"Go on."
"After he got the door open, he swung his head and shoulders inside, then he turned to the chief and the others on shore. He took his mouthpiece out and yelled, "No body. Nobody inside." The chief waved his hand in a circle over his head, and the diver replaced the mouthpiece and went under. Even with the rain, you could follow his progress by watching the rope. After he zigzagged back and forth on the bridge side of the car a few times, he circled around the car, kind of jump-roping his line over the top of the car. He finally came up, shaking his head, and the chief waved him in to shore. He swam ashore, and then-"
"Any trouble with the current this time?"
"No." Doucette stopped for a moment. "No. In fact, this time he was swimming pretty slowly." Doucette blushed a little. "I remember thinking, 'No rush on the way in. Nobody to save.' "
"What happened then?"
"When he got to shore, Smollett seemed to ask him a few questions, then motioned everybody back up the bank. I trotted back to the cars. Gerry was the first one back. He waved off the ambulance guys, who waited for the chief to tell them to pack it iu. I went up to Gerry as he reached his cruiser, and asked him what happened.
"He said, 'The judge's wife. Mrs. Kinnington. Her car went off the bridge.'
"I said to him, 'Did you see it happen?'
"He said, 'No. I was driving across the bridge, I saw the railing was broken, and then I saw the car in the water. So I backed up and went down the bank. I couldn't see anybody, so I came back up just as you pulled up.' "
"Did you ask Blakey about his identification of the car?"
"Yes," Doucette grinned. "I asked him how he could tell it was her car, since it was already covered with water. He turned around, looked at the car, turned back, and grabbed my slicker like this" Doucette clutched and twisted his shirt front-"and slammed me into the side of the cruiser. 'Don't you ever say a fuckin' word about this,' he said to me. 'Or print it. Or you're dead.' " Doucette grew still. "He really meant it."
"Go on."
"Smollett came up and told Gerry to get to the other side of the bridge-another car had stopped to make sure there wasn't another accident. Gerry said to me, 'Remember,' and sort of sloshed off.
Smollett gave me his usual disgusted look, but he walked back to the other cruiser, where the diver was putting his equipment back in the trunk.
"I got into my car and drove home. Gerry's threat had really shaken me. I was just pulling out my house key when I heard a honk behind me. I turned, and it was Gerry in the cruiser. He rolled down the window and said, 'Remember,' again. Just the one word. Then he drove off. I went in and didn't fall asleep till nine or ten in the morning. I never wrote the story. I never really saw Gerry again. I moved to Boston a little while after that." Doucette paused. "I think that's about it."
"Ever talk with anyone else about what you saw and Blakey said?"
"No way. Oh, my parents knew the Kinnington incident was what pushed me to move out. It hit Mom hard." Doucette cleared his throat and voice. "You've met Gerry. He and I are the same age. We went to high school together. He was always so big. He was never good at athletics, not well-coordinated enough, I guess. Just big. And aware, painfully aware, of his hair. He started to lose it when he was a sophomore, and it was pretty well gone by senior year. Anyway, one day, our senior year, he and I were walking home from school, and we started talking, and well, we went into a bunch of woods and gave each other sex. He was real nervous, I think it was his first time ever, and I wasn't very experienced either. Anyway, we left the woods separately.
"The next day, I was walking to school, and a lot of guys suspected-funny, I still think of it that way, it's certainly the right word for back then-'suspected'-I was gay. One of them was jibing me that morning. He was a lot bigger than I was, but a lot smaller than Gerry. So, I went up to Gerry between classes and asked him if he'd tell the other guy to lay off me. Well, Gerry grabbed me by the collar and slammed me against the lockers, my books flying all over the place. He hissed at me, 'I don't protect faggots. Now stay away from me.' A bunch of other guys and girls turned around to stare, and Gerry huffed off. I was so embarrassed. It was so bad that the other kids didn't even make fun. I gathered up my books, got to the boys' room, and threw up. Then I cried.
"A few weeks later, I was walking home from school alone. I heard somebody running behind me. I turned, and it was Gerry. He apologized for embarrassing me, and then he asked me to go into the woods again. We did, but this time because I was scared of him. When we were finished, he said, 'You know, if you ever tell anyone about this, I'll kill you. Remember.' He used the same word he used that later time-remember-like maybe his parents used it on him when he was young and he thought it had some magic to it.
'Remember.'
I thought back to Blakey saying that to me as I left the judge's chambers, but decided it wouldn't help Doucette any. "Did you ever learn anything more about Diane Kinnington's death?"
Doucette shook his head. "No. I mean, I read the newspaper account in the Banner, which was just a neutral rehash of a police report. I also read the Globe article, which wasn't much more elaborate. And I did know about Mrs. Kinnington's, ah, social life. But Gerry's threats pretty much blanked me out on her death. In fact, I probably haven't spent as much time on it in the last four years total as I have with you on this bench."
I stretched my legs and stood up. "You've been a big help." He stood and we shook hands. "And no one will ever know I spoke with you."
"One last thing," he said as we walked from the park. "As you know, I guess, Mrs. Kinnington's body was never found. After talking to you today, giving you answers and listening to them myself, I'm pretty sure of something. I think you already figured it, but you weren't there that night and I was."
We'd come to our parting spot, me for my car and him for his office. He stuck his hands in his pockets and looked me straight in the eye. "She wasn't in that car when it went off the bridge. And Gerry Blakey knew it."
He turned and trotted in the heat back toward his office.
Jeremiah Healy
Blunt Darts – Jeremiah Healy
SIXTEENTH
– ¦ I drove back to the apartment house and double-parked out front. I took the steps two at a time, and just caught the tail end of a dial tone noise as I opened my apartment door. Someone's time for a message had just run out. I waited until I heard the machine turn off with a click, then rewound the tape to playback. There were two messages. The first was from Vaclass="underline"
"John, I've arranged to have us meet Kim at two o'clock at the Sturdevants You'll never find it without me, and anyway I don't think Mrs. Sturdevant would talk to you without me there. I don't know how much time I have left-I hate these machines-so pick me up at one-thirty here. I mean here at my house. Remember, 17 Ford…"
One admirable thing about the tape. It cuts everyone off equally. The second message, after two hang-ups, was too concise to be affected by the machine's tolerance for talking.
"I regret to report there has been no progress at this end, Mr. Pembroke. You need not contact me."
I thought of Nancy DeMarco and wished that someone would make some progress toward finding Stephen.
Apparently, however, I thought and wished too long. By the time I got back downstairs, an orange parking violation card fluttered between my windshield and wiper. I put it in my pocket, stopped at a steak house on the way to Meade, and picked Valerie up at 1:35.