Time Travelers Never Die - Jack McDevitt [120]
Dave said nothing.
“But it doesn’t have to happen until I’m ready for it.” He looked past Dave, out the window.
“I think you need to tell her,” Dave said gently.
His expression clouded. “I know.” He drew the words out. “I’ll talk to her. At the proper time.”
“Be careful,” Dave said. “She’s already been through a lot.”
“Yeah.”
“You okay?”
He nodded. Dave thought he might say something like Not bad for a dead guy. But he let it go.
CHAPTER 36
He has gone, left, cleared out, bolted.
—CICERO
THE critical question was whether they had in fact buried Adrian Shelborne, or whether there was a possibility of mistaken identity. Neither Dave nor Shel knew anything about police procedure other than what they saw on TV. So, in the morning, Dave set out to pursue the issue.
He started with Jerry, who seemed annoyed that Shel had died, almost as if he had in some way brought it on himself. “I shouldn’t speak ill of the dead,” he told Dave. “He was a decent man, but he never really made his life count.” That was an echo of what Shel had said, but the meaning was different. Jerry thought in terms of a professional reputation and the attendant compensation. He sat behind a polished teak desk. An India rubber plant in a large pot stood by a sun-filled window. The furniture was expensive, padded with leather, ponderous, exuding a sense that whatever went on in the office was significant. Plaques covered the walls, appreciations from civic groups, corporate awards, various licenses and testaments. Photos of his two children were prominently displayed, a boy in a Little League uniform, a girl nuzzling a horse. His wife, who had left him years earlier, was missing.
“Actually,” Dave said, “I thought he did pretty well.”
“I don’t mean money, Dave. But it seems to me a man has an obligation to live as part of his community. To participate in community functions. To help out. To belong to, say, the Optimists. Support one of the churches.”
“I’ve a question for you,” Dave said.
“Go ahead.”
“In a case like this, how thoroughly do the police check the identity of the victim? I mean, it’s Shel’s house. He’s the only one in it. So I was wondering if they might figure who else could it be? And maybe they just don’t bother going further.”
Jerry shook his head. “The cops are usually pretty careful about that sort of thing, Dave. Now understand, criminal law isn’t my field, but they’d be crazy simply to make assumptions in a situation like this. They’d be opening themselves up to all kinds of liability. Which is why they check the dental records.”
“They said they did. But is there a chance they might not have gone to the trouble? Because they were already sure?”
“No. Believe me, it’s no trouble. And they’re not going to risk lawsuits and public embarrassment. If they say it was Shel, you can believe that’s who it was.”
“I’m sorry to hear it.”
He shrugged. “It’s the way life is sometimes.” He rose, signaling that the interview was over.
They walked toward the door. “You know,” Dave said, “this experience has a little bit of déjà vu about it.”
Jerry paused with his hand on the knob. “How do you mean?”
“There was a language teacher at Princeton, where I got my doctorate. Same thing happened to him. He lived alone, and one night a gas main let go and blew up the whole house. They buried him, then found out it wasn’t him at all. He’d gone on an unannounced holiday to Vermont, and turned his place over to a friend. They didn’t find out until several days after the funeral.”
Jerry shrugged. The colossal stupidity loose in the world was no surprise to him. “Unfortunately,” he said, “there’s not much chance of that here.”
DAVE probably shouldn’t have tried to see how Helen was doing because his own emotions were still churning. But he called her from a drugstore, and she said yes, she’d like to see him, and suggested lunch. They met at an Applebee’s on City Avenue.
She looked worn, dazed, and her eyes were bloodshot.
Nothing