Hangman's Game (34 page)

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By the time Jessica returns from the gym and Whole Foods, I have formed, if not exactly a plan, at least the outline of one.

“Want to go on a trip together?” I ask after I help put away the groceries.

“Where did you have in mind?”

“Maryland,” I say.

“Baltimore? That could be fun. Crabs are in season.”

“I was thinking more toward the western part of the state. There's a town called Hartsburg I want to go to.”

“How wonderful,” she says with false cheer, setting a package of pita bread on the counter. “Hartsburg is on my bucket list. After Cape Town and Angkor Wat, of course.”

“I have to go there, tonight,” I say. “If you want to stay here, I understand. I mean … I know how busy you are.”

 

CHAPTER 29

A
S WE DRIVE
west on the Interstate, Jessica takes control of the car radio, dialing in soft rock from the eighties. She “ooohs” when she lands on REO Speedwagon's “Can't Fight This Feelin'.”

“What are the odds of me ever improving your musical tastes?” I ask.

“About the same as me ever improving yours.”

We roll on, locked into this station, and soon Hall and Oates remind us that private eyes (clap-clap) are watching you (clap-clap), watching your every move (ooh baby).

“Eighties music is what brought Dan and I together,” Jessica says, curled down in the seat, her bare feet crossed and resting on the dash. “I was at Smith, he was getting his MBA at Harvard, and he showed up at a party at my house. My roommates put me in charge of the stereo, and he came over to compliment me on playing the greatest song ever.”

“Which was…?”

“Madonna,” she says. “‘Crazy for You.'”

Fair enough. At least it wasn't the Smiths.

“Now, here's the bigger question,” I say. “Did he really like the song? Or was he just complimenting you because he saw you from across a crowded room.…”

“Crowded room,” Jessica says decisively. “Why else would a Harvard MBA student come to a Smith party? On the other hand, he still does listen to eighties music. If he's going out, his getting-dressed song is ‘Don't Stop Believin'.'”

“Did he get that from the last episode of
The Sopranos
?”

“From
Glee,
actually,” Jessica says with a small laugh.

Cool.

“Speaking of Dan,” I say. “Why is he inviting me to dinner? Are you sure he doesn't know about us?”

Jessica sighs. “Yes, one hundred percent,” she says, sounding mildly disappointed. “He was looking through one of my sketchbooks, which is how your name came up. But I told him you're just a model, same as I told that detective. Dan made a brief show of acting jealous, but then he let it go. It's not like I don't draw other models, male and female. I'm pretty sure he picked up the sketchbook because he was hoping to see a naked woman.”

She pauses, and then adds, “He was actually very impressed that I knew a real live Philadelphia Sentinel. Hence the dinner invitation. He's a football fan, unfortunately.”

Our first stop in Hartsburg is a Rite Aid, where I buy Jessica the props she will need—a pad and a pen. Then we drive on to the Hartsburg War Memorial Coliseum, a classically styled five-thousand-seat arena that looks like it was built in the 1950s, when the city of about a hundred thousand people expected that the circus would always be coming to town. Tonight the parking lot is a third full, for a game at the end of the Hyenas' season.

“I'll wait out here,” I say to Jessica. “Someone may recognize me if I go in with you.”

“Recognize you?” Jessica says, eyebrows raised. “We're full of ourselves lately, aren't we?”

“After the game just try to talk to the Hyenas' coach. His name is Randy Hillock.” Not that the name would mean anything to Jessica, but Randy Hillock played safety on a couple of championship teams in the early nineties. “Tell him you're a reporter doing a story on the players Samuel Sault injured, and you need help finding Luke Reckherd.”

“Can I tell them I'm with
GQ
?” she says, excited by the notion. “I see sports stories in there sometimes.”

“Knock yourself out.”

“It'll be perfect. If I'm from
GQ
it will explain why I don't seem like a typical sports reporter.”

“Brilliant choice. You're wonderful. Now go.”

