Flynn

by Mcdonald, Gregory, 1937-2008

  "Oh."

  "We all make our social gaffes, on occasion. Even airlines."

  "So the buggers just got off the plane? Didn't anybody see them?"

  "Apparently not."

  "Why haven't they said anything?"

  "They are awaiting instructions from their capital."

  "Uh! Sounds like they've had 'em! It's called abandonment of personnel, Frank."

  "I seem to remember it happening to me once. But I wouldn't think of reminding you of it, sir."

  "What are we going to do with them?"

  "At the moment they are being protected by Boston's finest. I have a cop at their door."

  "Does anybody else know about this?"

  "No."

  "Good. Keep it that way. Do you want to hear the second dispatch?"

  "Especially if it is as funny as the first."

  "This isn't an official dispatch. It's from our own people in Ifad."

  "Sir, there's only so much anticipation I can take in a day."

  "It reports that China is selling Ifad half a billion dollars in arms."

  Flynn's eyes moved along all four sides of his desk blotter. They then reversed direction and squared his blotter again.

  "Frank? Are you there?"

  "I think so," said Flynn. "But I'm not entirely sure. Can the report be correct?"

  "It can be correct," said N. N. Zero. "It can also be incorrect."

  "Tell me, sir. Do we still have a Chinese translator in Montreal, Canada?"

  "Yes."

  "At home at the same address?"

  "Yes. Do you want to see him?"

  "I'm not sure," said Flynn. "At the moment, I'm not sure of anything."

  "I'm glad you're involved in this case, Frank."

  "It was a Russian submarine that was pursued out of Massachusetts Bay, was it not? Russian, that is, not Chinese?"

  "Right. Russian."

  "This case," said Flynn, "has as many dangling loose ends as your average English sheep dog."

  "That's what makes it interesting. Right, Frank?"

  "... Right."

  "I don't know my next move."

  Flynn was standing over the chessboard, staring at it.

  He had heard Cocky enter the office, dragging one foot behind him.

  Cocky looked from the chessboard to Flynn. "You don't?"

  "I do not," said Flynn. "I do not know what my next move is. Methinks it will take some thinking."

  Cocky said, "Mister Baird Hastings is here to see you."

  "I know. I read about it in the newspapers. Or, I'm about to."

  "Shall I let him in?"

  "Go ahead, Cocky. We all work our way toward salvation with fear and trembling. After he goes, I'm leaving the office myself. I intend to visit Cartwright School this afternoon. A little rest and relaxation, if you take my meaning."

  Cocky chuckled. "Your next move is obvious, Inspector."

  "Is it? Is it though?"

  When Baird Hastings entered Flynn's office his overcoat was open, but his hands were still in his pockets.

  He stood in the middle of the room, and said nothing.

  Flynn said, "You make a pretty good case against yourself. I couldn't have done better myself. If I were given to holding press conferences, that is."

  Hastings' lips turned into a slight smile.

  Flynn said, "Would you believe I don't have any more 'extensive questioning' for you at the moment? I hate to disappoint your audience and all that—"

  "I told you, Inspector, I will stop at nothing to keep my production of Hamlet from closing, even without Daryl Conover."

  "At nothing?"

  "At nothing—even including implicating myself in one of history's worst crimes."

  " 'At nothing,' Mister Hastings, means you might even have committed the crime."

  "There are too many people whose livings and careers depend on the show's staying open—even if that shithead, Conover, did walk off."

  " 'Shithead,' is it now? 'I loved that man,'" Flynn quoted. " 'Daryl Conover was one of the all-time great actors—and not just in the Shakespearean field. Maybe the greatest.' " Flynn dropped his voice dramatically. " 'He was also my very dear friend.' Did you write all that yourself?"

  "You're a quick study, Inspector.' 1

  "Bless my Irish ears. They never miss an intonation. Of course, you forgot to mention that your own living and career depend on that show's staying open. With Daryl Conover. Or without him."

  "I've been honest about that."

  "To me, you have."

