Chuck Logan - Vapor Trail

Harry could be out there, could have put him to bed. Could be waiting to get him up in the morning. He considered lugging the Ithaca along on the run. Screw it. Broker sat down and pulled on his Nikes.

Five minutes later, he couldn’t tell where the air stopped and his sweat started. By the time he’d made it up the hill, he was back remembering his Camus from a literature class at the University of Minnesota- The Stranger , Meursault, on the torrid Algerian beach absurdly killing a man purely because of the heat. Broker completely understood the condition as he jogged into entry-level heat exhaustion. He crossed the road to catch some patches of darker humidity disguised as shade. He took a long look down the road at the steamy licorice waves rising off the black asphalt. He made his first really smart decision in the last couple of days.

He turned around and walked back down the driveway, skipped the plunge in the river, which was probably the temperature of warm spit, and went straight for a cold shower and a hot shave.

And he skipped making coffee; easier to grab some on the way into town. He did pay attention to the note he’d left under a magnet on the refrigerator, next to a snapshot of his daughter, Kit. FEED CAT!

He dumped about a pound of dry Chef’s Blend into a large stainless steel mixing bowl and remembered to check to make sure the toilet seat was up so Ambush could get to water. Then he pulled on a pair of loose khaki’s, a light cotton polo shirt, and loafers. He debated about the shotgun and decided to put it back in the trunk. Loaded. Okay. He had the ten o’clock meeting with Jack Malloy, pastor at Redeemer in St. Paul.

Heading south down 95, he hit an open stretch, so he put the souped-up Crown Vic cop package to the test, easing off the gas just shy of one hundred miles per hour. Going fast didn’t change the fact that the morning air was turning to sticky gray vapor right before his eyes.

It was a little over half-an-hour drive time to St. Paul, so he figured he had time to stop by the Washington County government center for an unscheduled office call on Gloria Russell, ostensibly to get the deal machinery going for Ray Tardee.

In reality he wanted to get a close-up look and see if the Harry-Gloria-Lymon gossip really had legs.

He parked on the government side of the county offices, went in, and took an elevator to the attorneys’ offices on the third floor. He showed his ID to the secretary and asked the location of Ms. Russell’s office.

No, he didn’t have an appointment.

Broker found the office and rapped on the doorjamb.

“Yes?” Gloria Russell spoke without looking up from the paperwork on her blotter. She sat behind her desk in a gray sleeveless blouse that complemented her short black hair. There was enough definition in the muscles of her upper arms so that a discreet puddle of purple vein rested in the hollow of her elbows and disappeared up either biceps. Her office space was Doric, basic, unadorned; just shelves of a law books and law degree on the wall.

“I’m Broker,” he said. “I called you yesterday about Ray Tardee.”

Gloria’s tanned face came up like a bronze figurehead. Broker saw heat and danger but not a lot of warmth; Joan Crawford from 1940s noir. Not a bad face if it learned how to relax.

Lavender triangles of fatigue stamped the smooth tan below her lower eyelids. The eyelids quivered slightly. A faint stripe on the third finger of her left hand had almost completely faded into her tan. She took her heavy framed, black, plastic glasses from the desktop and put them on like a mask.

“Oh yeah, Broker. You’re Special Projects on the dead priest,” Gloria said. “John Eisenhower brought you in to spy while he’s out of town.”

“Nice meeting you, too,” Broker said, giving her his best empty grin.

“I checked around. The book on you is BCA left you out in the cold five years too long. A lot of people think you migrated to the other side.”

“Yeah, well; I just did a fast migrate back. Can we talk, or do I go down the hall and talk to Jerry?” Jerry Hassler was the county prosecutor.

“And you know Jerry going way back to when he worked in St. Paul, I know. You know everybody. The Old Boys’ Club. That’s why the sheriff sailed you in here on a sky hook.” Gloria exhaled. “Fine. Come in, sit down, get comfy, and stay for about thirty seconds.”

Broker entered her office and sat at the stiff-backed chair in front of her desk. A stand-alone picture frame on the corner of the desk faced the visitor’s chair and held an enlarged block of type:

NO PERSON IN THE UNITED STATES SHALL, ON THE BASIS OF SEX. .BE SUBJECTED TO DISCRIMINATION UNDER ANY EDUCATIONAL PROGRAM OR ACTIVITY RECEIVING FEDERAL FINANCIAL ASSISTANCE.

Broker thought about it and decided to jazz her a little, to see where it went. He pointed to the frame. “So are you really the dark side of Title IX? Funny, you don’t look like that kind of feminist. .”

“Really.” Gloria inclined her head and raised her hand, a reflex to fluff hair that was no longer there. “And why is that, because I’m not ugly?”

“But, on the other hand, you could be an Amazon.”

“Is there a difference?”

“Sure, feminists talk; Amazons do.”

“You know this for a fact?”

“Absolutely. I married an Amazon.”

Gloria managed a small grin on her drawn face and said, “That sounds like a good title for a weepy male memoir. So how’d it turn out?”

“She left me for a younger guy.”

“Good for her.”

He leaned forward. “We need Ray Tardee as a witness on the dead priest. John wants to deal him down to some light county time. No commit to prison,” Broker said.

“No way. Tardee is a scumbag repeater who sells dope to high school kids. He’s over the line on points. He’s on his way to a new career as a wifey and pole smoker in Stillwater Prison.” Gloria paused. “Unless you can tell me why you’re pulling a news blackout on this priest thing.” She pointed out her window, across a grassy plot at the LEC. “We’re all getting calls from our favorite reporters. Everybody in our shop is real curious just what you have going.” She leaned forward and said, “Motive? Suspect?”

Broker rubbed the bruise circling his wrist that was starting to look like a Maori tattoo. “You mean Lymon hasn’t told you?” If Patti Palen down in the patrol basement knew about the Saint’s medallion yesterday afternoon, this legal diva had to know too.

Gloria sat up straight in her chair. Her voice went dead formal. “Lymon Greene? No. As a matter of fact he hasn’t.”

“What about Harry-he tell you anything?” Broker said.

She narrowed her eyes. “I heard you were going to escort Harry to St. Joseph’s, and somewhere things went. . awry.”

Broker couldn’t put a fast comeback together and granted her the point. So he let his eyes wander past her shoulder to another picture frame on top of her bookcase that he’d missed when he first walked in the office. A small school picture of a smiling boy with freckles and a cowlick, maybe six years old. Besides her law degree, the picture was the only personal touch in the office.

“Your son?” he said, pointing past her at the picture.

“No. I don’t have any children,” she said. Then she stood up, turned, plucked the picture from the bookcase and put it in her desk drawer. Then she fussed with some papers on her desk, worried her lower lip briefly between her teeth, and said, “Look, I don’t know you. And I don’t like being dictated to by strangers. You have to give us a legitimate reason to back off on Tardee.”

Broker raised his hands in a reasonable gesture. “John’s orders. That’s really all I can tell you right now.”