I hang fire till the kid dreams up some chore for himself in back. Then I stride the length of the room. Everyone says I like to dress as a beat cop. As the beat cop I once was. But my jacket is black cotton, not black leather or sateen. And I wear black cotton pants, not the issue serge. And no nightstick, flashlight, radio, hat, gun. The man’s wearing cowboy boots under his slacks. Another giant. Americans are going through the roof. Their mothers watch them grow, first with pride, then with panic.
“You Arn Debs?”
“Who the fuck wants to know?”
“The law,” I said. “That’s who the fuck wants to know.” And I opened my jacket to show him the shield pinned to my blouse. “Are you here to meet Jennifer Rockwell?”
“Maybe and maybe not. And fuck you whichever.”
“Yeah well she’s dead,” I told him. And I made a quelling gesture with my raised palms. “Easy now, Mr. Debs. This is going to go just fine. We’ll sit in the corner there and talk this thing through.”
He said quietly, “Get your damn hand off of me.”
And I said quietly, “Okay. You want to come and listen while I call the house? Do your wife and daughter know about Jennifer and you? Do they know about that spot of pain you had in August ‘81? With what’s her face—September Duvall? That was a rape beef, wasn’t it. Copped to Agg Assault. This was when you were still living up in Fuckbag, Nebraska. Remember?
“Eric?” I called to the barman. “Let me have a Virgin and a double Dewar’s for the gentleman over at my table.”
“Right away, Detective Hoolihan. Right away.”
What I’m looking at here, I think (and he’s sitting opposite me now, crowded into the nook by the window, with a hollow duck practically perched on each shoulder), is a semireformed shitkicker, in a good tweed coat and twills, who likes to get it wet at both ends whenever he’s out of town. Table for two booked at the French restaurant upstairs. Tex tan, dark glasses ready in his top pocket, and a head of tawny hair he’s real proud of—I’m surprised he’s not called Randy or Rowdy or Red. High, wide, and handsome, with itty-bitty eyes. A card-carrying tailchaser who’s that close to being a fruit.
I said drink up, Mr. Debs.
He said well this is a hell of a turn for the evening to take.
I said so you’re a friend of Jennifer Rockwell’s.
He said yeah. Well. I only met her but once.
I said when?
He said oh, maybe a month back. I make these business trips regular, like every three or four weeks?
Met her on my last trip. February twenty-eight. I remember because no leap year. Met her February twenty-eight.
I said where?
He said here. Right here. At the bar there. She was sitting a couple of stools away and we got talking.
I said she was here alone. Not waiting for anybody.
He said yeah, sitting at the bar there with a white wine. You know.
I said so what were you thinking?
He said to tell you the truth, I thought she was like a model, or maybe even some kind of high-class call girl. Like you get in the better hotels. Not that I was fixing to pay for it. Then we got talking. I could tell she was a nice girl. She wasn’t wearing a wedding band. She married?
I said what did you talk about?
He said life. You know. Life.
I said yeah? What? Sometimes you’re up, sometimes you’re down. Look before you leap. That kind of stuff?
He said hey. What is this? I’m answering your questions, okay?
I said you tell her about your wife and kid?
He said it didn’t come up.
I said so you made a date. For tonight.
He said listen. I conducted myself like a gentleman.
Debs went into a thing about the company he works for in Dallas, how they had a guy come down from DC to give a seminar on social etiquette. A seminar on how to avoid sexual-harassment suits. He reminded me that you can’t be too careful, not these days, and he always conducted himself like a gentleman.