No, not death. Dying,’ said Kristina. Spencer nodded.
‘How about you? What does a cop fear most?’
‘I don’t know about a cop, but me, I’m most scared about having to live with my conscience. I like to sleep at night.’
‘Has your conscience been bothering you?’ She smiled.
‘Not so far.’
She nodded, sipping her drink. ‘In your line of work, you can’t afford to make mistakes, I guess. To be wrong about people.’
‘You’re right.’ Spencer took a sip of his drink. Where was she heading with this? ‘I’m not often wrong about people.’
She smiled coyly. ‘Think you’re wrong about me?’
He willingly smiled back. ‘I’m right on about you. You are brave and smart.’ He wanted to add that she was also very beautiful, but of course one did not say those things to a Dartmouth girl over coffee. Besides, she didn’t need to be told that.
‘Are you flexible, detective?’
‘I’m as stiff as a board,’ he said. ‘One of my many failings.’
‘You don’t seem like you have many of those,’ said Kristina.
‘You’re trying to be gracious. I’m full of bad habits.’
‘Yeah? Like what? And who isn’t?’
‘You, for one.’
‘Me?’ She laughed. ‘I have more bad habits than you’ve had dinners.’
‘Name one.’
She thought for a moment. ‘I’m compulsively neat,’ she said.
‘Really? I’m compulsively sloppy.’
‘I really like to win at basketball,’ she said.
‘I really like to close my cases.’
‘I never wear enough clothing outside and always catch colds.’ As if to prove that, she sneezed.
‘Oh, yeah? I always bundle up too much and sweat profusely.’
‘I constantly do things to make my life really complicated.’
‘I constantly do things to make my life as simple as possible.’
She paused. ‘Sometimes I drink.’
He paused too. ‘Huh! Would that I only drank sometimes.’
And then they smiled at each other.
‘Are you twenty-one, Kristina?’
‘Tomorrow,’ she said, inexplicably excited. ‘Finally.’
‘I see. You didn’t tell me you drink, okay?’
‘Drink? I meant drink coffee.’
‘Good. We won’t mention it again.’ He paused. ‘So you’re happy to be turning twenty-one? For all the usual reasons?’
She nodded. ‘And then some,’ she said, raising her eyebrows. But she didn’t offer to explain and he didn’t pursue it.
They drank their hot chocolates and nibbled on the Portuguese muffins - a sort of English muffin but bigger, thicker, and sweeter.
‘So Detective O’Malley, have you had any interesting cases? I have to write this article on the death penalty for the Review. I’m thinking of writing something about the criminal.’
‘Well, that would be pretty revolutionary of you,’ Spencer said. ‘In today’s day and age.’ He was getting a good feeling about her.
‘Can you tell me anything about the criminal?’
‘Like what?’
‘Like why do people kill other people?’
Spencer thought about it. She was confusing him. She was too pretty. ‘Power,’ he said at last. ‘Power and intimidation. That’s all it’s about.’
‘Power and intimidation, huh? Serial killers, abusive husbands, rapists, all of them?’
‘Yes. All of them.’
Kristina smiled. ‘That’s really good. I like that.’
‘Enough about the death penalty. Tell me something about yourself.’
‘Like what?’
‘Like anything. What year are you in?’
‘I’m a senior.’
‘What’s your major?’
‘Philosophy and religion.’
‘That’s interesting. So what can philosophy tell us about why men kill other men?’
‘How do I know? I don’t study anything as concrete as that. Nietzsche tells us we shouldn’t be upset at evil, and we shouldn’t punish the deviant.’
‘Why is that?’
‘He says because the criminal is only exercising his free will, which society gave him, and for which it now wants to punish him, punish for the very thing it told him made him a human being and not an animal.’
‘This Nietzsche, he’s obviously never lived in New York,’ said Spencer.
Kristina laughed.
‘You know, I don’t know if I agree with that,’ said Spencer. ‘Society didn’t give man free will. God did. Society just reins in the excesses of free will in those who can’t rein it in themselves.’
‘You may be right,’ said Kristina. ‘But Nietzsche doesn’t believe in God.’
‘Well, I,’ said Spencer quietly, ‘don’t believe in Nietzsche.’
Kristina was looking at him with an expression of great amusement.
‘What?’ he asked her.
‘Nothing, nothing,’ she said quickly. ‘Where are you from, Spencer?’
‘Born and bred on Long Island,’ Spencer said.
‘Oh, yeah? My best friend is from Cold Spring Harbor.’
‘Cold Spring Harbor? I’ve read about that place in books. I don’t think mere mortals like me are allowed there.’
‘Don’t be silly. Where are you from?’
‘Farmingville.’
‘Never
