The school bell – picture a giant-sized annoying alarm clock signaling the beginning of the Friday school day – had gone off thirty minutes ago. I had cleared the playground, monitored the door for latecomers, and made sure the hallways were empty and everyone was pretty much where they were supposed to be. By nine o’clock I had returned three emails, made two phone calls and finished my second cup of coffee. Now I was standing inside the closet that had served as MoJo’s ‘room.’
Just as Royce had explained yesterday, three-dozen or so copies of The Great Gatsby had been moved off the shelves, revealing a small hole in the wall where MoJo apparently kept his secret stash. The hole was empty. Anything of relevance, I assumed, had been removed by the police.
Except for a few catalogs offering hydroponics equipment, a copy of this month’s Purebred Pigeon Magazine – who knew? – an opened ream of copier paper, a stapler, and some assorted desk supplies strewn across an old wooden table, it was almost as if Maurice Joseph had never been there.
There was a light tapping on the door. Elaine Stiles, our school counselor, was standing in the doorway.
‘Hey, Ray,’ she said, ‘I’m really sorry about Maurice.’
‘Pretty shitty for everyone. How much do the kids know?’
‘Just what they heard on the street and their phones. Ron wants to have an assembly last period so we can explain to the kids what happened. We also need to offer any grief counseling that we can.’ She looked at her watch. ‘I’m expecting some grief counselors from the DOE any minute.’
That’s standard procedure when a school loses a staff member or student so suddenly and violently. Grief counselors were also available for catastrophes that took place outside the school, such as 9/11 or other traumatic events the kids would need help processing. Just two days ago we had had a hard lockdown drill. The kind of thing we were mandated to practice in the event of an active-shooter situation. Makes you appreciate a good old-fashioned fire drill.
‘I can give you a list of kids he was close to,’ I offered.
‘That’d be good.’ She touched my arm. ‘How are you doing?’
‘That’s a good question, Elaine.’ I told her about Royce comparing me to Jessica Fletcher. ‘I’m starting to wonder if he has a point.’
‘He does not have a point, Ray.’
‘He kinda does, Elaine. Some people collect stamps or coins. I seem to collect crime scenes. I’m starting to feel that maybe I somehow invite violence into my life.’
‘You do not.’ She stepped over to hug me. ‘What you do is you put yourself out there for people in crisis. You help them make sense out of what’s going on. And as much as I think you’d like to, you can’t save everyone.’
‘I’m not trying to save anyone,’ I said, returning the hug. ‘If I were, I’d be doing a pretty crappy job of it.’
‘Crappy job of what?’
Elaine and I broke the hug. Ron Thomas was just outside the doorway. Like most times, he had his sleeves rolled up, ready for action.
‘Ray’s upset about Maurice, Ron. I was just …’
‘I could see what you were … just. Anyway.’ He looked at Elaine while he adjusted his tie. It must have been weird for Ron to understand two of his teachers were truly fond of each other. Poor guy. It must have been so much easier on him when he was teaching Phys Ed. ‘There’re two … “grief counselors” waiting in the office for you. Why wasn’t I told they were coming?’
Elaine explained their presence, and also that as principal, Ron should have been expecting them. He had no snarky boss answer for that.
‘Well, please go down and do what you need to do to prepare for the assembly, Ms Stiles. I’ll make an announcement after the final lunch that last period will be canceled and we will meet in the auditorium for a full-school assembly.’
‘Yes, Ron,’ she said. To me, ‘Talk later, Ray?’
‘Let’s see how the day goes, but yeah, I’d like that.’
As she walked away, Ron said to me, ‘I guess you’ve seen the papers today?’
‘No, Ron. I haven’t had time to read the papers this morning.’ I said this knowing full well that Ron subscribed to all three local papers and made sure to read them every morning. He also, a few years back, had the bright idea of installing a large-screen HD television in his office. He told me once that he wanted to ‘keep up to date on current events.’ He was especially interested in those current events that involved rich white guys hitting a small ball great distances.
‘Well, we’re in all three of them and all over the local news. I told you that inviting a convicted drug abuser to the school could backfire on us.’ He let out a sigh. ‘A goddamned arrow? Really?’
Fucking Ron. If it were up to him, he’d be principal of a talented and gifted middle school somewhere in mythical Suburbia. Such was his lot that each day he had to get up, drive an hour to Williamsburg, Brooklyn, and run a school with needy kids who were darker-skinned than he was. And now, one of his staff was murdered on his rooftop and the media were on it like holy on the Pope. Life was like that sometimes.
