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Randall spent a few more minutes fidgeting. Then he stood up again, walked jerkily around the room, pausing at the door, and then sat and fidgeted again, drummed his fingers on the table. He took a deep breath and tried to relax. That didn’t work, either.
A few minutes later the door finally opened. A guy with a face like an old catcher’s mitt walked in, sipping from a chipped mug in his left hand. The mug was almost as battered-looking as the man holding it. He stood just inside the door and looked Randall over carefully without blinking. “Randall Miller?” he said mildly.
“Yes. That’s me,” Randall said.
The man nodded and went to the opposite side of the table, sipped some more without looking away from Randall, and then hooked the chair out with one foot and sat in it. He put the cup on the table. “Hello, Randall. I’m Detective Sanders.”
“Hello,” Randall said.
The detective raised one eyebrow in question. “So you killed Michael Hobson, did you,” he said.
“That’s right.”
He nodded again. “Why?”
“I was having an affair with his wife,” Randall said, looking down at the table. “He came home early.” He licked his lips, looked up, shrugged. “I didn’t mean to kill him, but . . .”
Detective Sanders just kept looking at Randall, watching impassively, not even blinking. It was oddly unsettling because the detective kept a mild, even sympathetic look on his face—but his eyes were reptilian, predatory, and half the time he had that battered old coffee mug up and covering the lower half of his face. “How did it happen?” he said.
Randall cleared his throat. “Like I said, he came home early,” he said. “While we were . . .” He looked away, embarrassed, then went on. “I, um, I heard something and went downstairs, and . . .” He shrugged.
“And what?” he said.
“And he came at me, really angry,” Randall said. “I mean, it was pretty obvious why I was there so early in the morning, right?”
“Uh-huh. What time exactly?”
“Um, like I said, it was early morning. About 7:15?”
Sanders nodded. “Okay,” he said. “So he comes at you—where was that? In the front hall?”
Randall licked his lips and hesitated. “Yyyes,” he said at last. “In the hall.”
“And how did you get him into his office?” Sanders asked mildly.
“I, uh—” Randall swallowed convulsively. “I said, ‘Let’s talk.’ You know, be reasonable? I—I didn’t want Katrina to hear us and worry? And so we went into the office. To talk?”
“Okay,” Sanders said. He sipped. “And then?”
“And then, so, uh,” Randall said. This was not going smoothly. Something about Detective Sanders and his unmov
ing old-leather face was truly intimidating, and Randall began to sweat. “So he started to get mad again? And he came at me swinging.”
Sanders raised both eyebrows. “And what, you just grabbed up the fire poker and swung back?”
“Yes. Yes, that’s right,” Randall said. “See, he just kept trying to hit me, and I—I mean, I didn’t know what—I mean, I just reached behind me and felt the handle? And he hit me again, and, and I just . . .”
“You hit him with the poker,” Sanders finished for him.
“Yes. Yes, that’s right.” Randall nodded vigorously.
“Okay,” Sanders said. “That makes sense. I guess it was an accident. Maybe even self-defense.” He sipped again and looked thoughtful. “Except for one thing. How many times did you hit him, Randall?”
“How many . . . ?”
“Yeah, you know. One good swing and he goes down? Two smacks, just to be sure? Or it felt real good and you just kept swinging?” And he looked expectantly and unblinking at Randall.
Randall swallowed loudly. “I—I’m not sure exactly . . . ,” he said.
