“I heard you,” I said.
“Well?”
“Why don’t we pretend it’s intermission at the concert, and you and I are having a nice little talk in the lobby?”
“What about?”
“Jennifer Creasey. I’ve been hired to look into her death, and I’d like some information.”
He’d gotten his back up over the mention of her name. “Get the fuck out of my room.”
“As soon as we talk.”
“Now!”
“No.”
Based on watching him with Joey, I had the feeling little Richard wasn’t used to defiance of his orders. It’s amazing how readily we mistake one person’s acquiescence for the world’s obedience. He eyed the telephone.
“I’ll call campus security.”
“I’d wait till the atmosphere clears a bit,” I said.
He looked at his joint, crossed to the desk opposite me, and carefully stubbed it out. He put the stub in a desk drawer. There were actually some books gathering dust on the shelf above it. One caught my eye. A yellow binding with bold blue lettering.
“What’s your major, Richard?”
He turned, sneering. “What is this, a mixer? You trying to pick me up?”
I smiled and moved toward him. He took a step back, which put him against the desk. I grabbed his left elbow with my right hand, digging my fingers like nails into the fleshy part.
“Hey,” he said, wriggling a little. “Hey, that hurts. Stop it.”
I read, sideways, The Art of Hypnosis over his shoulder. “What’s your major?”
“Psychology. Hey, stop it. No shit, that hurts.”
I kept the come-along hold on him and led him back over to his bed. A little push, and he sat heavily as I released the hold. He rubbed his arm, watching my hand.
“You do much hypnotizing in psychology, Richard?”
“Hypnotizing? Yeah, a little. In this seminar, we hypnotized each other.”
“When did you first meet Jennifer Creasey?”
“This year. She was a freshman. In September, I met her at a party.”
“Date her?”
“Yeah, I dated her.” A little belligerence returned to his voice.
“Who broke it off?”
“None of your business.”
I shook my head as I had with Joey. Richard got the message.
“She did,” he said, head down, “when the black bastard who killed her showed up.”
“Daniels lived in this dormitory?”
“Yeah. Single room. You know, special privileges? Shit, you have to be a senior or a cripple or something to have a single. But they gave him one, all right. Make up for his deprived upbringing.”
“You welcomed him with open arms, did you?”
“Aw, you don’t see it, do you, man? This nigger comes in here, free ride. Free! You know how many cars my father has to sell to pay the tab here for me?”
“No. How do you help him?”
“Help him? Daniels?”
“No, your father. How do you help him pay for all this?”
McCatty wagged his head in disgust. “They think we owe them, and not just a living, either. My father says they think we owe them everything. Food stamps that they cheat on, public housing that they wreck, our schools, our jobs—”
“Our girlfriends?”
“Oh, man. You just don’t get it at all. Let them rip you off. See if you don’t …”
“Don’t what?”
“Don’t get even. Or get them out. Sure, we scared Daniels off. He sucked. Tried to suck up to us when he first got here. That’s how he met Jennifer. Here, in this room. He heard some music and came in here. Actually!”
“Imagine that.”
“I told him to shag it out. He gave me that mean nigger look, but he went. Moon … Daniels went, but no, Ms. Hotpants has to go after him. To apologize. That’s how it started with them. Her apologizing for me.”
“You going with anyone now?”
He started to give me the belligerent look again, but reconsidered. “No, I’m not.”
I got as far as “Where were you the night—” when a powerful arm from behind shot up my armpit and slapped the back of my neck, pushing my head down and my shoulder up and back in a half nelson. The arm was slick and smelly with sweat.
“Moon … was in … the gym,” Joey’s voice said. “I had … to run.” He was out of breath.
McCatty’s voice had a satisfied, oily edge to it. “Moon’s a wrestler, asshole. Heavyweight.”
Moon didn’t say anything. I let him get real comfortable with the hold, waiting till he shifted to push me down onto my knees. Then I raised my right foot and brought it down hard just below his knee, using the outside of my heel to scrape the shinbone down to his instep, which I stomped.
