Winter and Night (15 page)

What did I expect?

What had I ever expected?

I got out of the car, stood breathing the cold night air. I stopped myself from pounding my fist on the hood by heading down to the diner, for the coffee I'd wanted twenty minutes ago, had needed for hours.

The diner coffee was strong and bitter and no cars turned into Hamlin's driveway while I was buying it. I picked up a cheese danish, too, bit into it while I headed back to my car, so my hands were full and one of them was sticky when my cell phone rang again.

I was tempted to let the damn thing just go on ringing. It would take a message, and I'd call whoever the hell it was back when I felt like it, which was unlikely to be soon. But it could be Lydia. It could be Gary. It could be important.

I juggled the coffee and danish, flipped open the phone, told it who I was.

It told me, "Stacie Phillips, Tri-Town Gazette."

I sipped some coffee, started toward my car again. Bitter or not, the coffee was hot and full of caffeine, and Stacie Phillips was a seventeen-year-old kid who as far as I knew didn't owe me a thing.

"Hey," I said. "I'm having coffee. Can I buy you a cup?"

"Funny. Did you find Gary Russell yet?"

"You looking for a scoop?"

"Of course. If you promise me one, I'll trade."

"Trade what?"

"Information. I know something you might want to know. I'll tell you if you promise that when you find Gary I can talk to him first."

"First before the other reporters?"

"Of course, but mostly first before the police."

"I'm not sure I can do that."

"You could if you wanted to."

"I'm not sure I want to. What are you trading?"

"This: They haven't found Gary's fingerprints anywhere at Tory Wesley's house."

"This may ruin your day," I said, biting into the danish, "but I know that already."

A pause. "How?"

"Sullivan called me."

"No way. I thought he didn't like you."

"If everyone who didn't like me refused to call me I'd be a very lonely man. More interesting to me is, how do you know?"

"Sources."

"Come on. If this is all over Warrenstown, I want to know about it."

"It's not. It's confidential information."

"Sullivan called you, too?"

"Yeah, right. Hey, I have my own sources."

I thought back to Warrenstown, the bright sun, the yellow leaves blowing across the Wesleys' lawn. "That cop," I said. "Trevor."

I could hear the grin in her voice as she said, "I told him if he kept me filled in I'd try to talk my sister into dating him again when she comes home for Christmas."

"You think she will?"

"Ugh."

"And knowing that, you still promised? I'm getting seriously disillusioned about the press here."

"I only said I'd try. Hey, it gives the guy something to look forward to. How close are you to finding Gary?"

"I don't know."

"Where are you?"

"Hamlin's."

"Ohmigod," she said. "The promised land."

"Everyone seems to feel that way. What is it about this place?"

"They build men out there."

"So do the marines, and Dr. Frankenstein. What is it about Hamlin's that gets everybody all excited?"

She paused. "I think because Mr. Hamlin, he does it exactly like they do it here."

"What does that mean?"

"Well, you know Coach Ryder? Oh, actually, I guess you don't."

"No, we've met. I saw him at practice today."

"Then you know. I mean, I've never met Mr. Hamlin, but from everything I've heard he's just exactly the same as Coach Ryder. He thinks the same way about sports. And he even uses the same kinds of drills and things."

"And yells at the kids the same way. You know, you're right."

"Why do you sound surprised? Because I said something smart and I'm a kid?"

"No, because you said something true and you're a reporter."

"You better remember who can misquote who."

"Whom, I think. You won't get a job on the Times if you can't tell your who from your whom."

"That's what rewrite people are for," she informed me. "You know, 'Get me rewrite!' They probably had that in movies when you were my age."

"They didn't have movies when I was your age. We lived in log cabins and walked five miles through the snow to get to school."

"Yeah, yeah, uphill both ways, I know," she said. "You must've gone to school with my dad. So you'll call me as soon as you find Gary?"

"Why would I do that?"

"Because I want the story!"

"Ah," I said. "But what do I get?"

She paused, giving me time for more danish.

"The power of the press to create public sympathy for him?" she offered.

"That's a reach. No, I want something more concrete."

"Like?"

