Third Rail

by Rory Flynn

  “Even in third grade, you wanted to be a cop.”

  “I remember that.”

  “But you actually did it!” She backs away and looks at him. “I heard about your mother, Eddy. I’m so sorry. Best principal we ever had.” With that, Mrs. Pettengill bursts into tears.

  Harkness steps forward to pull his former teacher close—once comforted, he becomes the comforter. “She’s doing okay, Mrs. P,” Harkness whispers. “My sister’s taking great care of her. Mom’s happy.” Harkness doesn’t tell her that his mother doesn’t recognize him. That she shits herself.

  “What’s happened to your family, Eddy—it’s Shakespearean.” Mrs. Pettengill shivers in his arms.

  “And you don’t mean the comedies, do you?”

  She shakes her head.

  6

  THALIA’S SITTING AT THE KITCHEN TABLE drinking whiskey with even more enthusiasm than usual. She flicks ashes toward a chipped Cinzano ashtray on the kitchen table, crowded with bottles and glasses, yellowed sections of the Globe, and brushes jammed in a jar.

  Harkness wonders why she’s hitting it so hard tonight. He’s the one with the big problem. “I got to find my gun, Thalia.”

  “We’ll keep looking, Eddy. It’ll turn up.” After Harkness got off work, they walked down every street in Thalia’s neighborhood until the light faded. They stumbled along abandoned train tracks and the sludgy banks of the industrial canal that runs behind her building. They dug through corner trash barrels. They smell like sweat and garbage.

  Harkness shakes his head. “The captain’s going to fire me.”

  Thalia moves closer. “Look. You’re not going to get fired. You’ll find your gun. It just may take a while.”

  “Think so, do you?”

  “Absolutely.”

  Harkness isn’t so sure.

  “Hey. We could post a Have You Seen Me? sign with a picture of your gun. Like they do for missing cats.”

  “Not funny,” he says.

  “Just tell them, Eddy. Be honest about it. What can they do?”

  “Fire me. Or worse, not fire me and just keep me in Nagog forever.”

  “It isn’t your fault.”

  “Yes, it is. You don’t go out and drink tons of whiskey and beers without thinking that something stupid might happen.” He sees himself careening around the convenience store.

  “You could just drive up to New Hampshire and buy a new one.”

  “There’s a waiting period. And they report it. Anyway, that won’t work. Even if I got another Glock, it wouldn’t be the same. Mine’s special issue. They check serial numbers. And it’s got a scrape on it from the last cop that had it.”

  Thalia turns quiet.

  “I hate to ask, but I have to.” Harkness pauses for a moment, then barges ahead. “Did you take my gun, Thalia?”

  Thalia startles, and looks him in the eye. “No. No way!”

  “Know anything about it? Anything at all?” Harkness watches her fingers, eyelids, tongue—looking for the flickering tells of a liar.

  “Nothing, Eddy.”

  “Did Mach tell you to steal it to mess with me?”

  “The guy’s a douche, Eddy. I wouldn’t do anything for him.”

  “You worked for him for years.”

  “It was a job, Eddy. All I ever did was pour drinks for creeps and sleazy politicians. And the occasional handsome cop. Or make that paranoid cop.”

  “Paranoid, really?”

  “Fuck you, Eddy.”

  “You’re not being very reassuring.”

  “So why did Mach fire me?”

  “Because that would be the world’s most obvious diversion. I’m a detective, Thalia. I know how people try to get away with shit.”

  “All I can say is I don’t know where your gun is. I got fired. I’ll never work for Mach again or even talk to him.”

  “Sure about that?”

  She nods.

  For a moment, Eddy thinks about twisting her arm around her back and lifting, a proven move that draws out the truth. But he can’t do it to Thalia. When she’s not around, he’ll search the loft. That, he can do.

  “I don’t blame you.” Thalia fills her glass. “I mean, even Nancy-fucking-Drew would think I took your gun. I was the only other person around. You stayed over for the first time last night. And I’m not exactly squeaky-clean. But I didn’t take it, Eddy. Why would I do something like that to you?”

