Crusader (33 page)

The tape showed a still mallway, and the bottom part of PIP Printing across the way. Sam pressed Fast Forward until he got to the most recent part. Then he slowed it down.

It all happened very quickly. A man with a hat appeared in the frame. If you looked really hard at him, you could tell that it was Uncle Frank. He stopped right in front of the window and looked into the lens of the camera. Then a look of horror came over his face. He jerked himself backward, out of the frame, and disappeared.

Sam announced, "Okay. We got him. I got Griffin's beeper number. I'm calling him right now."

I followed Sam back to his office. He punched in Griffin's beeper number on the store's phone. He got a call back in less than a minute, but it wasn't from Griffin. It was from his sergeant. I heard Sam say, "No. No. It can wait until tomorrow. Thank you, Sergeant."

Sam looked at me. "Griffin is off tonight. That was Sergeant Fisk. He said we could call nine-one-one if it's an emergency. Otherwise Griffin will call back tomorrow."

"Well, that's good."

Sam nodded happily. "Yeah. That's good." He tightened his mouth up, as if he was trying to hold back something. But he couldn't. His eyes became pools of water. Then two lines of happy tears started to roll down his cheeks.

That same kid from the guidance office came into Mr. Herman's room just before class started. This time he kept his distance from the podium. He held up a small sheet of paper and pointed to the back of the class. Mr. Herman nodded curtly and then looked back down at his lecture notes.

The kid approached Hawg and said, "They want you down in guidance again."

Hawg snarled at him. "Yeah? Who's 'they'?"

The kid looked at the paper and read, "Mr. Archer."

"So why does Mr. Archer want to see me?"

"I don't know."

"What's it say on your damn paper?"

The kid read the contents of the paper word for word, "Hugh Mason. Journalism Two."

"That's it?"

"That's it."

Mr. Herman looked up at them. He cleared his throat and said, "This is fascinating, but it needs to end now. Leave, both of you."

Hawg sat still for a moment longer, defiantly considering his options. I could tell what he was thinking. I know he thought this was about RDT, but I had a bad feeling that it wasn't. So
when Hawg finally got to his feet and started out, I got up with him. Mr. Herman noticed me just as I slipped out the door, but he didn't have time to say anything.

Hawg stomped away ahead of the guidance kid and me. I didn't catch up to him until we were right outside of the office. I tapped him on the back and said, "Hey, wait a minute."

Hawg turned around, surprised. "What are you doing here?"

The guidance kid continued into the office without us. I said, "I don't think you know what's going on."

Hawg looked at me suspiciously. "The hell I don't. They kicked me off the football team, but I ain't goin'. I talked to Archie about it."

"Look, this may not be about any of that—the RDT, or the F in Journalism, or the football team. It may be about something else."

Hawg stared at me blankly, his back to the office. He didn't see Griffin come out the door, or Mr. Archer, or Officer Dwyer, our permanent deputy. But he could tell by my expression that something was happening behind him. He spun around and regarded them all, one by one. He pointed at Griffin and spoke to him familiarly. "What are you doing here?"

Griffin held out his sheriff's department badge, just as he had that night in the carport. "I'm Detective John Griffin. I've been working undercover at the West End Mall."

"What? You're a damn cop?"

Mr. Archer said, "Can we take this into my office, please?"

Griffin and Officer Dwyer each took a giant step backward, cutting off any plans Hawg may have had for running. Hawg looked sideways at me. His face was frightened, anguished. He walked numbly behind Mr. Archer into the office. Everybody in guidance stopped what they were doing to stare.

Nobody told me to go away, so I followed them all the way
in. Mr. Archer closed the door behind us. He indicated that Hawg should sit on a chair in front of his desk, but Hawg remained standing.

Mr. Archer looked at Griffin, who cleared his throat and spoke in a formal way. "Hugh Mason, I am arresting you under the Florida Hate Crimes Statute." Griffin pulled out a small laminated card and started to read him his rights. "You have the right to remain silent—"

But I interrupted. I nearly shouted at him, "Wait a minute! He didn't do it."

Griffin looked at me in surprise, then his eyes narrowed. I think he was about to go back to reading from his card, but then Mr. Archer broke in, "Yeah. Wait a minute, fellas. I want to say something, too."