"Whose fingerprints were in the house?"

"I don't know," she said. "That could get Trevor in trouble."

"I'll make sure no one knows I know. But it may help me work things out, to find Gary."

"Promise?"

She sounded like a kid trying to pin me down about a trip to the zoo. People lie, Stacie, I wanted to say. Even if they promise. A reporter better learn that. A cold breeze chased the steam from my coffee.

"Yes," I said.

"Okay. But Trevor only told me a couple. Mostly he wanted to tell me about Gary. He thought maybe I'd call my sister right away and tell her what a big help he was."

"Did you?"

"Are you my sister?"

"Well," I said, "I want them all. What you have now, and what you can get."

"And you promise? About the interview with Gary?"

"If I can."

"That sounds weaselly to me."

"I'm a weasel."

She accepted that assessment a little too fast, I thought, but I was the one who'd said it. I put the half-empty coffee and the half-eaten danish on the hood of my car, reached for my pen and notebook. Stacie gave me five or six names, fingerprints from the beer cans and broken furniture. Some I'd heard, some I hadn't. They were all boys. Morgan Reed was one. Randy Macpherson was another. I wrote them down.

"There might be some Trevor didn't tell me," Stacie said. "And there are a whole bunch they don't know whose they are. They have to go around town asking people if they can take prints from their kids' rooms. And the way people are here, Trevor thinks most of them won't let them."

"A little jargon for you," I said. "To help advance what I can see is going to be a distinguished career. You don't take prints, you lift them. But tell me something. About the ones you gave me— those people cooperated?"

"No way. They didn't need to. They have those kids' prints on file already."

"Why?"

"Give me a break. Those are jocks. They've all been arrested before."

"For what?"

"Speeding. Breaking people's windows. Driving their cars across people's lawns. Drinking in public. Peeing in public. Everything."

"Jails in Warrenstown must be full all the time."

"Oh, yeah, right. What happens, their parents just come to the police station apologizing all over the place. You know, he didn't mean it, boys will be boys. They pay a fine and they pay for the windows or whatever and the kid does community service, raking leaves in the park or something. We have a very clean park."

"What about the second or third time?"

"Hey, these guys are all in double digits already."

"Their parents never get sick of it? Decide to leave them in jail overnight, teach them a lesson?"

"If they're in jail, they can't play on Friday night."

I sipped my coffee, thought about that. I asked, "What if the arrest is for something serious?"

"Like what?"

"Drugs?"

"It never is."

"Kids in Warrenstown don't do drugs?"

"Well, of course," she said guardedly, "I don't actually know anything about that."

"Of course. But you have sources; what do you hear?"

"Well, I hear that if anything like that ever happens, Chief Letourneau has a long talk with the parents and the kid and explains the difference between a record with fifty hours of community service for breaking windows and one with four years in jail for possession."

"Most towns, these days, the police chief would do a clean-sweep, zero-tolerance thing."

"Chief Letourneau is very tolerant. Especially to jocks."

I leaned against the car for a while after Stacie Phillips and I hung up. I finished the danish and the coffee, which was cold now but still had some useful caffeine left. The neon at the diner still glowed blue, traffic was even thinner, and the night had grown chilly. I lit a cigarette, walked up and down to clear my head, stay awake. I thought about Warrenstown, and Westbury, and the other towns that sent their sons to Hamlin's. I thought about the grade school kids, the Warrenstown Junior Warriors, playing their pickup game on the school lawn before class. I wondered how well that left guard, Tindall, would sleep tonight. And how well Gary would sleep, and where.

* * *

I was back in the car with the Bach on again when Macpherson's Mercedes SUV swept by me. I watched him make the turn into Hamlin's drive, saw his taillights dwindle as he headed for the lot. When his lights went off, I followed with mine off, too. I went as far as Hamlin's entrance, parked across the drive. A bad spot to be in if Sullivan showed up, but I was betting on all the Plaindale judges to be home in bed and warrants for teenagers at Hamlin's Institute, requested by an out-of-state cop, to be a long sell.