‘We took a chance on a good guy, Ron.’
‘I took the chance, Ray. Based on your recommendation. If I’d had any idea how this would play out—’
I raised my hand. ‘Hey, Ron. Give it a rest, will ya? There’s no way any of us had any idea what was going to happen. MoJo was worth the chance and we took it.’
‘MoJo,’ he repeated, not trying at all to hide his sarcasm. ‘Just the name should’ve tipped me off.’ He brushed something invisible off his shirtsleeve. ‘What are the police saying?’
Again, like I had a secret pipeline. ‘Just what you heard on the news or read in the papers, Ron. Allie told me that this kind of killing – by arrow – is extremely rare, so the press is going to be on it for a while. It’s a story.’
‘Fucking reporters.’ I watched his face as he remembered what my girlfriend does for a living. ‘No offense.’
‘Don’t worry about it.’ I stepped out of the closet and made sure the door was locked when I closed it. ‘I’m going to swing through the halls. Unless there was something else you wanted to talk about?’
He gave that some thought and said, ‘No, not now. Just keep your walkie on.’
‘It’s never off, Ron,’ I said and walked away from my boss.
It was pushing one o’clock and I had just completed eighth-grade lunch duty. Imagine two hundred and fifty hormone-filled middle-school students all lining up for lunch in a crowded, noisy room; sitting with some amount of decorum while eating this lunch; lining up again to get rid of what they had not eaten – in many cases most of the government-subsidized food; and then sitting back down and waiting for the bell to signal lunch was now over and it was time to go to the next class. As one of three adults in the room, and the one with the whistle and walkie-talkie, it was my duty to make sure that this fifty-minute part of the day came off with no fights – food, fists, or otherwise – and that the students left the lunchroom looking pretty much as they had when they walked in. This was one of those subjects they did not cover during my master’s program. But a good friend who runs a summer camp once told me, ‘Maintain order in the dining area and you maintain order throughout the whole facility.’ I took lunch duty very seriously.
Just as the last diner was leaving the lunchroom, my cell phone rang. It was Edgar. ‘Hey, man. What’s up?’
‘I just got a call from a guy who said he was a client,’ Edgar said.
‘OK.’
‘A client of Maurice Joseph.’
I let that sink in. ‘Someone you didn’t know about?’
‘Never heard of him, Ray. Said he was working strictly with MoJo.’
‘And I guess you didn’t exactly know what to say to that?’
‘No, but he said that he needed to drop by.’
‘Did he?’
‘Did he what?’
‘Drop by.’
‘No. I was able to convince him that I was too busy and told him he’d have to wait until later.’
‘Did you schedule an appointment with him?’
‘Yeah. Today at four.’
‘Good. So what did you want to talk to me about?’
I could hear his deep breath. ‘Are you free today at four?’
Oh, boy. ‘Because you don’t want to meet with him alone?’
‘Right.’
I went through my mental schedule. If I left right after school and put off some paperwork, I could make that happen. Edgar lived not far from school. ‘Yeah, I can do that. Where are you meeting him, Edgar? Your apartment?’
‘No, Ray. I’m not going to meet him at my apartment. That would make us – me – look like an amateur.’
‘So …’
‘I told him we could meet at The LineUp.’
‘Because meeting at a bar would make you look more professional?’
‘I told him that I was busy all day with clients and would be having an early dinner at The LineUp and I could squeeze a meeting with him in then.’
I considered that. ‘That’s pretty good, Edgar. Smart thinking.’
‘I saw it on an old episode of Rockford Files. I figured if it worked for Jim Rockford, it could work for me.’
I watched those reruns, too, and seemed to remember Jim Rockford getting beat up a lot. I didn’t mention that.
‘So what do you want me to do at this meeting?’
‘I’m gonna spend the next few hours going through all of MoJo’s stuff and see if I can find out who this guy is. All I got is his name. David Henderson. I don’t want him to realize that I had no idea MoJo had a client I didn’t know about.’ He paused. ‘I guess I need you for support.’
‘You got me, Edgar. It may cost you a beer or two.’
‘Thanks, Ray. I’ll see you at four.’ Before hanging up, he quickly added, ‘And I told him you were a partner of mine.’
Then he hung up, apparently impatient to figure out why his real partner was doing business with a client he had no idea about.
The rest of the day went by without incident. Just the kind of buzz going through the building you’d expect on a warm Friday afternoon in April – a day after it had snowed. The assembly did not go the way Ron Thomas had planned. That is until Elaine Stiles took the microphone. If Ron had any clue the students had more respect for her than him, his immense ego protected him from that knowledge. She made sure the students knew counseling was available after school and into the next week for anyone in need. She introduced the grief counselors who’d said that they, too, would be around after school and back on Monday. That was pretty much it.
