The late Olivia Trelawney’s house stands at the top of an asphalt drive almost as wide as the street it fronts. On the gate is a FOR SALE sign inviting Qualified Buyers to call MICHAEL ZAFRON REALTY & FINE HOMES. Hodges thinks that sign is apt to be there awhile, given the housing market in this Year of Our Lord, 2010. But somebody is keeping the grass cut, and given the size of the lawn, the somebody must be using a mower a lot bigger than Hodges’s Lawn-Boy.
Who’s paying for the upkeep? Got to be Mrs T.’s estate. She had certainly been rolling in dough. He seems to recall that the probated figure was in the neighborhood of seven million dollars. For the first time since his retirement, when he turned the unsolved case of the City Center Massacre over to Pete Huntley and Isabelle Jaynes, Hodges wonders if Mrs T.’s mother is still alive. He remembers the scoliosis that bent the poor old lady almost double, and left her in terrible pain … but scoliosis isn’t necessarily fatal. Also, hadn’t Olivia Trelawney had a sister living somewhere out west?
He fishes for the sister’s name but can’t come up with it. What he does remember is that Pete took to calling Mrs Trelawney Mrs Twitchy, because she couldn’t stop adjusting her clothes, and brushing at tightly bunned hair that needed no brushing, and fiddling with the gold band of her Patek Philippe watch, turning it around and around on her bony wrist. Hodges disliked her; Pete had almost come to loathe her. Which made saddling her with some of the blame for the City Center atrocity rather satisfying. She had enabled the guy, after all; how could there be any doubt? She had been given two keys when she bought the Mercedes, but had been able to produce only one.
Then, shortly before Thanksgiving, the suicide.
Hodges remembers clearly what Pete said when they got the news: ‘If she meets those dead people on the other side – especially the Cray girl and her baby – she’s going to have some serious questions to answer.’ For Pete it had been the final confirmation: somewhere in her mind, Mrs T. had known all along that she had left her key in the ignition of the car she called her Gray Lady.
Hodges had believed it, too. The question is, does he still? Or has the poison-pen letter he got yesterday from the self-confessed Mercedes Killer changed his mind?
Maybe not, but that letter raises questions. Suppose Mr Mercedes had written a similar missive to Mrs Trelawney? Mrs Trelawney with all those tics and insecurities just below a thin crust of defiance? Wasn’t it possible? Mr Mercedes certainly would have known about the anger and contempt with which the public had showered her in the wake of the killings; all he had to do was read the Letters to the Editor page of the local paper.
Is it possible—
But here his thoughts break off, because a car has pulled up behind him, so close it’s almost touching his Toyota’s bumper. There are no jackpot lights on the roof, but it’s a late-model Crown Vic, powder blue. The man getting out from behind the wheel is burly and crewcut, his sportcoat no doubt covering a gun in a shoulder holster. If this were a city detective, Hodges knows, the gun would be a Glock .40, just like the one in his safe at home. But he’s not a city detective. Hodges still knows them all.
He rolls down his window.
‘Afternoon, sir,’ Crewcut says. ‘May I ask what you’re doing here? Because you’ve been parked quite awhile.’
Hodges glances at his watch and sees this is true. It’s almost four-thirty. Given the rush-hour traffic downtown, he’ll be lucky to get home in time to watch Scott Pelley on CBS Evening News. He used to watch NBC until he decided Brian Williams was a good-natured goof who’s too fond of YouTube videos. Not the sort of newscaster he wants when it seems like the whole world is falling apa—
‘Sir? Sincerely hoping for an answer here.’ Crewcut bends down. The side of his sportcoat gapes open. Not a Glock but a Ruger. Sort of a cowboy gun, in Hodges’s opinion.
‘And I,’ Hodges says, ‘am sincerely hoping you have the authority to ask.’
His interlocutor’s brow creases. ‘Beg pardon?’
‘I think you’re private security,’ Hodges says patiently, ‘but I want to see some ID. Then, you know what? I want to see your carry-concealed permit for the cannon you’ve got inside your coat. And it better be in your wallet and not in the glove compartment of your car, or you’re in violation of section nineteen of the city firearms code, which, briefly stated, is this: “If you carry concealed, you must also carry your permit to carry concealed.” So let’s see your paperwork.’
Crewcut’s frown deepens. ‘Are you a cop?’
‘Retired,’ Hodges says, ‘but that doesn’t mean I’ve forgotten either my rights or your responsibilities. Let me see your ID and your carry permit, please. You don’t have to hand them over—’
‘You’re damn right I don’t.’
‘—but I want to see them. Then we can discuss my presence here on Lilac Drive.’
Crewcut thinks it over, but only for a few seconds. Then he takes out his wallet and flips it open. In this city – as in most, Hodges thinks – security personnel treat retired cops as they would those on active duty, because retired cops have plenty of friends who are on active duty, and who can make life difficult if given a reason to do so. The guy turns out to be Radney Peeples, and his company card identifies him as an employee of Vigilant Guard Service. He also shows Hodges a permit to carry concealed, which is good until June of 2012.
‘Radney, not Rodney,’ Hodges says. ‘Like Radney Foster, the country singer.’
Foster’s face breaks into a grin. ‘That’s right.’
‘Mr Peeples, my name is Bill Hodges, I ended my tour as a Detective First Class, and my last big case was the Mercedes Killer. I’m guessing that’ll give you a pretty good idea of what I’m doing here.’
‘Mrs Trelawney,’ Foster says, and steps back respectfully as Hodges opens his car door, gets out, and stretches. ‘Little trip down Memory Lane, Detective?’
‘I’m just a mister these days.’ Hodges offers his hand. Peeples shakes it. ‘Otherwise, you’re correct. I retired from the cops at about the same time Mrs Trelawney retired from life in general.’
‘That was sad,’ Peeples said. ‘Do you know that kids egged her gate? Not just at Halloween, either. Three or four times. We caught one bunch, the others …’ He shook his head. ‘Plus toilet paper.’
‘Yeah, they love that,’ Hodges says.
‘And one night someone tagged the lefthand gatepost. We got it taken care of before she saw it, and I’m glad. You know what it said?’
Hodges shakes his head.
Peeples lowers his voice. ‘KILLER CUNT is what it said, in big drippy capital letters. Which was absolutely not fair. She goofed up, that’s all. Is there any of us who haven’t at one time or another?’
‘Not me, that’s for sure,’ Hodges says.
‘Right. Bible says let him who is without sin cast the first stone.’
That’ll be the day, Hodges thinks, and asks (with honest curiosity), ‘Did you like her?’
Peeples’s eyes shift up and to the left, an involuntary movement Hodges has seen in a great many interrogation rooms over the years. It means Peeples is either going to duck the question or outright lie.
It turns out to be a duck.
‘Well,’ he says, ‘she treated us right at Christmas. She sometimes mixed up the names, but she knew who we all were, and we each got forty dollars and a bottle of whiskey. Good whiskey. Do you think we got that from her husband?’ He snorts. ‘Ten bucks tucked inside a Hallmark card was what we got when that skinflint was still in the saddle.’
‘Who exactly does Vigilant work for?’
‘It’s called the Sugar Heights Association. You know, one of those neighborhood things. They fight over the zoning regulations when they don’t like em and make sure everyone in the neighborhood keeps to a certain … uh, standard, I guess you’d say. There are lots of rules. Like you can put up white lights at Christmas but not colored ones. And they can’t blink.’