He was shaking his head. “I’m already skeptical. You’d be surprised how many so-called ‘accidental crimes’ aren’t so accidental. You bring a loaded gun where it doesn’t belong, the gun goes off by accident—that isn’t really an accidental crime, is it?”
“Then I guess I mean it wasn’t planned.” I wasn’t going to get into details. “So now these three men want nothing more than to set things right. But they aren’t sure how, without …”
“Without facing the consequences.”
“That’s right.”
The small ticket office by the platform was shutting down for the evening. Out front, a gray-haired woman in a large yellow sweater briskly swept a broom across the pavement. A man of about the same age was on his knees by the door, tying twine around stacks of unsold newspapers. I couldn’t help wondering about tomorrow’s front page.
“Maybe there are mitigating circumstances,” Evan said, more to himself than to me. His eyebrows raised. “Was there a car involved?”
He must have seen the surprise register in my face.
“That’s what I thought,” he said. “And I’ll bet there was drinking.”
“A little,” I said. “Nobody was drunk, if that’s what you mean.”
But he’d evidently come to a conclusion. “Time is critical.” And just when I thought that, impossibly, he’d figured out about the kidnapping—that maybe he’d already heard about it on the radio—he said, “In New York, a hit-and-run is a third-degree felony. That’s three to five years in prison. Doesn’t even matter if anybody’s injured. I’m sure the law is similar in New Jersey.” He watched me closely. “The driver of the car is probably terrified, but he needs to understand that the longer he waits to turn himself in, the worse off he’s going to be. And that by waiting, he’s making things a lot worse for his friends.”
We watched the man from the ticket office stack more newspapers.
“If he wants to help his friends,” Evan said, “he’ll confess. He’ll take the blame. Maybe even suggest that his friends tried to get him to stop the car, but he refused. Do you understand this hypothetical advice I’m giving you?”
I was thinking about Jeffrey, how when earlier he’d offered to take the full blame, Nolan and I had called him naive. We were wrong, though. We’d been naive. And how much time had passed now? I glanced at the clock on my dash. Almost two hours since she’d first gotten into my car. Sitting there with Evan, feeling the weight of each passing minute, I wished that I were back in the studio urging Jeffrey on. Write that confession! Take the blame! It seemed so obvious, now. He had gotten us into this trouble. Only he could get us out.
“I need to get going,” I said.
“Are you sure you don’t want to tell me any more?”
I wanted to, but I wasn’t going to. “Thanks,” I said.
“Suit yourself.” He said he’d wait here at the station for the next train. We got his things out of the backseat.
“I was looking forward to golfing this weekend,” he said, and put a hand on my shoulder. “I was going to play well. I just dropped four hundred bucks on a new Callaway driver.”
“Some other time, I hope.” We shook hands.
“You’ve got to remember,” he said, looking me in the eyes, “that these are lifelong decisions you’re making now. Decisions that you can’t unmake. So please, Will, if you think there’s any way I can help—”
“I’ll let you know. I promise.”
I got into the car, still wishing I could have told him more, yet relieved to have spared one friend. But before I’d driven even ten feet, he was waving his arms at me. I stopped the car and rolled down the passenger-side window. He jogged over.
“Get rid of your cell phones! They can be tracked, even if they’re turned off.”
I thought about the phone in my pocket. Nolan and Jeffrey must have had cell phones, too. I thanked him again, rolled up the window, and left him standing there in the empty parking lot with his confusion and his golf clubs.
10
A brief stop for pizza and cigarettes—pack of Marlboro Lights for Marie, pack of Camels for myself, plus two lighters—and then back to the recording studio. Would Marie eat with freedom imminent? It seemed important to come through with the meal I’d promised. Especially after convincing the restaurant to change the order from “the works” to something called “crazy veggie.”
I had a cigarette lit before the key was even in the ignition. As I drove, I smoked and listened to the radio. The whole way to the studio I kept switching stations but heard nothing of our transgressions. When I parked my car behind the studio it was 9:40. It’d been more than two hours now, so why no word? It seemed very strange.
“Where’s Evan?” Jeffrey asked, seeing me enter the studio alone.
“I told you, I didn’t want him involved.”
“But we need him! He could’ve—”
I held up a hand. “Save your breath. He’s already on his way back to New York, so there’s nothing to discuss. One of you, help me carry this stuff over to Marie.”