It wasn't long before he was in conversation with the others and then they were all leaving, going to a strip joint on South State Street, Colin among them.
He remembered the place: lots of smoke, girls with tassels, more boilermakers. He remembered going to the men's room. But that was it.
When he awoke in his car he was stunned. It was six-thirty in the morning and the sun was beating in through the windshield. The taste in his mouth was sour, like old socks. He'd been crumpled up under the steering wheel and when he tried to straighten, everything hurt, as if he'd been in a fight. It was then that he saw the blood. The front of his shirt was stained and there was some on his pants. In the rearview mirror he saw that although he looked like hell, there were no cuts or scrapes. So he must have been in a fight, and the blood was from the other guy. But what other guy? He couldn't remember. The last thing he could clearly recall was going into that men's room at the strip joint.
He got out of the car, pulled his jacket closed over the bloodstains and made his way home. Nancy would be up with the kids. He didn't know what he was going to say, hoped she'd forgive him, felt pretty sure she would. When he got to the apartment and put his key in the door he found that it was unlocked. For a moment he was alarmed, then figured Nancy might have been afraid he'd forgotten his keys, left it open for him. It gave him some courage. But when he stepped inside his courage fled, leaving only fear in its stead.
He could see immediately that the place had been ransacked. Lamps were knocked over, drawers pulled out, things strewn about the floor. He yelled for Nancy. There was no answer. Cautiously moving into the room, he called for her again. Then for Todd. No one answered. And then he saw her. Across the room partially under an upended table. He shouted her name and ran to her, pushing the table aside. She was on her stomach, and when he turned her over he almost vomited. Alicia was under her. They were covered in blood, dead. He'd seen enough dead people to know. He shouted for Todd, then raced madly through the rooms, falling, bumping into things, continuing to call for his son. He found him in his bed. Dead. Blood everywhere. Falling on the bed, he picked up the boy and held him, crying, rocking. Time passed, and then he lay Todd down and stumbled back to the living room, to his wife and daughter. He crumpled to the floor and held Nancy in his arms, Alicia too. Over and over he said their names. He didn't know how long he stayed with the bodies, holding them, rocking them, talking to them, but eventually he realized he had to do something. Gently he placed Nancy and Alicia on the rug and slowly got to his feet. When he found the phone under the couch, he saw that it had been pulled from the wall. Something about that pushed him over the edge and he began to scream, baying almost. He left the apartment, went into the street, and shouted for help.
People ran from him. He was covered in blood-face, hands, shirt, jacket, pants, even shoes. No one would help him. And then he was attacked, wrestled to the ground, handcuffed. He tried to tell them, but no one would listen. It was only later, in the police station, that they understood what he'd been attempting to tell them about Nancy and the children.
Colin was arrested for the murders. Unidentified fingerprints were found in the apartment and unidentified blood on Colin's clothes. He couldn't prove where he was after midnight, but the blood helped his story of being in a fight. The murder weapon, a large knife of some sort, was never found. Colin was let go for lack of evidence, and the murders went unsolved.
But in the back of Colin's mind, some days, some nights was the nagging question he would live with forever: Would they have died if he'd been at home?
Most of the time he knew he couldn't have saved them, probably would have been murdered himself. And the year after the murders that he'd spent living with his mother, talking to a therapist, had helped him to lessen his guilt. Still-sometimes when he woke in the night, covered in sweat, having dreamed of his family, mutilated and bloody-he wondered and wept.
LOOKING BACK-25 YEARS AGO
The controversy over the proposed plan to turn Terry's old oyster factory, at the foot of Sixth Street in Seaville, into a nightclub, continued at last night's Town Meeting. Residents of Sixth Street claim there is no room to park the cars of all the patrons to a nightclub in that vicinity. There is also the question of noise and possible rowdiness. Ralph Heaney, the prospective owner of the club, said that he will blacktop a large enough area for cars to park.
ELEVEN
On Monday morning Carl Gildersleeve, sunglasses low on the bridge of his nose, stood over Chief Hallock, his hands gripping the edge of the desk. "Well, what the hell've you got?"
"On what?"
"Don't bullshit me, Waldo, you know damn well what!"
"You mean the murders?"
"What else would I mean?"
"You wanna know what I got? I got nothing. A big fat zero, if you mean a suspect."
"I mean a suspect. And more to the point, an arrest."
Hallock laughed. "No suspect, no arrest."
"You think this is funny?"
"Nope. But I think you're ridiculous."
The mayor's face flushed, turning brick red. "You'd better watch your mouth, Waldo, and I mean it. You can't talk to me like that."
"I'm telling you I got nothing and you're pushing me. So I find that pretty ridiculous."
"I can't believe you haven't got one damn shred of-of anything, not one suspect."
Hallock pushed his cap back on his head, ran a big hand over his chin, and felt a patch of stubble he missed that morning. "Okay. This is what I got. I got a confession."
Gildersleeve stared at Hallock with cold eyes. "What's that bullshit?"
"No bullshit. I got a confession. To both murders. Jim Drew's confession."
"You mean that loony-tunes peckerhead who confesses to everything from being a peepin' tom to armed robbery?"
"The very same."
"What the fuck good is that?"
"So who said it was good? I told you I didn't have diddly-squat."
Gildersleeve was silent for a moment, sat down in an orange chair, and played with his flowered tie. "Wait a minute, wait a minute. Lemme think."
"Be my guest."
"Drew confessed, huh? To both murders?"
"I was waiting for him. Took him five hours before he confessed to Ruth Cooper's murder."
"So arrest him," Gildersleeve ordered.
"I'm dying laughing."
"I'm serious." Gildersleeve moved forward in his chair, his tie end resting on the desk. "Listen. We make an arrest now, get an indictment, and if it doesn't hold up three, four months from now, nobody gives two farts in the wind. You see what I mean?"
"No. I don't see. It wouldn't hold up for two minutes, let alone months. Nobody's gonna indict that bedbug. Like you said, Carl, he confesses to every misdemeanor comes down the pike."
"We need an arrest."
"What's the we stuff, huh?" Hallock leaned forward, stared into Gildersleeve's eyes. "I make the arrest, I take the heat when the DA goes to indict and sees he's got snow in August. But before that the paper nails me like a piece of…"
"What paper? That rag? What do they know?"
"They'll squeeze my balls till they bust if I go arresting Drew. They know he's a loon."
"Listen, Waldo, the guy confessed, right? So give him what he wants, and give the public what they want. Everybody wants to sleep easy."
Hallock walked around the side of the desk and stood over Gildersleeve. "I don't think you understand what we got here. Two murders in two days."
"The first one was over a month ago. Bastard, puttin' her in my pool."
"Okay, so it happened a month ago. The point is, there's been a second one. And maybe there's gonna be a third. So let's say I got Drew locked up nice an' cozy, and the real killer bumps off another woman and writes another A on her chest. Then what, huh? It's my ass in a sling, not yours."