Laura Lippman - No Good Deeds

He had eaten and talked, talked and eaten, and almost come to enjoy it, the way those people hung on his every word. He was going to help solve a big-ass murder . He was almost inclined to brag on himself to Dub, but then he remembered: If the ATM card was linked to some murder, the murder was almost certainly linked to Bennie Tep, and Lloyd did not want to be crossways with any drug dealers. He’d have to keep it quiet. Still, he had a private thrill when he and Dub stopped in the Korean’s and he saw the front of the newspaper framed in the box on the corner. He leaned closer, reading a few lines, until Dub punched him and asked what he was doing, looking at the newspaper like some old-timer.

They walked across Patterson Park, the fields still muddy. The day was cold and bright, but it held the promise of spring. Lloyd liked spring. People seemed nicer in the days after the cold weather snapped, and it was easier to bum money from the tourists who flocked to downtown. If you got too close to the harbor proper, the cops or the purple people ran you off, but a block or two away, near the parking garages, was just as good. Yes, spring would be great this year, he promised himself. He’d get something going this spring.

Crow worked at the Point all day Saturday and into early Sunday, arriving home at 3:00 A.M. Restless, he prowled the house. Since going to work at her father’s bar, he had tried to keep to Tess’s more normal hours as much as possible, but he just couldn’t throw himself into bed upon coming home, especially when a band like the Wild Magnolias had played. His head still buzzed with the music, and he hummed a few bars of “Smoke My Peace Pipe.” He wished he could get out his own guitar and play, but that would be unfair to the slumbering household. Instead he went into the den, thinking to smoke himself into serenity, but the unicorn box was gone. Oh, Lloyd. Tess wouldn’t miss the dope. A little more law-and-order every year, she seldom smoked anymore and was nervous about Crow’s occasional indulgence. But the box was a recent gift from a little boy named Isaac Rubin, who had purchased it at the Metropolitan Museum of Art while on a pilgrimage to visit the location of his favorite book of all times, The Mixed-up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler . Isaac had given the box to Tess for agreeing to speak to his class on Career Day. The loss of the box would kill Tess, who could be surprisingly sentimental about objects. Maybe Crow could go online, order her another one.

At 5:00 A.M., still wide awake, he heard the thud of the newspaper on the front steps, decided the Beacon-Light would be as good a soporific as dope. He settled in at the dining room table, reading Marcy’s story. He read the same words that everyone else had read in the bulldog edition, except for one key change. Now, in the home edition’s second paragraph, it said, “In a meeting arranged by private investigator Tess Monaghan, the source told Beacon-Light reporters…”

Shit. Crow skimmed the rest of the story. Lloyd was safe, as promised. Marcy and Feeney, covered by state shield laws, couldn’t be compelled to reveal his identity. Even if the feds decided to get involved, it would take months to play out. So they, too, were protected, if only in the short run.

But Tess wasn’t. Neither were Crow and Whitney, if it came to that. Citizens had no shield protection. But Tess was the only one whose name had been served up to the authorities, a fat, juicy target for what were probably some very angry people.

He let her sleep until seven-thirty, then woke her with breakfast. “What’s wrong?” she demanded the moment she saw the tray with fresh pastry and coffee purchased from Evergreen.

She was gone by eight, about an hour ahead of the Howard County detectives, as it turned out.

“Where is she?” asked a freckled, redheaded detective, who brandished his badge as if it could make her reappear magically. “When is she coming back?”

“I have no idea,” Crow said, and it was the absolute truth.

“Tess, I don’t know what to tell you. I edited the story myself and baby-sat it every step of the way through that first edition. I checked midday Saturday to see if anything had cropped up, if the top guys were second-guessing so much as a comma. Sunday editor told me everything was okay. Even so, I had my cell phone on every moment, and no one called me.”

Tess almost felt sorry for Feeney, who was so upset that he couldn’t be bothered to sip the martini in front of him. But Feeney wasn’t the one who had to move out of his own house Sunday morning and go into semi-hiding. Feeney was going home to his own bed tonight.

“So how does my name end up above the fold and before the jump? It might as well have been in neon.”

“Hector called Marcy at home at six P.M., began badgering her. Said one anonymous source was pretty thin, and couldn’t we source it at all? She only told him about your role to buttress the case that the source was trustworthy. He didn’t tell her that he was going to put it in the story, just turned around and called the desk himself. That’s why it reads a little stilted.”

“How could he do that without talking to you first?”

“As an assistant managing editor, he outranks me. He doesn’t need my permission to do anything.”

Neither one of them mentioned the obvious fact-that the AME might not have been so quick to insert Tess’s name in the story if she hadn’t pissed him off earlier in the week. Her mother had frequently told Tess that there was a cost to speaking one’s mind, but Tess had never imagined that it could be jail time. But that would be the outcome if she was brought before a grand jury and refused to testify.

She chewed her lip, found that unsatisfactory, and decided to try the olives the restaurant had provided. Baltimore had discovered tapas, or vice versa, and the city was now thick with variations-Greek, Spanish, Middle Eastern. Tess and Feeney had agreed to meet at Tapas Teatro because it was reliably chaotic, the kind of place where no one attracted attention and even the most determined eavesdroppers were thwarted. Plus, it had windows on the street and several exits through which Tess could flee if any official types showed up.

“I promised Lloyd. I gave my word that I wouldn’t tell the police his name. You did, too, but you’re covered by shield laws.”

“Only on the state level, although I’d never reveal an anonymous source. But what’s Lloyd got to lose by coming forward?”

“He thinks that the police won’t believe he’s told all he knows, that they’ll hold him as an accomplice to the homicide until he’s revealed the name of his contact-and he doesn’t have it. He’s given us everything he’s got.”

“Can you argue that your position in this is privileged, that Lloyd falls under the attorney-client exemption?”

“Lloyd’s not a client, and he didn’t sign the usual paperwork. Tyner’s never heard of him, and I can’t ask an attorney to lie about that.”

Tess drained her sangria as if it were fruit punch and looked around the restaurant. So many happy, normal people with such uncomplicated lives, chatting about the films they had just seen at the Charles Theater next door, eating with gusto and joy. Not a single one of them under the threat of federal investigation.

Actually, neither was she. Yet. For the past thirty-six hours, only the Howard County detectives had been trying to find her for questioning, sending increasingly urgent messages via Crow, then her lawyer Tyner, who was able to say truthfully-and, because he was Tyner, loudly and brusquely-that he didn’t have any idea where she was. No one did. She had packed a bag, turned off her incoming cell phone, and checked into a nightly rental at a North Side high-rise. Even some of the residents didn’t know about these by-the-day rooms, so Tess was confident that she had bought herself a little time. Very little.