"merely" terrorize the black community, the explosion had come too early. The deaths in the church had enraged the African-American people of Shakespeare. Whoever had planted the bomb did not represent white supremacy, but white stupidity.
As I locked Deedra's apartment - scorning to even cross the landing and listen at Jack's door - and descended the stairs to drive to Mookie Preston's modest rental, I thought about the unexpected, normally concealed aspects of the people around me, the part I was seeing the past few days. It was like seeing their skeleton beneath their outer flesh.
Bluff, hearty good ole boy Darcy Orchard, for example: I'd worked out with Darcy for years, and seen only the good-natured sportsman. But last night I'd seen him tracking a man, at the head of a pack of hunters. Beneath his yard-dog exterior, Darcy was a wolf.
I'd always known that about Tom David Meicklejohn. He was naturally cruel and sly, naturally an able and remorseless hunter. He was reliable in what he undertook, whether good or bad. But Darcy had kept this facet of his character buried, and something or someone had unearthed it and used it.
For the first time, I allowed myself to imagine what would have happened if the pack had caught Jack.
And I found myself almost sure they would have killed him.
I began work at Mookie's house in a grim mood. Of course her place couldn't be as dirty as it had been the first time I'd cleaned it, but every week she did a grand job of retrashing it. I scrubbed the bathroom in silence, trying to ignore the little questions and comments she tossed to me as she passed by the open door.
Mookie showed me her cuts from the bombing. They'd been caused by flying splinters, and they were healing well. She inquired after my leg. Would the woman never shut up and settle down to her work?
Once I got the bathroom decent again, I moved into the bedroom. This old house had big rooms and high ceilings, and Mookie's low modern bed and chest of drawers looked out of place. The bare wooden floors made a bit of an echo, footsteps clacking unnaturally loud. Maybe she liked the noise, maybe it kept her company.
"You know," Mookie said, making one of her abrupt appearances, "they haven't got a clue who planted that bomb." She'd been reading the papers. I hadn't.
"Is that right?" I asked. I really didn't want to talk.
"The device that started the explosion was a wristwatch, like the one you've got on," Mookie said. She was very angry, very intense. I'd had enough angry and intense already today. "All the chemicals in the bomb were things you could order from any chemical supply house. All you'd have to do is not order everything from one place, so they won't get suspicious."
"I wouldn't know," I said pointedly.
"It's in books you can check out of the library here!" she said, her hands flying up in a gesture of complete exasperation. "It's in books you can buy at the bookstore in Montrose!"
"So it's probably almost as easy to make a bomb as it is to buy a rifle," I said, my voice calm and even.
The rifle was not under her bed any longer.
"A rifle's legal."
"Sure." I was careful not to turn and look her in the eyes. I didn't want any kind of confrontation. That, too, I'd had enough of already today.
After I changed the sheets and dusted the bedroom, I looked around for an empty bag to dump the contents of the plastic garbage pail, which was full of soiled tissues, balls of hair, and gum wrappers. There, next to a Reebok shoe box, was a dark red plastic bag, and it bore the distinctive logo of Winthrop Sporting Goods.
I tried to persuade myself that there was nothing odd about this. People did mostly buy their sports shoes at Winthrop's, because the store carried a great selection and would special-order what they didn't have in stock.
But I'd seen another red plastic bag the week before. And I remembered seeing yet another crammed into the kitchen garbage. Mookie was going to Winthrops' very frequently.
Slowly I dumped the garbage pail into the bag and went to the bathroom to empty another one. Mookie barely glanced at me as I cleared the one by her desk. Her coarse reddish hair was braided today, and she was wearing wind-suit pants and a turtleneck. She was tapping computer keys with great energy. The same charts