“What, a can of beer or something like that?”
Pasquale took a deep breath. “Yes, sir.”
I let that answer hang in the bright sun for a moment. “You’re starting for the Jaguars this year.” I knew the starting line-up, and knew that as a ninth-grader two years before, Thomas had warmed the varsity bench for the first few games, then played a little, and then, the previous year as a sophomore, had hit pay dirt. Big and husky for his age, he loved the tackle business.
“Practice this afternoon, right?” I added.
He nodded. “I won’t miss it, sir.”
“I’m not concerned that you might,” I said easily. “Of course, if Coach Page had driven by while you were hitting the suds with Mr. Zipoli, you wouldn’t have to worry about it, would you?”
The stricken expression on the boy’s broad face gave me a surge of satisfaction. Maybe he’d think a little, now and then. I took a deep breath, head tipped back, examining the kid’s face through the lower choice of my bifocals. “You know, son, at this point, I just don’t care about whether or not you and some of your pals shared a brew with the county road grader operator. Now, if I had driven by while that was going on, Mr. Zipoli would be facing all kinds of charges. At the very least, he’d have lost his job. Maybe even faced some jail time. You understand that, don’t you?”
“Yes, sir.” The words came out as a strangled whisper.
“But Mr. Zipoli is dead.” I reached out and tapped the boy gently over the left eyebrow with an index finger. He didn’t flinch. “Somebody put a rifle bullet right through the windshield of his road grader and blew his goddamned brains all over the inside of the cab.” An exaggeration, of course, but it had the desired effect. “That’s what interests us at the moment.”
The kid’s face paled several shades. “I don’t know anything about what happened, sir. I really, really don’t.” His gaze didn’t waver.
“I don’t guess that you do, Thomas. But we’ll talk with every soul we can think of who might have crossed paths with Larry Zipoli just before he was killed. Right now, the list is damn short, son, and you and your friends are included. Who were you riding with the other day?”
“Just the guys, sir.”
I grinned. “Look, son, I know you don’t want to rat anybody out, okay? I understand that. And I already told you…at this point, I don’t care if you guys had a goddamn orgy up on the county road, and wobbled home stinkin’ plastered. You follow me? We already know that Mr. Zipoli had beer with him…maybe some of the hard stuff as well. We already know that. So.” I sighed. “I don’t care what you and your buds did-or did not do-for a few minutes up on the mesa yesterday. But I do need to know who else was there that afternoon. I need to talk with them, but they won’t know you’re the one who gave me the names.” I reached out a hand, made a fist, and thumped him gently on the shoulder. “One way or another, Thomas. And it’ll save a whole lot of valuable time if you’ll tell me what you know.” I thumped him again, just a bit harder.
“See, the thing is, Thomas, the killer is still out there somewhere. Now, exactly why he or she pulled the trigger, we don’t know. But we will know, Thomas. I guarantee you that. Larry Zipoli showed you guys some good times. You owe him for that.”
For a long moment, Thomas Pasquale occupied himself with a bit of loose handlebar grip tape. He smoothed the frayed end in about eight directions, but his mind had no idea what his hands were doing.
“Jason and Mo,” he said finally. “It was just the three of us.”
“Jason Packard and Mo Arnett?”
“Yes, sir. Just the three of us.”
“Mo and Jason…they’re into this as much as you are?”
Thomas grinned, showing a chipped tooth he’d probably earned sometime when he’d taken up aviation with his bike. “Jason more so, Mo hardly at all. We’re trying to get him on the team. Me and Jason.”
Jason Packard, a junior classmate of Pasquale’s, looked like a cyclist-medium height, not an extra ounce of pudge, hair cropped short, a thin, hatchet face that would split the wind. I didn’t know the boy very well, other than being able to pick him out of a crowd when reminded of his name. I knew his stepdad, Lance Frank, a man who was joining the legion of unemployed as Consolidating Mining collapsed. Frank had fallen for Jason’s mother, decided that ranching was the life for him, and made a hash of the whole affair-alienating Jason at the same time.
Mo Arnett had made it to his senior year without drawing the attention of the Sheriff’s Department or the village police. I could pick him out of a lineup as well, but that was the extent of my background on him. A little on the pudgy side, but medium everything else, as I recalled. Medium height, looks, intelligence…nothing to make him a standout. The latest page of my memory had Mo Arnett lighting M-80’s, or cherry bombs, thrilling his neighbors.
“Of the three of you, who’s the fastest?” I asked.
“Jason,” Thomas replied without hesitation. “I can outsprint him for a little bit, but not for any distance. And on hills, forget it.”
“How’s Mo do?”
“He’s…” Thomas paused and made a face. “He doesn’t try very hard. But his bike sucks, so that’s part of it. He’s got this old Schwinn three-speed that weighs a ton.”
“Not a hot rod, eh.”
“No, sir.”
“How often does he go out with you?”
“Just a couple of times.”
“He’s not in school today, Thomas. I’m surprised he isn’t out with you.”
“I don’t know where he is, sir.”
“You didn’t talk with him this morning?”
“No, sir.”
“You’ll see him this afternoon?”
“Hmmm…might.”
“Where were you guys headed the other day when you stopped to chat with Zipoli?”
“We were thinking of the mesa top, but Mo was walking more than he was riding. Jason was way out ahead-he said he’d wait on top. So me and Mo were just makin’ it work. I was going to try and take Jason on the hill, but then Mo couldn’t keep up, and I didn’t want to just take off and leave him. I knew Jason wouldn’t wait, ‘cause him and Mo…” He stopped, as if embarrassed by this gusher of information.
“Him and Mo what?”
“They don’t get along so good any more. They used to, I guess, but…”
“So you were riding with Mo, trying to coax him along.”
“Yes, sir. And then we came around that corner there above the old drive-in and Jason was stopped, talkin’ with Mr. Zip.”
Mr. Zip, your friendly circus clown. “For how long?”
“Just a few minutes.”
I leaned back and rested my rump on the front fender of the county car, crossing my arms over my chest. “He offered you guys some refreshment?”
“Yes, sir.”
“You accepted?”
That prompted a long, uncomfortable silence. Self-incrimination wasn’t Tom Pasquale’s favorite sport.
“I guess,” he said finally.
“What, a beer or two?”
“Me and Jason shared a beer. Mo didn’t.”
“Really.” That was interesting, peer influence being the super-power that it was.
“No, sir. He was workin’ on his bike, and rode on up the road a few feet. Something with his chain, but I don’t know what. I mean, what’s to go wrong with a chain? It’s either on or it isn’t.”
“What did Zipoli talk about?”
“Oh, just stuff, you know. He wanted to know if I was going to get a job with the county when I graduate.”
“And are you?”
Pasquale frowned in disbelief. “No, sir. I don’t think so.”
“And that’s it?”
“He mentioned that he’d be taking a trip over to the Butte with the boat some Sunday comin’ up. That’d be cool.”
“Indeed. So no mention of any arguments? Nothing like that?”
“No, sir.”
“And then you went on up the hill.”
“Yes, sir. Mo went on ahead some while we was talking, working on his bike, but it only took us about ten seconds to catch him.”