Safe at Home (16 page)

Sandy turned out to be true to his word. While I prepared some potatoes to roast with garlic, he tore and washed the greens, sliced onions, peppers, and mushrooms, then made a delicious dressing, with my tasting assistance.

My preparations were interrupted by a phone call from the paper. The front page wanted me to dictate an eyewitness story to the rewrite desk.

“I’ll call you back in five minutes,” I said.

I explained to Sandy what was left to do to the potatoes, then went to my study to collect my thoughts. I decided it was easier to write the story than to dictate it. I think better with my fingers than my mouth. My portable computer was already set up. I wrote a short story, mentioning Joe’s role in the capture. I had to be careful that I only wrote what I had seen, not anything I knew because of my conversations with Andy. I transmitted it over the phone to the office computer, then called Jake.

“You should have something in now. Do you want to check?”

“Yeah, it’s here,” he said, a few minutes later. “I’ll get it over to the news desk.”

“What’s going on down there?”

“What do you think? A staffer is charged with the most horrible crimes the city has ever seen. The city editor has come in to stage-manage the coverage. We can’t ignore it, but it’s not something we can really run with, under the circumstances.”

“For the first time in the history of the
Planet
, you’re hoping there’s a publication ban soon.”

“You got it.”

“You have to say something.”

“Well, he’s innocent until proven guilty. Right now, the news side is more worried about covering our asses than anything else. That’s from the publisher on down.”

“I don’t envy you,” I said.

“I don’t have to worry about the coverage, but I hired the guy, for Christ’s sake.”

“No one could have known, Jake.”

“Yeah, I guess. What are you going to do tomorrow? Are you all right to go to Detroit, or do you have to stick around to give evidence or something?”

“I’ll be doing that later tonight. I’ll be ready to go tomorrow. The charter doesn’t leave until noon. If I have to, I’ll take a later flight.”

“I can send someone else if you like.”

“No, I’d rather get out of here.”

“All right. Let me know what’s happening.”

“I’ll call you in the morning.”

I went back to the garden and told Joe what I had written.

“I mentioned your name, too, Sandy,” I said, hesitantly. “I described you as a friend of Joe’s. I hope that’s not a problem.”

“It’s the truth,” he said.

“This might take some of the heat off you, Joe,” Sally said. “You’re a real hero now.”

“It was no big deal,” he shrugged. “He was just a little guy.”

“Big enough,” I said.

“What will happen to him?” T.C. asked.

“If he’s found guilty, I don’t guess he’ll ever ever get out of jail,” I said.

“Not if I can help it,” said Andy, who had overheard us as he came into the yard, along with a uniformed constable. A very attractive female constable, in fact, with blonde hair and dimples. He went immediately to Sally and hugged her. I hung back, waiting for his move.

“Are you all right?” he asked, a little stiffly.

“Fine. I’m just appalled that I didn’t figure it out sooner.”

“How do you think I feel? It’s my job, not yours.”

“Do we know for sure?”

“He’s the one, all right.”

“Did he confess?”

“Not yet. But he will. His kind always does, eventually.”

“I sat at the desk next to him for a year,” I said. “I can’t believe I didn’t notice something about him.”

“It’s always that way,” Sandy said. “Whenever something like this happens, don’t all the neighbours say what a quiet person the murderer was? It’s weird.”

“I know it’s the great cliché, but I always figured those neighbours were either really stupid or didn’t know the killer well,” I said. “But I
knew
Dickie. I had lunch with him. We had beers after work. He was just a normal guy. A bit of an asshole, sometimes, but I had no clue.”

“Don’t beat yourself up about it, Kate,” Andy said. “There’s no way you could have known. That’s one of the most frightening things about serial killers. Because they really don’t believe what they are doing is wrong, it doesn’t affect them. They can kill, then go about their business.”

“But Dickie couldn’t, could he?” I asked. “He wanted to get caught. He laid it all out for me. He was pleading for my help.”

“And gave you good reason to catch him by threatening T.C., too,” Andy agreed. “It happens that way sometimes. It’s as if there is a more rational half of the personality trying to gain control.”

“What would have happened if I hadn’t figured it out?”

“He would have killed T.C.,” Andy said. “To punish you for not being as smart as you thought. I don’t think your friend Dickie was too fond of you.”

“Jesus,” I said.

