A Safe Place for Dying by Jack Fredrickson Page A

cars and to ask him to make a few phone calls. He suggested a workout late Sunday morning at the outdoor basketball court behind Rivertown High School. We’d been shooting bull and hoops there since
freshman year, though neither of us had ever learned to drop a basket. A game of horse could run three hours and end scoreless. The workout came from fetching the ball.
    I turned around for my over-the-head backward shot. Leo snickered, but I could hear the fear in it. I rarely dropped such a shot, but when I did, it was a marvel to behold. I leaned back and sighted upside down at the backboard behind me. Some poet had spray-painted EAT SHIT in neon green letters on the gray, flaking plywood. I aimed at the space just to the right of EAT, held my breath, and let the ball fly. It hit the underside of the backboard, banged against the fence, and skittered along a rut toward the far end of the blacktop.
    â€œHaven’t lost your touch,” Leo yelled, but it was in relief. He ran to stop the ball before it rolled into a puddle.
    â€œPeople could die,” I said when he came back.
    â€œAnd you staking out the drop site will prevent that?” He put the basketball into the small of his back and used it to lean against the rusty fence. A cut from that fence needed a tetanus shot. “Look, I checked around as you asked. Chernek’s lost some clients, and a couple of his analysts have quit, but those things happen when the market takes a tumble. Financial guys get blamed, they lose clients, and the junior associates take off for other pastures.”
    â€œThe Bohemian is hurting for money.”
    Leo wiped his forehead with his T-shirt sleeve. “Like almost everybody, including thousands of brokers. But they’re not going around setting off bombs. Besides, you’ve got a direct link with the bomb that went off in 1970. Same paper for the note, same kind of explosive. Why not concentrate on that?”
    â€œI don’t like the way the Bohemian’s so willing to fork over half a million dollars to whoever it is. Maybe he doesn’t mind because he’s giving the money to himself.”
    â€œHe’s doing what he’s told. He’s taking his orders from the board of rich people, like you are taking orders from him.”

    â€œWhat if the bomber is one of them?”
    â€œOne of who?”
    â€œOne of the Members. I told the Bohemian the bomber could be an insider, a Member.”
    â€œI’ll bet he loved that.”
    â€œHe brushed it off.”
    â€œOf course he did.”
    â€œI don’t like it, Leo. The Bohemian should be looking at everybody as a potential suspect.”
    â€œHe’s doing the obvious, paying off the guy like last time, hoping he’ll go away for another few decades.” Leo shook his head and pushed himself off the fence. “What are you going to do tonight when it’s collection time? Jump out of your garage and yell, ‘Stop, bomber’?”
    â€œI’m going to take a few pictures. Get the license plate number, maybe follow the car.”
    â€œWhat if he spots you? What if he’s got a gun?”
    â€œI’ll stay well back. The important thing is not the tail, it’s the license plate and the description of the man.”
    Leo stepped in front of the basket and prepared to shoot. “Dek, half the things I see are forgeries. I do my analysis, make my report to the people who hired me, and that’s it. What they do with the information is up to them. Sometimes, a bad piece I’ve examined pops up later at a different house, with a fake attribution. I don’t second-guess my clients, I don’t rat them out, don’t announce they’ve passed off a forgery. I just do what I’m hired to do.”
    â€œNo one dies because of that.”
    Leo aimed the ball and fired. It hit the backboard and dropped onto the metal rim, where it teetered for a full five seconds before, incredibly,