IV.

With a nod to Chris, Vin was lead off by two bailiffs while a third corralled the other line-up participants. Chris just shook his head. He'd expected Vin to bring the same calm dignity to this whole affair that Chris saw him apply to the rest of his life. Not - this.

"You think that whole thing just now was so that he could apologize to me?" asked curly-hair.

"Well, if he's not done, he can write you a nice note on the plane," said the Cascade cop. "You okay, chief?"

Curly-hair nodded.

This just seemed fishy to Chris. "You know this guy?" he asked the cop, gesturing at the witness.

"You could say that," he said. "And you are?"

"Uh, apologies," said Fitzgerald. "Chris Larabee, this is Capt. Jim Ellison of the Cascade Police, and Blair Sandburg, who, as I understand it, has had some association with the force as part of his graduate education."

"Yeah, close enough," said curly.

"Mr. Sandburg, Capt. Ellison, Chris is Vin Tanner's supervisor at the ATF."

"And he's here why?" snapped Ellison, just as Chris was starting to protest that he didn't think it was proper for an associate of the witness to be in charge of escorting Vin to Washington.

"Shut up, both of you," said Mary Travis, coming into the room. "Before this goes any further, let's all sit down, figure out what's in the best interest of justice at this point."

Ellison scoffed a little; Sandburg had moved over to take Mary's hand and introduce himself earnestly. Chris was liking curly less and less.

"Vin is a good man," said Chris. "I don't know what happened back when he was a kid, though if he says he's innocent I believe him. I don't want him being treated like some thug, or meeting any sort of convenient accident on the way back to the most dangerous city in America."

"If he's such a good man, what was he doing hanging out with the likes of Joe Vassiconelli?" Ellison asked.

"Uh, actually, I was the one hanging out with Eli Joe that summer," said curly.

"Your original statement and deposition were faxed to my office right before I headed over here; I just finished reading it before the line-up," said Mary. "It might be instructive if you went over the details again, for all of us."

"That sounds rather inappropriate..." Ellison started.

"Jim, don't treat me like some sort of child witness!" curly snapped. "Shit, I could have handled all of you THEN!"

He turned back to Mary. "Sure, I'd be happy to sit down with everyone, figure out how we can safely get your guy back to Cascade."

"Safely?" Chris asked. Coming from the Cascade people, after what he'd just said - was that some sort of threat?

"Yeah, security's a concern," said Ellison. "Joe Vassiconelli contacted us so that he could flush Tanner out for him. We went along with it because we had our own concerns regarding security and Mr. Tanner."

"You don't have to do this now," Jim murmured to Blair as they joined Chris Larabee, Agent Fitzgerald, Mary Travis, and a Captain Dan Scott of the Denver PD around a small conference table.

Blair shrugged. As traumatic events went, having someone on the other side of a piece of half-inch-thick plexiglass say he was sorry that he'd left him without a ride - well, that didn't really rate.

"So let's start at the beginning," said Agent Fitzgerald.

"There isn't a lot to say," said Blair. "Eli Joe..."

"He went to Yale?" Mary Travis interrupted. "After Juvenile Hall?"

"NOT that sort of Eli," said Jim.

"Nothing like," said Blair. "Like I was saying, Eli Joe and I hung out together for a few weeks right after I moved to Cascade the summer I was thirteen. One day, he said he wanted to introduce me to a friend of his. So we rode out after dinner to this convenience store a ways out of town."

Blair paused, realizing he was talking way too fast. It wasn't like he hadn't given a statement before! But it was like he was thirteen again, or something. He took a breath (calmly!) then continued, "Joe went in first, because he didn't want me to spook Vin. I came in about three minutes later and Joe made a gesture like Vin had a gun and told me to run, so I ran. Then I heard Vin shoot the cashier and then Vin ran out past me and stole my bike and then Joe came out and I don't know what he did next but I headed inside the store and got to see my first murder victim."

So much for professional comportment. He swallowed. "The cashier, he didn't really even have a head anymore. I - I guess Vin must have rushed the front before he fired. There wasn't anything I could do to help the victim."

