His first stop today would be Declan’s high school before the rest of the press descended. He called Laura.
“Taylor! Christ, Worthless is trying to fire you.”
“That he is. You know Eli Prep?”
“Of course.”
“Is that the one you went to?”
“Just because it’s a private school on the Eastside doesn’t mean—”
“Please, I don’t have time.”
“No, I went to Dalton.”
“You know Eli?”
“Well enough.”
“Good. You’re coming with me. Declan McNally went there and I’m going to need help talking to those kids.”
“They’re not going to speak Latin.”
“Latin, pig Latin, it’ll all be Greek to me. I want someone who can read them. Meet me at the stairs to the uptown 6.”
Chapter 10
Taylor and Laura walked west on 99th Street into an icy wind. As they reached Fifth Avenue, he held up his hand, turned downtown and walked in the wrong direction like he meant to go that way.
“What is it?”
“Two detectives coming out of Eli. Demarco and Simone.”
They went around the block once. Taylor checked to make sure the unmarked Ford sedan was gone before approaching the iron gates of the private school.
“These kids are going to be upset,” Laura said.
“They won’t be surprised to see us. Their families move and shake this city. Everything they do is news. A death in their midst ….”
“That’s cynical.”
“We’ll see.”
They went through the half-opened gates, across a cobbled driveway to an archway with the school name carved into stone, and entered the granite building.
Taylor held the door for her. “We can’t go into classrooms. I was thinking his activities. Yearbook and lacrosse.”
Laura checked her watch. “Classes don’t end for another twenty minutes, so no winter practice yet.”
Taylor gave her a look.
“I called ahead to check the schedule. I’d say the yearbook office.”
“Office?”
“My yearbook had an office. A nice one.”
“MT’s newsroom must have been some come-down for you.”
She spread her arms. “Money makes this world go around.”
“I’ve told you. Greek to me.”
A girl and two boys sat at a circular table in the yearbook office. The front wall was covered with black and white proof sheets. Layout tables, identical to the professional ones in the MT’s production shop, lined the back of the room. The three kids talked in hushed near-whispers and went silent when Taylor and Laura entered.
The girl, a brunette with the figure of a woman, sniffled and gripped the cuff of her navy sweater with her fingers to wipe away tears. “You’re here about Dec.”
“I’m very sorry about what’s happened. I’m Taylor from the Messenger-Telegram. This is Laura Wheeler.”
“The cops just left.”
One of the two boys wore a red-and-yellow-striped tie and a blue tweed blazer with a school patch stitched on the pocket. The other boy was in the same uniform, though he had no tie and his shirttails were out. He had an expensive German-make camera around his neck.
“It’s best if they do their interviews first.”
“What do you want?” The boy without the camera looked steadily at Taylor.
“To find out about Declan. See if we can figure out what happened. And why.”
“You’re going to do some kind of Woodward and Bernstein thing? Solve the crime before the cops?” It was the same kid. He didn’t sound convinced.
“I never know what I’m going to find until I find it.” Taylor gestured to a chair next to a desk covered with more photos. The three teens didn’t object, so he slid it closer and sat down without actually joining them at the table. Laura took a chair near the wall. He was glad she didn’t crowd the interview. The girl was Carolyn Marie Bancroft and the boys were Reginald Morton and Dickie Bennett. Bennett fingered his camera and looked warily at Taylor’s notebook.
“You all knew Declan?”
“We all know everyone.” Morton straightened the knot of his tie. “Everyone’s everyone.”
“Tell me about him.”
“This is only going to make it more real.” Bancroft took in a breath and pressed the sleeve to her mouth. She stood and was crying before she reached the door. Laura nodded at Taylor and slipped out behind the girl.
“C’mon,” Morton said. “We’ve all got to get real about this.”
“It can be hard to deal with.” Taylor moved his chair a little closer.
“Later to that. Much later. Bancroft’s being a drama queen. There’s going to be a whole lot of that going around. She’s had a crush on McNally for—Christ, since freshman year. He ignored her. Like everyone who couldn’t do something for him. She’s going to forget that. Everyone’s going to forget what an asshole Dec really was.”
“He’s dead,” said Bennett. “Don’t say that to the paper.”
“What do you know? You took half the damn pictures for the yearbook and he didn’t even know your name.”
Bennett looked at the camera. “He knew it.”
“What did Declan do to make you so angry?” Taylor asked.
“For one, got me nailed for cheating. The headmaster learned the answers were in my bag. Right where McNally put them. If my father weren’t on the Board of Visitors, I’d be gone.”
“You can prove he put them there?”
“He told me he was stealing the key to the trig midterm.”
“Why’d he set you up?”
“I was a well-timed distraction. The headmaster was about to get him for all the cheating he was doing. I stayed clear after that. Only thing to do with McNally. If you don’t believe me, ask some of the others. Find someone who’ll be honest with you. Ask his best friend. Ronald Carlson and McNally played lacrosse together since freshman year. That didn’t matter to McNally. He stole Ronald’s girlfriend. Everyone talks about it.”
