Flynn

by Mcdonald, Gregory, 1937-2008

  "I don't think so. I took one of those pills. A Ses-sonal. I mean, a Seconal. What time is it?"

  "Twenty-five minutes to three in the morning. Shall I sing you a few bars of Trere Jacques'?"

  "Is Chicky all right?"

  "Why do you ask?"

  "Why are you calling me at two-thirty in the morning?"

  "I want you to meet me at 1319 Fosburg Street in Cambridge as soon as you can."

  "What?"

  "Look for Hippo's liquor store. It's near that."

  "Frank, really! If this is your idea of impetuously arranging an assignation—"

  "Ach, quit! It's a police matter."

  "I'll say it is—calling me at two-thirty in the morning."

  "We've found the HSL."

  "The Human Surplus League?"

  "You've got it."

  "Listen, Frank, I also don't want to have anything to do with storming a place with tear gas and machine guns and bazookas! Not my line of work at all."

  "I find you talk a lot in your sleep."

  "You heard me."

  "I did. Now, would you pull on your bloomers and get yourself into Cambridge as fast as you can, please? Use your pink motorcycle, why don't you?"

  "Frank—"

  "I promise you, there won't be a bazooka in sight; not even a machine gun."

  "No tear gas?"

  "We'll leave Cambridge as dry-eyed as we found it."

  "All right. It's a good thing I know you don't drink. What's the number on Fosburg Street?"

  "1319. Near Hippo's liquor store. Got it?"

  "Yes."

  "Good," Flynn said. "Nice doing business with you."

  Thirty-two

  "SQUONK!" yelled the man, threateningly.

  He held them all at bay in the doorway of his filthy, near-empty loft on the second floor of 1319 Fosburg Street, with a can of spray paint.

  As soon as any of them—either of the two Cambridge detectives, Flynn or Sassie Fleming, Randy, all huddled in the door—began to say anything or move forward, the man calling himself Jade, doing business as the Human Surplus League, would strike a dueling pose and press his button. Black paint would spray from the nozzle, fragment in the air, and drift to the floor. They were well out of range.

  Jade had been lecturing them for some time.

  "Kill lovingly! I say. Kill lovingly! Before it is too late to kill lovingly! Soon you will be out of space. Soon you will be out of food. Soon you will be out of water. Soon you will be out of air. Then will come Armageddon! Brother will kill brother, and father child, not in love, but in hatred, not in kindness, but in greed! In greed for space, for food, for water, for air!"

  Flynn kept stepping forward and back, each time triggering another squirt of black paint.

  Soon, he knew, the can would be empty.

  "Slaughter the innocents, now! Slaughter them innocently! Let nothing stop you from loving murder!"

  Skinny Jade, barefooted in the freezing loft, wore narrow black trousers and a paint-smeared once-white T-shirt. His head was almost completely enveloped in long, curly, greasy black hair. The lenses of his glasses were almost as thick as ice cubes; behind them, his eyes were frantic, intense.

  "As, at one time in ancient history, when there was work to be done—work that could be done—animals bred, fields sown, and forests felled, there was a need for people to populate the earth, it was right, it was moral to bring people into the world. But now, now! Oh, God, now! It is right, it is moral to take as many people off the world with you as you can." (Squirt.) "Don't approach me! I am your prophet!"

  On a card table in the loft was an International Business Machines office-size typewriter. There was no accompanying chair.

  Flat on the floor and leaning against the walls were spray-painted posters, mostly made from the sides of cardboard boxes, "kill thy neighbor!" "mass production / mass murder!" "murder without prejudice!" "DO YOUR BIT KILL SOMEONE TODAY!" Some of the posters were nicely decorated, in reds and greens.

  In one corner of the loft, thick newspaper sections had been laid down. They were urine-soaked. Excrement rested on top of the pile.

  The smell of the paint shot at them relieved the noses of everyone in the doorway.

  "Listen to the words of Heraclitus, and practice the noble arts of war!" (Squirt.) "Take your young, your healthy, your strong—your best—and run them against each other's swords!" (Squirt.) "Especially the young, the unformed and unfucked! Use them as cannon fodder! Destroy them before they destroy you, before they destroy life—before they procreate!"

