Scent of Evil (41 page)

I climbed the outer staircase to the deck. She remained at a distance, facing me. She was completely naked, her body glowing white in the starlight. In the blackness of the building beside her, she looked as if she were floating.

“It was too hot to sleep inside.” Beyond her, shining dully under the stars, I saw her mattress laid out on the deck.

“Take your clothes off.”

I hesitated, not wanting to lose sight of why I had come.

“I feel at a disadvantage,” she added.

The gentleness of her voice persuaded me.

I pulled off my clothes, feeling awkward and self-conscious, and walked over to her. We didn’t touch, but stood side by side, our elbows on the railing, facing the dark slope below and the glow of the city beyond.

“I wanted to apologize for the way I’ve been acting.”

She opened her mouth to respond, but I kept going, wanting it out in the open. “I’ve used you to comfort myself, but I haven’t paid enough attention to how all this has been affecting you.”

“It’s been affecting all of us, and there’s not much you can do about it.”

That stung slightly. I wanted her to accept my offer, not remind me of my limitations. But maybe that was her point: I wasn’t responsible for everything that had happened.

“Has Jackson kept it up?”

“You’ll soon find out for yourself. He’s called for a closed-door session of the selectmen with you and Chief Brandt first thing tomorrow morning.”

I hung my head with weariness. “Terrific. Can he do that?”

“Legally? I’m not sure; normally, the town attorney would check on something like that, but I seriously doubt Gary Nadeau’s going to stick his neck out.” She paused and then let out a short, mirthless laugh. “That’s an option, by the way; if it turns out the meeting’s illegal, you and Tony could try suing the town.”

I whistled at the mere thought. “That might be fun.”

She didn’t react.

We had been here before, Gail and I: Each of us could see the other’s viewpoint, often with empathy, but our responsibilities were frequently at odds. The stress of a mind going down a road not of the heart’s choosing could take its toll. It could even border on the absurd. I found it sadly disillusioning to stand next to an attractive, naked woman, under a sparkling-clean sheet of stars, only to ponder the coolness that kept us apart.

“I met a woman who’s acted as a kind of unofficial counselor to John with his drinking problem—someone he met at the Retreat.”

“What did she have to say?”

“That he’s been a closet drinker from the start, that he never did get on the wagon like we’d thought when we rehired him.”

“Jackson’s going to love that.”

“He may not find out about it. The point is, this woman thinks it plays in John’s favor. She says an alcoholic like him is so focused on getting his next drink that he doesn’t take time off to go running around torturing people.”

Gail didn’t seem impressed. “Well, if Luman doesn’t find out about it, it won’t matter, and if he does, he won’t care. He’ll just say it’s self-serving, psychological bullshit. I wouldn’t be able to argue the point; a lot of addicts are violent.”

I was a little irritated at her narrow view. “The point is, I think John didn’t do it; I don’t give a damn about Luman Jackson.”

“Maybe you should. John Woll isn’t the one who’s going to drag you over the coals.” She paused, reflecting on that very point. “Why has Jackson become so unstrung over this?”

“I’ve been wondering the same thing. Under different circumstances, I think I’d try to find out.”

“How do you mean, different circumstances?”

“I don’t have the manpower, and he has the spies, or at least some information pipeline I haven’t been able to track. Something came up this morning at a squad meeting which was handed to me on a plate by Brandt this afternoon, right through Luman Jackson.”

This time she showed some interest. “How could that have happened?”

“There was a rational explanation, but I don’t know if it was the truth.” I ran down the conversation I’d had with Brandt earlier.

She chewed that over for a while in silence. “I guess it’s not so hard to figure out why he called tomorrow’s meeting. I didn’t know he and Wentworth were acquainted, but he sure as hell toadies up to the higher class in this town. It’s the only time I ever see him bow and scrape; it’s a real stomach-turner, in fact.” She let out a long, deep sigh. “What a mess this is.”

I moved closer to her and placed my arm around her waist. She reciprocated and drew me close. I was filled with a sense of relief. Somehow, obliquely, we’d managed to clear the air. Knowing the tough times we’d survived, and the presumably grueling session we were to share in a few hours, I was particularly grateful for this hiatus. With so much general animosity and tension around us, I needed to know that our friendship was sound.

