John Sandford - Mad River

His father did, and one of the McClatchys answered, and they had a brief gossipy chat, and then his father hung up and said, “Now we are good. And thank the good Lord for that.”

Virgil dropped his father off and went back to the motel, watched a movie on pay-per-view, got undressed, took a shower, then lay on his bed and thought about God, and eventually, almost drifted off to sleep. Almost.

Then he was wide awake, said to the ceiling, “Ah, bullshit.” He lay there for a few more seconds, then looked at the telephone. Not that late; but then, his parents usually went to bed about nine o’clock.

He picked up the phone, pushed the “home” button, and ten seconds later his father asked, “Virgil?”

“There are two McDonald’s in town. Do the McClatchys own both of them?”

“No, the one out on 23 is Rick Box. I don’t know where they live. . in town, though. Are you going over there?”

“Maybe. Rick Box.”

“Yeah. Rick and Nina. Maybe Paul Berry would know, I think they belong there. You want me to come with you?”

Berry was a Catholic priest, and an old golfing pal of Virgil’s father. “Thanks, but I’ll be okay. I’ll get back to you. Like, tomorrow.”

“If anything happens, call me tonight.”

Virgil didn’t call the priest. Instead, he brought his laptop up and signed onto the DMV computers. Rick and Nina Box were both licensed drivers. Rick was thirty-six and overweight, and Nina was thirty-four, and they lived on Parkside, not far from the McClatchys.

Virgil got dressed, went out to his truck, and drove over; not really that late, still well before midnight, but the streets were empty. The Boxes lived in a brick-and-clapboard ranch house that was elbow-to-elbow with other ranch houses, and right next door to the parents of a guy, Randy Carew, with whom Virgil had played high school basketball seventeen or eighteen years earlier. Old man Carew always had a couple cases of beer in the garage, and Virgil had stolen more than a few bottles from him.

Virgil went on past the Boxes’ place, past the Carews’, to the next house, stopped, got out, and walked up the Carews’ driveway. There was no sign of a light, but there was no sign of a light in most of the houses on the street. He leaned on the doorbell. Nothing happened for a moment, and then he heard an impact, feet hitting a floor. A minute later, an older man came to the door, looked out through the glass panel, turned on the porch light, opened the door, and said, “Virgil?”

Virgil thought, God bless you, and said, quietly, because he couldn’t remember Carew’s first name, “Mr. Carew, I’m with the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension now. I’m a cop.”

“I knew that.” Carew was wearing a pajama top and jeans, and was barefoot.

“I need to come inside and talk to you for a minute,” Virgil said.

“You’re not here for the rest of my Budweiser, are you?”

Made Virgil laugh, and he said, “Not at the moment, but maybe later. I need to take a second of your time.”

“Sure, come on in,” Carew said, holding open the door.

Virgil stepped across the threshold and Carew called, “Viv? It’s Virgil Flowers.”

“Virgil? What’s he want? The rest of your beer?” She came out a minute later, a robust woman in a pink terrycloth bathrobe, and Virgil remembered that her name was Vivian. She said, “C’mere, you,” and grabbed Virgil by the cheeks and bent him over so she could kiss him on the forehead.

Carew asked, “What’s going on?”

“Probably nothing,” Virgil said. “I’m trying to chase down some kids who’ve gotten themselves in a lot of trouble. . Killed some people over in Bigham and Shinder.”

“We saw it on TV,” Carew said. There was wonder in his voice. This didn’t happen. Not here.

“The thing is, one of them worked at a McDonald’s over here, and they’re kinda dumb, and it’s remotely possible. . remotely possible . . that they’re targeting people that they think can give them money or a new ride. The McClatchys are fine, and I just want to make sure the Boxes are okay.”

“Haven’t seen them today,” Vivian Carew said, her fingertips going to her mouth. “But it was kind of chilly. They might not have been out when we were.”

“You haven’t seen a silver pickup around. .”

The Carews looked at each other, and then Carew said, “Virgil, there was a silver pickup in their driveway this morning. An old Chevy. . kinda crappy-looking. Broke-down. It was there when I got up this morning. It was gone by lunchtime.”

Virgil said, “Ah, man.”

“What does that mean?” Vivian asked.

“It means I need more cops. A whole lot of cops,” Virgil said.

Marshall didn’t have a whole lot of cops, but more than enough-maybe eighteen or twenty city officers, and ten or twelve sheriff’s deputies. Virgil walked back to his car, after warning the Carews to stay inside, called the law enforcement center, got the duty officer, and filled him in as he drove over.

When he got there, a city patrol car was pulling into the parking lot, just behind a sheriff’s deputy’s car. Virgil got out, said hello to the two cops, realized that he vaguely knew one of them, who said, “I’ve read about you in the newspapers, Virg. Goddamn, can I get a job like yours?”

“You’d have to fuck up first,” Virgil said, and they all went inside, where they were joined by the duty officer, who said, “I called everybody. We’ll have ten people here in a couple of minutes.”

The ten minutes seemed to take forever, but in something like six or seven minutes, the sheriff walked in, and Virgil decided to start: they all gathered around a computer and Virgil pulled up Google Maps and got an aerial view of the Box house; all of the city cops and all but two of the sheriff’s deputies knew the street pretty well. Virgil said, “We need to block it off.”

As he detailed the blocking action on the computer monitor, two more officers showed up; they were members of the drug task force, trained in SWAT-type entries, and the sheriff designated them to enter the house, with Virgil. Virgil didn’t have full SWAT equipment, so he’d go in last.

Virgil finished and said, “We need more planning, but we just don’t have the time. If they’re in there, and they don’t know we’re around, they could kill the Boxes anytime.”

“If they haven’t already done it,” the sheriff said.

“That’s right,” Virgil said. “We’ll block the place, then we’ll call. If they answer, I’ll take it from there. If there’s no answer, then we’ll approach the front door, and if we still get nothing, we’ll enter.”

“Better not have messed with my cheeseburger man,” one of the drug guys said, as he slapped the Velcros on his vest.

“You know him?” Virgil asked.

The drug guy said, “Sort of. By sight.”

“Anybody know him well?” Virgil asked. “Anybody know any of their relatives?”

“I don’t think they went to school here,” somebody said. “When they opened the other McDonald’s, I think I heard they came up from Worthington.”

“All right. . so we’ll have to do it cold,” Virgil said. He told the duty officer to hold any late arrivals at the law enforcement center. “We don’t know how it’s going to break. We might possibly need people with cars. So keep them loose.”

Half the cars went to an elementary school south of the Box house, and the rest went to Horizon, north of Parkside. They coordinated with handsets and cell phones, crossing backyards in the dark, until they had the target house surrounded.

Virgil called from his cell phone. The Box phone rang four times, then kicked over to an answering machine-but they’d gotten lucky: an answering machine, and not the phone company answering service. He said, “Mr. Box, this is the Marshall Fire Department. We’ve got a major problem at the McDonald’s. If you’re there, could you pick up, please? We need to talk with you immediately. Please pick up.”