Wilde Lake(61)

“That was Bash,” he told our father. “He wants to come by and pick me up, go out for the evening.”

“And do what?” Our father had an intense loathing for “just hanging.” He allowed AJ to roam the mall because AJ always claimed to have an errand, a purpose. But the mall would be closed on Thanksgiving night.

“Well, nothing’s really open, except the movies, and we’ve seen what’s playing. We just thought we’d drive, maybe go to Roy Rogers or the Double T Diner.”

“You can’t possibly be hungry,” our father said. “And if you are, go make yourself a turkey sandwich. Driving around, with no plans—that’s how young people get in trouble. Young people and not-so-young people. I see it all the time. I’m not a churchgoing man, but the Bible got it right, about idle hands.”

“Honestly, Dad—”

“Not tonight, AJ. You can go out tomorrow and Saturday, if you have concrete plans. But not tonight. Your friends, however, are free to come here if their parents agree.”

“There’s nothing to do here.” AJ, usually so amiable, stormed into his room and didn’t emerge again except to slice another piece of pie.



Over dinner the next evening, AJ told my father that his group had worked up a definite plan for the evening: “The girls want to go bowling, up on Route 40. And they always want to go get ice cream after, even when it’s cold out.”

Our father was not the kind of man to gloat in victory. He was so glad AJ was doing things his way that he gave him twenty dollars. But when AJ asked if he could have the family car, he demurred. “Can’t Bash come get you?” he said. “It’s practically on his way.”

“In what universe? He could go straight out 108 to 29 if he didn’t have to come down here first.”

“I just hate that turn,” our father said. “That left onto 29 from Governor Warfield Parkway, with no lights and that enormous blind spot—I worry when I know you’re headed that way.”

“But if Bash picks me up, he has to make the turn. What difference does it make?”

“I’m not always rational,” our father said, smiling at his own inconsistency. “Sometimes, I’m a father first and a lawyer second. But, okay, you make a good point. Take the car. All I ask is that you be home by midnight.”

“Midnight,” AJ groaned.

“How late are bowling alleys open?”

“I said the girls wanted to go out after and they’ll want ice cream, but the guys will want sandwiches or burgers, so we’ll probably choose the Double T because you can get everything there, and it’s open all night.”

“Twelve thirty.”

AJ was home by 12:25. Could I have been awake? Is that how I remember hearing him, then checking his arrival against my digital clock, a gift at Christmas a year ago? A digital clock. I am old enough to remember when they seemed magical. Or do I know the time AJ returned home because he would have to repeat the fact again and again over the next few months, and our father would confirm it? He arrived home at 12:25 A.M. and went straight to bed.

Eleven hours later, the Howard County chief of police called and said my brother might be a material witness to a felony.





FEBRUARY 17


Lu waits a week before sending the DNA report to Fred. In her heart of hearts, she has come to believe that Rudy Drysdale did not set out that evening to kill someone. But that is not how the law defines intent, which can be formed in an instant. He broke into Mary McNally’s apartment. He was probably masturbating when she walked in. Imagine the moment for both of them—she finds a strange man seated on her bed in midstroke or perhaps just finishing up, tidying himself with a corner of her pretty red-and-khaki bedspread. She screams. Maybe they both scream. It’s New Year’s Eve. Her nearest neighbor is out, and a hoarse shout or two, even a scream, might not attract attention. He can’t let her scream again. She has to stop screaming. Maybe he panics because she’s between him and the door. He hits her in the back of the head, knocks her down, chokes her. He has to stop the screaming. Then, when she’s dead, he takes whatever he has used to hit her—what, they still don’t know, and Lu is resigned to the fact that the weapon will never be discovered—and hits her again and again and again. Is it his humiliation that accounts for the ferocity of the attack? Is he trying to blind her?

But, also—if his pants are down, how does he move so quickly? Or is he pleasuring himself through the fly? God, it’s almost comic. Until the moment he strikes Mary McNally on the back of the head. Blood must have been everywhere—on his face, his coat. Yet his clothing was clean when he was picked up. She thinks again of the walk-out basement below the deck of the Drysdales’ home—would he have been bold enough to sneak in there and do his laundry? He had time, although he couldn’t have known it would be a week before the body was found. How far would Mrs. Drysdale go to protect her son? How far would Lu go to protect her son and daughter? She hopes never to find out.

At any rate, she can’t accept a plea to anything but first-degree murder. The only thing she’s willing to negotiate are the terms: a minimum of twenty years, no parole. It’s a capital crime, with or without a semen stain on the bedspread. What if he sat down and masturbated after killing her? What if the act of violence was what got him off? He would have to be pretty cold-blooded, but then—he was cool and collected enough to adjust the thermostat, open the sliding door. That’s the story she’ll tell, and if he wants to tell another one, he’ll have to get on the stand. If he doesn’t take the stand, then Fred has to convince the jury that Rudy Drysdale entered the apartment after Mary McNally was dead, then sat down within arm’s reach of her body and masturbated. Or that he has been in the apartment twice, returning for another date with himself and finding the body.