“Darnell Arlington…a real charmer. One of the few kids who fooled Ben in a big way, but I must tell you, the police checked him out thoroughly. Darnell had moved to Ohio to live with his grandmother. The night of Ben’s murder, he was playing in a basketball game at the local high school. About a hundred people saw him.

“From what I was led to believe, Darnell was turning his life around. His grandmother was a no-nonsense person. But check him out if you want.”

“Do you remember any other wayward students?”

“Not specifically, but there could have been others. I do remember Ben being upset about Darnell even after he moved. For some reason, the kid tugged at his heartstrings.”

“Did Darnell ever come to the house?”

“No, not on your life. Ben kept his students away from his family. He never gave out his home phone number or his car phone number.”

“What about his pager?”

“From what I recall, no one had paged Ben that evening.”

Her memory was correct. No activity was recorded on Ben’s pager on the evening of his demise. Still, Decker didn’t have Ben’s pager records for the previous morning and afternoon. It was possible that someone had paged him earlier in the day and Ben used a public phone to return the call that evening. Maybe a hasty meeting was set up. That would explain why Ben was at Clearwater Park, but it wouldn’t shed any light on why Ben hadn’t called his wife.

“Was Ben familiar with Clearwater Park?”

“We’d been there before for cookouts when the boys were little.”

“So Ben had driven the roads around that area before.”

“Why do you ask?”

“If you were going to Clearwater Park from Civic Auditorium, you’d have to take some small roads and at night. If Ben wasn’t familiar with the park, it would indicate to me that he was driven there by his abductors. If he knew the park well, maybe he was meeting someone.”

“We’d been there a few times. That’s all I can tell you.” She shrugged.

“The primary detectives interviewed scores of people, including quite a few students. What did you think of the detectives?”

“That’s an odd question.”

Decker didn’t respond.

“Arnie Lamar and Cal Vitton.” She smiled, but it lacked mirth. “I suppose they were nice enough; they just didn’t get anywhere. It was always Arnie’s contention that it was a carjacking. That didn’t make sense to me.”

“How so?”

“First of all, Ben wasn’t a fool. If someone wanted the car, he would have handed over the keys. The other option is that they stole the car and purposely put Ben in the trunk while they went on a joyride.” She made a face. “I don’t see kids driving a stolen car with a dead man in the trunk.”