Jonathan Kellerman - When The Bough Breaks

"A tragic affair."

"Oh yes. She was a lovely girl."

"Dr. Towle keeps her picture in his office."

"A sentimentalist, is he?"

"I suppose." I drank some whiskey. "After the tragedy he began seeing more of his friends?"

"Yes. Though as I hear you use the term I realize something. In my concept of friendship there is implied a bond of affection, some degree of mutual admiration. Those three always looked so grim when they were together - they didn't seem to enjoy each other's company. I never knew what the link between them was, but it did exist. Willie went away to medical school and Stuart tagged along. Edwin Hayden attended law school at the same university. They settled in the same city. No doubt you'll be contacting the other two in order to obtain laudatory quotes for your article. If there is an article."

I struggled to remain calm.

"What do you mean?"

"Oh, I think you know what I mean, my boy. I'm not going to ask you to present identification confirming you're who you say you are - it wouldn't prove a thing anyway - because you seem like a pleasant, intelligent young man and how many visitors to whom I can blab do you think I receive? Enough said."

"I appreciate that, Professor."

"And well you should. I trust you have your reasons for wanting to ask me about Willie. Undoubtedly they're boring and I've no wish to know them. Have I been helpful?"

"You've been more than helpful." I filled our glasses and we shared another drink, no conversation passing between us.

"Would you be willing to be a bit more helpful?" I asked.

"That depends."

"Dr. Towle has a nephew. Timothy Kruger. I wonder if there's anything you could tell me about him."

Van der Graaf raised his drink to his lips with trembling hands. His face clouded.

"Kruger." He said the name as if it were an epithet.

"Yes."

"Cousin. Distant cousin, not nephew."

"Cousin, then."

"Kruger. An old family. Prussians, every one of them. Power brokers. A powerful family." His melliflu ousness was gone and he spat out the words with mechanical intonation. "Prussians."

He took a few steps. The arachnid stagger ceased abruptly and he let his hands drop to his sides.

"This must be a police matter," he said.

"Why do you say that?"

His face blackened with anger and he raised one fist in the air, a prophet of doom.

"Don't trifle with me, young man! If it has something to do with Timothy Kruger there's little else it could be!"

"It is part of a criminal investigation. I can't go into details."

"Oh, can't you? I've wagged my tongue at you without demanding to know your true intentions. A moment ago I judged them to be boring. Now I've changed my mind."

"What is it about the Kruger name that scares you so much, Professor?"

"Evil," he said. "Evil frightens me. You say your questions are part of a criminal investigation. How do I know what side you're on?"

"I'm working with the police. But I'm not a policeman."

"I won't tolerate riddles! Either be truthful or be gone!"

I considered the choice.

"Margaret Dopplemeier," I said. "I don't want her to lose her job because of anything I tell you."

"Maggie?" he snorted. "Don't worry about her, I've no intention of letting on the fact that she led you to me. She's a sad girl, needs intrigue to spice up her life. I've spoken enough to her to know that she clings longingly to the Conspiracy Theory of Life. Dangle one before her - she'll go for it like a trout for a lure. Kennedy assassinations, Unidentified Flying Objects, cancer tooth decay - all the result of a grand collusion of anonymous demons. No doubt you recognized that and exploited it."

He made it sound Machiavellian. I didn't dispute it.

"No," he said. "I've no interest in crushing Maggie. She's been a friend. Apart from that, my loyalties to this institution are far from blind. I detest certain aspects of this place - my true home, if you will."

"Such as the Krugers?"

"Such as the environment that allows Krugers and their ilk to flourish."

He tottered, the too - large head lolling on its misshapen base.

"The choice is yours, young man. Put up or shut up."

I put up.

"Nothing in your story surprises me," he said. "I didn't know of Stuart Hickle's death nor of his sexual proclivities, but neither are shocking. He was a bad poet, Dr. Delaware, very bad - and nothing is beyond a bad poet."

I recalled the verse at the bottom of Lilah Towle's yearbook obituary. It was clear who "S" was.

"When you mentioned Timothy I became alarmed, because I didn't know if you were in the employ of the Krugers. The badge you showed me is well and fine, but such trinkets are easily counterfeited."

"Call Detective Delano Hardy at West Lost Angeles Police Division. He'll tell you what side I'm on." I hoped he wouldn't take me up on it - who knew how Hardy would react?

He looked at me thoughtfully. "No, that won't be necessary. You're a dreadful liar. I believe I can intuitively tell when you're telling the truth."

"Thank you."

"You're welcome. A compliment was intended."

"Tell me about Timothy Kruger," I said.

He stood blinking, gnome like a concoction of a Hollywood special - effects lab.

"The first thing I'd like to emphasize is that the evil of the Krugers has nothing to do with wealth. They would be evil paupers - I imagine they were, at one time. If that sounds defensive, it is."

"I understand."

"The very wealthy are not evil, Bolshevist propaganda to the contrary. They are a harmless lot - overly - sheltered, reticent, destined for extinction." He took a step backward as if retreating from his own prediction.

I waited.

"Timothy Kruger," he finally said, "is a murderer, plain and simple. The fact that he was never arrested, tried or convicted does nothing to diminish his guilt in my eyes. The story goes back seven - no, eight years. There was a student here, a farm boy from Idaho. Sharp as a tack, built like Adonis. His name was Saxon. Jeffrey Saxon. He came here to study, the first of his family to finish high school, dreaming of becoming a writer.

"He was accepted on an athletic scholarship - crew, baseball, football, wrestling - and managed to excel in all of those while maintaining an A average. He majored in history and I was his faculty advisor, though by that time I wasn't teaching any more. We had many chats, up here in this room. The boy was a pleasure to converse with. He had an enthusiasm for life, a thirst for knowledge."

A tear collected in the corner of one drooping, blue eye.

"Excuse me." The old man pulled out a linen handkerchief and dabbed his cheek. "Dusty in here, must get the custodial staff to clean." He sipped his whiskey and when he spoke his voice was enfeebled by memories.

"Jeffrey Saxon had the curious, searching nature of a true scholar, Dr. Delaware. I recall the first time he came up here and saw all the books. Like a child let loose in a toy store. I lent him my finest antiquarian volumes - everything from the London edition of Josephus' Chronicles to anthropologic treatises. He devoured them. "For God's sake, Professor," he'd say, 'it would take several lifetimes to learn even a fraction of what there is to know' - that's the mark of an intellectual, in my view, becoming cognizant of one's own insignificance in relation to the accumulated mass of human knowledge.

"The others, of course, thought him a rube, a hick. They made fun of his clothes, his manner, his lack of sophistication. He spoke to me about it - I'd become a kind of surrogate grandfather I suppose - and I reassured him that he was meant for more noble company than what Jedson had to offer. In fact I'd encouraged him to put in for a transfer to an Eastern school - Yale, Princeton - where he could achieve significant intellectual growth. With his grades and a letter from me, he might have made it. But he never got a chance.