Northern Lights

by Nora Roberts

  you ever take time off during the school year? Give yourself a break and just head out?"

  "I've been known to. Mental-health breaks, I'd call them. Why?"

  "I'm wondering if you took a mental-health break back in February of 1988."

  Behind his lenses, John's eyes went cool. "It would be hard to say."

  "Try."

  "Should I be talking to a lawyer, Chief Burke?"

  "That would be up to you. I'm just trying to get a picture of where everyone was, what everyone was up to when Patrick Galloway was killed."

  "Shouldn't the State Police be the ones trying to get that picture? And if I'm not mistaken, haven't they drawn their conclusions?"

  "I like my own drawings. You wouldn't say it was a secret that you've been, let's say, partial to Charlene for a long time."

  "No." After taking off his glasses, John began to polish them, slowly, thoroughly, with a handkerchief from his jacket pocket. "I wouldn't say it's a secret."

  "And were partial to her when she was with Galloway."

  "I had feelings, strong feelings for her, yes. They hardly did me any good as she married someone else less than a year after Galloway left."

  "Was murdered," Nate corrected.

  "Yes." He replaced his glasses. "Was murdered."

  "Did you ask her?"

  "She said no. She's said no every time I've asked her."

  "But she slept with you."

  "You're treading on very personal ground now."

  "She slept with you," Nate continued, "but she married someone else. Slept with you while she was married to someone else. And not just you."

  "That's private. As much as anything can be in a place like this. I'm not going to discuss it with you."

  "Love's a kind of ambition, isn't it." Nate tapped a finger on the copy of Macbeth still sitting on John's desk. "Men kill for it."

  "Men kill. Half the time they don't need any excuse."

  "Can't argue with that. Sometimes they get away with it. More often they don't. I'd appreciate it if you'd think back, and when you remember where you were that February, you let me know."

  He started for the door, turned back. "Oh, I wondered, did you ever read any of the books Max Hawbaker started?"

  "No." Though his voice was calm, a dull anger still rode in his eyes. "He was secretive about them.

  A lot of aspiring writers are. I had the impression he talked about writing a book more than he actually wrote."

  "Turns out he started a few. I've got the copies. They all sort of circle around to the same thing.

  A theme, I guess you'd call it."

  "That's not atypical for a fledgling writer either. Even an experienced one will explore a theme from several angles."

  "His seems to be about men surviving nature—and each other. Or not surviving. Always ends up being three men, no matter how many it starts out with, it comes down to three. The one he did the most on is about three men climbing a mountain, in the winter."

  Nate jingled loose change in his pocket when John remained silent.

  "He only had a few chapters complete, but he had notes on the rest, like an outline or scattered scenes he was going to plug in. Three men go up the mountain. Only two come back." Nate paused a moment. "A lot of novels are autobiographical, aren't they?"

  "Some," John said evenly. "It's often a device used for a first novel."

  "Interesting, isn't it? It'd be even more interesting to find out who that third man was. Well, I'll be around. You let me know if you recall where you were that February."

  John stood where he was until Nate's footsteps stopped echoing down the hall. Then he sat, slowly, at his desk. And saw his hands were shaking.

  * * *

  Nate walked in on an informal meeting at Town Hall. He did so deliberately and wasn't surprised when conversation snapped off when he came in the door.

  "Sorry to interrupt." He scanned the faces of the town council, faces he'd come to know. More than one of them registered embarrassment. "I can wait until you're finished if you want."

  "I think we're about wrapped up here," Hopp said.

  "I disagree." Ed planted his Vasque Sundowners on the floor, folded his arms over his chest. "I don't think we've resolved anything—and I think this meeting should continue—and, I'm sorry, chief, remain closed until things are resolved."

  "Ed." Deb leaned forward. "We've hashed this around six dozen ways. Let's give it a rest."

  "I move we continue."

  "Oh, move it up your ass, Ed." Joe Wise got to his feet.

  "Joe." Hopp jabbed a finger at him. "We're informal here, but that doesn't mean we're going to start a rumble. Since Ignatious is here, and his name's come up in this meeting, let's get his input."

  "I agree." Ken rose, dragged another chair into the circle they'd formed. "Have a seat, Nate. Listen,"

  he said before anyone could object, "this is our chief of police. He should be a part of this."

