He listened, then probed the bedroom. Went through the chest of drawers, through the closets, looked at photographs in a grass basket, dug through a trunk, through a jewelry, smelled her perfume, dabbed some of it on his throat.
Stretched out on her bed; turned his face into her pillow.
Hated her; but still loved her, too, he thought.
He was still there, on the bed, when she got back.
Felt a finger of panic: then remembered the closet.
Crept into it, made himself small, in the back, with the shoes, behind the hanging lengths of the hippie dresses.
Took the gun out, placed the long, cool length of it against his face.
Heard voices: she was with a man. The bodyguard.
He'd wait until he was gone, and take her.
End her.
And if the bodyguard stayed?
He worked it out: Take the bodyguard first. No warning, just step up and do it.
Then her.
He tried to control his breathing, but found it difficult.
Hate/sex/death/darkness. The odor of Chanel. The silken feel of her dresses on his face.
He waited.
Chapter 26
Louis found the kid's nameCharles McKinley. An address was listed in the university directory, but when Louis called it, the phone had been disconnected.
'Student,' Louis said to Anna.
'We need an address,' Anna said. When she got off the phone, she said to Harper, 'We've got to go after this kid. This little stunt he pulled. there's something in here. A couple of different personalities, or something.'
'It won't hurt to take a look at Clark while we're waiting,' Harper said. 'If Louis says the kid's not in the directory, then it'll take a while to find him.'
Anna shook her head, but said, 'I guess.' Harper made sense, but the gloom was on her. She dreaded the idea of spying on Clark.
Harper pulled away from the curb and headed down the hill, into the campus, silent, knowing that she was working through it. She stared out the window at the passing landscape and wondered why the idea of surveillance worried her so much.
She turned the question in her mind until she arrived at the nexus: If we get back together, I'll have to tell him. And if I tell him, I'll be admitting that I thought he might be this killer. But only if we get back together, and we won't. But if we do.
The thoughts tumbled over each other, always running into the paradox: we won't, but if we do.
A barefoot man in a ragged winter coat, the kind people wore in Minnesota, stood on the corner by the Shell station and held up a cardboard sign hand-lettered with Magic Marker: will work for drugs. He laughed crazily, drunkenlyor maybe somebody had dropped some acid on himat the passing cars. Harper guided the BMW past him, wordlessly, glancing at Anna from time to time.
'That's where the trouble started,' Anna said, looking at the gas station as they went by.
'What?'
'That's where we picked up the woman who took us into the animal rights thing. we were right down there at the medical center.'
'Maybe the kid's up there, McKinley,' Harper suggested. 'You want to run in? We've still got a little time.'
She thought about it for a second. Anything seemed preferable to looking for Clark: 'Sure.'
'I'll waittake the gun,' Harper said.
Anna ran up to the front of the building while Harper idled at the curb. The building was locked, but she could see a security guard inside. She banged on the door, and the guard got up, reluctantly, and walked toward her, cracked the door.
'Can I help you?'
'I'm trying to find Charles McKinley. He works up in the animal labs.'
'He's not here tonight,' the guard said, talking through the crack. 'He's been off since last week.'
''Cause of the animal rights thing?'
'Yup. He's been all over the TV. He was on the "Today" show, even.'
'Great,' Anna nodded. 'Does anybody know where he lives?'
'I couldn't tell you if I did know,' the guard said. 'But I don't, anyway.'
'Got a phone number?'
'I don't think so. I could look, I guess.'
'Thanks, I'd appreciate it.'
The guard pulled the door closed and went back to his desk, rummaged around for a while, and came back, shaking his head. 'Nothing there. Best thing to do is call tomorrow morning. Somebody might know. Buthe's a student.'
'Nothing?' Harper asked.
'He's not there.'
They drove the next two blocks in silence, dumped the car in a parking garage and walked toward the music building.
'I hate this,' Anna said. She felt like she was plodding through paste.
'Where's he most likely to come out?'
She thought about it, and again got caught in the memories: playing with Clark, exploring the building, playing every instrument they could find. They spent several nights in the place, even made love on a library table, when neither one of them would back off the dare.
'Right out the front,' she said, reluctantly. 'He used to always try to park in the Number Two parking structure, it's just down the block.'
'So let's find a place to sit,' Harper said. He was being stubborn about it. He could have offered to break it off, to concentrate on the kid. He could have accepted Anna's argument that she knew Clark well enough to vouch for him. But instead, Harper moved her along, pulling her into it.
Schoenberg Hall was a low white building on the south side of a grassy sunken square called Dickson Plaza. Anna found a spot on the steps on the north side of the plaza, where they could see the main entrance to the building. She said, 'I wish I had that joint.'
'That'd keep you sharp,' Harper said, dropping down beside her.
'I don't need sharp.' She looked at her watch. 'Should be ending.'
Ten minutes went by. Then the door opened, and a woman walked out. A minute later, a couple. Another minute, and a stream of people pushed out of the building, chatting and laughing as they headed down the walk.
'Lot of people. Must've been pretty good,' Anna said.
'No Clark?'
'If it's really his student, they're probably hanging around until everyone leaves, talking about it.'
'Is that fun? A good time?'
She let the question hang for a second, then said, 'Mostly. It can be pretty terrible. But even when it's terrible, it's kind of fun. You know, people mess up. If they're your friends, you pretend it was nothing. If they're your enemies, you tell everybody that you feel sorry for them, and you still think it's possible that they can recover. Stab them in the back.'
'Did you ever mess up?'
'Sure. Everyone does. But if you do it with confidence, keep on counting, you can get away with it. You can get away with a lot, when you're playing alone or with a good group. That's part of the fun, too. A secret that nobody knows except the players.'
'Never played music,' Harper said. 'Can't even whistle.'
'Everybody can whistle,' Anna said. She whistled the first few notes of 'Yankee Doodle'.
'Nope. Can't do that. I can make a noise, but.' She touched his sleeve: 'There he is. That's Clark.'
Clark was walking with a woman who was carrying a cello case, and Anna said, half-joking, but her voice fierce, 'Oh, Christ, a cello.'
'What?' Harper asked. He was whispering, though Clark and the woman were seventy-five yards away.
'Cello players are supposed to be, you know, sexy. All those hours with a big vibrating instrument between their knees.'
'Hmm.'
'Yeah, it's gotta be bullshit.'
'Why?'
'I don't know.'
The other couple walked past, still seventy-five or eighty yards away, and Harper said, 'Walk behind mehe'll recognize your walk if he sees you.' Anna looked after Clark, and realized that she would recognize him from the back, anywhere, just by the walk. How had Harper known that?
'Okay.'
They followed Clark and the woman around the end of the building, and Anna said, 'They're headed for Structure Two.'
'You sure?'
'There's nothing else over there, unless they're walking somewhere. I can't see them walking far with that cello.'