  "The press conference I just gave will fill the house and maybe even get us into New York."

  "I figured that's what you were doing. Pardon me if I'm wrong, but I think in your business it's called a cheap publicity stunt. Have I got it right?"

  "Look. People will come to the theater now hoping to get a glimpse of me. Me: prime suspect. They'll sit there watching Rod fucking up Hamlet but they'll actually be seeing Daryl Conover, mourning him, consoling themselves with the idea that no one could compare with him anyway."

  "And all this time," said Flynn, "you'll be sulking around the theater competing with Hamlet's father, a veritable wraith yourself, sad and nervous, allowing people to perturb themselves with the thought that you actually might have killed Daryl Conover and a hundred and seventeen other people. You have your talents, Mister Hastings."

  Baird Hastings looked at the floor.

  And then looked up at Flynn.

  "Do you blame me?"

  Flynn said, "I think it may be one of the cleverest efforts to remove suspicion from a prime suspect I've ever had the pleasure of witnessing."

  Twenty-nine

  "Now look at this incredible thing, will you?"

  Flynn pretended to be surprised at finding the pin Irwin Maurice Fletcher had sent Jenny in his vest pocket.

  Indifferently he held it out to the boy nearest him, who took it gingerly.

  "Is it real?"

  "It is."

  The hockey team of Cartwright School had come off the ice ten or fifteen minutes before (Flynn had watched their practice for a half-hour and then had spent a few moments saying what he hoped were the right enthusiastic things to the coach concerning the team's chances for the rest of the season) and stripped their smelly uniforms off their sweaty bodies, jammed them into smelly lockers, slamming the light steel, air-vented doors, shouting back and forth to each other, as if decibels could overcome wretched smells.

  Their winter-white skin at first was flushed from their exercise; as they ambled back from their showers, their skin was a different kind of red, from soap and hot water.

  Almost to a man they pulled their clothes on over wet skin. Their major efforts went to drying and arranging their hair.

  Three of the hockey players had visible dental problems. One had an upper tooth missing. (He returned from the shower room wearing a false tooth.) A second had a lower front tooth chipped. A third had two upper teeth chipped.

  Jenny's pin was being handed from boy to boy,

  "Think of anybody giving such a thing to a twelve-year-old girl," Flynn said.

  "Who? Someone gave it to Jenny?'*

  "Yes."

  "What's the red stuff?" asked one.

  "Ruby," said Flynn. "Rubies."

  "My sister has a pin like that," said a boy.

  "She has not," said another.

  Flynn said, "She has not."

  He turned his back on the boys and went to the water bubbler and had a long drink.

  When he turned around, the pin was nowhere in sight.

  The boy to whom he had handed it was pulling on his sweater. He was saying, "You rest on your skates like Bobby Orr, Tony. Too bad you can't do anything else like he did."

  By the door, a boy was zipping up his ski parka.

  It was the boy with the chipped upper teeth.

  He took his schoolbooks from a bench, opened the door with his free hand, and, without saying anything to anybody, went through th
e door, alone.

  Moving very slowly through the confusion of chunky boys pulling on winter clothing, Flynn followed.

  Thirty

  He waited until the boy looked over his shoulder and saw Flynn following him before he said anything.

  In the dark, the whites of the boy's eyes seemed too large,

  Flynn said, quietly, "Wait up, lad. I'll walk along home with you."

  The boy stopped. He turned halfway.

  They were under a street light.

  "How do you know which direction I'm going?"

  The boy's voice was huskier than Flynn expected.

  "Whichever way you go, lad, I can tell you you're going in the wrong direction."

  The boy was taking rapid, short breaths.

  Facing the boy under the street light, Flynn said, "You're a thief."

  The boy's body braced to run.

  Flynn put his hand on the boy's shoulder and squeezed it, just once, to show the boy Flynn could restrain him.

  The boy turned his face up to Flynn.

  "You've no right—"

  Flynn unzipped the lower right pocket of the boy's ski parka and inserted his left hand.

