Blunt Darts

complete nervous breakdown. He returned to school the next year. He had lost a year, but he seemed to be doing so well until now.”
    “Do you remember anything else that might help us?” I asked.
    “I’m afraid not. Although...”
    “Yes?” prompted Valerie.
    “Well,” she looked from Valerie to me, “there was a reporter named Thomas Doucette on the Banner at the time Diane died. The rumor was that he’d been assigned to the story and, well, covered it a little too well. Anyway, no article by him appeared in the paper, and he quit the Banner a few weeks later, though most people figured he was fired. Just as well actually. He was the least gifted boy in the class of ‘61, and certainly not destined for the Pulitzer Prize.”
    “Does he still live in Meade?” I asked.
    “No. No, he lives somewhere in Boston now. At least that’s what I remember from his uncle’s funeral, and that was, oh, two years ago. You might try his parents, though. They’re retired, too, and live on Moody Street.”
    I had run out of topics, so I decided there was nothing to be lost by asking what was on my mind.
    “One last thing, Miss Pitts. What did Eleanor Kinnington say when you told her about seeing Blakey with Stephen?”
    Miss Pitts, to my great surprise, blushed and her look saddened. “Well, what could she say? She said she had suspected as much but had hoped against hope that she was wrong.”
    “Wrong about what?”
    Miss Pitts suddenly stabbed several times at a box of tissues on the table next to her.
    “Gerald Blakey is thirty years old and has never been seen in this town in the company of a woman, Mr. Cuddy. Isn’t that enough to be wrong about?” She hurried from the room, crying.
     
     
     

     
    “I guess you don’t feel like a picnic anymore, do you?” We were back in the car, and Valerie’s were the first words spoken since we’d left Miss Pitts.
    “Actually, I’d love a picnic,” I said. She smiled broadly. “As long as the conversation level is low enough to give me some time to sort things out.“
    “Terrific!” she said, and shook her hair down onto her shoulders.
    “But first,” I said, “let’s be sure we can reach this Thomas Doucette character, class of ‘61.”
    We stopped at a gas station and I called Boston information. No Thomas Doucette nor T. Doucette. Then I tried the elder Doucettes. Again, no listing in Meade. We decided to stop at Moody Street and see the Doucettes on the way to the beach.
    Valerie directed me up and down and left and right through semi-rural, increasingly narrow roads. If there was a poorer section of Meade, this was it. We pulled onto Moody Street and up to a small and old, but neatly kept, ranch house to which someone had added a little greenhouse. The mailbox had “Doucette” in paste-on letters. There were three of four similar homes on the street, but no sense of development or planning. It was as though the distance between houses was less a function of privacy of exclusivity and more a reaction to the undesirability of the intervening and uneven scrub-pine land.
    A small, four-door American subcompact sat in the driveway, and a small woman stood at the screen door. We left our car and started up the path toward her.
    She had been watching us leave the car and approach her. She stepped outside and looked around. She had light blue hair and a troubled expression. “May I help you?”
    “Yes,” said Valerie. “Are you Mrs. Doucette?“
    “Yes.”
    “Mrs. Doucette, I’m Valerie Jacobs. I teach eighth grade at the Lincoln Drive School. This is a friend of mine, John Cuddy. We’d like to contact your son Thomas.”
    By the time Valerie had finished, we were nearly to her. At the mention of Thomas, Mrs. Doucette stiffened and eyed us both very carefully.
    “Thomas doesn’t live here anymore,” she said carefully.
    “We know,” I said.
    “He also likes his privacy,” she continued.
    “And he’s entitled to enjoy it,” I said.
    Before I could continue, Valerie broke in. “Mrs. Doucette, we simply need to speak with him about a news story he covered years ago. A young boy’s safety is at stake.”
    Mrs. Doucette’s eyebrows shot up. “The Kinnington boy?”
    “That’s right,” said Valerie, flashing her most ingratiating smile.
    “Goddamn him!” Mrs. Doucette bit off her words. Goddamn him and his whole family!” She stormed into the house, slamming the screen door behind her. She whirled. “And you! Goddamn you for