by Parnell Hall
Which she didn’t want to do. What a pain in the ass. Teasing, wheedling, calling out his name.
“Jeremy. Jeremy!”
The voice was not Beth Killmore’s. The yacht vanished. Reality set back in. Jeremy blinked, opened his eyes.
Miss Swain, the algebra teacher, was standing looking down at him. Oh shit, he was in for it now. The principal’s office again? He was in no mood for that today, and—
Jeremy saw the two men standing next to her. The two men in suits and ties. Clean cut, grim, purposeful. Holy shit. Narcs? Was it possible? Were they busting him?
The taller of them stepped forward. “Jeremy Dawson?”
“Yeah.”
The policeman flipped open his wallet, showed his badge. “Come with us, please.”
“What? What are you talking about?”
“Just come with us, please.”
Jeremy drew back in his seat. “Hey, man. No way.”
The cop shook his head. “Listen, it’ll be easier if you cooperate.”
“Says you,” Jeremy said. “I ain’t done nothin’, and I ain’t goin’ nowhere.”
The tall cop sighed. “All right, if that’s the way you want it.”
He reached in his pocket and pulled out a pair of handcuffs. “Jeremy Dawson, you’re under arrest. You have the right to remain silent. If you give up the right to remain silent ...”
20.
MASK TAYLOR TOOK A SIP FROM his paper cup of coffee, leaned forward, set it on Steve Winslow’s desk, and flipped open his notebook. He frowned and shook his head. “Bad news all around.”
“How so?” Steve said.
“The bottom line is the cops picked up Jeremy Dawson half an hour ago.”
“Shit.”
“Yeah. They showed up at his school, snagged him right out of class.”
“How’d you get that so fast?”
“My man saw it happen.”
“Oh?”
“Yeah. I sent two men out to the school, trying to get a line on Jack Walsh’s movements yesterday. My man was in the right place and actually saw it go down.”
“What happened?”
“Two plainclothes cops come down the hall escorted by an academic looking gentleman with the word “principal” written all over him. They go into the classroom. Two minutes later the cops come out escorting Jeremy between ’em.”
“In handcuffs?”
“Yeah.”
“Was he talkin’?”
“What?”
“Jeremy. Was he talkin’? Protesting? Sayin’ anything?”
“No. The way I get it, he was just walking between ‘em lookin’ absolutely stunned.”
“Well, that’s something.”
“Incidentally, my men got what they came for, which don’t matter much now, with the kid’s arrest. Still, it’s a confirmation.”
“Of what?”
“That Jack Walsh was there yesterday. At least two students saw an old bum prowling the corridors. I got no one saw him actually leave with Jeremy, but it’s a cinch he did, ’cause I found a kid says Jeremy cut his last class.”
“Oh shit.”
“Yeah, it’s a mess all right. And if the cops got onto Jeremy, that means they know who Jack Walsh is. I mean, they’re on to the fact he’s got money and the whole bit.”
Steve sighed, rubbed his head.
Tracy Garvin looked up from the notes she’d been taking. “Where does that leave you?” she said.
Steve looked up. “What?”
“Well,” Tracy said. “Jack Walsh was your client. He’s dead. Maybe I’m not understanding this, but what’s your involvement now?”
Steve shook his head. “Except for the fact I haven’t got a client, my involvement’s the same as when I started.”
“Which is?”
Steve shrugged. “The hell of it is, I don’t know. Perhaps none. On the other hand, I could be an accessory before and after the fact to fraud.”
“How’s that?” Taylor said.
“In case someone shows up with a holographic will purporting to be entirely in Jack Walsh’s handwriting. Then I’m in one hell of a position, ’cause I have every reason to believe that will would be fraudulent.”
“Right,” Tracy said.
“And that’s just the legal aspect of it. The fact is, I got Jack Walsh out of Bellevue and now he’s dead. If I hadn’t interfered, he’d still be alive.”
“You can’t look at it that way,” Taylor said.
“Oh yeah? How the hell am I supposed to look at it?”
Steve picked up an envelope from his desk, reached in and pulled out a check. “This came this morning. Five thousand bucks from Jack Walsh for services rendered.”
“You feel bad takin’ it?” Taylor said.
Steve smiled. “Yes and no.”
“What does that mean?”
“Yes, I feel bad, and no, I’m not takin’ it.”
Taylor stared at him. “Why not?”
“Relax, Mark. I’m not so high principled as all that. The fact is, the check’s worthless.”
“What?” Taylor said.
“Why?” Tracy asked.
“Because Jack Walsh is dead. That freezes his account. You can’t cash a check on a dead man.”
“Oh shit,” Taylor said.
“So it’s worse than I thought,” Tracy said. “You got no client and you just lost your fee. Plus you got detectives working overtime on this thing.”
“Hey, easy,” Taylor said. “You trying to get me fired?”
“No, I’m just pointing out—”
Steve held up his hand. “I understand. This may not he good business practice, but it’s what I want to do. Stay on the job, Mark, until I tell you different. The fact is, I fucked up, and I’m gonna do what I can to straighten things out.”
“With a dead client and no fee?”
Steve nodded. “Unfortunately, that’s the case.”