“What’s the girlfriend’s name?”
“Marcella Roberts.”
“Any idea where I can find her?”
“I don’t know about Marcella. She’s probably gone home to cry. Now I don’t like to gossip ….”
“No, please go on.”
“McNally was selling drugs.”
“How do you know that?”
“From Carolyn. She follows him around school like a puppy dog. One day he used the pay phone by the cafeteria. She heard him making a deal. He met a guy at the corner. Definitely not at Eli. Passed money for a package. Carolyn saw it all. She’s such an idiot. She decided that made McNally even cooler.”
“Do you know for sure there were drugs in the package?”
“I know what she said. She said it was drugs.”
Morton sure wasn’t holding back. Gang members showed more sympathy for the dead. Maybe Taylor was out of touch. On the police beat, he didn’t spend time interviewing upper class kids. Anyone upper class really.
“Any idea what happened to Declan after he left his house Sunday night?”
“I don’t even know how he died. We’re hearing some pretty freaky stuff.”
“You didn’t see him that night?”
“No way, man. I was home. I went out Monday night.”
“Were you with anyone?”
“Sure. Eight of us went to see The Towering Inferno. It was the monthly meeting of the Eli Drive-In Movie Club.” He squeezed his hands together. “We’re kids, so we don’t understand death. Right? We’re supposed to go all to pieces. Run to our parents and cry all day and night. My grandparents died. The things that were said. All the bad stuff was left out. Gone. That’s what we’re supposed to do with death.”
“You’re just being honest then?”
“Because of all this bullshit hypocrisy.”
Taylor turned to Bennett. “What do you know a
bout Declan?”
“I won’t lie. I’ve heard some things. I’ve seen some things too. Why do we have to talk about that now? He’s got family—”
“Climbers, all of them.” Morton walked to the door. “He didn’t belong at this school. New money. A family of political hacks and flatfoots. Real goddamn grunters. When my father heard Declan was coming here, he about dumped the Scotch on the rocks in his lap. He says there’s a reason Eli is selective.”
He left.
Bennett went to the table piled with black-and-white prints. He brushed his hand over the photos, moving sheets from side to side, uncovering different pictures, shifting, looking at others. He pulled out one, then two more. He handed them over and narrated as Taylor flipped through the headshots. “Marcella Roberts. Ronald Carlson. Martin van der Meer.”
Taylor looked up at the third name.
“He’s the lacrosse captain. He’ll know as much as Ronald. He’s the one guy on the team better than Declan. Martin winning to be captain was the only time Declan got beat at anything. To be honest, I don’t think you’ll find out what happened here at the school. It’s out there.” Bennett looked through the leaded glass window at Central Park covered in snow. “I understand you have to ask. It would make a much better story if kids were involved.”
The boy shook his head and left. He was right; it would. Why did Bennett take the trouble to pick out the headshots yet say almost nothing? Did his silence mean more than Morton’s anger? Was he pointing to something? Right now, Taylor needed to get to more students before the building emptied for the day. Other reporters wouldn’t be far behind, and then the TV stations. They’d put McNally’s schoolmates through the Eyewitness News mill, trampling over everyone and everything.
Outside the office, natural light brightened the hallway from windows on the left. Taylor passed small knots of students talking quietly. They glanced over as he passed; here was another stranger among them after news of a death. He tried to talk to a pair of boys, but they backed away as soon as he identified himself. He didn’t push it. As soon as school officials found out he was here, he’d lose his shot at finding out anything else.
Laura came up from behind. “The gym?”
“Yes. What did Carolyn say?”
“He should have been lacrosse captain. He was the very best. At everything, apparently.”
“She didn’t wish him dead, then?”
“Not at all. He was the bad boy, and she liked him for it.”
“Any details?”
“Drug dealing. She said he went up to Columbia and sold to Eli alumni. At least, that was the word from the younger brothers and sisters of alumni. Guess he was smart enough not to do it here. Carolyn saw him trade a wad of cash for a package over on Madison.”
“That backs up what Reginald Morton told me, whatever his motives. Great reporting.”
Her face reddened at the praise, and the flush moved down her neck to the top of her chest. His eyes lingered there a moment before he looked down the hall. They set off in the direction of practice.
The highly polished gym floor reflected boys moving in patterns and swinging sticks that spat out balls. They zigzagged, stopped, turned, caught, and hurled. The sport was alien to Taylor. Growing up, he played stickball and handball and the other games invented for concrete and tight spaces. These boys wore pads and helmets like those for football. They wielded the sticks like weapons. Looked like a great way for well-off kids to beat on each other.
The bleachers were maple-colored and shiny like the floor. Twenty or so kids watched the practice. The basketball hoops gave the gym a modern touch, with the clear Plexiglas backboards the ABA used. Up high in the far wall, the winter sun split into reds, blues, golds, purples and greens as it came through a stained glass window. Figures running, rowing and wrestling surrounded the school crest. This gym was a temple.
