Robert Barnard - Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 135, No. 2. Whole No. 822, February 2010

“I was on a ride-along,” Nick said. “We caught a hot pursuit just after lunch that turned into a standoff. I couldn’t just abandon a great story like that.”

“You always have an excuse, Nick. And it always involves your camera.”

“It’s how I make my living, Joyce.”

“It’s how you hide, Nick. It’s how you keep a safe distance, putting that camera between you and the rest of the world.”

He could hear the edge in her voice, the lingering resentment. He couldn’t blame her, he thought, not after the way he’d behaved the last few years of their marriage — the drugs, alcohol, other women. In the end, he’d wrecked his marriage, alienated his son, almost destroyed his career. But George Claxton had stuck by him, gotten him some help, kept him on the payroll. Now, everything was okay again. He was working hard, staying clean, making his child-support payments. Everything was under control.

Until today. Until that moment in the alley when I saw my mother’s face on a dead girl.

“Tony’s birthday is coming up,” he said, turning the conversation away from himself. “I’d like to be there.”

“We’re having the party at Dom’s house, Nick. It was Tony’s idea. You know how he worships his grandfather.”

“He’s a drunk, Joyce. He’s — he’s not the saint you and Tony think he is.”

“Maybe you could drop by the house with your present before we leave for the party.” Her tone had softened, reminding him of why he’d once loved her, and maybe still did. “I could talk to Tony, try to convince him to see you.”

“What do I get with him? Five minutes?”

“Better than nothing,” she said. “More than you gave him at the soccer game.”

“Touché.”

“You know your father’s sick, right? The liver again.”

“George Claxton told me. He’s always on me to patch things up with the old man.”

“Maybe he’s right, Nick. Maybe it’s time you and Dom made up.”

Nick said nothing, just felt the old feelings well up, threatening to overwhelm him. If they only knew, he thought. If they only knew the truth.

“He’s your father, Nick,” Joyce went on. “I don’t know what it is between you two, but—”

“No, you don’t,” Nick said, and abruptly hung up.

He wanted a drink in the worst way, but got out a collection of CDs instead, the discs he’d used to copy the Super 8 movies he’d shot as a boy. He was only interested in one — the video he’d shot at thirteen when he’d surprised his father by coming home early from basketball practice. He still remembered the moment four years ago when he’d discovered it in a box with all the other home movies he’d made, viewing it for the first time, eighteen years after he’d shoved it in the back of his closet under a pile of old sneakers.

Buried deep, like so much other stuff all these years.

He slipped the disc into the CD drawer of his computer, recalling how that first viewing had sent him into a tailspin. Now he watched it to steel himself, to help him prepare for what he had to do. It was grainy and washed out with age and copying, but the images were adequate. Over and over he studied it, late into the night. Watching his father, Deputy Dominick Falco, the grandfather Tony now idolized, carry his wife’s body from their bedroom to the kitchen, to cover up the way she’d really died.

George Claxton sat behind his big desk in the offices of Claxton Productions, sipping bottled water as he studied a rough cut of the Police in Action episode that would open the new season, the show’s twenty-first.

He shifted uneasily in his chair, trying to keep his mind on the video. It wasn’t easy, not with his best friend, Dom Falco, slowly drinking himself to death, and Dom’s son, Nick, always on the edge.

Damn, he thought, I should feel on top of the world, counting all my money and other blessings. His mind drifted back to his early days as a consultant on one of the police dramas, when he’d realized that what cops face on the street every day was every bit as compelling as fiction, if it could be produced right. So he’d taken early retirement and gone into production himself. Twenty years Police in Action had been on the air in prime time, spawning countless weaker imitations and making him one of the rare African-American producers to make it big in network TV. He’d built a small business empire with it, put three kids through college, watched out for Dom and Nick the best he could. What do I have to do, he asked himself, to earn some peace of mind?

He started as someone knocked on the door. Nick Falco opened it a crack and stuck his head in.

“You wanted to see me?”

Claxton nodded. “Shut the door.”

Nick closed it behind him and took a seat on the other side of Claxton’s big desk. At thirty-five, he was still a good-looking kid, Claxton thought, with a nice face he’d inherited from his mother. But not today. Today, he was unshaven and haggard-looking, with dark circles under his eyes. Still, Claxton thought, just seeing him stirred up memories of Rosemary Falco.

“You look like crap,” Claxton said.

“I’m a little tired, that’s all.”

“Late night?”

“You could say that.”

“I heard you had some problems yesterday, on the ride-along.”

“Heat got to me. It won’t happen again.”

“You sure that’s all it was?”

“I’m not using again, if that’s what you’re thinking. I’m not drinking.”

Claxton nodded and let it go. “You call your old man yet?”

“No.”

“Don’t you think it’s time you two talked? It’s been what, four years?”

“What’s on your mind, George?”

“He’s sick, Nick. He’s in bad shape.”

“Not so bad he can’t throw a birthday party for Tony next week.”

“It might be his last one. Did you ever think about that?”

“I guess that happens when your liver’s shot and you keep on boozing.”

Claxton wanted to say more but held back. Then he said, “I want you to take a week off, pull yourself together.”

“We’re scheduled to shoot in Fort Worth in two days.”

“I’m sending another crew. I want you here in L.A., resting up.”

“Where you can keep an eye on me?”

“It’s not a request, Nick.”

Nick glowered. “Is that all?”

Claxton nodded curtly. Nick got up and headed for the door.

“Nick! Maybe with the time off, you can find five minutes to pay your old man a visit.”

Nick said nothing, just stood there, looking sullen.

“I’m telling you,” Claxton said, “when he’s gone, when it’s too late to say the things you need to say, you’ll regret it.”

“I’ll take that into consideration,” Nick said, and closed the door on his way out.

That afternoon, Nick went to see Sergeant Forrest.

They met by appointment in her office at sheriff’s headquarters in East L.A., where she kept plaques and certificates of commendation on the wall behind her and a framed photograph of her longtime female companion on her desk. With her clean record and plenty of years in for retirement, and a reputation for standing up to the brass, Nick figured she was the right one to come to with his story. Still, he dreaded digging up the past like this, worried sick about how Tony would take it, learning what his grandfather was really like.

Sergeant Forrest listened to him calmly and attentively, but Nick could see in her stiffening posture the conflict she had to be feeling, since he was accusing a former deputy of murder. He’d brought along old newspaper articles he’d photocopied at the public library, implicating his mother’s boss, Marshall Blake, in her death. The articles reported the basic facts, at least what the press and public had been fed: Blake had been arrested for Rosemary Falco’s murder while preparing to flee the country. The case had never gone to trial because Blake had committed suicide in county jail shortly after his arrest, following a verbal confession to the lead detective.