Kiss Them Goodbye

by Joseph Eastburn

  He then walked up to Robby Cole, who stood pushing a hand through his dark hair. Nick asked if he had gotten any leads on the victim.

  “What?” Cole said distractedly, staring down at his report.

  “Ed Crawford. Would you please find out what he’s been doing? If he had any enemies? Were there any witnesses? Like that.”

  “. . . Oh sure.”

  Fowler looked at Cole. “Are you with us today, Sergeant?”

  “I’m here,” he said curtly.

  “You’re handling the prints?”

  “Sir?”

  “Elimination prints of all the boys, prefects, and masters on the hall. Should have those by now.”

  Cole glanced again at the report he had written two hours ago and shook his head. “No prints yet.”

  “Well, get some techs up here,” Fowler said. “Standard samples are only now being taken. We waiting for Christmas or what?”

  Cole’s gaze hardened. “I put in the call, whaddaya want me to do?”

  “Call them again.”

  Now Cole had his back up. Nick Fowler didn’t pay attention as the sergeant stalked away. He got on another phone himself to connect his forensics team with the county coroner. He wanted an acid phosphatase test to discover if there were traces of semen on the dead boy.

  He was starting to unwind.

  A photographer finally arrived. Fowler watched him take endless shots of the bloodstains above the wainscoting. He made sure the photographer took enough pictures for a full sketch of the scene and pointed out more bloodstains under the window behind the garbage can.

  Fowler was studying the shape and position of the stains when the rest of the team arrived. He put one technician on prints and pointed the second tech across the hallway, where at eye level there were more blots and smudges of blood along the white walls. He watched as the man carefully scraped a crusted sample loose with a razor blade. This would go for a serology test as to blood type; it could also provide genetic markers for a whole DNA workup of the victim or assailant.

  Fowler wanted a lot of blood samples, hoping the killer had shed some in the process. He paced, wondered to himself how many hours the stains had been there. The photographer finally stood up.

  “I want ultraviolet too,” Nick said to the man before he could speak. The photographer shrugged, reached into his kit, and reloaded his camera. Fowler felt sweat building up around the holster of the police-issue .38 under his arm. He fanned himself and turned around to see a technician dusting the window ledge. His eyes were drawn to the soft brush in the man’s hand as it kept going over the same spot in the corner. “Got something?”

  “Yeah,” said the print man. “He must have taken off his gloves for a minute. Three or four points here, a loop, an arch. When I lift it, I might have something—but without a whorl, Lieutenant, forget it.”

  Nick Fowler knew he was right. The signature of a print was the whorl at the top center of each finger. He sighed and looked out the windows. The field van that the state police had sent over was now parked down near the stone arch. He knew they could process some of the evidence here, but most would have to be taken back to the lab. As he stood gazing through the glass at the manicured lawns of the back campus, he wondered if the autopsy had begun.

  He was trying to reconstruct the crime in his head. He couldn’t imagine the boy being murdered in front of these large windows. He called over one of the men assigned to him, a young cop nervously tapping his foot by the banister.

  “I’m sorry, what’s your name?”

  “Marty Orloff.”

  “Marty, see if you can find out who last emptied the garbage cans up here, and if there’s a regular schedule of collection.”

  “Okay,” the young cop said, a small smile appearing on his face.

  “These men are going to comb this whole area for fibers, hair, soils, fluids, the usual. There’s something strange about these bloodstains.”

  Marty grinned as he rocked on the balls of his feet. “Covering all your bases, huh?”

  Nick raised an eyebrow. “Why not?”

  “You don’t have to go so hard, Mr. Fowler—we know you’re a lieutenant.”

  “Thanks for reminding me,” he said. “Just do it.”

  4

  RAVENHILL WAS ONE of the finest boarding schools in New York. It sat on a hill that sloped down past a lake toward a small town that jealously guarded its eighteenth-century buildings against the march of time. All along the main street, the old structures were dilapidated, in need of paint, and many of the residents left their houses in their original condition, holding up the layers of grime as an emblem of pride to the passing years.