I leaned on my car and waited for Macpherson to get back into his. It wasn't long before his lights flooded the lot and his engine purred to life, though I couldn't make out, that far down the drive, whether he was alone. His tires spit gravel as he drove too fast toward me, but he was the one in the late-model Mercedes. His headlights caught me and my roadblock; I squinted against the blinding light as he slammed on his brakes and hit the horn. I stayed leaning on my car until his had stopped completely, about four feet from me.

The driver's window powered down and Macpherson stuck his head out, his face knotted with rage. "What the fuck— oh, Christ, it's you? Move that fucking car!" He blasted the horn again, again, over and over.

I stepped fast to the passenger's side, yanked on the door. I'd figured Macpherson for a guy who wouldn't bother with wussy things like locking, unless he was driving through a place where he suspected the inhabitants of coveting what he possessed. And look, Smith, I thought, as the door pulled wide, you were right.

A broad-shouldered, dark-haired kid stared down at me from the shotgun seat, his already-angry eyes narrowed, the tendons in his neck knotted. "Who the fuck are you?" he snarled.

"Bill Smith. I'm a private investigator. I need to ask you a few questions, Randy."

Macpherson senior leaned across the seat, shouted, "Get out of my fucking way! Randy, don't talk to him!"

"He took you out of there, huh, Randy?" I said quietly. "So much for your week at Hamlin's."

The son threw a look of purest hatred at the father. "Yeah. Cocksucker."

Macpherson swung toward Randy. "Don't you talk to me that way!"

Ignoring me, Randy shouted back, "They have college scouts coming to the game! What the fuck am I supposed to do now?" Fury and desperation made his voice raw.

If you didn't have a game anyone had noticed already, I thought, I'm not sure two more days here would have given you one; but I didn't say that. "Who killed Tory Wesley, Randy?"

He jerked around to look at me. In the yellow glare from the high sodium lamps his face paled. "What?"

I looked at Macpherson. "You didn't tell him? You took him out of camp and you didn't tell him why?"

"What are you talking about?" Randy's voice was louder, insistent.

"Goddammit!" Mapherson growled, threw his door open.

I said fast, "She was killed at that party, Randy. Do you know who killed her? Was it you?"

Macpherson jumped down. I moved in front of his car, stood facing him. Off-balance, blinded by his own headlights, he grabbed for me wildly. I sidestepped, pulled him toward me, the way he was coming already. He stumbled and I thought I had him, but his hand vise-gripped my arm. I dug into the gravel looking for footing; he used me for leverage and found his, too. He threw a punch, aiming for my face, clipping me on the ear. My head rang. My punch was as wild as his, but lower, and I was luckier: I found his gut. He groaned and I slammed another fast one. He doubled over. I grabbed him by the jacket and threw him to the ground.

Randy had exploded out of the car and was coming toward me, fists clenched.

"Don't!" I shouted, stepping back, putting distance between us. "I don't want to fight you, Randy, but if I have to I will and I fight dirty. You want to play on Saturday?"

He stopped, looked from his father to me, eyes wild. His father rolled to his knees. Randy stayed where he was, but he was twitching: the wrong word, the wrong move, and he'd be all over me.

"Listen." I stayed still, kept my voice low. "All I want to know is this: where's Gary Russell?"

Randy Macpherson stared at me as though I'd asked him where the aliens were planning to land.

"Gary? What the fuck do you mean, where is he? How the hell do I know where he is?"

Of course, I thought. These kids were at Hamlin's; all the rest of the world could have come to an end and no one would have told them about it.

"Gary left home Monday," I said. "He hasn't been back. I saw him in New York last night and he said he had something important to do but he wouldn't tell me what. I want you to tell me what he's doing and where he is."

"How the fuck do I know? What are you talking about?"

"Tory Wesley's dead. What happened there, Randy?"

"I— it was just a party. What do you mean, she's dead?"

"Dead. Naked, all bruised up, stone dead. Who raped her? Who killed her?" I was reaching, but it worked.

"Raped her? Bullshit! We got a little wild, is all; that's how she wanted it."

"Rough?" I said. "She liked it that way?"

"Sure. Don't they all?" He gave me a man-to-man smirk, ghastly in the colorless sodium lights.