Moon released his hold and grabbed for his shin. Without turning, I swung my left elbow up into his left cheek, then duplicated with my right elbow to his right. He teetered from the first shot, went down with the second.
“That’s not fair …” Moon gasped. He was thick-bodied and hairy, a bear rug in gym shorts. “You can’t … it’s against the rules.”
McCatty looked at me with disbelief. Neither he nor Joey spoke.
“The night she was killed,” I said, “where were you?”
“Here,” McCatty said, then again, “here. In the room. Getting ready for finals.”
“That’s right,” said Joey. “He was here with me. From dinner on.”
“Joey,” I said, still looking at McCatty, “who are we talking about?”
“Jennifer, right? Jennifer Creasey? Who else we know got killed?”
The alibi, and more important, Joey’s voice, had the ring of truth. I stepped over Moon, past Joey, and out.
Thirteen
I GOT BACK INTO THE car and drove toward Calem. I found the Creasey house, new and modern, but resting on an old farm site. Orchard, small pond, the corner of a stable obscured by the far treeline. Expensive acreage but incongruous, a Beverly Hills mansion dropped into a rural Vermont setting.
The driveway was circular, no cars in sight. I pulled in and walked to the front door. The large brass knocker, a lion’s head, was heavy to lift and fell with a sound like a blacksmith’s hammer.
A petite woman in a maid’s outfit answered the door. In a slight Spanish accent, she said Mrs. Creasey was seeing no one, please. I took out a business card and wrote on the back of it: “For Jennifer’s sake, please speak with me.” The maid took it, reluctantly, and closed the door.
I waited for five minutes. The door reopened. The maid said to come in, Mrs. Creasey would see me in the library, please.
The entry foyer was large, the house multileveled, each floor separated by half a dozen steps and overlapping with the floor partially above it. I was led up two levels to a room approximately thirty by thirty, with built-in teak bookshelves and a tasteful arrangement of deep leather furniture. A severe-looking woman, perhaps early forties, stood. She was painfully thin, her high cheekbones prominent in her drawn face. Her right hand held my card, folded lengthwise by the press of her fingers.
“Mr. Cuddy, please sit down. I’m Tyne Creasey. Would you care for any refreshments? A drink?”
I declined and sat.
“Pina, please wait downstairs.”
“Yes, ma’am.” She left.
“This,” said Mrs. Creasey, tossing my card onto the end table next to her, “had better not be some vulgar entree.”
“It isn’t, Mrs. Creasey. At least, it’s not intended to be. I’m sorry about your daughter.”
“Let’s spare my feelings, shall we? What did you mean, ‘For Jennifer’s sake’?”
“Like the card says, I’m a private investigator. I’ve been hired to look into Jennifer’s death.”
“Well, since we didn’t hire you, I assume you’re representing the Daniels boy.”
“His mother, actually.”
“What does she have to do with Jennifer?�
�
“Nothing. So far as I can tell, she and your daughter never met.”
Mrs. Creasey exhaled elaborately. “Mr. Cuddy, what exactly do you want?”
“I want to see Jennifer’s killer arrested, convicted, and punished.”
“Admirable. Your sense of civic duty, I mean.” Her overall manner somehow made the words seem not cynical. “But why, then, are you working for the Daniels woman?”
“Because I’m not convinced that William Daniels killed your daughter.”
Mrs. Creasey started to laugh, then cut it off politely as it rose toward a shriek. She spoke normally. For her. “Sir, I don’t mean to question your sanity, but are you aware that four people heard him confess? With the gun still in his hand?”
“Yes, I am.”
“And you still …” She broke eye contact, gave herself a shake that implied I wasn’t worth laughing at. A telephone rang downstairs. It stopped before one full ring had sounded. “Perhaps you’d better go,” she said.
“Mrs. Creasey, I’ve answered your questions honestly without interposing any of my own. You’ve been through a terrible tragedy and therefore I’m here only by your good graces. My sole purpose is to keep another mother from losing her child.”