  Dr. Brandon Hickey was sitting alone in his office overlooking the town. His phone was ringing. He insisted on an old rotary phone in an antique black case. The tapered handle vibrated slightly in its cradle as the phone continued to peal. Fourth ring. Dr. Hickey leaned forward at his desk, staring at the noise. He didn’t move but the gray hairs in his mustache worked all around the tense circle of his mouth. Sixth ring now. He finally reached over and yanked up the receiver.

  “Yes? . . . Who is this?” One hand flapped impatiently across his desk. “Yes, Lieutenant, what can I do for you? . . . What? . . . I would be of no use to you. I was asleep when this tragic incident occurred . . . I’m sorry, Lieutenant, my plate is very full, as I’m sure you can imagine, and I—no, I’m explaining to you, I am unable to be interrogated . . . Why? . . . Because I’m in a board meeting . . . All day . . . Yes . . . Not tomorrow either . . . I’d be glad to tell you right now where I was last night—no, you listen, sir, I am the headmaster of this institution; I do not go around slaughtering students in the middle of the night. I need students. Ergo, I encourage our boys. I even chastise them at times, but I most certainly do not—you’re wasting your time . . . Fine, well you do that . . . Another day, yes . . .”

  He slammed down the phone. It was immediately ringing again. He picked it up, pressed down the receiver button, and left it off the hook. He stood up, his bony shoulder blades rotating as he pulled his sports jacket down repeatedly, straightening his tie. He was trying to ground himself and looked astonished when his oak door swung open and Elliot Allington stepped quietly in, gesturing toward Earl Hungerford, a stout, red-faced businessman wearing an open collar and polyester grays. The folds in Earl’s neck extruded like the bellows of an accordion. He was wheezing as he entered.

  “Brandon, I just wanted to say how sorry I am.”

  Dr. Hickey’s face was twitching, his mustache turned up at the ends. “Sure do appreciate you stopping by.” A glare at Allington. “Normally we make appointments in the office.”

  “As your chairman—with half the board on vacation, Brandon, I felt we had to talk.”

  “Won’t you sit down, Mr. Hungerford?”

  The man frowned, glanced back at Allington. “Elliot, get the door, will you? Hungerford’s wheeze segued to a drumroll of throat clearing, Dr. Hickey blinking to punctuate the interval. The door closed.

  “Brandon, I don’t think we need a board meeting to know that the school should be closed for a week, until things cool off, am I right?”

  “I’m sorry, that is out of the question.”

  Hungerford, owner of a chain of odd-lot stores, was not used to being refuted. He rattled his jowls as if he hadn’t heard correctly. “What?”

  “Send them home now and half of them won’t return. The answer is no.”

  “You’re not going to be pigheaded about this, are you?”

  “Rational is the word. A kind of thinking that is beyond certain people around here.”

  Hungerford thrust his neck forward. “Do you realize what the papers are going to say about this?”

  “We’re having a memorial service. We’ll invite them.” Mr. Allington nodded in agreement.

  “What the hell good is that? The gossip, Brandon, is already spreading out of control down the aisles of my stores, if you want to know.”


  “The aisles of your stores do not part the Red Sea, Mr. Hungerford, but the tuition invoices do. They are owed on the fifteenth. I have no intention of letting any of our parents fall behind on their payments.”

  Hungerford looked at Allington in disbelief. “I’m talking about damage control here. Close the school for two days, then . . . dedicate the time to young Crawford. Let us release a statement about increased security for the boys.”

  “I’ll take care of all that.”

  Hungerford stared at him. “Why, you stubborn old goat.”

  “Call the board members.”

  “By that time it will be All Hallows’ Eve, you nutcase.”

  “I’m sorry, Earl.”

  “Oh, it’s ‘Earl’ now?” His lungs gave a wheeze as he careened toward the door. “That tie is cutting off the circulation to your brain—if you have one.” He jerked the oak handle and disappeared.

  Dr. Hickey turned his stare on his assistant. “Why didn’t you tell me he was out there?”

  Allington blanched. “He just barged past me. I was on my way in to tell you there are some parents here to see you.”

