Night Passage - Robert B Parker

by Les Weil

  "He and Tommy Cruise decided to make the picture without you?"

  "There's no need to be hateful, Jesse."

  "Maybe there is," he said.

  Jennifer was silent for a time. When she spoke it was with a kind of desperate dignity. "I can't just sit here on the phone and let you beat up on me, Jesse."

  "No," Jesse said, "you can't. I'll try not to."

  "Thank you."

  "So how come you broke up with Elliott," Jesse said.

  "And I don't need to be humored, either," Jennifer said. "Jenn,"

  Jesse said, "I didn't call you. You want to talk, I'll listen."

  There was a pause. He heard the clink of glassware and realized she was drinking too. Probably white wine. Couple of lushes, Jesse thought, three thousand miles apart....Better than drinking alone, I guess.

  "Do you remember that ridiculous girlfriend Elliott had with him when we had dinner once at Spago?" Jennifer said.

  "Taffy."

  "Yes, that's right. God, Jesse, you always remember stuff. She was like an ornament, you know, like his Rolex."

  "A way to look successful," Jesse said.

  "That's right, well, I suppose everyone wants to look successful, but . . .

  "There's better ways," Jesse said.

  "Like being successful?" Jennifer said.

  "That's one," Jesse said.

  She wasn't stupid. She was ditzy enough so you could think she was, but she wasn't. She understood a lot, when she permitted herself to think.

  "Well, he was starting to treat me like Taffy. You know?"

  "I'm shocked," Jesse said.

  "Don't make fun of me, Jesse. It's too easy to do."

  "Yes," Jesse said. "You're right. I'm sorry."

  "So I called him on it. I told him I wasn't, you know, like a new hat he could wear around and hang up when he wasn't using it. And he got really mad, and said he was sick of getting used by all the stupid starlets that he tried to help and a lot of other things ... and I started to cry and told him to go fuck himself and got up and walked out of the place."

  "Good for you," Jesse said.

  "I feel like an asshole for crying," Jennifer said.

  "Everybody cries," Jesse said. "The important thing is you didn't let him use you."

  "Thank you," Jennifer said.

  They were silent across the continent while each of them drank.

  Then Jennifer said, "But now what am I going to do?"

  "What are you going to do about what?" Jesse said. "I don't have a job," Jennifer said.

  Her voice was shaky and he knew that she wasn't far from crying. "My career is going nowhere. I'm alone, and I've lost the only decent thing that ever happened in my life."

  "Meaning me?"

  "Yes."

  "It's not like we're enemies, Jenn."

  "Oh, Jesse, I want to see you."

  "Until the next producer comes along?"

  "Don't, Jesse. I need to see you."

  "Not right now, Jenn. Let things settle. Get yourself organized a little before you decide what you need. Maybe you might get some help, a shrink or somebody."

  "I have some friends in therapy," Jennifer said.

  "If you do get help, Jenn, try to get real help. Not some nitwit that reads your aura or does crystal therapy."

  "You think I'm a dreadful fool, don't you, Jesse."

  "I think you do foolish things, sometimes, Jenn. I don't think you're dreadful."

  They drank. Jesse's glass was empty; he got up, holding the phone, and refilled his glass with ice and scotch.

  "Have you met anyone, Jesse?"

  "Yes."

  "Do you love her?"

  "Not yet," Jesse said.

  "I still love you, Jesse."

  Across the harbor the lights were fewer now as people went to bed. And the ones that still glowed in the black night were more separate and much farther apart.

  "Do you still love me, Jesse?"

  "I'm trying not to, Jenn."

  "I know, I don't blame you. But I... I don't like to think about life without you."

  Again Jesse was silent, looking at the disconnected pinpoints of light in the overreaching darkness.

  "Can I see you sometime, Jesse?"

  "Sure," Jesse said. "But right now we both need to be a little separate so we can get our heads back in order, I think."

  "Can I call you again?"

  "Sure, Jenn. You can call me anytime."

  "I still love you, Jesse."

  "Take care of yourself, Jenn. Don't do anything impulsively. It's time to go slow and think things through. If you feel crazy, call me up."

