212: A Novel Part 13

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE.

2:45 P.M.

Like every other Web site on the Internet, campusjuice.com was required to register its domain name and address with the Internet Corporation for a.s.signed Names and Numbers. According to ICANN, a thirty-seven-year-old man named Richard Boyd had registered the Web site name two years earlier using a residential address in Huntington, one of a chain of towns that comprised Long Island's North sh.o.r.e.

As Rogan pulled to the curb in front of Boyd's house, Ellie took in the surrounding area. The split-level ranch had probably once been part of a neighborhood not unlike Ellie's own working-cla.s.s street back in Wichita. But Long Island, unlike Wichita, had changed. Most of the homes like Boyd's had been replaced, torn down to make room for McMansions that sprawled to the edges of their small lots. Ellie noticed the three extra inches of gra.s.s and the unkempt edge along the walkway as they made their way to the front porch. She could picture the neighbors complaining about the worst house on the block.

Rogan clanked the front door's bra.s.s knocker three times. An elderly woman wearing a crimson velour housedress opened the door.

"We're police officers with some questions for a Richard Boyd," Rogan explained. "Is he here?"

"Oh, sure. Richard's down in the bas.e.m.e.nt where he works. Come on in."

Ellie was immediately struck by the smell of mothb.a.l.l.s and mildew as they followed the woman into the dimly lit house. It reminded her of her Gram Hatcher's house, where she had always been afraid to fall asleep.

"You say you're from the police?" the woman asked, leading the way past a small kitchen with bright orange laminate counters and wallpaper with yellow sunflowers.

"Yes, ma'am," Rogan said. His tone was considerably more polite than Ellie had heard from her partner that entire day, and she realized that she was not the only one who might have been reminded of a grandmother. "Are you Richard's mother?"

"Practically, but, no, I'm his aunt. Nearly fifteen years ago, d.i.c.k needed a place to stay. They say middle-aged women can't land a man, but my sister ran off to California with the love of her life when she was fifty years old. d.i.c.k's been here ever since."

"You're a pretty generous aunt," Ellie noted.

"I'd always been on my own, so it's nice to have the company. I don't see a ring on that finger of yours, honey."

"Nope."

"Well, don't wait forever like I did. Not everyone's got the same luck as my sister."

"Okay, I'll keep that in mind, ma'am."

She opened a door leading to a narrow bas.e.m.e.nt staircase, leaned against the oak handrail, and then thought better of it. "These are a bit steep for me."

"Don't even risk it," Rogan said. "We'll find our way down just fine."

"Well, all right then. There's no problem now, is there?"

"Not at all," he explained. "Just something we think your nephew can give us a hand with."

"Okay. Because d.i.c.kie's a good boy. A little unusual, and not exactly a looker, but he's good."

When the bas.e.m.e.nt door swung closed behind them, Rogan turned his head toward Ellie and winked. "This d.i.c.kie guy sounds like a winner," he whispered. "Maybe we'll kill two birds with one stone and have a ring on that little finger of yours before you know it."

"I liked you better when you were p.i.s.sy."

"Joanna, is that you?" A voice echoed up from somewhere in the concrete-walled bas.e.m.e.nt. "I told you not to take the stairs. If you need something, I'll bring it up."

They took the final step and turned to find a large, unfinished room lined with crammed metal bookcases. Old newspapers, boxes, and magazines were stacked from floor to ceiling in every available s.p.a.ce, leaving only a narrow pathway winding through the bas.e.m.e.nt toward the man's voice.

"d.i.c.k Boyd?"

"It's Richard. And who's here?"

"NYPD," Rogan said. "We're here for information about Campus Juice."

They took another turn and came face to face with Richard Boyd, who was now standing behind a disheveled sectional desk that contained three separate computer screens.

"I told some lawyer before, I don't turn over private customer data without a subpoena."

"Which is why we've brought you one." Rogan wound his way through the clutter, then muttered under his breath to Ellie, "As if we could find anything in this Collyer mansion."

