Hard Case Crime: Witness To Myself (13 page)

“Take it. I’ll talk to you later.” She lifted her face and he kissed her.

In the car, he pulled open the paper. The sketch, a small one, was one of several items that filled a column called Nationwide that ran on the left of the front page; each item listed a page number for the full story on the inside. Quickly he went to the third page. There the sketch was twice as large; the story, by the Associated Press, ran four or five paragraphs.

Although it was relatively short he had to try reading it a couple of times before he could calm down enough to get through it. There was nothing in it he didn’t know: It gave a brief history of the “fifteen-year-old mystery,” and reported on the “routine” search for the visitor to the library. But now it would be in papers throughout the country, and everyone would know.

He had to run, he told himself. He didn’t know where but he had to pack a few things and just run. Or give himself up. Or kill himself. But where could he run to that would be safe? And give himself up? He was terrified of that, even more than of killing himself. And he couldn’t see killing himself — unless he was cornered, had a gun, raised it to his head in blind fear and no longer caring.

One thing he was sure of was that his life in this city, or any other for that matter, was over. That sketch — Anna would see it, everyone at work would see it, all the people in his building would see it, the nurses in his mother’s nursing home would see it, people he passed on the street would see it; maybe even the desk clerk back at that hotel who had his name and address. So he couldn’t go to work, couldn’t live in his apartment anymore, would never feel safe enough to go into a store to buy something, couldn’t even buy gas for his car without risk.

He kept touching his mouth, trying to think.

All he could come up with was that he had to buy time, see what developed and who suspected what, before he did anything he could never undo. He thought: I’ll call in sick and just wait and see. But wait and see what? And wouldn’t his not showing up for work on the day the sketch appeared confirm that it was really him?

But how could he just walk into that place with those dozens of eyes?

He started the car and began driving in the direction of the office though still trying to decide what to do. He was still debating it in his head as he drove along the street leading to the parking lot near his building. And he was still agonizing over a decision as he approached the lot.

He turned into it, almost as if with closed eyes.

He stood with a group of people waiting at the elevators. A couple of them were reading newspapers, but most were standing with their eyes fixed on the elevator doors. He didn’t recognize anyone from the Foundation.

The elevator opened directly to the Foundation’s large reception room before closing and continuing up. He nodded good morning to the young woman at the desk, then started his long walk past people at their desks or in their offices.

“Good morning, Mr. Benning,” from a secretary he had never spoken to.

“Good morning.”

“Lunch today?” It was Bob Feingold, a fellow about his own age who worked directly under him, standing in the doorway to his office.

“Okay.” Then regretted it instantly. To go out to a crowded restaurant when he didn’t have to?

“Hello.” Someone else.

“Hello.”

And his secretary: “Good morning.”

“Good morning.”

In his office he sagged onto his chair. There were letters on the desk his secretary had opened and put there. It took a while to settle himself down enough to read a couple of them, both appeals for grants, then almost jumped in alarm when his intercom buzzed.

“Alan, are you free for me?” It was Elsa Tomlinson.

“Yes, I am.” He pulled in a breath and walked to her office.

“I’d like your thoughts on this,” she said, holding up a sheaf of papers.

It had to do, she explained, with some programs for which a private high school in Montana was seeking funding. They talked of other things, grants, proposals, the direction she thought the Foundation should be taking in the near future. Then, as he was ready to leave, she said, “Oh, about that funding in child crime you spoke about, that could be very worthwhile. Could you write up something more about it for me?”

“Yes,” but thinking: Maybe someday.

Back in his office he just wanted to close his eyes and sleep forever. But he managed to do some work. Then, about an hour later, while he was trying to read through a proposal, a voice at his doorway said:

“Hey, I see you made the newspaper.”

He looked up sharply, a scalding going through him.

It was Jameson, the vice president with the bowtie. He was holding up the paper. Then his face reddened.