The phone rang. Steve scooped it up. “Steve Winslow ... Uh huh ... Uh huh ... sit tight, I’ll be right there.”
Steve hung up the phone and stood up. “O.K., that changes the situation. Get ready to swing into high gear, Mark. Tracy, I still don’t have a fee, but now I got a client.”
“Oh?”
“That’s Jeremy Dawson calling from the lockup. The cops just gave him his one phone call.”
“They charge him?” Taylor said.
“Sure thing.”
“What’d they charge him with.”
“What do you think? The murder of Jack Walsh.”
21.
JEREMY DAWSON LOOKED THROUGH THE wire mesh screen of the visiting room of the lockup. “You gotta get me out of here, man.”
Steve Winslow smiled. “That may not be so easy.”
“Hey, man, like don’t say that. I gotta get out of here.”
“I understand. But you happen to be charged with murder.”
“Yeah, but I didn’t do it.”
Steve smiled. “That’s what they all say.”
Jeremy stared at him. “Hey, man, whose side are you on?”
“Your side, of course. I’m just telling you how the police see it.”
“Yeah, well they see it wrong.”
“So what’s right?”
“Huh?”
“Look, I know you wanna get out of here. I’ll do the best I can. But I don’t wanna give you any false hopes. We have a serious situation here. The police seem to think they have a case. So what you gotta do is calm down, stop thinkin’ about how much you wanna get out of here, and tell me what happened. If you do that, you just might get out of here, but stop thinkin’ about that for now.”
Jeremy rubbed his hand over his green mohawk. “Yeah, easy for you to say. I’m the one sittin’ here.”
Steve shrugged. “I could always come back later.”
“What?” Jeremy said.
“All right, look,” Steve said. “You’re a kid. You’re also an orphan. Your relatives ain’t much, and yo
u probably had a hard life. I’m sure you’re an expert at complaining and telling people how you been fucked over. But the point is, I don’t want to hear it. You’re up against a murder now. The prosecutor isn’t gonna give a shit about what’s fair or unfair or the whole bit. And if we get that far, a jury isn’t gonna care either.
“So take a deep breath, get all that shit out of your mind, and let’s talk about what happened.”
Jeremy stared at Steve for a moment. Then he lowered his head. Steve smiled slightly as he noticed Jeremy actually was taking a deep breath.
Jeremy looked back up at Steve. “O.K. Shoot.”
“Fine,” Steve said. “Start with yesterday. Uncle Jack find you?”
“Yeah.”
“Where?”
“In school.”
“When? Where? How’d it happen?”
“O.K.,” Jeremy said. “It was in the morning. Around eleven-thirty. In between class. I was in the hall just, uh, just hangin’ out. I went to my locker to get my books and there he was.”
“Uncle Jack?”
“Yeah.”
“What’d he do?”
“Well, he was actin’ kinda funny. I mean, he always was kinda funny, but even for him, you know?”
“Yeah, I know,” Steve said. “Go on.”
“So he’s thankin’ me for getting him out of Bellevue, and he wants me to go with him.”
“Where?”
“He won’t say. Just I done him a favor, he’s gonna do one for me.”
Steve raised his eyebrows. “Oh yeah?”
“Yeah. But he don’t say what. It’s just, we gotta get out of here.”
“So?”
“So we start down the hall and Uncle Jack spots a teacher. He says, ‘Meet me out front,’ and scoots around a corner and I lose him. So after that I’m playin’ tag in the hallways with the teacher, and I finally get outside.”
“And he’s there?”
“Yeah, well he’s behind a parked car and he hisses to me.”
“What happens then?”
“We get out of there, we take a bus to Manhattan.”
“Who pays?”
“Him.”
“He had money?”
“Yeah.”
“How much?”
“I don’t know. He’s wearin’ this big old floppy coat, he fishes in the pocket, pulls out a couple of dollars. We take the bus.”
“To where?”
“Port Authority.”
“What happens then?”
“We walk over to Times Square, go down in the subway station.”
“What happens there?”
“He won’t pay, he says, ‘Fuck the Transit system.’ He pushes me under the turnstile, hops under himself.” Jeremy looked up. “Which is stupid, right? There’s a cop right there in the station. He doesn’t see, but he could, you know?”
“Yeah. So?”
“So we go down, catch the Number One up to 66th Street. We get out there, walk to the end of the platform. There’s an old bum sleepin’ there behind a dumpster and he wakes up, but Uncle Jack knows him, says it’s cool. So we sit down there.”
“What for?”
“Yeah, that’s what I’m wondering. All he’s told me is, I did him a favor, he’s gonna do me one, then I’m gonna one more for him.”
“So what happened?”
“He whips out a pen and paper and writes a will.”
Steve blinked. “What?”
“He writes out a will. Turns out that was the favor. Some favor. He asks for a pen and when I don’t have one, he makes some crack about how you should always carry a pen, you never know when it’s gonna get you a million bucks. Then he sits down and he writes out a will.”
“Did you read it?”
“Yeah.”
“So what did it say?”
“He leaves his money to me. All of it.”
Steve sighed and rubbed his head. “Jesus.”
