Withholding the folded paper, Billy said, “Did she have any children?”
“What does it matter?”
“It matters,” Billy said.
He realized that his empty hand had tightened into a fist. This was a friend standing before him, such as he allowed himself friends. Yet he relaxed his fist only with effort.
“It matters to me, Lanny.”
“Kids? I don’t know. Probably not. From what I heard, she must have lived alone.”
Two bursts of traffic passed on the state highway: paradiddles of engines, the soft percussion of displaced air.
In the ensuing quiet, Lanny said plaintively, “Listen, Billy, potentially, I’m in trouble here.”
“Potentially?” He found humor in that choice of words, but not the kind to make him laugh.
“No one else in the department would have taken that damn note seriously. But they’ll say I should have.”
“Maybe I should have,” Billy said.
Agitated, Lanny disagreed: “That’s hindsight. Bullshit. Don’t talk like that. We need a mutual defense.”
“Defense against what?”
“Whatever. Billy, listen, I don’t have a perfect ten card.”
40
“What’s a ten card?”
“My force record card, my performance file. I’ve gotten a couple negative reports.”
“What’d you do?”
Lanny’s eyes squinted when he took offense. “Damn it, I’m not a crooked cop.”
“I didn’t say you were.”
“I’m forty-six, never taken a dime of dirty money, and I never will.”
“All right. Okay.”
“I didn’t do anything.”
Lanny’s pique might have been pretense; he couldn’t sustain it. Or perhaps some grim mind’s-eye image scared him, for his pinched eyes widened. He chewed on his lower lip as if gnawing on a disturbing thought that he wanted to bite up, spit out, and never again consider. Although he glanced at his wristwatch, Billy waited.
“What’s true enough,” Lanny said, “is I’m sometimes a lazy cop. Out of boredom, you know. And maybe because… I never really wanted this life.”
“You don’t owe me any explanations,” Billy assured him.
“I know. But the thing is… whether I wanted this life or not, it’s what I’ve got now. It’s all I have. I want a chance to keep it. I gotta read that new note, Billy. Please give me the note.”
Sympathetic but unwilling to yield the paper, which was now damp with his own perspiration, Billy unfolded and read it. If you don’t go to the police and get them involved, I will kill an unmarried man who won’t much be missed by the world. If you do go to the police, I will kill a young mother of two. You have five hours to decide. The choice is yours.
On the first reading, Billy comprehended every terrible detail of the note, yet he read it again. Then he relinquished it.
Anxiety, the rust of life, corroded Lanny Olsen’s face as he scanned the lines. “This is one sick son of a bitch.”
“I’ve got to go down to Napa.”
“Why?”
“To give both these notes to the police.”
41
“Wait, wait, wait,” Lanny said. “You don’t know that the second victim’s going to be in Napa. Could be in St. Helena or Rutherford—”
“Or in Angwin,” Billy interrupted, “or Calistoga.”
Eager to press the point, Lanny said, “Or Yountville or Circle Oaks, or Oakville. You don’t know where. You don’t know anything.”
“I know some things,” Billy said. “I know what’s right.”
Blinking at the note, flicking sweat off his eyelashes, Lanny said, “Real killers don’t play these games.”
“This one does.”
Folding the note and tucking it in the breast pocket of his uniform shirt, Lanny pleaded, “Let me think a minute.”
Immediately retrieving the paper from Lanny’s pocket, Billy said, “Think all you want. I’m driving down to Napa.”
