new victim. It was an exhilarating thought, and Matthew felt himself walking faster, the wind now buffeting against him, pulling his blazer open so that he had to fasten its two buttons. He told himself to walk slower, that tonight was simply a fact-finding mission, a chance to observe Michelle’s boyfriend, to begin to make his decision. He needed to be composed, tranquil. A line went through his head, something he’d learned in college when he’d taken an elective in the Romantic poets: poetry was “emotion recollected in tranquility.” He thought of that quote often, applying it to his own life. Tranquility was his goal, not just after he committed a murder, but before. It was what made it meaningful, and it was what made him impervious to detection.
At the tavern he sat at a small table in the front room, toward the back but with a good view of the stage. Although he was not a drinker (that was Richard’s thing), he ordered a Guinness from the young waitress, plus the chicken potpie. When his drink arrived, he took a small sip, feeling as though he were wearing a disguise. He looked around the small room and toward the back bar, and noted all the men there with their pint glasses filled with their beer, just like him. Some were alone, and some with wives or girlfriends, but they all had that empty-eyed, stoop-shouldered look of men who’d just barely managed to get through their day and were now rewarding themselves with cheeseburgers and alcohol. Matthew didn’t recognize anyone in the restaurant. No neighbors or former students. It would have been okay if he had—he was fine with small talk—but it was a much better feeling to be anonymous.
When he was halfway through his dinner, the three-piece band began to lug their instruments onto the stage. Matthew recognized Scott from the website. He was in his midtwenties, with short hair and a full reddish beard. He wore dark jeans and a purposefully ragged oxford shirt half tucked in. As he was adjusting his microphone stand, a woman who had just come in from outside ran up and gave him a hug. The rest of the band acknowledged her, nodding and smiling, and then she moved toward the bar. Even though it was early fall in New England, she wore a short black leather skirt and a sleeveless shirt. She had dirty-blond hair and wore bright pink lipstick. Was she a groupie? More important, did the C-Beams even have groupies? They were about to start, and the place was full, but that was mostly because of people finishing up their dinners. It seemed that a few people had come in to hear the music, but not many.
When the waitress cleared his plate, she asked, “You staying for the music?”
“I thought I might,” Matthew said.
“You should. They’re good.”
“They’ve played here before?”
“Once, I think. But I’ve seen them play a couple times in Lowell. That’s where I live.”
Matthew ordered another beer. He planned to drink it slowly, while watching the band play. Was the waitress another one of the C-Beams’ groupies, another of Scott’s possible infidelities? She seemed excited that they were here, but maybe she was just making small talk with a customer. When she came back with the beer, he almost asked her where exactly they played in Lowell, but he didn’t want to seem too interested, didn’t want to be memorable. After she placed his Guinness on the wooden table, he watched her walk back to the waitress station, her gait reminding him a little bit of Mira’s. Matthew heard Richard’s plaintive voice in his head—Jesus, that ass—and almost smiled. The waitress was pretty, but she couldn’t have been much older than twenty. Her eyes had the startled look of a fearful deer, wide open and jittery. She probably did have a crush on one of the C-Beams. He studied the band again. The drummer was clean-shaven and pug-nosed and had a slight beer paunch, and the bass player was lanky to the point of emaciation, with one of those pronounced Adam’s apples that Matthew found disconcerting to look at. If the waitress did have a crush on a member of the band, it was probably on Michelle’s boyfriend, with his hipster beard and high cheekbones. Matthew tried hard to discern if he was actually handsome, but found it hard to do. All men looked alike to him. They either had fox faces or pig faces. Scott was a