Dell Shannon - Case Pending

"People," contributed Hackett rather savagely. The pretty blonde nurse came out and said they could see the boy for just ten minutes, if they wouldn't let him get too excited, held been in shock after all and needed rest and quiet.

The boy had tight hold on his father's hand, sitting up in bed looking at them a little uncertain, a little scared still. "We don't bite," said Mendoza, smiling down at him. "There's just a few little questions we want to ask and then we'll let you go to sleep."

"Yes, sir. I-I want to tell you-how it was, it was my fault, I know that-let him get away, when I knew how he was, he'd maybe get in trouble. But I-but I- That first time, it was all account of that doll, it was awfully silly but he wanted it so bad, he saw it in the store window, there was a light left on even when it was shut, you know, and times I took him out, nights, we went past a couple times and I couldn't hardly get him away from it, he-"

"He took funny notions like that," said Lindstrom. "Don't you get excited, Marty, I'm right here to watch out for you now, and all they want to know, I guess, is about-about today." He looked still a little dazed and shaken, but his voice was reassuringly stolid.

"But I want to tell-about everything, have it over… Ma, she'll be awful mad-I made things happen like they did." He hadn't been told about his mother yet; there was time. "I-I was scared to tell her, first, that time over on Tappan-and then I had to, account of knowing what he'd done. Ma said he told him she'd buy it for him, see-the doll. She'd saved up the money-"

"Waste, waste," muttered Lindstrom. "Foolish, but she'd do such, whatever he-"

"And then I guess she couldn't, somebody else- And that night, I was out with him, he ran off and I couldn't catch up-I looked everywhere, I went to that store but they'd taken the doll out of the window a while before, he wasn't- And when I f-found him, he had it, a great big box and inside- I thought he'd stole it, I shouldn't've let him get away like that-"

"You take it easy now," said Hackett, soothing; he glanced at Mendoza. They could both reconstruct that one, Brooks, now. Eddy peering in the shop window, seeing Carol come out with the doll. His doll, that he'd been promised, that she had no right to. Following, working up to anger at her thievery.

"-when I heard-about that girl, and I remembered there was a little spot on his shirt, like blood-I had to tell Ma, but she wouldn't listen, she wouldn't believe he'd- She said I'd just forgot, she had so bought the doll and I was making up bad stories-"

Mendoza sighed to himself; he had heard that animal mothers too always gave more attention to the runt of a litter, the sickly one.. .."I'd like to hear something about the skating rink, Marty. This girl, this time."

"Yes, sir. That was even more my fault, 'cause I knew how bad he could do, then. I shouldn't've-but Ma'd got kind of sick, she was doctoring at the clinic and couldn't go out with him any more nights, I had to every night. And sometimes it was kind of hard, things I wanted to do with other fellows, like movies sometimes-you know-h-he got away a couple times more, and once when I found him he was at that place, he'd found a sort of little back door that was open and he was getting in, and I had to go after, I had an awful time getting him to come away-he liked the music, and he liked to watch them going round and round. And Dad, you know how when he liked anything he'd be good and quiet, just sit there still as could be, hours sometimes-I thought it was all right! I-I went with him a couple of times, and he never moved, just sat there watching and listening, see. So I thought, he'd do like that long as that place was open at night, never bother nobody, nobody knew we was there at all. And, Dad, it wasn't like cheating to sneak in without paying like that, because we wasn't using it, I mean didn't go to skate. I thought I could just, sort of, leave him there and it'd be all right, he'd just sit and never do nothing. And I did, a lot of times, I went off and to a movie or somewheres, not to see it all through but mostly, you know-and came back to get him, and he was fine, right where I'd left him."

"And at the rink," said Mendoza softly, "he saw a girl, a pretty girl who looked like his beautiful doll… How'd I know that? Why, I'm a detective, Marty."

"He was-funny-about the doll," said the boy with a little gasp. "I mean, I guess he sort of-loved it-but same time, he did things to it-bad things. Yes, sir, it was like that-at that place, he saw this girl, he got terrible excited about it, kept talking about her- I mean, what-what he meant for talk, he couldn't ever talk real plain, you know. It was really that, sort of, that'd tell you what he was like, because just to look at him, he-"

Yes; not until you looked twice, saw the eyes, the lumbering walk, or heard the guttural attempts at speech, would you know. Otherwise, to the casual look, just a big young man, maybe a little stupid.

"Once down on Commerce, when I was with him, I saw her too-he-tried to go up and talk to her, I got him away then. And I guess she was a little scared, remembered me anyways, I mean what I looked like, even if it was dark-because a couple days after, in the daytime, I saw her in the street again, and she made like to say something to me, but she never-Danny was with me, he-"

"You're doing fine, but don't try to tell everything, just take it Easy."

"He wanted-to skate with her, round and round, to the music," said the boy faintly. "I shouldn't never have left him there that night. I got sort of scared about it in the movies, I thought I'd better-and he was gone! I looked everywheres, but it was so dark and I didn't dare call at him very loud, people- And when I did find him, it was right there, that lot where- I didn't know then, I didn't, I never saw her! He had a lady's handbag, I didn't see that until we was down the street a ways, and I thought he'd stole it. I just dropped it, like, didn't know what else-he didn't mind when I took it, he-"

So that built up Ramirez for them. He saw the boy she was with taken out, and the girl left alone. So now was his chance to go skating round and round with his pretty doll who'd come alive for him-and that was all, probably, he'd followed her for: to tell her that, ask her. And the girl, confronted there in the dark, alone, in the empty lot, with the animal mouthings, the eager pawings, losing her head, struggling to get away- And that was all it had needed.

Mendoza said, "All right, Marty, that's all for right now. You just try to stop thinking about it. Go to sleep and don't worry any more."

"He was just wild, find the doll was gone's morning." The boy lay back tiredly on the pillows, his eyes closing. "I think even Ma was real scared then-so was I-and tonight, well, she'd been telling him all the while I'd-get it back for him-and when I said I couldn't, he-"

"Yes, we understand all that. Don't worry about it now-everything's over."

As they turned to the door Lindstrom said rather desperately, "Please, sir, I got to ask you-will they-will they do anything to-to my boy or me for being to blame about this? I mean, I want to do what's right, I ain't trying to get out of anything, but-"

Mendoza turned back to him. "There's no legal responsibility involved here really, now the boy's dead, Mr. Lindstrom. I couldn't say, it's an academic question, under other circumstances very likely the D.A. and the grand jury might have decided to call it criminal negligence. As it is, I scarcely drink so. Certainly not the boy, a minor couldn't be assumed responsible… I might add, however, that at any time these seven years you could have taken action, if and when it seemed-indicated. A word to any of a number of agencies-police, county health, doctor, hospital-"

"She made us premise!" burst out the boy. "She made us promise on the Bible!"