American rust (13 page)

Only a few minutes had passed since he'd started the cigar but he went down his to- do list anyway, both the one on his notepad and the real one he kept in his head. He banished Billy Poe from his mind for good—the boy had built up a good head of steam but he was about to run out of track. He felt bad for Grace but that was all.

So why was his headache coming back? In eighteen months he could retire, had always presumed he would, though the closer it got the less sure he was about how he really felt about it, he liked coming in to work every day, liked his job. An extra day or two off a week would be nice, but seven days off might kill him—he couldn't spend the whole time hunting. It suddenly struck him what an enormous mistake it had been to move into the cabin: once he retired, he'd be completely alone. Steve Ho and Dick Nance, Dolly Wagner and Sue Pearson who worked in the city council's office, Don Cunko, even Miller and Borkowski—those people were the closest thing he had to a family. Everything, all of it, seemed like a mistake. He had done it to himself.

He stood up quickly and went to his bag to get a Xanax, shook one into his hand but didn't take it. He put the pill back and did three sets of situps and pushups. If you took care of your body, your mind would follow. So they said. He was not doing badly. Well, in fact—enough money had been put away, he wouldn't end up like Joe Lewis, the Monessen chief who'd had to work as a school security guard when he retired. And, as he reminded himself constantly, he did good work, he could be proud of what he'd done. Despite being one of the poorest, Buell was still one of the better towns in the Valley to live in, the kids didn't spraypaint so much, the dope dealing was not public. But it was only a delaying tactic. A young woman's body had been found a few weeks back, she lived in Greene County and her system was full of methamphetamines, no one knew what she was doing in Buell. There had been six other bodies in Fayette County this year as well, half of them gave up no leads at all. The newspapers were onto this and the new DA was on the defensive. And the last two are in your jurisdiction, thought Harris. He's gonna need to bang this one out of the park.

There was a knock and Harris unlocked the door to see Ho, carrying his big belly in front of him. He had strangely small hands and feet. His parents were from Hong Kong and they owned the Chinese Buffet in North Belle Vernon. He came into the office, pushing past Harris and sniffing the air, and, upon finding the cigar in the ashtray, picked it up and pitched it out the open window.

Harris grimaced. It was a seven- dollar cigar.

“It's ten in the goddamn morning,” said Ho.

“I'm a grown man,” said Harris.

Ho shrugged. “We might be getting a complaint,” he said. “Last night I got a noise violation at the Sparrows Point Apartments and ended up deploying my carbine. Twelve rounds.”

Harris blinked and then he thought no, if it was bad I would have heard about it already. Either way he was glad for the distraction. A good number of their problems came from Sparrows Point, a block of HUD apartments at the edge of town.

“It was just a pit bull,” Ho continued. “You know that little bald-headed dude, the one with all the tattoos on his face? He let the dog go on purpose to come after me, like I'd jump on the roof of the car or something, act like a funny Chinaman.”

“Did anything get hit besides the dog?”

“Hell no. But you should have seen all those motherfuckers, diving behind cars and shit. Wish I had it on tape.”

“What were you doing with the rifle for a noise violation?”

“There was like seven or eight of them. What the fuck was I supposed to do?”

“Do you know what our insurance costs,” he said to Ho.

“Fuck the insurance,” said Ho. “What about shock and awe? Those fuckers are cooking up crystal in the units back there. It's a fuckin environmental hazard.”

“They don't bother the citizens,” said Harris. “People will get it somewhere.”

“That's just your liberal politics talking,” said Ho.

“Libertarian.”

“Whatever.” Ho grinned.

“You better watch your mouth if you want to keep that rifle.”

“Yessir.”

“You do the paperwork yet?”

“I wanted to ask you first.”

Harris rubbed his temples. All in all, it was better if there was no record of Ho shooting a dog with an automatic rifle. But if a complaint was ever filed … “Lemme think about it. In the meantime, around eleven o'clock why don't you get some Dairy Queen for Billy Poe.”

“That boy's fucked, ain't he? Heard about Carzano's witness.”

“We'll see.”

“Sorry, Chief Like I said before, looks like it'd be better if that prick Cecil Small was still the DA.”