“I’m sorry,” he apologized. “Bad joke.”

“I don’t know what you mean.”

“Oh, a bad joke,” he apologized again. “But there was a funny resemblance with something in the paper. Sorry to have interrupted you.”

After Jameson walked off, he just sat there, numb except for the beating of his heart. How long could he get away with this? God, for how long?

Bob Feingold came by next. “Ready for lunch?”

Alan looked at him from his desk. “Oh. Look, I’m sorry, I really can’t break away right now.”

“Should I wait?”

“No, I probably will skip lunch.”

“That, my friend, is setting a bad precedent.”

But he smiled, gave Alan a thumbs-up and left.

As it turned out, he didn’t have a reason to leave his office that afternoon. Then when it was time to go he waited for most of the other people to leave before going out to the elevator. Walking to the parking lot he felt a kind of release that he had made it through this day. And then he did something he knew was crazy. He turned around on the sidewalk and began walking against most of the flow of people leaving work. He looked at faces as they passed, and gave them a chance to get a good look at his. Then when he got back to the apartment house he said hello to the few people waiting for the elevator and looked squarely at each of them.

It was only when he was in his apartment, the door locked behind him, that he began to tremble.

He looked at his trembling hands and could hardly believe he had done that. What had it proved? It was totally insane.

Later that night, he got a phone call from Gregg Osterly.

“Hey, I want you to know your girlfriend made a big hit here. Especially,” he laughed, “with me.”

“Good.”

“Only good? I just gave her the highest mark. Anyway, I want to know how about squash tomorrow?”

“I don’t think I can tomorrow but let me call you.”

“By the way, you know what made me think of you?” Gregg laughed. “There’s a picture in the paper today of some guy, some witness or something, that reminded me of you.”

Alan had been standing holding the phone. Now he slowly sat down with it.

“Did you see it?” Gregg asked.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“It’s one of those police sketches. Well, it doesn’t look all that much like you, but I got a kick out of it. Anyway, buddy, call me tomorrow.”

Putting the phone down, Alan just stared at it. Only then was he aware of how his heart was hammering.

He tried to take comfort in the fact that only two people he knew — at least so far — had seen even the vaguest resemblance between that sketch and him. But what of people he didn’t know about who might have quietly phoned in tips?

Again he felt everything closing in on him.

He was back once more to giving himself up. And he tried to find hope in it. The police knew he hadn’t raped her: They said it, and that would be in his favor, wouldn’t it? But they also thought it had been her father calling to her that had stopped it; and even though that wasn’t true, he had touched her, touched her... there. And more than once. Twice. That meant he would go into the deepest prison hell not only as a murderer but a sexual predator.

Again he was back to thinking of suicide — but this time as a comfort, something he could do if he decided to in desperation. But how? Overdose on pills? But he didn’t know what kind he’d need or how to get them. Plow his car into a tree? Use a gun? But he didn’t have a gun.

He pulled out the phone book, opened it quickly and found that there was a gun shop only two blocks from his office. He closed the book slowly.

He felt a little comfort already.

Going into his office in the morning was as hard for him as it had been the day before. After all, many people didn’t read the newspaper until they got home from work. Calls might have been exchanged between people here: Hon, look at that picture, doesn’t it look like...? Or perhaps just looking at him today, even in passing, might stir up a connection.

The main part of the morning was taken up with a meeting with Mrs. Tomlinson and a few others. New projects were discussed, some rejected, others delayed for further study, just one accepted. He was hoping she wouldn’t bring up the child-crime funding possibility, for he had nothing more to say on it, not even the vaguest thought on following through; and she didn’t.

About a quarter to one, during lunch hour, he was walking to the gun shop.

