Night Passage
Page 24
THE SKY OVER THE harbor was beginning to get light. Jesse felt gray and empty, his mouth dry and bitter, with the flat joyless contumescence of dissipated tension. He was his desk in his office with Healy, the state police captain.
“How’d it go down?” Healy said.
Jesse’s voice was soft and Healy had to lean forward to hear him.
“Kid named Michelle Merchant. Her father’s a Horseman. She heard the plan and told a woman I know, Abby Taylor.”
“The town attorney,” Healy said.
“Sometimes. Abby called the station, but the phones were dead, so she called Suit — Simpson — one of my cops.”
“Well, now you know whose side your department is on.”
Jesse nodded.
“Good to know,” Healy said.
Jesse nodded again, a movement so small that Healy wasn’t sure he’d made it.
“You talk to Wyoming?” Healy said.
“Yeah. They want Hathaway for blowing up Tom Carson.”
“The prosecutors will work it out,” Healy said. “Genest going to stand up when it’s time to testify?”
Jesse nodded again. “He knows Hathaway was trying to kill him last night,” Jesse said. “He’ll talk until you don’t want to listen.”
“What do you want to do about the rest of the mob?” Healy said.
Jesse didn’t answer for so long that Healy thought maybe Jesse hadn’t heard him. Finally Jesse shrugged slightly.
“I think most of them are harmless,” he said.
“You know who most of them are?”
“I can put together a list of Horsemen. Be harder to prove that any particular one was here last night,” Jesse said.
“Might be some federal charges,” Healy said. “Armed insurrection?”
“I’ll let the Feds worry about that,” Jesse said. “Most of these guys are just guilty of being jerks.”
“Lot of that going around,” Healy said.
“A lot,” Jesse said. “I’ll settle for lifting their gun permits.”
“Probably a way to do that,” Healy said. “You know the kid blew the whistle on them?”
“Yes,” Jesse said.
“Good kid?”
“Kind of a burnout,” Jesse said.
“Well, she saved your ass.”
“I plan to mention that to her,” Jesse said. “Abby Taylor too.”
The light from the east was whiter now, making the electric lights in Jesse’s office look weak.
“You should get out of here,” Healy said. “There’s going to be a lot to do later.”
Jesse nodded and swiveled in his chair and looked out his window. There was a television van with its odd-looking antenna parked next to the police cruisers. Channel Three/Action News was stenciled on the side.
“And the media is always with us,” he said.
“I’m getting too old for this all-night shit,” Healy said. “You got a bottle of whiskey somewhere?”
Jesse took it out of his bottom drawer and put it on the desk in front of Healy.
“Glass on the windowsill,” Jesse said.
“Join me?”
Jesse shook his head. Healy poured about an inch and drank it down. Then he capped the bottle and pushed it back across the desk toward Jesse. Jesse didn’t stir. He was too tired to put it away.
“How long you been on this job?” Healy said.
“About six months.”
“Nice start,” Healy said.
After Healy left, Jesse sat for a while until he got the strength to get up. He walked past the television crew without speaking, and got in his car and went home. He was so tired it was hard to focus on the road. The sun was up by the time he got home and there was a different tone to the black winter water in the harbor. He parked in his slot and walked heavily up the steps to his condominium. When he opened the door he heard the television. He closed the door quietly behind him and took out his gun and walked softly to the living room. Sitting on the sofa with her feet up on the coffee table watching the early-morning news was his ex-wife.
“Jesus Christ, Jenn,” Jesse said.
She stood and smiled at him.
“You’re okay,” she said.
Jesse nodded.
“The janitor let me in,” Jenn said. “I told him I was your wife.”
“You’re not,” Jesse said. “We’re divorced.”
“I saw on the news about last night,” Jenn said.
“It’s over,” Jesse said. “What the hell are you doing here?”
“I was worried about you. I missed you.”
“Jenn, I don’t know,” Jesse said.
“You still seeing that other woman?”
“No.”
Jenn smiled.
“I don’t know either, Jesse. But here I am. At least you could hug me.”
Jesse realized suddenly that he was still holding his gun. He put it back on his hip, and walked very slowly around the coffee table.
“Yes,” he said. “I could do that.”