It wasn’t an accusation, just a question.
I shrugged. “Maybe.”
“You seem to feel some debt of loyalty to him.”
“No, not to him in particular.” I wasn’t sure that I could put my reasons into words, but I felt like I had to try, to explain it to myself as much as to Rachel.
“When I’ve been in trouble, when I’ve taken on cases that were difficult, and worse than difficult, I’ve had people who were willing to stand alongside me: you, Angel, Louis, others too, and some of those people didn’t survive their involvement. Now I have someone asking me for help and I’m not sure that I can turn away so easily.”
“‘What goes around comes around?’”
“I guess so. But if I go down, there are things that need to be taken care of first.”
“Such as?”
I didn’t reply.
“You mean me.” Invisible fingers traced thin lines of irritation on her forehead. “We’ve talked about this before.”
“No, I’ve talked about it. You just block your ears.”
I heard my voice rising, and took a deep breath before I spoke again.
“Look, you won’t carry a gun, and-”
“I’m not listening to this,” she said. She stormed up the stairs. Seconds later, I heard the door to her office slam shut.
I met Detective Sergeant Wallace MacArthur of the Scarborough PD in the Panera Bread Company over by the Maine Mall. I’d had a run-in with MacArthur during the events leading up to Faulkner’s capture but we’d settled our differences over a meal at the Back Bay Grill. Admittedly, the meal had cost me the best part of two hundred bucks, including the wine MacArthur drank, although it was worth it to have him back on my side.
I ordered a coffee and joined him at a booth. He was tearing apart a warm cinnamon roll with his fingers, the frosting reduced to the consistency of melted butter, and leaving stains on the personal ads in the latest issue of the Casco Bay Weekly. The personals in the CBW tended to be pretty heavy on women who wanted to cuddle in front of fires, go hiking in the depths of winter, or join experimental dance classes. None of them seemed like candidates for MacArthur, who was about as cuddly as a holly bush and didn’t like any physical activity that involved getting out of bed. Aided by the metabolism of a greyhound and his bachelor lifestyle, he had reached his late forties without being forced into the potential pitfalls of good eating and regular exercise. MacArthur’s idea of exercise was using alternate fingers to push the remote.
“Found anyone you like?” I asked.
MacArthur chewed reflectively on a chunk of roll.
“How come all these women claim they’re ‘attractive’ and ‘cute’ and ‘easygoing’?” he replied. “I mean, I’m single. I’m out there, looking around, and I never meet women like these. I meet unattractive. I meet non-cute. I meet hard-going. If they’re so good looking and happy-go-lucky, how come they’re advertising at the back of the Casco Bay Weekly? I tell you, I think some of these women are telling lies.”
“Maybe you should try the ads farther on.”
MacArthur’s eyebrows gave a startled leap.
“The freaks? Are you kidding? I don’t even know what some of that stuff means.” He flicked discreetly to the back pages, then gave the tables nearby a quick scan to make sure no one was watching. His voice dropped to a whisper. “There’s a woman in here looking for ‘a male replacement for her shower.’ I mean, what the hell is that? I wouldn’t even know what she wanted me to do. Does she want me to fix her shower, or what?”
I looked at him. He looked back. For a man who had been a cop for over twenty years, MacArthur could come across as a little sheltered.
“What?” he asked.
“Nothing.”
“No, say it.”
“I just don’t think that woman’s for you, that’s all.”
“You’re telling me. I don’t know what’s worse: understanding what these people are looking for, or not understanding. Jesus, all I want is a normal, straightforward relationship. That’s got to exist somewhere, right?”
I wasn’t sure that there was such a thing as a normal, straightforward relationship, but I understood what he meant. He meant that Wallace MacArthur wasn’t going to be anybody’s shower replacement.
“Last I heard you were helping Al Buxton’s widow overcome her grief.” Al Buxton had been a York County deputy until he contracted some weird degenerative disease that made him look like a mummy without its bandages. His passing was mourned by pretty much nobody. Al Buxton was so unpleasant he made shingles look good.
“It didn’t last. I don’t think she had too much grief to overcome. Y’know, she told me once that she fucked his embalmer. I don’t think he even got to wash his hands, she was on him so fast.”
“Maybe she was grateful for the nice job he’d done. Al looked a whole lot better dead than he did alive. Better company, too.”
MacArthur laughed, but the action seemed to irritate his eyes. It was only then that I saw how red and swollen they were. He looked like he’d been crying. Maybe the whole single thing was getting to him more than I thought.
“What’s wrong with you? You look like Bambi’s mother just died.”
He instinctively raised his right hand to wipe at his eyes, which had begun to tear, then seemed to think better of it.
“I got Maced this morning.”
“No way. Who did it?”
“Jeff Wexler.”
“Detective Jeff Wexler? What did you do, try to ask him out? You know, that guy in the Village People wasn’t really a cop. You shouldn’t use him as a role model.”
MacArthur looked seriously unimpressed.
“You about done? I got Maced because it’s department regs: you want to carry Mace, you got to experience what it feels like to get Maced, just so you won’t be too hasty about doing it to somebody else.”
“Really? Does it work?”
“Like hell. I just want to get out there and blast some bastard in the face so I can feel better about myself. That stuff stings.”
Shocker. Mace stings. Who’d have thought?
“Someone told me you’re working for the Blythes,” said MacArthur. “That’s a pretty cold case.”
“They haven’t given up, even if the cops have.”
“That’s not fair, Charlie, and you know it.”
I raised a hand in apology. “I had Irv Blythe out at my house last night. I had to tell his wife and him that their first lead in years was false. I didn’t feel good about it. They’re in pain, Wallace: six years on and they’re still in pain every day. They’ve been forgotten. I know it’s not the cops’ fault. I know the case is cold. It’s just not cold for the Blythes.”
“You think she’s dead?” His tone told me that he had already reached his own conclusion.
“I hope she’s not.”
“There’s always hope, I guess.” He smiled crookedly. “I wouldn’t be looking at the personals if I didn’t believe that.”
“I said I was hopeful, not insanely optimistic.”
MacArthur gave me the finger. “So, you wanted to see me? Plus you got here late so I had to buy my own cinnamon roll, and these things are kind of expensive.”
“Sorry. Look, I may have to leave town for a week. Rachel doesn’t like me being overprotective and she won’t carry a gun.”
“You need someone to drop by, keep an eye on her?”
“Just until I get back.”
“It’s done.”
“Thanks.”
“This about Faulkner?”
I shrugged. “I guess.”
“His people are gone, Parker. It’s just him.”
“Maybe.”
“Anything happen to make you think otherwise?”
I shook my head. There was nothing but a feeling of unease and a belief that Faulkner would not let the annihilation of his brood slide.
“You lead a charmed life, Parker, you know that? The order from the attorney general’s office was strictly hands off: you weren’t to be pursued for obstructing the investigation, no charges against you or your buddy for the deaths in Lubec. I mean, it’s not like you killed aid workers or nothing, but still.”