Deb, Wake up each day with something to prove.
“Pretty busy room,” noted Lancaster, who had perched on the edge of the girl’s desk. “We’ll have forensics come and bag it all.”
She looked at Decker, obviously waiting for him to react to this, but instead he walked out of the room.
“Decker!”
“I’ll be back,” he called over his shoulder.
She watched him go and then muttered, “Of all the partners I could have had, I got Rain Man, only giant size.”
She pulled a stick of gum out of her bag, unwrapped it, and popped it into her mouth. Over the next several minutes she strolled the room and then came to the mirror on the back of the closet door. She appraised her appearance and ended it with the resigned sigh of a person who knows their best days physically are well in the past. She automatically reached for her smokes but then decided against it. Debbie’s room could be part of a criminal investigation. Her ash and smoke could only taint that investigation.
She whirled around when Decker came back into the room.
“Where’d you go?” she asked.
“Had some questions for the parents, and I wanted to take a look around the rest of the house.”
“And?”
He walked over to the musical score written on the chalkboard wall and pointed to it.
“Debbie didn’t do this.”
Lancaster gazed at the symbols. “How do you know that?”
“She doesn’t play an instrument. I checked her school record earlier. She’s never been in the band. I asked her mother. She’s never played an instrument and there are none in the house. Second, there are no sheets of music in this room. Even if you didn’t play an instrument and just composed music, I think you’d have some sheet music or more likely blank score sheets in your room. Third, that’s not Debbie’s handwriting.”
Lancaster drew closer to the wall and studied the marks there and then compared them with the other writing on the wall.
“But how can you really tell?” she asked. “I mean, musical scores aren’t like other writing. They’re symbols, not letters.”
“Because Debbie is right-handed. Who ever wrote this was left-handed. Even though it’s not letters you can still tell by the sweeps, flourishes, and general flow of the marks.” He picked up some chalk and wrote on a different section of the board some of the musical symbols. “I’m right-handed and you can see the difference.”
He pointed to some smudges on the board. “And that’s where the person’s left sleeve smeared some of the score. For a righty it would be in the opposite place. Like mine.” He pointed to where his sleeve had brushed against some of the chalk marks. “And Leopold is right-handed.”
“How do you know that?”
“He signed a paper I gave him when I saw him in his prison cell.”
“Okay, but maybe a friend of hers who is a musician did it.”
But Decker was already shaking his head. “No.”
“Why not? I could see a buddy of hers writing out a tune or something on here. Maybe inspirational, to match some of Debbie’s writing.”
“Because those notes make no sense at all. You couldn’t play it with any instrument of which I’m aware. From a music composition perspective, it’s gibberish.”
“How do you know? Did you play music?”
Decker nodded. “In high school, guitar and drums. I know my way around scores. And not just the ones on the football field.”
Lancaster glanced back at the symbols. “So what is it, then?”
“I think it’s a code,” said Decker. “And if I’m right about that, it means Jesus was in this house.”
Chapter 22
Decker and Lancaster had sealed off Debbie’s bedroom and called in the forensics team, which had gone over the room and the house in meticulous detail. Burlington had never suffered a crime such as this one, and everyone, from the rookie on the team to the most senior departmental official, was bringing his A-game.
The Watsons said they knew nothing of the musical score. Decker tended to believe them. After the forensics team finished, Decker and Lancaster sat down with the Watsons once more.
“If the guy came to this house to write the score on the wall, could he do so without your knowledge?” Decker asked them.
“Well, we do have to sleep,” said a defensive Beth. “But the house isn’t that big. And our room is right next to Debbie’s. George and I are both light sleepers. I don’t see how she could have had a guy in her room and we not know about it.”
“What about during the day?” said Lancaster.
“I’m a stay-at-home mom. George is a nine-to-fiver. I’m here a lot more than Debbie, actually.”
“How long ago do you remember seeing the musical score on the chalkboard?” asked Decker.
“It wasn’t there two weeks ago, I can tell you that,” she replied.
“How do you know that?” asked Decker.
“Because I wiped the whole thing clean.” She paused. “We’d had an argument and I just, well, I lost it and wiped all that crap off.” She let out a little sob. “And now I’ll never see her again.”
“Argument about what?” asked Decker, ignoring her distress. He needed answers. And he needed them now. She could grieve later.
Beth composed herself. “Debbie was a senior. She took the SAT and did okay, but she hadn’t applied to one damn college. She made excuses about cost. And it’s true that we can’t really help her out. But I kept telling her there’s financial aid out there. And without a degree what was she going to do? Be me?” She paused again as her husband looked away. “So I lost it and wiped her damn board clean. All those messages she had on there about changing the world and having a purpose. It was bullshit! She was doing nothing and going nowhere. So I wiped it clean. Clean slate. Hoped she’d get the point. Guess she didn’t. Guess she never will now. Not now. Oh, shit, my baby. My baby.”
Beth dissolved into tears and started writhing uncontrollably on the couch. With Decker’s help her husband managed to get her into the bedroom to lie down. Decker could hear her calling out to her dead daughter the whole way as he walked back down the hall to join Lancaster.
George Watson came back out a few minutes later and said, “I think we’re done for now, if that’s all right.”
Decker said, “Have you and your wife gone away on a trip recently?”
George looked at him in some amazement. “How did you know that?”
“The guy came here and wrote what he wrote. If you had been here you probably would have seen him. And he wouldn’t take that kind of chance. So you were gone at some point?”
“A week ago we drove to Indiana to be with Beth’s sister. She was ill. We were there two days and then drove back.”
“And Debbie stayed here?”
“Yes, we couldn’t take her out of school.”
“So that’s probably when he came,” said Decker.
George began to shake, wrapping his arms around himself. “Do you really think that animal was in our house? In our daughter’s bedroom?”
Decker gave the man with the wrecked arm the once-over. “I think it’s highly possible, yes.”
Lancaster gave Decker a fierce stare and said quickly, “Well, thanks for your help, Mr. Watson. We’ll be going now. And we’re very sorry for your loss.”
George walked them to the door. As he opened it he said, “Debbie wouldn’t have helped anyone kill people at Mansfield. They were her friends.”