“Alright,” said Harris. “I got work to do.” He gave a little wave and Ho left him alone in the office.

Ho was right. Cecil Small, who'd been DA of Fayette County longer than Harris had been a cop, had come looking for Harris's help in the election last year. Harris had demurred and Cecil Small had lost by fourteen votes. Cecil Small could have made something like this go away—in fact, he'd already allowed Billy Poe to plea down an assault charge. But Harris had never liked Cecil Small—he enjoyed playing God a little too much. It was undignified, a seventy- year- old man still getting high off locking people up. Expecting people to buy him drinks every time he won a trial. Like he was a key player in the battle between good and evil. For thirty years he'd been the emperor of Fayette County, though finally it had caught up to him—the voters got sick of it. The new DA, who was only twenty- eight years old, and who Harris had both voted for and essentially put in office by not making the requisite phone calls for Cecil Small, needed to prove himself and was now tripping over his own feet to be getting a case like this. There were consequences to voting your conscience.

He wondered what Ho thought about all this, about his protecting Grace's son. Most likely he just accepted it as natural behavior. Ho was very realistic. He did not think he could change things. He was part of the new generation, his stubby assault rifle went with him everywhere, he dressed like he was walking into a war zone, whereas Harris rarely even bothered to wear his bulletproof vest, his “duty boots” being these cowboy ropers he'd bought on a Wyoming trip—not a good choice if he had to run someone down. But Ho was right. If something went wrong, backup in the form of the state police was at least half an hour away, things were changing, the kids were all on speed now, they were cooking it up themselves and you didn't know what they might do. No, he thought, even thinking that way is a problem. Puts you and them on opposite sides before the word go. He shook his head at himself. There's probably never been an old man who didn't think that all the young people were degenerate. Nature of youth and age. Painful to see the world changing without you.

Still, he couldn't blame Ho for not wanting to walk into those situations with only a sidearm. Not to mention Ho was still here because Harris made the job fun, gave him carte blanche. The feds were getting rid of all their old M16s, giving them away to police departments, and Harris had ten of them, free except for shipping costs. They'd also gotten binoculars, night vision, riot shields, old ballistic vests, all free. They had more weapons and gear now than they had cops, they had more gear than Harris had had when he'd gone to Vietnam with the marines. It was all because of Ho, who had spent weeks of his own time filling out the paperwork, then thousands of dollars of his own money to customize his rifle, a ten- inch barrel and holographic sight. At the moment, Ho was happy living in his parents’ basement, doing gunsmithing on the side, but someday he would decide to move on. Sooner than later if Harris made the job boring. He would miss Ho. But he was getting ahead of himself again. Ho wasn't gone yet.

He tried to remember what he was supposed to be doing but then Billy Poe was on his mind again, and what this would do to Grace. He vaguely remembered the man Ho said was the owner of the dead dog, he'd just moved to town from West Virginia, typical toothless speed freak, had relatives here. He wondered if the man deserved a special visit. But probably watching his dog get machine- gunned was enough.

After an hour more of catching up on paperwork, he decided he couldn't stand it. He went and got Billy Poe from the cell. Billy looked depressed. That was a good sign.

“Let's talk in the office,” said Harris.

Billy Poe followed him into the office and stood politely until Harris motioned him to a chair. It occurred to him that the kid had been through this plenty of times before, called to the principal's office and lectured. Called to this very office and lectured. He tried to recollect what he'd said last time. He hoped he didn't repeat himself—they all remembered.

“I watched you play ball,” he said.

Billy Poe didn't say anything. He was looking at the floor.

“You should have gone to college with it.”

“I was sick of school.”

“Won't tell you that's smart. I know other people did, or just didn't say anything. But I won't. That was one of the dumbest moves you ever made.”

Poe shook his head. “You ought to be able to grow up in a place and not have to get the hell out of it when you turn eighteen.”

Harris was slightly taken aback. “I might agree with you and I might not,” he said, “but either way it doesn't change a goddamn thing.”

“I'm gonna call up the coach at Colgate.”

