“Wife, three daughters.”
“They know?”
“They came over to see what was going on,”
Perkins
said.
“Christ,” Jesse said.
“It wasn’t good,” Perkins said.
“I’ll talk with them,” Jesse
said.
The rain was washing over Kennedy’s face and soaking his
hair.
“And they won’t have any idea why someone killed him,” Jesse
said. “And I’ll ask if they know Kenneth Eisley or Barbara Carey,
and they won’t. And we’ll find no connection among the three of
them and the bullets will be from the same guns that killed the other two.”
“You think it’s a serial killer,
Jesse?”
“Yeah,” Jesse said. “Any fix on
when it
happened?”
“I talked with the pastor of the church and he says that the
church music director came in to practice on the organ at about four,” Perkins said. “And didn’t see anything. So, sometime between
four and when the call came in at seven-fifteen. Between four and seven-fifteen there were three commuter trains, the last one at six twenty-three.”
“Who found the body,” Jesse said.
“Couple kids skateboarding.”
“In the dark?”
“The pastor says the parking lot lights are on a timer and they
turned on at seven. They never changed the timer for daylight savings.”
“The kids still here?”
“Yeah. They’re in the cruiser with
Eddie.”
“Hang on to them.”
Jesse stood up. “Don’t move a
thing,” he said. “Everything just
the way it is.”
“Sure thing,” Perkins said. “I
still got to take my
pictures.”
Jesse walked away from the scene, a hundred yards up the railroad tracks to the Paradise Center Station. It was empty and dark. The last train would have been at 6:23. He turned and looked down the tracks. This time of year it would have been dark by six.
But if you were used to it, you probably wouldn’t have a problem.
He started down the tracks. He wasn’t used to it, but the light
from the church parking lot was helpful. Besides, I’m a natural
athlete. There was a pathway through the screen of trees into
the back of the church parking lot. He walked through this way,
carrying his briefcase. Lot was still dark. He’s walking down here,
toward Maple Street, and he sees a couple people walking toward him, and he doesn’t pay any attention and then they get close and
bang. He falls pretty much straight backward and, unless they weren’t shooting as good as usual, was dead before he was through
falling. He stood over the dead man and looked around the parking lot. There was a maroon Chevrolet Cavalier parked close to the church, and a brown Toyota Camry beside it. All the other vehicles were police and fire vehicles, lights on, flashers flashing. I wonder why cops always do that. I wonder why we don’t shut the damn things off
