Memory Man

Rabinowitz said, “Amos, I don’t know if this is good or bad news, but the institute has been forwarding professional mail to Chris since he left. Enough time has passed that it’s slowed to a trickle, but they did have an address.”

Decker wrote it down, thanked Rabinowitz, and then looked up the address on his phone.

He said, “It’s halfway between Chicago and Burlington. We passed it coming up here.”

“Meaning if he still lives there he could get to Burlington and back relatively easily.”

“Let’s go.”

“Decker, shouldn’t we call in the police on this?”

“On what? We have no proof that he’s done anything wrong. Not a shred. We can track this down. And if it turns out we’re right, we bring in the cops.”

He walked briskly out the door of the café and she more slowly followed.

Four hours later they pulled off the highway and spent another twenty minutes on surface streets before Decker, who was using the GPS on his phone, directed Jamison to a many-decades-old, run-down neighborhood.

“The guy looks like he’s fallen on hard times,” noted Jamison.

Decker remained quiet, but his gaze moved steadily around, taking in everything.

“That’s it, the third on the left with the black shutters. Pull past it.”

Jamison drove on, and then Decker had her park at the curb on the opposite side of the street about a half dozen homes down from Sizemore’s.

“Decker, Rabinowitz said that Sizemore had left the institute several years ago.”

“That’s right.”

“I just thought of this. Could he really be Leopold? I mean, the guy really looked homeless and out of it. Could Sizemore go downhill that fast?”

“Yes,” said Decker. “I did. And it didn’t take me years.”

She looked at him openmouthed for a moment and then slowly turned away before saying, “Oh. Okay.”

Decker extricated himself from the back of the car and stepped out. When Jamison started to do the same he ducked his head back in and said, “You’re staying in the car.”

“What!”

“Anything bad goes down, drive away and call the cops.”

“Decker, I’m not going to let you—”

“Yes you are.” He closed the car door and set off toward the house.

He went down the sidewalk, his hands in his pockets, his head down, seemingly trying to avoid the stiff, chilly breeze.

But he kept gazing to the right, observing the house as he went. It was growing dark, but there were no lights on inside. No car in the driveway. Sizemore, if he still lived here, might not be home. He might be in Burlington planning his next murder.

He actually thought it improbable that Sizemore and Leopold were one and the same. Though it had been twenty years, and people could change, Decker felt like he would have recognized the man, even though he hadn’t had that much interaction with Sizemore at the institute. But still, one couldn’t be sure without digging further. And right now it was the only viable lead he had.

He crossed the street, stepped between two parked cars, one of which was up on cement blocks, and walked down the crumbling sidewalk. He passed by the house, went around the block, cut through an alley, and ended up behind the house’s backyard. He struggled over the sagging chain-link fence and approached the house from the rear. There were no lights visible from here either.

He sidled up to the rear door, slipped one hand over the butt of his gun, and waited, listening intently. No footsteps. No sounds at all.

He looked left and right. He saw no one in the backyards of the houses on either side. The night was too chilly for folks to be sitting outside.

He put his elbow through the glass, reached through, unlocked the door, and entered.

He was now in a small foyer. On his left were a washer and dryer. Up a short set of stairs was the kitchen. The smell of fried foods was in the air, along with the stale stink of cigarette smoke. He remembered that Sizemore had been a smoker. He’d seen him taking his smoke breaks, the pack of cigarettes in his hand, and it appeared the man had never kicked the habit. But Decker had sat in a bar with Leopold and the man had never lighted up. If you were a smoker, you were going to light up in a bar if you could, and it was legal in Burlington to do so. And Decker hadn’t smelled smoke on Leopold’s clothes. And he would have. This lead was starting to go sideways, but he had to follow it through.

He glided up the steps and looked around the small kitchen. There were some dishes in the sink. A newspaper was in the wastebasket. He checked the date. Two weeks ago. This was looking more and more squirrelly.

He left the kitchen and looked into each of the rooms on the main level. There was no evidence that anyone had been here recently. He walked up the short flight of stairs to the upper floor.

Then, growing impatient, he raced forward, kicking open doors as he went. He cleared the first room, the second, and then came to the third and last door.

He pushed it open and started taking deep breaths, not because he wanted to, but because it was the only way to deaden his sense of smell.

He walked over to the bed and looked down.