On Monday Sally sat contemplating the menu at El Conquistador, waiting for Edna McCaffrey to arrive for their monthly lunch date. Why she was bothering with the menu, she didn’t know. She always ordered the same thing. Edna always ordered the same thing. They had beer if their afternoons didn’t include any classes, or appointments with people smarter than they were. Sally had a class to teach, and planned to go looking for Billy Reno after that. She was nursing an iced tea.
“Sorry I’m late,” said Edna, dashing to the table. She was wearing a lime-green silk suit that Sally was pretty sure had come from Armani...in Milan. “The provost is on a tear about fund-raising. All us deans are supposed to show balance sheets at the end of the year, with at least twenty million in outside funding in the plus column. It’s one thing if Halliburton is bankrolling your petroleum engineering students to practice their skills for drilling the Alaska National Wildlife Refuge. It’s another thing to try to figure out who wants to be the millionaire to give some English professor a big bunch of money to write about how The Virginian is just another version of Tristan and Isolde.”
The waitress arrived with chips and salsa. Sally and Edna ordered the usual.
“So,” said Sally, loading up a chip with salsa hot enough to take the skin off the roof of her mouth. “I presume you’re about to get on my case about fund-raising.”
Edna grinned. “Obviously, you’ve developed an understanding of how universities work.”
“How all institutions work,” said Sally. “The big boss gets a bug up his ass, and pretty soon, they’re passing the Preparation H down the line.”
Edna raised one eyebrow. “You do have a way with a metaphor, Professor.”
“I merely state the obvious,” said Sally, “and then bend over to take my medicine.”
Edna dipped a chip. “I am eating,” she said.
“Okay. No more metaphors. Who do you want me to—I almost said ‘grease’—approach?” Sally asked.
Edna looked down, drew a little circle with her fingertip on the paper placemat festooned with Wyoming cattle brands. “I’m thinking about corporate gifts to the Dunwoodie Center.”
Sally gave her a one-sided grin. “I don’t think we’re exactly in line for contributions from the oil, coal, and gas guys. And we’re not a military base, so that rules out the government. Who else has big bucks in Wyoming?”
“It’s not about Wyoming, or not exclusively,” said Edna. “Look, Sally. You started with Meg Dunwoodie’s bequest, and you’ve gotten some Hollywood money. You need to enlarge the circle, as they say in the development biz. Think ‘liberal money.’ What Wyoming lefties have the national prominence, and the connections, to bring in bigger money from outside the state?”
Sally thought a minute. “Golly,” she said, “I ought to be able to come up with both their names.”
“You’re so amusing today,” said Edna.
“I live to entertain,” Sally replied.
Their plates arrived. “I’m talking about Dave Haggerty. He’s already given you a nice contribution. He’s not afraid to support the sisterhood. He might be willing to up his own commitment, especially with what happened at that doctor’s office last week. Get him to be your point man, and maybe he can hook you up with people who might be good for a whole hell of a lot more,” Edna said, tucking into her flautas.
“He’s wired to people with that much money?” Sally asked, loading her steaming chicken taco with salsa and biting in.
“He’s the grid,” said Edna. “First of all, he’s on the boards of half the progressive organizations in the U.S. Second, the guy’s got some big bucks himself. Three years ago, he won a huge settlement in a product liability case, which meant that he gets brought in on all kinds of similar suits—on both sides. Sometimes the plaintiffs want his expertise, and sometimes the manufacturers hire him to cover their asses.”
“You mean, he’s on retainer with tobacco companies and the like?” Sally asked.
“I don’t know. There was a piece about him in Mother Jones—the interviewer asked him what he thought the major problem with big business was, and he answered, ‘Big greed.’ And since he does so much pro bono work, it’d be out of character, to say the least, for him to sell out to the biggest greedheads. But the people in the universitydevelopment office, who keep track of charitable giving, tell me he’s started handing out money like somebody who’s got something to prove. He’s not making that money representing the broken and busted. Draw your own conclusions,” Edna answered.
Sallysneered. “And I liked him when I met him,” she said. “Does he also go hunting with Supreme Court justices?”
“No. But I hear he plays chess with Paul Allen from time to time.”
“Microsoft Paul Allen?” Sally gaped.
Edna grinned.
“So, maybe I should set up a meeting with him,” said Sally.
“Sort of lay out my vision for the center, ask his advice.”
“If it were me,” said Edna, “I’d buy him dinner at the Yippie I O first, just to get acquainted. It wouldn’t be a big chore. From what I’ve seen, he’s a pretty fascinating guy.”
From what Sally’d seen, Dave Haggerty had tiger eyes and an interesting mouth. “I don’t know about that.”
