The Executioner

Ninety

James Reed’s living room had a hardwood floor and an L-shaped sofa that faced a large wall-mounted flat-screen TV. The curtains were drawn shut. The only light came from a single pedestal lamp in a corner, positioned to illuminate a large round table. On it, thousands of pieces of an unfinished jigsaw puzzle were perfectly separated into color groups. All the border pieces had already been assembled, forming a large rectangular frame. Reed was an aficionado and very organized, Hunter noted.

‘Seven and a half thousand pieces,’ Reed confirmed, following Hunter’s gaze. ‘It won’t take me long to finish it,’ he admitted proudly. ‘I only started it yesterday. Do you like jigsaw puzzles, detective?’

Hunter looked up from the pieces on the table. ‘I do.’

‘There’s no better exercise for a human’s analytical and visual mind.’ Reed paused by the table. His eyes studied the pieces and he picked one up, slotting it into place at the top right-hand corner. ‘It’s also very therapeutic,’ he said before motioning both detectives to the seating area.

Hunter and Garcia sat on the sofa while Reed took the antique-looking chair facing them.

‘Is it a particular student you’re after?’ Read asked, crossing his legs and resting his hands on his knees.

‘Yes,’ Hunter replied, placing the old Compton High yearbook on the glass coffee table in front of them and flipping it open. ‘He wasn’t from your year. Three years your senior. His name’s Brett Stewart Nichols.’

James Reed tensed and shuffled on his seat.

‘This is him.’ Hunter pointed to the photograph in the center of the page – a skinny kid with wild black hair and energetic dark brown eyes.

Reed made no effort to look at it. His unflinching eyes stayed on Hunter. ‘I don’t need to look at the picture. I remember him.’

‘What do you remember about him?’

Reed ran a hand over his mouth a couple of times as he searched for the right words. ‘He… wasn’t a very nice person.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘What did he do, detective? Did he kill someone? That wouldn’t surprise me. In school he could easily have been classed as a psychopath in the making.’

Neither detectives were expecting that statement.

‘Why do you say that? Can you tell us a little more about him?’

Reed leaned back, his shoulders tense. ‘He was a bully. He didn’t go to school to learn. School was just a place full of weaker kids he and his friends could push around.’

‘Did he push you around?’ Hunter watched every subtle movement and reaction.

Reed chuckled nervously before retrieving a cherry ChapStick from his pocket and running it over his lips. ‘They pushed everyone around. It didn’t matter what grade you were in. They didn’t care. People were scared of them.’

‘Scared?’

‘You know, when the word bully was used back then, people just imagined a foul-mouthed pupil calling other students names. Maybe teasing them because they were a little overweight or dressed funny or weren’t very good at sports, but not Brett and his friends. If you could imagine a modern-day street gangster with a severe attitude problem being taken back in time, then you’d probably come close to what kind of person Brett was.’ Reed paused and scratched his chin apprehensively. ‘There was this girl I remember. Katherine, I think her name was. She wasn’t in my class. I was a freshman, she was a junior, but I remember she was quite shy, very chubby, always by herself. She wasn’t an attractive girl – strange, hawk-like nose, unaligned teeth, bad hair and deep-set eyes behind big thick glasses. Brett and his friends loved tormenting her. Every time they saw her they’d make loud pig noises and call her names. Anyway, one day, I think it was during fifth period, they followed her into a bathroom and while she was in her cubicle, from over the partition of the adjacent one, they poured a bucket of human excrement over her.’

Garcia grimaced.

‘Did anyone see Brett doing it?’ Hunter asked.

‘No, but everyone knew no one else in Compton High would’ve been capable of something like that.’

‘Nobody ever notified the authorities or the school principal?’ Garcia asked.

‘I don’t think there were any witnesses to that specific incident.’

‘How about bullying in general?’ Hunter asked. ‘Did they simply get away with it all the time?’

Reed looked at Hunter. ‘Do you understand how bullying works, detective?’

Hunter met his stare. ‘Yes. Intimidation.’

‘That’s right, intimidation, and they were very good at it. In and out of school. They’d do things like what they did to this Katherine girl just for fun. No reason, no major grudge against anyone, just because they liked pushing people around and it made them laugh. Imagine what they’d do if you crossed them and they wanted to get back at you.’

‘This gang you refer to, how many were there? Could you point them out to us?’ Hunter pushed the yearbook towards Reed.

‘I can’t really remember.’ Reed shrugged, ignoring the book. ‘It was twenty-five years ago. I was a freshman, Brett was a senior. I tried my best to keep out of their way, as did everyone else. But Brett wasn’t the worst one. He wasn’t the-’ he drew quotation marks in the air ‘-leader.’

Hunter exchanged a quick look with Garcia. ‘So who was?’

Reed pinched his lip for a moment. ‘You still haven’t told me what this is about, detective. Is he wanted for questioning?’

‘Not exactly,’ Hunter replied.

Reed studied Hunter and Garcia. ‘Wait a minute. You guys are homicide, right? Did someone finally kill Brett?’ A thin smile played on his lips.

‘Do you think someone would have reason to?’

‘Did you listen to anything I said?’ Reed frowned. ‘They terrorized everyone in that school. Some students and at least one teacher quit Compton High because of them. It wouldn’t surprise me at all if they became hardened criminals after they left school.’

Hunter leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees. ‘Would it surprise you if I told you Brett Stewart Nichols became a Catholic priest?’

Reed stared at both detectives. ‘Are you serious?’

No reply.

‘They say redemption isn’t beyond anyone, but yes, that would surprise me immensely.’

‘The leader,’ Garcia questioned again, pushing the open yearbook closer to Reed. ‘Who was he?’

Reed’s eyes finally drifted towards the book. For a minute he flipped through the pages before pausing and glaring at a picture on the bottom left-hand corner for a long while. A nervous muscle flexed on his jaw as he tapped the photo with his right index finger.

‘Him.’