The Rag and Bone Shop (7 page)

I want to get out of here.

He realized that he
could
get out of there. He could simply get up and leave. He didn’t have to even speak to anybody. Hadn’t they said this was voluntary? He was a volunteer. Well, he didn’t feel like being a volunteer anymore. He wanted to go home.

Jason pushed back his chair, winced at the scraping sound on the bare wooden floor and made his way to the door.

T
he office was empty, the boy gone.

Trent stepped back into the hallway, saw Sarah Downes disappearing around the corner at the far end and no one else in sight. The boy had obviously left the building, most likely escaping through the rear entrance. The word
escape
gave Trent a measure of satisfaction. Escape was certainly an indication of guilt. Why would the boy flee if he was innocent?

Hurrying down the hallway to the rear door, he swung it open and stepped, blinking, into a blast of sunlight.

Waiting for his eyes to adjust, Trent saw the outlines of two cruisers parked at haphazard angles and a figure approaching an overflowing Dumpster. As his vision cleared, he saw that the figure was a derelict about to forage in the Dumpster.

He spotted the boy standing at the entrance of the parking area, shoulders drooping, head down as if studying the pavement for answers to questions that Trent could only guess at.

“Jason,” he called.

The boy glanced up, saw Trent, frowned, swayed slightly as if trying to make up his mind whether to stay or leave.

“Stay, please,” Trent said, going toward him.

Why was he keeping the kid here? If he left, alarms would sound and a search would be launched and all of it would point to the boy’s guilt.

I need him. I need him to confess to me.

“I’m sorry,” the boy said.

They stepped into the shadows of an ancient brick building, its walls scrawled with graffiti. Trent checked the cruisers, saw that they were unoccupied. The derelict was busy looking through the debris on top of the Dumpster.

“What made you leave?” Trent asked, genuinely curious.

“I want to go home. I don’t have anything to tell you.”

“Let me be the judge of that. But you can’t leave like this. It makes you look suspicious.”

Startled, the boy could only repeat the word. “Suspicious?”

“Look, no one has seen you leave. Let’s go back inside. You may have more information than you think you have.”

A cruiser swerved into the lot and pulled up in front of them, the sunlight flashing on the windshield. They stepped aside to let it pass.

“Okay,” said the boy, sighing, doubt still in his eyes. He seemed frail, vulnerable. “Okay,” he said again.

And allowed Trent to lead him back inside police headquarters.

"
L
et’s forget that you tried to escape, all right?”

Trent knew it was important to enter that vital word into the record and he leaned back with satisfaction, waiting for the boy’s answer.

“All right,” Jason said, glad to change the subject and move on with the questioning and get it over with. Yet he was dimly bothered by that word
escape
. Like he’d had a reason to run away besides just wanting to get out of there. Like he was guilty of something.

“Before we go back to what you witnessed on Monday, let me ask you some questions about Alicia. You were friends, weren’t you?”

Jason nodded, relieved to be off on another subject, even if it was a sad subject.

“Let’s see. You’re twelve and she was seven, and yet you were friends. Did that seem unusual to you?”

“She was a nice little kid. And she was always happy to see me.” Which was more than he could say about Brad and some other kids in the neighborhood, he thought, but didn’t bother Mr. Trent with that information.

“You liked visiting her?”

“Sure.” He wouldn’t have visited her if he hadn’t liked her.

“You said earlier that you helped her with the jigsaw puzzle. What was the subject of the puzzle?”

“A cardinal. The bird. Big. It practically covered the whole card table she’d set up on the patio. A thousand pieces. She was very good at spotting pieces. And it was a hard puzzle because all the red colors looked alike, just shaded a little. I could hardly tell them apart but she didn’t make . . .” And he stopped.

“Didn’t make what?”

Jason realized how quickly Mr. Trent picked up on anything he didn’t want to talk about.

Mr. Trent waited patiently.

What was the harm in telling him? “Make fun of me,” he said. Knowing how pathetic he sounded.

“Like the other kids, you mean?”

Jason nodded. Each admission he made depressed him. He had a feeling that he was telling this man too much about himself.