  "The fact is, Ignatious, we're discussing recent events. And your handling of them."

  "Okay. I take it some aren't satisfied with my handling of them."

  "Well, the fact is . . . " Harry scratched his head. "There've been some rumblings around town that we've had more trouble here since we hired you than before. Seems like we have—not that I see how that's your fault—but it seems we have."

  "It might have been a mistake." Ed firmed his jaw. "I'll say that right to your face. It might have been a mistake to hire you, anyone for that matter, from Outside."

  "The reasons for going Outside were valid," Walter Notti reminded him. "Chief Burke has done, is doing, the job he was hired to do."

  "That may be, Walter, that may be. But—" Ed held up his hands. "It could be some of the less lawful elements of this town look at that as a kind of dare. So they're more active, you could say. People around here don't like being told what to do."

  "We voted to have a police force," Hopp reminded him.

  "I know that, Hopp, and I was one who voted aye, right here in this room. I'm not saying Nate's to blame for the way it's worked out. I'm saying it was a mistake. Our mistake."

  "I'm stitching up the Mackies less often since Nate got here," Ken put in. "I had less patients coming in than usual for treatment after fights, less domestic violence. Last year Drunk Mike was brought in twice with frostbite after somebody found him passed out on the side of the road. This year he's still going on benders, but he's sleeping them off safe in a cell."

  "I don't think we can blame having a police force for you getting your equipment stolen, Ed, or your shack graffitied." Deb spread her hands. "We can't blame having law for Hawley getting his tires slashed, or for windows being broke at the school or any of that stuff. I say we blame it on parents not sitting hard enough on their kids."

  "A kid didn't kill my dog." Joe looked apologetically at Nate. "I agree with what Deb said, and with what Walter and Ken said before that, but a kid didn't do that to Yukon."

  "No," Nate said. "It wasn't a kid."

  "I don't think hiring you was a mistake, Nate," Deb continued, "but I think we've all got a responsibility to this town, and we ought to know how you're handling it. What you're doing to find out who's doing these things and who did that to Yukon."

  "That's fair. Some of the incidents mentioned may very well have been kids. The broken windows at the school certainly were, and since one of them was careless enough to drop his penknife, they've been identified. I talked to them and their parents yesterday. Restitution will be made, and both of them will get a three-day suspension—during which time, I doubt they're going to have a real good time."

  "You didn't charge them?" Ed demanded.

  "They were nine and ten, Ed. I didn't think locking them in a cell was the answer. A lot of us," he said remembering the sealed juvenile file on Ed's record, "do stupid things, get in trouble with the law when we're kids."

  "If they did that, maybe they did the other things," Deb suggested.

 
"They didn't. They got set down in school by their teacher, broke a couple of windows. They sure as hell didn't hike all the way out to Ed's ice shack or sneak out of the house at night and walk the two miles to Hawley's to slash his tires and spray paint all over his truck. You want my input? Your trouble didn't start since you hired me. Your trouble started sixteen years ago when somebody killed Patrick Galloway."

  "That's something that's shaken everybody up," Harry said, nodding to the others around the room. "Even those of us who didn't know him. But I don't see what it has to do with what we're discussing here."

  "I think it does. So that's how I'm handling it."

  "I don't follow you," Deb said.

  "Whoever killed Galloway is still here. Whoever killed Galloway," Nate continued as everyone began talking at once, "killed Max Hawbaker."

  "Max killed himself," Ed interrupted. "He killed himself because he killed Pat."

  "Someone wants you to believe that. I don't."

  "That's just crazy talk, Nate." Harry pushed back air with both hands. "Just crazy talk."

  "Crazier than Max killing Pat?" Deb rubbed her fingers over her throat. "Crazier than Max killing himself? I don't know."

  "Quiet!" Hopp held up both hands and shouted over the noise. "Just quiet down a damn minute. Ignatious." She drew a breath. "You're saying that someone we know has killed twice."

  "Three times." His gaze was flinty as it scanned the room. "Two men and an old dog. My department is investigating, and will continue to investigate, until this individual is identified and arrested."

  "The State Police—"Joe began.

  "Whatever the findings and the opinion of the State authorities, my department will investigate. I swore to protect and serve this town, and I will. Part of that investigation will require each one of you to account for your whereabouts and activities last night between nine and ten p.m."

