Westlake, Donald E - Novel 32 by Cops (and) Robbers (missing pg 22-23) (v1.1) Read Free Book Online Page A

subways and
all over the damn place in either spray paint or felt-tip pen, both of which
are very tough to get rid of, particularly from a porous surface like stone.
The fad is for a kid to write his name or his nickname or some magic name he’s
worked out for himself, and then under it write the number of the street he
lives on. “JUAN 135,” for instance, or “BOSS ZOOM 92,” that
kind of thing.
                 The
fad hit the school building. As high as a child’s arm could reach, the names
and numbers were scrawled everywhere on the walls, in black and red and blue
and green and yellow. Some of the signatures were like little paintings,
carefully and lovingly done, and some of them were just splashed and scrawled
on, with runlets of paint dripping down from the bottoms of the letters, but
most of them were simply reports of name and number, without flair or
imagination: “Andy 87,” “Beth 81,” “Moro 103.”
                 At
first, all of that paintwork looked like vandalism and nothing more. But as I
got used to it, to seeing it around, I realized it gave a brightly colored hem
to the gray stone skirt of a building like this, that it had a very sunny Latin
American flavor to it, and that once you got past the prejudice against marking
up public property it wasn’t that bad at all. Of course, I never said this to
anybody.
                 Inside,
we went to the principal’s office, and he said he’d show us where the body was.
Walking down the corridor with us, he said, “The room was a girl’s lavatory, but all of the plumbing is out of it now.
That’s as far as they got with the modernizing plan.” He was balding, about
forty, with a moustache and hom-rim glasses and a slightly prissy manner, as
though he were more sinned against than sinning.
                 We
got curious stares from the teen-agers we passed, so apparently the news wasn’t
general yet about the discovery of the teacher’s body.
                 Ed
said, “Why didn’t you report her missing?”
                 “So
many of these younger teachers,” the principal said, “they’re apt to take two
or three days off without warning, we didn’t think a thing of it. Another
teacher noticed the smell this morning, that’s why she happened to look.”
                 I
said, “We’ll want to talk to her. The other teacher.”
                 “Of
course,” he said. “She’s in the building at the moment. With Miss Evans, what
we think happened, a group of them must have decided to rape her, and took her
in there. At some point she must have fought back. I don’t think they brought
her in there with the intention of killing her.”
                 Intentions
didn’t matter, if she was dead. None of us said any more, until the principal
stopped and pointed at a door and said, “She’s in there.”
                 I
went to the door as Ed said to the principal, “What about her family? You try
calling her at home?”
                 I
opened the door and took a step in, and the smell hit me in the face. Then, in
the dim light through the dirty translucent windows, I saw her lying on the
floor over against the green wall. Plaster showed white where they’d pulled the
sinks out She’d been there for a week, and there were rats in the building.
“God,” I said, and backed out, and slammed the door.
                 The
principal was answering Ed’s question, saying, “She lived alone in—” Then he
noticed, and said, “Oh, Fm terribly sorry! I should have warned you, I
suppose.”
                 Ed
took a step toward me, looking worried. ‘You okay, Tom?”
                 I
waved my hand at him, to keep back away from the room. “Leave it for the
ambulance.” I could feel the blood draining out of my head, a sensation of
coldness in my arms and feet.
                 The
principal,