  He withdrew Jenny's pin from the pocket.

  He held it up in front of the boy's face, letting it reflect 4:he street light.

  The boy wouldn't look at it.

  "Maybe you're not a thief," said Flynn, gently. "But lately you've been doing a whale of a lot of stealing."

  Flynn dropped the pin into a pocket of his own overcoat.

  He let go of the boy.

  "What's your name, lad?"

  "Are you Todd Flynn's father?"

  "I am."

  "Shit."

  "So you might as well tell me your name."

  "What are you going to do about it? I mean, about my taking the pin?"

  Flynn said, "I'm going to try to puzzle out with you why it's happening. Why you're stealing."

  "Are you going to turn me in? I mean, to the cops?"

  Flynn smiled.

  "Jesus." The boy looked sickly at the sidewalk. "You are a cop. Inspector Flynn. Shit!"

  "Enough of all that now. Are you going to tell me your name?"

  The boy looked back at the school gates. "Gary," he said. He blinked. "Cary Dickerman. What are you going to do?"

  Flynn said, "I thought we'd have a waik-and-talk. How far from here do you live?"

  "Two blocks."

  "Come on, lad. We'll walk and you talk."

  The man and the boy walked down the dark winter sidewalk together.

  After a few paces, Flynn asked, "Can you tell me why you're stealing everything that isn't screwed to the floor?"

  "What else am I supposed to do?"

  "I never heard anybody say you're 'supposed to' steal."

  "Money." Cary shrugged.

  Flynn said nothing.

  Cary changed his schoolbooks from one hip to the other.

  Then he changed them back again.

  "Dad's gone," he said.

  Flynn said, "I'm sorry to hear that."

  Breathing badly, speaking quickly, in a voice higher than the voice he had been using, Cary said, "After Christmas. He couldn't take it anymore. He didn't know what to do. I don't know where he is. He tried. He really tried. He blamed himself. He said it was all his fault. He just didn't know what to do. He didn't trust himself anymore. He—he didn't even trust himself with me. He left me. The poor guy. He was reeling."

  They were walking slowly.

  "The house," Cary said. "I don't even know about things like mortgages, and—and banks. There has to be food. I paid the oil bill."

  Flynn put his hand on the boy's shoulder.

  "I keep expecting him back."

  The boy dodged out from under Flynn's hand.

  "I went to the electric company and the telephone company. I gave them cash. I haven't done anything about tuition. I don't even know how much it is."

  Walking the next block, the boy's breathing became more even.

  "Dad just didn't know what to do. He was hurt. Disappointed. He couldn't handle it."

  Cary Dickerman stopped outside a modest brick house.

  "Is this where you live?"

  "Yes."

  There was a faint light in one room.

  "May I come in?"

  The boy studied Flynn's face.

  "Do you want to?"

  "Yes."

  Cary shrugged and went up the steps.

  He took a house key from his back pocket and opened the front door.

  Flynn followed him inside.

  The boy was struggling to get the key out of the lock.

  A woman sat in a straight kitchen chair in the living room, ankles crossed, hands folded in her lap.

  Beside her, on an overturned wooden grapefruit crate, were a full ashtray and a few glasses.

  The only light in the room came from a table lamp, which was on the floor, at some distance from her.

  The room had no other furniture.

  The woman's hair was neatly combed.

  Her eyes in that light seemed to be without pupils -—they were entirely gray.

  Flynn remained in the living room doorway.

  Looking at him, the woman said, "Is . . . that . • • Cary ... you ... Cary ... ?"

  Cary had closed the front door.

  He stood in the front hall, looking at his mother in the living room.

  "There used to be a piano," he said.

  "Do you have any idea what it is she takes?" Flynn asked.

  "No." Cary leaned against the newel post. "And I don't know where she gets it. And I don't know where she keeps it. And I don't know how she takes it, or when she takes it."

  "I see," Flynn said. "I should know more about this, but I don't. Tell me, lad, can you get your own supper?"