  When Flynn had arrived on Fosburg Street, Randy was not in front of Hippo's liquor store.

  He had gone with the two Cambridge policemen to stand in the door of the second-floor loft at 1319.

  Their arrival had started the Jade Oration.

  Silently, Flynn shook hands with the two detectives and handed Randy a peanut butter sandwich and Coca Cola.

  Despite the smell, despite the death-encouraging oration, Randy wolfed the sandwich and poured the Coke down his throat with dispatch.

  "Why else has Man created these magnificent machines of death, if not to use them? And he will use them and does use them. Consider your poisonous gases outlawed by the Geneva Convention." (Squirt.) "Then consider the poison that pours forth from every smokestack and other waste duct in this world. Is this not forbidden by the Geneva Convention as well? There is a war being waged on this earth—a war of contempt and greed—and these are the weapons of this war. It is a war of the People against themselves!"

  Sassie arrived shortly thereafter, in a pleasant beige slack suit, and after wrinkling her nose at the oracle's odor, stood in the doorway with the others and watched and listened.

  "Be open in your killing, I say! Rid yourselves of contempt and greed. Murder not by these subtle means, but murder openly, with faith, hope and charity, with kindliness, and with love!"

  Flynn said to Sassie, "This is hardly the place for a father of five."

  Sassie said, "I trust you see the errors of your ways, Frank."

  "I do." Flynn knocked Randy on the head lightly with his knuckles. "I always have."

  One of the Cambridge detectives said, "We have a circus wagon downstairs, Inspector. We can take care of this monkey."

  "What will you do with him?"

  Sassie said, "I can take care of it, Frank. This is my bag."

  Flynn said to the detectives, "This is Doctor Sarah Fleming."

  The detectives shook hands with her.

  "I've heard of you," said one.

  "Thank you."

  "We'd appreciate your help. We've got enough fruitcakes in the cooler now to open a pastry store."

  "This one's really gonzo," said the other detective.

  "He's very interesting," Sassie said. "He seems perfectly logical, on the basis of his starting axiom."

  "Yeah," said the first detective. "He's a real fruitcake."

  "Well," Flynn said. "You lads might assume the task of draining the rest of that spray can. It's a simple two-step, you noticed. One step forward, slide, one step back. And I never took a lesson!"

  "DROP DEAD!"

  Jade, seeing he was losing his audience, raised his volume.

  "The LEAST you can do for the world, if you cannot improve it by the simple means of mass murder, is to void the space you presently occupy!"

  Flynn said, "Come on, Randy. Let's void the space we presently occupy, and go home to bed."

  Sassie said, "Thanks for calling me, Frank. I'll walk our death-champion here through to some kind of therapy."

  "Did he blow up the airplane?"

  Sassie said, "No. I'm sure not."

  "Did you?"

  She looked at him in surprise, smiled, and said nothing.

  Randy threw his knapsack into the back of the family car—a black Checker—and climbed into the front seat beside his father.

  "Good work, lad," Flynn said, as he headed the high, boxy vehicle toward Massachusetts Avenue.
/>   Randy said, "Now do I get to take a shower?"

  Flynn sniffed the air.

  "I'd recommend it."

  Thirty-three

  Friday morning, after breakfast, Flynn rinsed his coffee cup and loaded it with Yarrow Flowers tea.

  He took it into his study with him, set it on the desk to steep, and closed the door.

  It took him only a moment to find the number he wanted in the phone book.

  "Wentworth-Methodist. Good morning."

  "I haven't got your name," Flynn said.

  "Gerry Lasher."

  "Are you the minister there?"

  "Yes. How can I help you?"

  "This is Mister Finnegan, Doctor Lasher," Flynn said. "Of the HSL."

  The minister of Wentworth-Methodist Church gasped.

  "The Human Survival League," Flynn amended.

  "Oh. I see."

  "It's our purpose to be helpful," Flynn added.

  "Thank God. I thought you might be, you know, that other group—"

  "No," said Flynn. "Your congregation is safe from us."

  "—I read about in the newspapers."

  "I believe you have a family in your congregation by the name of Dickerman?"

