nothing less. Once I start to say, “So-and-so’s okay really, even though he shot a twelve-year-old in the head,” then it’s time for me to look for another line of work. The only safe way to proceed with ex-cons is to watch them like a hawk.’
‘That doesn’t make it any easier for them.’
‘It’s not my job to make it easy for them. I’m paid to protect you. If that means making these guys pay even after they’ve served their sentence, then that’s just the way it’s got to be.’
‘You must have a few who were innocent.’
Bockbauer looked at him wearily. ‘If you listen to these people, none of them did the crime. Or they had a good reason that justified it. Even a scumbag doesn’t like to admit he’s a scumbag.’
‘Jesus,’ Robert said appreciatively, in the face of his hardness.
Bockbauer gave a snorting laugh. ‘Cheer up, Mr Danziger. You don’t have to worry about it; that’s my job. And believe me, you wouldn’t want it any other way. For every Duval there’re ten of these guys who’d take your concern and wrap it round your throat if you gave them half a chance.’
‘I understand. I just hope I can find him before you put him back in.’
‘I just hope he wants to be found.’
Robert got up to go. ‘By the way,’ said the parole officer, ‘are you called Bobby?’
‘I was as a kid. That’s when I knew Duval.’
‘And your wife’s named Anna?’
‘That’s right. Why?’
‘You’re not exactly African-American, are you?’
‘You tell me, officer.’
Bockbauer laughed, and Robert said, ‘What’s this about?’
Bockbauer shook his head in wonder. ‘Duval said you were family. Cousins, I think. He kept talking about Bobby and Anna and your little girl. What’s her name?’
‘Sophie.’ Just saying it in this environment unsettled him.
‘Duval told me he wanted to move from Cornell Avenue and come live with you. I told him before I’d even consider it I’d need to meet you first.’
Robert was taken aback. ‘You’d know it wasn’t true as soon as you saw me. It doesn’t make sense.’
Bockbauer looked at him sympathetically. ‘You’ll find that with a lot of ex-cons there’s a strong element of fantasy – you could call it wishful thinking if you wanted to be nice. It serves a purpose – it gives these guys hope that somehow they can live a normal life again.’
He didn’t look like he was in the business of being nice, and his eyes made it clear what he thought of their chances. ‘The problems start when their balloon gets pricked. That’s when a lot of them can’t cope. They end up doing something stupid and get sent back to prison.’
He left Bockbauer’s office wondering why Duval had lied. He seemed so truthful – were there other things he had lied about?
Thinking hard, he came up with one. In the coffee shop in the Marchese, after Anna had offered him work, Duval had said he didn’t need instructions to get to their house, explaining he’d found their address in the phone book. But Robert and Anna weren’t in the phone book. And Lily out in California had been emphatic. Don’t worry: I didn’t give him your address.
At the time it had seemed trivial, a mistake rather than a fib. But thinking about it now, Robert suddenly wondered how Duval had got their address. Maybe Duval had followed him home one day. Worse, he might have followed Anna.
It bothered Robert, bothered him a lot as he drove through South Shore, and joined the Inner Drive at 67th Street. The gaps in his knowledge of Duval’s life were no longer neutral blanks that didn’t need to be filled in, but troubling holes. It seemed a terrible irony that just as Robert himself was beginning to accept that Duval was innocent, other reasons cropped up for distrust. Maybe Duval had another agenda.
2
The truce with Anna ended that evening. He was home before her, and found Sophie exhausted from a swimming gala at day camp that afternoon. He gave her early supper, put her in the bath, put her in bed, then read Tom Sawyer aloud to her. When Tom duped his friends into whitewashing the fence for him, Sophie started to giggle uncontrollably. Was it that funny? ‘It’s just like you, Daddy,’ she said. ‘Getting Duval to paint our fence.’ He had to laugh too.
Anna came in late from work looking subdued. He had made supper, but she only picked at her plate, though she drank down the glass of Sauvignon he poured