“How’d Donovan take being fired?”
“Not well,” Schultze said. He rocked back in his padded leather chair and folded his hands across his belly. “He blamed several young boys of plotting against him, even saying they’d been the ones who’d stolen the electronics. He threatened to sue the school when the parents of the boy filed charges. And he threatened me with violence. We had to have the police escort him from campus.”
“What exactly did he say to you?”
“He claimed I’d ruined his name,” Schultze said. He removed the stylish eyeglasses. He blew a warm breath on a lens and cleaned it with a tissue. “And that he wished to kick the crap out of me.”
“Subtle.”
“He’s a sick man,” Schultze said. “There’s an aura of meanness about him. He wouldn’t speak to you or look you in the eye. The only time I ever saw him animated was when he’d talk to some of the instructors about firefighting. He claimed to have been a volunteer firefighter.”
“Which is not true.”
“He said a lot of things that turned out not to be true.”
“What else?”
“He said he was a decorated Marine.”
“Did he have a military record?”
“None,” he said. “Were you in the service, Mr. Spenser?”
“Army,” I said. “For a few years.”
“I was in the Air Force,” he said. “You and I probably have similar feelings about those who lie about their service.”
I nodded. I didn’t do much in the Army, but I wasn’t overly fond of liars of any type.
“His stories on firefighting and his time in the Marines were very detailed,” Schultze said. “He put a lot of thought into his imaginary life as a hero of some sort.”
“So what ever happened to the assault charges against our Walter Mitty?”
Schultze leaned his elbows on his desk. I heard buckets being tossed back into the marsh, lots of laughing, and more sloshing. The muck bubbled up and turned the surface water a deep brown. A sign above his desk said GIFTED MINDS NEED CREATIVE INSTRUCTION. The school was brick and stately, with numerous state and national awards displayed in the halls.
I bet a free pony probably came with the price of tuition.
He threw up his hands and shook his head. “The boy’s family decided not to press charges,” he said. “I was very disappointed. But our board of directors were privately pleased. If this had made the news, we would have lost so many students. We are much, much better about our new hiring process.”
“Any idea why they dropped the charges?”
“The family has had some personal hardships,” Schultze said. “There was a terrible fire at their home. They lost everything and they had to move. I believe they let go of the case because of all the pressure.”
“Aha,” I said.
“You don’t think—”
“I’m not a fan of coincidence,” I said. “Where did the family live?”
42
The thing about bad guys,” I said, “is that sooner or later they’ll tell you the truth.”
I was behind the wheel of my Explorer in Southie that afternoon, riffing my years of wisdom like John Coltrane on playing sax, Y. A. Tittle on throwing touchdowns, or Carmen Miranda doing the samba. Z leaned back in the passenger seat, his eyes slightly closed, but I was pretty sure he was still awake.
“Get them talking,” he said, “and they can’t shut up.”
“Unless they’re shooting at you. If they’re shooting, you should delay the conversation until later.”
“A medicine man told me the same thing,” Z said. “But he was speaking of the white man. Not hoods.”
“You can always call me,” I said. “When you need advice. Or the medicine man. Whichever one of us is relevant.”
“Or ask your buddies in L.A.”
“Chollo and I would offer very different guidance,” I said. “But Bobby Horse? He and I might share the same opinion.”
Johnny Donovan kept his security office in a one-story brick building in a weedy lot behind a chain-link fence. I figured he didn’t want anyone stealing the weeds or junked old fire trucks haphazardly parked. We had parked along D Street, not far off Old Colony.
“We don’t want to confront him,” Z said.
“No,” I said. “Not yet.”
“But you want him to know that we’re tailing him,” Z said. “That we’re interested.”
“Let’s just see where he leads us,” I said. “We have little else going for us.”
“So, what do we know about this guy?”
“Donovan appears to be a true lunatic,” I said. “He’s been arrested three times for impersonating cops. He lost a job three years ago as a maintenance guy at a rich private school. He was accused of stealing electronics and later of slapping a young boy. The case was nol-prossed.”
“Lovely.”