I said it was, and we went to his car, a Japanese import a couple of years old. It sparkled, and I guessed that he’d taken it through a car wash on his way to the airport.
On the way, I asked him what he knew about the case. “Nothing,” he said.
“Tom didn’t tell you anything?”
“My uncle’s a need-to-know kind of guy,” he said. “He gave me a name and an address and told me to go take the guy’s picture without being obvious about it. I told him I might have to buy a telephoto lens.”
“I’ll reimburse you.”
He grinned. “‘Borrow one,’ he said. So that’s what I did. I parked across the street from Mr. Havemeyer’s house and waited for him to come home. When he did get home he drove straight into the garage. It’s an attached garage, which is unusual in that neighborhood. They’re mostly older homes there, but his is newer than the others and it’s got a carport-type garage. So he went on in without giving me a look at him, let alone a chance to zoom in and take his picture.”
“What did you do, wait for him to come out again?”
“No, because he’d probably leave the same way, right? Uncle Tom hadn’t told me how to cope with this sort of situation. As a matter of fact the only advice he gave me — well, can you guess what it was?”
“Bring a milk bottle.”
“He said a wide-mouthed jar. Same difference. I asked him what I was supposed to do with it, and he said after I sat there for a couple of hours the answer would come to me. At which point I figured out what the jar was for. You’ll never guess what he told me next.”
“What’s that?”
“‘When the jar fills up, empty it in the gutter.’ I said, like, pour it out in the gutter? No one’ll see you, he said, and it’ll wash away. I told him thanks for the wise counsel, but I probably would have figured out how to empty the jar on my own. He said after all the rookies he’s trained over the years he’s learned to leave nothing to chance.”
“He’s a wise man,” I said. “But I’m on your side. I have a feeling you’d have worked out the part about emptying the jar all by yourself.”
“Maybe, but on the other hand I have to admit I never would have thought to bring the jar in the first place. You don’t ever see them peeing in bottles in the movies.”
I agreed that you didn’t. “How’d you get the pictures?”
“There was this kid shooting baskets all by himself a few doors down the street. I told him I’d give him five bucks if he could ring the doorbell and get the man inside to come outside of his house. He went and rang it and ran off, and Mr. Havemeyer opened the door a crack and then shut it again. I snapped a picture but it wasn’t one of the ones I sent you because you couldn’t see anything. Anyway, I told the kid that wasn’t good enough, but if he did it again and got the guy to come out I’d pay him the five and another five on top of it.”
“And it worked.”
“He made it work. He went into his own house and got a paper bag about so big and filled it with crumpled newspaper. Then he put it on the stoop and set it on fire, and then he rang the bell again and pounded on the door and ran like a thief. Mr. Havemeyer opened the door a crack again, and then he rushed outside and started stomping and kicking at the burning bag.” He grinned. “It took me a minute to get focused because I was laughing too hard to hold the camera steady. It was pretty funny.”
“I can imagine.”
“It’s an old Halloween trick, actually.”
“As I recall,” I said, “there’s a surprise in the bag.”
“Well, yeah. Dog crap, so when you stomp out the fire you’re stepping in it. The kid skipped that part.”
“Just as well.”
“The pictures don’t show what he’s doing,” he said, “because with the lens I was right in tight on his face. But I have to laugh when I look at them, because his expression brings it all back.”
“I thought he looked sort of beleaguered.”
“Well,” he said, “that’s why.”
Cleveland’s airport is south and west of the city. Lakewood is situated on the lake, appropriately enough, and a little ways to the west of Cleveland, so we could get there without running into city traffic. Jason drove and kept up his end of the conversation, and I found myself comparing him with TJ. Jason was probably a year or two older, and looked on the surface to have had an easier time of it, blessed as he was with a white face and a middle-class upbringing. He’d had a good deal more in the way of formal education, although you could argue that TJ’s street sense was as valuable, with a tuition every bit as pricey. By the time we got to Lakewood I’d decided that the two of them weren’t as different as they seemed. They were both decent kids.
Lakewood turned out to be an older suburb, with big trees and prewar houses. Here and there you’d see a lot that the builders had originally passed up, with a little ranch house perched on it looking like the new kid on the block. We parked across the street from one of these and Jason killed the engine.
“You can’t see where the fire was,” he said. “When I drove off he was going at it with a broom. I guess he did a pretty good job of cleaning up.”
“He could have hired that same kid to scrub it for him.”
“That would be something, wouldn’t it? I don’t know if he’s home. With the garage door shut you can’t tell if his car’s there or not.”
“I don’t think I’ll have to set any fires to find out,” I said. “I’ll just ring his doorbell.”
“Do you want me to come with you?”
I considered it. “No,” I said. “I don’t think so.”
“Then I’ll wait here.”
“I’d appreciate that,” I said. “I don’t know how long I’ll be. It may be a while.”
“No problem,” he said. “I’ve still got that jar.”
I only had to ring the bell once. The eight-note chimes were still echoing when I heard his footsteps approaching. Then he opened the door a crack and saw me, and then he opened it the rest of the way.
The photos were a good likeness. He was a small and slender man, with some age showing in his pink face and some gray lightening his neatly combed hair. Close up, I could see his watery blue eyes behind his bifocal lenses.
He was wearing dark gabardine slacks and a plaid sportshirt. There were several pens in the breast pocket of the shirt. His shoes were brown oxfords, recently polished.
There was no fire raging on his stoop this time, just another middle-aged guy. But Havemeyer still sported his beleaguered expression, as if the world was just a little bit more than he could cope with. I knew the feeling.
I said, “Mr. Havemeyer?”
“Yes?”
“May I come in? I’d like to talk with you.”
“Are you a policeman?”
It’s often a temptation to say yes to that question, or to leave it artfully unanswered. This time, though, I didn’t feel the need.
“No,” I said. “My name is Scudder, Mr. Havemeyer. I’m a private investigator from New York.”
“From New York.”
“Yes.”
“How did you get here?”
“How did I...”
“Did you fly?”
“Yes.”
“Well,” he said, and his shoulders drooped. “I guess you’d better come in, hadn’t you?”
22
You’d have thought it was a social call. He led me to the front parlor, recommended a chair, and announced that he could do with a cup of tea. Would I have one? I said I would, and not just to be sociable. It sounded like a good idea.
I stayed there while he fussed in the kitchen, and it struck me that he might return brandishing a butcher knife, or holding the same gun he’d used to kill Byron Leopold. If he did, I wouldn’t stand a chance. I wasn’t wearing body armor, and the closest thing I had to a weapon was the nail clipper on my key ring.