“And David’s not going to write about it?”
“Well—just that it happened.”
“Scooped by the Inquirer and Mirror. Amazing.”
She snuggled against me. “It’s over. That’s what matters.”
I was making pancakes the next morning when Mitch Stone appeared at my door. He stood on the little deck at the top of the front stairs.
“Any idea who might have set that fire last night, Chief?”
I smiled. “We suspect Muslim terrorists. Or possibly, disgruntled immigrants. Those are some bad hombres.”
“I was thinking of guerilla real estate brokers. A gallows across the harbor really tanks the property values.”
“I’ll look into it.”
We stood just breathing the morning air for a few seconds. A gardener’s truck drove by, with a trailer full of riding lawnmowers. We’d be getting the complaint calls as soon as those big engines started up. Mitch made some joke about roasting marshmallows, but I brushed it aside.
“They told some stories, put out some grass fires, passed around a flask, and went home. The Staties wanted to know if I was pressing charges against the individual who broke my wrist.”
“What did you say?”
“I told them I was going to call your girlfriend, find out what kind of beer you drink, and buy you a case of it.”
He shrugged. “I like Kronenbourg. But it’s hard to find on Nantucket.”
“There’s a lot that’s hard to find here.”
Mitch nodded. “Big Macs, fountain pens, ammunition.”
“Among other things.”
Mrs. Penniston from number 6 strolled past with her two waddling pugs. Dervish was an Olympic athlete by comparison. Billy Delavane referred to his pug as “the sports model.” I couldn’t see these two dogs chasing rabbits or deer—or the moon. Dervish had been known to chase the moon when he caught sight of it. I nodded to Mrs. Penniston. She smiled and lifted a hand.
I turned back to Mitch. “So what brings a world traveler like you to Nantucket?”
“What brings an LAPD cop to Nantucket?”
“My ex-wife’s family were summer people for years.”
“Summer people.”
“You say that the way I say ‘shoplifters.’ So I assume you grew up here.”
“You don’t assume anything, Chief. After the school shooting, you did your research. You know everything there is to know about me. You know my father was an abusive drunk. You know I was suspended from fifth grade for throwing snowballs at police cars. You pulled my Marine Corps service record. You have my whole life on your computer.”
“Until 2009, when you disappear off the face of the earth.”
Mitch shrugged. “Well, I’m back.”
We studied each other. I could see there was no point in probing any further. Whatever Mitch Stone’s secrets were, he was keeping them. In nosy, small-town Nantucket that was actually refreshing. I lifted my wrist from the sling. “Thanks for your help.”
“We have a saying in the Marines, Chief. ‘Two is one and one is none.’ You gotta have backup.”
Some kids on bikes rode by on Fair Street, shouting and laughing. When they were gone Mitch said, “You think their parents know what they’re up to today?”
“I certainly hope not.”
Mitch squinted up at the cloudless early autumn sky. “Beautiful day.”
“Yeah. Looks like things are back to normal finally.”
“Let’s hope.”
My kids were still talking about the weekend events when I picked them up from school the next day. Carrie gave me a solemn hug. Her friends were watching, but she didn’t seem to care. And she had some news of her own. “I made friends with Judy Gobeler. I apologized.”
“That’s great.”
“She tried out for The Grace Notes. She really can sing.”
“There you go.”
“She and Debbie are friends again, too, Dad.”
“Wow.”
“So Judy’s not going to come back years from now and try to kill us all.”
“Well, that’s taking the long view. In the meantime, you needed another soprano.”
“And she’s letting me borrow her Levi’s Wedgie icon jeans.”
“So it’s all good.”
At home, Tim found me starting dinner in the kitchen.
“I was thinking about that poem you wrote, about you and your dad and me and all the generations and everything and the dead guy and the whale.”
“Maybe I bit off a little more than I could chew there.”
“No, it’s a great poem!”
“Well, thanks.”
“I wrote one, too. I did it today in Social Studies.”
“You couldn’t wait for study hall?”
“No! Remember what you told me about poems?”
“Uh…”
“They’re like visits from the Royal Family. You said you have to drop everything and go outside to wave, or pay homage or whatever.”
“I do remember that. It’s true. Poetic Prerogative.”
“Right.”
“Can I see it?”
“It’s not that great. Too many rhymes.”
“What’s it about?”
“Uh…you. You and me. And maybe Grandpa, too, I don’t know. I couldn’t get the whale in there, but it feels like he’s in there, anyway.”
I stuck out a flat palm and beckoned with my fingers. “Show me.”
He dug his spiral notebook out of his book bag, opened it to a page of cramped but legible handwriting. Was it in the genes? It looked a little like my own scrawl, and a lot like my father’s.
My dad is strong and good
At least he knows he should be
He’s not a bad man
But he knows he could be
He chooses every day
When he has to choose, he’s alone
We’ve both always known
But neither of us say
I’m not him
He’s not me
I’m free, I’m no clone
But he’s everything I’d like to be
When I’m grown.
I handed the notebook back. “Nice. But it’s a lot to live up to.”