  "Are you succeeding?" Jennifer said.

  "Succeeding?"

  "You said you were trying not to love me, Jesse. Are you succeeding?"

  Jesse took a long breath and let it out and drank some scotch. In the harbor, invisible in the darkness, a bell buoy sounded.

  "Not so far, Jenn."

  Chapter 24

  Jesse was sitting in the middle booth at the village Room restaurant a block from the town hall having lunch with Abby Taylor.

  "Jenn called me the other night," Jesse said.

  "Oh?"

  "She broke up with Elliott."

  "The producer?"

  "Yes."

  "So what does that mean?" Abby said.

  "I don't know."

  "Well, what does it mean to us?" Abby said.

  "Us?"

  "Us. You know, you and me, who have been sort of dating and sleeping together and stuff like that. Us."

  "I don't know."

  "Christ!" Abby said. "Think about it. Does it mean you're going to annul the divorce?"

  "No. Can you do that?"

  "No. Does it mean you are going to dash back to L.A. and move back in with her?"

  "No."

  "See, you can think about this. Do you still love her?" The waitress came to the booth.

  "Who gets the tuna?" the waitress said.

  Jesse pointed at Abby. The waitress set the plate down in front of her.

  "And you must get the club."

  Jesse nodded. The waitress put it down in front of him and went off. Jesse picked up a wedge of sandwich.

  "Do you?" Abby said.

  "Still love her?"

  "Un huh."

  Jesse put the sandwich wedge back down on the plate and leaned back in the booth.

  "I don't know where it will go with Jenn," Jesse said. "I don't even know where I want it to go."

  "That's comforting," Abby said.

  "What I know is that I'm not a good basket to put all your eggs in at the moment, you understand. I don't know if I love Jenn or not right now. I don't know if I can love anybody but Jenn right now. I like you, and we have fun together, but I don't know what it will be like between us next week or next month. Until I get myself clear about Jenn . . ." He didn't finish the sentence because he didn't know how to. So he let it hang unfinished. Abby met his look for a moment and took a deep breath and let it out slowly. Her eyes glistened. Then she looked down at her sandwich.

  They were quiet for a time neither talking nor eating. Then Abby said, "Well, consider myself warned, I guess."

  She looked up at him and smiled very brightly.

  "Doesn't mean we can't eat lunch," she said and her voice was as bright as her smile. Jesse didn't feel very hungry at the moment, but he started on his sandwich because he didn't know what else to do.

  Jo Jo Genest came into the restaurant and took a seat at the counter. He was wearing a sleeveless black tee shirt and his arms bulged obscenely. He swiveled on the counter stool and rested his back and elbows against the counter and looked at Jesse. Jesse finished chewing a bite of his sandwich and looked back at Jo Jo. He was a city cop, and he had long ago mastered the dead-eyed city cop stare. Jo Jo's stare was more of a smirk, Jesse thought. They held the stare for about a minute, which to Abby, sitting in the booth watching them, seemed like an hour. Then Jo Jo wheeled slowly around on his
stool and faced the counter and ordered a steak sandwich.

  "Doesn't he scare you?" Abby said softly.

  Jesse shrugged.

  "Like hell," Abby said. "No shrugging. I asked you a question I want you to answer."

  Jesse didn't like her tone and it showed in the look he gave her. But Abby held his look.

  "Talk about yourself, Jesse. I want to know you."

  "What's to know?" Jesse said.

  "Well, for instance, are you scared of Jo Jo Genest?"

  Through his nose Jesse took a long inhale and a long exhale, and pursed his lips. His right hand rested on the tabletop and he tapped it several times, as if listening to music that Abby couldn't hear. She waited.

  "On the one hand," Jesse said, "Jo Jo's big and strong and stupid and mean and he's mad at me. I'd be an idiot not to be scared of him. On the other hand, if I have to, I can shoot him just as easy as if he were small and weak and smart and kindly."

  "And you'd be willing to do that?" Abby said. "And that's why you're not scared of Jo Jo."

  "I'd be willing," Jesse said. Jesse smiled.

  "You ever shoot anyone?"

  "Yes."

  "Kill him?"

