Were all the cops in on it? He had no way of knowing. Novak and Woodbury, certainly, and maybe that other one, Officer Duncan. The one that never smiled. He doubted Lucy Thornton was involved – she always struck him as an honest sort of cop. And if Thornton was honest maybe her pal Ortmann was, too. But again he couldn’t be sure. They could all be part of this.
His heart was beating faster all of a sudden. This probably wasn’t a good thing, but for once Virgil didn’t mind. He was taking his pills and that’s all anyone could be expected to do in his position. He had a mystery to solve, after all.
Sure, his paranoia had been getting to him. Every creak in his house was a footstep. Every passing car was a police cruiser, come to silence him. He wasn’t getting much sleep. He wasn’t eating much. But so what? He had important things to be doing, for God’s sake. For the seventh time that day, he checked the windows and doors, made sure they were locked.
He watched an old man in a blue jacket shuffle along the sidewalk, reading from a scrap of paper and then looking up and around. Lost and confused, the same way Virgil spent most of his days. Not anymore, though. He realised, with a smile, that purpose had crept into his life when he wasn’t looking. What an odd sensation that was.
He set about making himself a sandwich. He had to keep his strength up, even if he wasn’t hungry. He laid out his ingredients, but hadn’t even buttered the bread when there was a knock on the door. His good mood soured. That would be Mrs Galloway. Every year she knocked on his door, gave him that condescending smile, and enquired as to his well-being before asking about his plans for Hell Night with all the grace and subtlety of a … a …
Goddammit, he couldn’t even think of a suitable insult.
Walking to the front door, he did his best to stifle his anger. It wasn’t easy. She wouldn’t even call it Hell Night. She called it “the festival” around him, as if he’d never heard the actual name in all of his years here. Condescending busybody that she was. He reached the door, calmed down, put a neutral expression on his face, and then opened it.
The old man in the blue jacket stood there. For a moment, Virgil didn’t know who it was. He was probably around Virgil’s own age. Hispanic. Shrunken. Then it came to him.
“Goat-molester?”
Javier Santorum snarled. When he did so, his false teeth clacked in his mouth. He drew back his spindly arm, his liver-spotted hand clenching into a liver-spotted fist. As a younger man, he’d telegraphed every punch in every fight scene they’d ever had (those in which he hadn’t been replaced with a stuntman) and it seemed his real-life technique wasn’t much better. He swung his fist in a wide, unsteady arc that Virgil could easily have dodged, back in the old days. But now, even though he saw it coming, he was still too slow to avoid it.
Javier’s fist bounced painfully off his cheek.
“Ow,” said Virgil.
“Yeah,” said Javier triumphantly. “How’d you like them—”
Javier had been a stage magician before he’d become an actor – Javier Santorum, Circus Magician and Escape Artist! – but Virgil had been a boxer, and those instincts never leave you. His left jab had slowed considerably over the years, but it still had that snap to it, and he still landed it with unerring precision, right on the point of Javier’s chin. Javier’s eyes crossed and his legs gave out, and he sat down faster than he’d probably managed for quite some time, and then flattened out on Virgil’s front porch.
“Oh goddammit,” said Virgil.
For a moment, he wondered if he’d killed him, but the rise and fall of Javier’s pigeon chest assured him that no, the idiot was still alive. He couldn’t leave him out on the porch, though. It wasn’t so much that the neighbours might wonder what was going on, but that Javier might get carried off by a bear or something on its way past. What an undignified way to go.
So Virgil prepared himself and, moving slowly, took a good grip on each of Javier’s matchstick ankles. Straightening up even slower than he’d bent down, he got himself in a good position, and pulled. Dragging Javier into the house was easier than he’d expected. The man seemed to consist of nothing more than dried kindling and leathered skin. His head bounced off the doorsill and Virgil grinned.
When he was inside, Virgil closed the door and went to fetch a glass of water. He stood over Javier, then, about to upend it over the other man’s face, when his mischievous streak lit up. He poured half of the water on to Javier’s crotch, and the rest he dumped on Javier’s face.
Javier spluttered, coughed, turned his head away and wiped his eyes. “What the hell … what the hell’re you doing?”
Virgil put the glass on the hall table. “Reviving you,” he said. “You looked dead.”
“That’s how I always look, you sonofabitch. You hit me!”
“You hit me first.”
“You deserved it!”
“Sorry I called you Goat-molester,” Virgil said. “It was the first thing that came into my head, honestly.”
“I don’t need your damn apology!”
“Then why are you here?”
“I came here to kick your ass!”
“You might want to do that from a standing position.”
“Screw you! I’ll get up in my own time!”
“Right. Sure. You wet yourself, by the way.”
“Oh, for Christ’s sake …”
Javier struggled into a sitting position, then wiped at his crotch with dismay.
“Need some help?” Virgil asked.
“Not from the likes of you!”
Virgil shrugged.
Javier rubbed his chin. “You sucker-punched me.”
“No, I hit you back.”
“Yeah, when I wasn’t expecting it. I might have concussion. If my brain swells tonight, you’re to blame. Everyone will know you killed me.”
“Not if I leave you out for the bears.”
“There are bears?” Javier said quickly, looking around like he expected one to come ambling through from the bathroom.
“This is Alaska,” said Virgil. “We have everything here. Javier, are you sure you don’t want any help getting off the floor? You’re a long way down, and it’s a long way up.”
“I can do it myself,” said Javier. “Look at you, talking like an old man. You probably need those handles in the tub, don’t you?”
“Yeah,” said Virgil. “I also have a seat in the shower.”
“Ha! Like an old man!”
“Says the guy who can’t get up off my floor.”
“I’m waiting for my second wind!”
“What are you doing here, Javier? Why’d they even let you out?”
“Let me out?” said Javier. “It’s a retirement village, not a goddamn prison camp! I leave when I want to leave! If I want to catch a plane, I catch a plane! Don’t you be treating me like I’m an old man. I ain’t dead yet!” Moving slowly, and carefully, Javier turned over on to his hands and knees.
Virgil watched him. “Did you travel across the country just so you could hit me?”
“Don’t flatter yourself,” Javier wheezed, crawling to the wall. “Hitting you was a bonus. Hitting you made the trip sweeter.”
“So why are you here?”
“The mystery,” Javier grunted. Using the wall to steady himself,