It was just your normal assembly program a school conducts after one of the adults in the building is murdered by an arrow on the roof of the building.
I called Allison and left a message that I’d be at The LineUp helping out Edgar and for her to give me a call about dinner. I got to The LineUp a little before four and found Edgar in a booth in the back. He had his laptop, a manila folder, his cell phone, and a pint glass of water.
And, for the first time I could remember, maybe since the funeral service for Mr McVernon, the owner of the bar in which we sat, Edgar was wearing a jacket and tie.
I took in the look. ‘Dressed to impress, I see.’
‘I’m nervous, Ray,’ he said. ‘I don’t know what to expect and I don’t know what Mr Henderson’s expecting, so …’ He took a sip of water. ‘Do I look too … dorky?’
‘You look fine, Edgar. First time you’ve ever made me feel underdressed. I’m glad Allie’s not here to see this. She’d make me go shopping.’
Edgar looked at his watch. ‘Henderson’s gonna be here any minute.’
I slid into the booth across from him. ‘What do you want me to do?’
‘I’m glad you asked.’ He cleared his throat. ‘I’m going to try and do most of the talking – more listening, I hope – but you know how sometimes I can’t find the right words? How I get mixed up with people?’
‘I’ve noticed that,’ I said. ‘From time to time.’
‘If you see me stumbling or something, please jump in until I get my thoughts together. You’re good at that.’
I looked at the stuff in front of him. ‘Have you been able to figure out who this Henderson guy is and what MoJo was doing for him?’
He shook his head. ‘Not a clue, Ray. And I’ve been looking since we spoke. There’s a lot of David Hendersons out there. I’m guessing MoJo had the info stored somewhere else. Somewhere I wouldn’t find it. Probably at home or school.’
I could tell the thought of that – more than any other at the moment aside from MoJo’s murder – was what was bothering Edgar. He took the partnership seriously and would never hide anything from MoJo. He wasn’t capable of that type of thinking.
‘Mr Martinez?’
We looked up and saw a large man in a blue suit standing above us. He had brown hair that was going gray and he was large enough – and in good enough shape – to have played football not so long ago. My second thought was that he carried himself like a cop. I pegged him for about fifty, give or take. Edgar and I stood and shook his hand. He slid into the booth next to Edgar. ‘I’m David Henderson. Thank you for seeing me so soon.’ He looked at me. ‘I know this is a horrible time for you both.’
‘It is,’ Edgar said. ‘Mr Henderson.’
‘Please,’ Henderson said. ‘Call me David. Maurice did.’
‘Sure,’ Edgar said. ‘David.’
Henderson lowered his voice. ‘First of all,’ he began, ‘let me apologize for keeping you in the dark.’
‘I don’t understand,’ Edgar said. And, of course, that was true.
‘It was my idea,’ Henderson said, ‘for Maurice not to tell you what he was working on with me. I’m very …’ he struggled for the right word, ‘uncomfortable with the situation and I’m hoping you’ll understand when I explain.’
Edgar nodded. ‘OK.’
‘I employed Maurice because I knew him through a friend who attends the Newer Leaves meetings. I knew he would keep things quiet and confidential. The fewer people who know about this the better. And that included you, I’m afraid. And again’ – he put his hand on his chest – ‘that’s on me. Maurice was not comfortable with the arrangement.’
This time I nodded along with Edgar. ‘Go on,’ Edgar said.
‘My son is missing,’ Henderson said. He rubbed his eyes. ‘Stepson, to be exact. From my second marriage. Keeping it as quiet as possible was my wife’s idea. This is quite a sensitive subject.’
Edgar took that in. ‘Because …’
‘We’ve had a hard time with Brian,’ he said. ‘My stepson. He didn’t take his mother and father’s divorce well, his grades went down terribly, and he’s disappeared a few times only to show up a week or so later with no explanation of where he’d been.’
Edgar was quiet for a while. When he didn’t speak for ten seconds, I broke my vow of silence. ‘What did the police say?’
Henderson looked down at the table. ‘We didn’t want the police involved. Brian’s also had a history of drug use and we were afraid if we got the police involved it would only make the situation worse.’
I waited again for Edgar. Nothing.
‘How long has Brian been missing this time?’ I asked.
‘Eight days.’
‘So. You just assumed Brian would come home on his own, knowing that he may have been involved with drugs.’
