Nick of Time

by John Gilstrap

Stewart glanced again, even more briefly. “Nope, sorry.”

  Carter sighed as he felt himself flush. People like this were the reason for half the world’s misery. No one wanted to get involved. “Anyone here that you can recommend I talk to? I figure she must have come through in the last four or five hours.”

  The old man pushed his wheeled bucket forward, using the handle of the mop as a rudder in a weird parody of a Venetian gondolier. “The ticket folks changed shifts two hours ago.”

  “What about the baggage handlers?”

  Stewart’s face folded into a smile, exposing a set of teeth that reminded Carter of a half-eaten ear of corn. “This is a bus station, young feller. The ticket folk do it all.”

  “What about you? How long you been on duty?”

  The janitor bumped Carter’s foot with his bucket and Carter stepped sideways to let him pass. “Hell, I never go home,” he said. “Work twelve, fourteen hours a day just to keep the rent paid. Sometimes I wonder why I even bother since I ain’t never there.”

  Carter reached for Stewart’s arm and the old man cringed, as if expecting to be hit. “Look, I know you don’t want to share information about the people who pass through here—especially with some lawyer from New York—but you have to believe me when I tell you that the girl in the picture is very sick. She’s my only daughter—my only child—and she’s run away.” His instincts told him not to mention anything about Brad or his criminal record; he didn’t want to scare the old man off. “Please,” Carter pressed. “If you know anything at all—or if you know anyone else who might know something—please share it with me.”

  Stewart eyed him, considering his words before he spoke them. Just from the way the janitor’s eyes narrowed, Carter thought that he was about to get a break.

  “No, sorry,” Stewart said. “I can’t help you.” He pointed to a pile of filthy clothes gathered in the far corner of the station. “Might want to talk to him, though. He’s always here, though I can’t say his mind is all that it oughtta be.”

  Carter never would have noticed the homeless guy if Stewart hadn’t pointed him out. “What’s his name?”

  “People call him Lee.”

  Interesting way to put that, Carter thought. Was there a difference between the man’s name and what people called him? “Thank you,” he said. For nothing, he didn’t say.

  Carter crossed the lobby, past the half-dozen travelers crammed in plastic seats that were linked together for maximum discomfort. Off in the corner opposite the lump that was Lee, a bank of snack machines hummed and glowed against the stained walls and floor. He wondered how many cross-country travelers lived off a diet of Cheez-Its, Ding Dongs, and soft drinks as they hopped from one bus station to the next, without transportation to take them even to a Waffle House somewhere.

  As he got closer to Lee, Carter realized that the bum was responsible for at least half of the station’s offensive odor. One glance at the empty bottle of cheap cognac, and Carter gave him up as a lost cause.

  “Hey,” a voice called from behind, “Mr. Lawyer-man.” Carter turned. It was Stewart. He hadn’t moved from where Carter had last spoken to him. “That true, what you said about her bein’ sick?”

  Carter fought the urge to step closer. “Yessir,” he said.

  “Swear to God?”

  Carter made a slow approach. He crossed his heart with his fingers, a gesture he hadn’t made in thirty years.

  “It’s important,” Stewart said, “because half the people come through here got some kinda story to tell, you know? A lot of them is tryin’ to get away from somethin’, and it ain’t none o’ my business to—”

  “I swear to God, Stewart. She’s my daughter and she’s sick. And I’m desperate.”

  The janitor stewed on it, and then sighed. “I had a daughter run away from me long time ago. Turned to the streets and got herself mixed up in drugs and whorin’ an’ all kinds of death.” His eyes narrowed and grew hot. “I was a drinker and a hitter, I was. I drove her off and she got dead as a result. Prob’ly best, because I prob’ly woulda killed her myself sooner or later. You don’t look like a drinker. You a hitter?”

  Carter allowed himself a soft smile. “Do I look like one?”

  “No, sir, you look like the lawyer you say you are. Thing is, I don’t know what that’s any better.”

  Now here’s a guy with a thousand stories to tell, Carter thought. He assured Stewart, “I’m not a drunk and I’m definitely not a hitter. I’m just a worried dad.”