“Yeah,” Andy said. “T.C., are you ready to talk to me? I don’t want to take you away from your dinner.”

“I’m finished,” he said, getting up from the table.

“Can we talk inside?” Andy asked Sally.

“Sure. Shall I come?”

“If you like. And I would really appreciate a coffee, if you could manage it.”

“Do you want something to eat?” I asked Andy. “I’m just about to cook.”

“No. I had a sandwich. I have to get statements from you and Joe and Sandy, too. Then I have to get back to the office. I’ve left your friend with Jim.”

“Don’t call him my friend, please,” I said.

“Sorry, let’s go T.C.”

It didn’t take long, but by the time he came back, we were all a little drunk. Screaming tension and three bottles of wine will do that every time. Sandy was telling stories about Joe’s first days at the health club, and we were laughing until the tears ran down our faces.

Andy looked at the dirty dishes and empty wine bottles with dismay.

“Great interviews I’m going to have here,” Andy said, more grumpily than I thought completely justified.

“No, it’s fine,” I said. “Don’t get your drawers in a knot. Do you want to talk to us separately or together?”

“One at a time,” he said. “Joe first. Do you mind if I use your place, Kate? Sally is getting T.C. to bed.”

“No problem. You know your way.”

It took an hour for us to all tell our stories. The constable left at 9:00, and Joe and Sandy shortly afterwards.

They didn’t take the car. Nothing like having a cop in residence to change one’s mind about driving drunk.

“I’ll come get it in the morning,” Sandy said.

“Knock on the door, and I’ll give you a cup of coffee.”

Hugs all around. I was almost sorry to see them go. I wasn’t looking forward to the scene with Andy.

I closed the door, and we stood for a moment in silence. Then we both started speaking at once. When I realized that he was apologizing, too, I shut up.

“It was my fear coming out in anger,” he explained. “When the dispatcher told me your message, I went crazy.”

I, of course, began to cry, while he looked embarrassed.

“But, goddamn it, you shouldn’t have gone to the park and put both of you in danger,” he said.

He was right, but I was saved from admitting it by the telephone. A vaguely familiar woman’s voice asked for Andy. He talked with his arm around me. It was obvious that he was being interviewed. He ran through the story in an extremely circumspect manner, using all the tortuous circumlocutions cops hold so dear, then handed the phone to me, with a wicked smile.

“Hello, Kate, it’s Margaret Papadakis. I wonder if you would mind telling me about what happened in Withrow Park today. I gather you were quite the heroine.”

It was the sound of someone speaking through clenched teeth.

Andy left shortly after my conversation with Margaret, and didn’t come back until 2:00, by which time I was long asleep. I woke just enough to notice he was there. He wriggled, settling himself into a comfortable position to sleep, rather like a dog circling his sleeping spot before he lies down. We were both too exhausted to do anything more than exchange affectionate murmurs.

The next morning we read all the papers over coffee. There were banner headlines in my own paper, with Margaret’s story on the front page, along with statements from the publisher and managing editor. Both emphasized the presumption of innocence, and that Dickie had no criminal record. They had also provided him with a high-profile lawyer, the kind of guy who, when he takes a case, everyone assumes his client is guilty.

There were two more pages inside the front section devoted to the story. My eyewitness account was there, along with interviews with kids who were in the park when it happened, and predictable statements from some of my colleagues: “I can’t believe it . . . he was so quiet . . . he just did his job . . . we never suspected . . . this can’t be true.” There was a photograph of Dickie and Beth, captioned, inevitably, “In happier days.” And there was a picture of me, too.

“Margaret’s story is a piece of work,” Andy said, when it was his turn to read the story. “She doesn’t seem to want you to get any credit in the arrest.”

“And then the headline writers put ‘Our Kate’ all over the rest of the page,” I laughed.

The
World
was low-key in its story. The self-important grey journal of record seldom stooped to reporting local stories, keeping its national audience in mind. Serial murder is still rare enough in this country that they did give it a full page, with a small story on the front. I was referred to as “a local sports reporter.” So was Dickie.

The
Mirror
took Dickie’s logo shot from his
Planet
column and blew it up to fill the tabloid front page, a nice touch in a competitive newspaper market. There were four more pages on Dickie and the arrest inside, but the scantily clad brunette on page three expressed no opinions.

