Chapter 17

FROM THE WINDOW Of Hollis Grant's unimpressive office in an industrial park he'd built, you could see straight across the parking lot and observe the westbound lane of the Mass Pike. Hollis himself was only a little better-looking than his office. He was a strong-looking, overweight guy with not much hair and a lot of red face. He was wearing khaki pants and work boots and a white dress shirt with the sleeves rolled to his elbows. The office was small and full of architectural drawings and spec books. There was a drawing table along one wall. The walls were done in plywood paneling. Hollis himself sat not at a desk but at an old table littered with papers, a calculator, two phones, a computer, and a big, clearplastic T square.

"I'm looking into that shooting your grandson was involved in," I said.

"Why?"

"Make sure everything is as it seems to be."

"So what do you want with me," he said.

"Do you know Jared Clark?" I said.

"Kid that was with Wendell? No, I never met him."

"You close with your grandson?"

"Hard to be close with Wendell. There was no father in his life. I tried to provide him some of that..." He shook his head. "But my daughter didn't want me to teach him any of the things I knew."

"Like what?" I said.

"Sports, business, tools, stuff that men might know."

"What did she want for him?"

He shook his head slowly.

"She wanted him to be her prepubescent toy forever."

"Difficult to achieve," I said.

"I tried to tell her he was going to grow up and would need to become a man. She said it didn't mean he had to be a man like me."

"What did she mean by that?" I said.

"You met her?" he said.

"I have."

"Miss Crunchy Granola. She was born in 1963 and grew up to be a hippie."

"Timing is everything," I said. "What's her problem with you?"

He shook his head again.

"I'm, oh, hell, I don't know. I'm too rough for her. I like contact sports. I was in the Navy. I sometimes vote Republican."

"Good God!" I said.

"I know," he said. "I know."

"You must have had some success," I said. "He played football."

"Yes, God, she hated that."

"You teach him?"

"No, not really. The only thing I did, I got a box at Foxboro. I took him once to see the Pats play the Jets. She had a fit. I never took him again. Doesn't seem like such a fucking crime."

"You ever teach him to shoot?"

"Jesus, no," he said. "His mother would have ... no. I never taught him to shoot."

"Somebody did. He and the Clark kid fired thirty-seven rounds and scored on twenty of them."

Grant didn't say anything.

"You shoot?" I said.

"I know how. I was in the service."

"Own a gun?"

"Revolver," he said. ".357 for plinking burglars."

"No semiautomatic weapons?"

"No. Revolver's so much simpler," he said. "And six rounds is enough."

"Why do you think he did what he did?"

Hollis sat for a time, looking at his fist resting on the tabletop.

"I don't know," he said. "I think Wilma blames me. I suppose I sort of blame Wilma."

He shook his head.

"Is there a Mrs. Grant?" I said.

"No."

"Was there?"

"Yes."

`And what happened to her?" I said.

"She left."

"When?"

"June twelfth, 1993."

"You know where she is?"

"No."

"Do you know if she's in touch with her grandson or her daughter?"

"No."

Spenser, grand inquisitor, give him a few minutes and he can find the topic to shut off any conversation. Maybe if I moved on.

"You said Wendell was hard to be close to. Why was that?"

"His mother filled his head with crap. I mean, she's my daughter, and I love her, but her head got filled with crap by her mother. Not the same crap, but she was fucked up, and she fucked up her kid."

"What did Wilma's mother fill her head with?"

"Ladylike," he said. "White gloves. Dinner parties. Her mother filled her head with silly shit, and Wilma rebelled."

"And filled her head with rebellious silly shit," I said.

"Yes."

"Have you seen Wendell since the shooting?"

"No. "

"Because?"

"His mother has denied my access."

"Do you know Lily Ellsworth?" I said.

"Yes. Old money. Everyone knows Lily."

"She feels her grandson is innocent. She hired me to prove it."

"How you doing?" Grant said.

"So far," I said. "He looks guilty as sin."

"Like Wendell," Grant said.

"You know anything that would suggest he didn't do it?" I said.

"Except what I read in the papers," Grant said, "I don't know anything about the whole goddamned sorry mess."

"Sadly," I said, "me either."