  "Dickerman. Yes. Dickerman. They used to be members of our congregation."

  " 'Used to be'?"

  "Yes. I think they moved away. About a year ago."

  "They did not move away, Doctor Lasher."

  "No? Maybe they joined some other congregation."

  "They did not join another congregation, Doctor Lasher."

  "Oh. Well, what happened to them? I haven't seen them in about a year, I'd say."

  "They fell into serious trouble."

  "Oh. I'm sorry to hear that. Anything I can do?"

  "Mrs. Dickerman has developed what I would describe as a serious drug problem."

  "Oh, that's terrible!"

  "Mister Dickerman, not knowing how to handle all this, and probably blaming himself, somewhat, left hearth, home, and family sometime around Christmas."

  "Terrible situation. We had one similar to this—"

  "You have one now, Doctor Lasher. I believe the Dickerman family needs a certain amount of community support?"

  "Yes. Of course."

  "In fact, I suspect Mister Dickerman took to the mountains, or wherever, in expectation community support would be more forthcoming and fulsome in his absence."

  "We can't do anything about a situation we don't know about."

  "Ah, that's where the Human Survival League comes in, Doctor Lasher. We tattle."

  "Wasn't there a boy in that family, a son? Little fellow—"

  "Yes. Cary Dickerman. He's about fifteen."

  "That old?"

  "That old. But not old enough, by law, to get a job."

  "This is one of those situations—"

  "It is, indeed," Flynn agreed.

  "Is someone at the Dickerman house now?"

  "I believe so," answered Flynn. "I saw Mrs. Dickerman last night in an advanced drugged condition. The boy, I suspect, is on his way to school at the moment. A nice lad."

  "I'll go over to the house right away. I'll see if Doctor Moore is available. Do you know him?"

  "No."

  "He's a member of the congregation, and very good in situations of this sort. Very generous with his time. Very understanding. Will the Dickerman woman require hospitalization, do you think?"

  "Yes. I think so. Doctor Moore should be able to tell you."

  "Well, we'll go over right away. In situations of this sort. ... By the way," Gerry Lasher asked, "what is the Dickerman woman's first name?"

  "I don't know."

  "It's much easier, in a situation of this sort, if we know the first name."

  "I'm sure it is."

  "Thank you very much for calling. By the way, will you and the, uh, Human Surplus, uh, Survival League wish to be involved in this matter any further?"

  "No," said Flynn. "We're just bringing this situation to your attention."

  "Well, thank you very much. I was just wondering if perhaps you had some funds, which could be used in a situation of this sort—"

  "No," said Flynn. "We're not funded."

  After hanging up, Flynn had a sip of his tea, and said to himself, "Now to ring Ding-Dong-the-Bell."

  "Is this the Headmaster?"

  "Yes. This is Jack Lubell."

  "Good morning, Mister Lubell. This is Mister Flynn, beaming parent of 'the Flynn Twin,' as you have it."

  "Oh, yes. I was talking to Randy yesterday. Did he mention it?"

  "Randy's missed school the last day or two."

  "Todd, then."

  "So has Todd."

  "Are they sick?"

  "No, I've had them out of school for other reasons."

  "We haven't had any luck in finding Randy's violin, Mister Flynn."

  "Oh, I'm sorry to hear that."

  "I trust you don't mean to make a police action out of this. I mean, as you said—"

  "No, that's not why I'm calling, Mister Lubell."

  "Oh?"

  "Some friends and myself have a little extra money —tax returns, you know—and we've banded together under the banner of the Human Survival League— that's what we're calling ourselves—"

  "Cute."

  "Isn't it? And we've decided to give one of your students a full scholarship, room, board, and tuition, for as long as it's necessary—"

  "Oh, that's wonderful! We have some very interesting candidates. There's this girl from Iran. Her father is having difficulty getting money out of Iran to pay her bills here, such a complicated matter, and—"

  "We've picked our recipient."

  "Oh?"

  "Cary Dickerman."

  "Cary? Why Cary?"

  "Why not Cary?"

  "Well, I mean, his family's fully able to pay; they live just down the street. It's almost as if he were boarding here now. Another candidate is this boy from Oklahoma who has applied. From what we've heard, he's a very talented dancer—"

  "Cary Dickerman's tuition is in arrears, is it not?"

