“That’s exactly what Linda said.”
He grinned. “Linda? We’re on first-name basis, hoo-hoo.”
“Down, Rover.”
“Linda. All that fluffy blond hair, the southern accent. But feisty- gives her an appealing edge. Not a bad choice at all, pal. Time for you to be getting back into the social swing, anyway.”
“No one’s made any choice.”
“Uh-huh.” He made rude sounds. “Leenda. Muy leenda.”
“How’s Rick?”
“Fine. Don’t change the subject.”
I said, “That’s exactly what I’m going to do.” I told him about the silver Honda. He looked unimpressed.
“What did it do other than stop for a few minutes?”
“Nothing. But the timing was weird. It was there when I arrived, driving by when I left.”
“Maybe someone thinks you’re cute, Alex. Or could be it’s just one of the locals, playing paranoid posse, checking out the neighborhood for strangers, thinking you’re the weirdo.”
“Could be.”
“If it would make you feel better,” he said, “give me the license number.”
I did and he copied it down.
“Service with a smile,” he said. “Anything else I can do for you?”
I said, “Massengil seemed sure he was the target. You hear anything backing that up?”
“Nothing- not that Frisk has opened his files to me. Maybe the old coot knows something, but what’s more likely is that he’s got an inflated sense of self-worth, thinks he’s actually worth shooting. Or maybe he’s the paranoid one and that’s what Santa’s treating him for.”
He ate more pear, said, “Some milk would go well with this,” and went to get some. He returned, drinking out of the carton.
“Something else you should know about,” I said, and told him about the hate mail.
“Your basic bedbugs,” he said. “Too bad she has to go through it.”
“She said Frisk didn’t take it too seriously.”
“To tell the truth, Alex, there’s not much you can do with that kind of garbage. Now if it turns out the Burden girl was affiliated with some racist group, that’ll be different.”
“Would Frisk tell you if she was?”
“Not until after he put on his Giorgio suit, smiled into the camera, and told the greater metropolitan area first. But chances are, if she was highly political he’d know already. ATD’s got everything computerized, would have moved on her known associates and I would have heard it through the old interoffice rumor transport system.”
“Is there anything now you can tell me about her, Milo? The kids are asking.”
“I’ve learned a few things by way of my source at the coroner’s but I doubt it’s the kind of info that’ll help you. She was wearing black- jeans, sweater, shoes, everything down to the undies.”
“Sounds like a commando getup.”
“Or ninja nutcase. Or her taste in couture ran to basic black and a string of bullets. Or maybe she just didn’t want to be seen in the dark- who the hell knows? What else- yeah, she was clean, drug-wiso and booze-wise, an intact virgin, in excellent physical health prior to being perforated. Stomach contents showed she’d eaten around six the previous evening. There was a paper cup with urine in it in the shed. The chemical composition of the pee implied she’d been camped out there some time during the night, sipping and waiting. Sound like something you want to tell the kids?”
I shook my head. “I learned something too. She had a black boyfriend.”
He put down the milk carton. “Oh, yeah? Where’d you hear that?”
“One of the teachers at Hale lives in the neighborhood, taught her years ago. She told Linda about the boyfriend and Linda told me. Linda told Frisk but he wasn’t any more interested than he’d been in the hate mail.”
He ran his hand over his face. “Boyfriend, huh? Active or ex?”
“That’s what I wanted to know. If he was recent, he might know something, right? But the teacher never said.”
“Not that active, anyway,” he said. “The intact virgin part. Got a name?”
“No. Just what I told you.”
“Well,” he said, “interracial dating’s no crime. Officially.”
I thought back to the hate mail. Racemixer biches. “Even casual interracial dating would be considered a felony in Ocean Heights, Milo. Meaning she might have gotten a lot of social punishment for it- nasty comments, ostracization, or worse. And it also implies she was anything but a racist- wouldn’t have been likely to be shooting at those kids.”
“Unless she and the boyfriend had a nasty breakup and she started resenting all minorities.”
“Maybe,” I said. “Here’s a more likely scenario: What if coming face to face with local racism radicalized her and turned her against someone she viewed as racist. A racist authority figure.”
“Massengil?”
“Maybe she and Massengil even had some kind of confrontation before the shooting. Something he’d never admit to. You should have seen how he reacted when I accused him of drawing a killer to the school, Milo. It definitely struck a nerve. With his temper, even a minor confrontation with her could have gotten ugly. Combine that with her history of psychological problems… By the way, where did Frisk come up with that?”
He shook his head in disgust. I resolved to stop evoking feelings of impotence.
“Anyway,” I said, “mix those elements and you’ve got something potentially explosive. It would explain why Massengil was so sure he was the intended target.”
Milo thought about it, said, “Guess it’s feasible, but good luck proving it.”
I said, “Don’t you think it’s worth talking to the boyfriend? Checking out known associates?”
“Sure. But it’s possible Frisk has already done it.”
“He didn’t mention it to Linda.”
“He wouldn’t. Guy would swear off orgasms if it gave him the upper hand.”
“He who dies with the most secrets wins?”
“You got it.”
“Must be a blast working with him.”
“Oh, yeah. Like a cattle prod to the prostate. Anyway, what’s this teacher’s name?”
“Esme Ferguson. She teaches fourth grade. She called in sick this morning. You can get her home number from Linda.”
He copied down the name. “She have anything else to say about the late Ms. Burden?”
“Lousy student, used to space out in class, not too social. Fits with what the neighbors told the papers about her hanging around the house all day.”
“How,” he said, “does she meet a black guy if she spends all her time just hanging around the house? In that neighborhood.”
“Good question.”
He closed his pad, put it back in his pocket. “Only good question, my friend, is one that can be answered.”
“Profound.”
“Yeah. Someone profound said it- Heidegger, Krishnamurti. Or maybe it was Harpo Marx. Squeak squeak.”
He finished the pear with two ferocious bites and emptied the milk carton.
“Sounds more like Zeppo,” I said. “Care for some dessert?”
10
After he left I listened to the white cassette. The contents were nothing that would have intrigued a grade-schooler: synthesized harp music that sounded as if it had been recorded underwater and Dobbs talking in the syrupy-sweet, patronizing tone people who don’t really like kids put on when they talk to them.
The gist of the message was Play Ostrich- clean your brain, blot out reality in order to make it go away. Pop psych in all its superficial glory; Freud would have turned over in his grave. B. F. Skinner wouldn’t have pushed the reward button.
I turned off the tape recorder, ejected the cassette, and lobbed a two-pointer into the nearest wastebasket, wondering how much Dobbs charged per tape. How many copies he’d peddled to the state, via Massengil’s expense account.
The phone rang. I took it in the kitchen.
“Hi, Alex, it’s me.”
A voice that had once soothed me, then cut me. First time I’d heard it in months.