by J. A. Jance
“I sure as hell do,” Big Al returned in a strangled whisper. “And that’s why- because he was my friend. I owe him.”
We were standing in the hallway near a pocket door that seemed to cover a linen closet. Just then, there was a distinct scratching from somewhere near the base of the other side of that door.
I don’t know if the same thing happened to Big Al, but I can tell you, the hair on the back of my neck stood straight up. We both jumped as though we’d been shot, but the scratching came again, followed by a small, whimpering voice.
“Can I come out now? Is the bad man gone?”
If I hadn’t seen it myself, I wouldn’t have believed Big Al Lindstrom capable of that kind of lightning movement. He spun around and grabbed for the finger hole. For a moment, he struggled, trying to open it, but the door had apparently fallen off its track. He had to lift the door and drop it back into place before he could finally slide it open. When it did, a small, pajama-clad child tumbled out into the hallway.
“Junior!” Big Al croaked as soon as he caught sight of the boy. “What in the world are you doing in there?”
The little kid took one look at Big Al and held out his short arms to be picked up. Obviously they knew each other.
“Where’s my daddy?” Junior Weston asked, snuggling close to Big Al’s thick neck “Where’s my mommy? Why wouldn’t they come let me out? The door got stuck. I had to go to the bathroom, but they didn’t come when I called. I think I wet my pants.”
You hardly ever consider the possibility of someone like Big Al Lindstrom being radiant. Brides are radiant. Mothers of newborns are radiant. Men aren’t supposed to look that way, but the exultant joy on Detective Lindstrom’s face was amazing to behold as he clutched Benjamin Harrison Weston, Jr., in a fierce, breath-crushing bear hug.
“Hey, you guys,” he crowed, laughing and crying at the same time, shouting to anyone who cared to listen. “Come see what I found!”
The narrow hallway immediately filled with people, although not one of them stepped on the trail of bloody footprints that marred the carpeting. They all wanted to know what was going on, but no one wanted to risk screwing up the evidence.
“Look here,” Big Al gloated. “Here’s Junior-Junior Weston, and he’s all right, by God. There’s not a scratch on him!”
“So who’s the other kid?”
I asked the question of the world in general rather than anyone in particular, but it turned out that no one was listening and nobody else answered my question. I myself had seen those two dead boys lying on the bunk beds in that first bedroom, but at that precise moment in time, everyone within earshot was focused on the miracle that Junior Weston was still alive, that at least one member of Ben Weston’s family had escaped the scourge. No one else had time to think about that other unfortunate child and his soon-to-be-grieving family.
For a moment, we were all too stunned to do anything, but finally my brain slipped out of neutral. “I’ll be right back,” I told Al. I fought my way down the crowded hallway, through the living room, and out the front door.
“Hey, Detective Beaumont,” Captain Powell yelled after me as I vaulted past him down the steps. “Where the hell do you think you’re going? You can’t be finished in there already.”
“I’m going after the teddy bear,” I called back over my shoulder, “and there by God better be one out in the car!”
Years earlier, a local radio station had sponsored a program called the Teddy Bear Patrol. The idea was to put donated teddy bears in all local emergency vehicles-law enforcement, fire, and Medic One-in both the city and county. When confronted with traumatized children, emergency personnel and police officers would then have something besides mere words with which to comfort injured or frightened kids.
At the time I first heard about it, I confess it struck me as a pretty dumb idea. The idea of men getting ready to go on shift and making sure they had their weapon, their cuffs, their bulletproof vest, and their teddy bear seemed a little ridiculous. After all, real men don’t eat quiche, and they don’t pack teddy bears either. Over the years, however, I’ve been forced to change my mind, having heard enough secondhand, heart-rending stories to see the error of my ways. That April night, though, was the first time I personally had need of one of those damned bears.
“Teddy bear?” Captain Powell echoed, following me down the sidewalk. “What the hell do you want with a teddy bear?”