Griffin put the card down. Mr. Archer held up a manila file. "Hugh? I have your records here, from your time with us. They're not much, but they do tell me something. Also, I have talked with my son about you." He looked at Griffin. "My son is Hugh's history teacher and his football coach."

Mr. Archer came around the desk and stood next to Hawg. Hawg was blinking, like a trapped animal in a cage. Mr. Archer told him, "Hugh, my son said you were a real honest kind of guy. He didn't think you would be involved in criminal activity."

Hawg answered in a quavering voice, "No, sir, I would not."

"I asked him about African American members of the football team, and he said you got along with them very well."

"Yes, sir. That's a fact."

"But I must inform you that I'm releasing your file to the sheriff's department, and it does contain a racial incident."

"What?"

"You did get into a fight with black students on your first day at our school. And you did use racial slurs."

Hawg thought back. He asked Mr. Archer, "You talking about that thing in the cafeteria?"

Mr. Archer peered through his bifocals at the file. "I believe that's where it happened. Yes."

Hawg's voice got stronger. "I was standin' in line at the soda machine. These boys figured they didn't have to wait in line like me. I told em they did."

"Well, Hugh, apparently you told them some other things, too."

"Hey, they think you're supposed to be scared of em because there's four of 'em and because they're black. Well, that don't happen where I come from. They got all these white boys down here runnin' scared. I ain't scared of em. I said I'd take em one at a time or all at once. I hit one, and the other three jumped me. Then the damn dean came around the corner, grabbed me, and let them go."

Mr. Archer listened closely. He answered, "All right. But whatever happened, it's classified as race based in our file."

"It was race based, all right. They jumped me because I was white."

"That was a very serious incident, Hugh. I nearly had to put the whole school on alert, and you know what that means."

"Yes, sir."

I don't think Mr. Archer knew what to do next, so he looked at Griffin. Griffin said, "We can read Hugh his rights in the car, sir. Or at the station, if you would prefer that."

Mr. Archer was clearly upset now. He said to Griffin and Officer Dwyer, "No. We need to step next door and discuss this."

The three men stepped out. Hawg looked at me and hissed, "Roberta, what the hell's going on here?"

"They think you've been doing stuff to Sam, and to Sam's car, and to Crescent Electronics."

"What? Why?"

"Because you had that fight with him at Arcane. You called him that racial name."

"He called me a race name, too. Or don't nobody remember that part?"

I held up my hands, shoulder high.

Mr. Archer opened the door. "Hugh, we're telephoning your father right now."

"My stepfather."

"Yes, of course. He will meet us at the police station."

"What for?"

Mr. Archer looked pained again. "Hugh, you will have a chance to present your side of this case. I promise you that. Your stepfather needs to know that there are two sides to this story."

"Sir, my stepdaddy don't want to hear my side of nothin'. He knows I'm tellin' the truth, but he don't want to hear it. He's got a new wife down here, and she don't want me around. That's the whole damn deal right there. That's why I gotta get back up to Georgia."

Mr. Archer's big head tilted to one side. He turned around and called over to Mrs. Biddulph, who was watching the proceedings from the front desk, "Mrs. Biddulph, I'll be accompanying Hugh this morning. Take over for me, please."

She answered, "Yes, sir."

Officer Dwyer approached Hawg with a pair of handcuffs. Mr. Archer asked him, "Now, is that really necessary?"

"It is, sir. It's regulations. I'd get written up if I didn't do it."

Griffin told Officer Dwyer, "Go ahead to the car, Deputy. I'll be another few minutes in here." Griffin caught my eye and jerked his thumb toward the time-out office.

I walked in, and he closed the door behind me. He stood in front of the sign that reads,
IF YOU'RE SO SMART, WHAT ARE YOU DOING HERE
? and waited for me to speak.

I demanded to know, "Didn't you get our page? We paged you!"

Griffin shook his head. "No, I didn't get any page. And who is 'we'?"

"Sam and me. We know who did it. We saw him from the window of La Boutique de Paris." I lowered my voice instinctively. "It was my uncle Frank."

Griffin's mouth twisted up into a disbelieving smile. "Your uncle Frank?"

"We saw him, Detective! With our own eyes."

