“Oliver, give me a break. I can’t divulge confidences. And if you go to her and tell her that I told you about an affair, I’ll sue your ass off.”

“Did she have an affair with one of Little’s students? Sometimes women get a kick out of that. Sticking one to the old man who had time for everyone except the wife. Did she have an affair with Darnell Arlington?”

“Oh, Christ, Oliver, the kid was seventeen when he left.”

“And a seventeen-year-old can’t get a hard-on? There are teachers getting it on with twelve-year-olds. Seventeen is practically legal. And probably a lot better than her old man, right? Maybe that’s why Little had him expelled.”

“You have an evil mind. She didn’t fuck Arlington. I’ll tell you that much.”

“How about a former North Valley student. He would have been about twenty-one or twenty-two at the time of Little’s death. Does the name Rudy Banks ring a bell?” And there it was…that millisecond pause. Oliver clapped his hands. “Holy shit, it was Rudy.”

“I’m leaving now.”

“He’s missing by the way—Rudy is.”

That stopped Shriner for a moment. “What do you mean?”

“He moved out of his apartment last Saturday.”

“So he moved. That doesn’t mean he’s missing.”

“We can’t find him, there’s no forwarding address, and the neighbors never saw him with the movers. Plus we found blood in his apartment.”

Shriner grimaced slightly. “I can’t help you there. I haven’t thought about Banks in years.”

“But you thought about him at one time. Did you ever consider him a suspect in Little’s murder?”

“I can’t say anything.”

“We’re not talking about Melinda Little, we’re talking about Rudy Banks. Did you ever consider him a suspect in Bennett Little’s murder?”

He sighed. “His name came up.”

“And?”

“That’s it. I mentioned him to the police. I’m not in the business of solving murders. I’m in the business of passing along information to cops who are supposed to be solving murders. If they don’t choose to act on it, there’s nothing I can do about it.”

“Why did you mention him to the police? What made you consider him a suspect?”

“I can’t get into that without breaking confidences.”

“Do you know what Banks had against Little?”

“Banks felt Little had disrespected him, but Rudy felt everyone disrespected him.”

“You told your suspicions to Arnie Lamar?”

“No, Lamar wasn’t in. It was the other one.”

“Calvin Vitton?”

“That’s the one.”

“And you never followed up on it?”

“No, I never followed up on it. I am not in a position to arrest anyone. If the police didn’t think he was worth looking into, who am I to step on toes.”