JONATHAN KELLERMAN. THE CLINIC

His shoulders dropped. “The lady professor. Tessa really doesn’t know nothing about that and she’s pretty—you know—upset.”

“About the murder?”

He touched the cigarette pocket again, pulled out a softpack of Salems, then patted his pants for matches.

I found a book in the glove compartment and lit him up.

“Thanks. Not exactly about the professor. She . . .” He looked back at the house. “Mind if I get in your car, sir?”

“Not at all.”

He walked around the back and took the passenger seat, touching the leather. “Nice shape, always liked this model—seventy-eight?”

“Nine.”

He nodded and smoked, blowing it out the window. “GM built it on a Chevy Two chassis, which lots of people thought was a mistake. But they hold up. This belong to the city, one of those impounds?”

“No, it’s mine.”

“Had it long?”

“A few years.”

Another nod. He looked at the floorboards. “Tessa had a problem. Do you know about that?”

Not knowing if Tessa had told him about the rape, I said, “A problem Professor Devane helped her with?”

“Yeah. She . . . she’s very bright. Tessa. Almost a genius IQ. When she wanted to drop out we asked why but she wouldn’t tell us, just said she wanted to move back home. We were surprised, my wife and me, because she’d been the one made such a fuss about living on her own. Finally she broke down and cried and told us about the—you know. The assault. And how the professor hauled the guy up on charges. And then she got murdered. At first it sounded so wild we didn’t know what to believe. Then we saw the news about the murder.”

“What was wild, the murder or the rape?”

He inhaled a lot of smoke and held on to it for a long time. “Tell the truth, sir, all of it.”

“Did you have doubts Tessa had been attacked?”

He stuck his arm out the car and flicked ashes. “How do I put this—I love my daughter a lot but she’s . . . she’s really smart, always was. Right from a baby. But different. She gets in these low moods. Depression. Since she’s been little, always moody. And then she goes into her own little world—a real good imagination. Sometimes . . .” He shrugged and smoked. The cigarette was nearly down to the filter.

“Her imagination can get wild,” he said.

“Has she accused others of raping her, Mr. Bowlby?”

He sighed, took another drag, looked at the butt, and squeezed it out between his fingers. I slid open the ashtray and he dropped it in.

“Thanks. Mind if I light up another?”

“Go ahead.”

“Disgusting habit. I quit every day.” He laughed.

I smiled and repeated my question.

He said, “We used to live out in Temple City, the police there probably still got records. Though maybe not, ’cause the boy was a minor, I heard they don’t keep records on minors.”

“How long ago was this?”

“Tessa’s almost twenty and she was twelve at the time, so eight years. The boy—we knew his family, I worked with his father at Ford, back when they had a plant in Montebello—the boy was a little older. Thirteen, I think. The families were close. We were all camping at Yosemite. Supposedly it happened in a tent, the two of them stayed behind while the rest of us went to the dump looking for bears. But the thing was, Tessa never said nothing til we got back home. Three or four days later. The Temple City police said it was really the park rangers’ jurisdiction but they brought the boy in anyway for questioning. Then they said they thought he was innocent but we could pursue it if we wanted. They also said we should have a psychiatrist see Tessa.”

Hollowing his cheeks, he sucked hungrily on the second cigarette and let the smoke trail out of his mouth. His teeth were brown, widely spaced. Veins bulged in the heavy, sunburned arms, and the tips of his nails were coal-black.

“She’s—the thing is, sir, Tessa’s smart, even with her problems, she always did great in school. Straight A’s. Great imagination . . . we were hoping . . . I’d really prefer if you don’t talk to her, sir. She’s such a nice kid but delicate. Raising her’s like walking a tightrope. One of her doctors said that to us. Said she’s fragile. I can’t see what good it would do to talk to her.”

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