"What would you say if I got a tattoo and a ring through my eyebrow?" he said.
"I'd definitely want to watch," I said. "And it would be interesting to see what kind of tattoo you picked." I looked at him for a moment, trying to imagine Tolliver with a silver hoop in his eyebrow or nostril, and I grinned. "And where you put it."
"Oh, if I ever got one, I'd get it on my lower back," he said. "So I could cover it up almost all the time."
"You've put thought into this."
"Yeah. A little."
"Hmmm. You've picked out the tattoo?"
"Sure."
"What?"
"A lightning bolt," he said, and I couldn't tell if he was serious or not.
seven
DURING our cab ride back from the suburban Cineplex to the downtown hotel, I had a little time to think. Xylda was nuts, but she was a true psychic. If she said Tabitha had lived a few hours after the abduction, I believed her. I should have asked different questions, I realized. I should have asked Xylda why Tabitha's abductor had kept her alive for that long. A sexual reason? Some other purpose?
"Did it seem to you that Xylda was nuttier than usual?" Tolliver asked, echoing my thoughts to an eerie degree.
"Yes," I said. "The kind of nutty that made me wonder how old she really is."
"She couldn't be over sixty, right?"
"I would have said younger, but today…"
"She looked okay."
"As okay as Xylda ever looks."
"True. But she seemed to walk just fine, and maneuver all right physically."
"But mentally, she was quite a bit more off… so vague. 'In the time of ice, you'll be happy.' What the hell does that mean?"
"Yeah, that was weird. And the part about being truthful."
I nodded. " 'The time of ice.' She could have told us things that would have been a hell of a lot more to the point. Maybe it's the loss of Robert that's thrown her for such a loop? Not that she was ever Miss Stability. At least Manfred seems to be taking good care of her, and he respects her talent."
"Think we should mention that guy we met in San Francisco to the Morgensterns? Think they'd be open to a clairvoyant?"
"Nah," I said instantly. "Tom will make something up if he doesn't get a genuine reading."
"So would Xylda."
"But only when it didn't matter, Tolliver." He looked at me as if he couldn't see the difference.
"Like if it was some teenager visiting her on a dare, wanting to know if she'd be happy in the future, Xylda might make up stuff so the kid would leave confident and cheerful. That kind of thing, that can't hurt. But if a lot depended on it, if the client took her seriously, Xylda wouldn't say, 'Oh yes, your missing son is really alive,' unless she got a true vision. Tom will tell you something under any circumstances, whether or not he really knows anything. He'll just make it up."
"Then I won't mention him," Tolliver said, though he sounded a little huffy. "I was trying to think of some way to help them get through this, and I think the only way they're going to come out the other side of it is to find out who did kill Tabitha. That is, if it really wasn't one of them."
"I know," I said, surprised at his irritation.
"What did you get from her yesterday? When you were standing on the grave?"
I was very reluctant to return to that moment. But then I thought of the faces of Diane and Joel Morgenstern, and the cloud of suspicion surrounding them, and I knew I had to return to Tabitha's last resting place.
"You think we could go back to the site?" I asked. "I know there's no physical remains there, but it might help."
Tolliver never questioned my professional judgment. "Then we'll go," he said. "But I think we better go tonight, so no one'll follow us. We won't want to be in a cab for that."
I agreed, especially after I caught our current cabbie's curious look in the rearview mirror.
"You want him to drop us off on Beale?" Tolliver asked. "Maybe we could go listen to some music before supper?"
I glanced at my watch. It seemed unlikely that there would be good blues playing at five in the afternoon. "Why don't you go?" I suggested. "I'll go back to the hotel and take a nap."
So Tolliver got out at B.B. King's Blues Club on legendary Beale Street, and reminded the cabbie where he was to drop me off. The cabbie made a face, said, "Sure, man, I little on the protective side," the man said when I was paying him. "Your man is a worrier."
"Yes," I said. "My brother."
"Your brother?" The cabbie looked at me, half-smiling, sure I was pulling his leg.
I told him to keep the change because I was kind of rattled, and I scrambled out of the cab and into the hotel without looking around me, which was stupid.
For the second time that day, someone seized hold of me. But this time it was a man, an angry man. He grabbed me as I walked into the lobby, and he marched me over to a chair before I could even be sure who he was.
Dr. Clyde Nunley was slightly better dressed than he had been the morning before. This afternoon he looked like a typical college professor in his sport jacket and dark slacks. His shoes needed shining.
"How'd you do it?" he asked me, still gripping my arm.
"What?"
"You've made a fool out of me. I was standing right there. Those records were sealed. I watched over them. No one else had read them. How did you do it? You make me look like an idiot in front of the students, and then your damn pimp calls me to ask me for my money."
I was disgusted, and I realized Dr. Nunley had been drinking.
I tried to yank my arm away. He'd scared me, so now I was proportionately angrier.
"Drop my arm and stand away from me," I said, and I said it sharply and loudly.
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw that the three (very young) staff members at the counter were buzzing around nervously, unsure of what to do. I was so glad when someone else stepped forward and clamped a hand on Dr. Nunley's shoulder.
"Let go of the lady," said the man who'd been in the class the day before. He had that stillness about him that says, "I know what I'm doing and no one messes with me."
"What?" Clyde Nunley was very confused by the interruption of his bullying session. His grip on me didn't loosen. I had a wild impulse to grab the arm of Mr. Student, so we'd all be standing there holding on to one another. We must look ridiculous.
"Dr. Nunley, let go of me or I'll break your fucking fingers," I said, and that worked like a charm. He looked startled, as if I'd finally become a real person to him. Mr. Student kept hold of the inebriated professor, and his mouth moved in a very small smile.
By that time, one of the staff members had hustled around the desk and was striding over to us, trying to hurry without looking like he was hurrying. It was the pleasant-faced man in his twenties who'd checked us in. "Problem, Ms. Connelly?"
"Don't say a word," hissed Dr. Nunley, as though that would be sure to shut me up. He must normally deal with the well-mannered children of the privileged.
"Yes, there is a problem," I said to the young man, and Clyde Nunley's face twisted with surprise. He just didn't think I'd complain about him; I don't know why. "This man grabbed me when I came into the lobby, and he won't leave me alone. If this gentleman hadn't helped me out, he might have hit me." Of course, I didn't know that, but Dr. Nunley had definitely been spoiling for a confrontation, and if he thought I was going to forget he'd called my brother a pimp, he had another thought coming.
"Do you know him, Ms. Connelly?"
"I don't know him," I said firmly. In an existential sense, this was the truth. Do any of us know each other, really? I was sure the staff would back me up with no qualms if they thought Dr. Nunley was a stranger off the street, out to harass me. The minute I said the words "Doctor" and "Bingham College" I'd lose some of my own stature as a wronged female.
My new assistant, Mr. Student, said, "In that case, mister, I think you should leave. And in view of the fact that you seem drunk, I'd call a cab if I were you."