He grinned. “Yeah, Dad. Don’t blow it.”
They were moving Lonnie Fraker to Barnstable the next afternoon, and I wanted to see him before the transfer. I caught him just after his breakfast and buzzed the cell door open as he sipped the last of his coffee.
“Hey, Lonnie.”
“Chief.”
He sat down on the hard mattress of his concrete-slab bed, “Never thought I’d wind up in here.”
“Then you weren’t thinking.”
Lonnie shrugged. “No, just feeling.”
“I was thinking about something you said to me the other day, in the Darling Street attic, when you made your case against Haden Krakauer. That maybe we’re all strangers.”
“Maybe we are.”
“I thought I knew you.”
“I showed you the good stuff. No one shows the bad stuff.”
“Well, it’s all out now. You and your brother are going away for a long time.”
“Don’t worry about me, Chief. I’ll be fine. And Todd’s used to the lockup. He’s an institutional man.”
I studied him as he drained the last of his coffee. “Why? Why do this? I don’t get it.”
“Sure you do. I saw you with Toddie. You would have blown his brains out if not for Mitch. You were feeling it, all right.”
“So that’s it? Just—rage and hate?”
“And a dash of bitters. Gotta have the bitters.”
“It’s been twenty years, Lonnie.”
“Yeah. I thought the f
eeling would go away, but it didn’t. Not for Toddie either. Maybe it never goes away for anybody. I thought the law would take care of those assholes, you know? Justice would prevail! And it seemed that way for a while. You arrested Ed. But he wound up king of the prison like some Mexican drug lord.”
“He was happy to escape, though.”
“He went for the better deal. Getting his stash and getting away. Ed always went for the better deal. And nothing happened to Toland! He got rewarded! That little movie he made about all of us? It was his ticket to Tinseltown. I mean, come on.”
“No one could have proved he killed your stepmother.”
“My point exactly. Waiting around for our legal system to do its job…you could wait forever. I thought I was going to.” He set his cup down on the floor and leaned back against the cinderblock wall. “You know how they say revenge is a dish best served cold?” I nodded. “Well, that’s bullshit. Take it from me. Life is a long, cold night. You want roast chicken, you want beef stew. Comfort food, not some cold dinner. Who eats sushi in a blizzard?”
“Good point.”
“I got my meal, Chief. Piping hot the way I wanted it.”
“You know, they also say if you want revenge, dig two graves.”
“I’ll let you dig mine. I’m good with that.”
We were quiet for a minute or two, listening to the noises of the booking room, the phones ringing, and the muted conversations. “You still haven’t told me,” I said finally. “Why get involved with this whole crazy scheme in the first place? Why not just hire a couple of hitters from Southie to take Toland out?”
He smiled. “That’s a little cold, Chief. And anyway…Todd is my brother.”
“Half brother.”
“No such thing. Not with us.”
“Okay, but what about all the other people? Jane never hurt you. You had no problem with David Trezize. And Monica Terwilliger?”
“I wasn’t going to let anything happen to them.”
That was too much for me. I charged forward, lifted him off the bed, and slammed him into the wall. “Jane was hanging from your gallows when we hit the beach!”
His eyes were wild. “I didn’t want that! I feel like shit about that!”
I pushed him back down onto the mattress. “No, you don’t.”
A long silence raged between us, cold and uncrossable as a snowmelt river. We stood on opposite banks, with the white noise and the rapids between us.
Lonnie spoke first. “This was a war, Chief. All right? Civilians die in a war. It’s called collateral damage.”
“No. It’s more than that.”
“What are you talking about?”
“I read your brother’s blog. High School Military Tribunal dot blogspot dot com. It’s on the net—anyone can find it. Sippy Bascomb did.”
“Yeah.”
“And that’s when this whole thing started.”
I pulled out my phone, went online, and tapped in the URL for Sippy’s blog. I wanted to read the words verbatim. Sippy had to start his own blog just to comment on Todd’s, because he went on for so long, and they have a 4,200-character limit. “Here it is. Fish Face and Mr. Peanut dot blogspot dot com. I guess those were the nicknames the mean kids gave them. What did they call you?”
“Pumpkin Head. Squeaky. After Toland spread the word, they left it at faggot, basically.”
“Here it is. Listen to this. He’s talking about the Nazi government. ‘It would have been unthinkable without the agreement of the ordinary people, each ordinary person. Everyone who participated with a secret smile, everyone who could have helped a single Jew and decided it was safer not to, everyone who looked away—they all deserved to be put on trial and convicted along with their overlords.’ A little later he tells Todd, ‘You understand the culture of cruelty that tormented us. So I respond. You’ve earned it.’ The culture of cruelty. You believed in that, too.”
Lonnie looked up at me. “It was real.”
“So they all deserved to die? David, Monica, Billy…Cindy and Jane? All of them.”
He grabbed his face with his hands and shook his head. “What do you care what I believed? Or Todd or Sippy. You never knew us. And you won. It’s over. Let it alone.”
“I will. I’m done here.”