The reference was to two infamous brothers, hermits and h.o.a.rders who were eventually found dead among their eclectic possessions. By the time police removed more than a hundred tons of detritus from the Collyers' townhouse, New York City law enforcement had added a new term to its lexicon.

"I heard that, you know. And I'm not a Collyer brother. Everything in here, I need. And I can describe for you every single piece of paper, the purpose it serves, and its filing location."

He peered at them with small, dark eyes from behind a curtain of greasy dark bangs. Folds of fat surrounded his acne-pocked face. His aunt had been generous in her description.

"Well, where do you think you might file this, d.i.c.k?" Rogan handed Boyd a copy of the subpoena.

"I told you. It's Richard." Boyd sucked his front teeth while he reviewed the doc.u.ment.

"Copies of the posts we're interested in are attached to the subpoena. 'Incorporated by reference,' I believe is the legal term."

Boyd plopped himself down in a battered chintz-upholstered office chair, wheeled it over to the far side of his desk, and jiggled a computer mouse. He tapped away at his keyboard, shook his head, tapped away some more, and shook his head again.

"Nope. I can't help ya." He tried to return the subpoena to Rogan, but J. J. held up a hand.

"You could at least try to hide your glee. What do you mean, you can't help? Give up the guy's IP address, and we'll take it from there."

"Whoever posted these messages used an IP cloaker, which is precisely what it sounds like. If you're spooked about privacy, you can download free software right off the net to mask your IP address."

"And, gee, I guess it's just a coincidence that your Web site tells people that if they want to hide their trail from the police, they can get themselves one of these IP-cloaking devices."

"I'm just helping people protect their privacy."

"Privacy?" Rogan said incredulously. "Doesn't seem like the kind of privacy you need unless you're doing some sick s.h.i.+t that's going to land you in trouble."

"Just like a cop to say that. It's about rights, man. I admire this dude for being smart. Besides, these posts are pretty tame compared to some of our content. This bird must be high-f.u.c.king-society to bring you guys all the way out from the city with a subpoena."

"No, Richard," Ellie said, "that bird's not part of any society, at least not now. She's dead."

"Oh, s.h.i.+t." Boyd dropped his eyes to the subpoena.

"Very eloquent," Rogan said. "You still admire this guy and his cloaking software?"

"h.e.l.l, man. I didn't know, okay?" He tapped away at the keyboard again before pus.h.i.+ng it away. "Really, I tried. The dude knew what he was doing."

"Yeah, thanks to your advice," Ellie said. She looked at the string of dates and numbers on Boyd's computer screen but couldn't make any sense of it. "You mean to tell me that anyone can just post whatever they want to your Web site? They don't need to register, or have an account, or tell you who they are in any way?"

"It's sort of the point, you know? The Web site's slogan is 'All the Juice, Always Anonymous.'"

"I don't get it," Ellie said. "Why in the world would you create something like this? You knew weeks ago when the district attorney's office called you how much damage you were causing."

"It's words. There's no damage in words. And why do I do it? Two words: Muh-knee. I get a grand a month for a single ad on that site. I've launched probably a dozen Web sites since the nineties, and I finally have one that's bringing in cash."

"And what about now, Richard?" Ellie said. "A girl is dead, and it started with words. There's damage. And you had a role in it."

Boyd shook his head and tried to hand Rogan the subpoena again.

"That's your copy," Rogan said. "Ponder it a little while longer before you file it away in your perfect system here."

Ellie followed her partner up the bas.e.m.e.nt stairs to find Aunt Joanna waiting eagerly at the kitchen table.

"Did you get everything you needed?"

"We're good for now," Rogan said.

"Because d.i.c.k can be a little ornery at times. He'll listen to me, though, if you need me to intervene."

They thanked the woman for her generosity and then showed themselves to the front door.

"A grand a month times, what, ten ads on there? Not bad cash when you're living in your aunt's bas.e.m.e.nt. You sure there's not the possibility of a little love connection there, Hatcher?"

"With Jabba the Hutt? Don't think so."

As Rogan took the corner at the end of the block, Ellie found herself laughing. "d.i.c.k Boyd? You know they called him d.i.c.k Boy on the playground."

