Steve Hamilton - Misery Bay

“Chief Maven, yes. My partner was talking to him in his office. If they’re done, I think we can wrap this up together.”

She excused herself and went down the hall. About a minute later, she came back, followed by Chief Maven and a man in a dark blue suit much like hers. It might have even been the exact same fabric, cut from the same bolt. He was young and slick-looking, with a narrow face and sharp eyes. As he entered the room he seemed to be distracted by his cell phone.

“Any day now,” he said to the phone. “Is there any service up here?”

“This is my partner,” Agent Long said to me. “Agent Fleury.”

He put down his phone just long enough to shake my hand.

“Mr. McKnight,” he said. “Sorry this wasn’t a more pleasant occasion.”

Chief Maven sat down next to me. He hadn’t said a word yet and it didn’t look like he was planning on speaking anytime soon. He looked even worse than before-at least twenty years older now, his face drained of color. He kept staring down at the table with half-closed eyes.

“We’ve been letting you guys do all the talking,” Agent Fleury said, “so I figure maybe it’s our turn.”

He looked over at his partner until she nodded back to him. Then he continued.

“As you know, Mr. Razniewski was a U.S. marshal. I assume you know what that job entails?”

“In general,” I said. “I believe so.”

Maven didn’t look up from the table.

“Mr. Razniewski probably didn’t get into specifics, but I can tell you that in the past two years he was involved in some very high-profile cases. He wasn’t just transporting detainees. He was closely involved in the actual capture of fugitives. Were you aware that U.S. marshals actually arrest more fugitives than all the other federal branches combined?”

“I didn’t know that,” I said.

Still nothing from Maven.

“Raz brought down some pretty heavy hitters,” the agent said.

Maven finally raised his eyes at that.

“I hope you don’t mind me calling him Raz,” he said. “I know that was his nickname. We didn’t work together, but I’d certainly heard all about him. I mean, even before today.”

Maven kept looking at him, but stayed silent.

“In the past six months especially,” Agent Long said, “Mr. Razniewski was personally involved in a major case that we feel might be connected to this murder.”

“So it had nothing to do with his son’s suicide,” I said. It was starting to make more sense now-why Agent Long had been so focused on anything that anybody might have noticed here in town, and not so much on my trip to Houghton at all. “Is that what you’re saying?”

“I can’t imagine any direct connection, no. I mean, how could it?”

“It just seems strange that it would happen three months later.”

“Well, that’s the thing,” Agent Fleury said. “There might not be a direct connection, but it did perhaps create an opportunity for somebody to get to him.”

“I don’t follow you.”

“As a marshal working on these kinds of cases, it was natural that he’d need to stay in pretty safe company. As long as he was in Detroit, at least.”

“Apparently,” Agent Long said, “ever since his divorce and his son moving away to college, he’d been sharing his house with two other marshals. Young guys, just out of school. They needed a place and he had the room.”

“So between that and the secure workplace,” Agent Fleury said, “we figure he must have been a tough target.”

“Wait a minute,” I said. “Are you saying-”

“Somebody may have been watching him, yes. If they happened to follow him all the way up here…”

He put his hands up, like that’s all that needed to be said on the matter. I sneaked a quick look at Maven, wondering when he’d finally blow. I was surprised it hadn’t happened already.

“We mean no disrespect,” Agent Fleury went on. Needlessly. Apparently, he didn’t have the skill of knowing when to stop talking. “But you have to admit, if you were looking to take somebody out and you knew they were up here in Sault Ste. Marie…”

“We’ll be talking to some of your neighbors,” Agent Long said. “Just in case somebody saw something. I’m afraid this is going to be a tough one. If they sent a pro to track him down, well, I’m not sure what we’re going to be able to find up here.”

“If it was a pro,” I said, “why the bloodbath? Why not a simple shot to the head?”

Agent Fleury looked over at his partner. I was trying not to read too much into any of this, I swear. I didn’t want to believe they were treating us like dumb hick yoopers.

“With a suppressor?” he said. “Make him take his shoes off and get down on his knees?”

“I wasn’t going for the whole cliche, no. I’m just saying-”

“There are other players in the game these days, Mr. McKnight. People with very different ideas about how you should kill your enemies. In this case, well, there was obviously a lot of blood involved. It was a lot more dramatic.”

Maven kept looking at the agent, but the chief was still doing his best imitation of a granite statue. He hadn’t even blinked yet.

“I’m assuming you want it straight, Chief. And I’m sure you realize, it’s probably a very good thing that your wife wasn’t home today. If this was somebody who tracked him from downstate, I’m sure he wouldn’t have hesitated to kill two people instead of one.”

“We have other agents working on this from the Detroit end,” Agent Long said. She was starting to look a little apprehensive, at least. Unlike her partner. “Maybe they’ll find someone who’ll be willing to point us in the right direction. That’s what we all want, right?”

“In the meantime,” Agent Fleury said, “we’ll try to stay out of your way as much as possible. You do realize that anything directly relating to this case needs to come through us. We’re clear on that?”

On top of everything else, I thought, Chief Maven just got pushed down one more notch on the totem pole. He’s so low now it’s a wonder he can still see above the dirt.

Without even realizing what I was doing, I started to edge my chair back away from the impending blast zone.

Then he spoke.

“I’ll do whatever I can to cooperate with your investigation.” Maven’s voice was devoid of any anger, any sincerity, anything living at all.

“Very good,” Agent Fleury said. He seemed only slightly put off by the robot who’d apparently taken over Chief Maven’s body. Agent Long looked at me for some kind of reassurance, but I was even more confused than she was.

“Chief, are you okay?” she said.

“His wife,” he said. “Has she been notified?”

“His ex-wife,” Agent Fleury said. “Yes, she’s been notified.”

“Who told her?”

“Another marshal, I believe.”

“Okay,” Maven said. “Then I think we’re done here. Go do your jobs and find out who did this.”

“You can rest assured we’ll do exactly that,” Agent Fleury said. “I can’t tell you how much we appreciate your cooperation today.”

“We’ll be staying at the Ojibway if you need us,” Agent Long said. “I’m sure we’ll be here in town for a couple of days, at the very least. Of course, we’ll be in touch as soon as we know anything.”

She gave Chief Maven one more look of vague bewilderment, then a quick smile for me. Then they were both out the door.

The chief made no move to get up. I kept sitting there next to him for a long while, waiting for him to say something to me.

“If you send me the bill for your services,” he finally said, “I’ll make sure you get paid.”

“What are you talking about?”