“Big Al just found one of Ben’s kids, Ben Junior.”
Powell stopped in his tracks. “He’s still alive?”
The soft, squishy brown bear was right there in the trunk, exactly where it was supposed to be. My groping hand closed around one tiny leg. When I triumphantly hauled it out of the car and slammed the trunk lid shut, I almost collided with Captain Powell, who had stopped directly behind me.
“He’s alive all right. He’s fine. He was hiding in a linen closet. Got stuck in there. I think he just woke up and recognized Al’s voice.”
“You’re kidding!”
“The hell I am! Come see for yourself.”
“Hallelujah,” Captain Powell breathed. “I can’t believe it!”
I left him standing there and hurried back up the sidewalk with that precious teddy bear crushed against my chest. Holding that soft, cuddly creature even helped me that night, made me feel better. I knew holding it would help Junior Weston too.
Back in the hallway, Big Al hadn’t moved. He still held the child, although the crowd of onlookers had thinned some as people returned to their various assignments. I caught Big Al’s eye and held the bear up high enough so he could see it. He nodded gratefully as I handed it to him.
“Look here,” Big Al said to the child in his arms. “Look what Detective Beaumont found for you. A teddy bear.”
Benjamin Harrison Weston, Jr., couldn’t have been more than five years old. As far as we knew, he was totally unaware of what had happened to his parents. He had no idea that his entire family had been wiped off the face of the earth and that he himself was an orphan. He saw only the lovable brown teddy bear and knew that, for whatever reason, he was being given a gift.
“For me?” he squealed delightedly, hugging the bear to his pajama-clad chest. “Really?”
For a few moments, there wasn’t a dry eye anywhere within earshot, mine included.
CHAPTER 3
It seemed important to have Junior Weston well away from the house before Doc Baker’s helpers began wheeling gurneys loaded with body bags out the front door and into waiting vans. We bundled the boy into a jacket over his pajamas and then took him along downtown. Some kids might have balked at or been terrified by the prospect of a trip to the Public Safety Building, but because Junior was a cop’s kid, for him it was nothing more than a trip to his dad’s office.
After a quick but necessary visit to the bathroom, we brought him back to our crowded cubicle on the fifth floor. There he settled easily into Big Al’s lap, clutching the teddy bear. A steaming cup of cocoa sat at the ready on the detective’s cluttered desk.
Genetically linked stubbornness has necessitated a long learning curve, but now when I’m wrong, I can come right out and admit it. In regard to Detective Lindstrom and the Weston family murders, I’m happy to report I was absolutely dead wrong. During the next few minutes Big Al reverted almost totally to type. By dint of pure Scandinavian hardheadedness, he set aside his own feelings of grief and outrage and functioned flawlessly as the consummate investigator questioning a vulnerable but essential eyewitness.
In dealing with witnesses of any kind-young or old, willing or not-that initial questioning session often offers the best chance of gleaning really useful information. With young children especially, those first few moments are critical. It’s important to hear what the child himself has to say before his memory is colored or diluted by the preconceived notions of those around him. Well-intentioned adults-relatives, friends, or social workers-may inadvertently or deliberately encourage him to forget
or change what he remembers, thinking that by doing so they will somehow lessen the trauma of what the child has experienced.
In the case of Benjamin Harrison Weston, Jr., there was no other detective in the Seattle Police Department who could have worked with the five-year-old boy the way Big Al did. Already a known and trusted adult in the Weston family sphere of influence, he dealt with the child in a straightforward, no-nonsense manner that gave the kid credit for having a good head on his shoulders. The detective’s whole approach, caring but devoid of condescension, was no doubt good for the boy, with the reverse also true-Junior Weston’s trusting innocence gave courage and purpose to the man.
“Do you know what dead is?” Big Al opened the discussion with a quiet but throat-lumping question.
Junior nodded, his eyes focused intently on the man’s face. “My granny’s dead,” he answered slowly, “and so’s Bonnie’s mama. She died before I was born. Mommy told me that when people die, they go to heaven.”
