by Josh Cook
Max got a pack. It reminded him that he needed to stop for a carton on his way to the cabin. The cashier moved like he’d just woken up. Max paid, thanked him, and left.
He checked his watch. Somehow he still had twenty minutes. And that would be if he showed up right on time. No route presented clear advantages or disadvantages. He decided to go by the old courthouse. There and back to the bar would just about do it. And being five minutes early never killed anybody. Or rather, the five minutes were never really the vital facet of someone’s demise.
The old courthouse was built in 1882, when the city was the federal seat for the county, built for grandeur. Columns. Bronze of Justice on the domed roof. Latin carved in foot-high letters above the looming entrance. Granite steps and lion statues. It still managed to be grand—dignified and grand, nostalgic and grand, impressive and grand—despite being a bank for the last fifteen years.
Max walked up a few steps. Only security lights on inside. He heard a vacuum cleaner.
The old courthouse was an argument for the inherent grandeur of justice. Quiet voices. Confident steps across marble. The fading echo of gavels striking decisions into the record of human civilization. Everything asserting masculine certainty. Hats. Mustaches. Stern nods. Terse greetings. Hearty handshakes. And it’s not hard to imagine Max in that world: his badge tarnished because he hadn’t had a chance to put his boots up for a spell, let alone polish his badge, a draw twice as fast as anybody who drew against him because if you draw fast enough you never have to shoot, the gnarled and toughened face and hands from knowing when to take one punch to throw two, walking up those stairs day in and day out and walking back down in some state of just about to pack it all up and head West no matter what the judge said to bring the gavel down and it all builds up or breaks down with oil or rails in a distant city in a saloon backroom, where he bursts in on a scene gun ready, to discover the outlaw he’d been chasing was seconds away from doing right by the world and making the real villain no longer with us—the glaring gap in Max’s personal story of justice. He decided not to think about the courthouse any longer.
He pushed his mind back to The Joyce Case. The big question blinking on the side of the blimp was still “Why?”
“Why did Joyce do all this?” Max almost said out loud.
He lit another cigarette to give his hand something to do while he thought.
“Five years of effort … money for the setup, the reward, salaries … plus whatever it took to avoid other charges. Managing incompetent thugs. Coordinating lawyers. Erasing data. Sixty-hour work weeks easy. Then Trike knocks on the door … Joyce goes home.
“Not like any revenge I’ve seen. Trike’s spending a month in Paris with the woman he loves … Bit of revenge there, but none Joyce knew of. So much. For what?
“A hidden reward. Something buried so deep not even the three of us can uncover it. Has to be. Otherwise … millions and millions of dollars and hours and hours of time for … a prank.
“Trike’s been coy about the solution. ‘Eliminating the impossible.’ ‘Greater quotient of explanatory scenarios.’ But there’s always a … thing. Sometimes it must be … dragged out, but there’s always a … Sherlock clue. Kind of bulb in the lamp … An ID is required to cash a check … another … made me want to smash my face through the coffee table … Toenail clippers instead of fingernail clippers on the counter. Eyes almost combusted halfway through that explanation.
“Know him better than anybody. Know his brain better than anybody. Heard hundreds of metaphors. Still no idea what it could feel like. There’s a primal separation, but we’re all allowed to guess. Not with Trike. Maybe Lola could. Maybe Joyce knows. Maybe Joyce has a brain like Trike’s. Maybe this was the only way he could think of to connect with someone … who understands.
“Trike would’ve explained that. Just as baffled as me. And the revenge was against—”
Max was at the bar. Ten minutes early.
“Got thinking. Started walking fast.”
Max considered taking a walk around the block. He could just go in, order a beer, and nurse it till they showed up. Pretend he’d just gotten there. Trike would know based on the condensation ring on the coaster, but he wasn’t meeting Trike.
Or he could just go in, order a beer, and not care what they thought about suspecting he got there first. Hell, Max could buy the night for them.
Max decided to smoke another cigarette. He lit up and leaned against the wall.
“Maybe for once I shouldn’t care why. Nobody died. We’re set for money … for a while. Lola can paint between cases without worrying about the rent. Wonder if she understands what the trip means to Trike. She must. She knows those things. Got that from her dad, too. He broke a lot of spirits around the poker table. Miss the hell out of him. Miss the hell out of Octavian while I’m at it. Wonder if Trike knew right away or if he … detected it. Octavian could do a lot of things … best at keeping a secret. His is a crowded grave. Can’t imagine what it was like raising those two. Hear it’s hard enough with normal kids. Wonder if they’ll call.”
Max looked up at the bare bulb in a big room strewn with low furniture and battered books. Parts of his brain could be our contemporary American Old Bailey. Others were an anthology of hard-boiled detective fiction. There’s a working-class hero in there too. There was less and more left over after those parts were considered than one is inclined to assume. Monuments and monoliths so persistent, Max wasn’t aware of them until something drastic happened. Just like everybody.
Max crushed his cigarette out in the smokers’ station and blew a last stream of smoke from his mouth. Then it hit him. He leaned against the outside wall. Rested the back of his head against the brick. He had never felt so stupid in his life. Never. Maybe money went to your head faster than he imagined. Unless the guys had become ardent textile artists, their conference happened last week.
The FBI had hundreds of reasons for cryptic meetings with Max. In a way, he was surprised that this hadn’t happened years ago. Though coincidence does not imply causation, it’d be one hell of a causeless coincidence for the first surprise meeting and The Joyce Case to be unrelated. “Besides,” Max thought with half a smirk, “coincidence is boring.”
Max opened the door. “Won’t know till they get here. Might as well have a beer while I wait,” he thought as he walked in.
Max grabbed a seat at the bar. Figured they’d get a table when the others arrived. Or leave right away in unmarked cars. He ordered a beer. Left a two-dollar tip. Made a visual sweep of the room. No detectable threats. Nice place to grab a quick drink.
Max knew the stranger would be answers and that those answers would be inadequate, but he understood that, even after everyone was at home, behind bars, or in the ground, mystery would persist. He heard the bar door open behind him. Decided to let them approach him. He doubted they’d tase him in public without a “hello” first. He wrapped his hand around his pint glass and an image rose in his mind. Footsteps approached. Glass is really just slow-flowing liquid sand. Someone tapped him on the shoulder. People are really just slow-flowing liquid questions.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Josh Cook is a bookseller at Porter Square Books in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and grew up in Lewiston, Maine. His fiction, criticism, and poetry have appeared in numerous magazines and journals. He blogs for Porter Square, at In Order of Importance, and lives in Somerville, Massachusetts. This is his first novel.