  Stewart bobbed his head. That was good enough for him. “She was here,” the janitor said. “She’s a pretty little thing. Tiny, though. Makes sense, now that you tell me she’s sick.”

  “Was she by herself?”

  Stewart scowled as he replayed the scene in his head. “I b’lieve she was, at least at first. I remember her sitting right over yonder and checking her watch.”

  “How long ago?”

  “I b’lieve she was on the Zephyr from up north. That would’ve put her here round four o’clock. Like you said, five, six hours ago.”

  “Did somebody meet her?”

  “Yessir, somebody did, after a few minutes. A nice-looking kid, dressed like he was goin’ to Harvard or somethin’. They was happy to see each other, too.”

  “How do you mean?”

  “How do I mean? I mean, they had this big hug, just like in the movies. He even twirled her around. You gotta smile at young love.”

  “That wasn’t love,” Carter snapped, but then he pulled back. The clothing detail interested him. “What did this guy look like? Other than like he was nice?”

  Stewart gave that a hard thought. “That’s a hard one, you know? I don’t notice boys all that much, if you know what I mean. He just looked like any other kid. Tall, thin, big smile. Good lookin’ boy.”

  “So you got the sense that the girl—my daughter—had been waiting for him?”

  “Oh, yessir, without a doubt. One o’ the best things about this shitty job I got is watchin’ reunions. Lots o’ happiness in a reunion, you know? Make up for all the sad good-byes I see. That girl and that boy, well, I kinda feel this ain’t what you want to hear, but that there was a good reunion.”

  He was right; it wasn’t what Carter wanted to hear. “How about luggage? Did you see any of that?”

  “No, sir, I didn’t, and I gotta tell you, that’s one o’ the things that drew my attention to the girl. You see somebody that size, that age hangin’ around a bus station, and you gotta think maybe somethin’ bad is happenin’. That’s how my own daughter did her slide downhill. She was a bus-rider all the way. When I saw your little girl sittin’ there on the bench by herself, I kinda kept an eye on her, just to make sure that she didn’t do something stupid.”

  Carter smiled. Stewart the guardian angel. “And when you saw the boy come in for her?”

  “Well, I just let them have their peace. If he was her pimp or some such, there’d’ve been a lot o’ that awkward shit, but not there. I stopped lookin’ because even in here, people deserve a little privacy.”

  “I don’t suppose you saw the kind of car he was driving.”

  Stewart displayed his corn-teeth again in a big grin. “No, sir, and that’s the God’s honest truth. If it don’t park out there into the stalls, or in here on the floor, I just plain don’t see what people drive.”

  Carter tried to think of another relevant question.

  “Oh, an’ I got one other detail you prob’ly might like to know. I did overhear them talkin’ a little, an’ I heard him tell her he was gonna treat her like some queen. No, that he was gonna take her to a prom.”

  Carter scowled. “Prom, as in a high school dance?”

  “That’s it, yessir, he was gonna take her to a prom. Even named the place they was gonna go to. He was gonna take her to her fantasy.”

  * * *

  Carter punched the numbers into his cell phone as he drove toward the Braddock County police headquarters, following the directio
ns given to him by whoever was sitting on the watch desk. He’d been halfway through arguing with the watch officer about his need for police support when it hit him why the town of Brookfield rang such a strong bell in his mind. Four years ago, he’d done one hell of a favor for a detective in that department—a lieutenant—and once Carter put the pieces together in his mind, he knew exactly how to get the kind of help he needed. The watch officer refused to give out the lieutenant’s number, even when Carter assured him that there’d be no repercussions.

  After a call to Chris Tu, however, Carter got what he needed. He punched the number into his cell.

  As the phone rang on the other end, Carter checked his watch. Eight-thirty was a little late to be calling anyone at home, but under the circumstances, he’d live with the guilt.

  They picked up on the other end in the middle of the fourth ring. “Michaels residence, Nathan speaking,” said a reedy voice.