  Harkness looks Thalia in the eye and she holds his stare. No blinking, looking away, fidgeting, or moving things around on the table. A couple of years at the helm of Narco-Intel left Harkness with a built-in polygraph. Thalia’s passing, for now.

  “I don’t know, Thalia. Maybe you’re still mad about the raid.”

  “I don’t sleep with people I’m mad at,” she says. “I’ve had an embarrassing girly crush on you for a long time, in case you didn’t notice.” She jabs out her cigarette. “Though you’re doing a good job ruining it, Major Buzzkill.”

  “That’s not what I’m trying to do.”

  “Look. I would never take anything from you, Eddy.” Her voice rises and her lips curl. “I want to be with you. I don’t steal things from people I . . .”

  “Like?”

  “People I like. Sure. Look, you have to know some things about me, Eddy. First, I’m loyal to a fault. Look how long I hung around Mr. Mach’s place. And he’s a total dirtbag. Second thing. I’m not just a bartender. My gallery sells some of my stuff. And there’s even a little buzz going about my paintings. Google me. Thalia Havoc.”

  “That’s not your name.”

  “Sounds better than Thalia Prochazka.”

  “Didn’t know painters used other names.”

  “Sometimes you have to,” she says, “when you have a Czech name no one can spell or pronounce.”

  Outside, they hear people on the street, walking to bars. Harkness wishes they were with them, that he could just be in love instead of in trouble.

  “Your gun’s out there somewhere,” Thalia says. “You dropped it and someone picked it up. Probably some kid on his way to school. It’s going to turn up. They’ll brag about it or show it to someone. I already put out the word with the young dudes on the street and the old guys who hang around the convenience store. They’re like Wi-Fi around here. If someone says something, they’ll hear it.”

  “Met your friend in the big orange parka.”

  “The guy who looks like a supersized Kenny from South Park?” Thalia breaks into a broad smile. “That’s Woo-Derek. He’s so cute. Talks all street. Dresses like a playa. His dad’s a dentist. And he sings bass in a youth choir.”

  “Everyone’s got a dirty little secret.”

  “Want to know mine?”

  “Thought you already told me all of yours.”

  “I like you a lot,” Thalia says, “and I like being your girlfriend.” She drags out the word and rolls it down her tongue like a butterscotch Life Saver. “Sounds so clean and nice.”

  “Let’s hope not,” Harkness says.

  “Stay here until you find your gun, Eddy. Maybe even after, if you want.”

  Harkness nods, not convinced she’s telling the truth but sure he should stay. Keep your friends close and your suspects closer.

  “I’ll spend the day tomorrow walking around again, looking on the street while you’re at work,” she says. “After all, I don’t have a job anymore. Might as well do something useful.”

  “Thanks.”

  “But right now I’m going to take a shower, Eddy. When we were looking in the trashcans, I picked up a McDonald’s bag and something supergross dripped on my arm.”

  Thalia sheds her clothes as she crosses toward the bathroom. A black and white vision of pale skin and dark tights, she fades into the shadows on the far side of the loft. Harkness keeps staring at the point where she disappeared. Within an hour they’ll be rolling on her futon. For now, he takes out his cell phone and texts Patrick, asks him to run a full records check on Thalia Pro
chazka, aka Thalia Havoc, resident of 640 Atkinson Street, Boston.

  7

  HARKNESS LOOKS UP from emptying meters in front of the Unitarian church to see a car speeding toward the town green, its center spiked with a tall granite obelisk carved with the names of the Union dead. The silver Volvo’s hitting sixty, engine racing. It crosses the centerline and swerves into the oncoming lane, heading toward Harkness and the green.

  Must be an out-of-control elder or a student driver heading to high school, Harkness guesses. Too early for a drunk. As the car speeds closer, a low huddle of deer starts to cross North Street. Deer have become a nuisance in the last couple of years, devouring gardens and stopping traffic. Oblivious, they step forward on elegant legs, hooves recoiling slightly on the asphalt as they meander across the road like a pack of toddlers.

