Watch Them Die

While suffering through those videos, Hannah and Ben wondered about Seth’s possible culpability in the murders. Hannah went to bed, resolving to dig deeper with Seth when they worked side by side on Wednesday.

She had another resolve. Nothing was going to happen between Ben Podowski and herself. That evening, she’d caught Ben gazing at her several times. She pretended not to notice the look of longing in his eyes. It didn’t mean anything. He was just lonely, discouraged, and far away from home.

Ben had left in the morning to return the lecture tapes to Paul’s office. He planned to keep tabs on Paul for the rest of the day.

Walking to the funeral parlor, Hannah had the feeling she was being watched again. She was also struck with a strange thought. What if Ben wasn’t really following Paul? He could have been following her. He might have slipped that folder of photos inside Paul’s desk drawer last night. He’d had plenty of time to do it. What if he was friends with that man who had been trying to look through her living-room curtains the night before last? Ben had disappeared for over ten minutes, then come back with his story about trying to chase down that elusive prowler. And she’d believed him.

Hannah shook off the notion. Ben couldn’t be one of the killers. He’d barely escaped becoming one of the victims. She just wasn’t thinking right. Too little sleep.

Perhaps that explained her extra-fragile emotional state at this funeral service. Having a breakdown in the cloakroom, no less.

“Hello, Hannah.”

The handkerchief clutched in her hand, Hannah turned around. “Oh, hi, Ned,” she replied, clearing her throat.

Ned Reemar stood in the cloakroom doorway. He wore his usual brown shirt with Snoopy over the pocket, jeans, and sneakers. But he’d added an ugly tie to the ensemble. It looked like a clip-on. He carried a windbreaker over his arm.

Wiping her eyes, Hannah edged past him. “I’ll get out of your way here,” she said. “It’s awfully sweet of you to come.”

“A lot of freaks attending, aren’t there?” he said, hanging up his coat.

And you win the prize, Hannah thought. But she merely shrugged. “It’s a diverse group. I didn’t know Britt had such a wide range of friends.”

“Well, I hate to say it,” Ned muttered, smoothing back his greasy hair. “But I used to see her hanging out with some of these weirdos when she wasn’t working. Talk about the wrong kind of crowd. I could have told you she’d end up dying young.”

Hannah frowned, but didn’t say anything.

Ned came up beside her. “How’s your son?” he asked. “Gotta be careful with chicken pox. Do you think Scott caught the chicken pox from Guy?”

“No, I—I think they were both exposed to it around the same time,” Hannah replied. It was unsettling how Nutty Ned always knew what was happening with everyone in the video store. Still, Hannah managed to smile. “But both patients seem to be doing all right, Ned.”

She glanced toward the casket and saw Webb standing near one of the potted palms. Tall and crudely handsome, he had a five o’clock shadow and a perpetual sneer that someone must have once told him was sexy. He wore a leather jacket, jeans, a black shirt, and a bolo tie. With his hands shoved in his pockets, he leaned against the wood-paneled wall and glared at her.

“Hannah, do you know if the store will be carrying any of the old Twentieth Century Fox classics in DVD?” Ned was asking. “There’s a whole bunch coming out next week, but they didn’t say if the DVDs will be in the original screen ratio from CinemaScope. I was reading about it—”

“Um, Ned. I really don’t know,” Hannah gently interrupted. “I’m sorry. I’m kind of not in the mood to talk about work-related stuff right now. You understand, don’t you?”

He frowned. “Oh, well, okay, sure. See you later.”

Hannah watched Ned retreat into the crowd; then he stopped in front of the casket. She watched him touch the coffin, running his hand over the polished wood. Ever so casually, Nutty Ned poked his finger in the crevice between the coffin and its lid. Like a curious child, he must have been wondering if the casket was sealed shut.

Dumbfounded, Hannah stared at him.

Suddenly, someone shoved her, almost knocking her down. Hannah grabbed on to a chair to keep from falling, then swiveled around to see Webb.

“Because of you,” Webb growled, “I have the police on my ass. You fucking ratted on me.”

Glaring back at him, Hannah caught her breath. “I simply told them Britt was with you last weekend. That’s the truth, isn’t it? She was with you, wasn’t she? Or did you ditch her someplace?”

“I didn’t ditch her that night,” Webb muttered. “She ditched me.”

“Well, good for Britt,” Hannah replied, keeping her voice down. “Too bad her timing was off. She should have ditched you ages ago.”

“What the fuck are you talking about?” he snarled.

“I’m talking about all the times you beat her, Webb.” Hannah shook her head at him. “That poor, sweet girl. At least she won’t be getting smacked around and hurt by you anymore, you low-life creep.”

He grabbed her arm. “You listen to me, you stupid—”

Hannah wrenched free of him. “Don’t you touch me,” she hissed. “If you ever lay a goddamn hand on me, I swear I’ll have the police down on you so fast, you won’t know what hit you.”

He grinned defiantly. “Oh, really?”

Hannah suddenly realized people were staring. Her eyes wrestled with his. “You can count on it, you son of a bitch,” she said under her breath.

“You’re gonna sic the cops on me?” Webb chuckled. “That’s a good one. You wouldn’t dare. You’re in trouble with the police. Britt told me. Hell, you never would’ve talked to the cops at all if they hadn’t tracked you down at the store after Britt OD’d.”

Hannah took a step back from him. “What?” she murmured.

He nodded. “Yeah, they told me they came to you. I’ll bet you were pissing in your panties, you were so scared.” He raised his voice. “What kind of trouble are you in with the police, Hannah? Britt said you must be in some pretty deep shit.”

Hannah turned away. She stiffly edged through the crowd to the cloakroom. She couldn’t look at anyone. Her heart was pounding, and she felt sick. She hated shrinking away, leaving him with a smirk and the last word.

Hannah fetched her trench coat. She was still nauseous and shaking inside as she left the funeral parlor.

The chilly autumn wind whipped at her as she hurried down the sidewalk. Hannah threw on her coat. She felt something slightly bulky in the left pocket, something that hadn’t been there before.

Hannah stopped dead. She shoved her hand in the pocket and felt the plastic box. “Oh, no,” she whispered.

She knew what it was.

“Wasn’t he one of the doctors on St. Elsewhere?” Ben asked.

Gazing at the TV screen in her living room, Hannah nodded. “William Daniels, he was also Dustin Hoffman’s father in The Graduate.”

They sat by each other on the floor, watching William Daniels and Warren Beatty on the screen. In the scene, Daniels and Beatty were in the galley of a small yacht, discussing a photo that had been taken at the Space Needle. The film was The Parallax View, a political thriller from 1974. It had been years since Hannah had seen it. But she had watched this particular scene just a few hours ago. The tape had been set to start there.

The next two minutes of footage was wordless, just Beatty and William Daniels aboard the yacht, with a third man at the wheel. “He’s a bodyguard, I think,” Hannah explained to Ben.

At a certain point, Beatty moved to one end of the boat; then he watched Daniels and his bodyguard at the stern. The camera pulled back for a long shot of the yacht gliding along the water’s choppy surface. Suddenly, the