Ho knocked and Harris told him to come in. He was carrying a box from Dairy Queen and Harris went through it and set a hamburger and French fries and a milkshake in front of Poe. They could all see the steam coming off the food.

“Vanilla shake?” said Harris.

“No, thank you.”

“Go on and eat.”

“I can't,” said Poe. “That stuff gives me problems with my stomach.”

Harris and Ho looked at each other, then at Billy Poe.

“He didn't eat what I brought him last night, either,” said Ho.

“It's the chemicals,” Poe said. “That stuff isn't fresh.”

“What do you think prison food is gonna be like?” said Ho. “You think they offer organic?”

Harris grinned but waved him out of the room, and then faced Billy Poe across the desk again. He decided to push the boy a little. “No job,” he said. “No skills to speak of, no car, if you're counting ones that actually run. Mostly likely headed to get some girl in trouble, if you haven't already. And now you're a cunt hair away from a murder conviction and I do mean a cunt hair, too.” Harris held up his fingers. “So whether some college football coach remembers you or not, that's pretty much the least of your worries.”

Poe didn't say anything. He began to pick at the fries.

“Tell me about this man,” said Harris.

“Don't know anything about it.”

“I saw you there, William. Returning to the scene of the crime to …” He nearly mentioned the jacket but stopped himself. “The only reason I didn't take you in right then was because of your mother. Plenty of kids like you get out but the ones that stay, I've seen what becomes of them.”

“You're here, if it's so good to leave.”

“I'm an old man. I've got a boat and slip and a cabin on top of a mountain.”

“Big deal.”

Harris rummaged in the broad oak desk and came out with a manila folder, from which he took several printouts of digital photos. He passed them to Poe. From the way Poe dropped the papers, he recognized the scene pictured.

“Otto Carson, if you want to know the guy's name. The DA over in Uniontown is a brand- new guy as you may or may not know, he's got a dead woman in a dumpster with no clues and here you are dropping this in his lap. The staties want me to confiscate your goddamn shoes.”

Poe looked at his sneakers.

“Thing is, Billy, the now- deceased Mr. Carson was a piece of shit. Been locked up for all kinds of crap, some stays in mental wards, two outstanding warrants for assault, one from Baltimore and the other from Philadelphia. Sooner or later he was going to kill somebody. Most likely he already had.”

“What's your point,” Poe said.

“If it were up to me, if you'd come to me right away, this would have been an easy self- defense plea. Or it might have just gone away on its own. But that's not what you did. You ran. Now you got a guy who was there with you in that machine shop claiming you killed his buddy.”

Harris leaned back in his chair, into the sunlight. Usually he liked to watch people in these situations, every tic on their guilty faces. But he did not want to look at Billy Poe. “You need any coffee?” he said.

Poe shook his head.

He waited for Poe to comment, or make a gesture, but he didn't. Harris got up and walked to the window and looked out over the Valley. “I'm guessing there were five of you in the machine shop. You, someone else who was probably Isaac English, Mr. Carson, and two of his friends—”

“Then why haven't you picked up Isaac?”

“Isaac English is not a suspect,” Harris said, “because the DA doesn't know who he is, and the more the DA knows, the worse off you are going to be.”

“Like I said,” Poe told him, “I don't know anything about it.”

Harris nodded. He decided to try nice cop. “You did the right thing, Billy. You need to tell me what happened, and who else was in that plant with you, so we can make sure this goes to trial as self-defense. Because if all the jury sees is that you killed a man and fled the scene, even a bunch of good ole boys are gonna vote to hang you.”

“His buddy had a knife to my neck and the dead guy was coming at me to finish the job,” said Poe.

“Good.”

Poe looked at him.

“Don't stop now.”

“It was dark,” Poe said. “I couldn't see the rest of their faces.”

“No.”

“I didn't kill him.”

“Billy, I goddamn caught you going back to the crime scene.” Again he resisted mentioning the jacket he'd found. “I got your footprints everywhere. Size fourteen Adidas—know how many people wear those?” He looked under the desk at Poe's feet. “Most likely blue in color, right?”

Poe shrugged.

“If you're lucky this is going to put you in jail until you're fifty. If you catch a bad break it'll send you to the injection booth.”