I called for the cell door to open. I was on the other side, and the bars slid shut again when Lonnie stood up and approached them. “Chief—”
I turned. “What?”
“You can fix this.”
“Enough, Lonnie.”
“You can tell them I was working undercover, helping you from the inside. That Bulgarian punk won’t say a word; he doesn’t want to get deported. And Mitch Stone knows how to keep a secret. They’d go along. And it’s a good story. I’m the hero. I tipped you off. I saved the day. There’s no scandal. The state police look good, everybody’s happy. Wait a second! I’m not asking for favors! There’s plenty in it for you, Chief. I still know where Ed’s stash is buried. You can have it all. Those kids of yours are gonna be going to college soon. That ain’t cheap.”
I watched him closely, more sad than angry now. “You know, Lonnie…my mother always says liars think everyone is lying, and thieves think everyone’s a thief. She’s right. You think everyone’s just like you. But they’re not. Apart from everything else, you’ve just violated Massachusetts General Law 268A Section Two ‘corrupt gifts, offers or promises to influence official acts.’ That’s another five years on your sentence. Looks like you’ve found a home.”
He had no answer for that, and I left him there, climbed the stairs to the main lobby, and walked out into the bright, cold autumn sunshine. Patty Stokes and Jill Swenson were walking across the parking lot about to start their shift. Two tough, smart young women, one white, one black, first in their classes from the Academy, highest scores on our own aptitude tests, and I heard they had rented a house together off of First Way with a couple of other female officers to save money. They waved happily at me and returned my salute. It felt good to see them at this moment. I badly needed a dose of their high spirits and their optimism. They had a mission, and so did I. We were all struggling toward a better world. We were making progress. It was slow and irregular and incremental. But we were getting there.
That was a good thought to remember.
I married Jane Stiles the next Saturday, after Sam’s first full week at Cyrus Pierce, where he had already made two new friends and gotten his first A on a book report. I took the week off and left Haden Krakauer in charge of the cop shop. Jane and I worked on our vows together, organized the reception (Spanky’s raw bar and all the booze anyone could drink at the Admiralty Club in Madaket), found rooms for Franny Tate, my brother Phil, Jane’s sister and her dad, plus Chuck Obremski, who took some of his bereavement leave from the LAPD to come east for the wedding.
We held the ceremony on the beach at Madequecham under the steep sand cliff in the lee of the sharp north wind with the rest of our families and friends—my ex-wife, Jane’s ex-husband, our kids, a few friends like David Trezize and Kathleen Lomax, Mitch Stone and Vicky Fleishman, Mike and Cindy Henderson, Billy Delavane, on crutches, with Karen Gifford—so they really were a couple now!—Sam and Claire Trikilis—with my father’s ghost muttering, “All the world does not love a lover. All the world is in fact bored to tears by a lover,” and my mother presiding over the ceremony from her wheelchair at the top of the bluff. There was no whale on the beach, but the porpoises in the water put on a fine show for the occasion. Bethany Starbuck, the new town clerk, presided, while Dervish and Bailey chased each other and tussled over pieces of driftwood and an abandoned flip-flop sandal.
I recited my vows first:
“I will clean the toilets when you least expect it, step on the edge of the rug when you vacuum, and always be on the other side when you’re making the bed.
“I will b
ring you flowers for no reason.
“I will read to you from books that are exactly the right amount of boring when you cannot get to sleep.
“I will listen to you working out the plot points of your books and comfort you when you hit page one hundred and nothing makes sense and you want to throw the thing away and remind you that you always feel that way on page one hundred.
“I will swim in the ocean with you late in the afternoon in the late summer when the tourists have gone back to their rental houses for cocktails, even though the water is cold and the air is chilly.
“I will make your first cup of coffee in the morning and let you add the milk.
“I will let you navigate when I drive off-island and enjoy all instructions, even, ‘Oh, my God, turn left, I mean right!”
“I will hug your son all the time until he’s old enough to hate it and then again when he’s grown up and doesn’t mind again.
“I will not tease you about losing your glasses, even when I find them in one of your boots or the vegetable drawer of the fridge.
“I will edit your books and always say exactly what I think.
“I will tell you that you’re beautiful and argue the point like a high-school debate-team star when you disagree.
“I will kiss you when these vows are done just long enough to make everything absolutely clear to everyone.
“I will plan amazing trips to Europe and China and the Maldives with you, and I swear we will take one of those trips before we’re too old to enjoy them.
“I will grow old with you. You are my favorite person who doesn’t share my DNA.
“I will choose you, every day, forever.”
Bethany said, “Jane?”
She took my hands.
“I will laugh at your jokes and smile at your puns and enjoy your plays on words. ‘Be it ever so crumpled there’s no plate like chrome’ isn’t exactly funny or even witty, it’s just awesome.
“I will watch the Godfather movies and Chinatown as many times as you like.
“I will scratch your back even when I’m exhausted.
“I will dance with you whenever we hear good music, especially Creedence.
“I will do the dishes after every meal you cook and only have you in the kitchen to keep me company.
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