  Carter smiled. Last time he heard that voice, it belonged to a little boy. “Hello, Nathan, this is Carter Janssen, I don’t know if you remember me, but I’m—”

  “You’re the lawyer from New York,” Nathan said, and judging from the sudden weakness in his tone, the sound of the prosecutor’s voice terrified him.

  Carter felt bad for not having introduced himself more gently. He remembered that day on the square near the obelisk, just as most of the country remembered from the television news coverage. At the age of twelve, Nathan Bailey had been the object of a nationwide hunt as a suspected murderer, and had very nearly earned a sniper’s bullet. Carter could have prosecuted the boy on dozens of charges, but when Warren Michaels and his wife stepped in to be his foster family, Carter had cut them a break.

  “There’s no problem for you to be concerned about,” Carter assured him, “but I need to speak with Lieutenant Michaels. Is he home?”

  The teenager hesitated. “Yes, sir, I’ll get him.”

  On the other end of the line, Carter heard Nathan yell, “Papa! Telephone!” There was movement, and then intense, muffled talk that Carter couldn’t understand.

  A more familiar voice came on the line. “This is Lieutenant Michaels. Can I help you?”

  “Hello, Warren, this is Carter Janssen. I’m sorry to have startled Nathan like that. This is nothing about him or those old problems. I need to talk to you about a favor.”

  “Name it and it’s yours,” Michaels said.

  “Is there a place where we can meet, and where I can maybe get a bite to eat? I haven’t had anything since lunch.”

  “You bet. Where are you now?”

  * * *

  They decided on a twenty-four-hour breakfast place near the bus station. Warren Michaels hadn’t changed much in four years. Maybe a little grayer around the temples, but he still had the easygoing athletic grace that Carter remembered.

  Carter stood and they shook hands before Warren slid into the padded bench on the other side of the table. “It’s great to see you again,” Warren said.

  “I really am sorry about startling Nathan.”

  “Don’t give it a thought. Keeping him a little off balance keeps him from thinking he rules the world.”

  “He sounds so old on the phone.”

  Warren nodded. “Sixteen. He sings bass in the choir, and he’s a head taller than me. Wears size twelve shoes. It’s amazing.”

  The small talk was killing Carter, but he understood that this was the way things were done in Virginia, and it only seemed polite. “So, is he living with you permanently?”

  Warren explained, “He’s officially my foster son, but it’s as permanent an arrangement as you can get. After the . . . incident”—he leaned on the word—“I looked into adopting him, but what with his inheritance and all, it got too complicated. He knows where home is. He calls me his papa and I call him my son.”

  The explanation had the rhythm of a stump speech, details explained so many times that they’d become automatic. Such was the price of fame, Carter supposed.

  “But you’re not here to talk about Nathan,” Warren said, reading the body language. “Still, before I turn over the floor, I want you to know yet again how much I appreciate everything you did to iron things out for him.”

  Carter waved it off as if it were nothing, but Warren didn’t know the half of it. As the bright light of Nathan’s celebrity faded into memory, not everyone was so anxious to look the other way on the dozens of felonies the boy had racked up. It took some major league arm-twisting and more than a few official threats to get all the signatures he needed to make it happen.

  “Let me tell you my problem,” Carter began. It took the better part of ten minutes to tell the story, and by the time he was done, Warren Michaels seemed moved. “What I need is shoe leather,” Carter concluded. “I can’t do all the canvassing I need by myself, so I thought maybe you could get some of your guys on the street for me.”

  “Consider it done. I’ll make the calls right now. Meanwhile, you look like crap. Do you have a place to stay?”

  Carter blushed. “I didn’t think that far ahead.”

  “You’re staying with us.” The way he said it, there was no room for argument. “Chez Michaels isn’t the fanciest B and B on the planet, but there’s always a spare bed.”

  Carter waved the offer away. “I can’t take the time to sleep.”

  “Actually, you can,” Warren countered. “This is my turf, not yours. Get some rest and I’ll spin some wheels for you. If my guys turn up anything, I’ll be the first to know, and you’ll be next in line. Deal?”