She watched me, reappraising. In a different voice, she asked, “Do you have any evidence that someone other than Daniels killed my daughter?”
“I have oddities, Mrs. Creasey. Jangles. Individuals who didn’t act as I would have expected. To find evidence, I need to know Jennifer better. I need you to help me.”
“I don’t …” Her voice quavered, then started again. “I don’t know that I can … help. Jennifer and I had … When she began college, she grew distant. Her father … we both were so careful with her. So strict that I …” She waved both her hands and lowered her face to them. “Perhaps her roommate could …”
I heard the downstairs door open and close, the sound of heavy treading on the stairs.
She looked up, startled. “Mr. Cuddy, I’m sorry, but my husband said—” She broke off, then spoke rapidly. “Deborah Wald, her roommate. She lives in Marion. She left school because of—”
Mrs. Creasey stopped cold, now staring past me. I swiveled my head around. Two uniformed police officers, one about my age and slight, the other young and beefy, were in the doorway. The young one stomped over to me. “All right, on your feet,” he said.
“Officer,” began Mrs. Creasey.
“It’s all right, ma’am,” said the older one, moving in too. “I’m Officer Clay. Your husband called us.”
“I said get up.” The younger one grabbed my left arm, yanked me halfway out of the chair. I continued up, then twisted my arm back against his thumb, breaking his grip. He reached behind him for the leather sap he probably carried in a back pocket.
“No, George, no need for that,” said Clay. Then, to me: “Assume the position against this case here.”
I walked around the young one, the name BJORKMAN on the name tag over the badge on his chest. I spread legs and arms, with my hands on the shelf. Clay came up to me.
“Revolver,” I said, “holster over my right hip.”
Clay tugged my gun out, then stepped back and unloaded it. He put the weapon in one pocket and the bullets in another. He frisked further, my ID and wallet joining the bullets.
“You got a charge?” I asked.
“Shut up,” said Bjorkman, moving a step closer.
“Easy, George,” said Clay, then, to me: “We’ll explain everything at the station.”
Mrs. Creasey had her head in her hands. Pina, appearing magically, stood over her. My captors and I walked downstairs and to their cruiser, a third officer taking my keys to follow in my car. I sat in the back of the cruiser with Clay, George driving a bit faster and more recklessly than the situation required.
Fourteen
“I SAID SHUT UP.”
I couldn’t argue with Bjorkman there. Between the ride in the cruiser and the time we’d sat in probably the only interrogation room in the Calem Police building, he’d told me to shut up ten times, minimum.
“Why am I—”
“I said shut up.”
“George,” said Clay soothingly, “take it easy. Detective O’Boy will be here in a coupla minutes.”
I was starting to like Clay. He tried to calm his partner down while giving me an answer that might stop me from riling Bjorkman again. A good cop avoids confrontations; they’re rarely productive.
There was a quick rap on the other side of the door. It opened, and a stumpy man in a short-sleeved dress shirt and a polyester tie came in. He had a few long wisps of red hair on the top of his head and a fringe of short-cropped fuzz around his ears. He juggled a manila file folder and what looked like my gun, wallet, and ID.
“I’m Detective Paul O’Boy,” he said to me. He asked Clay, “He been read his rights?”
Clay nodded, looking tired.
O’Boy turned back to me. “I’m in charge of the Creasey girl’s murder. You were out bothering her mother today. Why?”
I said to Bjorkman, “Gee, Georgie, aren’t you going to tell him to shut up too?”
O’Boy said, “What are you talking about?”
“Officer Bjorkman here has been telling me to shut up for half an hour now. I thought it was because I was asking him ‘why’-type questions. Now I’m not so sure.”
O’Boy said, “Why don’t we cut the shit and answer my question?”
I looked at O’Boy and said, “William Daniels’ mother hired me to help his attorney investigate the murder. I wanted to find out about the girl’s background.”
Bjorkman snapped at me: “Whaddya mean, her ‘background’?”
