Jeffry Lindsay - Dexter in the Dark

I was waiting for the elevator to arrive when I was blindsided by a hoarse shout of “Hey!”

I turned and saw a grim, very angry old man racing at me wearing sandals and black socks that came up almost to his knobby old knees. He also wore baggy shorts and a silk shirt and an expression of completely righteous wrath. “Are you the police?” he demanded.

“Not all of them,” I said.

“What about my goddamn paper?” he said.

Elevators are so slow, aren’t they? But I do try to be polite when it is unavoidable, so I smiled reassuringly at the old lunatic. “You didn’t like your paper?” I asked.

“I didn’t get my goddamn paper!” he shouted at me, turning a light purple from the effort. “I called and I told you people and the colored girl on the phone said to call the newspaper! I watch the kid steal it, and she hangs up on me!”

“A kid stole your newspaper,” I said.

“What the hell did I just say?” he said, and he was getting a little bit shrill now, which did nothing to make waiting for the elevator any more enjoyable. “Why the hell do I pay my taxes, to hear her say that? And she laughs at me, goddamn it!”

“You could get another paper,” I said soothingly.

It didn’t seem to soothe him. “What the hell is that, get another paper? Saturday morning, in my pajamas, and I should get another paper? Why can’t you people just catch the criminals?”

The elevator made a muted ding sound to announce its arrival at last, but I was no longer interested, because I had a thought. Every now and then I do have thoughts. Most of them never make it all the way to the surface, probably because of a lifetime of trying to seem human. But this one came slowly up and, like a gas bubble bursting through mud, popped brightly in my brain. “Saturday morning?” I said. “Do you remember what time?”

“Of course I remember what time! I told them when I called, ten thirty, on a Saturday morning, and the kid is stealing my paper!”

“How do you know it was a kid?”

“I watched through the peephole, that’s how!” he yelled at me. “I should go out in the hall without looking, the job you people do? Forget it!”

“When you say ‘kid,’” I said, “how old do you mean?”

“Listen, mister,” he said, “to me, everybody under seventy is a kid. But this kid was maybe twenty, and he had a backpack on like they all wear.”

“Can you describe this kid?” I asked.

“I’m not blind,” he said. “He stands up with my paper, he’s got one of those goddamn tattoos they all have now, right on the back of his neck!”

I felt little metal fingers flutter across the back of my neck and I knew the answer, but I asked anyway. “What kind of tattoo?”

“Stupid thing, one of those Jap symbols. We beat the crap out of the Japs so we could buy their cars and tattoo their goddamn scribbles on our kids?”

He seemed to be only warming up, and while I really admired the fact that he had such terrific stamina at his age, I felt it was time to turn him over to the proper authorities as constituted by my sister, which lit up in me a small glow of satisfaction, since it not only gave her a suspect better than poor Disenfranchised Dexter but also inflicted this beguiling old poop on her as a small measure of punishment for suspecting me in the first place. “Come with me,” I said to the old man.

“I’m not going anywhere,” he said.

“Wouldn’t you like to talk to a real detective?” I said, and the hours of practice I had spent on my smile must have paid off, because he frowned, looked around him, and then said, “Well, all right,” and followed me all the way back to where Sergeant Sister was snarling at Camilla Figg.

“I told you to stay away,” she said, with all the warmth and charm I had come to expect from her.

“Okay,” I said. “Shall I take the witness away with me?”

Deborah opened her mouth, then closed and opened it a few more times, as if she was trying to figure out how to breathe like a fish.

“You can’t-it isn’t-Goddamn it, Dexter,” she said at last.

“I can, it is, and I’m sure he will,” I said. “But in the meantime, this nice old gentleman has something interesting to tell you.”

“Who the hell are you to call me old?” he said.

“This is Detective Morgan,” I told him. “She’s in charge here.”

“A girl?” he snorted. “No wonder they can’t catch anybody. A girl detective.”

“Be sure to tell her about the backpack,” I told him. “And the tattoo.”

“What tattoo?” she demanded. “What the hell are you talking about?”

“The mouth on you,” the old man said. “Shame!”

I smiled at my sister. “Have a nice chat,” I said.

ICOULD NOT BE SURE THAT I WAS OFFICIALLY INVITED BACK to the party, but I didn’t want to go so far away that I missed the chance to graciously accept my sister’s apology. So I went to loiter just inside the front door of the former Manny Borque’s apartment, where I could be noticed at the appropriate time. Unfortunately, the killer had not stolen the giant artistic ball of animal vomit on the pedestal by the door. It was still there, right in the middle of my loitering grounds, and I was forced to look at it while I waited.

I was wondering how long it would take Deborah to ask the old man about the tattoo and then make the connection. Even as I wondered, I heard her raise her voice in official ritual words of dismissal, thanking the old man for his help and instructing him to call if he thought of anything else. And then the two of them came toward the door, Deborah holding the old man firmly by the elbow and steering him out of the apartment.

“But what about my paper, miss?” he protested as she opened the door.

“It’s Sergeant Miss,” I told him, and Deborah glared at me.

“Call the paper,” she told him. “They’ll give you a refund.” And she practically hurled him out the door, where he stood for a moment trembling with anger.

“The bad guys are winning!” he shouted, and then, happily for us, Deborah closed the door.

“He’s right, you know,” I said to her.

“Well, you don’t have to look so goddamned happy about it,” she said.

“And you, on the other hand, might try looking a lot happier,” I said. “It’s him, the boyfriend, what’s his name.”

“Kurt Wagner,” she said.

“Very good,” I said. “Due diligence. Kurt Wagner it is, and you know it.”

“I don’t know shit,” she said. “It could still be a coincidence.”

“Sure, it could be,” I said. “And there’s even a mathematical chance that the sun will come up in the west, but it’s not very likely. And who else do you have?”

“That fucking creep, Wilkins,” she said.

“Somebody’s been watching him, right?”

She snorted. “Yeah, but you know what these guys are like. They take a nap, or take a dump, and swear the guy was never out of their sight. Meantime, the guy they’re supposed to watch is out chopping up cheerleaders.”

“So you really still think he could be the killer? Even when this kid was here at exactly the same time Manny was killed?”

“You were here at the same time,” she said. “And this one’s not like the others. More like a cheap copy.”

“Then how did Tammy Connor’s head get here?” I said. “Kurt Wagner is doing this, Debs, he has to be.”

“All right,” she said. “He probably is.”

“Probably?” I said, and I really was surprised. Everything pointed to the kid with the neck tattoo, and Deborah was dithering.

She looked at me for a long moment, and it was not a look of warm, loving filial affection. “It still might be you,” she said.