  No. Harkness shakes his head at the deer. The driver must know the Don’t Veer for Deer drill that the Public Safety Commission has been pushing on local cable and in the Nagog Journal. The Volvo races toward the pack. And the driver’s not slowing down.

  He’s speeding up.

  The Volvo passes right through the herd, sending a deer flying over the hood and knocking a couple of others to the side with a thud. The car keeps racing toward the center of town.

  The smiling driver grips the steering wheel and laughs.

  “Stop!” Harkness steps into the street and draws his gun, drops down into a crouch, and aims at the tires. The lightweight gun in his hand puzzles Harkness for a moment. Then he remembers.

  Bent forward, face flushed red, eyes wide, the driver lays on the horn. He’s had a heart attack. Or he’s insane. The Volvo races by Harkness, jumps the curb, and roars across the green to smash into the town monument. The scream of torquing metal and the crunch of safety glass shattering cut through the morning air. The crushed grille of the car bends around the marble base of the monument, smoke gushing from beneath the mangled hood.

  Harkness shoves his plastic gun in its holster and runs toward the green. He has to keep people away from the accident; the car could explode. He keeps one hand on his radio, calling in an emergency and requesting an ambulance, following protocol. Can’t make any mistakes. When it’s all over, he doesn’t want anyone to say he couldn’t handle the situation.

  The monument creaks and shudders in the cool morning air. The sculpture of a Union soldier, standing at attention atop the monument for more than a century, gyrates slowly for a moment, then tumbles. In slow motion, the soldier dives headfirst to land squarely on the Volvo with another smash. The top of the monument shatters, sending rocky debris raining down on the green. Harkness dodges the stones as he runs toward the car.

  The driver slumps against his half-shattered window, trapped in his car, arms flailing. Harkness radios in to confirm that the driver is alive and that they’ll need the Jaws of Life to get him free. Dispatch tells him the EMTs are on the way.

  “Hey!” Harkness steps over a chunk of soldier and knocks out what’s left of the driver’s window with his elbow.

  The driver turns toward Harkness, his face powder-white from airbag dust. Two straight lines of blood stream from his nose. He looks like a dead baker. Cubes of safety glass shine on his navy blazer.

  “Try to hold still, sir. Ambulance is coming.”

  The driver shakes his head, probably the only part of him that can move, except for his arm, which is still jerking around toward what used to be the passenger seat. He’s got the metal door of the glove compartment open and he’s pawing around, sending papers flying.

  “I don’t need your registration, sir,” Harkness says. “Don’t need anything. Just keep still. The EMTs are coming.” Sirens howl in the distance. An ambulance, fire engine, and the rest of the Nagog Police Department are on the way.

  The driver grunts, finds what he’s looking for.

  He holds a gun in his right hand, a fancy revolver that he shoves over his ear.

  “No!” Harkness leans through the driver’s window and gets one hand around his thick wrist, then another. He smells vodka and gasoline. The sirens come closer.

  The driver grunts. His teeth are shattered, and who knows what else. But he’s holding tight to his gun. Harkness pries his trigger finger out and sticks his own thumb behind the trigger. With one hard pull, he yanks the blood-slick pistol away. He clicks the safety on. For a moment he imagines how easy his life would be if the gun were a matte-black Glock. But it’s a shiny Smith & Wesson—wrong gun, different caliber. He slips the gun behind his belt.

  The driver slumps forward on the dashboard. Harkness leans into the car again, its floor crowded with Grey Goose bottles dislodged by the impact. Cockroach-colored vials gleam among the bottles. Harkness remembers a burnt-out Cambridge triple-decker, its floor covered with the same vials, melted into amber pools next to three blackened and blistered college kids, conjoined on the floor like cowering citizens of Pompeii after their makeshift drug lab caught fire.

  Harkness picks out a full vial and puts it in the pocket of his leather jacket, a Narco-Intel habit—Be your own chain of custody. You never know what might be evidence. And you never know when evidence might disappear.

  He looks up. EMTs are running across the grass. Slumped against the dash, the driver opens his dark eyes open for a moment to give Harkness a heavy-lidded stare.

  “Edward, right?” he says softly. “You Eddy Harkness, Red’s boy?”

