The Juror Read Free Page B

and she takes Seminary Lane up the hill away from the lake. A pair of big three-story Queen Anne elephants
     to the right, with a view to the water. On the left are homelier cottages. She slows and turns at their own small bungalow.
     She tells Oliver, “OK, you got two minutes to change your clothes, then I’m taking you to work with me.”
    “Mom!” Panicky whine. “I’m supposed to meet Jesse at the churchyard—”
    “Can’t help you. I promised Mr. Slivey. Got to post some orders, that’s all. Only an hour or so—”
    “Mom, in an hour it’ll be
dark.
Jeez, I trashed the whole freakin afternoon at Mrs. Kolodny’s and now you tell me—”
    “Two minutes, you miserable little snot. Hustle.”

    T HE TEACHER waits in the red Lotus S4. He’s got Vivaldi’s Concerto Grosso in A Minor coming over the Magnus. He’s parked on a side street,
     which runs into Seminary Lane two hundred yards ahead of him. His car sits under a linden tree, under a razor-blue sky. He
     has the speaker turned up on the cellular phone, and his friend at DMV is telling him:
    “License JXA-385 is registered to an Annie Laird. Address: 48 Seminary Lane, Pharaoh, New York. Anything else?”
    The Teacher speaks above the violins. “This woman has a son. He’s twelve years old, I presume he’s in elementary school or
     middle school somewhere around here. Could you find out something about him?”
    “I can try.”
    “Don’t push, don’t force it. Drop it if you can’t finesse it.”
    Skirl of wind. Leaf-shadow trembling on the red hood before him. A girl sails past on her bike. Liquid-limbed, maybe sixteen.
     Her near haunch is piston-straight as she coasts past. She seems to admire his red car. Am I too conspicuous, he wonders,
     in such a vivid red Lotus on such a plain street? Am I taking unnecessary risks?
    I am, yes.
    He whistles along with the flute.
    The cellular phone buzzes, and he touches the panel.
    “Yes.”
    Eddie’s voice: “Vincent. She’s coming out of her house now.”
    “With her child?”
    “Yeah. With.”
    “They don’t see you?”
    “No. I’m parked way down. OK, they’re getting in her car.”
    “Careful. I think she sounded somewhat frightened in court today. She might be looking for a tail. If she comes your way—”
    “She’s not gonna. She’s going up
your
way, Vincent—and she’s in a fuckin hurry.”
    “
Up
the hill?”
    “Yeah.”
    “Get on her, Eddie.”
    “Yeah.”
    “But give her plenty of room. If you lose her, that’s no tragedy, we’ll pick her up some other time—but
don’t let her spot you.
”
    Then the Teacher waits.
    A moment later, he sees Annie Laird’s car blur by, on Seminary Lane. Only one glimpse of her. Her worn-at-the-edges loveliness.
    Next, Eddie’s car passes by.
    The Teacher pulls out, but he doesn’t follow them. He drives the other way, back down the hill. To his right a few houses,
     then a long stand of woods, and then he comes to her rusted mailbox. He eases up, his eyes prowling.
    Across the road is another stand of trees, sloping down toward some big houses and the lake. Must be a stunning view in the
     pitch of winter, with the trees bare, but for now there’s still some feeling of seclusion. On Annie’s side of the street the
     next bungalow is a hundred yards down, and there’s a prim wood fence in between.
    He pulls into her drive. Takes his car all the way to the back, to the space between the bungalow and the old wood barn behind
     it.
    Quiet back here.
    He attaches the phone to his belt. Takes his Heckler & Koch P7 from the glove compartment and slips it into the shoulder holster
     under his jacket. He reaches under the seat and draws out his doctor’s bag.
    As he walks up to the bungalow a male mockingbird opens up in the big Indian bean tree above him.
Mimus polyglottos
, the Teacher’s favorite.
    Two cracked-concrete steps up to the back porch. The screen door whimpers as he opens it. Wasps’ nests over the lintel—that