  "Yes."

  "Will you tell me about it?"

  Jesse shifted uncomfortably.

  "He had a machete," Jesse said. "Nine years ago."

  "You would have been, what? Twenty-six?" Jesse nodded. Abby waited. Jesse didn't continue. "So you shot him dead?" Abby said.

  "Yes."

  "Did you mean to?"

  "Yes."

  "You didn't try to wound him, you know, shoot him in the leg or something?"

  "You shoot, you always shoot to kill. It's not the movies. You're in a crisis situation, you got about a half second to do what needs to be done. Your heart's pounding, you can't swallow. It feels like you can't get your breath and you got some guy with a machete. You aim for the middle of the mass and you try to remember not to jerk the trigger."

  Abby nodded slowly as she watched his face.

  "Listening to you talk," Abby said. "It's in there."

  "What exactly?" Jesse said.

  "I don't know exactly. I sensed it when we made love. I guess I thought of it as, you know, `My he's strong,' " Abby said. "But that wasn't really it."

  "Jenn said I was very fierce."

  Abby nodded. "Something like that. I suppose you need to be that way if you're a policeman."

  "Maybe I'm a policeman because I'm that way," Jesse said.

  "And that's why you're not scared of Jo Jo."

  Jesse smiled.

  "It is prudent to be scared of Jo Jo. It would also be prudent of Jo Jo to be scared of me."

  Chapter 25

  Pat Sears found Captain Cat when he got off the eleven-to-seven shift and parked the cruiser out front and went in to log off. There were three steps up to the front door of the police station. The cat was on the bottom step, dead, with a small sign hanging around its neck. On the sign was written SLUT in black Magic Marker. By the time Jesse got there most of the police had heard about Captain Cat and several of them had come in, though they weren't on duty. Nobody said much. He was after all, only a cat. But he had been their cat and they liked him and they all could see that his death was about them.

  "I find the little punk asshole that did this," Suitcase Simpson said, and realized he didn't quite know what he'd do and so didn't finish the sentence. But his round face was bright with anger.

  "What the hell does `slut' mean?" Pat Sears said. "For crissake he's a male cat."

  Jesse picked up the cat and his head flopped loosely. "I'd say his neck is broken," Jesse said.

  He put the cat back down.

  "Peter," Jesse said to the evidence officer, "when you've done what you can do here, take the cat down to the vet and see what he died of. And dust that tag on him."

  Perkins nodded. Jesse stood and went into the police station. He closed his office door and sat in his chair and put his feet up on the desk. "Slut" again, he thought. It didn't fit with spray painting the cruiser, and it doesn't fit with killing the cat. But of course it was not about the cruiser, Jesse knew that, or about the cat. It was about the police department and about somebody's private connection to the word "slut." Is it the whole department? Is it one cop? Is it me? Jesse laced his hands behind his head and let his mind go empty, letting the problem drift at the periphery of his consciousness, looking at it obliquely. He was still sitting, hands behind his head, feet up on the desk, lips pursed slightly, when Peter Perkins knocked on the door.

  "Vet says the cat's neck is broken," Perkins said. "Says he would have died mmediately."

  Jesse nodded.

  "There's a little trace of dried blood on the cat's claws," Perkins said. "Not enough really to do me much good, but I figure Captain scratched the guy."

  "Can you get a blood type?"

  "Not enough," Perkins said. "It's microscopic."

  "How about state forensic?"

  "For what," Perkins said. "A felinicide?"

  Jesse smiled slightly.

  "Might be a little embarrassing, I guess."

  Perkins stood without speaking in front of Jesse's desk.

  "You find anything else?" Jesse said.

  "No."

  Jesse waited.

  "I," Perkins started and stopped, looking for what he wanted to say. "I don't like this thing, Jesse."

  "What thing?"

  "The slut thing. The cruiser, now the cat. It's an escalation."

  "Yes," Jesse said. "It is."

  "Maybe this isn't some kid."

  "Maybe not," Jesse said.

  "Maybe it's serious," Perkins said.

  "Maybe you need to take the microscopic blood samples into state forensic," Jesse said.

