there was any drug in him—save for the fact that he could pull images from people’s minds, of course, push other ones in their place.
The thirty-year-old woman who answered the door in Irving told him that Caspar had left to catch a ride to work with—
Chandler couldn’t wait. He pushed, and grabbed the name from the woman’s mind. Wesley Frazier. He lived right up the block. Chandler ran there. The door was answered by a young woman. Frazier’s sister.
“Wes and Lee have already gone—”
Chandler pushed so hard that Frazier’s sister stumbled backward. He saw Caspar putting a long brown-paper package into the backseat of Wesley’s ’59 Chevy and then get in the passenger seat.
Frazier’s sister was wavering back and forth in the doorway like a blade of grass in the wake of a speeding car. Chandler pushed more, saw Wesley telling his sister he’d got a job at Texas School Books a couple of months ago, saw his sister asking him if there was maybe another job there for Marina’s husband, Lee. “Although I heard her call him Alik once,” he saw Wesley’s sister saying. “You think maybe that’s Russian for Lee?”
Chandler pushed so hard that Frazier’s sister fell back on her sofa. She didn’t know the exact address of the School Book Depository, but she knew it was on Dealey Plaza. Something flickered in her mind, and with the last of his juice Chandler pulled it out of her. It turned out to be the cover of the newspaper. A map. The president’s motorcade route. He followed the arrows. Main. Houston. Elm.
“W-why, yes,” Frazier’s sister said absently, though Chandler hadn’t said anything. “That
“That’s handy,” Chandler said, and ran for his car.
Five minutes later Frazier’s sister blinked rapidly, noticed the open door.
“Durn pollen,” she said, getting up slowly and shuffling to the door. “Give me a helluva headache.”
Wesley kept up a steady patter as he drove them to work: the rain, the fact that his car battery was low, the president’s visit. In the passenger’s seat Caspar sat quietly, eyes forward, hands on thighs. The absurdity of it all, he thought. He’s a
“I heard the only reason he got in in ’60 was because Joe paid the mob to stuff the boxes in Chicago or some such,” Wesley was saying, “but I don’t think Johnson can give him Texas and Georgia this time around. Not with the Civil Rights Bill hanging over—”
The Chevy went over a bump and the paper-wrapped package in the backseat reverberated with a loud metal clank.
“Curtain rods,” Caspar said, even though Wesley didn’t ask. Even though he’d said it when he first got in the car, had said it yesterday, too, when he’d asked Wesley for a ride to work this morning. He’d told Wesley he was going to spend the night with Marina in Irving to see his daughters and pick up some curtain rods she’d bought for him so he could have some privacy in the rooming house he stayed in on Beckley Street.
“All the same I think I’ll go see him.” Wesley was prattling on. “The newspaper said the motorcade’s supposed to pass by work around noon, twelve thirty, so maybe I’ll eat lunch in the park and wave to him and Jackie when they go by.
“I think it’s a combination of motor and parade,” Caspar said.
“But then it’d be motor
“Arcade?”
“You know,” Wesley said. “A shooting gallery.”
When they got to work Caspar got out of the car almost before it stopped and grabbed the package from the backseat and tucked it up under his arm to make it as inconspicuous as possible. As soon as he did that, however, he thought that maybe it looked like he was trying to hide it, but at the same time he was afraid that if he rearranged the package it would draw too much attention to it, so he left it where it was and started off at a fast walk to the main building. Wesley stayed in the car gunning the engine to charge the battery, but he rolled down the window and asked if Caspar needed a ride home. Caspar said he wasn’t going back to Irving that night. Wesley didn’t ask why.
“Damn it, damn it, damn it, damn it,
Melchior stared at BC’s facedown body, the umbrella still quivering in his hand. This wasn’t the way it was supposed to have happened.
The fallen detective’s bladder had released, and a dark stain was spreading out in the dingy flat pile of the carpet. Melchior kicked BC over, did a cursory pulse check, but it was clear he was dead. The fat needle hung from his stomach. A button was missing from his shirt and the skin underneath was stained with a few drops of blood. It was the shirt that got Melchior. Not the blood, not the corpse itself. The goddamn shirt. Mercerized white cotton, with silk piping and French cuffs held closed with knots of silver. This wasn’t the same man Melchior’d met on the train three weeks ago. He’d remade himself entirely to pursue this thing. To pursue Melchior, and Chandler, and Naz. Remade himself first into a dandy, and now into a corpse.
“Aw, fuck it. Fuck you, BC Querrey. Fuck
Melchior fell to his knees, careful to avoid the puddle of urine, ripped the man’s shirt open so violently that three more buttons flew across the room. He reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out a flat zippered case, opened it. There were more syringes in there, including one with a three-inch needle, and a couple of vials, one of which was filled with epinephrine (there was also a Medaille d’Or tucked into a corner of the case, which Melchior planned on smoking after he got Chandler on Song’s plane). Keller had made Melchior carry the epinephrine in case