The others around the table were looking at him like he wasn't even speaking English. Well, except for Mary Travis, who was looking a bit smug. It was a good look on her (well, you couldn't fault a guy for noticing someone like Mary Travis, could you? Not that he'd ever successfully gotten a date out of opposing counsel, and not for lack of trying.)

"You didn't actually see Tanner shoot Jesse Kincaid?" asked Agent Fitzgerald.

"No, but I forgot to say, I know Tanner had custody, possession, whatever, of the gun, right before the shooting. Right before I left the store. I saw something in the back of his pants."

"Did Joe Vassiconelli tell you who it was you'd be meeting?" asked Jim.

"I don't really remember."

"Was the name Vin Tanner familiar to you before yesterday?" asked Chris Larabee.

"Yes; after the shooting, Eli Joe was quite definite about it being 'Vin Tanner' who'd done it. Though the prosecution at Eli Joe's trial referred to him Vince, or maybe Vincent, Tanen, and so I guess I figured Eli Joe didn't have it right. Anyway, Joe kept on saying that Vin fired the shot. He was very consistent. I'm sure there are records."

"Yes, I've browsed the transcript," said Ms. Travis. "Vassiconelli was quite vociferous in his hatred of Vin."

Jim was shaking his head. "It smells like a set-up, chief, top to bottom. I think you screwed this one up."

Blair felt his cheeks start to burn. "Why? Because the Joe Vassiconelli we met yesterday came off like a petty felon, and Vin Tanner has turned himself into a-a candidate for Denver's Outstanding Citizen, or something? Jim, you know what being in the system does to someone. That's not what Eli Joe was like that summer. He was my only friend!"

There was silence around the table for a moment, finally broken by Larabee. "Mary, I don't have to tell you that it would risk everything to have any of us talk to Vin before he makes a statement, not after what Sandburg here has said. Can you phone one of your associates now to sit with him for a while this afternoon when we all see what he has to say?"

"Yes, I can do that," she said.

Everyone was looking at Blair again. What the hell had he done wrong, exactly??

Another observation room, another lousy ventilation system. Jim was not going to miss Denver.

Beside him, Blair was fidgeting. He hadn't meant to come down on Blair like he had, but, jeeze, if you're going to try to pin a murder on someone, it was usually a good idea to be really, really sure. How much had his earnestness, his good-kid persona influenced the jury's cake-and-eat-it-too verdict in Joe Vassiconelli's trial? From what he could gleam from a quick read-over of Ms. Travis's copy of the original trial's transcripts, the physical evidence tying Vassiconelli to the shooting had been pretty conclusive. Without Blair, Joe Vassiconelli might still be in jail.

Yeah, Blair might well have screwed this one up - and if he had, Blair being Blair, he'd probably figure the whole thing out, probably in pretty short order. Chris Larabee could just give that attitude of his a rest.

Agent Fitzgerald and Captain Scott entered the interrogation room first and took a moment to settle themselves before signaling for Tanner to be brought in. He looked far more composed than he had during the line-up. The lawyer Ms. Travis had rounded up for this, introduced as Allen Polk, looked almost giddy.

Vin Tanner spoke slowly and with the exquisite politeness one only found in native Texans. Yes, sir, he'd known Joe Vassiconelli. Yes, he'd known him from probably the spring of 1976, in Tuscosa, Texas. No, sir, he didn't think Vassiconelli had had anything particularly against him, and he'd had no particular problems with Vassiconelli, though they'd stopped really being friends once they were placed in separate homes after living with Vin's uncle Ron for a spell.

In a manner that could not have been more different than Blair's 20-second one-breath recount of the events of Thursday, July 29, 1982, Vin Tanner calmly detailed how there was a message waiting for him when he returned from a day of mowing lawns. According to the note, whose authorship he had not thought to verify at the time but didn't believe was important, Vassiconelli had called earlier that afternoon and asked to meet him at the GasSnack&Go to show him some 'action figures' he'd recently acquired.

"Action figures?" prompted Agent Fitzgerald.

"Code, sir. When we lived with Ron Armstrong, sometimes Eli Joe would get his hands on stuff. Um, usually stolen, but I was remiss in not always asking. Since it would have raised suspicions to talk about watches or whatever, Eli Joe would call his objects of value 'action figures.'"

