“And there he is,” Suit said.
Seth Ralston came out of the front door of his condo unit. He was wearing black pants and a white T-shirt. He had a Yankees cap on his head, and a dark windbreaker tied around his waist.
“Making a foray?” Suit said.
“Dressed for it,” Jesse said. “Put on the jacket, zip it up, and you’re all in black.”
Ralston walked to the sidewalk and looked back at the truck. He paused. Then he turned and walked toward downtown.
“Drive or walk,” Suit said.
“One of each,” Jesse said.
Jesse got out of the car and walked in the same direction as Ralston, on the other side of the street. Suit put the truck in gear and drove past Ralston. Ralston would probably make them, Jesse knew, if he hadn’t already. It was nearly impossible to tail somebody in a town the size of Paradise, with so little foot traffic. Still, it would crank up the pressure, maybe. And it was something to do.
Ralston walked slowly along Front Street with the harbor on his right. He passed Suit’s truck, parked at a hydrant. He glanced at it but kept going. Jesse drifted along behind him. At the town wharf, Ralston turned and went into the Gray Gull. Suit pulled into the parking lot on the wharf and sat in his truck. Jesse went on into the Gray Gull and spotted Ralston at the bar. Jesse went to the other end of the bar and ordered a beer. He drank it slowly, while Ralston had a martini, paid, stood, and went out. Jesse left a bill on the bar and went out after him.
With Jesse watching him and Suit circling slowly in the truck, Ralston walked back to his condo and went inside. Suit parked across the street. Jesse went over and got in the truck.
“Is police work exciting,” Suit said, “or what?”
“I think he was going out to peep,” Jesse said, “and spotted us and changed his plan.”
“Or maybe he just wanted a drink,” Suit said.
“Who do you know goes out at nine o’clock at night, walks to a bar, has one martini, and walks home.”
“Most people I know drink beer,” Suit said. “But you got a point. It is like he was going out for another reason and changed his mind when he saw us.”
“That’s my theory,” Jesse said.
“Kinda thin,” Suit said.
“Kinda?” Jesse said.
43
JESSE MADE himself a drink and sat at the bar in his living room to read the Night Hawk’s letter.
Dear Jesse,
I’m feeling trapped and desperate. No, not because of anything you’re doing (God! Small-town cops). . . . No, I feel trapped by my obsession. The struggle between my obsession and my self is the real struggle, not the pathetically unequal conflict between you and me. It’s not what you do or who you talk to. . . . It’s whether my obsession drives me to do things that I don’t want to do. It’s whether finally, to save me from my obsession, I allow you to catch me and put a stop to it. . . . But I worry that if that time comes, you and the other Keystone Kops won’t have the wherewithal to do it. One thing is certain: I will strike again, and you can’t stop me, and can never stop me . . . unless I arrange for you to stop me in order to stop my obsession . . . It should be interesting.
The Night Hawk
Jesse put the letter on the bar. He stood and carried his drink to the French doors and looked out at the harbor. He drank some scotch.
It’s him,Jesse thought. He’s letting me know that it’s him. He knows I’ve talked to his wife.
He knows we’ve had him under surveillance. “It’s not what you do or who you talk to.” He’s letting me know. I wonder if it’s conscious?
Jesse had some more scotch.
I wonder what it means that he called me Jesse? He’s getting more ragged, I can hear it in the voice in the letter. I wonder if he started out to go peeping, a deescalating step, so to speak. Maybe he’d been frightened by Gloria Fisher. Maybe he’s got to back up and start over and work himself up to it again.
Jesse walked back to the bar and made another drink.
The trick will be,Jesse thought , to put enough pressure on him to make him give himself away but not enough pressure to make him hurt somebody.
He wondered if Dix could help. He knew one thing. Dix would draw the analogy. The Night Hawk was clinging to an obsession that he felt he couldn’t live without, and it was destroying him. Dix would direct Jesse’s attention to his own situation with Jenn.
“It’s not exactly the same,” Jesse said as he walked back across his living room to look out at the harbor again. “But you don’t have to bend it too much to make it fit.”
Everyone wanted him to give up on Jenn. As far as that argument went, everyone was probably right. He’d be better off without her. He was pretty sure that the Night Hawk wanted to stop being the Night Hawk. Except that he also didn’t want to give up being the Night Hawk.
Jesse looked out at the harbor, except that he didn’t see it. What he saw was himself in the darkened glass. Not old yet, still in shape. The booze didn’t show yet.
He’d had a lot of women. They had been, by and large, good women. Sometimes amazingly good, like Sunny Randall. And he’d liked them all, especially Sunny Randall. But they weren’t like Jenn.
Jenn wasn’t good. Maybe that was her charm. Maybe what made their relationship so in-tense was the anger. Maybe when they did make love it was seasoned with rage, and the rage made it special.
Maybe he was drunk.
He walked back to get some more scotch. At the bar he made a new drink, and turned and looked back at the window where he’d been reflected and raised his glass.
“Sooner or later,” he said aloud, “I’ll bust you.”
He drank. And looked at the black window. Was he talking to the Night Hawk, or was he talking to himself? He felt sad for the Night Hawk. Sad for himself.
“So what am I,” Jesse said, “a Day Hawk? How about a Night Eagle?”
He laughed. It was a derisive sound in the empty room.
“Night and day,” he sang, “I am the one.”
He raised his glass toward the dark glass in the French doors that opened onto his deck.
“Only me beneath the moon and under the sun.”
He drank again.
God,he thought, I’m drunk.
He walked into the bedroom, where Jenn’s picture still stood on the night table by the bed.
He looked at it for a moment and shook his head. Then he turned it facedown on top of the night-stand and drank some scotch.
44
JESSE HAD coffee with Sunny at the Gray Gull, which was now closed for renovation. They sat at the bar and watched Spike unload a large stainless-steel refrigerator from a truck and carry it the length of the restaurant.
“Yikes,” Jesse said.
“Spike is very strong,” Sunny said.
“I would have guessed that,” Jesse said.
“He looks like sort of a big lovable bear, and sometimes people misjudge that,” Sunny said.
“That’s probably an error,” Jesse said.
“Plus,” Sunny said, “he does some martial-arts training.”
“Like he needs to,” Jesse said.
“Plus, he’s really quite quick on his feet.”
Jesse nodded.
“If I ever have trouble with Spike,” Jesse said, “I think I’ll rely on gunplay.”
“Use a big caliber,” Sunny said.
Jesse grinned.
“Besides,” Sunny said, “you won’t have trouble with Spike.”
“Because I’m the chief of police?” Jesse said.
“Because you’re my friend,” Sunny said.
“You still painting?” Jesse said.
“Not since Rosie died,” Sunny said.
“But you will,” Jesse said.
“I hope so.”
“Might you buy a new Rosie?” Jesse said.
“I don’t know,” Sunny said. “I invested so much time in her. I was married when Rosie was a puppy. . . . Now I live alone. . . . I don’t know.”
Jesse nodded.
“Richie’s wife have the kid yet?” he said.