“How so?” said Lucas.
“You know that first Man with No Name joint?”
“ A Fistful of Dollars.”
“That was based on a Japanese movie about a samurai. And that one was taken from an old crime story. That Hamlet dude-”
“Hammett. You’re talking about Red Harvest.”
“They made a rack of movies based on that book. Not a one of them gave credit to Hamlet.”
“Hammett.”
“Right.”
“You’re pretty smart, Ernest.”
Ernest smiled shyly. “I’m gonna make movies, Mr. Lucas.”
“Call me Spero.”
“Sayin, I’m going to.”
“No doubt. But you need to get your undergrad work done first. Get yourself a base.”
“I picked up an application from UDC a few days ago.”
“There’s plenty of scholarship money for minority students. It’s lying around, waiting to be used. I bet my brother will help you fill out the forms.”
“My mother will help me.”
“Great.”
“I’ma drop the form back off next week.”
“Do it,” said Lucas. “Don’t wait.”
The room became uncomfortably quiet. A failing fluorescent bulb buzzed steadily overhead. Ernest withdrew the apple slices from his bag and handed one to Lucas. As Lucas ate it, he noticed Ernest staring at him.
“What’s up?” said Lucas.
“I was just wondering. About when you were overseas, in the war.”
Lucas sat back. Instinctively, he folded his arms across his chest. “Yes?”
Ernest shifted his weight in his chair. “You hear all kinds of stuff about what got done over there. By our soldiers, I mean. Things that got done to, you know, the people that lived in that country.”
“The civilians,” said Lucas.
“People that weren’t the enemy or terrorists.”
“It happens. Especially in wars that get fought today. Generally you’re not fighting men and women in uniform. Mistakes are made involving citizens. What’s called collateral damage.”
“So you saw civilians bein killed in Iraq?”
Lucas did not answer or gesture with his eyes.
“If you saw something like that,” said Ernest, “would you turn the soldier in who did it?”
Lucas shook his head. It was not a no. He was telling Ernest that the question was unanswerable and maybe out of bounds.
“Okay, then,” said Ernest. “Let me ask you this: You know that soldier who got killed by his own men? The one who played football in the NFL? They got a word for what happened to him.”
“Friendly fire. His name was Pat Tillman.”
“Well, it wasn’t just the generals and the politicians who knew what happened. Some of his friends, the other soldiers, they had to know, too. So why didn’t anyone speak out? Why didn’t anyone come forward and say what went down?”
“It got told eventually.”
“But everyone tried to cover it up at first.”
“I don’t know about that, Ernest. I can’t speak for those who were there.”
“You’re not helping me out here much.”
“Helping you out with what?”
“You’re an investigator. You tried to talk to me, and I think I know what it was about.”
“Well?”
Ernest looked toward the windows and gripped his legs above his knees. “Man, I don’t know.”
“What’s going on with you?”
“I got a problem,” said Ernest.
“What is it?” said Lucas.
Ernest leaned forward. “I saw somethin.”
“I wasn’t at school that day,” said Ernest, after Lucas had helped himself to a couple of water bottles from Leo’s desk drawer and returned with them to the table.
“Were you sick?” said Lucas.
“Nah. My mother works at the GAO, and all her other kids, my brothers and sisters, are grown and out the house.”
“So you cut school. What do you do, bring girls over while your mom’s at work, stuff like that?”
Ernest looked away, mildly embarrassed. “I watch movies on Turner, mostly, like if they’re havin like a festival. Something I really want to see.”
“What were you watching that day? Do you remember?” Lucas wanted to test the young man’s veracity. The TCM schedule for the past month was easy enough to check.
“It was…” Ernest’s brow creased. “It was called The Last Hunt. ’Bout buffalo killings in the West. I hadn’t even heard of it, but I got this friend Diego, a movie freak, told me about it. It’s not on DVD, so when it got scheduled during a school day, I knew I had to find a way to watch it.”
“Go on.”
“Way my mom’s got our house set up, when you’re watching television, you’re kind of sittin by the front porch window, so naturally you look out onto Twelfth Street from time to time. I heard a truck come down the street and stop. It was the FedEx man. He got a big package out the truck and carried it up the steps of Miss Lisa’s house and left it on her porch. She works during the day, too.”
“Lisa Weitzman, your next-door neighbor.”
“Yeah. So right after the FedEx man leaves, a black Impala SS shows up and this young dude gets out the car. It was the old-style SS, not that crud joint they got now.”
“How soon after?”
“Like, five minutes.”
“What’d the guy look like?”
“He had braids. That’s all I remember ’bout him, really.”
“Anyone else in the car with him?”
“There was someone in the passenger side, but he never did get out.”
“Okay.”
“So this dude with the braids comes up on Miss Lisa’s porch real quick and picks up that box. Must have been kinda heavy, ’cause he struggled with it some.”
Lucas’s blood was getting up. Tavon and Edwin had been lying to him. The package wasn’t stolen. He took a long drink of water and set the bottle back on the table.
“What happened next? The guy put the package in the car and drove away?”
“No,” said Ernest. He said nothing else and sat back in his chair.
Lucas stared at Ernest Lindsay. “You didn’t tell Lisa Weitzman that a package had been taken off her property. I know that she’s been a friend to you. Why wouldn’t you let her know?”
“I like Miss Lisa. She’s cool people.”
“Come on, Ernest, help me out here. What is this?”
“I don’t know for sure if I can trust you. You stand up in our class and talk about doin what’s right, and it moved me to reach out to you, but I just don’t know.”
“What’s holding you back?”
“It’s not just me. I got my mother to think of.”
“What are you afraid of? Do you want to bring the police into this?”
“No.”
“Do you need protection?”
“No.”
“What, then?”
“Police are already in it. They part of it, man.”
Lucas nodded slowly. “Tell me about it.”
Ernest exhaled, the air leaving him like he was pushing something away. “When that boy went down Miss Lisa’s steps with that box in his hand, a police car turned onto Twelfth and stopped behind the Impala. By then I was standing up in my mom’s living room, looking out the window, looking down on the street.”
“What happened next?”
“Police officer gets out the squad car and opens up its trunk. Says somethin, just a couple of words to the dude with the braids, and then that dude puts the package in the police officer’s trunk. Police officer gets in his car and drives away. Dude with the braids drives off, too. It happened fast, like, bang. You know?”
“Was the officer riding alone?”
“Yes.”
“What kind of car?”
“You know, a patrol car. Fourth District car.”
“And this cop was in uniform,” said Lucas.
“Yeah, but not a regular one, though. He had on a blue shirt, said ‘Police’ in big letters across his back.”
“What did he look like?”