Sixkill

43

I called the Smithfield police and talked with a cop named Cataldo, with whom I had done some business years ago. He confirmed that there was no public transportation.

“Cabs?” I said.

“Not in town.”

“Doesn’t anyone want to leave?” I said.

“They drive,” Cataldo said. “And good riddance.”

“If you wanted to get into Boston and you didn’t have a car, how would you get there?” I said.

“Why would I want to go to Boston?”

“See a ball game?” I said.

“That’s why they make TVs,” Cataldo said.

“Because you are a sophisticated urban guy?”

“Like you?”

“Not that sophisticated,” I said. “How would you get here?”

“Borrow a car or get somebody to drive me.”

“Thank you,” I said. “If you never leave town, what do you do there?”

“Write parking tickets, keep the kids from loitering on the common, play softball, drink beer, bang the old lady.”

“What else is there,” I said.

“This about the kid got killed?” Cataldo said. “Dawn Lopata?”

“Yes,” I said. “Know her?”

“Sure,” Cataldo said. “Not a bad kid, really, just a fuckup. Always getting caught for something, like smoking dope in the girls’ room at school, or cell-phoning nude pictures of herself that ended up on the Internet, or skipping school, or driving after-hours on a learner’s permit. You know? Not evil, just fucked up.”

“How about the family,” I said.

“Old man’s a blow,” Cataldo said. “Big house, nice car, and no cash. You know the type?”

“Sure.”

“Mother stays home mostly; she used to call a lot, see if we knew where her daughter was. Don’t know much else about her.”

“Older brother seems fine,” I said.

“Yeah, good grades, played sports, went to Harvard,” Cataldo said. “I don’t know how he escaped.”

“No trouble with the law,” I said.

“Except for what I told about Dawn, none of them.”

“You know what they got for cars?”

“Yeah, he just got a new one, and was blowing off to me about it.”

“What kind?”

“Cadillac DTS, maroon.”

“The big sedan?”

“Yeah, top of the line,” Cataldo said.

“Anything else you know?”

“Lots,” Cataldo said. “But not about the Lopata family.”

After I hung up, I called Dawn’s friend Christine. They had left Dawn after they lunched with Jumbo. Neither Christine nor James owned a car, and neither she nor James knew how Dawn traveled to Boston on the day of her death.