  "Sure." Cary nodded at his mother. "She also drinks. She used to be a nice mother."

  "What will you do with her? Can you put her to bed?"

  "No. I'll have to leave her there. I'll just take away her cigarettes. And matches. So she won't burn down what's left of the house. She does everything," Cary said. "She drinks and smokes and shoots up and pops pills and whatever else. She's a beaut."

  The boy sighed and sat on the second stair.

  "Tell me, son," Flynn said. "Why haven't you told anyone about this?"

  "It's not exactly something you brag about."

  "I know, but—your mother's sick, Cary. Do you understand that much?"

  Cary shook his head.

  "Does the Dickerman family belong to a church?"

  "Methodist. Wentworth-Methodist Church. Haven't gone for a long time, of course."

  Flynn said, "You know, lad, I suspect you wish you had been caught stealing long before now. Is that true?"

  Cary stood up.

  He said, "I've got homework to do."

  He picked his books up off the stairs.

  "By the way," Flynn said, "How much did the pawnbroker give you for Randy's violin?"

  "Twenty dollars," Cary said. He shrugged. "He knew I stole it."

  Flynn watched the boy climb the stairs, carrying both his schoolbooks and his pride, neatly.

  Then Flynn let himself out.

  Thirty-one

  "Da?"

  "Good evening, Randy." Flynn looked at his watch. It was quarter-past-two. "Good morning."

  Flynn had staggered out to the telephone in the hall on bare feet. He took a step sideways, to stand on the hall rug.

  "I've found the HSL."

  "Really? Good lad! Where are they?"

  "1319 Fosburg Street."

  "Are you there now?"

  "I'm in a phone booth on the street. Outside Hippo's liquor store."

  "I've got it. Can you fill me in? How many are they, who are they—"

  "You'll be surprised."

  "Try me."

  "Would you believe the Human Surplus League is one nutty guy with a typewriter and a can of spray paint?"

&nb
sp; "I'd believe anything."

  "He's starkers, Da. He didn't blow up any airplane."

  "Why do you say that?"

  "He couldn't organize it. He couldn't organize himself. I tell you, Da, he's a basket case. A raving lunatic."

  "Are you sure he's not one of a group?"

  "He's the group, the whole group. This kid—one of the runaways I've been crashing with—he brought me over."

  "How did he know about the HSL?"

  "Everybody in Cambridge knows about Jade. He's a local character."

  "Everybody but the police."

  "Oh, the police must know about him. They just wouldn't think of turning him in. He's harmless."

  "He calls himself 'Jade'?"

  "Yeah. I've been talking to him since about eleven o'clock. Listening to his raving."

  "Did he say anything about the airplane?"

  "He's been lecturing us about minks."

  "Minks?"

  "Yeah, you know those little animals you make coats out of."

  "I never have."

  "Jade says they swallow their young, at the slightest frightening noise."

  "And is that what everybody in Boston was supposed to do when the airplane exploded?"

  "He didn't blow up the airplane, Da."

  "Is the other kid still with you?"

  "No. I was waiting for him to leave before calling you."

  "Okay, Randy. You stay there. Outside the liquor store. Hippo's, is it called? I'll get cooperation from the Cambridge police and get there as soon as I can."

  "Take your time, Da. Have a cup of Eyebright before you come, if you want."

  "That's kind of you, lad. See you soon."

  "Are you bringing Grover?"

  "Under the circumstances I think I'll l^ave Grover

  in his kennel—where I hope he is. His voice still rises when he mentions your name. Although, for the life of me, I can't think why."

  Randy guffawed into the phone.

  "Are you all right yourself?"

  "Sure."

  "All right, Randy. I'll be there in a few minutes."

  "I'm hungry," Randy said.

  "What?"

  "I'm hungry!"

  Flynn said, "I've never known you when you weren't." •

  Flynn let the phone ring a dozen times,

  "Hello?"

  "Sassie?"

  "Who is it?"

  "Frank Flynn, Sassie. Can you wake up?"