  “Nothing but parents all day, Elliot. You’ll have to tell them I’m busy.”

  “Dr. Hickey . . .” He paused. “It’s Mr. and Mrs. Crawford.”

  The headmaster stiffened. The burnished wainscoting around his office reflected back a series of nervous movements—fingers pushed along the side of his hair, mustache thumbed; a deep breath was heard. The man seemed to shiver. Allington opened the door.

  Dr. Hickey stepped into his outer office. His secretary was arranging stacks of paper with jittery fingers. Her strained eyes signaled him toward a small couch where a middle-aged couple, looking frail and small, were sitting, leaning against each other for ballast, their faces drawn, their eyes resting on the carpet. Mr. Crawford looked smaller than his wife; he seemed to collapse into his suit jacket, his face pale gray. Mrs. Crawford had put on weight, her blouse tight around her shoulders; a brown perm held wisps of white hair. She didn’t seem to be breathing.

  Dr. Hickey approached them. They saw him coming and both stood up, looking hopefully at the headmaster as if his face would hold an answer. When they saw his hollow cheeks, they knew there wasn’t, and would never be, as long as they lived, an answer.

  “Mr. and Mrs. Crawford . . . I’m terribly sorry.”

  Mr. Crawford just shook his head, lost deep inside himself. Mrs. Crawford lifted her face up, her eyes, imploring at first, then turning as hard as obsidian. “How could this happen?”

  “Not in the history of the academy has a boy been . . .”

  “You said his life would begin here. You said that the day of his interview.”

  “We’re doing everything we can.”

  “There’s nothing you can do now.” Her voice was hoarse from crying. “What can anyone do now?” Mr. Crawford took a hold of his wife’s shoulders.

  “Nothing,” said Dr. Hickey.

  “That’s right, nothing.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “You let him be murdered in his sleep. You might as well have killed him yourself. His neck was . . .” Her composure vanished as her shoulders began to shudder in silent heaves, deep rolling waves, until the tears just came out. She started to wail.

  Dr. Hickey was no longer shaking. Whatever movement his body was making had disappeared inside.

  5

  FOWLER HAD SITUATED himself at a boy’s desk in an empty room on the fourth floor of Ardsley. He had been interviewing for several hours now. Ms. Coates walked in and sat down across from him on the edge of one of the twin beds.

  She was in her mid-thirties and was the only woman master in the school. She wore her brown hair in a pageboy cut, her face almost pixieish. She had a diminutive nose, dappled with light freckles, and a flawless mouth—“toy lips” Nick had heard one of the students say under his breath—now he understood. She kept her lips slightly puckered as she stared at him, suggesting an inviolate sensuality. Her ample bosom seemed to back up the stare. Her voice was surprisingly deep, though, and for all her femininity, Ms. Coates was practically a baritone.

  She was also very tall. Over six feet in heels, Nick decided, when she strode in. She seemed to wear the heels with a vengeance. She walked like a bodybuilder in stockings.

  Fowler noticed her face was tight when she sat down. Her calf muscles rippled as she pressed her knees together.

  “Ed Crawford was one of your students?”

  “I teach algebra one. All the freshman get me.” Another ripple in her face now, as if a muscle was out of control.

  “What kind of student was he?”

  “Average.”

  “Do you have any thoughts or impressions about him?”

  “He was a difficult boy . . . strongheaded . . . unruly . . . not a great student . . . but he made up for it in other ways.”

  “What ways?”

  “Oh . . . he was courteous. Turned in his assignments on time . . . he just couldn’t get it.”

  “Get what?”

  “Logarithms, mainly. And coefficients. Sine and cosine. They all just flew right out of his head.”

  “Was he distracted, worried about something?”

  Ms. Coates adjusted her posture, a slight arching of the back. “Not that I know of.”

  “Did he ever look frightened, pensive—anything like that?”

  “Not with me.”

  “I’m sorry?”

  “He was not frightened with me.”

  “You brought him out?”

  “Well, yes, I got along with him. I wasn’t privy to his innermost thoughts, mind you, but . . .”