From the look on his face, I could tell Henderson – David – didn’t like that question. Maybe he thought I was judging his step-parenting abilities. I didn’t give a shit. This may have been MoJo’s client, and Edgar’s business, but something about this guy was rubbing me the wrong way – aside from the feeling that he was not telling us the complete story. Maybe if he talked long enough, he would. I just severely doubted that.
‘Brian,’ Henderson said, ‘always kept in touch with us when he … went away. He called every day, or every other day, and let us know he was OK.’ He paused. ‘He made it clear that if we called the police or tried to find him, we never would. And then pretty soon after that, he would just come home.’
I reached over and took a sip from Edgar’s water. He looked at me and I gave him a look back; he needed to be in on this conversation. It took him a while to figure that out. But when he did, he asked exactly the question I was thinking of.
‘What makes this time different?’ Edgar said, and I subtly nodded my approval.
Henderson took that question in. I watched his face as he did so. Again, I couldn’t shake the cop feeling this guy was giving off. I also believed the next thing out of his mouth was not going to be the complete truth, but that could’ve been an occupational hazard. When you work with kids in crisis and education bureaucrats, you expect lies and half-truths. I often expected it when someone’s lips were moving.
‘He hasn’t called us this time,’ Henderson said. ‘He left his phone at home, which he’s done before, but he’s always found a way to call us. Never a landline, though. I guess he knew they could be traced. He told us he was borrowing other people’s phones or using those pre-paid ones.’
‘Burners,’ Edgar said. ‘Hard to trace.’
‘That’s what Maurice suggested.’
‘What do you do, Mr Henderson?’ I asked, hoping to catch him off-guard.
‘I manage a hedge fund,’ he said. ‘Money is no problem if that’s—’
‘No,’ I said. ‘It’s just that your stepson is missing, you don’t get the police involved, and you don’t hire a private investigator. But, you do hire a security expert with little to no investigative experience.’
‘I knew Maurice from my friend who goes to the Newer Leaves meetings. I trusted him. He said he would deal with the police if need be, but we would talk about hiring a private investigator before that. Maurice promised to do what he could to keep my family’s name out of this. He was the closest person I knew to law enforcement without being law enforcement. My wife was not even comfortable with that.’
The cop smell coming off this guy was getting stronger. David Henderson was as much a hedge fund manager as I was a peach farmer. I told myself to ask for a card before the meeting was over, but a business card was the easiest thing to fake. I could get one in two hours that claimed I played second base for the Seattle Mariners.
‘Was MoJo able to tell you anything useful?’ I asked.
‘No. I wanted to meet with you,’ he looked at Edgar, ‘to see if maybe he had told you anything, given you any information on what he had found before he … you know … was murdered.’
Edgar shook his head. ‘No,’ he said. ‘I just found out about … this when you called. If Maurice told you he wouldn’t say anything to me, he meant it.’
Again, I couldn’t help myself. ‘You have no reason to believe,’ I said, ‘that what happened to MoJo had anything to do with what he was doing for you, do you?’
‘I don’t see how, but not knowing what he found out, I can’t say.’ He thought about that some more. ‘No, absolutely not. I don’t see it having any connection. Brian’s a sixteen-year-old kid who’s missing. How does that connect to someone being murdered?’
Following a question with a question. It reminded me too much of the kids I worked with now, and the cops and perps I worked with years ago.
‘It probably doesn’t,’ I said.
Edgar said, ‘Where do you live, David?’
‘Midtown.’ He gave us an embarrassed grin. ‘We’re in one of those newer buildings on the west side of Manhattan. You ever hear of MiMa?’
I nodded. ‘MiMa’ was a name the real estate people came up with for Midtown Manhattan in the hopes of rivaling SoHo, NoHo, Tribeca: a fake name that sounded desperately fancy. MiMa never took off. I think because it sounded too much like what an Italian kid called his grandmother. I had some friends in that neighborhood and the rule they went by was if you owned your apartment in that area, you called it Clinton or Midtown West. If you rented, you were living in Hell’s Kitchen.
‘We still have our place up in the Catskills, but we spend most of our time down here in the city.’
‘Do you have any other children?’ Edgar asked.
‘Just Brian. Believe me, he’s more than enough.’
‘You’ve obviously reached out to all of Brian’s friends?’ I asked.
‘The ones we know about, yes.’
‘And when was the last time you were up at your house in …’
‘Palenville,’ David said. ‘Not far from Hunter Mountain. We all like to ski. We checked the house two days after Brian left. No sign of him being there. We have a neighbor up there looking in on the place every day. Nothing.’