She gets out of the car, studiously checks her appearance in the reflection of the passenger side window, straightens her skirt, and walks confidently, pad and pen in hand. My stomach does a flip as she disappears inside the arena.

The game had started at 7:00
P.M.
, and it is now nine. These arena games are designed not to test a fan's attention span. I imagine the crowd will be spilling out before too long.

Sitting alone in a parking lot, I search the local radio stations. I bounce from country to pop to talk before giving up and turning the radio off. I think back to Luke Reckherd at the funeral, in that white suit, praying long after the service was over. I wonder if this tall and strange athlete, confronted with his misdeeds, would see the virtue of peaceful surrender.

I am beginning to sweat just sitting here. I step out of the car, hoping some fresh air will settle me down. But almost immediately I kneel down and vomit half-digested pita and baba ghanoush onto the cement stanchion of the light pole. The first heave is tentative, the next two thunderous.

My throat burning and my eyes watering, I stand up and look around, but no one is there to notice, which is good. I don't need anyone coming over to help, and this is not a big deal. I have thrown up before a game more than once—I did it before my one playoff game, actually, and that went fine. I tell myself it is good that I have gotten this out of the way. Better now than later, wherever this night goes.

Sweat drying on my face, I look up in the sky. The moon is a couple days past full, on its way back down again.

Soon a large goateed man emerges from the arena's loading ramp, with a collie close at his heel. The man carries a black shoulder bag with the words
K9 SHOWTIME
on it in neon yellow. I am guessing that the bag contained Frisbees, and that this man's job is to run onto the field with his dog and hold the fans' interest during play stoppages. If his night is done, this means the game will soon be over.

And it is. Minutes later the masses, such as they are, begin streaming from the arena's wide banks of doors and down the steps to the parking lot. The crowd includes many boys in pee-wee league uniforms and shoulder pads, carrying helmets and walking with their parents. My guess: these kids played on the field as the half-time entertainment. This would be smart community relations for the Hyenas, and a way to fill the seats with these kids' parents and siblings.

A half hour later, after the parking lot has emptied, Jessica comes up the same ramp as the dog act. She looks around for my car, finds it, and waves enthusiastically. She has something, I can see it in her step.

“It's amazing how people just start telling you things when you have a notepad in your hand,” Jessica says after she gets in the car. “The coach hasn't talked to Luke since he cut him, but he heard something about him going to work at his dad's restaurant. In a town called Berry, which is just down the road.”

“Good,” I say. I have already read about the restaurant and I have the address.

“If Luke is there,” Jessica asks, clutching her pad, “do I keep up my reporter disguise and ask him where he was on the night of the shooting? That's too blunt, right?”

“Probably,” I say. “For now, let's just go there, have something to eat, and see what happens.”

“What if we learn something important? Is that when we call someone else in?”

I start the engine. “We'll figure that out as we go.”

“But what if we're face-to-face with this killer, and we know it and he knows it? What happens then?” She sounds more curious than concerned.

“I'll perform,” I say. “It's what I do.” Even as the words escape my mouth, I wish I could pull them back. They feel like an invitation to bad luck.

She clucks her tongue and says, “You do realize this performance won't involve punting a football, right?”

To drive to Berry we have to backtrack east a couple exits on the Interstate. The restaurant is called Wee Willie's Rib Revue, and the food is supposed to be good. In my research on Luke I came across a “Where Are They Now?” story from a few years ago about the place. The story claimed that Willie not only owned the place but worked several days a week as a manager. A photo showed him bald-headed and resplendent among a sea of patrons.

The story also included a video clip, filmed at the restaurant, which showed Willie's legendary ambidexterity in action. A slab of ribs was laid before the former quarterback, a broad-shouldered man with slits for eyes and a cherubic smile. Holding a meat cleaver in each hand, Willie chopped away at the ribs rapid-fire until they were transformed into a pile of dismembered meat and bone. The patrons in the background cheered the display as Willie raised the sauce-soaked cleavers triumphantly into the air.

