abraded nerves.
Later, at home, after he had tucked the girl in bed, kissed her
forehead, wished her sweet dreams, and turned off the light, she said,
“Goodnight … Dad.”
He was in her doorway, stepping into the hall, when the word “dad”
stopped him. He turned and looked back at her.
“Goodnight,” he said, deciding to receive her gift as casually as she
had given it, for fear that if he made a big deal about it, she would
call him Mr. Harrison forever. But his heart soared.
In the bedroom, where Lindsey was undressing, he said, “She called me
Dad.”
“Who did?”
“Be serious, who do you think?”
“How much did you pay her?”
“You’re just jealous cause she hasn’t called you Mom yet.”
“She will. She’s not so afraid any more.”
“Of you?”
“Of taking a chance.”
Before getting undressed for bed, Hatch went downstairs to check the
telephone answering machine in the kitchen. Funny, after all that had
happened to him and considering the problems he still had to sort out,
the mere fact that the girl had called him. Dad was enough to quicken
his step and raise his spirits. He climbed the stairs two at a time.
The answering machine was on the counter to the left of the
refrigerator, below the cork memo board He was hoping to have a response
from the estate executor to whom he had given a bid for the Wedgwood
collection that morning. The window on the machine showed three
messages. The first was from Glenda Dockridge, his right hand at the
antique shop. The second was from Simpson Smith, a friend and antique
dealer on Melrose Place in Los Angeles. The third was from Janice
Dimes, a friend of Lindsey’s. All three were reporting the same news:
Hatch, Lindsey, Hatch and Lindsey, have you seen tv? have you read the
paper, have you heard the news about Cooper, about that guy who ran you
off the road, about Bill Cooper, he’s dead he was killed he was killed
last night.
Hatch felt as if a refrigerant, instead of blood, pumped through his
veins.
last evening he had raged about Cooper getting off scot-free, and had
wished him dead. No, wait. He’d said he wanted to hurt him, make him
pay, pitch him in that icy river, but he hadn’t really wanted Cooper
dead.
And so what if he had wanted him dead? He had not killed the man. He
was not at fault for what had happened.
Punching the button to erase the messages, he thought: The cops will
want to talk to me sooner or later.
Then he wondered why he was worried about the police. Maybe the
murderer was already in custody, in which case no suspicion would fall
upon him. But why should he come under suspicion anyway? He had done
nothing. Nothing. Why was guilt creeping through him like the
Millipede inching up a long tunnel?
He hurried upstairs.
Millipede?
The utterly enigmatic nature of that image chilled him. He couldn’t
reference the source of it. As if it wasn’t his own thought but
something he had… received.
Lindsey was lying on her back in bed, adjusting the covers around her.
The newspaper was on his nightstand, where she always put it. He
snatched it up and quickly scanned the front page.
“Hatch?” she said. “What’s wrong?”
“Cooper’s dead.”
“What?”
“The guy driving the beer truck. William Cooper. Murdered.”
She threw back the covers and sat on the edge of the bed.
He found the story on page three. He sat beside Lindsey, and they read
the article together.
According to the newspaper, police were interested in talking to a young
man in his early twenties, with pale skin and dark hair. A neighbor had
glimpsed him fleeing down the alleyway behind the Palin Court
apartments. He might have been wearing sunglasses. At night.
“He’s the same damned one who killed the blonde,” Hatch said fearfully.
“The sunglasses in the rearview mirror. And now he’s picking up on my
thoughts. He’s acting out my anger, murdering people that I’d like to
see punished.”
“That doesn’t make sense. It can’t be.”
“It is.” He felt sick. He looked at his hands, as if he might actually