Чак Хоган - The Standoff

The latrines and the Red Cross truck dispensing coffee and plain donuts were right near each other, to Brian’s right as he parked the Jeep at the top of the mountain road, so he didn’t have to go far. Men were hammering and constructing two long wooden sheds behind the trucks, and when Brian asked one of them what they were building, the agent looked up and said, “Kitchens.” But Brian had to admire their efficiency; ask the Huddleston cops to build their own soup kitchen and forget about it. Obviously the feds were shaping up to be in this for the long haul.

It was two wooden steps up to the latrine, and a thin wooden door that might not stand a storm if they got one. Inside was a narrow row of plastic urinals set one next to the other. It wasn’t as private as the Porta-Johns outside, but probably cleaner, Brian figured, and definitely more airy. There were no mirrors, and the one sink basin near the door had an empty mop bucket in it. There was a stained green towel hanging off the sink, and two bulbs in socket cords were strung along the low ceiling where the planks were warped anyway, letting in long streams of slanting daylight. A wave of odor hit Brian that was briny and foul.

There was one person in there already, and as in any public restroom, Brian tried not to look at him first. You don’t want to meet a stranger’s eye in a public toilet. You want to do what has to be done and then wash up and leave. The guy was maybe four urinals away, right in the middle of the row, so there was plenty of room for Brian to go discreetly two or three away from him on either side. But this person had his back turned to Brian. When he shut the door and the guy didn’t even turn around to look, Brian was able to size him up without risk. That was when he realized it was Agent Banish.

His first impulse was to turn right around and leave. As though he might be disturbing the man just by being there. But then Brian stopped himself. It was just the two of them inside there, one on one. Brian figured this was his chance.

He remembered his ring again with a grateful start and slipped it off and dropped it into his pants pocket. He started along the creaking boards, literally swallowing, thinking of what to say. Agent Banish wasn’t wearing a ball cap just then, his hair grayed and slightly curling, and he was staring straight ahead at the drab wood wall. He was running his water. Brian made sure to make plenty of noise walking so as not to be thought of as sneaking up on him.

Agent Banish’s head didn’t turn even as Brian stopped at the urinal next to him. But Brian still couldn’t think of anything to say, or how to go about starting, so he just cleared his throat and pulled down his fly and began pretty much as usual. Of course by this point, he didn’t have to go anymore. He had forgotten all about that. But it would have looked even stranger if he didn’t follow through with procedure, so Brian was standing there with his fly down, facing the wall and smelling the salty odor of the place and waiting for something to happen. He was looking straight ahead just like Agent Banish. He was too intimidated to look any other way. Agent Banish’s water splashed in fits and starts and Brian knew then that it was now or never. Brian’s father liked to say things, and one of the things he always said was, a man’s got to take the initiative in life. Brian knew he wasn’t going anywhere, wasn’t ever getting out of Huddleston, Montana, if he didn’t go to the big table and speak up and ask for his plate of food.

So he finally turned his head. It shocked him how close they were. “Agent Banish,” he said, pretending to have just noticed him there. Brian took his right hand and extended it across. “Officer Brian Kearney,” he said.

Agent Banish’s water stopped. His head turned and his steel-blue eyes drilled Brian, just as they had in the rain the night before. He looked at Brian’s open hand and then again at his face, all with an expression of hard-to-believe.

“I just wanted you to know,” Brian said, forcing it out bravely, “I’m not like the other cops. I mean, they don’t see things the way I do. I mean, I don’t see things the way they do. In fact,” he managed, “two months ago I filed an FD-646, a Special Agent application. I’m hoping to sign on with the FBI myself.”

That was when Agent Banish’s eyes darkened. He looked at Brian as though from across some great divide, then his eyes dropped away. He zipped up and walked off without a word, without even washing his hands. The thin door whacked shut behind him.

Sawdust blew through shafts of daylight in his wake. Brian stood there frozen, not sure what to do. Then he zipped up and went right out quick after him.

Agent Banish was striding away fast across the clearing and Brian hurried to catch up, then kept apace at his side. It surprised him that they were about the same height.

“I was one of the officers who got shot at,” Brian said quickly, so that Agent Banish would know. “It ricocheted right off my hip radio. Not even a scratch. I guess I’ve always been lucky—”

Agent Banish stopped then. His face was turned toward the open clearing, eyes reading the activity and the surrounding trees the way people look at words and punctuation and make out a sentence. Brian followed his gaze to where Sheriff Blood was standing across the way.

Agent Banish said, “What’s his story?”

He was asking Brian a question. Brian stumbled over the answer, because Agent Banish had asked it, and because Brian was wondering what an FBI hostage negotiator could possibly want with the sheriff.

“Sheriff Blood?” he said. “He doesn’t have one.”

The answer made little sense even to Brian. Agent Banish was still looking, though. The impression Brian got was of deliberate curiosity, the way big animals sometimes paw at smaller animals before killing them.

Agent Banish said, “What’s between him and your Chief of Police?”

Brian kind of squinted then. He was trying to decode Agent Banish’s face. “How did you know?” he said.

But it was the wrong thing to do, asking a question of the man, because Agent Banish just turned his head and looked full at Brian, recognizing him then, or maybe just seeing the uniform. “Shouldn’t you be down at the barricade?” he said.

“I am. I mean — I was. I came back up on a coffee run for the others, and because I had to take a leak too. You know how it is. Only two things to do on a detail like that, stamp your feet and drink coffee, both of which make—”

Agent Banish was already walking away. Brian stayed put, just watching after him. He didn’t know why he was trying to waste Agent Banish’s time. These were men of action. They did not stand around talking or stamping their feet or drinking coffee. A man couldn’t just go up and ask for their camaraderie. They owned the brand of respect you had to earn.

Brian saw that he had bungled the whole thing pretty well, and actually was starting to feel his water again, but now knew he had to see the sheriff. Sheriff Blood noticed him coming and stopped halfway to his Bronco, and then looked and saw Agent Banish walking off in the other direction. Knowing that the sheriff had seen them standing together put a little more pepper into Brian’s stride.

“Brian.” The sheriff nodded, in his way, arms crossed and casual. “How’re you keeping yourself?”

“Good,” Brian said, turning back to look at Agent Banish and prompting the sheriff to do the same. “You know,” Brian said, “he was inquiring about you.”

Brian stayed looking a while longer, for effect, and then turned back to the sheriff, expecting a few prying questions whereby he might be able to dope out some useful information. Instead, the sheriff was eyeing him with some reproach.