He put the emphasis on family.
“I’ll see you later, Randy,” Duckworth said. He raised the window and put the car in drive.
Finley offered up a friendly wave good-bye, but Duckworth wasn’t looking.
Duckworth headed for Thackeray College.
The campus was close enough to the park that students often walked through it, jogged through it, did drugs in it, made out in it. A Thackeray kid could have killed those squirrels. Or if not, a Thackeray kid might have seen it happen.
Maybe this was a waste of his time and energy. A couple dozen squirrels would get run over on the streets of Promise Falls before the day was over, and the police wouldn’t exactly be going around charging drivers with leaving the scene of an accident.
Duckworth fully expected that when he got back to the station, there’d be a pack of nuts on his desk. If not from Angus Carlson, then from someone else.
After all, it was legal to hunt squirrels much of the year in New York State. A couple years ago, in fact, over in Holley, the local fire department had a fund-raiser that awarded a prize to whoever shot the five heaviest squirrels. Finding the killer of a couple dozen of the critters was not exactly something the Promise Falls police force was going to devote all its resources to.
What troubled Duckworth was, What kind of person found entertainment value in killing twenty-three small animals and stringing them up for all to see?
What inspired him — okay, maybe a her, but most likely a him — to do such a thing?
And what would this person’s next stunt be? The literature was full of convicted killers who got their start snuffing the life out of house pets and other creatures.
He steered the car off the main road and through the gates into the grounds of Thackeray College. Handsome, stately redbrick buildings with imposing white columns, many of them dating back more than a century. There were some architectural exceptions. The chemistry building was five years old, and the athletic center was constructed ten years ago.
As he drove along the road to the administrative buildings, past Thackeray Pond, the college’s own miniature lake that was about a quarter mile wide, Duckworth noticed a work crew installing a six-foot post with a red button, and a small sign attached. He was driving by too quickly to make out what it said, but it reminded him of an old-fashioned fire alarm call box.
He parked in a visitor spot and once inside the building consulted a directory to locate the office of the head of campus security.
Heading into the building, he thought about what Randall Finley had said, and what he might have been intimating.
Did Randy think he had something on him? Was he trying to blackmail the detective into giving him dirt on what was going on inside the department so he’d have something to campaign on if he really did take another run at the mayor’s job?
If that was his plan, he could goddamn well forget it, Duckworth thought. Because the man had no leverage. Just like the former mayor said, Duckworth had had an exemplary career. He’d kept his nose clean.
Pretty much, anyway.
Sure, he’d cut the odd corner here and there over the years. There wasn’t a cop in the department who hadn’t. But he’d never taken a bribe. Never planted evidence, or held on to some, like cash from a drug deal, for himself.
Maybe years ago, before he met Maureen, he’d let a couple of pretty girls off with a warning when they’d been driving over the limit.
Maybe he’d even gotten a phone number or two that way.
But he chalked that up to youth and inexperience. He’d never pull a stunt like that now. Surely Finley hadn’t gone back twenty years to get some dirt on—
“Can I help you?”
Barry found himself at a desk just outside the campus security offices. A young man with several studs in one ear who looked as though he might still be a student had just offered to be of assistance.
“I want to see your boss,” Duckworth said.
“Do you have an appointment?”
Duckworth flashed his ID, and within seconds he was sitting across the desk from Clive Duncomb, Thackeray College chief of security.
He was in his mid to late forties. Just shy of six feet, about a hundred and seventy pounds, a hard, square jaw and thick, dark eyebrows that matched his hair. Trim, and wearing a shirt that looked one size too small, as if he knew it would draw attention to his biceps. The guy had a decent set of guns. Weights, Duckworth guessed. Probably didn’t have a doughnut every morning on the way to work, either.
“Nice to meet you,” Duncomb said. “What’d you say your name was again?”
Duckworth told him.
“And you’re a detective?”
“Yes.”
“What can I do for you?”
“I need to talk to you about an incident last night.”
Duncomb nodded grimly and sighed. He leaned back in his chair, arms extended, palms flat on his desk.
“I can’t say I’m surprised to see you. I’ve kind of been expecting someone from the Promise Falls police. Word gets around; I understand that. Hard to keep a lid on these things forever. But I want you to know, I’ve got matters well in hand here. I run a tight ship, and I’ve got my people working on it. But I can understand your concern, and don’t mind bringing you up to speed on the steps we’ve been taking.”
Duckworth wondered what sorts of steps the college might be taking to protect the squirrel community, and was more than a little surprised to learn this was already a high priority. “Go on,” he said.
“Maybe you noticed, driving in, some of the emergency posts they’re installing on the grounds.”
“Emergency posts?”
“All you do is hit the button; that sends a message to the security team, tells them where you are, and we dispatch someone right away. Kind of like a fire alarm, or one of those panic strips they put in the subway cars in the big cities.”
“And you’re doing this why?”
Duncomb took his hands off the table and leaned forward in the chair. He eyed Duckworth suspiciously.
“You telling me you’re not here about the attempted rapes we’ve had? We got some nutcase running around, got every woman on campus scared half to death.”
Six
“What are you talking about, Mom?” I said. “What do you mean, ‘not again’? Marla’s grabbed a baby before?”
“While you were in Boston,” she said. “There was an incident.”
“What kind of incident?”
“At the hospital. She snuck into the maternity ward and tried to walk out with someone else’s baby.”
“Oh, my God. You’re not serious.”
“It was just awful. Marla almost made it to the parking lot before someone spotted her, stopped her. Probably someone recognized her, given that she’s in the hospital pretty often, not just to see your aunt, but I think she goes there to see a psychologist or psychiatrist or something. I think his name is... I just can’t remember it. It was right on the tip of my tongue. Oh, that’s so annoying.”
“Don’t worry about it. Just tell me what happened.”
“Well, the police got called, but Agnes and Gill explained what had happened, that Marla’d lost a child, that she was, you know, mentally unstable, that she shouldn’t be held accountable for her actions because of the state she was in, that she’d been getting help.”
“I never heard a word about this.”