"Yes."
"Face-to-face," Yang said.
I nodded.
"He was looking at you when he died," Yang said.
"He was."
Yang stood suddenly and walked down the hot top walkway to the far end of the park and stood with his back to us, looking out at the tightly packed neighborhood around us. None of us on the benches did anything. After a time, Yang turned and walked back down the walkway and stood in front of me. He looked at me. I looked at him.
"He straight?" Yang said to Major.
"Yeah."
"You believe what he say?"
"Yeah."
"Why you come tell me?" Yang said to me.
"Didn't want to be looking behind me the rest of my life."
"He was my brother," Yang said.
I nodded.
"He a fucking fool, too," Yang said.
I nodded.
"Never knew how to act," Yang said.
"He stood up," I said. "At the end. He came at me straight-on."
Yang nodded.
"You got some big balls coming here like this," Yang said.
"Had to be done," I said.
"Like killing Luis," Yang said.
"Yeah," I said.
Yang nodded some more. He looked back at the corner of the park where he had stood, as if there was something there only he could see.
"I got no problem with you," he said finally, still staring at the far corner of the park.
"Good," I said and stood.
Yang's gaze came slowly back from the corner and settled on me. He nodded.
"Sorry about your brother," I said.
Yang nodded again. He didn't speak. I had nothing else to say, so, with Major and his pal behind me, I turned and walked out of the park.
Chapter 44
I SAT IN A BIG maple captain's chair in the a small office in the Bethel County Courthouse and talked to Francis X. Cleary, the Bethel County Chief Prosecutor.
"I've heard a lot about you already," Cleary said.
He had longish silvery hair, which he combed straight back, and high color, and pale blue eyes that were very bright and never seemed to blink.
"So you are fully prepared to admire me," I said.
Cleary laughed.
"I'm maintaining a wait-and-see attitude," he said. "You convinced the Clark kid did it?"
"Yes," I said. "But I don't know why."
"And you care why," Clearly said.
"Yes."
"I don't," Cleary said.
"We got his confession. His accomplice supports it."
Cleary spread his hands, palms up.
"Slam, bam," he said. "Thank you, ma'am."
He grinned at me happily.
"You had a shrink talk with him?"
"Naw. If the putz that's representing him goes for an insanity defense, I'll have somebody talk to him and say he's legally sane. If not, why waste the taxpayers' money."
"You've talked with him," I said.
"The kid? Sure. We've had several conversations with him. Always, of course, with his attorney present."
"Lawyer seems a little weak," I said.
"You want to do time," Cleary said. "Hire him. I wouldn't let him search a title for me."
"Off the record," I said. "Just you and me. What do you think?"
"About the kid?" Cleary said. "Oh, he did it. No doubt. But..."
"But?"
"But, there's something wrong with him," Cleary said.
I nodded.
"Besides the fact that he shot up his school," I said. "For no good reason."
"Besides that," Cleary said. "I been doing this a long time. I like it. I like putting them away and not letting them out. It's why I'm still doing it. I've talked to a lotta killers, a lotta whack jobs. But this kid ... there's something missing, and I don't know what it is."
"Yeah," I said.
"I'm not in the business of helping people I'm prosecuting. I'm in the business of throwing away the key, and I'll do it with this kid, and never look back. But . . ."
"There's no sport in it," I said.
"Everybody wants to bury the kids, bury the crime, forget about it all. Parents want to bury him and move on. School. His fucking lawyer."
Cleary shook his head.
"It's barely an adversarial procedure," I said.
"At least the other kid's got Taglio."
"Good defense lawyer?"
"Decent," Cleary said. "I mean, he's got no case, but he's trying."
"If I can get somebody," I said, "will you let my shrink evaluate him?"
"So he can show up in court and say the poor lad's crazy, and I'll have to get my expert and put him on the stand and we'll have dueling shrinks?"
"No," I said. "The eval will be private, just with me. I won't make it available to anyone. Without your say-so."
Cleary looked at me, frowning.
"There's something wrong with him," I said.
Cleary kept frowning.
"Fish in a barrel?" I said.
Cleary grinned.
"I talked to Healy about you," he said.
I nodded.
"And I got a professional courtesy-type call from an attorney named Rita Fiore at Cone, Oakes and Beldon," he said. "In Boston. Used to be a prosecutor in Norfolk County."
"I know Rita," I said.
"Led me to believe that if I was nice to you, she'd come out some day and fuck my brains out."
"Ever met Rita?" I said.
Cleary grinned.
"Yes," he said. "That's why I'm being so nice."
"Can I send in my shrink?"
"Yeah. Call me when you're ready."
I stood up.
"Healy say nice things?" I said.
"Sort of," Cleary said. "But he made no mention of fucking."
"Isn't that good," I said.
Chapter 45
IT WAS ALMOST MIDNIGHT when Susan called. She had been out to dinner.
"Magnolia Grill," she said, "in Durham, very nice."
"Anybody there I need to be jealous of?" I said.
"Lovenik," she said. "These are all highly educated mental health professionals."
"Anyone there I need to be jealous of?"
"Several," she said. "Thank God."
"You still got it, kid."
"I hope so," she said.
We were quiet for a moment. Then we talked about how we wished we were together and what we would be doing if we were together.
"Is this phone sex?" I said at one point in the conversation.
"I think so," Susan said. "I hope the baby can't hear you."
"At this hour?" I said. "She's zonkered under the covers."
"Is she all right?"
"She's fine," I said. "She's been crime-busting with me."
"And brilliantly, too, I'll wager," Susan said.
"Think Rin Tin Tin," I said.
"Are you still on that school shooting?" Susan said.
"Yep."
"Is it hard going?"
"Yes."
"Did that boy really do it?" Susan said.
"I'm sure he did."
"So ... ?"
"I want to know why," I said.
"There's always a why," Susan said.
"But there's not always somebody who knows what it is," I said.
"Not even the perpetrator sometimes," Susan said.
"Why is hard."
"I need a shrink," I said.
"I've told you that for years," she said.
"I have you," I said. "But you're not here."
"We both regret that," Susan said.
"I want somebody to evaluate the kid for me," I said.
Susan was quiet for a moment. Under the covers, Pearl made a soft lip-smacking noise, and shifted so that her head stuck out. The process took most of the covers from me.
"There's a man named Dix," Susan said. "He's in private practice, works a lot with cops."
"Alcohol and depression," I said.
"Of course," Susan said. "He also consults forensically. I don't know from here how to get him. But he's probably in the book. Or you can find him through the Boston Psychiatric Institute."
"He a psychiatrist?"
"Yes."
"He got a first name?"
"Of course, but I don't know it. I met him last year during a seminar at Brandeis. He calls himself Dix. He's quite handsome."
"Handsomer than anyone?" I said.
"Sure," Susan said.
I waited. She didn't say anything. I waited some more.
Then she said, "Except, of course, you, Hunko."
"Thank you," I said.