  "It's still on the cat's claws," Perkins said. "So take the cat."

  "Jesus, Jesse."

  "I'll call over there," Jesse said. "Sort of smooth the way for you."

  Perkins nodded. He was not happy.

  "You think it could be important, Jesse?"

  "I got no idea, Pete. I'm just trying to accumulate data."

  Perkins nodded. He wanted to say something else. But there wasn't anything else to say. He hesitated another minute, then turned to leave.

  "I'll get right on it, Jesse."

  Perkins went out and closed the door quietly behind him. Jesse leaned back again with his feet up and his lips pursed and his mind relaxed and laced his hands behind his head.

  Chapter 26

  Freedom's Horsemen were practicing squad maneuvers in the wooded area along the railroad tracks in back of the high school.

  In full battle dress, camouflage fatigues with a whitehandled .45 revolver in a shoulder holster, Hasty Hathaway directed his troops through a bullhorn.

  "I want first squad along the track embankments to the right."

  His voice amplified by the bullhorn had lost its human sound.

  "I want second squad on the high ground back here under those trees."

  The mechanized voice sounded odd in the leafy margin where the tracks went out through a low salt marsh.

  "You spread out," the voice boomed, "under the trees so the helicopters can't see you, and you lay your field of fire down, so it'll intersect with first squad, the way we laid it out. Noncoms stand by your men, and await my command."

  The late-summer afternoon buzzed with the low hum of locusts, and the sound of a bird's odd cry which was more like hiccup than song. The salt marsh supported a large number of flying insects with big translucent wings who hovered close to the surface of the brackish water between the salt hay hummocks. Bobbing on the water among the clumps of sea grass were several bright beach balls.

  The mechanical voice over the bullhorn spoke again.

  "Commence firing."

  And a fusillade of small-arms fire snarled over the salt marsh. The beach balls exploded as the bullets tore through them, and the water between the clumps of marshland spurted and roi
led as the bullets sloshed into it. The gunfire was mixed. There was the crack of pistols and the harder sound of rifle fire and the big hollow sound of shotguns.

  After a few moments of sustained fire, the mechanical voice boomed, "Cease firing," and the marsh, ringing with the memory of sound, was now entirely silent, devoid even of the odd hiccupping song and the locust buzz. No insects flew over the surface of the marsh, and the beach balls had vanished from the waterways. Only the bright scrap of one clinging to a reed remained as evidence that they had been there.

  "Assemble on me," the bullhorn voice said. And the men dressed up like soldiers came out of the woods and from behind the railroad embankment and gathered around Hathaway, who stood on a pile of railroad ties, a hundred yards down the track from the football field behind the high school. He put the bullhorn to his mouth again and the voice spoke.

  "Fellows, first let me congratulate you. Had this been the real thing, and not an exercise, we would have prevailed entirely. The fields of fire interlocked, the firing discipline was maintained, each of you did his job and I'm proud of every one of you."

  The men stood in a semicircle around him, thirty-one of them, carrying a variety of shotguns, hunting rifles, modified military weapons, and side arms.

  "And make no mistake about it, men, one day it will be the real thing. And men like us will be what stands between the one-worlders and this White Christian Nation. We who have remained true. We who abide by the constitutional mandate for a well-regulated militia. We who exercise our constitutional right to keep and bear arms. We will keep safe the heritage of this country. And if someday we must die to serve this cause, well, then, it will be a good day to die."

  Hathaway handed the bullhorn to Lou Burke, who was standing on the ground beside the pile of ties. Then he turned back toward the assembled men and came to attention and saluted them. They returned the salute and Hathaway yelled, his voice much smaller without the bullhorn.

  "Dismissed!"

  The men broke their ranks and wandered down the tracks toward the parking lot near the commuter station off Main Street. They stowed their guns in trunks and backseats and drove home in their Toyota sedans and Plymouth Voyagers to take off their uniforms and watch television until bedtime.

  The parking lot had been empty for several minutes and the insect buzz and birdsong had resumed around the salt marsh and along the railroad tracks when Jesse Stone walked out of the woods, cut through the high-school football field, and walked back toward the town hall in the lavender twilight.