Chris Grabenstein - Tilt-a-Whirl

“What the papers say he did.” She waves the newspaper in Ceepak's face. “Murder? Kidnapping? Lies and bullshit. Just because it's in the paper doesn't make it true. It's just propaganda-paper and ink and lies and bullshit. Republican bullshit.”

“If that's the case, Mr. Shapiro has nothing to fear from me.”

“Bullshit. You're the fucking fuzz. Can't trust the fuzz.”

“You can trust me,” he tells her.

“Really? How come? What makes you so super-special?”

“I give you my word.”

“Your word? Like your solemn vow?”

“Yes, ma'am.”

“Wow. That's some heavy, serious shit. You give me your word? Wow. Just like Nixon? He gave us his word. ‘I am not a crook.’ So did Clinton. ‘I didn't have sex with that woman.’ Bush. ‘Saddam has nukes.’ Fucking Republicans.”

She's staring at Ceepak, trying to figure out who he might really be.

“You can trust him,” I say.

“What?”

“He cannot tell a lie.”

She stares some more at him.

“Really? Who is he? George Fucking Washington?”

“Officer Ceepak doesn't know how to be dishonest,” I say.

Now she's studying his eyes.

“What's the matter? Your parents never taught you how?”

“They tried,” he says. “However, they failed.”

“Is that so?”

“Yes, ma'am.”

“Uh-uh-uh. You did that damn ma'am thing again.”

“Sorry. Do you know where Jerry is?”

“Maybe.”

“I'd like to talk to him.”

“You won't hurt him?”

“I give you my word.”

“When I was cold? He gave me his shirt. His favorite fucking shirt.”

“I will not hurt him.”

The bag lady bends down to rub the dog's head.

“Upstairs,” she says. “Room 215.”

“Thank you. Danny?”

“Yes, sir?”

“Stay here with….”

“Gladys,” she says.

“Yes, sir.”

Ceepak holds out his hand to me.

“I need the keys to the car.”

Gladys is sitting on the floor in front of me, petting her dog. Her legs are splayed out and Henry is nuzzling against her knee.

“He likes it when you scratch under his ears.”

“Unh-hunh.”

Behind her, I see Ceepak out front where we parked the Ford. He's unlocking the hatchback. Opening it. Pulling out his rifle.

“Ah, Jesus. I think he has a tick.”

I glance down to see Gladys pinching something buried in Henry's fur.

“Got it.”

Whatever she got, she flings across the dark lobby like I might flick a wad of earwax when no one's watching.

I look out front again and see Ceepak toting his sniper weapon system around the side of the car and heading to what I can only guess is some kind of alternate entrance. Maybe where the fire steps exit into the parking lot.

He probably doesn't want to deal with climbing up the same staircase we recently scrambled down.

He probably doesn't want Gladys to see him going upstairs with a sniper rifle.

“You have a dog, kid?”

“No, ma'am.”

“Jesus. What's with you fucking fuzz? Ma'am, ma'am, ma'am.”

“Sorry.”

“Your partner? Slezak?”

“Ceepak.”

“Yeah. Ceepak. He seems like a good man. Decent.”

“Yes. He does.”

He sure seems that way.

You ever talk to a bag lady for fifteen minutes? It's totally random. A barrel of laughs.

Gladys tells me all about Karl Marx and the redistribution of wealth and how Henry will always have the Milkbones he needs provided he contributes to society to the best of his ability.

Then she gets into some guy named Friedrich Nietzsche and says his tendency to seek explanations for commonly accepted values in the less-elevated realms of animal instinct was crucial to Sigmund Freud's development of psychoanalysis.

I nod and say “Is that so?” a lot.

All the time, I keep waiting to hear the rifle shot, the snap-pop report, but I guess I won't because Ceepak screwed on that silencer.

He's been up in Room 215 a long time.

I'm sure he's interrogating Squeegee, pumping him for information about Ashley. If he gets what he needs, will he still pump a bullet into the guy? I hope not. But I keep thinking about a certain pedophile chaplain in Germany who, as far as I know, nobody ever heard from again.

And why does Ceepak need a sniper rifle?

If his animal instinct is telling him Jerry Shapiro, a.k.a. Squeegee, needs to die, why doesn't he just use his pistol? The rifle with the sniper scope seems kind of dramatic. Seems like overkill. But maybe he forgot to pack a silencer for the pistol. Maybe a pistol silencer is the one thing he doesn't have in his cargo-pants pockets.

“Danny?”

Ceepak is on the staircase behind me. He's holding the rifle at his side.

I sniff the air, searching for “transient evidence,” just like he taught me to. The air reeks of gunpowder.

“Jesus!”

Gladys sees the rifle.

“What did you fucking do?’

“Ma’am, you need to leave here. Now.”

“What did you fucking do, you fucking liar?”

“You need to take your dog, find any of your friends who may be habitating here with you in the hotel, you need to find them and tell them all to leave. You have ten minutes.”

“Where's Jerry?” She lurches toward the staircase. Ceepak holds up his hand and stops her.

“Ma’am, you do not want to go upstairs. You want to vacate these premises.”

“You motherfucking …”

“Ma’am, like I said-you need to take your dog, find your friends, and evacuate this location. You need to do so immediately.”

Ceepak checks his watch.

“You now have nine minutes and thirty seconds.”

Gladys is crying. I can see the tears clearing a white path down her dirty cheeks.

“You lied to me … gave me your fucking word….”

Ceepak doesn't say anything.

“You goddamn motherfucking son-of-a-bitch liar!”

Gladys tugs her twine leash and Henry stands up.

Her shoulders are shaking as she drags Henry toward the front. When she steps outside, she hesitates, thinks about coming back in to drag her friend's dead body out of the room upstairs.

“You have nine minutes,” Ceepak shouts.

“Motherfucking fuzz!”

Henry snarls.

The two of them run and disappear into the darkness.

I turn to Ceepak.

“Did you?”

“Danny? Don't make me say things I'd rather not say.”

I've never seen Ceepak look so intense. Veins pop out of his arms. His eyes dilate. It's as if he's possessed of some unnatural energy.

Guess killing a man gives a guy a rush.

“Don't force me to tell you a lie,” he says.

“You mean another one?”

Ceepak just lets it hang there.

He steps off the staircase and leans the rifle against the railing and pulls out his pistol. He checks the clip, slides off the safety.

He points it to the floor and fires.

The explosion rings in my ears.

“Listen up!” Ceepak shouts. “If you can hear me, you need to leave here immediately. It is not safe for you to remain in this location. Repeat-it is not safe to remain here! You have eight minutes!”

He puts his gun back in his holster.

“We need to leave.”

“Yes, sir.”

I am so quitting this job.

It sucks.

Ceepak sucks.

“Danny?”

“What?”

Now there's some kind of sadness in his eyes. Like he wants to explain something but he can't.

“Do you know where the old train depot is?”

“Yeah.”

“We need to go there. Immediately. To release Ashley.”

“He confessed?”

“He told me where we could find Ashley.”

Ceepak stalks across the lobby. I follow him because, at the moment, I don't know what else to do.