“Yes,” Howard said. “Yes, Mr. Demarkian, that’s it. Some people who lived in the park saw him walking around that last night, and then that was it.”
“There are clothes back there in a closet. Did you go through those at the time? Was anything missing?”
“I went through everything in this trailer piece by piece,” Charlene said. “I did it no more than four days after Chester disappeared. Not that anybody was listening to me about Chester disappearing. Oh, no. They all thought he’d run out just to get away from me. But I went through everything, and there was nothing missing.”
“Except the backpack,” Howard said. “Don’t forget about the backpack.”
“Oh, for God’s sake, Howard. Yes, the backpack was gone, but nobody goes missing with nothing but a backpack full of schoolbooks.”
“Chester did,” Howard said. “You can’t say he didn’t, Charlene. He did.”
“Wait,” Gregor said. “The last time anybody saw Chester was here, in this trailer park, when?”
“The night he went missing,” Howard Androcoelho looked confused.
“I mean what time of day?” Gregor Demarkian asked.
“It was late,” Charlene said. “Around ten o’clock. Which makes sense, because he’d been to class. The class started around seven or eight, I don’t know. It only lasted about an hour and twenty minutes, but he and Darvelle liked to go eat at those fast-food places. She likes fast food, Darvelle does.”
“Chester and Darvelle were in the same class?”
“Yes,” Charlene said. “They were taking all their classes together. They were in love. Wasn’t that sweet?”
“Oh, Charlene,” Howard said. “Just can it.”
“And of course,” Charlene said, “Darvelle was supposed to be pregnant. And don’t start in on me, Howard. She came to my house, no more than a week before Chester disappeared, and she was as big as a house. You can ask Stew, or Mark, or Suzanne. They were all there. She came into my living room and she was as big as a house. And if she wasn’t when you went to talk to her, it’s because she went somewhere and got rid of it.”
“Charlene,” Howard said. “I’ve told you a dozen times—”
Charlene wheeled around on Gregor Demarkian. It was hard to do in this small a space, but she managed it. “He’s going to say it was proved positive that she was never pregnant,” she said. “He’s going to say dozens of people saw her all that same month and they didn’t think she looked pregnant at all. Well, she was pregnant. I saw her. My whole family saw her. And if Chester did run away and hide for twelve years, I know why he did it.”
“Why?” Gregor Demarkian asked.
“Because she went somewhere and aborted that child,” Charlene said triumphantly. “She went somewhere they weren’t particular about the trimester and had that child killed. That’s how the skull got cracked, Mr. Demarkian. That was the skull you found in the backpack. That’s how they do a partial birth abortion. They crack the skull and they haul the body out with forceps. Darvelle Haymes had that done and then she handed over that body to my son, and do you know why she did it? She did it because she knew she was never going to get hold of my money, even if she did marry Chester.”
2
Howard Androcoelho wasn’t really comfortable in his body, but he could usually tell himself there was nothing he could do about it. Men who were big the way he was big always ran to fat in middle age. Just look at all those football players. There were also other football players, but he chose not to think about that. The problem was, with Gregor Demarkian in the car, he could think about nothing else. Gregor Demarkian was tall. It was obvious that he had once been very muscular. You couldn’t say that he was fat.
“Flabby, maybe,” Howard said, out loud, getting the car to start.
“What?”
Howard looked across the car to the other seat. Gregor Demarkian was on the phone—text messaging. He had been on the phone and text messaging ever since they had left Chester Morton’s trailer and sat down to watch Charlene sail off into the distance in her shiny new Fusion. Charlene always had a new car. She got one every two or three years.
“It’s a miracle somebody didn’t throw a rock at that windshield,” Howard said.
“What?” Gregor Demarkian said again.
“The windshield,” Howard said. “It’s a miracle somebody didn’t throw a rock at it. You don’t want to bring a new car like that to a place like this. You don’t want to bring it even if they don’t know you here. And everybody here knows Charlene.”