Steven Havill - Privileged to Kill

Elliott Parker was working the counter-figuratively, anyway. He was sitting in the shade of the cash register, reading. He glanced up, saw that we weren’t armed and dangerous, and took his time marking his place in the magazine.

I had known Elliott Parker for more than twenty years. He had almost graduated in the same class as my youngest son, Kenyon, who had shared his consuming fascination with model airplanes.

For a couple of years, Elliott and Kenyon had been the best of friends. Elliott had stayed overnight at our house dozens of times, and in their basement lair the two boys had built models and talked about aircraft until even the Wright Brothers would have thrown up their hands in despair.

And then it had gradually dawned on my hyperactive son, about the time he turned seventeen, that Elliott didn’t actually want to do anything other than talk and read and fuss with models. That was about the time that Kenyon discovered women.

The two drifted apart after that year. Elliott didn’t graduate with his class at all, preferring during his senior year to take a job at one of the shops in town where he could talk and read and fuss with models. Kenyon did graduate, married his first date, joined the naval ROTC at the state university, and earned his gold aviator wings five years later.

But all that was a full career in the past. My lieutenant-commander son was stationed in Corpus Christi, and Elliott was looking at me expectantly across the counter of Portillo’s Handy-Way.

I purchased a tube of lip balm just to hear the sound of coins clattering on the counter, and then showed Elliott the photograph of Maria Ibarra.

He raised his eyebrows and held his breath. “Yeah, she’s been in here a time or two. Is she the one…”

“Yes, she is. When was the last time you saw her?”

Elliott frowned and pursed his lips. “Gee…I don’t know if I could swear to a day, Mr. Gastner.”

“But you have seen her.”

“Oh, yes. She’s probably been in here half a dozen times. I think she’s new in town, though. I mean she just started coming in a couple of weeks ago.”

“What about last night?” Estelle prompted.

Elliott Parker shook his head. “Not while I was here, anyway.”

“What time do you come in to work, Elliott?”

“Four. I work four to midnight. Sometimes later, if there’s any need.”

I retrieved the photograph. “And you remember for certain that she was not in here last night?”

“She was not in here last night. No, sir. Now”-and his face brightened a little-“the afternoon before that, she was in here.”

“What did she buy?”

“Nothing. A girl with her did, though.”

My heart skipped a beat. “Do you know the girl who was with her?”

Elliott shook his head. “I’ve seen her a few times, but I don’t know her name.”

“What did she buy?”

Elliott frowned and looked up at the ceiling. The answer wasn’t there, and he shrugged. “I really don’t remember. I remember what the girl there in the picture had, though.”

“I thought you said she didn’t buy anything?”

“She didn’t. She slipped a fruit pie into her pocket.”

Estelle leaned against the counter and fixed her black eyes on Elliott Parker. He stirred uncomfortably. “She shoplifted?” she asked.

He nodded.

“What did you do?” Estelle asked.

Parker shrugged. “Nothing.”

“Why didn’t you say something to her?” I asked.

“I don’t know. There didn’t seem to be any point. She didn’t speak much English and I just didn’t want to make a scene about it. If she denies it, what am I going to do, search her? And I’m going to call the cops over a fruit pie?”

“Was that the first time you saw her do something like that?”

Parker shook his head. “Two or three times before, when she would come in.”

“With the same friend?”

Parker nodded.

“And you never did anything about it.”

“No, sir.” He returned my gaze steadily.

“Why not?”

“Because, like I said. I just didn’t, is all.”

“Do other kids steal?” I asked, knowing goddamn well what the answer was.

“Sure.”

“And do you do anything about them?”

“Usually not. Unless it’s really serious. And they always buy stuff, too, so it’s not like they’re doing it all the time.”

“Do they know that you know?”

“I don’t think so. I think they honestly believe they’re being really clever.” He shrugged again. “It’s just easier to ignore it, ignore the hassle, as long as they don’t walk off with the whole store.”

“Is that the company’s policy?” I asked.

Elliott Parker smiled and pointed at the SHOPLIFTERS WILL BE PROSECUTED sign by the door.

I was glad that Elliott had found his niche in life. If he actually owned Portillo’s, I wondered if he would put a big neon sign in the window that said STEAL HERE.

“Would you recognize the girl’s companion if you saw her photograph?”

“Probably. She was really chubby, you know?” He held up his hands around his face. “Almost perfectly round, like a bowling ball. Perfect teeth. Smiled a lot. Giggled a lot. Looked like she probably had fleas.”

“Fleas?”

“Well, you know what I mean.”

I didn’t know what he meant, but didn’t press the matter.

“Elliott, thanks. We’ll be back with a yearbook to see if you can give us an I.D. In the meantime, if you happen to think of anything else, let us know.” I handed him a business card, just in case he didn’t have the energy to look through the phone book.

I left the store thinking it was time to give my son Kenyon a call, even though the official date of Thanksgiving was still a month away.

I rang Glen Archer’s doorbell at five minutes after ten that night. Under normal circumstances, he would have attended the out-of-town football game. The day was anything but normal, and the principal was about out of starch.

According to our dispatch records, he’d called the sheriff’s office on the hour, requesting updates. We hadn’t been able to give him much. I was sure that the good folks down at the twice-weekly Posadas Register were calling him hourly, too.

The doorbell chimed once before Archer snatched it open.

“Thank God,” he said, and I could see his wife behind him. She was hugging a sweater around herself, her hatchet-thin face set in lines of concern. Mrs. Archer looked as if she were counting the days until her husband’s retirement. “What have you got?” Archer asked. He waved me in impatiently. “Come in, come in.” Estelle remained in the patrol car.

“That’s not necessary, Glen. We do need to see a yearbook, though. We need to borrow one.”

“Last year’s?”

I nodded and stepped inside so he could shut the door.

“I tell ya,” Archer said, “when I retire, I’m going to burn everything I own that has to do with education.” He walked into his living room and motioned for me to follow. “Then I’m going to buy a big, oceangoing yacht. That way I won’t have to live by the side of the road and be a friend to man, as the poet says. I’m getting damn sick of it.”

“Would either of you two like something?” Mrs. Archer said. She hovered in the doorway to the kitchen. One hand had released its grip on the sweater and held a glass with amber liquid and ice. It looked good.

“No thanks,” I said.

Archer knelt by the bookcase in the corner and selected the last in a long row of high school yearbooks. “Here you are,” he said. “You don’t have a set of these down at the sheriff’s department?”

“No. But about fifteen years ago, we did buy a new dictionary.” I grinned. “We like to keep up, you know.”