“What?”
Thomas still had my phone, and had swiped his thumb across the screen to see the next picture. “What’s this?”
“Oh, that’s the directory, in the lobby.”
“Is that the landlord’s number?”
“Yes, it is.”
“So you talked to him?”
“No, I did not talk to him.”
“Why didn’t you talk to the landlord? He would probably know if someone had been killed in one of his apartments.”
“Thomas, look, I got you some pictures, I knocked on the door, there was no one there, I don’t know what else I could have done.”
Julie made a little snorting noise.
“What?” I said.
She asked, “How hard would it have been to talk to the super? Or some of the other neighbors?”
“And this involves you how?”
She smiled. “You were already there. In the city, in the building. You might have knocked on a couple more doors, make it worth the trip.”
I glared at her.
“Yeah,” Thomas agreed, looking at me with disapproval. “Why did you even bother? I should have gone myself last night.”
“Yeah, well, you still wouldn’t be there for another week,” I said.
“But at least when I got there, I’d have found out something. This is just like before, when there was someone in trouble in a window.”
“What?” I asked.
“This wasn’t much of an investigation. It’s certainly not up to the standards of the Central Intelligence Agency. I hate to think what they’d have to say about it.”
“Yeah,” said Julie.
“Okay,” I said, raising my hands in defeat. “Next time, you can leave the house and get on the train and go to New York and be Archie Goodwin and I’ll be the one who sits in the house while you go around and gather clues. I’ll just tend to my orchids.”
“Archie? Orchids?”
“Thomas, I did what I could. Honestly. There’s nothing at all online about anyone being killed at that address. No news stories. Whatever you saw, it’s pretty clear it was nothing. The best thing to do now would be to let this go.” I took the printout from my pocket, crumpled it, and tossed it into the trash. Thomas studied the paper ball as it bounced into the receptacle, then looked back at me.
“That’s a bit dickish,” Julie said.
I gave her another look, then sighed. Maybe she was right, but it had been a long day, and I was exhausted.
I was expecting Thomas to agree with Julie, but what he said next came out of left field.
“I don’t like Mr. Prentice.”
I blinked. “What?” I allowed my brain two seconds to switch gears and asked, “Why don’t you like Mr. Prentice?”
“He wants me to do stuff I don’t want to do.”
“Thomas, what are we talking about here?”
“He wanted to take me out for lunch and I didn’t want to go.”
“Today? He came by here?”
My brother nodded. “He grabbed me to make me go and then I hit him.”
I took a step forward and put a hand on his shoulder. “Jesus, Thomas, you hit Len Prentice?”
Thomas nodded. “Only a little.” He stood up out of the computer chair so he could demonstrate. He took my hand and put it on my arm. “He grabbed me like that and then I pulled away and then I hit his face.” He did it in slow motion, touching my cheek with the back of his hand.
“You hit Len Prentice in the face.”
“I don’t like him. I’ve never liked him.”
“Thomas, you can’t go around hitting people.”
“I told you, he grabbed my arm first. I didn’t hit him hard. He didn’t bleed or cry or anything.”
“What did he do then?”
“He left.”
I sighed. I was never going to be able to leave Thomas alone again. At least not for an entire day. Before I could sell this house and go back to Burlington, I was going to have to get Thomas settled in a place where he’d be supervised. The other thing that alarmed me was that, within a very short time, Thomas had gotten physical. Twice. He’d tackled me. And now he’d struck Len Prentice. In his defense, both times he’d been provoked.
“Thomas,” I said, “it’s not like you to lose your temper. This isn’t like you.”
“I know,” he said, settling back into this chair and looking at the monitors. “Usually I’m good.”
Thomas started clicking on the mouse and said nothing more.
I felt Julie’s hand on my back. “Come on,” she said softly. “I think we could both use that drink.”
THIRTY-THREE
“Who’s Len Prentice?” Julie asked as I handed her a beer from the fridge.
I told her, and said she might remember him from the funeral. When I described him, she did. “Thomas has never liked him,” I said.
“What the hell was he doing here trying to drag your brother out for lunch?”
“I don’t know. Thing with Len is, he doesn’t quite grasp the concept that some people are different. He figures if Thomas hears voices he should just put in earplugs, and his ailing wife should be more energetic so she can travel with him. You know. ‘Walk it off.’”
“Yeah, I know the type.”
“Maybe I should call Len. See if he’s upset. It’s too late now. Maybe in the morning. Honest to God.”
We stood there in the kitchen, leaning up against the counter, sipping our beers, not saying anything for a few seconds.
Finally, I said, “Thank you for being so nice to him, taking him out for dinner, letting him use your iPad.”
“You see, that’s what he’s talking about,” Julie said.
“I’m sorry?”
“You’re thanking me for spending time with him. Like I was babysitting, or looking after your cat.”
“I never meant-”
“Thomas is a nice man,” Julie said. “A decent, well-meaning guy. Yeah, he’s got some issues. He’s slightly out of the ordinary. I mean, he told me how he got you to go to New York looking for this head-in-a-bag person, which I have to admit is kind of out there. Sorry about calling you dickish, by the way.” Her smile suggested she wasn’t sorry at all. “Did you really go into the city just to do that?”
“I had a meeting about a job.”
“How’d that go?”
“Not bad.”
“You moving there?”
“No, it’s the kind of work I can do from my studio.”
She nodded. “Anyway, thing about your brother is, there’s more to him than just this map stuff. That’s what I was going to say.”
I had no comment.
