Read Online Simple Simon by Ryne Douglas Pearson - Free Book Online

inside.
    “Hello.”
    “Martin Lynch?” the red haired man asked in greeting.
    “Yes.”
    He removed a black wallet from his inside pocket and flipped it open. A badge shined at Martin Lynch. “I’m Detective Burrell, Chicago Police.” It was a lie, but the red haired man had no trouble with that. He was after the truth, not its keeper. “Can I have a word with you?”
    Martin Lynch blinked nervously and reached for the storm door latch. “Sure. Come inside.”
    The red haired man smiled and entered. He noted a dining room to the left, a staircase and an arched opening directly ahead, and a living room to the right. A woman came through the arched opening. She smiled at him, then saw her husband’s face and the expression faded.
    “This is…”
    “Detective Burrell, Chicago Police.” The red haired man finished the introduction and shook the wife’s hand. He heard water running in the kitchen.
    “Is something wrong?” Jean Lynch asked. Her husband closed the door and stood next to her.
    “Not exactly,” the red haired man said. “But I do need to ask you a few questions.”
    Martin Lynch nodded. “About?”
    The red haired man produced a small notebook and clicked open a pen. “Are you familiar with a Dr. Lawrence Wollam?”
    Jean Lynch’s eyes narrowed. “He treated our son a few months back. Why?”
    “Well, Dr. Wollam has been accused of some inappropriate behavior, I’m afraid to say.” He saw the wife’s eyes go wide. Perfect. “These accusations all center on one day; the day your son was seen by Dr. Wollam.”
    “What did he do?” Martin Lynch asked with a rising voice, then turned to his wife. “Weren’t you with Simon when he saw the doctor?”
    “Almost all the time.”
    “Listen, folks,” the red haired man said in a calming voice. “So far we’ve found nothing to back up the accusations. The other patients he saw that day have said nothing happened. But we have to check with everybody. Now you say your son was with Dr. Wollam alone for a while?”
    “A short while,” Jean Lynch answered. Her husband’s eyes burned at her. “For a few minutes. That’s all.”
    The red haired man nodded and recorded her response in his notebook. “Okay. I’d like to talk to your son. Just to ask him a few questions about the visit.”
    Jean Lynch’s eyes dipped briefly. “Our son is autistic.”
    “Autistic? Is that like retarded?” the red haired man asked, just like a cop would. He knew better. Autistic ? The medical report in the insurance company’s computer hadn’t mentioned that, but that was just a report. He hadn’t delved into the complete medical history. Just an opening to the son, that was all he’d been looking for. But autistic? That would fit… ‘ Spoke like a child, but with an older voice’ …or would it?
    “He doesn’t function like normal people,” Martin Lynch said.
    The red haired man slowly nodded. “But he can talk? He could answer questions, right?”
    Martin looked to his wife. “You’d better get back to dinner. I’ll take the detective up to Simon.”
    “Uh, it’s better in these situations if we talk to the person alone,” the red haired man explained. He had to be alone with the kid. Had to. “That’s standard.”
    Martin Lynch disagreed with a shake of his head. “Simon won’t talk to you without his mother or I there. He doesn’t know you.”
    The red haired man considered further protest, but thought better of it at this point. ‘Get the information…period.’ He had to get to the kid. “All right. As long as you let him say whatever he has to say.”
    That admonition seemed strange to Martin Lynch, but then cops thought differently than ordinary people he believed. “Let’s go.”
    Jean Lynch watched them ascend the steps then returned to the kitchen and her Hungarian goulash. It was her son’s favorite.
    Simon sat in a chair at his desk with a pad of graph paper before him. His right hand held a pencil, and with that he