We sat in silence, all of us in our own thoughts. I had more to say but reminded myself this was Edgar’s meeting and I wasn’t going to take over. That’s what I told myself until the silence got to be too much.
‘Well, David,’ I said, ‘our advice is that it’s time to go to the police. Eight days is a long time and the longer it gets, the more likely something bad’s going to happen.’
Henderson looked at Edgar. ‘You don’t think you can take over where your partner left off?’
Edgar took a breath. ‘That’s … I don’t know where Maurice left off because I didn’t know what was going on. Raymond’s right. You should really call the police. Or a private investigator who does missing persons. They’re good at this. I do high-tech security, jobs like that.’
Henderson picked up a napkin, rolled it into a ball, and then worked it with his fingers as he mulled over our advice. ‘You’re probably right,’ he finally said. ‘I’m going to have to run that past Maureen. My wife.’
‘Yeah,’ I said. ‘You should do that.’
He got up. ‘Do I owe you anything for your time, Mr Martinez?’
Edgar shook his head. ‘No.’
‘I do believe I owe Mr Joseph for his. How would I go about …?’
Edgar pulled a card out and handed it to Henderson. ‘You can send a check to our office. I’ll make sure it gets to his wife.’
‘I appreciate that.’ He shook our hands. ‘Thank you both for your time.’
I got up. ‘How’d you get here? Drive?’
‘Yes.’
‘I’ll walk you to your car.’
‘There’s no need for that, Raymond. I’m familiar with this neighborhood.’
‘I need the air, Dave.’ If he could lie, so could I. ‘I’ll be right back, Edgar. Why don’t you get us a couple of beers? It’s almost five.’
‘OK, Ray.’
When we got outside, Henderson said, ‘Really, Raymond. You don’t need to—’
‘Yeah, I do,’ I said. ‘Besides, you forgot to give us your card.’
He made that look people make when they forget the obvious and pulled his wallet from his jacket. He handed me a card. Sure enough, it stated for anyone who wished to know that David Henderson was a hedge fund manager for DH Consultants.
‘You an American League fan?’ I asked.
‘I like the sound of “DH.” Are you a fan of baseball, Raymond?’
‘You could say that, Dave. I’m not a fan of being lied to, though.’
He stopped walking. ‘I don’t think I follow you.’
‘I think you do,’ I said. ‘I had you pegged for a cop before you sat down.’
He laughed. ‘I assure you, Raymond. I am not a cop. Just a money guy. If I were a cop, why would I need help finding my son?’
‘Stepson,’ I reminded him. ‘I don’t know, David. But if you’re such a money guy, I’d think you could buy the best private investigator you could who would eagerly take your money to look for Brian while keeping his mouth shut.’
He started walking again. I followed. ‘You’re a suspicious man, Raymond. I guess that serves you well in your business.’
I was about to ask him why that was when I realized he still believed Edgar and I were partners in a security firm. ‘It helps,’ I said. ‘So, ex-military maybe?’
We got to his car and he pulled out his keys. ‘You got me there,’ he said. ‘Ten years in the National Guard. Mostly weekend warrior stuff. I got out when my business took off. No time to play Saturday Soldier, you know?’
‘I guess not.’ I stuck out my hand. ‘Good luck. Do take our advice and contact the police no matter what Maura says.’
He gave me a puzzled look. ‘Maureen, Raymond. My wife’s name is Maureen.’ He knew what I was doing, which made me think again that he was something other than he said he was.
‘Oh, right. Sorry.’
‘Goodbye, Raymond.’
‘Goodbye, David. Get home safe.’
‘Always do.’
Back inside The LineUp, Edgar was at the bar with two pint glasses and a can of tomato juice in front of him. He was busy on his laptop when I slid onto the stool next to him. ‘Hey,’ I said, handing him the business card. ‘I think you should run another check on David Henderson.’
He looked at me as if I’d just told him Halle Berry was hot. He turned his laptop so I could see the screen and said, ‘David Alan Henderson. DH Consultants. This is his website. Two addresses: one on West Forty Second in the city, one in Palenville, New York. Married to Maureen Henderson, one stepson named Brian Sean Henderson, taking his stepfather’s last name. Former National Guard member, he has a permit to carry in New York State and a valid New York State driver’s license.’
‘So,’ I said. ‘He appears to be who he says he is.’
‘Appears? You are one suspicious hombre, Ray.’
‘Yeah,’ I said and took a sip of pilsner. ‘I just heard that from someone.’