I couldn't get anything to come to mind. Not even the memory of a comic-strip-wrapped gift. I was certain those started arriving two years later, when I was seven.
The silence was finally broken by the chirping of the cell phone clipped to Bobby's waist. He retrieved it, exchanged a few terse words, slid a look at me sideways. He flipped it shut, seemed about to speak, then the phone rang again.
This time, his voice was different. Polite, professional. The voice of a detective addressing a stranger. He seemed to be trying to work out a meeting, and it wasn't going his way
"When do you leave for the conference? I'll be honest, sir, I need to meet with you as soon as possible. It involves one of your former professors. Russell Granger—"
Even I could hear the sudden squawk on the other end of the line. And then, that quickly, Bobby was nodding.
"Where do you live again? Lexington. As a matter of fact, I happen to be right around the corner."
He glanced at me. I answered with a shrug, grateful that I didn't have to elaborate. Obviously, Bobby was trying to set up an interview with my father's former boss and obviously it needed to happen now.
I didn't mind. Of course, there was no way in hell I was waiting in the car.
Chapter 32
TIME TO TAKE Bella for a walk," Bobby announced as he drove through a winding side street just north of the Minuteman Statue in Lexington Center. Paul Schuepp had given his house number as 58. Bobby spotted 26, then 32, so he was moving in the right direction. "Looks like a nice area to stretch your legs."
Annabelle took it about as well as he expected. "Ha ha ha. Very funny."
"I mean it. This is an official police investigation."
"Then you'd better start deputizing me, because I'm going in." House number 48… There, the white colonial with the red brick facade. "You know, it's not exactly the Wild Wild West anymore."
"Have you read the latest accounts of shootings in the city? Could've fooled me."
Bobby pulled into the driveway. He had a decision to make. Spend ten minutes of the thirty Schuepp had agreed to spare arguing with Annabelle, or let her tag along and receive another lecture on proper policing techniques from D.D. He was still annoyed from his last conversation with the sergeant, which, frankly, didn't work in D.D.'s favor.
Bobby popped his door and didn't say a word as Annabelle followed suit.
"Detective Sinkus tracked down Charlie Marvin," he filled her in as they headed for the front door. "Marvin spent the night at the Pine Street Inn, from midnight to eight a.m. Nine homeless and three staff members vouched for him. So whoever came to your building with that gift, it wasn't him."
Annabelle merely grunted. No doubt Charlie Marvin made a good suspect in her mind. On the one hand, he was an urban cross between a priest and Santa Claus. On the other hand, he wasn't her father.
Bobby would like to say he didn't believe Annabelle's father had returned from the dead either. Except he was growing more and more puzzled by the hour. Mr. Petracelli had been a poignant lesson in the power of obsession. Bobby would have an officer follow up on Mr. Petracelli's whereabouts late last night, though, in all honesty, delivering comic-strip-wrapped presents was probably a shade too subtle for someone who was obviously mad as a hatter.
The sketch was the key, Bobby decided. Who had Russell Granger known, and why had he felt threatened nearly two years before filing that first police report?
It had become clear to Bobby within the first five minutes of meeting Walter Petracelli that Annabelle's former neighbor didn't hold the key to those answers. Perhaps Bobby would get luckier with Russell's former boss, whom Bobby had first buzzed at seven this morning from outside Annabelle's apartment. Seemed lately all he did was work his cell phone. Yet, still the demands on his time had D.D. operating behind his back. Reaching out to the ME in a thinly veiled attempt to bolster her own theory of the case… just thinking about it pissed him off all over again.
Bobby found the brass knocker, strategically located in the middle of a giant wreath of red berries. Three knocks and half a dozen berry droppings later, the door swung open.
Bobby's first impression of Paul Schuepp: about two inches taller than Yoda and two years younger than dirt. The small, wizened former head of MIT's mathematics department had sparse gray hair, an age-spotted scalp, and rheumy blue eyes that peered out from beneath bushy white eyebrows. Schuepp's face was sinking down with the years, revealing red-rimmed eyelids, shaky jowls, and extra folds of skin flapping around his neck.
Schuepp stuck out a gnarled hand, catching Bobby's arm in an unexpectedly firm grip. "Come in, come in. Good to see you, Detective. And this is… ?"