“Yeah,” Jeremy said. “Real shocker. But that’s the thing. That’s why I called you. I can afford a lawyer, right? He’s dead, I’m his heir, I got lot of money comin’, right?”
“Holy shit,” Steve said. He shook his head.
“What’s the matter?”
“What happened to the will?”
“He gave it to me.”
“He gave it to you?”
“Yeah. That was the other favor. He’ll do me a favor, then I’ll do him another one. That was it. To hold onto the will for him.”
“Where’s the will now?”
“Cops have it.”
“What?”
“I had it on me when I was arrested. The cops took all my possessions, so they have it now.”
“Oh shit.”
“What’s the matter? They won’t lose it. Safest place for it.”
“Yeah, sure,” Steve said dryly. “All right, let’s hear the rest of it.”
“The rest of it?”
“Yeah. What happened then.”
Jeremy shrugged. “Nothin’. That was it.”
Steve looked at him in exasperation. “No, that isn’t it. You’re in jail charged with murder. I’m trying to find some way to get you out. Let’s go on. Uncle Jack wrote the will and he gave it to you. Was that there in the subway station?”
“Right.”
“So what happened next?”
“Nothin’. I took the will and I left.”
“When?”
“What do you mean, when? Right then. When he gave it to me.”
“He didn’t want you to stick around?”
“No. He told me to take the will, put it in a safe place, say nothin’ about it to no one.”
“And did you?”
“What?”
“Did you tell anyone?”
“Christ, no. Why would I do that?”
“I don’t know. I’m just asking.”
“No, I didn’t.”
“All right. So you left him there in the subway station?”
“That’s right.”
“What’d you do then?”
“What does it matter?”
“I won’t know until I hear. I’m a lawyer. I gotta know the facts. What did you do then?”
“Well, by then it was afternoon, too late to go back to school. Not that I would have anyway. So I took the subway back downtown, caught a bus back to Jersey.”
“And went home?”
Jeremy’s eyes shifted. “Not right away.”
“Where’d you go?”
“Down by the school. Newsstand there. Went in and played a few video games.”
“That where the school kids hang out?”
“Yeah.”
“See any of them there?”
“Yeah. Why?”
“I dunno. Happen to mention to ‘em you were gonna be rich?”
“Christ, no. Why the hell I do that?”
“It’s not every high school kid finds out he’s gonna be a millionaire. It’s the type of thing you might mention.”
Jeremy’s eyes were wide and innocent. “Hey. Uncle Jack told me tell no one.”
“I understand.”
“Well, that’s what I did.”
“Fine. So what’d you do then?”
“Hung out a while and went home.”
“What time was that?”
“Why is it important?”
“’Cause Uncle Jack is dead.”
Jeremy winced. He shook his head. “Shit, that’s so hard to understand.”
“Yeah. So what happened when you got home?”
“Whaddya mean?”
“You see anyone?”
“Just Carl Jenson.”
“You talk to him?”
“He talked to me.”
“Oh?”
“Yeah. He heard me come in, he came out pissed as hell.”
“Why?”
“School called. Told him I skipped out, was cuttin’ class.”
“What did he say?”
“Wanted t
o know where I’d been, wanted to know if I’d seen Uncle Jack.”
“What’d you tell him.”
“Told him to go fuck himself.” Jeremy shrugged. “Carl’s a moron.”
“Why’d he ask about Uncle Jack?”
“Whaddya mean?”
“What do you think I mean? Did he know something, or was he just taking a shot in the dark? I’ll spell it out for you. Maybe someone at the school saw you with Uncle Jack. So when the school called and said you were cuttin’ class, they might have mentioned you left with some old bum. I’m wondering if you could tell that from anything he said.”
Jeremy thought about it. “I don’t know. I’m not really sure. Like I said, I didn’t talk to him, just told him to go get fucked, and walked out of there.”
“What did you do?”
“I went upstairs, took a shower, changed.”
“And did you go out again?”
“When?”
“That night.”
“Yeah, actually I did.”
“What time?”
“Around seven.”
“Where’d you go?”
Jeremy’s eyes flicked again. “I went to the movies.”
“You go with anyone?”
“No, I went by myself.”
“What’d you see?”
“A teenage picture. Heathers.”
“Heathers? What’s it about?”
“Teenage suicide and murder. Good picture. Kind of funny.”
“What time was the picture?”
“Eight o’clock.”
“Where was it playing?”
“In Teaneck.”
“You were at a movie in Teaneck from eight o’clock till when?”
“Got out about nine-thirty. Hung out for a while. Didn’t feel like goin’ home.”
“What time did you get home?”
“I don’t know. Twelve. Twelve-thirty.”
“Anyone see you come in?”
Jeremy grimaced. “Yeah. Aunt Claire.”
“Oh?”
“Yeah. She’s in the living room watchin’ the Johnny Carson show. She heard the door, jumped up to bawl me out.”
“For what?”
“Skippin’ school.”
“I see. So she knows you came in around midnight?”
“Somewhere between twelve, twelve-thirty. Couldn’t have been later than that ’cause the Carson show was still on.”
“Tell me something. Did she mention Uncle Jack?”
“Huh?”