“Thank you, Gail.”

She turned and kissed me, her breast brushing my arm. “For what?”

I hesitated, trying to put it right, knowing it would fall short, and that it wouldn’t matter anyhow. “For your spirit.”

She patted my bare hip. “Come on, let’s stare up at the stars for a while.”

I HAD JUST BEEN HANDED MY MAIL
, my phone messages, and the daily report by Maxine Paroddy through Dispatch’s freshly hung door when Tony Brandt left his office diagonally across the room and grabbed me on the way by.

“Ready for the slaughter?” He headed for the back stairs up to the second floor, where the selectmen held their meetings.

I was both trying to follow him and go through my correspondence, with more or less success. “I wouldn’t mind a cup of coffee first.”

“No can do, unless they have some in there.” We walked down the upstairs hallway to the front of the building. Ahead of us, clustered in front of the doors leading to, respectively, the town manager’s office, the town attorney’s office, and the board of selectmen’s meeting room, were Tom Wilson, Gary Nadeau, and Brandt’s secretary, Judy. Off to one side was James Dunn, whose face looked like he was standing barefoot in manure.

Brandt swept by them as he had me earlier, marching toward the far-left door. “Hi, boys and girls.” By his tone and demeanor, he struck me as the happiest of Hannibal’s soldiers, off to conquer Rome. I just hoped the results weren’t the same.

He led the way into a large, newly redone room smelling of fresh paint, cut wood, and new carpeting. The back, from where we entered, was filled with metal folding chairs arranged in rows. Facing us, their backs against the sunlit windows, the five selectmen sat at a long semicircular table, looking like a half-baked imitation of the Supreme Court.

By instinct, we clustered in separate groups: Brandt, Judy, and I off to one side of the center aisle; Wilson and Nadeau to the other. Dunn stayed disdainfully in the rear, by the door, as if planning to leave discreetly as soon as the lights dimmed and the play began.

Indeed, the lighting was theatrical, coming mostly as it did from the windows. It forced us to squint slightly and made the faces of those across from us dark and slightly menacing. Brandt said something to Judy. She looked doubtful but, with a little more prodding, finally got to her feet and walked around to the back of the selectmen, lowering the blinds of each of the windows with a snap. Dunn, for his part, hit the switch by the door for the overhead lights. Suddenly, the room was bathed in bland, even, artificial light.

Luman Jackson, tall, hawk-like, and furiously scowling, twisted in his chair, hoping perhaps to burn Brandt’s emissary with the heat of his glare. It almost worked; the poor woman returned to Tony’s side looking diminished in stature.

Brandt merely smiled at Jackson. “Sorry. Hard to see.”

I noticed Gail was hiding her smile behind her hand.

Jackson was not amused and pointed at Judy. “What is she doing here? This is an executive session.”

“This is my secretary, Judith Levine. I invited her here to take a verbatim transcription of everything that’s said today.”

“We already have someone doing that.” He nodded toward the most recent member of the board, a pale-faced accountant named Orton, who was already scribbling furiously.

“Good,” was all Brandt answered.

There was a pause, during which I guessed Brandt was supposed to give Judy her marching orders. He just stared at Jackson, waiting for the meeting to begin. Judy looked like one of the vestal virgins about to be thrown on the fire. I seriously doubted that any notes she took following this would be readable.

Jackson tried a more direct approach: “I’m requesting that you ask your secretary to leave before we begin, Chief Brandt.”

“I don’t think so, Mr. Chairman, but thank you all the same.”

The silence was thundering. I thought I could hear my watch ticking on my wrist. Mrs. Morse, who’d been ineffectually holding her chairman’s gavel from the start, slowly leaned over toward Jackson and whispered into his ear. His expression didn’t change, but his mind apparently did. He nodded once curtly and announced as if nothing had happened, “This meeting is now in session.”

Gail cleared her throat gently and pointed delicately at Mrs. Morse. Jackson looked from one to the other with irritation and then flushed slightly. Indeed, Mrs. Morse, no shrinking violet herself, looked ready to use the gavel on Jackson’s head.