“Did Alicia make fun of you sometimes, though? You know, good friends sometimes poke fun at each other. Did Alicia?”

Jason smiled at a sudden memory. Alicia mocking him when he finally did manage to place a piece in the puzzle, imitating the careful way he would fit the piece into the slot, humming as he did so, a habit he had developed whenever he accomplished something. She imitated him perfectly.

“Yes,” Jason said, his voice gentle with reminiscence and sadness, too, acknowledging again that she was dead.

“Did this upset you?”

“No.” But the image of Alicia dead and the way she must have looked hidden under the brush and branches when they found her caused him to shudder a bit.

“You seem upset at the memory of Alicia poking fun at you,” Trent said.

“No . . . I mean, it’s not that,” Jason said, discombobulated now, confused by the sad memory and Mr. Trent’s sudden question. “I was thinking of her just now. How it must have been, you know, how she must have looked when they found her in the woods.”

“How did she look?”

“Terrible, all covered over like that.”

“Covered over with what?”

“Branches and bushes and stuff.”

“Does that upset you?”

The question, in fact this entire line of questioning, made Jason pause before replying. He didn’t want to talk anymore about these things with a stranger like this man. It was like Trent was trying to peek into his heart.

“I don’t want to talk about it,” Jason said.

“About Alicia and the way she was found?”

Jason nodded.

“I realize how tough this must be for you, since she was such a good friend. But sometimes it’s better to talk. Instead of keeping it all inside. Maybe this questioning can help you personally as well as help the investigation.”

“How can it help me?” Jason asked, mollified a bit. Mr. Trent’s voice had become soft and tender, his attitude suddenly sympathetic.

“There are such things as trauma, Jason. Shock. When something like this happens, the death of a friend, it can affect you emotionally, deeper than you think. And it’s sometimes good to express your sadness and your anger and your regret . . .”

“Regret?” The word sounded strange.

“Something you’re sorry about.”

“I’m sorry Alicia’s . . . I mean, I’m sorry about what happened to Alicia, but what else can I be sorry about?”

“That’s for you to say, Jason. That’s a question you have to answer. I can’t answer for you.”

Jason, puzzled and confused again, was aware of his thirst returning. Mr. Trent had forgotten to bring him a drink. His mouth was dry, tongue parched. He was afraid he might choke if he tried to swallow. He had heard somewhere that swallowing was a reflex action, that people couldn’t help swallowing. Suppose he swallowed now and began to choke? He was aware, too, that he was sweating, that his T-shirt was stuck to his back, the perspiration like glue between his flesh and the cloth. He gulped in sudden panic. When he spoke, his voice emerged in a kind of croak, like a frog’s voice.

“What?” Mr. Trent asked.

Jason was relieved that he had found enough spit to swallow without choking. “I’m thirsty,” he said. “Can I have a glass of water?”

He saw the questioner hesitate.

“I won’t try to escape again,” he said, immediately sorry that he had used the word.

“You seem upset. Upset about being sorry?”

“I’m just thirsty,” Jason said.

“All right,” Trent said. “I’ll find you something to drink. You’re important to this investigation, Jason, and if having a drink will make you feel better, then you’ll have your drink.”

Why did the words sound threatening? Like his thirst was some kind of admission. But of what?

Trent went to the door, knowing that he was departing from protocol, breaking the rules. But his success was largely the result of following his instincts and his instincts here told him to tread lightly, to treat the boy gently, to gain his entire confidence. He wondered if Sarah was back in the corridor with any news.

The corridor was empty.

He looked for a vending machine, found one tucked in an alcove near the back entrance.

Returning with a can of Coke Classic cold in his hand, he waited for a moment outside the door, hoping for a glimpse of someone, anyone. Suddenly lonely, an emotion foreign to him, he went into the office.

Jason received the Coke with a murmur of thanks and asked: “Did you get one, too?”