A coach in a white sports shirt and tight blue shorts yelled instructions. Except for “hustle” and “faster,” Taylor didn’t understand a thing. The whistle blew, and the running stopped. Boys pulled their helmets off. Their hands fell to their knees as they blew hard. Taylor picked out Ronald Carlson and Martin van der Meer.
“I’m going to interview those two. See if you can get anything out of these kids watching.” He walked over. “Can I talk with you about Declan McNally?”
The teens became somber.
“You are …?” asked van der Meer.
“Taylor with the Messenger-Telegram.”
“What do you want to know?”
“I understand he was a good lacrosse player.”
“He was one of our best. It’s a blow to the team. To the whole school.” Van der Meer stood half a head taller than Carlson and just even with Taylor. His muscled torso stretched a gray practice T-shirt tight across his chest.
“He wanted to be captain, but you beat him out, right?”
“That was the coach’s decision. An honor. I already told you. Declan was one of our best players.”
“Were you friends?”
“We were teammates. Nothing’s more important than that. What’s the point of this?”
“His death is suspicious. I’m trying to figure out what happened to him.” Taylor pointed at Carlson with his pen. “He was your best friend?”
“Yeah, for a long time.” Carlson’s close-set blue eyes made him look angry. There was a nasty purple-brown bruise under his left eye.
“How did you feel when he started dating Marcella Roberts?”
“You think I did something to Declan because of Marcella?” Carlson edged closer.
Van der Meer swung his stick onto his shoulder, at the ready.
“I was done with Marcella. She was welcome to go with anyone she wanted. You have no right coming in here and asking questions like this.”
Something whistled past Taylor’s head, lifting his hair. The lacrosse ball smacked the gym wall and bounced right back at him. In the same instant, van der Meer’s stick swung toward Taylor’s face. He ducked, but van der Meer wasn’t aiming for him. Instead, the big teenager caught the ball. Everyone nearby laughed as Taylor came up from a crouch.
“What are you doing talking to my players?” The coach tossed and caught a second ball. He strode up to Taylor and the two boys. “Nobody talks to my players without my permission. Heads up, Carlson!” The coach whipped the second ball in Taylor’s direction, and this time, before he could even think of ducking, the mesh net at the end of Carlson’s stick caught the ball at chest height. “Little slow, Carlson. Or maybe not slow enough. Now both of you get showered.”
They walked off, laughing.
“Leave my gym now. Or I can find a police officer.”
Laura joined him at the gym doors.
“The kids tell you anything?”
“Couple might have. You were putting on too good a show. Apparently no one interrupts coach’s practice. Ever.”
“He’s being protective, that’s all. The two boys, though. There is something there. I need to talk with them again. You never know when a relationship is involved.”
“C’mon, Taylor. These kids go for melodrama, not tragedy.”
He found the words his father shoved into his head years earlier. “ ‘All thoughts, all passions, all delights. Whatever stirs this mortal frame. All are but ministers of Love. And feed his sacred flame.’ ”
“Quoting poetry now? There are depths to you I don’t know.”
“Coleridge, from ‘Love.’ We all act on passions. Even these kids. Maybe Carlson killed McNally over the girl.”
“If you say so. Sounds like a stretch to me. When did you learn those lines?”
“I’ll tell you all about that someday. My father recited Coleridge a lot. Over drinks. Lots and lots of drinks.”
“My quote for you, from Tolstoy. ‘Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.’ ”
“You come to school, you learn so much.”
“Keep studying. You’
ll get there.”
Why did he bring up the damn poem? He didn’t need those lines to make the point. To show Laura how smart he was while standing in a school that was so much more her element? If so, he was actually an idiot.
Taylor pushed open the door to the icy golden air of the late afternoon and held it for Laura.
“Let’s eat down in the Village,” she said as she walked out ahead of him. “We’re still getting drinks, right?”
“I may be out sick, but I think I can manage.”
“You look all right to me. CBGB has The Ramones and Patti Smith. It’ll be a blast.”
He turned east toward Lex. “CB what?”
“Don’t play like you don’t know. It’s the punk rock club.”
“I guess these aren’t the same punks from my old neighborhood in Queens.”
“Funny you should mention it. The Ramones are from Forest Hills. They’re the best. Fast, angry, funny rock and roll. It’s the answer to disco and all that old hippie stuff.”
“Careful. That old hippie stuff is my refuge from disco.”
Chapter 11
Taylor pulled open the door to Ray’s Pizza on Broadway at Bleecker. “Lou Reed and Velvet Underground. They rock and roll.”
They’d talked music the entire ride down on the subway.
“See, you like punk after all. The Underground invented it. Oh, everyone argues. I know. They came first.”
“Rock ’n’ Roll Animal is the all time number one live album. All time.”
“Exactly.”
Taylor had Laura get a booth while he ordered two slices for himself and one for her, a Tab, and a Miller High Life. He folded one slice in half and polished it off quickly. It tasted so good. Laura looked on, bemused, and worked on hers more slowly.
“Now, what do we have?” He sat back, opened the notebook and drank the beer.
“Well, I think the two Eli boys—”
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