“Oh for Christ’s sake, Sally. You think he’s never been out for a business dinner? Or are you worried Hawk will object?”
“Hawk understands the demands of business,” Sally said. “I’m sure he’s done his share of working dinners with attractive women.”
“If I’m not mistaken,” Edna said, “Professor Green’s job requires him to spend days at a time camped in remote locations with graduate students, some of whom are females. Some of whom are triathletes who enjoy exhibiting their muscle tone. And you don’t seem to have any objection to those professional responsibilities.”
“Professor Green,” said Sally, “is a free man in a free country. I don’t inquire about muscle tone.”
Edna smirked. “So why would he have a problem with a business dinner? Or is it you who has the problem? Just do it. You’re getting way ahead of yourself.”
She was right, Sally reflected. Better slow that Mustang down. “All right,” she said, “I’ll give Haggerty a call.”
“It’s not as if I’m asking you to suck up to somebody really odious,” Edna said. “Although I certainly reserve the right to do that. In fact, maybe I should give you a long list of loathsome people to court. Might keep you out of trouble,” she finished.
Okay. All right. Right away. Sally told herself she’d just take a stab at finding Billy Reno, then she’d get down to business and make the call to Dave Haggerty.
Maybe it was the size of the town; maybe it was just that, as Lorelei Lee, the gentleman’s favorite blond, had observed, fate kept on happening. When Sally pulled up in front of the dilapidated two-story duplex at the address she’d gotten from Aggie Stark, a small crowd was gathered on the sidewalk. A sheriff’s deputy was stapling a notice to one of the front doors. Three young men in baggy pants and limp T-shirts stood smoking cigarettes and watching morosely as another deputy tossed a motley assortment of gear on top of a heap of similar stuff in the front yard. But the crowd on the sidewalk was focused on Dickie Lang-ham, sucking on a Marlboro of his own, leaning against his truck, getting an earful from none other than Dave Haggerty, casually dressed in jeans and a fleece jacket.
“Come on, Sheriff,” Sally heard Haggerty say as she worked her way into the midst of the onlookers. “My clients paid their rent on time. And what about their right to be safe in their own home? Broken light fixtures, appliances with shorts, bare wires hangin’ out all over the place—it’s no wonder they had a fire in here! I thought you people were public safety officers.”
“ ’Course we are, Dave,” Dickie told him in a soothing voice. “The building inspector’s been here a time or two and cited the management company for code violations. According to the paperwork I’ve got, the place has been brought up to code. It’s not clear who’s responsible for those broken light fixtures, I’ll grant you, but I might mention that your clients,” he said, gesturing toward the young men, “appear to have done some damage to the place themselves. There’s trash everywhere, spray-painted graffiti on the walls; hell, somebody ripped the bathroom door right off the hinges! It don’t exactly look like these lads have spent their time in this place memorizing Bible verses and polishing their Eagle Scout badges.”
“They’re entitled to the protection of the law,” Haggerty retorted. “This morning at seven A.M., the apartment manager came into their apartment without knocking, waving a forty-four, yelling, ‘If you punks don’t get the hell off this propertyin fifteen minutes, I’ll blow everydamn one of you to Kingdom Come!’ No prior notice of eviction, not to mention the threat of bodily harm. What do you plan to do about that?”
Dickie contemplated his cigarette, flicked the ash. “Maybe tell him to watch his language?”
“Come on, Sheriff. The guy manages half the slum properties in town. The owners rent to kids who don’t know jack shit about their renters’ rights, and half the time they end up getting evicted, taken to court, and charged for enough repairs and renovations to build the Trump Tower. We get a case like this every day at the university law clinic. It’s a slumlord’s racket, and you know it!”
“I also know,” said Dickie, “that these fine, upstanding young citizens have been partying and trashing their place, off and on for the last two weeks. We’ve had at least three complaints about noise, and on one occasion had to come in and shut things down. My officers busted three kids for drugs and wrote twenty-five minor-in-possession citations that night. Your boys here might be of age, but some of their guests were still suckin’ on pacifiers. I wouldn’t be surprised if some of those cases have showed up at your university law clinic. ’Scuse me a minute.”
Dickie had caught sight of Sally. He tilted his head, took a last drag on his cigarette, and flicked the butt away as he walked toward her, took her hand, pulled her aside, Haggerty at his heels. “What brings you out today, Mustang?” he asked, only a hint of irritation slipping into his voice.
Haggerty turned to look at her, more than a glimmer of annoyance still on his own face, but quickly covered the emotion. “Sally Alder,” he said. “What a surprise.”
