Richard Patterson - Conviction

SIX

MONK HAD BEGUN WATCHING THE STREET TRAFFIC AND THE neighborhood stores, a grocery and vegetable stand and delicatessen with salami hanging in the window, stirring to life as they talked. Observing was his habit, Terri supposed.

"I suppose it occurred to you," she said, "that Flora Lewis saw what she wanted to see. Or maybe didn't see it at all."

Monk turned to her. "You mean used me to rid her of these two black crackheads and their boom box, sort of scoop up the garbage?"

"Something like that."

Monk smiled faintly. "Something like that is why we went back to see her."

* * *

They drove back to the Bayview in the morning. Crack dealers stay up at night and sleep in late—they didn't want the Price brothers to see them and then torch Flora Lewis's house with her still in it.

Their questions started simply, parsing her story into microscopic details: the time she first saw Payton and Rennell on the day Thuy Sen vanished; where precisely she was standing; whether she was wearing her glasses; how long it was until the Asian child appeared; how much longer it took for the girl to disappear inside. Then, what the brothers were wearing—a red windbreaker and blue jeans for Payton, she said, a black hooded sweatshirt and maybe matching sweatpants for Rennell. Now and then, Monk or Ainsworth would repeat a question to see if her answers were the same. At length, Ainsworth placed six mug shots on the coffee table in front of her.

"Recognize any of them?" he asked.

"Of course," she answered with asperity and jabbed a palsied finger at two photographs. "This one's Payton. This is Rennell—the one that grabbed that child off the street."

"Can you tell me again what she was wearing?"

"Of course—plaid skirt and a dark green sweater."

"Is it possible," Monk asked carefully, "that you remember her clothes from the description on TV?"

Lewis plucked at a pleat of her flowered dress in a gesture of irritation. "I saw her. What I least remember, Inspector, is the description on TV. I was too shocked."

"We have to be thorough. I'm sure you understand the importance of that."

The tacit reminder that this was a homicide investigation which could become a murder trial seemed to give Lewis pause. When Monk placed Thuy Sen's school photograph beside the two black faces, she studied it with quiet sobriety.

"Is this the girl you saw?"

Lewis bit her lip. "You know, I just can't be sure. I think so. But I don't remember ever seeing her pass by before—or any Asian girl. From here to the sidewalk it's hard to pick up features."

"But you recognized Rennell and Payton."

"Because they were facing me, and I've seen them all their lives. They live there, after all."

"But you say other young men come there, too."

"That's true."

"Could one or both of the men you saw with the Asian girl have been one of them—a visitor—instead of Payton or Rennell?"

In the dim light of her standing lamp, Lewis's mouth pursed, and then she shook her head decisively. "No. I can even tell you how Rennell Price walked toward that little girl, with the kind of lumbering menace he always has. Like he enjoys what his presence does to people."

Monk pondered whether to raise the matter of race, then chose a more neutral question. "The other young men that visited the brothers—can you identify any of them?"

Lewis stared into some middle distance, considering the question. "I don't know them, or even know their names. Maybe one—the tall one with the light blue, beat-up Cadillac. Seems like he's always parked out there when there's any space to park."

"Ever see this man up close?"

"No. Just through the window."

"Think you'd recognize his picture?"

Lewis's eyes narrowed in thought. "Without seeing it, I don't know."

"But you didn't see his car that day."

"Not that day, no." Lewis paused, then added with emphatic distaste, "All I saw was those two brothers."

Watching her, Monk decided to change course. "Do you remember the last time, Miss Lewis, you spoke with either Payton or Rennell?"

Lewis's shoulders twitched. "A long time ago."

"Years?"

"Several years. Ever since I saw what they'd become."

"Was there a particular incident?" Ainsworth asked.

Lewis hesitated. Then she said, "Payton called me a vulgarity."

"Recall the nature of it?"

She folded her arms. "I was carrying a bag of groceries. The bottom dropped out, and a melon burst all over the sidewalk." Her voice filled with indignation. "Payton and Rennell were sitting on the porch. But neither lifted a finger to help. Instead, Payton laughed and said, 'Serves that nosy old bitch right.' "

"How old would you say Payton was?" Monk inquired.

"Thirteen, fourteen."

"So that was eight or more years ago. When was the last time you saw one of the brothers up close?"

"I don't know, Inspector—I cross the street to avoid them, and keep my eyes straight ahead." Her tone became quiet. "Like I saw that little Asian girl do."

"So it's been years since you looked Rennell or Payton in the face."

"Maybe that's been years. But I see them most afternoons across the street, preparing to do their filthy business."

"What business would that be?"

"Selling drugs, Inspector. Turning other boys into them."

Monk considered this. "While all that's going on, what's their grandmother doing?"

"Mrs. Price? I barely see her anymore, except looking out on the street from the second-story window." Lewis's tone assumed a measured compassion. "She always seemed like a decent, churchgoing woman. I still see her walking to church on Sundays, sometimes with a flower pinned to her dress.

"Years ago, maybe we'd stop and talk. But now I think she just stays locked up on the second floor of the house, hiding from those boys and their lowlife friends. Sometimes I wonder how their music sounds to her."

Monk was silent. The sense of kinship which he heard seemed to make Flora Lewis pensive. "I suppose," she reflected, "that those brothers have turned us both into recluses. Eula Price only goes to church, and I only go to the corner store. So we don't speak anymore."

"Do you have any black friends, Miss Lewis?"

"I don't have any friends, now. The ones I had are dead or gone."

"Did they include black folks?"

"To talk to."

"To invite to your house?"

Lewis looked him in the eyes. "No. Does that make me a racist?"

"What you are for sure, ma'am, is a witness. What about friends or acquaintances who are Asian—at any time."

"At all times," Lewis said flatly, "I'm civil. Have been my entire life, to anyone who deserves it. But I can't say that I've had Asian friends."

"Just how long have you lived here, Miss Lewis?"

"I was born here. If you're curious, that adds up to seventy-two years. Thirty-three with my parents, thirty-nine alone, twelve since I retired from teaching school."

She had lived here by herself, Monk calculated, since World War II, the time that Bayview had begun to change. "How does this neighborhood seem to you now?"

Lewis sat erect. "Like a nightmare," she said harshly. "Except that I don't wake up." Abruptly, her voice trembled, and a film of tears glistened in her eyes. "My parents left me this house out of love, to be my safety and security. Now I can't escape it."

Monk drew a breath. "I'm sorry, ma'am."

Lewis paused to compose herself. "Don't be. Just believe the truth of what I've told you." Once more, she laid her finger on the mug shot of Rennell Price. "This one's Rennell, the one who pulled the Asian girl off the street. The other one, Payton, closed the door behind her. Lord knows what they did to her."

Monk and Ainsworth stopped for coffee at a dingy soul food restaurant on Third Street. No one else was there.