Andy was out the door by 9:00, assuring me that any business the police had with me could be conducted over the phone. Personal business was another matter, but I didn’t need to stay in the city. I called Jake and told him I would be able to make the Titan charter and packed for the six-day road trip to Detroit and Cleveland.

I was depressed, for some reason. I guess it was a natural rebound from the adrenalin high I’d been through the day before. I didn’t much feel like a road trip, but staying home would be worse. I wanted to get away from the newspapers and broadcasts.

I got to the airport half an hour early, dropped off my bag with the travelling secretary, who gave me the gate number and my boarding pass, then went to the self-serve coffee shop to wait. Stinger Swain and Goober Grabowski were a few places ahead of me in line. They didn’t see me, but I was close enough to overhear them.

“The way I figure it,” Swain declaimed to his sidekick, “Preacher was just jealous. He wanted the little boy for his self.”

Grabowski didn’t share in his buddy’s guffaws.

“I don’t know, Stinger,” he frowned. “The guy had a knife and all. I think it was pretty brave of Joe.”

Wonder of wonder. Dissension in the redneck ranks.

“Don’t you go getting soft on me,” Swain scoffed, as they got to the cash register. “You got any of that funny money on you? I’ve only got American.”

Grabowski pulled out a handful of coloured Canadian bills and dropped a blue one on the counter.

“You’re gonna owe me one in Dee-troit,” he grumbled, picking up his change.

I couldn’t resist stopping by their table.

“I see someone read the newspapers to you this morning, Stinger,” I said.

“Oh, looky. Here’s the lady detective,” he sneered. “When you going to start wearing a badge?”

“Our heroine,” Grabowski chimed in.

“I couldn’t have done it without Preacher,” I said. “He was the real hero. What he and his friend did really took balls. Don’t you think?”

That shut them up. For the moment, anyway. I went to the farthest empty table I could find and opened my book.

Gradually, half a dozen other players drifted in to the coffee shop, dressed according to the Titan travel code, in jackets and ties. Some of them were more sartorially splendid than others. Eddie Carter had on his usual silk Italian number, with pleats in his pants straight out of the forties. Gloves was professorial in a tweed sports jacket. Tiny challenged the seams of his pin-striped suit. Kid Cooper, the rookie, was with him, dressed in something that looked as if he had bought it for his high school graduation. He probably had. Atsuo Watanabe was a surprise, all in black and white, very high fashion, with an unconstructed jacket and soft kid leather shoes.

I overheard a lot more conversation about Dickie’s arrest, of course. A couple of the players stopped by my table to talk about it. But Preacher didn’t appear until just before it was time to board. When he walked into the departure lounge, Eddie Carter was the first to cross the room and shake his hand. He wasn’t the only one.

It wasn’t exactly high fives all around, but a dozen players offered manly punches on the shoulder and awkward pats on the back. Joe smiled shyly and mumbled his thanks.

We got on the plane and settled into our usual seats. First came Red O’Brien and the coaches and other team personnel, followed by the writers and broadcasters, with the players in their own territory in the rear. Joe ended up in the row just behind me, with Tiny on the aisle seat next to him.

“So, what do you think of the Preacher now, Kate Henry?” boomed the deposed first baseman. “Ain’t he the man?”

“He sure is, Tiny,” I said, over my shoulder. “How are you doing today, Joe?”

“I’m fine. How’s T.C.?”

“I haven’t seen him since last night, but I’m sure he’s fine. He’s going to be the most important kid in his class. He’ll love it.”

“Of course, it was just luck,” Tiny said. “The man just happened to be at the right place. I can’t remember when I’ve been invited over to Kate’s house for some barbecue.”

I turned in my seat to check that his teasing smile was in place before answering.

“If I had to feed you, Tiny, I’d have to take a second mortgage out on my house.”

“And you know it,” he said.

Keith Jarvis, the
Mirror
beat writer, was the last one on the plane, breathless and rumpled.

“Damn cab had a flat on the 427,” he said, stepping over me to his window seat. His shoulder bag whacked me in the jaw. The plane’s engines had started by the time he got his seat belt fastened.

“You gotta get up a bit earlier in the morning, Keith,” Tiny said. “Especially if you want to beat Kate Henry to a story.”

Jarvis glared at me. I reached back and punched Tiny’s knee.

“Well, Tiny,” Jarvis said. “It’s hard to compete with a paper that will do anything for a story, even hire a murderer.”

I opened my book and got set for a bumpy ride.