Trent shook his head. He suspended all hunger and thirst during interrogations, but the question surprised him. Subjects never considered him beyond his role as an interrogator, never made any personal remarks or inquiries. This sudden recognition of himself as a person by this boy made him pause. He watched the boy gulping the Coke greedily, his Adam’s apple bobbing, his hand trembling slightly. Trent knew a moment of misgiving. This boy, vulnerable, defenseless, with no knowledge of what awaited him.

Time to get out, Trent thought. Get this over with and collect his due from the senator. And somehow make his own escape.

"
S
hall we begin again?”

The boy, obviously refreshed, the caffeine probably percolating through his veins, nodded, eagerness bright in his eyes. “Okay,” he said.

Trent regretted the loss of intensity and concentration but was confident that he could easily lead the boy into the heart of the interrogation.

“Earlier, we covered your actions during the first part of the afternoon. Your sightings of the postal carrier and some youngsters. Did you observe anyone else on your way to Alicia Bartlett’s house?”

Jason lowered his head in an effort to concentrate, his eyes half closed, trying to envision what Main Street had looked like that hot afternoon.

He recalled a few cars passing by, the sun flashing on store windows, the Walk sign at the intersection of Water and Main Streets, a young girl pushing a baby carriage, but all of it muted, quiet, like watching a movie without sound.

“Nothing,” he said. “Nobody in particular. I mean, a few people but nothing outstanding.” Then added: “Nobody out of context.” Glad to be using one of Mr. Trent’s phrases.

“Good,” Trent said, indicating his approval. “Then, on to Alicia’s house. And now we must be careful, Jason. I want you to be specific about that visit.”

Trent watched for the boy’s reaction to this sudden switch from his observations in the town to the scene at Alicia Bartlett’s house. He saw the boy look away, as if suddenly troubled and doubtful. Have I moved too soon? he wondered.

Jason was regarding the blank wall, as if he could find the answer to his question there. The question: Was this the moment to tell what he hadn’t told the detective? About Brad and Alicia and how they seemed mad at each other on Monday, not only about the puzzle but about something else.

“Brad, her brother, was there on Monday swimming with his friends in the pool,” Jason began.

Mr. Trent looked at him quizzically. But didn’t say anything.

“They seemed to be fighting,” Jason said. “I mean, not really fighting but mad at each other.”

Mr. Trent was still silent, which encouraged Jason to go on.

“I had a feeling something was wrong between them, that maybe Brad had done something to her.”

Trent listened patiently, waiting for the boy to make his point but realizing that he was struggling to express himself. Trent’s attention was drawn to the boy’s hands, active, fluttering, moving away from his body as if trying to express what he was attempting to say. Trent leaned forward a bit, knowing by the movement of his hands, his entire body, that the boy was revealing the truth, whatever the truth might be.

“Brad was always teasing her,” the boy said. “He teased everybody. But he was, like, more than teasing her on Monday.”

The boy’s eyes half-closed again, an indication that he was fully concentrating, trying to pin down a memory or bringing vital information to the surface of his mind.

“She said to him, ’Haven’t you done enough today?’ Something like that.”

The boy sighed, a huge sigh, and blew air out of his mouth as if he had just delivered a monumental message.

“Why didn’t you tell the detective about this?” Trent asked.

“I don’t know. I didn’t think it was important. Alicia and Brad were always . . .” The boy shrugged, losing his struggle to find the proper words.

“Bickering?” Trent supplied. “Arguing?”

Jason nodded. “That’s right.”

“Why did you think the exchange between them that day was so different?” Trent asked.

“It wasn’t, I guess,” the boy said. “That’s why I didn’t mention it to the detective.” Then, looking directly at Trent, an appeal in his eyes: “Do you think it was important? Did I do something wrong?”

Trent tried not to show his surprise at the boy’s remarks. Astonishingly, the boy seemed to be suggesting that the girl’s brother was somehow implicated in the girl’s murder. That they quarreled on the day she was killed, which could provide a motive. Trent recalled that the brother had an alibi, although he knew that alibis could be manufactured. Was it worth looking into?
Should
it be looked into? If it was, the present situation could be disrupted. And it mustn’t be.
Jason Dorrant is my subject, not the girl’s brother.

“What do you think, Mr. Trent?” Waiting for a reply.