Big Al faltered, his voice cracking slightly. “They’re dead, Junior. They’re all dead-your mommy and daddy, your sister and your brother.”
The child was quiet for a moment, assimilating the words. “Does that mean they’re in heaven now, with Jesus?”
Big Al blinked. “Yes,” he said. “I suppose they are.”
“Can I go too?”
“No, Junior. You can’t. You’ll have to stay here.”
“Alone?”
“Yes.”
The boy turned away while two gigantic tears slipped down his round cheeks. “The bad man did it, didn’t he,” Junior said softly. “He hurt Bonnie. I saw him do it.”
“You saw him?” Big Al asked with a meaningful glance in my direction.
“Yes. In the kitchen. He had a knife, a big knife. He started to come after me, too, but I ran and hid in the closet. I closed the door so he couldn’t find me.”
The bearers of bad news can also issue a rousing call to arms. Big Al, after delivering his devastating news, now wisely offered Junior Weston the opportunity to do something about what had happened to him. “We’ve got to catch that bad man, Junior. Will you help us?”
The boy’s huge, unblinking brown eyes met the detective’s searching gaze. “It’s what my Daddy would have done, isn’t it,” he said gravely, making a statement, not asking a question.
Big Al nodded. “Yes,” he said. “It’s exactly what your daddy would have done.”
For a moment Junior Weston nuzzled his small, tear-stained face against the top of the fuzzy teddy bear’s head. “I want to catch him,” he whispered.
I didn’t know Big Al was holding his breath until he let it out in a long, grateful sigh.
“Try to remember everything you saw and heard, Junior. Tell us whatever you can about the man, about how he looked and acted and sounded, about how big he was. Anything at all that you remember. Will you do that?”
“He was wearing sweats,” the boy said at once. “Red sweats, and his arm was bleeding.”
“Which arm?” Big Al asked. “Right or left?”
Junior shook his head. “I don’t know. I can’t remember right and left.”
“Was it the one that was holding the knife?”
“No, the other one.”
“Tell us some more about his clothes. You said sweats. Both top and bottom?”
“Yes. The top had a zipper.”
“What about his shoes?”
“High tops, like Reeboks. The kind my daddy doesn’t let us get because they cost too much money.”
Busy taking notes, I forgot myself and asked a question of my own. “What was the man doing when you first saw him?”
Butting in like that was a serious tactical error, and the moment I opened my mouth I was sorry. Junior Weston stared at me blankly as though I had spoken to him from outer space in some strange, indecipherable language. Totally tuned in to the man who was holding him, he would answer questions from no one else.
“Can you tell us what was happening?” Detective Lindstrom asked, quietly resuming control of the interview.
The boy swallowed hard before he answered. “They were fighting. Bonnie and the man were fighting. He was bigger than she was, and she couldn’t get away.”
“Did either one of them say anything to you?”
“Bonnie saw me, and she shook her head like for me not to come any closer. The man saw me too, I think, but I ran away before he could catch me.”
“What did he look like?”
Junior shrugged. “I dunno. Just a man, I guess.”
“Was he tall or short? Taller than your mommy? As tall as your daddy?
“Tall, but not as tall as my daddy.”
Big Al looked at me. “Ben was six five,” he said before turning back to Junior. “Was he fat?”
“No, he was kinda skinny.”
“Was the man black or white, brown or yellow?”
“White,” Junior answered at once.
“What kind of white?” Big Al asked.
Junior Weston regarded Big Al with his head cocked to one side. “Not like you,” he said seriously. “You’re kinda red. More like him,” he said, pointing at me, “and his hair was brown.”
“Long or short, straight or curly?”
Junior leaned back. “It wasn’t curly,” he said. “Definitely straight.”
“Had you ever seen him before? Is he maybe someone from right around here, someone from this neighborhood?”
“No. I never saw him before.” Junior hunkered against the detective’s chest. “I’m tired. Can’t we stop now?”