  "Us?" Ed bellowed it. "You're going to question us?"

  "That's right. In addition, I'm going to be looking for the whereabouts and activities of everyone during the month of February 1988."

  "You—you—" Ed blustered to a halt, then, gripping the edge of his chair, pushed himself forward. "You intend to question us, as suspects. This is over the top. This is beyond belief. I'm not going to be subjected to this or have my family and my neighbors subjected to this. You're exceeding your authority."

  "I don't think so. But you guys can vote to cancel my contract, pay me off. I'll still investigate. I'll still find the person responsible. That's what I do." He rose. "I find the people responsible. So you can have your meetings, your votes, your discussions. You can take my badge. I'll still find the one responsible. That's the only person who has to worry about me."

  He strode out, leaving the raised voices and insulted faces behind.

  Hopp caught up with him on the sidewalk. "Ignatious, wait a minute. Wait just a minute," she snapped when he kept walking. "Damn it!"

  He stopped, jiggling the keys in his pocket. She scowled up at him as she finished pulling on her coat. "You sure know how to liven up a town council meeting."

  "Am I fired?"

  "Not yet, but I sure don't think you won any popularity votes in there." She tugged the hip-length coat, the color of a Concord grape, closed. "You might've been a little more tactful about it."

  "Murder's one of those things that short circuits all my tact switches. Then there's the matter of walking in on a meeting where my professional status is being questioned."

  "All right, all right, maybe that was poorly done."

  "If you or anyone else has a problem with how I'm doing the job, you should've come to me with it."

  "You're right." She pinched the bridge of her nose. "We're all upset, we're all on edge. And now you've dumped this in our laps. Nobody liked thinking Max had done what it seemed clear he'd done, but it was a hell of a lot easier to think that than what you're suggesting."

  "I'm not suggesting it. I'm saying it, flat out. I'm going to find out what I need to know, however long it takes, and whoever I have to step on along the way."

  She pulled her cigarettes and lighter out of her coat pocket. "I can see that plain enough."

  "Where were you sixteen years ago, Hopp?"

  "Me?" Her eyes popped wide. "For Christ's sake, Ignatious, you don't honestly think I climbed up No Name with Pat and stuck an ice ax in him. He was twice my size."

  "But not your husband's. You're a tough-minded woman, Hopp. You've done a lot around here to preserve your husband's vision. You might do a lot to protect his name."

  "That's a filthy thing to say to me. A filthy thing to say about a man you didn't even know."

  "I didn't know Galloway either. You did."

  Fury covered her face as she took a step back. She turned away, marched back into Town Hall.

  The door slammed like a cannon shot behind her.

  * * *

  He knew murmurs and mutters would be going around, so Nate decided to stay visible. He had his dinner at The Lodge. From the glances tossed his way, he imagined the statements he'd made at the meeting were making their way around Lunacy's frosty grapevine.

  And that was fine. It was time to shake things up.

  Charlene brought his salmon special to the booth herself, then slid in across from him. "You've sure got people wondering and worried."

  "Do I?"

  "I'm one of them." She picked up his coffee, sipped, then wrinkled her nose. "I don't know how anybody can drink this without sweetening it up some."

  He pushed the dispenser of sugar packets over. "Help yourself if you want it."

  "I will." She tore open two packets of Sweet'N Low, poured it in and stirred it up.

  She was wearing a shimmery gray shirt, the sort that clung to a woman's curves, and had scooped back her hair to show off dangling silver earrings. After tapping the spoon on the side of the mug, she sampled.

  "That's better." Then she kept both hands around the mug, as she leaned intimately toward Nate.

  "When I first found out about Pat, I went a little crazy inside. I'd have been ready to believe you if you'd told me Skinny Jim had put that ax in him—and he didn't come along until five or six years after Pat had been gone. But I've calmed down some."

  "That's good," Nate said, and continued to eat.

  "Maybe knowing I can bring him back here and bury him when the ground's ready helped. I like you, Nate, even though you wouldn't give me a tumble. I like you well enough to tell you you're not doing anybody any good with all this."

  Nate slathered butter on a roll. "And what would 'all this' consist of, Charlene?"

  "You know what I'm saying—this talk about us having a murderer