Now and then - By Robert B. Parker Page 0,33

Lyndon,” I said.

Epstein nodded.

“Tell me about them,” he said.

I did. Epstein took some notes on the organizations and places they had mentioned in connection with Alderson. The waitress warmed up our coffee as needed. My normal ration wastwo cups in the morning. I was somewhere around five this morning. Of course, they were small cups. I’d probably be able to sleep fi ne by the time the week was out.

“A hippie legend,” Epstein said when I finished my recitation. “Perry told us he was forty-eight.”

“Kent State was in 1970,” I said.

“Which would have made him thirteen when it happened,”

Epstein said.

“Precocious,” I said.

Epstein said, “We’ll run it down. See how much of the legend is true. Can you give me a couple of the pictures you took?”

I nodded.

“When the truth conflicts with the legend,” I said, “print the legend.”

“William Randolph Hearst?” Epstein said.

“The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, ” I said.

“Close,” Epstein said.

The waitress brought the check. Epstein picked it up.

“I got this one,” he said. “You’re a business expense.”

“Wow, you do avoid ethnic clichés,” I said.

“Jews are generous,” Epstein said.

We still had coffee to drink, so we each drank some. Epstein put down his cup.

“This,” he said, “has been a model of law enforcement giveand-take. Me, a representative of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. You, a simple private peep. And we share what we know to the betterment of our common interest.”

“Ain’t it grand,” I said.

“There was another shooting in Cambridge yesterday,”

Epstein said. “Right in Harvard Square.”

“The town too tough to die,” I said.

“You wouldn’t know anything about that, I suppose.”

“I don’t,” I said.

“Some similarities to the guy got shot up in Kendall Square,”

Epstein said.

“The guy who killed Jordan Richmond?”

“Yeah. This guy has no identity either. We got no record of him, no fingerprints on file, no DNA. He’s got no ID. The gun is unregistered.”

“He had a gun,” I said.

“Yeah, one I never heard of,” Epstein said. “Thing was manufactured in fucking Paraguay.”

“Don’t see that many Paraguayan handguns,” I said. “Did he have it out?”

“Yeah.”

“Been fi red?”

“Not recently,” Epstein said.

“Where’d he get hit?” I said.

“Two in the forehead,” Epstein said.

“Pretty good,” I said. “Sounds like a pro.”

Epstein nodded.

“Yeah,” he said. “Most people aim for the middle of the mass. Gotta have confidence to shoot for the head. Especially in what looks like a gunfight. Odd how two guys with peculiar handguns and no ID get shot in the head on the street in Cambridge.”

“Where’d it happen?” I said.

“Little alley next to the post offi ce on Mt. Auburn Street.”

“Not generally considered a high-risk area,” I said. “What time of day?”

“Middle of the afternoon,” Epstein said.

“Witnesses?” I said.

“Couple people said they saw a white van speed away right after the sound of shooting.”

“That’s it?” I said. “In that location? At that time of day?”

“That’s it. Oddly enough, one of the postal workers got a plate number.”

“And?”

“Stolen.”

“Incredible,” I said.

“I’m shocked,” Epstein said. “Shocked, I tell you.”

“And nobody saw the shooter?” I said.

Epstein looked at me for quite a long time without speaking.

Then he said, “No. Nobody saw the shooter.”

36.

We went to the student union and sat in the café and had coffee. I had an apple turnover with mine. Red chose not to eat anything. I could tell by the way he spoke that his jaw had already started to stiffen where I popped him. It would be quite sore at the hinge tomorrow.

“Tell me how you met Perry,” I said.

“I was in a shelter,” he said. “Strung out.”

“What were you on?”

“Whatever I could get,” he said. “And Perry would come around to the shelter and talk to us.”

“About what?”

“About how pervasive governmental repression had forced me, all of us, into addiction and dependence,” Red said. “About how our only hope was to become independent, to be free of things that made us dependent, to stand up and say no!”

It was Red speaking, but it was Alderson’s voice I was hearing.

“The government made you do it?” I said.

“Through economic manipulation.”

“Like taxes?”

“Yeah, and welfare, which creates a pernicious climate of dependence that we all fall prey to.”

“Pernicious,” I said.

“Once you start sucking on the federal tit,” Red said, “you become a federal slave. Being a drug addict is just one version of it.”

“What were you doing before you became a drug addict,” I said.

“I was playing football at Bowling Green. Scholarship. I failed to take advantage of the opportunity afforded me. I just played football and partied. And the partying graduated from beer to hard booze to pot to hard drugs. I