Thomas Johnston has a full head of bushy black hair and black eyebrows, deep brown eyes. He strides into the police station clearly incensed. I notice him immediately. Despite his dark coloring, and darker expression, the resemblance to his blond sister is striking: the same long face, the widely spaced cheekbones, the pointed nose. You’d know they were related without being told.
He does not meet anyone’s eyes as he’s shown to my desk, where I’m still going through the rest of the tickets. I lead him to an interview room, offer to get him a glass of water. He refuses, and sits down. He looks as if he hasn’t shaved in a week. He is not unattractive, despite all this. With his delicate, almost feminine features he is a pretty, pretty boy.
“I don’t know why you asked to see me,” he says as I turn on the video recorder. He’s slouching in the chair.
“You are your sister’s alibi, at least for part of the evening that John Taylor was killed,” I say. “Yet there’s the matter of this ticket, which puts you quite near the scene of the death at 6:27 PM.” I can smell his unwashed body. This is not a man who takes care of himself. Repulsive, really. Yet I think of MJ’s lifelong devotion to him. The age difference must be roughly the same as the one between Gregory and myself. But MJ took on the role of protecting and nurturing her brother, whereas mine needed to be protected against me. My on-again, off-again shrink tells me this was because my parents had created a “safe” environment. If the emotional situation had been riskier for either you or your brother, you would have clung together, she’s told me on more than one occasion. According to this philosophy, we would have been more devoted to each other if we’d had less love from our parents. I’m not sure I believe that. I still crush spiders with more force than I need to. I speed up when motorists are trying to merge. There is this streak in me that I must fight against, especially with Peter.
“So tell me where you were the afternoon and evening of Friday, May 10,” I say.
Thomas glowers for a moment before answering.
“I came down to visit MJ,” he says. “I knew she’d be at work until at least 5:30, but I didn’t want to hit rush hour, so I started down early—around 3 PM. Since MJ wouldn’t be home for at least another two and a half hours, I stopped in Palo Alto and walked around, went into a bunch of different stores. As it turned out, though, MJ was home, but I didn’t know that, and by the time I got to her house, she was running errands. So I didn’t actually see her until after 7:30.”
“So can anyone verify your whereabouts between 6:30—the time you got the ticket—and the time you finally saw MJ?” I ask.
“I’m not sure. I wasn’t watching the clock. It was probably after 7:30, but before 8,” he says “And, no, no one. I was driving between Palo Alto and Los Gatos between 6:30 and 7:00. And after 7:00 I was waiting at her house, alone.” He smiled at something then.
“What?” I ask.
“I had a key,” he says. “It drove John crazy that I could—and did—walk into the house whenever I wanted. But MJ was adamant: Her house was my house.”
“What about before 6:30? What were you doing?” I ask.
“I was just walking around downtown. I suppose you could ask in the stores if they remember me,” he says. “I personally doubt it, but you never know.”
We sit there a moment, looking at each other. I frankly don’t know what to ask next.
“What was your relationship with John Taylor like?” I say, finally.
“Very friendly, the key notwithstanding.”
“How friendly?” I ask.
“He was generous with money when I was out of work,” he says. “I counted him as a true friend.”
I’m surprised at this, at the thought that anyone would trust Thomas with money or friendship. “How much money are we talking?”
He pauses and appears to be calculating. Then he says, “Maybe fifty thousand over the years. More or less.”
“John Taylor gave you fifty thousand dollars?” I ask. “It wasn’t a loan?” Again, I’m incredulous. Such a ridiculously large amount of money—almost as much as I make a year.
“No,” says Thomas. “Like I said, he was a very generous man.” He then says, “All that generosity died with him, you know. I would be the last person to benefit from his death. Unfortunately, he was on the verge of giving me more money. Had promised me another 10k the week before he died. I’ve been kinda down on my luck lately. And I had an idea for a new business venture.”
“Do you have any proof of this?” I ask. “Of the money given, or promised?”
“No,” he says. “This was all a gentleman’s agreement. John was that kind of person.”
Something about Thomas, something about his sleek complexion and the expression in his wide-set eyes, makes him appear to be holding back, to have secrets. It makes me think that if I just poked him a little, in the right way, other stuff might come out, perhaps relevant to this case, perhaps not. So I decide to poke.