"HE SORTA WALKED away from that question," Del said.
"Doesn't look like she'll be asking any more for a while," said Gibson.
"Goddamnit," Marshall said to Gibson. "Somebody ought to kick your ass for you."
"Take it easy, pal," Gibson said. "When we get finished with this, you wanna take it outside, I'll go with you."
"Nobody's taking it outside," Lucas said. To Gibson he said, "Another comment about Barstad and you'll be directing traffic at a construction site." And to Marshalclass="underline" "You keep your problems to yourself or I'll ship your ass back to Dunn County." And to both of them: "Everybody know where I'm coming from?"
LATER, WHEN THEY finished with a second round, Barstad asked, "What do you think of the gravedigger?"
"Well, I guess I think what everybody thinks," he said. "He's a crazy man. He needs care."
"I think they just ought to take him out and dump him in a hole somewhere, and cover it up and not tell anybody where he is," she declared. "That would teach him."
"That would," he said. "You're right." Qatar stood up and gathered his clothes. "Everything's getting wrinkled," he said fussily. "Let me go hang them up."
"The rack in the bedroom," she said lazily. "Hurry back."
"You are far too young for me, m'dear," he said.
Qatar was in a panic. She'd mentioned asphyxiation sex twice; she'd mentioned the gravedigger three times-she was interrogating him, he thought, but then…
Was it possible that it was all a symptom of her craziness, with her whole sexual experimentation regime? Was it possible that the gravedigger turned her on? That all of this was innocent?
Then why the false notes? And they were false, clanging like a leaden bell. And now some of her smiles seemed false, and her sexual commentary too dramatic.
The biggest problem, he thought, was that he'd stupidly brought his rope. If there were police around, if they were watching him, they would hang him with it. He didn't know the details of DNA, but he had a general idea of how it worked. And the rope looked dense: It must have soaked up blood-there had been blood almost every time-and skin, and who knows what else.
In the bedroom, he looked around quickly, but there seemed no place to hide anything. He carefully hung his clothes on the rack, then took the rope out of his pants pocket, coiled it tightly, and stepped out of the bedroom and into the bathroom. She had a large rack of towels, washcloths, and other bathroom equipment on a stainless-steel kitchen rack, pushed against one wall. He turned on the water, then slipped the rope under the bottom pile of towels. He washed himself, dried, and went back to the front room.
A camera? Who knew? It might even excite him if he knew…
She was waiting and asked, "What next? You don't want to try the necktie thing?"
"Some other time," he said. "It really makes me nervous, thinking about it."
Again the shadow of disappointment-but exactly how was she disappointed? Because a conspiracy was failing, or because she wanted a loop around her neck?
"James, you can be such a pill," she said.
A little after three o'clock, Qatar left.
"I thought we were gonna go wine shopping," Barstad complained. "I got some money out, I got a book on it-"
"Ellen, you have absolutely destroyed me. I couldn't go wine shopping today without risking a stroke. Next time, we'll go wine shopping before we start the sex. Honestly, you're a little bit… over the top."
"A pill," she said. "You really can be."
"NOTHING HERE," DEL said, as they watched him leave.
Marshall said, "But I think that little girl could use treatment."
Lucas said to Gibson, "I want the tapes-I'll take them with me. I don't want any copies made, I don't want any editing. I'll tell you guys, we're all playing with our jobs on this. If it turns out that Qatar is innocent, and he believes we set him up to make this tape… our gooses could be cooked."
"Hey, I just did what you told me," Gibson said.
"I know. But you'd be cooked anyway. That's why I'm taking the tapes. They're going in a safe, and if we don't need them in this case, I'll burn the sonsofbitches." He shook his head. "Little Miss Muffin may have fucked us up."
THEY STOOD BY the silvered window and watched Qatar walk across the parking lot and get into his car. He seemed a little beaten, and Lucas almost sympathized with him: Barstad was definitely, distinctly, too much. Lucas collected the tapes, and said to Del and Marshall, "We're back to Randy."
25
LUCAS BROUGHT IN the intelligence cops to watch Qatar. Since Qatar didn't know he was being watched, only one man was assigned at a time: one man to watch the car, get him to work, monitor the classroom, and his travels during the day. "If he gets erratic, we'll get you help," Lucas told the first guy up. "Basically, at this point, it's baby-sitting."
The baby-sitter took Qatar through the night and then to work; a new guy picked him up at work, took him out of his office to a classroom, out to lunch, shopping, a visit to a funeral home, back to his office.
Lucas stayed in touch all day, but focused on the problem with Randy. He finally decided the best way to handle it was with Marcy. "He relates to women. He may relate to your getting shot."
"You want me to show him the bullet hole?"
She didn't have a bullet hole; she had a scar that looked like the star shape made when a pebble falls in mud, with a string leading out of it, which was the surgeon's entry cut. She was being tough, and Lucas recognized it: "If you think it'll help. You've got to read him."
Lucas applied some pressure on Randy's attorney by calling the public defender and explaining the deal. The PD went to Lansing and told him to take it, and to talk to Randy about it. The bureaucratic hassling took all of the morning and a piece of the afternoon, and finally an assistant county attorney got back to Lucas.
"We've been talking with the Ramsey county attorney and the Ramsey PD, and this is the deaclass="underline" If Whitcomb can positively identify the picture, and give us details surrounding his contacts with the suspect…"
"Qatar."
"Yeah, Qatar. If he can do that, Ramsey'll reduce the ag assault to simple assault and drop the drug charge down to misdemeanor possession-and he takes a six-month to two-year sentence, which he spends in the hospital, because that's how long the docs think rehab will take. In other words, he takes an easy fall and we pay for medical."
"We'd have to pay it anyway, one way or another," Lucas said. "So the deal is done?"
"Everybody's agreed but Randy. The idea is, you show up with the pictures and see if you can get him to move."
"I'm sending Marcy Sherrill in to talk to him. He has a personal problem with me."
"Whatever you think. We need him if we're gonna have a chance with Qatar."
LUCAS AND MARCY drove to Regions together, and talked about approaches. "He's a pimp," Lucas said. "You oughta show a little street balls, like a hooker, but basically back off when he comes on to you. Gonna have to play him."
"That's the bullshit I don't like," she said. "That's why I never was a good decoy. I always wanted to go straight for the throat."
"Aim a little lower this time," Lucas said. "If you can get a grip on his dick, we can put Qatar away this afternoon."
Lansing was waiting outside Randy's hospital room. Lansing looked at Marcy and asked Lucas, "Who's this?"
"Why don't you ask me? I'm standing right here," Marcy said.
Lansing stepped back. "All right. Who're you?"
"I'm a Minneapolis police sergeant and I'm a little fuckin' cranky this afternoon, so if you don't want me to pull your nose off, I'd suggest you be polite. I'm the one who talks to Whitcomb."
Lansing looked at Lucas, who shrugged. " I'malways polite with her."
Lansing nodded abruptly, as if he'd had enough of the Minneapolis police show. "All right. I'll tell Mr. Whitcomb why we're here, and then you can make your pitch. It's all fine with us, if he goes for it-but he's pretty angry."