He remembered how as a kid he used to want a BB rifle. But he never even bothered to ask his parents for one. Lose an eye? Hurt someone? Are you kidding? He knew those answers without even hearing them — because he’d heard similar ones about other things. But Tommy next door, who was only a year older, had one. And not only did Tommy have one, Tommy’s father and two brothers were hunters, and they had a cabinet filled with rifles, and several walls in their home were hung with deer heads. It was a bad day for Tommy when he didn’t kill a sparrow perched high on a telephone wire or tree limb. The neighborhood seemed to take this with a casual, “Oh, that’s Tommy.” On this one day Alan was with him behind their houses when they saw a blackbird standing a few yards ahead of them on the grass. Tommy handed him his rifle and, almost without thinking, Alan aimed and fired, and to his horror the bird actually flopped over, and he was running back into his house in disbelief and fear. But a mother had witnessed it from her window, and a funeral was held, attended by most of the kids around there, perhaps including Tommy. No one was allowed to speak to Alan for a week.

“Maybe you’ll learn,” his mother said. “I hope so.”

“I would never have expected that of you,” his father said.

Now he was at the gun shop, trying to buy something he’d never once handled. A grandmotherly woman was behind the counter.

“I’m interested in buying a handgun. For protection,” he added.

He had this feeling that she would at least look at him strangely. But she simply said, “Do you know what you want?”

“No, I’d appreciate you showing me some.”

She brought several models over to the counter and he selected a .22 Smith and Wesson, simply because it was the name he was most familiar with. He had to give her his driver’s license and fill out a form stating among other things that he had no criminal record. The computerized check of the information was finished quickly. And half an hour later he was walking back into the offices of the Elsa and Jonathan Tomlinson Foundation, hub of so much great and important work, holding an unmarked blue plastic bag, in it a package containing his Smith and Wesson and a small box of shells. He hid it temporarily deep in his file cabinet, behind a row of folders.

In his apartment he had to decide again where to put it. He wanted it someplace where he could grab it at the first suspicious sound at his door, hold it ready in his hand and at the sight of a cop put it to his temple and just squeeze the trigger. But what if it happened outside, if they started to close around him on the sidewalk? Should he carry it in his pocket? Get a license for that?

He started to put the gun and shells in one drawer, then another, but still had them in his hands. No place seemed quite right.

It was strange, but if anyone was going to catch up with him he saw it being McKinney. He pictured him pursuing every lead, every hint of a clue, until it led here. He saw McKinney following him in his car as he walked along the sidewalk. He saw him at his door, ringing the bell and saying “package.” He saw him clearing everyone away at the Foundation and waiting just outside his office. He saw him kicking in the door to his apartment — and, in a blaze of desperation, saw himself grabbing hold of his gun and firing bullet after bullet into him.

Firing and firing —

He touched his head in horror at himself.

Me? Me? The killer in him he feared?

All he knew now was that he must get rid of the gun, not just put it away in the apartment. But where? In the trash? The river? Dig a hole somewhere and bury it? But it was as if there was no place in this world where it was safe enough — from him.

That morning I saw the sketch when I looked at the paper at breakfast. At first it meant nothing to me, and then when I noticed the resemblance it struck me as funny. I showed it to Patty.

“Who does this remind you of?”

She looked at it carefully, then at me, puzzled. “Who?”

“You don’t see it?”

“I see a drawing, that’s all. Who?”

“Never mind.” I smiled and put down the paper.

“Tell me, who?”

“Oh, nothing. I thought it looked a little like my cousin, that’s all.”

“Alan?” She picked up the paper again. She looked at the sketch once more, head tilted. “Maybe. Maybe just a little.” Then, shaking her head, “No, I really don’t see it.”

“I just thought it was funny,” I said, and she put aside the paper.

I didn’t read the paper until I was at my desk. And I didn’t get to that story until I read the ones I was really interested in as well as the op-ed page. Then I looked at the larger sketch on the third page but this time it was just that, a sketch of someone or other. And the story of Susheela Kapasi’s murder was like so many others — until the name South Minton registered with me.

This, Detective Murray had told me, was one of the murders Harold Luder may have committed.