Robert Bennett - The Company Man

She sat for a moment longer, then stood and began walking toward Evesden Central Police Department.

She wanted to wait for him on the front steps, but they told her they were going to be letting him out on the side. When she asked why, the duty officer gestured out toward the street in front of Central, and she looked and saw several men loitering, watching the building front with hooded eyes. She turned away and went down to the side of the station.

She stood in the small loading dock with the municipal workers for more than an hour before Garvey came shambling out. He wore ill-fitting clothes that were certainly not his own. His hair was uncombed and his cheeks bore days of stubble. He blinked up at the sunlight. When he saw Samantha his shoulders drooped as though he was stunned and deeply disappointed, all at once.

“Sam,” he said softly. “Sam, what are you doing here?”

She did not answer. She simply walked to him and held his face to make sure he was all right. Then she kissed him. He withdrew in surprise, then gently returned it.

“Samantha,” he said. “Jesus, Samantha, what the hell?”

“They were going to prosecute you,” she said softly.

“We need to get out of here. Is there a car nearby?”

“There’s a cab waiting at the end of the lane.”

He grabbed her and looked back at the front of the building, where a crowd was forming, presumably waiting for him. Someone’s amplified voice shouted at them, telling them to keep their distance.

“They were going to prosecute you,” she said. “I couldn’t let you do that to yourself. I couldn’t. So I went to them and asked to speak to your lieutenant.”

“Jesus.”

“And I told him what had happened, what had really happened. And then he got his major. And I told him and he went and got the commissioner. And I told him and they all seemed to think for a bit.”

Garvey shook his head and kept hustling her down the lane.

“And then once I had them all in a room together I told them I had written ten letters, each to one of the major newspaper publishers telling them what had actually happened, about the… the assault and everything, and they’d be getting them by the end of the day. So either they could go public with the story or they would wind up fighting the papers.”

“Jesus Christ.”

“And I suppose they decided to let you go.”

“God, Sam. That may make it worse,” he said. “That may make it worse for everyone.”

“I don’t care. It wasn’t right. It wasn’t right what they were doing to you.”

They climbed into the cab. “Where’d Hayes stash you?” Garvey asked. “No. Wait. Don’t tell me. Just get us close and we’ll let you out.”

Samantha gave the driver an address only a few blocks away. Garvey nodded, his face drawn and thin and white as a sheet.

“They’ll fire you for this, you know,” he said. “This’ll be the end of it. Of your career. Jesus, Samantha, they’ll crucify you for this. Unioners may be after you.”

“I know. I don’t care anymore. Will the Department ever take you back?”

“Not after this, I don’t think. They said they were going to committee over it soon but they were hinting real hard that I should maybe resign. Maybe I should. Seems like the alternative would be a hearing.” He bowed his head and sighed. “You can love your job, but that doesn’t mean it loves you. You can love your city and you can love your country and your people, but they don’t love you back. They’re just things. Things that get too big and one day they just scrape you off their back. They don’t need you.”

“I do,” she said. “I need you. I do.”

He looked at her. His brow and cheeks lined and loose. Dark eyes soft and haggard. Then he leaned his head against hers and shut his eyes.

“I know you do,” he said softly.

“I’ll be there,” she said. “Wherever. When you’re ready.”

They came to the safe house canal. He opened the door for her but did not get out.

“What’s going to happen?” she asked.

“I don’t know. I think we’re being watched. I think we have to assume that.”

“By who?”

“By the union. By McNaughton. Hell, by the police. So just for now, stay low. Stay clear. And I don’t think we should be seen together, Sam.”

“Why? What more could they do to us?”

“I don’t want to know the answer to that question. Just keep your distance. From me. From Hayes.” He reached out and took her hand. Then he pulled her close and kissed her. “I’m sorry,” he said.

“For what?” she asked.

“I don’t know.”

Then she stepped back and he shut the door and the cab pulled away. Garvey did not look back.

She walked back to the dusty little apartment. Hayes was not there. She waited for an hour and then she went and got the paper.

The Department had acted on it just fast enough to look semi-responsible. She was not named, only listed as a “high-level McNaughton Securities employee.” Hayes was not mentioned, as she had kept him out of it. It seemed like just another lie in a heap of them. But that was the end of it, she knew. She no longer belonged to herself.

Hayes staggered out of the canal passageways as afternoon was darkening, then waited until he was steady enough on his feet to begin the hunt again. He was not really sure what time it was, but he felt it was far too late for his liking. The memory he’d stolen from Colomb in the trolley tunnels still burned bright in him, and he knew whatever transaction they were making was about to pass.

He ran to his usual contacts first, asking if they knew the whereabouts of Mr. Colomb, yet found he was a leper to them now. They wouldn’t answer his calls, and when he persisted they threatened him. He was too hot now, they said, poison to everyone. No one wanted contact with a man who’d taken part in a union murder.

In the end it didn’t matter. Colomb was such a visible unioner that even the lowliest and most ignorant of Hayes’s informants knew a little about him, and soon Hayes tracked his quarry to a shabby little inn on the south side of town. There he found a good vantage point within the grasping branches of a dying wax myrtle, and he sat and tried to steady himself when the world swam about him.

He was still fairly wobbly. The place where the unioner’s wrench had hit him felt like ice fused into his skull, and every once in a while he’d have to turn his head aside and spit blood. He knew it was stupid to be out here, wounded and reeling, but he didn’t care. It was easier to keep moving than to stop and rest. This way he never had time to realize the mess he’d caused.

He gritted his teeth and tried not to think of Garvey trying to pump life back into the dead man. Tried not to remember Samantha, her head leaned back against the safe house wall as she languished in the prison that her life had suddenly become. He shook himself and resumed watching.

As night fell Hayes began to wonder if his informants had been wrong or if he’d somehow missed Colomb among the mists of his concussion, but finally the door of the inn opened and a little figure came tottering out, hat pulled low and mustache bristling. As he stepped below a streetlight Hayes saw Colomb’s face peeking out through the shadows. He gave him twenty seconds and then followed from the opposite side of the street.

The little man went to a street-side trolley station and sat on one of the green tin benches. He smoked a quick cigarette and rocked back and forth, head darting around. When the trolley pulled up he jumped on and Hayes snaked through the doors at the other end of the car, marking the gray cap for the second time in two days. Hayes sat down with the rest of the south side rabble and pulled his collar up. Colomb did not notice him. His eyes stayed fixed on the floor, and he continued rocking back and forth with his back hunched, completely consumed by whatever was on his mind.