Katherine was dead. And their old dog Lucy. She was dead too. Tabbie’d gone to the vet with her mother when they gave Lucy the shot. The vet put the needle in and just like that Lucy went from being an alive thing to a dead thing.  At eleven years old a person obviously knew what dead meant.

What she wasn’t all that sure about was what happened after you were dead. Were you just not there anymore? Gone. Poof. Like you never existed? Just a rotting lump of meat in a box underground being eaten up by bugs and worms?

Or was dying more like what they said in church?  Tabitha was by no means certain it was, but if it was, well then there was a distinct possibility Tiff was flying around somewhere in either heaven or hell. She was in what Mrs St Pierre who lived up the road called a better place. Mrs St Pierre came over with some cupcakes after she heard on television about Tiff being murdered. Tabbie didn’t know why Mrs. St. Pierre thought cupcakes would help but apparently she did.”

Darkness First comes out first in the British Commonwealth countries.  On September 15^th, Penguin UK will release it in Britain, Australia, New Zealand, India, South Africa and so on.  Two weeks later Harper Collins will release the book as the lead title in the launch of their new Witness Impulse E-book imprint.