Fasca pushed the warrant at him. “To search this place. Belongs to Norm Bouch, right?”
“Who?” The boy stepped aside to let us enter.
“What’s your name?” I asked him.
“Randy Haskins.”
“You live here, Randy?”
The others had spread throughout the small, dark, shabbily furnished apartment. Haskins eyed them nervously. “No. I come to visit.”
“Where do you live, then?”
“On Archibald.”
“And who do you visit when you come here?” I steered him over to a lumpy sofa covered with a dirty electric blanket with the wires hanging out. I took the armchair opposite.
“Lenny Markham. I thought he owned it.” He looked around nervously. “Are you sure you have the right place? I never heard of the other guy.”
“You used the phone to call a beeper number about two hours ago, didn’t you?”
His mouth opened. “How’d you know that?”
“Who were you calling?”
“Robbie Moore.”
“Why?”
“Just to hang out-you know.”
“What do you and Robbie and Lenny have in common?”
Randy Haskins swallowed hard. “Nothing. We’re just friends. We do stuff together.”
“Then why are you here and they’re not?”
“Lenny lets us use this as a crash pad. We all drop by when we want. It doesn’t have to be to meet anybody.”
“So there are more than just Robbie and yourself.”
His face reddened. “A few.” He began absent-mindedly picking at a dark rectangular patch sewn into the middle of the blanket.
“What are their names?”
He hesitated, chewing his lip.
I leaned forward. “Randy. Our being here should tell you it’s all gone up in smoke. A judge doesn’t sign a search warrant unless there’s a very good reason for it. You and I both know what that reason is, right?”
I gave him enough time to nod.
“Then you probably also know your best bet is to be as cooperative as you’ve been so far.”
He grimaced as if in pain. “I don’t want to get in trouble.”
“From Lenny? He can be nasty, can’t he?”
Again, he nodded.
“Well, here’s the deal, then. Lenny met with Robbie on the ferry earlier today, and before we could stop him, he stuck a knife into Robbie’s heart and threw him overboard. Robbie’s dead, and Lenny’s in jail, and he’s never getting out.”
Randy’s mouth opened and closed several times. “Robbie’s dead?”
“I’m afraid so. Why do you think Lenny killed him?”
He rubbed his forehead, shaking his head. “He was stupid. I told him to keep quiet. Lenny even warned him, but he didn’t take it seriously. I was scared of Lenny. I knew he didn’t kid around.”
“Keep quiet about what?” I asked gently.
“Running dope. That’s what we did so Lenny would take care of us. But it was supposed to be secret. That was the one big rule. Lenny said he’d kill anyone who squealed-that he’d done it before and would do it again.”
“And what was Robbie’s problem?”
The patch on the blanket was almost totally detached, what with Randy’s nagging it. “He liked to brag. Made him feel bigger. He did everything he could to suck up to Lenny, but then he’d shoot his mouth off to complete strangers-ask them if they wanted some dope, that he could put together a big score if they’d pay.”
“He was working behind Lenny’s back?”
Randy shook his head sharply. “No, no. That’s how Lenny found out about it. Robbie came to him and said he’d set up a deal-all Lenny had to do was produce the dope and collect the cash. Lenny almost took his head off, but he still didn’t get the message.”
“Why didn’t Lenny get rid of him? Wasn’t there a regular turnover of kids?”
At that Randy seemed genuinely baffled. “There was… But it didn’t affect Robbie. Even with all their fights, they really liked each other.”
I placed the list of names Randy Haskins had eventually given me on the conference table. “He didn’t know Norm Bouch, has never been to Bellows Falls, didn’t know if Lenny had either… There doesn’t seem to be any connection at all between Norm and Lenny, except for the use of the apartment.”
“Which was clean as a whistle,” Kathleen Bartlett said.
“Right.”
We were back at the Burlington Police Department’s headquarters-Bartlett, Jonathon, Audrey and myself-sitting around a small table near the coffee machine.
Kathy Bartlett sighed. “Well, maybe it’s just as well. It would’ve complicated things if you had found something. What about phone records?”
“We got ’em. The long distance numbers are being checked right now, but I wouldn’t hold my breath. There were none to Bellows Falls or Lawrence, Mass, or anywhere else connected to all this.” I slid the Randy Haskins list across the table to Audrey. “Maybe you can get something out of this, but my guess is Lenny played it pretty close to the vest.”
“Which is why we think he whacked Robbie Moore, by the way,” Jonathon added.
“Why did you say it was just as well we didn’t find anything in the apartment?” I asked Kathy, my spirits sinking still further. “Aren’t we going to deal on this?”
She shook her head. “I’ve spent the last four hours in the ring with the Chittenden County SA. There is no way in hell he’s going to piss away election-year bragging rights on a first-degree, premeditated murder of a minor, witnessed by a bunch of cops, just so we can get the goods on some penny-ante dope pusher in Bellows Falls. Those were his words, not mine.”
She cupped her cheek in one hand and looked at us mournfully. “We might get a crack at Lenny in a year or more, after the SA’s finished with him, and assuming his lawyer’ll go along with it, but I doubt even that. We wouldn’t have anything to offer him. He’d have to want to talk to us from the goodness of his heart.”
There was a long, telling silence while we pondered the likelihood of that scenario.
“Where’s that leave you?” Audrey asked, sensing her own involvement in the case was nearing an end.
“Up a creek,” Jonathon answered, reflecting the general mood. “Lenny was supposed to be our ticket to Norm Bouch.”
I’d been staring at the tabletop, running through every angle I could think of, struggling with the feeling that we’d never get anywhere on this case. I finally looked up at Jonathon. “You staying here to sew up the odds and ends?”
He nodded. “A day at most.”
“I’m heading back to Brattleboro,” I told them. “I need to find out how things’re going down there anyway, and maybe I can kick something loose that we missed.”
In the dark of night, the trip between Burlington and Brattleboro is smooth, monotonous, and fast-interstates all the way. Beyond the reach of the headlights, the mountain ranges, sloping fields, and glacier-carved valleys tug at the mind’s edge like half-forgotten memories, making the car’s closed interior a comforting cocoon. It was a time and place I preferred for thinking, and I was moodily indulging myself when the cell phone cut it short.
“My God,” Gail said, “You’re a hard man to find. I’ve been calling all over.”
“Why? What’s up?”
“Greg Davis wants to see you. Brian Padget’s in some sort of pickle.”
“That’s all he said? When did he call?”
“Over two hours ago.” I let out a sigh. I’d been looking forward to a good night’s sleep.
“And I suppose he wants to see me ASAP.”
“You got it-at Padget’s house.”
I was forty-five minutes north of Westminster.
“There’s something else,” she added. “Remember I told you I knew Anne Murphy? After I cleared it with Derby, I called her up to see if she’d tell me more about Jan Bouch than she’d told you. What she said-unofficially of course-was that Jan suffers from dependent personality disorder. That’s a clinical diagnosis.”
“What’s it mean?”
“They’re like recipe titles, basically-this plus this plus this equals manic depression, or whatever. With Jan’s problem, there are eight ingredients total, and she’s got most of them: can’t make everyday decisions without advice, depends on others to assume responsibility, doesn’t argue out of fear of being rejected, can’t stand being alone, clings to the people she quote-unquote loves, and-this is the one I thought you’d like-is so needy of attention she’ll volunteer to do things she doesn’t like or knows are wrong.”