I look at him.
“Hank was crushed by what happened to Leo and Diana.”
“That’s not the same thing as ‘honoring.’”
“You really don’t know?”
I assume the question is rhetorical.
“Hank took the same walk pretty much every day. You know that, right?”
“Right,” I say. “He started at the Path, by the middle school.”
“And do you know where he ended up?”
It suddenly feels like a cold finger is traveling down the back of my neck.
“The railroad tracks,” David says. “Hank ended his walk on the exact spot where . . . well, you know.”
There is a buzzing in my ears. My words seem to be coming from very far away now. “So every day, Hank started his walk by the old military base”—I’m trying not to sputter—“and ended it where Leo and Diana died?”
“I thought you knew.”
I shake my head.
“Some days he would time the walk,” David continues. “A couple of times . . . well, this was strange.”
“What?”
“He’d ask me to drive him so he could time how long a car ride would take.”
“A car ride between the military base and the tracks on the other side of town?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“He never said. He was jotting down calculations and muttering to himself.”
“Calculating what?”
“I don’t know.”
“But he was focused on how long it would take to get from one place to another?”
“Focused?” David is quiet for a moment. Then he says, “I’d say he was more like obsessed. I only saw him at the tracks, I don’t know, three or four times. It would be when I took the train into the city and we’d drive by him. He was always crying. He cared, Nap. He wanted to honor the dead.”
I try to absorb all this. I ask David for more details, but there is nothing. I ask him about anything else he might know connecting Hank to Leo, connecting Hank to the Conspiracy Club, connecting Hank to Rex, Maura, and Beth, connecting Hank to anything else about the past. But again I come up empty.
David Rainiv pulls up to the front of Ellie and Bob’s house. I thank him. We shake hands. He reminds me again that if anything is needed to give Hank a proper funeral, he’s ready to step up. I nod. I see he wants to ask something more but he shakes it off.
“I don’t have to know what’s on the tape,” he says.
I get out and watch him drive off.
Ellie and Bob’s lawn is manicured as though they are preparing for a PGA Tour event. Their flower boxes are coordinated and symmetrical to the point that the right half of the house looks like a precise mirror image of the left. Bob opens the door and greets me with the big smile and the firm handshake.
Bob works in commercial real estate, though I don’t quite get exactly what he does with it. He’s a terrific guy, and I would take a bullet for him. We tried going out a few times on our own to Yag’s Sports Bar to watch some NCAA March Madness or the NHL playoffs—Bro Time—but the truth is, our relationship fizzles without Ellie. We are both okay with this. I have heard that men and women can’t be friends without there being some kind of sexual component, but at the risk of sounding horribly PC, that’s horseshit.
Ellie comes over more warily than usual and kisses me on the cheek. I think we both know after the whole meeting with Lynn Wells that there is unfinished business between us, but right now I have bigger concerns.
“I have the video camera out in the workshop,” Bob says. “It doesn’t have a charge yet, but as long as you keep it plugged in, it works.”
“Thanks.”
“Uncle Nap!”
Their two girls, Leah, age nine, and Kelsi, age seven, come ripping around the corner as only two young girls can. They both wrap their arms around me as only two young girls can, nearly tackling me with their loving onslaught. I would do a lot more than take a bullet for Leah and Kelsi—I would shoot plenty in return.
As godfather to both—and a man with virtually no other family—I dote on Leah and Kelsi and spoil them right up to the line where Ellie and Bob have to admonish me. I quickly ask them now about school, and they enthusiastically tell me. I’m no fool. They are getting older and soon they won’t tear around the corner so fast, but I’m okay with that. Some might wonder whether I feel a pang, not having a family of my own yet or missing being an uncle for your kids.
We would have made great uncles for each other’s kids, Leo.
Ellie starts to shoo them off me. “Okay, girls, that’s enough. Uncle Nap has to do something in the workshop with Daddy.”
“What does he have to do?” Kelsi asks.
“Some work stuff,” Bob says to her.
Leah: “What kind of work stuff?”
Kelsi: “Is it police work stuff, Uncle Nap?”
Leah: “Are you catching bad guys?”
“Nothing that dramatic,” I say, and then I wonder whether they know the word “dramatic” and then I don’t like saying that since “nothing dramatic” may be a lie so I add, “I just need to watch this tape.”
“Ooo, can we watch?” Leah asks.
Ellie rescues me from that. “You certainly cannot. Go set the table.”
They do very little moaning before heading off to do their chore. Bob and I head toward the workshop in the garage. A sign above the door reads BOB’S WORKSHOP. The sign is carved in wood, and every letter is a different color. As you might expect, you could film handyman how-to videos in Bob’s workshop. The tools are hung in size order, equidistant from one another. Lumber and piping are stored in perfect pyramids against the back wall. Fluorescent fixtures hang from the ceiling. Plastic bins, all properly labeled, hold nails, screws, fasteners, connectors. The floor is snap-together rubber modules. All the colors in the room are neutral and soothing. There is no dirt, no sawdust, nothing to dispel the relative calm of the place.
I can’t hammer a nail, but I see why Bob loves being in here.
The camera sitting on the workbench is an exact match—a Canon PV1—and I wonder whether it is indeed your old one. Like I said, Dad gave away most of your stuff. Maybe somehow that camera ended up with Ellie and Bob, who knows? The Canon PV1 stands upright with the viewing lens on the top. Bob turns it over and presses the eject button. He reaches back for me to hand him the cassette. I do. He sticks it in and pushes it into the designated slot.
“It’s ready,” Bob tells me. “You just hit the play button here”—he points to it—“and you can watch it here.” Bob pulls on something, and a little screen hinges out from the side.
Everything about this is reminding me of you. Not in a pleasant way.
“I’ll be in the kitchen if you need any help,” Bob says.
“Thanks.”
Bob heads back into the house, closing the door behind him. No reason for me to drag this out. I hit the play button. It starts with static, which then gives way to darkness. The only thing I can see is the date stamp.
One week before you and Diana were killed.
The picture is shaky, like whoever is holding the camera is walking. It gets shakier, so that maybe whoever was walking is now running. I can’t make out anything yet. Just black. I think I hear something, but it’s faint.
I find the volume knob and turn it all the way up.
The shaking stops, but the picture is still too dark to make anything out. Playing with the brightness knob doesn’t help, so I turn out the lights for better contrast. The garage turns spooky now, the tools more menacing in the shadows. I stare hard at the small screen.
Then I hear a voice from the past say, “Is it on, Hank?”
My heart stops.
The voice on the tape is yours.
Hank says, “Yeah, it’s on.”
Then another voice: “Point it up at the sky, Hank.”
It’s Maura. My stopped heart explodes in my chest.
I put my hands on the workbench to steady myself. Maura sounds animated. I remember that tone so well. I watch now as the camera pans up. Hank had been pointing the lens at the ground. As he raises it, I can see the lights from the military base.
You again, Leo: “Do you guys still hear it?”
“I do. It’s faint, though.”
That sounds like Rex.