“Oh, just little things. Like who she was dating, who she threw over. Things like that, Babyfat.”
Bjorkman came off the edge of the table, hands balled into fists. Clay clamped his arms from behind and pulled him back to the door. Very quick and very strong, Clay, nice adjuncts to his brains and manner. And Homer seemed on target regarding Bjorkman’s feelings for Jennifer.
O’Boy said, “Take him out of here, Clay. Then you come back.”
Bjorkman was seething as Clay squeezed him through the door and O’Boy kicked it shut behind them.
“Well,” said O’Boy, “you got that all out of your system now?”
“You know, you’re going to have trouble with Bjorkman. If you haven’t already.”
“Let’s talk about you. You say you’re investigating the murder. Terrific. It’s the best case I’ve ever seen. Set in concrete. But everybody’s gotta make a living, right? So you’re on a per diem and you don’t wanna miss tomorrow’s bread ration. Fine. Talk to anybody you want. Me, the chief, the governor. Just stay off the Creaseys, okay? They already had enough about the daughter.”
“Mrs. Creasey wasn’t all that upset by me. Why the cruiser?”
“The maid called the husband. He called us. Miracle he got through, our phones’ve been on the blink.”
“Your name was on the homicide report as investigating officer, right?”
“Right.”
“Anything strike you as odd when you got there?”
“Odd?” said O’Boy, his voice rising. “Odd? No, of course not. We get hypnotized kids confessing to shooting their girlfriends alla time. Used to be one a week.”
“Strike you as odd that Marek never turned on the video equipment?”
“He forgot.”
“He remembered to dim and up the lights for the hypnosis.”
“Heat of the moment. You do funny things.”
“Focus on Daniels, then. You just shot your girlfriend. First thing you do is keep an appointment with your shrink?”
“Kid was there, in the building already.”
“And submits himself to hypnosis, when he knows he’ll tell the truth about it?”
“The kid was screwed up. Pressure from school and shit. Who can say what he was thinking? Maybe he figured confession’d be g
ood for the soul.”
“So what’s his motive?”
“For killing her?”
“Yeah.”
“For chrissake, he was a black kid out of his league, fucking a rich white chick. Maybe she wouldn’t blow him and he got peeved. Who am I to say?”
“I heard Bjorkman used to date her.”
O’Boy hardened a little. “You heard wrong.”
“Something about a senior prom?”
“The fuck do I know? I look like I was his guidance counselor or something?”
“They teach hypnosis at the police academy?”
“Used to. Then with—hey, what’re you getting at?”
Clay came back in. “Bjorkman’s in the locker room. He’ll be okay.”
O’Boy said, “Mr. Cuddy’s just leaving. How about you escort him to his car.”
“Fine,” said Clay, taking my gun and things from O’Boy. “I’ll give these back to you at the car.”
Clay and I walked side by side out to the parking lot. When he got to my car, he handed me my stuff, keys included, but bullets separate from gun.
Clay said, “You shouldn’t have ridden George like that.”
“He was behaving like an asshole. In the MPs, if one of my troopers ever put on a show like that, he’d be doing push-ups ’til his arms fell off.”
“George really felt for the girl. You knew that when you goaded him. By the way, he was with me all that afternoon, four o’clock on until we got the call.”
I wondered how long Clay had been listening outside the interrogation room door, but I said, “Then you and Bjorkman responded to the murder scene, right?”
“Right.”
“Anything strike you as odd?”
“Yeah, one thing.”
“What?”
“That you think I’ll give you something after you called my partner ‘Babyfat.’ Have a nice day.” Clay turned and walked away.
More impressive all the time. Except for volunteering an alibi for George.
I reloaded my revolver and holstered it. I started the car and pulled slowly to the exit driveway. A midnight-blue Mercedes, the biggest one they sell, screeched on its way in and cut me off.
A tall man in a gray suit got out from behind the wheel, slamming the door behind him. He was about forty-five and could have been Gregory Peck’s younger brother. He strode determinedly to my car window and said, “Are you John Cuddy?”
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