…A Dangerous Thing (26 page)

"I really do think he was being unfair about the grade," Kristi said.
 
"My answers were a lot better than some others that I could name.
 
I just didn't sit in the right place.
 
And maybe I don't have the right shape."

"I'm sure you had a good case," Burns said.
 
"It's a little late to be worrying about that now, though."

"I guess it is," Kristi said.
 
"But I still think I should have a better grade."

"W
hat did you think?" Elaine asked as she and Burns walked back to the church, only a few blocks away, where their cars were parked.
 
"Was she lying?"

"I don't know," Burns said.
 
"She lied at first.
 
Maybe she was still lying at the end."

"How did we do as the good cop and the bad cop?"

"Not bad.
 
Boss Napier would be proud of us."

Elaine frowned at the mention of Napier's name.
 
"You can see from what Kristi told us that sexual harassment has its really dark side."

"I never doubted it.
 
What does that have to do with Napier?"

"Nothing.
 
Exactly.
 
But it's always the woman who suffers, and he's not as enlightened as he should be.
 
Maybe someone needs to take him in hand and explain things to him."

Burns felt a momentary thrill of panic.
 
He could imagine what might happen if Napier got the chance to be alone with Elaine while she tried to enlighten him.
 
He didn't like the idea of her "taking him in hand," either.

"I don't think so," he said.
 
"Or then again, maybe it's a good idea.
 
I'll have a little talk with him."

Elaine smiled and took Burns's arm.
 
"I like it when you're jealous," she said.

T
hat afternoon, Burns put some
Creedence
LPs on his turntable and tried to work out what he knew and what he thought he knew while he listened to "Green River" and "Born on the Bayou."
 
What he knew wasn't much more than it had been the last time he tried it.
 
He still didn't know who was lying and who was telling the truth.
 
Walt
Melling
and Kristi Albert had, by their own admission, both been in the vicinity of Henderson's office on the day he was killed.
 
Holt hadn't been seen there, but he hadn't shown up for his class.
 
His alibi was Dean Partridge, which was suspicious in itself as far as Burns was concerned.

And then there was the Henry
Mitchum
business.
 
Burns was almost convinced that Holt and
Mitchum
were connected in some way.
 
Maybe Holt
was
Mitchum
.
 
It wasn't really even a far-fetched idea; lots of radicals from the 70s were still in hiding. Burns had read about getting fingerprints by taking a person's water glass and giving it to the cops.
 
He didn't know about the possibility of doing that, but there were any number of smooth-surfaced things he could take from Holt's office and turn over to Napier.
 
It was worth thinking about.

And he wondered just how well fingerprints would show up on a bust of Sigmund Freud.
 
All he had to do was locate it, and he could find out.

Burns turned that idea, and everything else, over and over in his mind, but the more he thought about things, the less he was sure he knew.
 
And the more he developed the nagging feeling that he had overlooked something that he should have asked more about.
 
Try as he would, he couldn't make it come clear.

Late in the afternoon, he gave up and read the rest of
You'll Die Next!
 
He had just set the book aside to make himself a ham sandwich when the telephone rang.

It was Mal Tomlin, who said he'd be by to pick Burns up at eight-thirty.

"It'll be good and dark by then," Tomlin said.
 
"That's the best time."

Burns didn't know what Tomlin was talking about.
 
"Best time for what?"

"You know what.
 
For catching them in the act."

Then Burns remembered.
 
"I'm not going sneaking around anyone's house in the dark," he said.
 
"You must be crazy."

Tomlin adopted a patient tone.
 
"I'm not crazy.
 
Just smart.
 
Partridge and Holt are going to get together tonight, and they're going to talk about killing Henderson.
 
If you'd heard them talking today, you'd know how worried they are.
 
I'll be by at eight-thirty.
 
Wear something black.
 
Do you have a black turtleneck?"

"Yes, but I'm not going to wear it," Burns said.
 
"I'm not going anywhere with you on some half-baked spying expedition."

"Look," Tomlin said, "we have to do this.
 
Your cop friend has scheduled another interview with
Joynell
for tomorrow.
 
To clear up some 'discrepancies,' he says.
 
He really thinks I had something to do with killing Henderson, and we have to prove he's wrong."

"But we can't prove anything by going over to Dean Partridge's house," Burns said.

There was a click on the other end of the line, but Burns continued to protest for another few seconds and before he realized that he was talking to dead air.
 
He hung up the phone and made his sandwich.
 
It didn't taste as good as he had thought it would.

H
e was wearing the black turtleneck, not to mention black jeans, and feeling like a fool when Mal Tomlin rang his doorbell at eight-thirty.

Tomlin had on a similar outfit, and his cheeks and forehead were covered with something dark and oily-looking.

"Smear some of this stuff on your face," Tomlin said, and still standing in the doorway he handed Burns a tin can.

The outside of the can was slick, and Burns handed it back.
 
"I'm not going to put that stuff on my face.
 
