pushed the door wide open, still from around the corner, and listened, cataloguing each sound-the clock, the heating pipes, the hum of the refrigerator-until I could hear no more. Only then did I step cautiously across the threshold and into the semidarkness.
It took me fifteen nervous minutes to find out the apartment was empty. I went through it twice, increasingly angry that my own house had become a place of menace on the strength of one half-seen Plymouth Duster and a torn piece of Scotch tape. I was angry that the place had been invaded and all my things picked over, and I was angry that I might be inventing the whole goddamned thing to begin with-torn tape notwithstanding.
Finally, and I suppose fundamentally, what bothered me most was that basic elements in my life were being disturbed, some by the simple pressures of time, like Murphy’s retirement, and others by a more malevolent force. I didn’t like it, and I didn’t like how they were all mixing together, forcing everyday events to assume ominous proportions. Having to put tape on the door was bad enough; finding it broken and stalking through my own apartment with a gun was downright disturbing. I wanted to be tightly focused as I began this investigation, but it wasn’t happening. Whether it was Murphy’s timidity or something subliminal I’d gotten from reading those transcripts, I was beginning to feel out of sorts.
The telephone rang and I picked it up in the darkness. I listened without speaking. “Joe?”
The voice was unfamiliar.
“Yes.”
The line went dead, but I paused with the receiver halfway back to the cradle. I remembered that when I’d answered, it had been wrong end around. That, for a man living alone, was a sign of things amiss.
I unscrewed the mouthpiece and poured its contents on the desk. A small silver disc rolled into a corner and shimmied to a stop. It glistened brightly in the glow of the streetlights outside. I turned on my desk lamp and slipped a piece of notepaper under the bug. On television these things were as common as lifesavers-even flat broke private eyes had them. But this was a first for me. The listening devices we used belonged to the state police and were far less fancy, with wires and battery packs. This, I thought as I poured it into an envelope, was in a whole different league.
· · ·
Murphy looked up over his reading glasses. “What’s up?”
“This.” I crossed his office and dropped the bug on the report between his hands.
He didn’t touch it but bent over carefully and peered at it. “That’s pretty neat. Where’d you get it?”
“You can pick it up. It’s been dusted. I got it out of my phone.”
He scowled and pinched it between his thumb and forefinger as if expecting it to sting. “When?”
“Last night. When I got home. I noticed some tape I’d put across the door was broken. That thing was all I found. I searched the rest of the apartment, but I’d need equipment to do a proper job.”
He rolled it in his palm. “I saw something like this at that FBI course I took a few years ago. It had a range of about a city block.” He let a few seconds pass before adding, “Do you always put tape across your door?”
“No.”
He put down the bug and leaned back in his chair. “Why now?”
“I thought I was being followed.”
He rubbed his eyes and refocused on a favorite spot on the wall near the ceiling. “Who by?”
“A green Plymouth Duster. No plate and no ID on the driver.”
“And you’re sure about this?”
“Nope.”
That brought his eyes off the wall. “Nope?”
I shrugged and pointed my chin at the bug.
“What other case are you working on?”
“Small stuff. A burglary, a vandalism-nothing that would tie in. Do you have any friends at the FBI that could take a look at that thing? J.P. says it’s way over his head.”
“Yeah, I think I might. You sure it’s worth it?”
“So far, we’ve got one killing, one sexual assault, one policeman mugged, and one maniac running around with a ski mask. You decide.” He allowed a half smile. “All right, I’ll Express Mail the little bastard.” He stopped and squinted at it again. “I wonder if it’s still working?”
I raised my eyebrows and turned to go. He stopped me. “Hold it.” He dropped the bug into his drawer and slammed it shut. “Where are you off to?”
“Woodstock. I thought I’d go have a chat with Davis.”
“That’s a hell of a distance for a chat.”
“I’m hoping for a hell of a chat.”
Bill Davis had changed a lot in three years. At the jail, he’d been a study in restrained frustration-a man whose consistent claims of innocence had been, in the public’s eyes, undermined by icy self-control. At his sentencing, standing straight and silent, he had merely shaken his head, incredulous at the stupidity of all those around him.
Now, in the low-ceilinged visitor’s room at Woodstock, the silence was still there, but it floated on bitterness and defeat. He sat opposite me, his arms crossed, staring at the table between us, as far away from this room as his mind could possibly take him. I imagined his years of isolation had made him an expert.
“My name is Gunther. I’m with the Brattleboro Police Department.”
He continued staring at the table.
“I wanted to ask you some questions.”
Still nothing.
“I’ve been spending the last couple of days reading over your case, but I haven’t been able to come up with much.”
A small crease appeared between his eyes. He glanced up at me. “About what?”
“About why you are where you are.”
He smiled gently and gave that familiar shake of the head-a glimpse from long ago. “You people.”
“I’m thinking of reopening the case.”
“You killing time?”
I wondered if I should tell him about Ski Mask but decided against it. “How much of the evidence found against you was planted?”
One eyebrow lifted. “What’s your problem?”
“Like I said, I’ve been going over the case. It feels wrong. I thought you might help me.”
“What for?”
“Right now? To kill time.”
The smile again. “I know how to do that.”
“I thought you might. So how much was planted?”
“All of it.”
“What really happened?”
“Sweet Jesus. If you don’t know that by now, you do need help.”
“So you’ve got nothing to add? Nothing you’ve thought of since the trial?”
He shook his head.
“You were about to go into your apartment, heard someone call your name from around the corner, went to investigate, and got knocked on the back of the head, and that’s all?”
“That’s it.”
“What had you been doing before coming home? It was late, wasn’t it?”
“You know it was. I was out drinking.”
“At Mort’s B amp; G? Like every night?”
“Uh-huh.”
“A couple of beers, a few hours of the bar TV, then home?”
“Right.”
“No dope?”
