Cedar Park was a small college nestled within a single city block. Its facilities consisted of a series a crumbling stone buildings, all of the same vintage and architectural design. Clearly no wealthy graduate was springing for a new theater or science lab.
The gymnasium turned out to be on the fourth floor of the history building. I determined this by going in what appeared to be the administration building and looking in vain for any sort of office, then going back outside and asking some students, who were leery of me, making me for a cop. Eventually I got the right building, found the stairs. Halfway up the last flight, I was rewarded by the sound of a bouncing basketball.
The Cedar Park College basketball court was small, as I’d expected, but surprisingly well maintained. The parquet floor gleamed. The keys and three-point lines had been stenciled on with care. The wooden backboards were freshly painted white. The orange rims were new, as were the white and blue nets.
The court was about three-quarters of the length of a regulation floor. There were no bleachers for fans, just a single row of benches along the narrow side walls, which might have led me to believe this was just a practice gym, were it not for the score clock on the wall. The clock looked older than me, which cast doubts as to whether it actually worked. Taken together, a pair of depressing thoughts.
There were ten men on the court, playing a practice game. Five wore red pullover jerseys, five did not. All were black. Most were lithe and thin. Some were tall. Some were broad. All had moves. None were dominant.
Watching the action was a wizened old black man with horn-rimmed glasses, a whistle in his mouth, and a perpetual frown. As I watched, he blew the whistle, stopped action, strode onto the court.
“No, no, no!” he complained, shaking his head. He addressed a lanky young man with an open mouth and a who, me? expression. “ Clyde, what was that play? That was a pick-an’-roll. You pick, but you din’t roll. Floyd got the ball, two defenders on him, nowhere to go. All you do is bring another man to cover Floyd. Now, is that helpful? Is that useful? Is that what you were tryin’ to do?”
Players from both teams grinned and snickered while Clyde shuffled his feet and muttered, “No.”
“No,” the man with the whistle said. “Tha’s right, Clyde. Good answer. So we learnin’ here. So the next time you pick an’ roll, you roll.”
Play started up again.
I moved around the court, approached the man. “Coach Tom?”
He spoke without looking or taking the whistle out of his mouth. “Yes?”
“I’m here about Grant Jackson.”
He exhaled hard enough to blow the whistle slightly. Heads turned on the court, but he waved it off. “Play on.” He turned to me, aggrieved. “What about him? Not bad enough I lose my star player, I gotta answer questions too?”
“Yeah,” I said. “It must be hard. But it’s harder for his family. For their sake, could you help me out?”
Coach Tom squinted up his eyes and turned his back on the action on the court. “Just what you mean?”
I was treading a fine line here, what with Richard rejecting the case. “I’m trying to help out Grant’s mom. See if there’s any insurance money to be had. It’s probably a long shot, but the woman had ten kids. If you can see a way to help me out.”
“How could I do that?”
“I understand Grant collapsed during a practice. Was that up here?”
“Course it here. You think we got some other gym we use for games? This here’s it. Always has been, probably always will. ‘Specially now.”
“You mean without Grant?”
“Made a difference, that he did. Expectations were high.”
“Justifiably so?”
He squinted. “Wha’s that?”
“Did you think Grant would have made a difference?”
“Yes, he would. How much is hard to say, but he certainly would.” He jerked his thumb. “These are good boys, but without him they just another team.”
“How will they do?”
“Same as usual. Not too good, not too bad. Couple of schools we always beat, couple always beat us. Bunch inna middle. Same thing every year.”
“How long have you coached this team?”
“Twenty-six years now.”
“Ever had a player like Grant?”
“I had good players. But like Grant? No, not like Grant. Damn shame.”
“How did it happen?”
“We havin’ a scrimmage, just like this. He goes up for a rebound. Come down holdin’ his side. I thought he got elbowed. By the guy in front. I’m giving him what-for ’bout boxin’ out, he fall down on the floor.”
“Any chance he did take an elbow to the ribs, something might have hurt his heart?”
“Sure there is. But that’s not what killed him. Not accordin’ to the TV.”
“That surprised you?”
“What?”
“That he was taking drugs?”
“Yes and no.”
“What do you mean by that?”
Coach Tom scratched his nose. “You gotta understand. I seen ’em come, I seen ’ em go. All types of kid. I never seen a kid as good as Grant. But I seen kids like him. I know how they think.”
“And how is that?”
“You wouldn’t understand.”
“Try me.”
He tapped his glasses. “You can see it in their eyes. The fear. The fear of failure. They got all the goods they need to succeed, and they afraid it’s not enough. They scared to death to get out there, have to prove themselves.” He shrugged. “So they turn to junk. You think Grant the first star player I had took to drugs? What planet you live on?”
“Grant was a special case. He had a heart problem. He knew drugs could kill him.”
“Drugs could kill anybody. Sometimes do. They still take ’em. Kid got the fear, like Grant, he not thinkin’ that. He don’t care. I’m not sayin’ he tryin’ to kill himself. But it’s not a deterrent, you know what I mean? Grant decide to take a toot, stuff don’t agree with him, there you go. Shame, but there you be.”
Coach Tom watched the action up and down the court. “Bounce-pass, Larry. Bounce-pass.”
“Grant never used drugs before?”
“How should I know?”
“I don’t know. The college have a drug policy?”
“Sure they do. Make me run drug tests.” He snorted. “What a joke. Guys pee in a cup. Big deal. Pass the cup around. Guy who’s not high pees for ’em all.”
“You don’t supervise ’em?”
He gave me the evil eye. “You like to hold that cup? They say test ’em, I test ’em. They don’t like it, jus’ too damn bad.”
“So Grant passed his drug screen?”
“That he did. Did he pass it on his own, I couldn’t say.”
“If he was gettin’ high, who was giving it to him?”
He gave me another look. “How the hell should I know?”
I shrugged. “You strike me as a man don’t miss much. I bet you could tell me the most likely source on your team for coke or grass.”
“Oh, you think so?” Coach Tom blew the whistle. “No, tha’s a turnover. You can palm the ball all you want, no one care anymore, but you carry it like that, you gonna get called. Red ball onna side.” He turned back to me. “You talk a good game. You start talkin’ to my boys about drugs, they’re gonna think you a cop, no matter what cover story you give. You don’t need that, and neither do I. And you ain’t a cop. You got no authority to do it, so you don’t.”
He stuck his finger in my face. “So lemme put it ‘nother way. How will knowing where Grant got his drugs help you get some insurance money for his mom? Riddle me that.”
I couldn’t.
MacAullif smiled when I walked in the door.
I stopped, blinked, wondered if I was in the wrong office.