"So when he called you, you thought that Vassiconelli was, what?" asked Fitzgerald

"I suspected that he had something he wanted me to help him sell."

"This didn't bother you?"

Tanner shrugged. "Fencing wasn't what I did, wasn't ever what I did, and I was going to remind him of that. He'd always taken 'no' for an answer fine. But I thought it would be good to see him, make sure he was okay. I had a few dollars on me, and was figuring on getting us a pizza, maybe shooting some pool."

"So you..."

"I had an early dinner at home, just to keep me going, then I walked over to the convenience store."

"Even though you expected that Vassiconelli wanted to entice you into a crime."

Tanner smiled a little. "Like I said, he'd always taken 'no' for an answer in the past." The smile vanished. "Eli Joe wanted to lift some stuff, but I told him I wouldn't do that, and anyway I had cash, so we started to pick out some snacks. While we were at the soda case, he said something to the effect of, he had a Ruger revolver in his knapsack that he'd lifted from the house next door, but he had second thoughts and would I please hold it for him and help him figure out how to slip it back. I really didn't think that Joe having a gun was a good idea, so I took it and stuffed it into the back of my shorts."

"You didn't leave immediately?"

Tanner shook his head. "I was a stupid kid."

"What happened next?"

"The soda case had just been restocked, I think; I was having a hard time finding a cold bottle. Some other kid came in, and I guess Joe knew him because he started signaling to him. I thought this was a little funny, but I could take care of myself, if you'll pardon the expression, and the kid didn't look like he was more'n eleven. Not really a threat, you understand."

Beside Jim, Blair stopped fidgeting.

"So I finally found a couple of cold Cokes and was just about to ask Eli Joe if he wanted one of them when I saw he was heading to the front of the store like he was ready to buy his stuff. Except, I'd said I was buying. It just seemed wrong. Then he pulled out another gun - a Beretta 92, I think - and he shot the cashier in the face. Then he turned and smiled at me and said, 'Look what you did, you bastard.' Then I ran."

"Where did you go?" asked Fitzgerald.

"The kid that was with Eli Joe was standing right outside, holding a bike. I, uh, took it from him and then I rode as hard as I could for as long as I could. It was a pretty good bike, I guess. It lasted until I was way outside the city. Maybe outside the state. I'm afraid I wasn't thinking too clearly. Eventually I busted a tire and had to dump it. I got rid of the revolver at the same time, because the folks who'd give someone like me a ride, I knew they'd be looking for something like that on me. Good thing, too, because the little old lady who have me my first lift patted me down first."

"Two guns," Jim heard Chris Larabee whisper. "Shit."

While Fitzgerald and Scott pressed Tanner for details, Blair softly asked, "Do you believe him?"

"It seems plausible," said Jim. "The records say Vassiconelli's prints were the only clear ones on the pistol found at the scene."

"So it really boils down to Vassiconelli's word versus Vin's," said Larabee softly. "Nothing he's said contradicts Sandburg."

Vin had never thought that he'd make it through telling about the night of the shooting without exploding or crying or something. But he just answered the questions and it was over pretty quickly - nothing like the two or three hours he'd expected.

Then, before he'd even gotten a chance to thank Fitzgerald and Scott for their civility, Chris was in the room beaming, taking his arm and leading him to the side. "That went perfect, Vin," he said. "There's no way they'll pin this on you now."

"But the witness..."

"You know what he told the cops and the DA back then? Did you read about it in the papers at the time?"

Vin shook his head. In 1982, he'd barely been able to read, hadn't realized that you could access out-of-state newspapers in public libraries.

"Your story matches his exactly. He never said he saw you shoot anyone, he just assumed you did because he heard the shot. Apparently Joe Vassiconelli was a friend of his."

"Will he change his story if he needs to, to protect a friend?" he asked.

"He'd better not," said Chris.

"I wouldn't!" Shit, the witness had come in. Had he heard his apology earlier?

Apparently. "It's, uh, okay about the bike," the guy was saying. "My mom got me another one."

Vin half-sat against the edge of the room's small table, covered his face with his hands, and let his body shake.