Lullaby

'He came by again just before Christmas,' Flynn said. 'Home for the holidays.'

'Caught Annie here in the apartment, she was the one who answered the door.'

'We were in the back room, watching television.'

'Started begging her to tell him what he'd done wrong. Same thing he'd kept asking my wife on the phone. What'd I do wrong? What'd I do wrong? Over and over again.'

'Annie told him it was over and done with . . .'

'Said she didn't want him to come here ever again . . .'

'Said she wanted nothing further to do with him.'

'That's when he raised his voice.'

'Began hollering.'

'Wanted to know if some other guy was involved.'

'We were in the back room, listening to all this.'

'Couldn't hear what Annie said.'

'But he said . . .'

'Scott.'

'He said, "Who is it?"'

'And then Annie said something else . . .'

'Couldn't quite make it out, her back, must've been to us . . .'

'And he yelled, "Whoever it is, I'll kill him!"'

'Tell them what else he said, Harry.'

'He said, "I'll kill you both!"'

'Those exact words?' Carella asked.

'Those exact words.'

'Do you know his address?' Meyer asked.

* * * *

Scott Handler's mother was a woman in her late forties, elegantly dressed at eleven-thirty that Tuesday morning, ready to leave for a meeting with clients for whom she was decorating an apartment. She looked a lot like Glenn Close in Fatal Attraction. Meyer thought that in this day and age, he would not like to be any woman who looked like the lady in that movie. If Meyer had been a woman with naturally curly blonde hair, he'd have paid a fortune to have it straightened and dyed black just so he wouldn't have to look like the woman in that movie. Luckily, he was bald and didn't look like her in the slightest. On the other hand, Mrs Handler had a problem. Right down to a somewhat chilling smile.

'My son left for Maine early this morning,' she said.

'Went back to school, did he?' Meyer asked.

'Yes,' Mrs Handler said, and smiled that slightly psychotic, hair-raising smile, although Meyer did not have any hair.

'The Prentiss Academy,' Carella said.

'Yes.'

'In Caribou, Maine.'

'Yes. Why do you want to see him? Does this have something to do with the little Irish girl?'

'Who do you mean?' Meyer asked innocently.

'The one who got killed on New Year's Eve. He broke off with her months ago, you know.'

'Yes, we know,' Carella said.

'If their relationship is why you came here.'

'We just wanted to ask him some questions.'

'About where he was on New Year's Eve, I'd imagine.'

The chilling smile again.

'Do you know where he was?' Carella asked.

'Here. We had a big party. Scott was here.'

'All night?'

'All night.'

'What time did the party start?'

'Nine.'

'And ended?'

She hesitated. Merely an instant's pause, but both detectives caught it. They guessed she was trying to remember if she'd read anything about the time of Annie Flynn's death. She hadn't because that was one of the little secrets the detectives were keeping to themselves. But the hesitation told them that her son had not been at the party all night long. If he'd been there at all. Finally, she chose what they figured she thought was a safe time to be saying goodbye to the old year.

'Four in the morning,' she said.

'A late one,' Meyer said, and smiled.

'Not very,' she said, and shrugged, and returned the smile.

'Well, thank you very much,' Carella said.

'Yes,' she said, and looked at her watch.

* * * *

On Wednesday morning, the fourth day of January, both murder victims were buried.

The detectives did not attend either of the funerals.

The detectives were on extension phones to the Prentiss Academy in Caribou, Maine, talking to an English professor named Tucker Lowery, who was Scott Handler's advisor. They would have preferred talking to Scott himself; that, after all, was why they had placed the long distance call. Both men were wearing sweaters under their jackets. It was very cold here in the city, but even colder in Caribou, Maine. Professor Lowery informed them at once that it was thirty degrees below zero up there. Fahrenheit. And still snowing hard. Carella imagined he could hear the wind blowing. He decided that if his son ever wanted to go to the Prentiss Academy, he would advise him to choose a school on the dark side of the moon. His daughter, too. If Prentiss ever began admitting females. Who, being the more sensible sex, probably would not want to go anyplace where it got to be thirty degrees below zero.

'I don't know where he is,' Lowery said. 'He's not due back until the ninth. Next Monday.'

'Let me understand this,' Carella said.

'Yes?' Lowery said.

Carella imagined a tweedy-looking man with a pleasant, bearded face and merry brown eyes. A man who was finding this somewhat amusing, two big-city detectives on extension telephones calling all the way up there to Maine.

'Are you saying that classes won't resume until next Monday?' Carella said.

'That's right,' Lowery said.

'His mother told us he'd gone back to school,' Meyer said.

'Scott's mother?'

'Yes. We saw her yesterday morning, she told us her son had already gone back to school.'

'She was mistaken,' Lowery said.

Or lying, Carella thought.

* * * *

The Puerto Rican's name was José Herrera.

There were tubes sticking out of his nose and mouth and bandages covering most of his face. One of his arms was in a cast. Kling was there at the hospital to try to learn when Herrera would be released. He had come here upon the advice of Arthur Brown, one of the black detectives on the squad.

Brown had said, 'Bert, you have shot two men, both of them black. Now every time a cop in this city shoots a black man, you got deep shit. A cop can shoot seventeen honest Chinese merchants sitting in the park minding their own business, no one will even raise an eyebrow. That same cop sees a black man coming out of a bank with a .357 Magnum in his fist, he just stole fifty thousand dollars in cash and he shot the teller and four other people besides, your cop better not shoot that man or there's going to be an outcry. All kinds of accusations, racial discrimination, police brutality, you name it. Now, Bert, I would love to see what would happen if one day I myself shot a black man, I would love to see how that particular dilemma would be resolved in this city. In the meantime, my friend, you had best get over to that hospital and talk to the man whose brains were getting beat out on that street corner. Get him to back up your word that you were following departmental guidelines for drawing and firing your pistol. That is my advice.'

'Go fuck yourself,' Herrera told Kling.

The words came out from under the bandages, somewhat muffled, but nonetheless distinct.

Kling blinked.

'I saved your life,' he said.

'Who asked you to save it?' Herrera said.

'Those men were . . .'

'Those men are gonna kill me anyways,' Herrera said. 'All you done . . .'

'I almost got killed myself!' Kling said, beginning to get angry. 'I lost a goddamn tooth?

'So next time don't butt in.'

Kling blinked again.