Finley made a hissing noise through his teeth. “I don’t know about four. I was thinking—”
David turned the ignition.
“Okay, four hundred. That’s fine. I can live with that.”
David turned off the ignition.
“There’s one other thing,” David said. “What we talked about just before the press conference.”
“That stuff about your kid,” Finley said, nodding.
“Don’t ever try to blackmail me again.”
Finley raised his hands defensively. “Never.” He smiled. “So you’re back?”
It took David Harwood several seconds to admit it. “Yeah, I’m back.”
“That’s good, that’s good, because I’ve been thinking.”
David closed his eyes wearily.
“No, listen, I’m just spitballin’ here, but what I was thinking was, to make up for the disaster that was today, we need to do something big. Something that will show this town how invaluable I am to them. That even though I can be a bit of an asshole—”
“Oh, stop,” David said.
“Even though I can be a bit of an asshole, I love this town, that I’m there for the people of Promise Falls when they need me.”
“You mean, like when you went up to the drive-in to have your picture taken helping people? Because that did not play well. It was opportunistic. It was insincere. It’s a good thing Duckworth booted us out of there before you made a total fool of yourself.”
Finley looked hurt. “I did care. I felt terrible for those people. Those little girls, who were so scared when that screen came down? You may not believe it, but my heart went out to them.”
“Sure, it did.”
“But what I’m saying is, something like that, if it was to happen again, I need to get in there, roll my sleeves up, get my hands dirty, show the people I’m right there with them.”
“What are you saying? We keep our fingers crossed for a flood, or a tornado?”
“Well, of course not,” Finley said. “But if something like that does happen, I wanna be in there like a dirty shirt.”
Sixty-five
I wanted to talk to Crystal. I wanted to talk to her without her mother present.
Not a problem. I still had her lunch to deliver. Lucy had said her lunch hour began at twelve thirty. If I could get Angus Carlson’s permission to leave the scene, I’d get it to her in time.
I went up to him, asked if there was anything else he needed. He said I’d have to come in and make a more formal statement, which I said I would be happy to do. Once he had my contact info, he allowed me to leave.
Sam also wanted a moment before I took off.
“Thank you,” she said.
“Just making up for yesterday,” I said.
She smiled. “I called the school, talked to Carl, said I’d be over for him as soon as possible. And the detective, he tells me they just picked up my ex-in-laws. I hear Yolanda passed out or something when the police showed up.”
I smiled, gave her hand a squeeze.
“Maybe they’ll finally get what’s coming to them,” she said.
“I’d like to say all bad people do, eventually. Let’s hope in this case it really happens.”
“So many bad people, they just get away with things,” she said. “And other people, they let them.”
“Yeah,” I said. “I know.”
I had to leave my laundry behind in the machines. Sam promised me that if Carlson would allow normal operations to resume, she’d look after it for me. I went out to the car, Crystal’s work in hand. I reached behind the passenger seat, where her bagged lunch was sitting. I arrived at the school at twenty minutes after twelve, making one stop along the way at a big-box office supply store.
Lucy, as she’d promised she would, had told the school I’d be dropping by. An office secretary greeted me, and apologized for having to ask me for some identification. I showed her my driver’s license, which more than satisfied her. I thought showing her my private investigator’s license might unnecessarily alarm her. She said Crystal had already been told to come straight to the office when class was dismissed.
She wandered into the office at twelve thirty-two. I was sitting in one of half a dozen chairs, waiting for her, her lunch, a plastic shopping bag, and her graphic novel all resting in my lap.
“Hi, Crystal. I brought your lunch.”
“Oh yeah,” she said. “I forgot it.”
I handed her the bag. “You having a good day?”
She shrugged.
I held up the stapled pages. “I wanted to tell you how much I enjoyed your book. Your graphic novel.”
“Okay,” she said.
“Also, I got you something.”
I peeled back the bag to show her a package of expensive markers, and a package of five hundred sheets of white printer paper.
“You always seem to be running out,” I said, “so I thought you could use a big package of paper like this.”
“Yes,” she said, taking it from me. It was a lot heavier in her arms than it had been in mine. “Mom gets mad at me when I’m taking her papers.”
“I hope the markers are the right kind. There’s a lot of different colors there.”
She yawned. I wondered whether I was boring her. But then she examined them and said, “Yes, these are good.” A pause, then, “Thank you.”
“Can you sit with me for a second?”
“Okay.”
She hopped up onto the chair to my right. I slid her book over slightly so that it was straddling her knee and mine.
I flipped the title page back so we were looking at the first page. “This drawing here, of the little girl in bed, that just blew me away. You’re a very talented artist.”
Crystal nodded without saying anything.
“I noticed the girl is called Crystal. So this is you?”
She shrugged. “I guess. It’s my adventure that happens in my head.” Another big yawn.
“You’re a very tired girl today.”
“I didn’t sleep good.”
I flipped ahead a few pages, found the one where the girl is walking down the alley late at night. “That’s a really good drawing, too. Do you get scared when you’re doing creepy scenes like this?”
She shook her head.
“Have you ever taken art lessons?”
“No. I mean, I’ve had art in school, but mostly I learned to draw from looking in comic books.”
I had turned over the page that had the letter on the back side.
“Crystal,” I said, pointing to it, “where did you find this sheet of paper?”
She glanced at it. She studied it for a moment and said, “My grandpa’s. My grandpa’s and Miriam’s house.”
“You liked to draw when you’d go to their house?”
Crystal nodded. “Grandpa liked my drawings. I’m sad about my grandpa.”
“I’ll bet.”
“Miriam didn’t die.”
“In the accident, you mean,” I said.
The girl nodded. She hadn’t heard about Miriam’s latest reversal of fortune, and I didn’t think it was my place to tell her.
“I probably won’t see her anymore. I won’t go over if Grandpa is dead.”
“Maybe not,” I said. “But when you did go over there, did you have a good time?”
A nod.
“Did your grandfather like your drawings?”
“Yes.”
“Did he give you lots of paper?”
“He told me to take it from his printer.”
Another big yawn.
“In his study,” I said. “In his office.”
Crystal nodded.
“But this page must not have come out of the printer. It’s got writing all over it.”
“When the printer got empty, I would look for paper in other places,” she said in her flat voice.
“Sure. So, then, where did you find this sheet?”
“Grandpa’s desk.”