  “Was anyone?”

  “I doubt it.”

  “Why?”

  “He was solitary. I recognize that in people because I am myself.”

  “He was a kindred spirit then?”

  “You’re a loner, too, aren’t you, Lieutenant?” She was smiling at him now.

  He looked at her. “Why the smile?”

  “You seem different from the other policeman.”

  “How?”

  “Oh, gentler, a little more refined.” She was inching forward on the sagging single mattress, her dress riding up slightly.

  His nostrils flared slightly. “That’s a nice perfume you’re wearing.”

  Her eyebrows went up in surprise. “Oh, I never wear perfume. That’s just me.” Another smile.

  A tight smile back. “If you say so.” Fowler cleared his throat. “Ms. Coates, where were you last night between two and four A.M.?”

  “In my bed at South End.”

  “Anyone who can confirm that?”

  “I was alone.”

  “The students at South End—might any of them have seen you retire?”

  “Look, Lieutenant.” The hips swiveled around so her knees were aimed at him. She tugged her skirt down, then smoothed her leg very slowly. “I don’t check in with the dorm before I put on my nightie. Those boys are very impressionable.”

  Fowler was staring at her now, not saying anything. He noticed her return the stare, getting self-conscious, her allure suddenly tempered by an icy change of posture, her shoulders back, her face drawn.

  “Something wrong?”

  “Do you think there’s something wrong, Lieutenant?”

  “Well, you seem insulted, Ms. Coates.”

  “Do I?”

  “When was the last time you saw Crawford alive?”

  “In class yesterday, of course.”

  “Why, ‘of course?’”

  “Well, these questions are getting exasperating.”

  “Are they?”

  “Yes! Can we please finish up? I have tests to correct.” She was adjusting her skirt down now.

  “What was he wearing the last time you saw him?”

  “How should I know? I have a class full of boys.”

  “Where did he sit in your class?”

  Again the hips swivelin
g like a turret, knees apart. “Look, in the front row, for God’s sake . . . he probably had on a pair of slacks and a sports jacket like all the boys.”

  “White shirt?”

  An impatient glare. “They’re required. What does this have to do with anything?”

  Fowler watched the anger flow into her features. “Ms. Coates, the deceased’s parents identified certain things as missing: pictures of the boy, a letter jacket everyone saw him wear. Name tags were ripped out of his underclothes.”

  Ms. Coates suddenly looked very saddened.

  He watched her. “Who would do that, Ms. Coates?”

  “How should I know?”

  “Did he have any enemies?”

  “Crawford was a good kid,” she said wistfully. “I’m sorry this happened to him.”

  “Why did you get upset just now?”

  “Well, I don’t care for your tone.”

  “What is my tone?”

  “I take back what I said before—you are like the other men.” She was shaking her head. “Typical, emotionless male.”

  “My job is to be emotionless.”

  “It’s more than that, Lieutenant. There’s something—disconnected about you.”

  Fowler felt the sting of that. He worried for an instant that she might be right. “In case you’ve forgotten, Ms. Coates, we had a gruesome murder here last night. A boy was very likely tortured.”

  “Oh, please don’t.”

  He was staring at her, more curious, watching her squirm as if her clothes were too tight. “All right.”

  “Can I go?”

  “Ms. Coates, who do you think killed Ed Crawford?”

  “Look, I don’t know. One of the janitors, maybe. They give me the creeps.”

  “Why not a faculty member?”

  Overly casual. “Why not?”

  “I may need to speak to you again.”

  She looked him in the eye. “My pleasure.”

  She sprang off the mattress and stood in front of him. She shook her hair out and did a runway turn.

  BALLARD AWOKE BEHIND the oak tree on the edge of the hill. He rubbed his eyes. The town looked like a burning postcard. He wondered how long he had been sleeping, then noticed the sun was high now. He was afraid to go upstairs, afraid to go to class. He turned around and caught a glimpse of Mabel shaking a dust mop into the air outside the basement door of Madison Hall. Mabel was the old, gray-haired matriarch of the wombats.