John Katzenbach - The Wrong Man

She looked around at the glistening faces of young women who had come to understand that a prize can be attained by hard work and dedication. It finds a spot in their eyes first, Hope thought, then spreads right into their skin, so intense that it gives off a sort of heat.

She smiled at them all, but felt a deep hole inside.

“Look,” Hope said carefully, “in order to win, we’re all going to have to pull together. So is there anything anyone wants to say here in front of the team? Is there anything holding you back?”

The girls looked oddly at each other. Some heads shook back and forth.

Hope was unsure whether any rumors about her had begun to circulate. But she found it hard to imagine that there hadn’t been some talk, yet. There are no secrets in some worlds, she thought.

The girls seemed to collectively shrug. She wanted to interpret this as support.

“Okay,” she said. “But if there is anyone, and I mean anyone, who is bothered by something, anything, before we start the play-offs, they can come to me. Office door is always open. Or, if you don’t want to talk to me, then see the athletic director.”

She could not believe she was saying what she was. She had the sense to change the subject.

“This is, without doubt, the quietest you’ve ever been as a team. So quiet, in fact, that I’m going to assume you’ve all lost your voices because you’ve worked so hard. So, let’s cancel the postpractice run. Give yourselves a cheer, a pat on the back, and then grab your bags and head on in.”

This got a round of applause. No extra laps always worked.

Hope gave them a wave, sending them on their way. They are ready, she thought. She wondered whether she was.

Within seconds, the girls had started to make their way off the field, knotting into groups, and Hope could hear laughter. She watched them depart, then sat on the wooden sideline bench.

The wind had increased, and she hunched her shoulders against the cold. She thought to herself that being a part of something, such as the school and the team, was a large part of how she defined herself, and now that was in jeopardy. A shadow moved across the green grass of the field, making the earth seem black. Little in the world is as soul-deadening as being falsely accused, she thought. An empty fury filled her. She wanted to find the person who had done it and pummel him or her with her fists.

But whoever it was, at that moment, seemed to have no more substance than the darkness growing around her, and Hope, as angry as she was, instead put her head in her hands and sobbed uncontrollably.

“Ashley? Ashley Freeman? I haven’t seen her in a while. Months. Maybe even more than a year. Does she still live in the city?”

I didn’t answer that question, but asked, “You worked here at the museum at the same time as she did?”

“Yes. There were a bunch of us working towards various graduate degrees who filled part-time jobs here.”

I was in the lobby of the museum, not far from the restaurant where Ashley had fruitlessly waited one afternoon for Michael O’Connell. The young woman working the reception desk wore her hair close-cropped on one side and spiked on the top, giving her a roosterlike appearance, and she sported at least a half dozen earrings in one ear and a single large, bright orange loop in the other, which made her seem curiously off balance. She looked up at me, with a small, youthful smile, and finally got around to asking the obvious question.

“Why are you interested in Ashley? Is something wrong?”

I shook my head. “I’m interested in a legal case that she was connected to. I’m just doing a little background work. Wanted to see where she worked. So, you knew her, when she was here?”

“Not very well…” The young woman hesitated.

“What is it?” I asked.

“I don’t think too many people knew her. Or liked her.”

“Really?”

“Well, I overheard one person once say that Ashley wasn’t at all like who she pretended to be, or something like that. I think that was the general consensus. There was a lot of talk and speculation when she left.”

“Why?”

“There was a rumor about some stuff found on her workstation computer that got her in trouble. At least that’s what I heard.”

“Stuff?”

“Like way different stuff. Is she in trouble again?”

“Not exactly,” I replied. “But then, trouble might not be the right word.”

Michael O’Connell told himself that his best skill was waiting.

It was not simply a matter of biding his time or sitting around patiently. Real waiting required all sorts of preparations and planning, so that when the moment that he was anticipating arrived, he was already significantly ahead of everyone else. He conceived of himself as something like a director, the sort of person who can see an entire story, act by act, scene by scene, right to the end. He was a man who knew all the endings, because he alone constructed each and every one.

O’Connell was stripped to his boxer shorts, his body glistening. A couple of years back, while browsing in a used-book shop, he had come across an exercise-regimen book that had been popular in the mid-1960s. This particular book was drawn from the Royal Canadian Air Force manual on physical fitness and was filled with antique drawings of men in shorts doing squat thrusts, one-handed push-ups, and chin lifts. It also had curious exercises he performed, such as springing into the air and lifting his knees so that he could touch his toes. It was the opposite of all the Pilates, Billy Blanks, Body by Jake, and six-minute abdomen-exercise programs that dominated daytime television channels. He had become proficient in the RCAF exercises and beneath his loose-fitting, worn student garb sported a wrestler’s physique. No vanity-driven health club membership or soulful, long runs alongside the Charles for him. He preferred to hone his muscles alone, in his room, occasionally wearing a headset blasting some pretentiously satanic rock group, such as Black Sabbath or AC/DC.

He dropped to the floor, raised his legs above his head, then lowered them slowly, pausing to hold his position three times before stopping with his heels just inches above the hardwood floor. He repeated this exercise twenty-five times. But on the final repetition, he remained in position, arms flat at his sides, holding himself immobile for one minute, then another. He knew that somewhere after three minutes he would start to feel discomfort, and two minutes later, distress. After six minutes, he would feel significant pain.

O’Connell told himself that it really wasn’t about developing muscles any longer.

Now, it was about overcoming.

He shut his eyes and shunted away the burning in his stomach, replacing it with a portrait of Ashley. In his mind, he slowly drew each detail, with all the patience of an artist devoted to duplicating every signature curve, every small, shadowy recess. Start with her feet, the splay of her toes, the arch, the tautness of her Achilles’. Then move up the length of her leg, capturing the muscles in her calf, to her knee and thigh.

He gritted his teeth and smiled. Usually he could hold his position all the way past her breasts, after lingering a long time contemplating her crotch, finally to the long and willowy, sensuous curve of her neck, before he was forced to drop his heels to the floor. But as he grew stronger, he knew he would someday complete the mental painting, filling in the features of her face and hair. He looked forward to developing that strength.

With a gasp, he relaxed and his feet bounced hard against the floor. He lay for a moment or two, feeling sweat trickle down his chest.