What is it?"

"Some of that goop baseball players put under their eyes on bright days."
 
Tomlin moved past Burns and into the house, sticking the can in
Burns's
hand.
 
"You can put it on in here.
 
We might want to wait a few more minutes before we go.
 
They haven't rolled up the sidewalks yet.
 
You got anything to eat?"

Burns looked into the can.
 
"Where did you get this stuff?"

"Coach Thomas.
 
You got any peanut butter and jelly?"

"Good grief," Burns said.
 
"You told Coach Thomas about your idea for a commando raid?"

Tomlin grinned, his teeth looking very white in his blackened face.
 
"I hadn't thought of it like that.
 
A commando raid."
 
He fell into a crouch and
duckwalked
across the den, pretending to be carrying an assault rifle.
 
"Just like Arnold Schwarzenegger."

"You look more like a bad imitation of Chuck Berry," Burns said, laughing.

Tomlin straightened up.
 
"You just don't appreciate style.
 
Anyway, an army travels on its stomach.
 
What about the peanut butter?"

"I have ham." Burns told him.
 
"And mustard.
 
Didn't
Joynell
feed you tonight?"

"Nope.
 
She spent her time lecturing me about how stupid you and I were."

"She's right.
 
If we do what I think we're going to do, we're even more stupid than she thinks."

"Yeah, well, we'll see how you feel after we get on
America's Most Wanted
for cracking this case."

Burns thought about telling Tomlin about Henry
Mitchum
but decided against it.
 
Tomlin was acting crazy enough already.
 
The only good thing Burns could think of was that Tomlin wasn't armed.
 
And if he knew that they might be encountering a man who took part, willingly or not, in an armed robbery in which a bank guard was killed, he'd insist on carrying an M-1 if he could find one.

So Burns didn't mention
Mitchum
.
 
Instead he asked, "What about Coach Thomas?
 
What did you tell him to get this stuff?"
 
He held up the can.

"I went by the gym after the funeral and told him that we were organizing a faculty baseball team.
 
He gave me some old bats and balls, and I asked for a can of goop.
 
If we handle this right, we can get some spikes, too.
 
You want to play?"

"Are you serious?"

"Sure.
 
I just wanted the black stuff, but the baseball team seems like a good idea.
 
We could play the students in a charity game, maybe raise a little money for scholarships."

Napier didn't have a prayer of getting close to Elaine again, Burns thought.
 
"Can I play second base?"

"Only if you put that stuff on your face."

Burns stuck a finger in the can.
 
It came out black and greasy.

"Just rub it in," Tomlin said.
 
"It won't hurt a bit."

Burns hesitated.

"Maybe we could get someone else to play second," Tomlin said.
 
"Earl looks like an infielder.
 
We'll see how he can handle a bat."

Burns smeared the greasy substance on his cheek.
 
It wasn't so bad after all.

"W
hat really worries me is that damn goat," Tomlin said.

They were parked a long block from Dean Partridge's house, located in a much more exclusive
subdivison
than
Burns's
own home, an area in which the houses were surrounded with towering pecan and oak trees and in which many of the houses sat on two or three lots to keep the neighbors at a proper distance.

The latter fact made things easier for a pair of prospective cat burglars, since the dean's home was set off from the others, and the adjoining properties had wide yards of their own.
 
Though the front yards were open to the street, the back yards were all surrounded by seven-foot wooden fences.
 
Burns liked the protective aspect of the fences, but he wondered how in the world he and Tomlin were going to climb over one of them.

They were in
Burns's
car, parked in the alleyway that led down the block between two rows of houses, an alleyway that was generally traveled only by the local garbage trucks on the days of regularly scheduled pick-ups.
 
Burns had pulled his car in behind a big brown dumpster, but it could still be seen from the street if anyone were looking.

Burns was worried about any number of things.
 
He was almost sorry he didn't have a pen and paper so he could make a proper list.
 
First, he was worried about climbing the high fence around the dean's back yard.
 
Then there was the fact that they were parked in an alley where any passing patrol car would probably spot them immediately.
 
After that, there was the whole idea of sneaking around someone's house to see if two people were having a conference about a murder one of them had committed.
 
And even if they were, how was anyone on the outside going to hear them?
 
Burns was feeling more like a fool with every passing second, and then Tomlin had to go and mention the goat.

Burns had forgotten about the goat.

"I don't see why anyone would want a goat for a pet in the first place," Tomlin said.

"It's not a pet," Burns said, determined to be politically correct.
 
"It's an 'animal companion.'"

"The hell it is."

Burns wasn't going to argue about it.
 
"I don't want to talk about the goat.
 
I want to know what kind of plan you have.
 
If you have one."

Tomlin tried to look hurt, but he merely looked grotesque.
 
The streetlight made the white flesh of his hands look green, and it made the greasepaint on his face look indescribable.

"Of course I have a plan," he said.
 
"I've cased the joint."

"You
what
?"