After ten minutes the window rolled back up. The Saab remained.

Nothing moved. Nothing happened. After half an hour the Saab engine turned over. The lights went on. And the Saab pulled out of the lot. Jesse made no attempt to follow. Instead he drove back to Seascape, taking his time, and checked the parking lot. The Saab was there. Jesse looked at the clock on his dashboard. 9:40. All of him was tired. His legs felt heavy. His shoulders were hunched. His eyes kept closing on him.

“You can only do what you can do,” Jesse said aloud, and turned

the car and went home.

49

Jesse was in the Essex County Court in Salem, sitting in a conference room with Martin Reagan, the ADA on the case, Rita Fiore, and lawyers for Feeney and Drake. Feeney’s lawyer was a

husky dark-eyed woman named Emily Frank, and Drake was represented by a loud-voiced man with a full white beard named Richard DeLuca.

“We don’t have to consult you,

Jesse,” Reagan said. “But we

thought your input might be useful in arriving at a plea bargain.”

Jesse nodded. Rita smiled at him. Jesse could feel the smile in

his stomach.

“None of these boys is a hardened

criminal,” Rita said. “All of

them are under eighteen. We’re thinking of no jail time.”

“They need jail time,” Jesse said.

“We were thinking probation, counseling, and community service,”

Rita said.

Jesse shook his head.

“They need jail time,” he said.

“Doesn’t have to be long, and it

doesn’t have to be hard time. It can be in a juvenile facility. But

they gang-raped a sixteen-year-old-girl and photographed her naked and threatened her and harassed her.”

“Hell, Chief, weren’t you ever a teenage boy? They’re hormones

with feet.”

“I was,” Jesse said. “And my

hormones were jumping through my

skin like everybody else’s. But I never raped anyone, did you?”

“We’re not condoning what they

did,” Emily Frank said. “Richard

was just suggesting that their youth made them less able to control themselves.”

“You think they didn’t know it was

wrong?” Jesse

said.

The lawyers were quiet.

“You think they couldn’t control

themselves?”

“Well,” Rita said. “They

didn’t.”

“No they didn’t,” Jesse said.

Rita met his eyes, and again he could feel it.

“But what purpose is served by locking these children up?” Emily

Frank said.

“You know that scale of justice, outside. What they did to

Candace Pennington will tip it pretty far down, and it will take a lot more than probation and community service to balance it out.”

“Well,” Reagan said. “What would

you recommend.”

“I recommend that I take each one into a spare cell and beat the

crap out of him and send him home.”

“You can’t do that,” Emily Frank

said.

“I know,” Jesse said.

“It’s too simple.”

“It’s barbaric,” Emily Frank

said.

Rita looked mildly amused.

“And illegal,” Emily Frank said.

“I know.”

“What would they learn about right and wrong from that?”

“Nothing,” Jesse said. “But

they’d know what hurts and what

doesn’t.”

“Thanks for your input, Jesse,” Reagan said. “We’ll go it alone

from here.”

Jesse nodded and stood up. He felt Rita watching him.

“I think you should know,” Emily Frank said, “that I for one

haven’t found this meeting useful.”

“I never thought it would be,” Jesse said, and walked out of the

room.

Rita followed him.

“This will take all day,” she said

“Are you free for

dinner?”

“Sure,” Jesse said.

“I’ll pick something up and come to your place.”

“Really,” Jesse said.

“About seven,” Rita said.

“Seven,” Jesse said.

Rita turned and walked back along the second-floor corridor to the conference room. At the door she turned.

“Probably eat about nine or ten,” she said and grinned and went

in.

50

The town beach was empty, except for a woman in a pink down jacket running a Jack Russell terrier. Jesse stood for a moment under the little pavilion that served, as far as Jesse could tell, no useful purpose. Twenty feet to his left Kenneth Eisley’s body

had rolled about at the tidal margin, until the ocean receded. The first one. Jesse looked out at the rim of the gray ocean, where it merged with the gray sky. It seemed longer ago than it was.

They’d

found him in November, and now it was the start of February. Dog was still with Valenti. Too long. Dog shouldn’t be in a shelter

that long. I got to find someone to take the dog.

Beaches

were cold places in February. Jesse was wearing a turtleneck and a sheepskin jacket. He pulled his watch cap down over his ears, and pushed his hands into the pockets of his coat. I know who killed you, Kenneth. He stepped off the little pavilion and onto the sand. He was above the high tide line where the mingle of seaweed and flotsam made a ragged line. Ahead of him the Jack Russell raced down at the ocean as it rolled in and barked at it, and dodged back when it got close. He was taunting the ocean. I know who killed the lady in the mall, and the guy in the church parking lot. I know who killed Abby. Jesse trudged along the sand, feeling it shift slightly beneath his feet as he walked.

Now me? He could think of no reasonable explanation for

why they would go out in the evening and take pictures of his home.

The day was not windy, and the ocean’s movement was gently rounded,

with only an occasional crest of the waves. There was something about oceans. The day he left LA he went to Santa Monica and looked at the Pacific. Despite their perpetual movement there was a stillness about oceans. Despite the sound of the waves, there was a great silence. The empty beach and the limitless ocean hinted at the vast secret of things. He’d gotten their attention. They were

reacting to him. It was a start. If I stay with them maybe they’ll make a run at me, and I’ll have them.

He smiled to

himself. Or they’ll have me. He stopped and looked out at

the ocean. High up, a single herring gull circled slowly above the ocean, looking down, hoping for food. Nothing moved on the horizon.

I guess if they get me I won’t care much.

In front of him

the Jack Russell yapped urgently at his owner. She took a ball from her backpack and threw it awkwardly, the way girls throw. The dog raced after it. Caught up with it, pounced on it with his forepaws, bumped it with his nose, grabbed it in his mouth and shook it to death.

Looking at the ocean, Jesse thought about Abby. She hadn’t found

the man of her dreams. She’d hoped that Jesse would make her happy,

but he hadn’t. Nothing much did. She wanted things too hard, she

needed things too much, she had her own private fight with alcohol.

Sometimes her sexuality embarrassed her. The gull had moved inland, looking for landfill or roadkill, or maybe a discarded Moon Pie.

Nothing moved above the ocean now. I wish I could have loved you, Abby. He reached the end of the beach, where the huge sea-smooth rocks loomed up, and beyond them, expensive houses with a view. So long, Ab. He turned and started back along the

beach. The Jack Russell had left too, joining his owner in a silver Audi coupe, just pulling out of the parking lot. The dog had his head out the window, and though it was far away, Jesse could faintly hear him yapping. The cold air was clean off the ocean, and he liked the way it felt as it went into his lungs. I wonder if

they are going to try to kill me. When he got to the aimless little pavilion Jesse paused again and looked out at the ocean again. Nothing alive was in sight. He was alone. He breathed in, and stood listening to the quiet sound of the ocean, and the soft sound of his breathing. I wonder if they will succeed.