"d.a.m.n. Glad I didn't grow up with the likes of you."

"So Long Island was a bust. Now what?"

"Run Megan's calls through the reverse directory and see what comes up?"

"Or go to her friends. I got a list from the mom. According to her, there's one girl we go to first. She's in the city."

"Okay, you see her, but drop me at the precinct and I'll start working on the phone history. See if our girl was calling anyone her parents didn't know about."

Ellie dialed Courtney Chang's number.

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO.

4:05 P.M.

Morningside Heights got its name from Morningside Park, which lines the east side of the neighborhood from 110th Street to 123rd. But most New Yorkers thought of Morningside Heights as an academic bastion in the middle of uptown, housing egghead students from nearby Columbia University and Barnard College. The late comedian George Carlin had called his old neighborhood White Harlem, and local business owners had now taken to calling the place SoHa, short for south of Harlem. With gentrification across the entire borough of Manhattan, many saw Morningside Heights as simply an extension of the Upper West Side.

But Ellie and many others had a different cultural referent for this neighborhood. She parked in front of a fire hydrant at 112th and Broadway, looked up at the blue-backed neon sign that read "Tom's Restaurant," and could almost picture Jerry, George, Elaine, and Kramer at a booth inside the window. Courtney Chang lived above the diner that was first immortalized in song by Suzanne Vega and later on the television show Seinfeld as the ensemble's daily diner.

Courtney was waiting at her apartment, just as she'd promised when Ellie phoned. She opened the front door and turned away with nothing but a "Come on in," and then plopped herself down on an overstuffed mocha-colored sofa littered with crumpled tissues.

"Sorry." She plucked up some of the mess from the couch and threw it to the floor, making room for Ellie to take a seat. "Whatever, I just can't care about this right now."

"Of course not," Ellie said. "Megan's parents told us how close you two are."

"She's my best friend. Was, I guess. Was my best friend. Since junior high school. We used to be inseparable."

"Used to be?"

"Before college." She used her fist, balled inside the overly long sleeve of her Columbia University sweats.h.i.+rt, to push a shoulder-length strand of s.h.i.+ny black hair from her eyes. "We carpooled to school, took all our cla.s.ses together, spent the night at each other's houses every weekend. Like I said, inseparable. But now I'm up here, and she's downtown, and, well, it wasn't always easy to find time for each other. I can't believe it's too late." She wiped a tear from her cheek with her sleeve.

Ellie was beginning to wonder whether she'd made a mistake relying on Patricia Gunther's information about her daughter's friends. She was relieved when she asked Courtney if she'd happened to speak to Megan within the last couple of days.

Courtney nodded. "Of course. Probably like...ten times. Patty told you about that f.u.c.king message board? Sorry-"

Ellie smiled. "No problem. And, yes, we know about the messages. We're trying to determine who might have posted them."

"You're the police. Can't you just-"

"We tried. The information isn't there. Whoever posted this stuff about Megan covered his tracks technologically. I was hoping you'd help me figure it out the old-fas.h.i.+oned way. Did Megan have any enemies?"

Courtney shook her head. "No, that's why the whole thing was so weird. I figured it was just someone from campus trying to screw with her mind. I told her it was no big deal. I can't believe this. I actually told her to blow it off. To forget about it. What was I thinking?"

"You were thinking what anyone would have a.s.sumed at the time. The truth is that ninety-nine-point-nine-nine percent of the time, words really are just words. You couldn't have known, Courtney."

"So poor Megan's the unlucky one out of ten thousand. Because we all just a.s.sumed she'd be on the right side of the odds."

"Let me guess," Ellie said, catching how quickly Courtney had translated a percentage into the odds. "Math major?"

"Physics," she said wearily.

"I know this is probably the worst day of your life, but anything you can think of-anything that might stand out-could make a big difference."

Courtney shook her head. "Megan wasn't the kind of person to make enemies. There was no drama with her. She studied. She worked out. She tried to make time for friends."

"Boyfriends?"