The restaurant is down the road from a string of shopping centers just outside Berry's modest downtown. The story I read boasted of a surging business in which patrons were waiting for tables; tonight, the parking lot is maybe a quarter full, and this is a Friday night.

“Quite the happening spot,” Jessica says dryly.

“It's okay. We're not here for the baby backs.”

Wee Willie's Rib Revue has, if nothing else, a distinctive sign. Above the Wee Willie name is an image of a quarterback with both arms raised and a football alternately lighting up in his right or left hand. To be an ambidextrous quarterback is truly impressive. I remembered all the time I spent in high school, training my right arm to make every throw on the field. Willie would have had to put in twice the work I did.

The entry area of the restaurant is decorated with five framed Wee Willie jerseys—one each from high school and college and then three from the pros. Which surprised me. I knew Willie played for Baltimore, but according to the placards underneath the jerseys, after five seasons there he spent a year each in Kansas City and Detroit.

The college jersey of Luke Reckherd also hangs on the wall. According to the placard, Willie's #6 was unretired by Langston University so his son could wear it, too. Willie's old Langston jersey is plain dark blue with an orange number, while his son's modern #6 features orange piping on the sleeves and shoulders. No one can leave well enough alone.

The restaurant is brightly lit, and its red-and-white-checked tablecloths glisten with reflected light, as does the brass rail on the bar. It is as if they were tipped off a couple of days ago to a visit from the health inspector.

So much preparation for so few customers. The nausea returning, I look around for Luke or Willie, but I don't see either.

“Two for the bar,” Jessica says to the hostess, a young woman with a dour smile.

“No problem,” she says, grabbing two menus. “Follow me.”

She walks us to the bar and, after we sit, places the menus precisely in front of Jessica and I, as if centering menus is an art in which she has been carefully trained.

“A server will be right with you,” she says. “Enjoy your meal.”

The bartender, a middle-aged woman with blown-out dark hair and blush generously applied to her cheeks, peels her attention away from the basketball game on the television and ambles our way.

“Welcome,” she says. This is Brenda, according to her name tag. “Can I get you anything?”

“Just some wings for now,” Jessica says.

“Anything to drink?”

“I'll have a Stella,” Jessica says.

“Club soda for me,” I say. “With lime.”

The waitress pours our drinks and punches the food order into the bar computer. Then she has nothing else to do. The lack of customers is going to be our friend.

“Excuse me, Brenda,” I say, calling her back.

She returns, with an uneven gait that suggests a chronic hip injury. “Something else I can help you with?”

“Just a question,” I say. “Do you know if Wee Willie is going to be in tonight?”

“I'm not sure,” she says, her smile sagging. “He'll stop by every now and then, but his business partner handles most of the operations.”

That story I read claimed that Willie was here most nights. But then, it surely isn't the first time a reporter has been misled in the quest for free publicity.

“So what does Willie do with himself these days?” I ask.

“What do you mean?” she asks.

“How does he spend his time,” I say, “if he's not here?”

“Why do you want to know that?” she says, drawing back. I haven't even gotten to inquiring about Luke yet.

“My boyfriend here used to play quarterback in high school,” Jessica interjects. “But he couldn't cut it in college. Broke his heart.”

Brenda manages to smile sympathetically, as if this is a real problem. “What do you do now?” she asks.

“He's a fitness instructor,” Jessica answers. “But he pines for the old days. He wonders what his life would be like if he had actually made it as a quarterback.”

Brenda shrugs her broad shoulders. “If you're a fitness instructor,” she says, “I say, thank God and don't look back. You can do that for years. Football, you have to pray for your health. Look at Willie's boy Luke. Back in high school, they said he had a million-dollar arm, and then he got hurt and he's done at age twenty-three.”

Under the bar I give Jessica's thigh a grateful squeeze.

“What's Luke up to these days?” I say.

Brenda shrugs again. “Beats me.”