“I had no idea what was happening here,” Sally told them, hoping to explain away her awkward presence. “I didn’t come just to gawk at the spectacle. I’m hoping to have a chance to speak to Billy Reno.”
Both men looked at her. “And why would that be?” Dickie said. “You need a cheap TV or a Jeep Cherokee?”
“Watch it, Sheriff,” said Haggerty. “Mr. Reno’s paid his debt to society for his juvenile indiscretions.”
“Indiscretions!” Dickie laughed. “Last time I encountered little Billy being indiscreet, he wasn’t a juvie anymore, and he was in the midst of hot-wiring a Lexus that happened to be parked right out in front of the county courthouse. In the middle of a blizzard! There’s your indiscretion, and then there’s your bein’ a sociopath. But then, of course you probably recall that episode yourself, Dave, seeing as how you went straight out and hired away the PD who got the little shit off by convincing the Lexus’s owner that Mr. Reno had merely been a good Samaritan, thinking he was helping out with a dead battery.”
“Since the owner had been at a bar where Billyhappened to be, and had slammed down six or seven vodka gimlets by the time he got back to his car, his recollection of the incident was a little hazy. The public defender merely presented the owner with a plausible explanation, which he chose to accept, rather than having his own DWI record become an issue,” Haggertypointed out blandly. “Come on. You have to admit it, Dick. That was a pretty sweet little piece of lawyering. No reason to revictimize the Lexus guy, or contribute to jail overcrowding and police overwork, when you can make everybody happy by getting a case dismissed. By the way,” he said, shifting gears suddenly and turning to Sally, “how do you know Billy Reno?”
When in doubt, the truth. “He’s Charlie Preston’s boyfriend. I thought he might know something about how she’s doing, maybe take her a message.”
“Why don’t you give me the message?” Dickie said. “I happen to be looking for Charlie Preston myself, you know.”
“And you’re hoping Billy Reno can lead you to Charlie,” Sally said.
“Better me than you, being as how I’m doing my job, which involves assaults and missing persons and homicide, for example, and last time I checked, you worked for the university. What kind of message are you trying to send this girl, Sally?” asked Dickie.
She was a little embarrassed. “I just wanted to tell her to come home, and to talk to you.”
“Thanks a heap,” said Dickie. “We peace officers need all the moral support we can get.”
“Give me a break, Dickie. I’m really worried that whoever killed her father might be dangerous to Charlie. Maybe she found out that Brad was in some kind of trouble. Maybe she even got beaten up in the first place for seeing or hearing something she wasn’t supposed to know about. She was in a hell of a hurry to get out of town, right? Maybe it wasn’t just her father she was worried might be coming after her.”
“Or maybe it was,” said Dickie. “And she had something to do with what happened to him. I’m sorry if it hurts your feelings to think that one of your students could be involved in murder, but it’s a possibility I have to consider.”
“Which is precisely why this girl is so scared of you, or any cop. The system hasn’t been any help to her. She must know that you all see her as a suspect in her father’s murder.”
Getting no reaction from Dickie, Sally appealed to Haggerty for support. “I thought, since I’m her teacher and she came to me for help before she disappeared this last time, I might be able to be, oh, I don’t know, a kind of go-between.”
“A bridge over troubled waters?” Haggerty asked, aiming the tiger eyes at her.
Sally looked into those eyes and fought not to mentally finish the line of the song, having to do with laying herself down. “Something like that.”
“Charlie Preston’s a troubled kid,” Haggerty said, gaze steady on Sally’s. “She’s lucky to have a professor who cares about her. I admire you for that.”
This was a man who seemed to know a thing or two about admiring. Sally’s heart was beating a little faster than it should. “I’m really not trying to interfere,” she told Dickie.
“Oh yes. I could tell,” said Dickie. “And I’m really not going to have to tell you that you really don’t want to interfere, for reasons that ought to be really obvious to a person of your really large intelligence.”
“Sarcasm. Really unbecoming,” said Sally, and then pointed at the punks on the lawn. “Which one’s Billy Reno?”
“Well now, that’s an interesting question,” said Dickie. “Because none of them is. Matter of fact, Mr. Reno’s not at home. You wouldn’t happen to have some idea where the young man might be?”
Sally shook her head. “I haven’t got a clue—I’ve never laid eyes on him. Any chance he just went out for a pack of cigarettes?” she asked.
“Oh, there’s always a chance,” said Dickie, glancing down at his watch. “But I’ve been here an hour or so, and he hasn’t made an appearance. Odds are, he’s cleared out entirely. Our Billy has reason to skedaddle when the law comes calling, of course, but moreover, there’s no reason for him to hang around here. His name, naturally, isn’t on the lease. Even slumlords don’t like renting to incorrigible criminals.”
