Part 26 (1/2)

”So what?” Melinda asked with attempted haughtiness.

”Melinda,” he pleaded, ”it's no good. The word *dos' was written on the wall of one of their rooms.”

He saw her pale in horror. She stared at him, wide-eyed, as if hoping to see something in his face that would deny what he'd said.

”It was written in their blood,” he said.

Melinda lowered her head and began to cry gently.

”Dwight followed your father there. He waited until he left their apartment. Then Dwight killed two women not much older than yourself.”

”Oh, G.o.d,” Melinda whispered.

”What I have to know,” Reardon said, ”is why he did that. Why he killed the deer and the women.”

Suddenly Melinda's face hardened. ”It's his fault,” she said bitterly.

”Whose?”

”His,” she said, spitting out the word. ”My father's. You don't know what it's like living with him.”

”No, I don't,” Reardon said.

Melinda stared out across the park. ”He used to humiliate Dwight all the time. He used to call him stupid, say that Dwight wasn't his real son, that there'd been a mistake in the hospital, and my father's real son went to someone else, and he got Dwight.” She turned to Reardon. ”Have you ever met him?”

”Your father?”

”No, Dwight.”

”I pa.s.sed him in an elevator once.”

”You pa.s.sed him in an elevator?”

”Yes.”

Melinda smiled bitterly. ”What a strange job you have,” she said.

Stranger than she knew, Reardon thought, stranger than mourning and the Buddha's solution to it, stranger than anything she would likely ever know.

”We made a party for my father the night the deer were killed,” she said. ”Dwight and I. For his birthday. For his fifty-seventh birthday. But he never showed up. I don't know how many times Dwight reminded him about the party that day. He kept reminding him all day. But he never showed up.” Her eyes narrowed hatefully. ”If it had been Dwight's birthday, he would have been there.”

”Why?” Reardon asked.

”Because my father was a kind of closet s.a.d.i.s.t when it came to Dwight.”

”What do you mean?”

”Oh, I don't mean a real s.a.d.i.s.t. It wasn't like he really beat Dwight.” She sneered. ”That would never be tolerated by his circle of friends. But there was a certain way he looked sometimes, a certain look in his eye. Do you know what I mean?”

”I guess,” Reardon said. He had seen cruelty split its mask.

”And there was one place, one time when it really came out,” she said. ”On Dwight's birthday.”

”His birthday?”

”Yes. On Dwight's birthday my father would bend him over his knee and start hitting him, you know, on his backside. Then he'd really beat him. And each time he'd hit Dwight, he'd call out a number. You know: One. Whack. Two. Whack. Three. Whack!” With each number, she struck the sheet of tin on Reardon's lap. ”Last year it went to fifteen,” she said, tears filling her eyes, her shoulders beginning to shake as she began to cry. She raised her hand and brought it down angrily on the tin. ”Fourteen. Whack! Fifteen. Whack!” and her hand made the tin reverberate across the Children's Zoo. She was crying almost hysterically now. She raised her arm high above her head and brought her hand down furiously on the sheet of tin. ”And one to grow on!” she shouted, and then collapsed in convulsive weeping. ”Dwight said he'd like to give it back to my father someday,” she said through her crying. ”Fifty-seven. And one to grow on.”

Fifty-seven and one, thought Reardon. Dear G.o.d.

He drew Melinda under his arm. She was sobbing uncontrollably now; he could feel her body convulsing against his own, her tears falling on his hand. ”All right, all right,” he said gently, knowing that it was not all right, that it never could be.

24.

Reardon went directly to Piccolini's office after his encounter with Melinda Van Allen. He did not feel victorious or jubilant, and he related the details of his conversation with Melinda in a weary, unemphatic voice. Piccolini's eyes remained riveted on Reardon throughout his report. He shook his head dejectedly from time to time, but Reardon was unable to fathom exactly what that meant.

”What are your conclusions?” Piccolini asked after Reardon had finished.

Reardon did not hesitate. ”Dwight Van Allen should be arrested on suspicion of murder immediately. I don't think we have any time to waste.”

”Well, I don't know,” Piccolini said. He stood up and thrust out his hand. ”But you've done a great job, John. I mean it. It was a ha.s.sle, but you did fine work.”

Reardon took Piccolini's hand but said nothing. He could not understand why Piccolini was balking on the arrest.

”I don't know if we can act right away with the arrest of the Van Allen boy,” Piccolini explained peremptorily as he resumed his seat behind his desk, ”but I think we may have the beginning of a case.”

”The beginning of a case?” Reardon asked, astonished. ”Are you saying you're not going to arrest Dwight Van Allen just as quick as you find him?”

”Yes,” Piccolini said without hesitation. ”That's exactly what I'm saying.” He waved his hand as if dismissing Reardon from his office and began to fumble through some papers on his desk as if he were looking for something.

”Why not?” Reardon demanded.

Piccolini looked up. He seemed almost surprised to see Reardon still in his office. ”Well, the evidence is still somewhat soft,” he said. ”The old lady's testimony is kinky, you know, her being such an eccentric and all. I mean, that stuff about trying to get somebody to kill her. Don't you know what a defense attorney would do with that?” Piccolini casually returned his attention to the papers on his desk. ”And the rest of the case is pretty circ.u.mstantial,” he added offhandedly.

Reardon leaned forward, pressing his palms on Piccolini's desk. ”Two women are dead. Let the DA worry about a soft case. I want Dwight Van Allen off the streets.”

”I know two women are dead,” Piccolini said defensively.

”Arrest Van Allen,” Reardon repeated.