Free Tell by Norah McClintock Page A

said.
    â€œWhere did you go?”
    I shrugged. “Just out, you know? Walking around.”
    â€œWere you with friends?”
    Geez, why was he asking about me?
    â€œNo,” I said. “I just like to walk around. I think better when I’m walking.”
    He kept staring at me, like he was waiting for me to say more.
    â€œI write comic books,” I said. “With a friend of mine. He draws the pictures and I write the stories. I was trying to think up a new story.”
    â€œWhen exactly were you out?” he said.
    â€œI left the house around 8:00,” I said. My mother would be able to back me up on that. “I got back around 10:30.” My mother had been asleep in bed when I got home. Based on past experience and on the fact that she’d been on her feet from 8:00 in the morning until 5:00 at the supermarket where she worked as a cashier and then had made supper for Phil and me when she got home, I figured she must have crashed out around 9:00. She wouldn’t be able to tell anyone for sure exactly when I had got home. “Why?” I said. “You don’t think my mother had anything to do with it, do you?”
    â€œWe’re trying to trace your stepfather’s movements this evening, David.”
    â€œBut you said it was a robbery,” I said.
    â€œIt looks like it might have been a robbery,” Detective Antonelli said carefully. “He was found about half a block from an atm machine. We have reason to believe that he had just withdrawn some money.”
    â€œThen probably someone saw him take out the money and robbed him,” I said. “You hear about stuff like that happening all the time.”
    Detective Antonelli’s expression was impossible to read.
    â€œWe didn’t find a wallet,” he said. “We identified him from a utility bill that he had in one of his pockets. We didn’t find any keys, either. Does your stepfather have a car?”
    I nodded.
    â€œDid he take it when he went out tonight?”
    â€œYes.”
    He asked me about the car. I described it and gave him the license plate number. Then he asked me about Jack. I gave him Jack’s address and phone number.
    â€œYou don’t t h in k Jack shot him, do you?”
    He didn’t answer the question directly. He just said, “We like to be thorough.”
    Across the hall, my mother was still quietly sobbing.
    â€œI should see how she is,” I said.
    Detective Antonelli nodded. I went into the living room, sat down on the couch beside my mother and put my arm around her. She sagged against me, still crying.
    â€œIt’s going to be okay,” I told her. I sure hoped I was right.

Chapter Two
    A parade of people came to the house all day to tell my mother how sorry they were about what had happened and to drop off food. They drank so much coffee that my mother sent me to the store to buy more. When I got back, I found her in tears— again. She was crying this time because Detective Antonelli had telephoned her and asked her to come down to the police station to answer some more questions about Phil.
    â€œI’ll go with you,” I said. I figured it was the least I could do.
    â€œWe found your husband’s car,” Detective Antonelli said after he had showed us into a small interview room. “It was parked up the street from where he was found. We also found his wallet and keys. I know this must be hard for you, Mrs. Benson, but it would really help us if you would take a look at his personal effects and tell us if anything is missing.”
    My mother agreed, of course.
    Phil’s personal effects were:
    (1) His wallet, which had been emptied of money, but which still contained his credit cards and his id. Also inside the wallet was a picture of my mother. She was wearing shorts and a tank top, and she looked nervous sitting at the end of a dock. There was a cottage in the background.
    (2) His watch, which was about