Big Al shook his head. “It’s important to go on. You might forget something.”
“Okay,” Junior said.
“Do you know what time it was?”
The boy shook his head. “No. We were in bed. We were supposed to be asleep, but Dougie and Adam started telling ghost stories. They do that sometimes, just to scare me ‘cause I’m littler than they are. That’s when I went out to sleep in the closet in the hall. It’s my secret hiding place. I go there when Dougie and Adam start acting mean or picking on me. I closed the door almost all the way so they couldn’t find me. When they got quiet, I was going to go back to bed, but I heard a noise. I went into the kitchen. That’s when I saw the bad man.”
“Did Bonnie say anything to you?”
“No, she couldn’t. She tried, but there was something over her mouth. He was behind her. When she shook her head, he looked up and saw me.”
“What did you do then?”
The boy ducked his head and bit his lip. His answer was little more than a whisper. “I ran away.”
“You went back to the closet?”
“Uh-huh.”
“Where did the bad man go?”
“I don’t know. I heard some doors opening and closing. I think he was looking for me. I think he went into our room.”
“Why didn’t you call your daddy?”
“I was too scared to make a noise. I heard him getting closer, going past. Then, after that, I wanted to get out, but I couldn’t. The door was stuck. It got really quiet.”
“But you did hear noises?”
This time, instead of answering aloud, Benjamin Harrison Weston, Jr., buried his head against Big Al’s chest and sobbed into it. The detective didn’t bother to ask him what he had heard-there was no need. We both had a pretty good idea what the horror outside must have sounded like to a terrified child hiding in a darkened closet, wondering if the monster would come after him next.
“I knew he hurt them. He was bad,” Junior Weston said finally. “Before you even told me, I thought maybe he killed them. Like on TV.”
“Ja,” Big Al said softly. “I thought maybe you did. You’re a smart boy, Junior, and you were real smart to stay hidden. Your daddy would be proud of you.”
At the mention of his father, Junior’s eyes once more clouded with tears. “But I wanted to help…what if…” he began, then he broke off. For the next several minutes he sobb
ed brokenly into Big Al’s massive chest. I couldn’t know how a five-year-old would process the end of that sentence. Maybe he wondered what would have happened if, instead of hiding, he had warned his father, just as Officer Dunn had wondered what would have happened if the patrol car had somehow arrived on the scene sooner.
In the aftermath of death, “what if” becomes a haunting question, a philosophical imperative dictating the lives of survivors. Some ask themselves variations of that question for the rest of their lives. I’ve done it myself on occasion, especially in regard to Anne Corley, a woman I loved and who I thought loved me-right up until she tricked me into killing her.
Actually, over the years I’ve almost managed to convince myself that she did love me with the same kind of life-changing ferocity I felt for her. I’ve wondered if the force of that love didn’t somehow bring her face-to-face with the reality of the fiendish monster she’d become. I don’t blame her for not being able to live with that reality, but I’ve often wished she had committed suicide with her own hand instead of mine.
Still, though, I’ve asked myself countless times what if I had done something else? What if I had taken some other action? Would it have caused a different result? Would we somehow, somewhere have managed to live happily ever after? I don’t know. I doubt it.
It was painful hearing Junior Weston, sitting there on Detective Lindstrom’s lap in our little cubicle, ask himself those same questions for the very first time. Finally, having cried himself out, the boy grew still.
“He was way bigger than you. You did the best you could at the time,” Big Al said reassuringly. “Now you’re helping us. We’ll have an artist work with you on a composite, a picture drawn from your description. Do you know about those?”
Junior nodded. “I saw one once when Daddy brought me down here on a Saturday morning.”
“We’ll do that later on, tomorrow or the next day,” Big Al added. “In the meantime, we have to talk to the other boy’s family, to Adam’s family. What’s his last name?”
“Jackson. Adam Jackson. He slept over because his mama had to work all night.”
“Where does she work?”
