The Rag and Bone Shop by Robert Cormier Page B

it had led nowhere and certainly hadn’t helped the investigation.
    “Who else?” Trent asked, disguising his impatience with these particular queries.
    “Well, a couple of kids from school.”
    “Were they alone or together? I mean, did you see them individually, or separately?”
    “Well, two of them were pushing their bikes. One of the bikes had a flat tire. They were kids from school but I don’t know their names. . . .”
    “Younger than you? Or the same age?”
    “Younger, like in the fourth or fifth grade, maybe.”
    And suddenly, Jason drew in his breath sharply as an idea occurred to him, stunning in its audacity. At the same moment, he saw Mr. Trent’s eyes narrow, as if he had somehow
seen
the idea forming in Jason’s mind. What Jason had been thinking, what had taken his breath away, was this: He could make up someone, someone suspicious. He could pretend he had spotted a stranger in town after all. Maybe a strange kid he had never seen before. Someone to satisfy this Mr. Trent. To show that he had been alert.
    Yet, at the same time, Jason knew that he had never been a good liar. He blushed easily, a pulse beating dangerously in his temples whenever he tried to fake someone out. Like sometimes pretending he had done his homework or telling his mother and father that he had no homework at all. In school, when teachers swept their eyes around the room, searching for suspicious activity, Jason would immediately begin to blush, afraid that he looked guilty even though he wasn’t. So how could he possibly lie to this man whose eyes were so penetrating, who often looked at Jason as if he could see right inside his brain, as he was doing at this minute? Jason looked away, dropped his eyes, acknowledging that he simply could not lie, could not pretend that he had seen what he had not seen.
    Trent, too, experienced a moment of revelation, a flash of—what?—in the boy’s eyes. Faster than the blinking of an eye, the boy had revealed something hidden and furtive that he brought out to the surface of his mind for a quick look and then dismissed. Something he remembered, perhaps? And then discarded? Or something else? A revelation of some sort? Or a sudden planned deception? Trent noted that during that brief flash, the boy’s body underwent a change, went suddenly into a defensive posture, stiff, taut. Something had happened inside the boy, like a fault line moving below the surface. A warning light went on in Trent’s mind.
    “What is it?” he asked.
    “What?” The boy startled now, a look of apprehension crossing his face, his eyes darting fearfully.
    “It’s not smart to be deceptive, Jason. We have to trust each other. I have to trust you and you have to trust me. I have to trust you to tell the truth because not telling the truth can lead to trouble. Sooner or later, the truth will emerge, the truth will come out as the questioning goes on.”
    Now a look of guilt, and Trent was certain that the boy had had a moment of planned deception and then had discarded the idea. An errant thought, probably, that had nothing to do with the interrogation, or a possibility that had blossomed for a moment. There often came a time in an interrogation when the subject wavered, drifted away. Or sometimes contemplated a new approach. Or even decided to lie. Body movements often tipped Trent off to that kind of thing. But the flash had come and gone so quickly in the boy’s mind that only a slight body movement had occurred. Now the boy sagged a bit in the chair, indicating that a crisis had been reached and passed.
    “Did you see anyone else?” Trent asked, allowing the moment to pass but on the alert now. He had been on the alert from the beginning, of course, but now he had an acute focus for his alertness, the possibility of deception.
    The boy seemed to go blank, eyes dulled, body slumped.
    “Let’s take a break,” Trent said.
    Although it was risky, Trent sometimes paused in an interrogation, depending