"But we checked —»
"Behind the paperbacks. "He used to do that years ago, toss his overshoes into the closet after a camping trip, and it was still there. "Mud. From his heels." The same kind? Yes, they would say that. They would be able to «prove» it somehow. Because they had to.
The Chief positioned the microphone closer to her. He held his breath.
"In. the alley. Empty cartons. Not empty. Yes. I see… a shirt." It was another Pendleton, the one he had been wearing when he cut himself on a fishing trip, and he had finally thrown it out. And it was red. The only color he ever bought. She had been safe in saying that. She hoped the blood type would match. With any luck it would.
"That's it, Polly! Talk to me, babe. We're almost home."
The tape recorder hummed in the small room. Her hands tightened on the arms of the chair. She stiffened, pressing forward. The sounds in the next office, the rumble of traffic on the other side of the barred windows became the roar of the earth as it buckled under the rains and began to move, disgorging its dead, but she fought it back. Her hands went to her ears.
"No," she said.
Then her hands fell to the table once more, her fingers twitching. Slowly she regained control.
"The car. Black. Under the floorboard. The mat. Look there. See…"
"What, Polly?"
"Leaves." Yes. Only one, but it would have to do. A single eucalyptus leaf carried on his shoe from somewhere and knocked loose by the pedal, slivered there under the edge who knows how long ago. But it was the same kind. It would do.
There were more details, like the fishing knife that had cut him accidentally, in the tackle box of the boat locker at the harbor, stained with his own blood. Again she hoped it would turn out to be the same type as the girl's. But already she had the feeling; she knew. It always worked out.
Finally she lowered her head. When she raised it again, the office was alive with activity. The Chief was snapping his fingers, spitting orders into the phone, hustling his men out the door. She rubbed her eyes.
"You did it, doll," he said. He winked at her.
She rose unsteadily.
"You're not leaving yet," he said. He sounded surprised.
"I have to," she said. "I've got a plane to catch. To Denver. They need my help. A child was strangled there last month and they don't have any leads, none at all."
"Hold it right there," said the Chief.
He left the office for a moment. She heard a muffled conversation, the sound of a locker clanging open. She thought she felt the ground begin to shift under her feet, far beneath the floor and the concrete foundation of the building, but she pushed it out of her mind.
"Here you go." The Chief thrust a carton of Lucky Strikes into her hands. "You know you deserve a hell of a lot more," he told her. "And you know I know it, too. Don't you, babe?" He reached into his coat for a check. It was already made out. He tried to fold her fingers around it.
"You know me better than that, Jack," she said. She pushed his hand away.
They walked together down the hall.
"Don't you even want to see him?" said the Chief.
"Who?"
"The creep. Aren't you curious, at least? Or is it already over for you?" She hesitated.
The Chief led her into a darkened room. When her eyes had adjusted she made out a row of seats, and a pane of glass that took up most of one wall. She reached for a cigarette with shaky fingers.
He stopped her hand. "Two-way mirror," he said.
She looked through to the man on the other side. He was seated at a table in a straight-backed chair. Tweed jacket, rust-colored wool tie loosened at the collar. He was being questioned by two detectives. His expression was serene and self-assured, as always. Even more confident than she remembered, in fact.
But that will change soon enough, she thought.
"That's him," said the Chief. "That's Claiborn."
Well, so long, Ronnie, she thought. Do you even remember me? You'll probably never know. If you do find out, you should be grateful, for in a way I've saved you. I've stopped you from treating anyone else the way you treated me so long ago. In a sense I've helped you, more than you know, more than you'll ever know. In the darkness, she blew him a kiss.
She went back out into the hall. The Chief walked her to the lobby.
"I reckon it's so long, then, till next time," he said. "Can't truthfully say I hope to need you again, Polly. It's always good to see you, though, you know that. What's next for you now? After Denver, that is?"
She sorted through her purse for her notebook.
"Oh, there was a kidnapping back in Rochester," she said. "And that terrible business in Kansas. And then, let me see, there was that funny drowning down in Malibu. Have you heard about that? I don't know if I can schedule them all. Chances are I'll be out to the Coast to see you again soon enough. Just wait and see."
The police station was now busy with noisy activity, switchboards and teletypes banging away full force.
"Listen," he said, "I could call the press in for you — set it up in a few minutes. All it takes is a couple of phone calls. That way you'd at least get some publicity out of this." When she didn't say anything, he said. "But I guess you don't need it, do you? And knowing you, Poll, I'd guess you don't want it, either."
"Justice," she said, "is its own reward. That and being able to do a favor for an old friend…"
She walked to the street. The night was coming fast. As she stood at the curb waiting for her police escort, she thought she saw a movement out of the corner of her eye. But it was only the persistence of the vision: a lonely figure scrabbling down a hillside, frightened by the sudden realization of what he had done. She saw him clearly now for only an instant, like the glimmer of the first star of evening that disappears when you stare too long at it.
He was young, a poor Mexican or Puerto Rican by the looks of him, and his trousers were filthy with mud as she had said. She had told the truth about that part. But that was all. He had no car waiting, no apartment to go to; his shirt was blue denim, though it was almost too wet and dirty to be sure. She wondered idly where he was going. Did he know? Up or down the state, did it matter? He would be caught sooner or later for something else. That was always the way. As he turned to run, his ankles sinking deep into the mulch of the graveyard, she caught a fleeting glimpse of his eyes, dark and quick in an intelligent, utterly terrified face.
She closed her eyes, trying to shut it out.
When she opened them, a patrol car was pulling to a halt in front of her.
She reached for the handle. She was startled by how cold it was to her touch.
The young lieutenant climbed out to help her. He tipped his hat.
"Where to?" he said.
Where? Let's see. There's that bastard of a salesman in Denver, she thought. And there's my old teacher, retired and living in Rochester. And the boy who moved to Kansas, or at least he had been a boy then, like her in his teens when he had tried to rape her that night. And after that.
She was aware of her hand on the door. The cold of the metal was seeping into her fingers, spreading up her goose-fleshed arm, grasping for her chest, seeking to grip her heart with a deathlike chill. She concentrated, focusing her attention. She snatched her hand away.
And then she felt the rumbling. She felt it first in her feet and then in her entire body. My God, she thought, is it the whole street?
"What. what is that?" she asked the officer. "Pardon, ma'am?"
Now the vision was upon her again, fiercer than ever this time. She saw the gray clouds, the heavy soil bubbling and roiling and breaking up through the dark greenery, and then the long, glistening scratchings of the dead awash in the storm as they descended the hills. It was as if the world were being burst apart from within, from its most secret and hidden depths.