“So Billy Reno wasn’t actually living here?” Sally asked.
“Oh no. This is the address listed with his parole officer,” Dickie told her. “But you know how it is with these kind of places, Sal. People come and go. Sometimes the rent gets split five ways, sometimes ten, and sometimes, as we see here, it doesn’t get paid at all. Then everybody’s got to find someplace new to tear apart.”
Sally looked at the boys on the lawn, noting the shaved heads, the tattoos, the wife-beater tank tops. One was lighting a cigarette off the butt of the previous one he’d been smoking, squinting against the smoke. Another, wearing a large, gem-studded cross around his neck, was slumped against a rusting car in the driveway, hand over one ear, cell phone at the other. A third bent to pick up something off the lawn: a handmade afghan, crocheted in pinks and purples and blacks. That afghan was something only a mother or grandmother could have made, and the kid was treating it like it was the Shroud of Turin. He stood, shook out the afghan, folded it neatly, and set it carefully on a La-Z-Boy lounge chair with half the stuffing coming out of it. There was a tattoo of Bob Marley’s sad-hopeful face on his arm, and something so poignant about the sight of him that Sally felt tears spring into her eyes. “Who knows who did the tearing apart, who’s responsible, and who just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time,” she observed.
“I can think of one person who falls into both of the last two groups,” said Dave, “as you’ll probably be interested to know, Sally. Charlie Preston. It appears,” he said, looking at the notice of eviction now firmly stapled to the front door, “that her name was on the lease.”
“Charlie signed the lease? Why? These guys look to me like they’ve got a few years on her, and she didn’t even live here, from what I’ve heard.”
“These boys also have worse credit records and rap sheets than she does, not to mention parents whose pockets aren’t close to being as deep as the Prestons’. I also think she was spending a fair bit of time here with Billy,” said Haggerty.
“Which is why I’m going to excuse myself, much as I enjoy your company, and chat with the roommates over there.” Dickie jerked his head toward the boys on the lawn. “And just in case you should happen to succeed in making contact with Miss Preston before I do, I’ll tell you one other thing. I haven’t entirely given up hope that Billy Boy might show up here at some point. He knows that, at the very least, Charlie’s liable to have to go to court over what happened at this place. He’s completely crazy, true enough, but in his twisted, amoral, borderline way, Billy’s one of the most loyal people on this green earth. He’s very protective of the younger punks and losers and lost girls who follow him around and look up to him, God help him. Kid thinks he’s fuckin’ Robin Hood.”
Sally and Dave watched Dickie walk toward the boys on the lawn. As he approached, each of them stopped what he was doing. Some slouched, some stood with their legs spread, arms folded or flexed at their sides. Their eyes grew flat, their faces expressionless.
“Those guys,” said Sally, “are a little bit scary.”
“They’re also a little bit scared,” said Haggerty. “More and more, I see kids these days who seem to be running out of options. What is it about our world that makes people with their whole lives ahead of them stop believing in possibility?”
Haggerty’s lips were pressed together, his sandy brows slanting downward. They both watched as the sheriff engaged the boy who’d folded the afghan with such reverence, now affecting utter boredom with the experience of dealing with the law. “As it happens,” said Haggerty, “I’ve represented Billy Reno in the past. And will again, if it comes to that. Charlie Preston may need a little help in that department too.”
“You’re a good guy, Dave,” said Sally.
“Thanks,” he said reaching in the back pocket of his jeans, pulling out his wallet, handing her a business card, and catching her with the tiger eyes. “Let’s keep in touch.”
“Uh, maybe we could get together for lunch or dinner,” Sally managed. “I mean, ever since the American Experience event, I’ve been meaning to call you. About the work I’ve been doing in the center. Talk about some projects,” she finished, wondering if she sounded as lame to him as she did to herself.
Haggerty smiled. “Projects. Yeah. Definitely. Maybe some fund-raising too?”
“How’d you guess?” Sally smiled back.
“I’m clairvoyant. Plus your dean sent me a note saying it was nice to see me at the reception. So I’ve been expecting a pitch.”
“I’m not that good at the pitch,” said Sally, “but I do think we care about a lot of the same things, and I’d like to pick your brain.”
Now the tiger eyes softened. “Looks like one thing we both care about is messed-up kids. We could start with that, and see what else develops.” He glanced once more at her bare-fingered left hand. “Why don’t we make it dinner next week at the Yippie I O? I’ll email you to firm things up.”
“I’m involved with somebody,” Sally said. “We live together.”
“Right. I believe I heard something about that.” Another glance at her hand. “The world,” said Haggerty, “is a complicated place.”