Small Steps - Louis Sachar [41]
“Well, our mayor seems to think there was quite a bit of harm. She saw what happened to Ginny, and to you, and she wants to get the guy.”
“What will happen to him?” Armpit asked, trying to sound only mildly curious. “Will he have to go to jail?”
“Oh, I doubt it. We’re just talking six hundred dollars.”
He tried not to let his relief show on his face.
“Unless he has a prior criminal record,” said Detective Newberg.
Armpit sat up straight.
“So your initial contact with him was by phone?”
It took Armpit a moment to decipher the question. “Um, yes.”
“I don’t suppose you remember his phone number?”
“No.”
She smiled. Her cheeks turned pink. “I wouldn’t expect you to. So then, where did you meet him?”
“At H-E-B. In the parking lot.”
“And how did you recognize each other?”
“I didn’t. I never saw him before in my life.”
Detective Newberg raised her eyebrows. “What I’m asking is, how did you find each other in the parking lot? How did you know he was the one selling the tickets?”
“Oh.” Armpit noticed his Raincreek cap hanging on the back of the door. “I said I’d be wearing a red cap.”
He got up and got the cap. It felt good to get up and move around.
He showed her the cap, but she didn’t seem all that interested. He put the cap on his head. “So then he drove up beside me, and we bargained a little, like I said, and then I gave him the money, and he gave me the tickets.” He sat back down on the arm of the couch. He removed the cap and set it on the cushion beside him.
“What kind of car was he driving?”
“A white Suburban.”
“And where were you standing?”
“On the curb.”
“In front of the H-E-B?”
“No, a few stores over. I think it was in front of Copy King.”
Why did he say that? Sometimes it felt like the words just jumped out of his mouth.
“Was he the only one in the car?”
“Yeah.”
“So he was driving on the wrong side of the road.”
“He was?”
“If the driver’s side was next to the curb.”
“Oh, yeah, I guess so,” said Armpit. He realized he had to be more careful. “I didn’t notice because there weren’t any other cars around.”
“At five-thirty?” asked Detective Newberg. “Man, I should start shopping there!” She smiled. “The H-E-B by me is jammed that time of day.”
Armpit shrugged.
“So what did he look like?”
“I didn’t get a real good look.”
“You were face to face, weren’t you, when he rolled down his window?”
“I was thinking about the tickets, not what he looked like.”
“Was he white? Black? Hispanic?”
“Kind of black.”
“Kind of black?”
“I think he might have been Iranian.”
Iranian? Where did that come from?
“You think he was Iranian?”
“Maybe part black, part Iranian,” Armpit said. “Now I remember. He said his name was Habib. That’s why I think he’s part Iranian.”
Officer Newberg raised her eyebrows. “Habib?” She wrote the name in her little black notebook.
“Did he speak with an accent?”
“Um, yeah, kind of.”
“An Iranian accent?”
“Yeah.”
“Was he tall? Short? Thin? Fat?”
“Kind of big,” Armpit said. “But it was hard to tell because he was sitting down in his car.”
“How old?”
“Maybe about your age.”
“How old do you think I am?”
He studied her face. “Twenty-three?”
“I’m twenty-eight.” She smiled. “So we’ll say he’s in his twenties. Any distinguishing characteristics?”
“No.”
“Tattoos? Facial hair?”
“Oh, yeah. He had a mustache.”
“Nice of you to mention it.”
“I didn’t think it was important. I mean, he probably shaved it off by now, don’t you think?”
She shrugged. “Anything else come to mind?”
He shook his head.
“You sure?”
“Not that I remember.”
“Okay, well, this is a good start. I’m going to talk to some of the other people seated nearby at the concert. Maybe they also bought their tickets from Habib.”
She gave him a card with her name and phone number on it and told him to call her if he remembered anything else.
He shook her hand. It felt cool and soft.
As he watched her drive away, he felt bad about having to lie to her. She was nice. She had a sweet smile.