  "Yes, I think so. But that's a temporary matter. He said something about his father's being on an extended business trip, in Pakistan or something—"

  "He's a good student?"

  "Not lately. His marks have dipped this term. In fact, he may be going on probation. Something seems to be bothering him, you know the way it is with children—"

  "I do."

  "And then there's a boy named Fox, from the inner city. His father blows glass, at the Boston Center for the Arts—"

  "And Cary is on the hockey team?"

  "He won't be, if he goes on academic probation."

  "Good, then, it's settled," Flynn said. "Cary Dickerman it is."

  "Mister Flynn—"

  "If you'd do me the favor, Mister Lubell, of never mentioning to young Dickerman that you and I talked. You know, seeing Randy and Todd are his classmates—"

  "Of course."

  "You might say, when he asks, that his bills are being paid by the Human Survival League, the HSL—"

  The Headmaster was silent.

  "In the meantime, just enclose his bills with the bills

  of my own sons, and send them all to me here at the house—"

  The Headmaster remained silent.

  "And incidentally," continued Flynn, "Gary Dickerman should be moved into the dormitories this afternoon."

  "Oh?"

  "Yes. Something has come up, suddenly. His mother has to join his father in Pakistan immediately, or something of the sort, and I'm sure Cary doesn't know about it yet. You can find the room for him right away, can't you?"

  "It won't be easy, but we will do so."

  "That's the spirit!" Flynn said to the Headmaster, "Appreciate all you're doing, Headmaster."

  "Yes—" said Jack Lubell.

  "Good morning," said Flynn,

  Still alone in his den, Flynn drained his teacup, and said to himself, "Now, being th
e shining fellow he is, I'll bet myself a fistful of parsley Paul Kirkman is at his desk in the Passenger Services Office, sitting up straight in his Zephyr Airways blazer, all ready to have me call him."

  Thirty-four

  "Ah, Cocky!" Flynn breezed into the office, scaled his hat onto a window seat and dumped his coat on top of it. "I know exactly what my next move is."

  At the chessboard, he moved his Bishop to Knight Five.

  "Nothing like a good night's sleep. I read about someone having one once/'

  He sat at his desk.

  "What's this? A bulletin from the FBI? And how come all of a sudden I'm on their mailing list?"

  "A messenger dropped it off an hour ago," Cocky said. "Marked 'Utmost Secret.' Without an envelope."

  "Ah, I see!" Flynn had turned to the last page. "This is why I'm on their mailing list. The sons of bees have stings in their tails. Listen to this, Cocky: 'During this investigation, cooperation from the Boston Police Department, represented by Inspector F. X. Flynn, has not only been minimal, but, at times, obstructive, and, at meetings, Inspector Flynn has been disruptive. . . .* Good! I'm glad they're keeping all that 'utmost secret.* My dear old mother would groan in her grave, if news of that reached her! Where's Grover, by the way?"

  "On his way in."

  "What does the rest of it say? Ah, yes: the Fibbies list of prime suspects for the blowing up of Flight 80.

  Who have they got, now? The Human Surplus League, described here as a 'nationally organized, radical underground group, members and addresses currently unknown; Baird Hastings, theater producer; Mrs. Charles Fleming; Charles Fleming, Junior; Annette Geiger; Alf Walbridge et al.,' whoever they may be. 'Alexander Coffin'? Who's he? 'Passenger,' it says here, from Atlanta, Georgia, 'employed as a bill collector for a public utility company, history of mental problems, known to have self-destructive tendencies, unknown why he was aboard the plane.' One or two others . . . Nathan Baumberg! I knew they'd get him. Hess would put him on any list of suspects he happens to be making up. Now, Cocky, they're doing very well, even without our cooperation, wouldn't you say?

  "Hello?" Flynn said into the telephone.

  "Da?"

  "Todd! Where are you, lad?"

  "Cambridge."

  "Good lad."

  "I called Mom and she said Randy's home asleep and that you and he rounded up the HSL last night."

  "We did. We rounded up the whole one hundred and forty pounds of it."