  Fact was, the vision of Brad Ward encountering dozens of police officers scared the shit out of Carter. “Just please be sure to make it clear to everyone that Nicki is an innocent in all of this.”

  “You have my word.”

  “And to be careful in any arrest. There’s no telling what this Ward/Dougherty guy might do.”

  Warren reached over and grasped Carter’s hand. “Try to relax, Counselor. My cops are the best in the business. This isn’t exactly new territory for me.”

  Carter considered that, considered his options. Maybe it was time for him to lie down and get some rest.

  They shook on it.

  April 5

  Derek witnessed a murder yesterday. He’s scared shitless about it. He said it was out in the yard in plain sight of the guards. Three of the Posse—Peter Chaney, Harold Letier, and Charley Samson—got a guy cornered back by the bleachers. The guy—I think it was a lifer named Raminowitz or something like that—started screaming even before they did him.

  Chaney and Samson held him while Letier did it. They raped him with a knife blade, for Christ sake. Derek said he’s never seen so much blood. I could hear the screaming from the other side of the yard. Sounded like an animal caught in a trap. He bled to death before the guards got to him.

  Derek’s terrified because Chaney and Samson looked right at him while it was all going on. Looked right at him. They didn’t say anything, but now Derek’s worried about being the only witness. He’s afraid they’re going to kill him, too.

  Chapter Eleven

  Brad hated this shit. He hated the penguin suit, the uncomfortable shoes, the finger foods that wouldn’t fill you up if you stood at the table for a week, and the snotty people who swarmed all around him. To think that these assholes paid hundreds of dollars apiece to be here curdled his stomach. What a ridiculous waste of money. For what? An evening of gyrations on the dance floor, driven by music from a band that didn’t have any idea what it wanted to be. Thus far, he’d listened to bad covers of Frank Sinatra, The Beatles, and—God help us—Cher.

  But a formal ball was one of Nicki’s dreams. She’d spoken of it three or four times in their cyber correspondence, listing it as one of the things that she’d never be able to do, thanks to her disease. If all he had to do was hang out in uncomfortable clothes and pretend to be interested in President Clinton’s dallyings with Monica Lewinsky, then that wasn’t such a high price to pay.

  Ma
ny of the items on Nicki’s list were beyond his power to obtain for her—going to college and raising a bunch of kids—but this one was easy. And tomorrow would begin the dream of spending a week at the beach.

  Honest to God, Brad didn’t get Carter Janssen. He knew from firsthand experience that the man could be a prick if he wanted to be, but why would he want to piss off the only remaining relative he had? His wife was dead and his daughter was dying and Carter couldn’t pop his head out of his ass long enough to see the world through her eyes. She wanted to live before she died. Why was that so impossible for him to understand?

  The man was irrelevant now, and Brad would be lying if he didn’t admit to a twinge of ironic pleasure. But for Janssen’s paranoia that Brad was diddling his daughter (which he could have done at any time if a) he’d been interested in diddling twelve-year-old girls, or b) asked), everything in Brad’s life would have been different. There would have been no ejection from the Benson house, no caroming from one homeless shelter to the next, no robbery, no murder, and no jail time. Brad knew how that sounded—knew how it made him look like a whiner who blamed others for his own problems—but he’d thought this all through a thousand times, and that was just how it was.

  He leaned closer to Nicki, so she could hear him over the Barry Manilow cover. “You having a good time?”

  She smiled, but her eyes looked tired. “It’s wonderful.”

  “You okay doing this? I don’t want to wear you out.”

  “We can stay a while longer. I just want to hang out long enough to make sure I remember everything. Do I want to know how you got this invitation?”

  “I called this morning and made it. They asked for my membership number or some such, but I told them that I was on the road and didn’t have it.”

  Nicki couldn’t believe it. This all came so naturally to him. “I suppose you charged this to the room, too?”

  Brad shook his head. “Nah, I thought that might raise too much suspicion. So I charged it to his credit card.”

  Nicki laughed. She wanted to be horrified, but admiration won out. “You’re amazing,” she said.