Happy Policeman Read Online Free PDF Page B

Torku. You know, in college I thought the trick was revolution. Then later, when I followed my father and became a Republican, I imagined money was the answer. But there aren’t any answers. When you get right down to it, nothing’s meaningful. Nothing at all.”
    Foster was talking a notch too loudly, and DeWitt began to wonder if the speech was meant for the Torku in the next room. The rattle of dice, the clack of the pieces along the board, fell silent.
    DeWitt sipped at his tea. It was watery, and Foster had put no sugar in it. “Loretta thought you were a sinner.”
    “Loretta thought a great many things that weren’t true. She was the wrong season to be perceptive, remember?”
    DeWitt put his cup down.
    “Loretta was a Thou Shalt Not,” Foster told him. “Consider me a Thou Canst. When the bombs hit, I lost a lot of money in the stock market, but you don’t see me crying over it, do you?”
    No , DeWitt thought. But I see a pair of Torku in the next room learning all about acquisitions and mergers. He wondered what Kol Seresen, what Pastor Jimmy, might think of that.
    “So you hated Loretta.”
    The chair returned to sitting position with a startled bang. Foster leaned forward, his face too pink, too Summery, against the strident orange of his shirt. “Why would you think that?”
    “Pastor Jimmy’s people prayed God would take the sinners. Seems to me that when you have a congregation that wants something bad enough, one of them might help God along. The law would understand if you killed Loretta in self-defense.” In a kindly tone he added, “Secrets eat you up inside, Hubert. So tell me. Where were you last night?”
    Foster’s cheeks went a sickly shade of gray. A Winter-sky hue. “Here. At home.”
    “Any witnesses?”
    “Jesus, DeWitt. Loretta was the town’s only Mary Kay rep. And I’m completely out of skin toner. Why in the world would I kill her?”
    Slowly, pointedly, DeWitt looked at the living-room door. He had thought Foster could get no more sallow, but the banker’s cheeks went through a Torku transformation. He was as pale as Loretta, as white as his trimmed hair.
    “What’s going on between you and the Torku? Does Seresen know his people are here? And what did Loretta find out?”
    Irate, Foster shot to his feet, then appeared to be amazed to find himself standing. “The Torku and I have a lot in common. There’s no crime in that, is there?”
    Putting his hand into his pocket, DeWitt was surprised to feel the cold beads tucked away like a secret.
    “Well? Is there?”
    “Let me handle the Torku, Hubert. It’s better if they talk to one person. It keeps things from getting confused. I don’t want the Torku confused.”
    “Oh, I understand. You’re jealous. That’s what all this is about. Well, you don’t own the Torku. Envy is a pre-holocaust idea, DeWitt, and you’d better learn to get rid of it. The whole town had better learn to get rid of a lot of things. Outmoded ideas of demons. The Judgment Day holding tank that Pastor Jimmy thinks we’re in.”
    DeWitt looked at the piles of tie-dye, the beads, the canny little incense holders scattered about the room. An old paisley tie just the pattern of today’s Line. Foster was an ingenious man. He could have devised an ingenious murder weapon.
    “So you’re telling me life is meaningless.”
    Foster laughed. “I’m the one who should know. I campaigned for McGovern and then turned around and campaigned for Reagan. Find meaning in that.”
    “Funny thing.” DeWitt’s fingers slipped over the beads one by one. “There’s never any vandalism in the Hollow. It happens over here, right on the good side of town.”
    “So?”
    “So it makes me wonder about rich kids. Remember when you were in high school, Hubert? And my daddy arrested you for DWl? And how the circuit court judge just seemed to drop the case?”
    Foster’s jaw muscles tightened. “You drove drunk, too. You were just never caught.”
    “Well, your