Jackson muttered an apology, and Mrs. Morse banged the tabletop loudly. “Now we are in session.”

James Dunn immediately stood up. “Madam Chairman, might I inquire why I was asked to be here? My understanding of the town charter is that executive sessions are held primarily to discuss personnel matters, like salaries and such.”

Luman Jackson, whose own frostiness could rival Dunn’s, cocked an eyebrow and shut Mrs. Morse up just as she opened her mouth to respond. “Mr. State’s Attorney, I can sympathize with your wanting to go back to your office, but to pretend this meeting was called to discuss salaries doesn’t do justice to your imagination. We are here to discuss John Woll, who is not only a town employee, but is also being investigated by your office—”

“And as such not a subject for conversation in a setting like this, at least not with me here,” Dunn finished for him. “If you, Madam Chairman, or anyone else in this room, wants to know what the state’s attorney’s office is doing about John Woll, you will just have to wait until that investigation has been concluded.”

With that, Dunn turned on his heel and left the room, closing the door behind him with a bang. Jackson was looking less and less like the vice-chairman he was, and more like an angry, frustrated caricature carved in stone. We hadn’t been here five minutes, and already the air had enough electricity in it to power the town for a week.

Brandt chose that moment to clear his throat. “Madam Chairman, with the departure of Mr. Dunn, I suggest that any further discussion of John Woll be tabled. As you are aware, the police department has been cut out of that investigation and has handed over all its files to the SA’s office. I’m sure Mr. Nadeau would agree with me that any official discussion of the case without Mr. Dunn might well be treading onto very thin legal ice.”

Mrs. Morse, not bothering to compete verbally, merely pointed her gavel at a pale and nervous Gary Nadeau, who nodded, also without a word.

“Let it be noted that the town attorney is in agreement with the chief,” she intoned, pleased at last to be heard.

Tom Wilson, who was no Richard the Lionhearted but who also disliked Jackson with a passion, raised his hand. “That brings up the advisedness of this entire meeting, actually. Mr. Dunn mentioned the town charter; if indeed we are to deal with personnel matters in any detail, it is my understanding that I as town manager am supposed to be the board’s agent in these matters, and that the board should be called together to discuss such a case only after I’ve completed my own investigation.”

Jackson whacked the table before him in irritation with his open hand. “I’ve had just about enough of this. You bureaucrats can run for cover all you want, but something stinks here, and I intend to find out what it is. I don’t give a rat’s ass what’s in the charter, and nobody’s going to tell me that I can or cannot ask certain questions while the whole goddamn town is falling down like a house of cards.”

“That may be overstating the case a bit,” Gail said levelly from her end of the curved table.

Jackson flared. “Maybe from your vantage point, Miss Zigman, but not all of us share your source of information, or your obvious bias.” He shifted his attention back to the rest of us, allowing Gail to redden angrily more or less in private. “My phone is ringing at all hours of the day and night; I’m getting calls from newspapers in California, for Christ’s sake. ‘Is it true that Brattleboro has become the chute for Massachusetts’s dirty laundry?’ That’s what one of them asked me. That’s not good for business or morale, and by allowing it to continue, it might just become true.”

Gail sailed back in. “What’s the point, Mr. Vice-Chairman?”

It seemed to me Jackson’s frustration was so real he could barely give it voice. Despite my antipathy for the man, I began to feel slightly sorry for him. “The point is: I want to know what’s happening here. I hear our building inspector is being investigated for no good reason. I hear one of our most eminent citizens is suspected of fraudulent financial dealings. I hear a perfectly respectable businessman had all his records removed by the police, again for no apparent reason. There’ve been shootings, high-speed chases, and now a DWI involving a cop who’s also suspected of murder. It sounds like our police department is both corrupt and stupid. And the result, I might add, will be more lawsuits than this town has ever seen. I’m sick and tired of looking like a moron to everyone who asks me what’s going on, and I want some answers. Now.”

There was a general rustling following this, as everyone either shifted through paperwork or squirmed in their chairs, figuratively looking for some sort of cover. Tom Wilson glanced at Brandt, who merely smiled and extended his hand in invitation; these people were more Wilson’s bosses than Brandt’s, the gesture said, so be my guest.