  “Yes.”

  The driver starts to laugh, slowly at first, then more and more until a stream of bright blood gushes from his mouth.

  “Says his name is Robert Hammond, of Oaktree Court. Know him?” Captain Munro holds out the license to Harkness. It shows a smiling, smaller version of the man now being raced to the Nagog Regional Hospital in an ambulance. Behind them, a tow truck struggles to free the Volvo.

  Harkness thinks for a moment. “My father knew him. He’s some kind of financial advisor.”

  “Like half the town. Got anything else, Eddy?”

  Harkness stares.

  The captain puts his hand on Harkness’s shoulder. “Look, I know this isn’t easy. I wouldn’t ask you if it weren’t important.”

  “He was a big wine guy,” Harkness remembers. “Had a cellar. Big drinker, big talker. That’s what my father used to say.”

  The captain holds up Hammond’s shiny pistol, zipped into an evidence bag. “Any reason he might want to kill himself?”

  Harkness shrugs. “Wouldn’t know. Never met him. Dad kept his business friends separate.”

  “From?”

  “Our family.” His throat tightens.

  “Was he involved in anything . . .”

  “Illegal? Like my father?”

  “That’s not what I’m saying, Harkness. Christ. I’m just trying to figure out why a middle-aged guy with a clean record would go off the rails like this. Anyone we could talk to?”

  Harkness runs through his Nagog connections. “I went to high school with his daughter, Candace,” he says. “She’s a couple of years younger than me. Completely wild.”

  “Did you know this wild daughter back in the day?”

  Harkness shakes his head. “Not very well. Haven’t seen her in years.”

  “Get reacquainted. Do some legwork.”

  “Me, sir? I have meters to empty.”

  “Don’t be clever. You think I should send Detective Ramble? He’ll just talk the guy to death,” the captain says quietly. “Or worse Dabilis? They don’t know this town the way you do. Being a local is a big advantage for cases like this. You’re not a stranger. You know everyone. And they know you, trust you.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Start at Nagog Regional, in the ICU,” the captain says. “This Hammond fellow is probably going to die there in a couple of hours. EMTs say he doesn’t have a chance.”

  “No disrespect intended, sir,” Harkness says. “But why do we care?”

  “If it’s an accident, the town ends up paying the whole bill for repairing t
his historic site.” The captain points at the smashed monument. “Which will be expensive. But if it’s suicide, it’s willful destruction of property and Mr. Hammond’s insurance has to pay.”

  The tow truck pulls the Volvo free from the monument and what’s left of the Union soldier rolls off its roof.

  “Hey, be careful!” the captain shouts at the wrecker, which runs over the soldier’s arm.

  “Hammond got drunk, smashed his car into a monument at about sixty miles an hour, and put a gun to his head. You need more proof than that, sir?”

  “Lawyers and insurance companies run the show now,” the captain says. “Got to get something in writing. That’s what the town manager wants.”

  “So you want me to go talk to a dying guy and get him to confess to wrecking the town monument while trying to kill himself? Sir?”

  “Yes, ideally as soon as possible. Before he dies.”

  Harkness says nothing.

  “Would you rather be emptying meters?”

  Harkness walks back to retrieve the coin transfer unit. A crowd gathers on Main Street, cars pulled off to both sides of the road. As he walks closer, a clutch of concerned women rushes toward him.

  “You have to do something,” one of them says.

  “What’s the problem, ma’am?”

  “A deer.”

  Harkness walks closer. After Hammond did his damage, the injured deer limped into the woods to die. But a big buck has managed to drag itself back onto the road. A group of citizens huddles around the buck, as if it’s a dolphin beached on the Cape. Dozens of cars are lined up down Main Street. Harkness radios in and requests Animal Control.

  The buck’s back legs splay at terrible angles behind him. Harkness can’t count how many points the buck has; his antlers are broken and scattered in pieces on the road. Glistening pink gel seeps from the nubs.

  The buck rises up suddenly, desperate eyes glinting, and tries to walk, front hooves clicking on the road as he pulls his scraped body and useless legs a few inches closer to the edge of the road.