"Saw him do what?"

"He had a can of red spray paint. He was sneaking around the mall with it. And ... and! Sam caught him on videotape."

"Caught him doing what?"

I stopped. I felt myself getting flustered. "He ... he was about to spray paint on Sam's window. That's what."

"Did he?"

"No. He saw the video camera and he ran away."

Griffin looked down at the ground, thinking to himself. Then he started thinking out loud. "So your uncle was outside Crescent, after hours, with spray paint."

I answered triumphantly, "Yes!"

"That changes things."

"Yes!"

Griffin looked me in the eye. "But, Roberta, it doesn't prove anything. There's a difference." He explained, "You saw your uncle last night, but no crime was committed last night." He suddenly glanced at his watch.

I said, "No. Not last night, but—"

Now Griffin was all business. "But nothing. Listen, Roberta. Here's how it works: The department spent the time and money to place me in the mall, and they expect a result. This is
the result. An arrest. That's a serious thing, but it's only a part of the process."

"But ... how can you arrest the wrong guy?"

Griffin pointed a big finger at me. "You know that Hawg has been the prime suspect from the start. He got into it with some blacks at Memorial. He called one the ‹-word. He got into a shouting match with Sam, with witnesses, where he used a racial slur. He even purchased red spray paint from Lombardo's. Hawg has placed himself in this predicament. He has made himself the prime suspect."

"But Hawg didn't do it. Don't you know that now? Uncle Frank did it."

He chose his words very carefully. "I now believe that that is possible. And if Hawg didn't do it, I will find that out. Once he's indicted, I can do a full investigation—physical evidence, fingerprints, alibis, witnesses. All of that. If there's no real case against him, the department will not proceed."

"What about Uncle Frank? Will you proceed against him?"

Griffin's eyes took on an odd expression. He said, "That's tough to say. Colonel Frank Ritter has never been a suspect at all. He's an army veteran, an officer, a business owner. The only thing we have against him is that his niece and Sam were alone in a dark spot in the mall one night and thought they saw him."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah. And maybe the windows were a little foggy."

"What? What are you talking about?"

"Maybe the windows were foggy because things were getting hot between you two."

"Cut it out!"

"Hey, that's nothing compared to what a lawyer would do to you in a courtroom."

I told him, "You are sick." I looked away, embarrassed, but
I guessed that was Griffins point. I pulled myself together and asked him, "So what's going to happen to Hawg? Is he going to get hurt?"

"Come on, Roberta. What do you think we have down there, a medieval torture chamber? I'm gonna take him to a nice office building. I'm going to buy him a soda, give him a doughnut, and let him tell his side of the story. He'll go before a judge, he'll be arraigned, and he'll make bail. He'll be home before supper. Heck, he'll probably be back at the mall."

"Then what?"

"I don't know. Maybe the judge will slap a peace bond on him."

"What's that?"

"It's a court order. He won't be allowed to go within a certain distance of Sam. Like a hundred yards. They use peace bonds a lot now—for stalkers, wife beaters, things like that. They might fix an electronic device on him, too, to make sure he keeps away." He held up his watch to me. "I have to take him in now. I will talk to you again as soon as I can."

I stayed in the time-out room for a few minutes after Griffin left, trying to make sense of his words. When I was ready to go back to class, I walked out into the office. That was when I saw Ironman. I immediately thought,
Oh no. Did he see all of this?

I stopped and regarded him closely. He seemed the same as always, just sitting there grinning nervously. I concluded that he hadn't seen anything. I said, "Hey, what are you doing here?"

"Waiting for Mrs. Biddulph."

"Are you here for RDT?"

"No. My PE teacher says I got head lice."

"Oh no. Where did you get that?"

"I got no idea."

Mrs. Biddulph hurried back into the office from somewhere, so I said, "See you," and left.

I went back to Journalism II. Mr. Herman was speaking about the Pulitzer Prizes. I slipped in quietly, just as I had left. If he noticed me, he didn't let on.

I brought an overnight bag with me to work. Ever since Griffin's appearance in the carport, I've been afraid to be at home alone. Tonight I was planning to have dinner with Mrs. Weiss and to stay over there, but first I had to make it through five hours of work with Uncle Frank.