Dorcas peered down at her from the bench. “I know this is difficult for you,” she said, “but just answer the fucking questions.” Then she reached inside her black robe and pulled out a coffeemaker and a five-gallon gas can.
The little thug rose from the prosecution table.
“Is the man who did this to you in this courtroom?” he asked.
Gloria nodded and pointed her finger.
“The record will show,” Dorcas said, “that the witness has identified Fucking Bastard.”
In the jury box, Hardcastle, Veronica, and Brady Coyle laughed and slapped high fives.
Dorcas was fiddling with the coffeemaker, trying to set the timer. The witness was still pointing at me, but now she had Cheryl Scibelli’s face. Then the coffeemaker exploded in a ball of flame, and I woke up. My ribs felt like they were on fire.
62
After forty-eight hours, I was kicked.
They returned my pills, belt, shoelaces, Mickey Mouse watch, lighter, and wallet, but the three twenties that had been in it were gone. My Visa card was still where it belonged, but I assumed they had taken down the number to check recent purchases. Fortunately I hadn’t bought any coffeemakers lately. I didn’t get my grandfather’s gun back.
Secretariat had been impounded and was no doubt being torn apart at the state police crime lab. I dry-swallowed a couple of painkillers and walked the half mile home from the station. The apartment had been tossed, the kitchen drawers pulled out and emptied on the floor. I was beyond caring. I stripped, stepped gingerly into the shower, and let the hot water stream over my ribs for a long, long time.
Late Friday morning, I stepped off the elevator and walked stiffly into the newsroom. Keyboard clacking dribbled into silence as two dozen reporters and copy editors stopped what they were doing to stare. At first, no one said anything. Then a drawl broke the silence.
“Burn down a neighborhood so you can write about it? Hot diggity! Why didn’t I think of that?”
“Shut it, Hardcastle,” Lomax said.
He rose from his throne behind the city desk, gestured that I should follow, and stepped into Pemberton’s glass-walled office. I was halfway there when Veronica intercepted me.
“Are you all right?”
“As good as can be expected.”
“Anything I can do?”
“Yeah,” I said. I took her hand and squeezed it. “Keep me company after I have this friendly little chat.”
Then I turned away, entered the managing editor’s office, and sank into one of the maroon leather visitor’s chairs.
Pemberton took off his glasses, wiped them with a Kleenex, and put them back on. Then he unbuttoned the cuffs of his starched white shirt and rolled up the sleeves.
“Can I get you anything, Mulligan? Bottled water? A cup of coffee, perhaps?”
“I could use some Percocet.”
“Excuse me?”
“Never mind. I’m good.”
“Yes, well. So let’s get right to it, then. We seem to have something of a situation here.”
“A situation?” Lomax said. “Feels more like a goddamned train wreck.”
I didn’t say anything.
“Have you observed how this unfortunate affair is playing on the TV news?” Pemberton said.
“Sorry, but the seventy-two-inch, high-def, flat-screen entertainment center in the holding cell was on the fritz.”
“Yes, of course. You were being detained. It must have been quite unpleasant for you.”
“Quite unpleasant indeed,” I said.
Lomax glared at me and said, “Cut it out.”
“Unfortunately,” Pemberton said, “all the local channels have blown the matter entirely out of proportion. To hear them tell it, you’d think the newspaper itself is the serial arsonist.”
“You mean, as opposed to just one wayward employee?”
“I didn’t intend to imply that.”
“And how is the paper handling the story?”
“Oh, that’s right. You haven’t seen the newspaper either. Perhaps you should read this before we continue.”
He pulled a paper from a stack on his desk and passed it to me. I folded it open to the sports page. The Sox bats had pounded the Yankees 7–5 the night before. Yippie.
The name L. S. A. Mulligan was on page one again, but this time it wasn’t a byline. The story of my arrest had been written by Lomax, the circumstances too sensitive to be entrusted to a mere reporter. I scanned it and learned that Polecki had identified me as “a person of interest” in the arson investigation. At least the cops hadn’t publicly connected me to the Scibelli murder. Pemberton was quoted as saying he would have no comment until he had time to “review the situation.”
I tossed the paper on the desk and looked at Pemberton.
“Funny,” I said. “I didn’t see anything in there about how you are standing by your reporter.”
“Yes, well …” He looked at Lomax for help, didn’t get any, and pressed on. “I do hope you understand why I have to ask you this, Mulligan. Are you in any way culpable in this dreadful affair?”
“Of course he isn’t,” Lomax said.
“I believe Mulligan is capable of answering for himself.”
“Fuck you,” I said.
“May I take that as a no, then?”
“You may.”
“Good. That’s settled. Now we have to decide what we are going to do with you.”
63
At two in the afternoon Hopes was mostly empty, just a couple of alkies slouched at the bar sipping something bitter. I led Veronica and Mason to a table by the beer cooler in back.
“Indefinite suspension without pay,” I said.
“You’re kidding,” Veronica said.
“At first, it was gonna be with pay, but only if I promised to keep my nose out of the arson investigation. I told them I couldn’t do that. Especially not now.”
“Baby, that’s so unfair.”
“Try to see it from their point of view,” I said. “For the good of the newspaper, they’ve got to distance themselves from me. If I were in their position, I’d do the same thing.”
“But without pay?”
“How’s it going to look if I keep digging into the story and some asshole like Logan Bedford finds out I’m still on the payroll?”
“Back up a minute,” Mason said. “Do the cops really think you set the fires, or is Polecki just trying to get even for that ‘Dumb and Dumber’ story?”
“Both.”
“Why would they think you’re involved?”
“The FBI profile does fit me to a T.”
“Yeah, but it could fit a lot of people.”
“True. And there’s a flaw in it, too.”
“Which is?”
“The profile assumes the perp is a pyromaniac.”
“He isn’t?”
“No. This isn’t pyromania. It’s arson for profit.”
“What makes you think that?” Mason asked.
“All in good time, Thanks-Dad.”
“What are you going to do now?” Veronica said.
“I’ve got twelve hundred in my checking account. That gives me about a month to crack this thing. If it takes longer than that …”
“You haven’t taken any vacation this year, right?” Mason said.
I nodded.
“And you get—what?—three weeks a year?”
“Yeah.”
“So you’ve got some vacation pay coming. At your salary it should come to …?”
“Just under twenty-six hundred,” I said.
“I’ll talk to Dad and get him to cut the check.”
Diego, the daytime waiter, was busy with something behind the stick, so Mason got up and fetched our drinks. Campari and soda for him, chardonnay for Veronica, Killian’s for me. I swallowed a couple of painkillers, washed them down with beer, and chased it with Maalox.