Linwood Barclay: Parting Shot

The man smiled. “We’re true crime nuts. You know the way?”

Duckworth said, “Hang a right here, then the next right, and just keep on going.”

The driver looked puzzled. “Won’t that put us on the road back to Albany?”

“Yup,” Duckworth said. He put the passenger window back up, took his foot off the brake, and drove off.

He parked half a block down from Knight’s. Before entering the premises, he inspected the alley next to the building. Brian Gaffney’s last memory before his two-day blackout was of this location. It was no more than six feet wide, which allowed room to step around a line of trash cans. At the back end it opened out onto a small parking lot.

Duckworth walked the length of it, glancing down at the cracked and broken asphalt. Nothing caught his eye, and he didn’t know what he was expecting to find. Then he cast his eyes skyward, hoping he might see a security camera mounted to the wall of the bar, or the building next to it, which was a dry-cleaning operation. No such luck.

He came back out onto the street. It was early May — nearly a year since the catastrophic events that had taken so many lives in Promise Falls — and each day seemed just a little longer than the last. The town was planning a special event later in the month to commemorate those who’d lost their lives, and Duckworth had been asked to be a guest of honor.

He wanted nothing to do with it.

He pulled on the door to Knight’s and went inside. It wouldn’t be fair to call this place a dive. Although a little rough around the edges, it was a decent neighborhood bar. It had the usual trappings. The neon signs for Bud Lite and Jack Daniels and Michelob. There were tables scattered about the room, booths down the right side, and the bar itself over on the left, half a dozen people perched on stools, watching a ball game playing on the TV hanging off the wall above a set of shelves stocked with liquor bottles.

The place was about half full, and Duckworth guessed it would be close to packed as more people got off work. Knight’s didn’t just serve booze. Four guys sitting in a booth were feasting on a plate of chicken wings. The smells of fried food and grease wafted up Duckworth’s nostrils and he found himself instantly starving.

Chicken wings, he told himself, were usually served with celery and carrot sticks. That made them a balanced meal, yes? But he knew that when he got home in another couple of hours, Maureen would have pulled something together for them for dinner. Something that was not battered or deep-fried or dripping in sauce.

Be strong.

He glanced around the room and saw something that pleased him. Unlike the alley, there were security cameras in here.

A slim man about thirty years old, dressed in jeans and a checked shirt with the sleeves rolled back to his elbows, was working behind the bar, drying some mugs with a white cloth. Duckworth hauled himself up onto a stool.

“What can I get you?” the bartender asked.

Duckworth dug out his ID and displayed it for the man. “Like to ask you some questions. What’s your name?”

“Axel. Axel Thurston.” He squinted at the ID for a final second before Duckworth put it away. “Jesus, you’re the guy.”

“Sorry?”

“I know the name. You caught that guy. Jesus, you caught that guy.”

Duckworth nodded.

“What are ya drinkin’?”

“Nothing, really.”

“No, come on. What’s your pleasure? On the house. Your money’s no good here. Whaddya want? Want some Scotch? Best stuff. I got Speyburn, I got Macallan, I got Glenmorangie, I got—”

Duckworth raised a palm. “No, really. That’s very kind of you. But I’m on duty, you know?”

Axel grinned. “Yeah, of course. I get that. So maybe something else?”

“Glass of water’d be nice.”

Axel laughed. “Glass of water! The irony, huh?”

Duckworth didn’t get it at first. Then he realized it was a reference to what had happened a year ago, when the town’s water supply had been poisoned.

“Oh, yeah, right.”

“Let me give you bottled,” Axel said. He reached under the counter and came up with a bottle of Finley Springs. “How’s this?”

“Wow,” Duckworth said. “My favorite.”

Axel got a glass, put some ice in it, cracked open the water and poured. “So what’s up? What can I do for you?”

Duckworth brought out his phone and showed him the picture of Brian Gaffney that he had taken at the hospital.

“You recognize him?”

Axel nodded. “Sure. That’s Brian.”

“You know him?”

“Sure. He comes in here all the time. Brian Gaffney. Works at the car cleaning place.” He grew concerned. “Shit, is he okay? Somethin’ happen to him?”

Duckworth put away his phone. “Looks like somebody got the drop on him when he left here a couple of nights ago.”

Axel looked puzzled. “I haven’t heard anything about that? We didn’t have any cops here. Nothing happened as far as I know.”

Duckworth nodded understandingly. “It’s complicated. Brian didn’t come to our attention until today.”

“Is he okay? He’s a sweet guy, you know? Not the kind to ever hurt anybody. You almost feel kind of protective of him, you know?”

“What do you mean?”

Axel shrugged. “He’s a bit too trusting. He could get taken in pretty easy. So’s he okay?”

“Yeah. But I’d like to trace his movements over the last forty-eight hours. Were you on that night?”

Axel nodded. “Yeah. I was. Brian was sitting right where you are.”

“When did he come in?”

He shrugged. “About eight? Stayed an hour or two. He comes in every couple of nights when he’s done work.”

“Been coming here long?”

Another nod. “He likes to talk, you know. He’s interested in all sorts of weird shit. Like, conspiracy theories? Who was really behind 9/11, were the moon landings fake, did aliens build the pyramids, shit like that.”

“UFOs?” Duckworth asked.

“Yeah, them. Sometimes he talked about his family, his old man.”

“Albert Gaffney?”

“I don’t know his name, but yeah. Brian was saying he moved out, got his own place because his dad said it was time for him to make it on his own. Thing is, I think Brian would have lived at home forever. He felt safer there, I reckon. But he seemed to be doing okay on his own, far as I could tell.”

“What I wondered is, did you notice anyone talking to him, taking an interest in him that night? Checking him out somehow?”

Axel shook his head slowly. “Not really. Brian usually just sits there and drinks his beer and watches the game.”

Duckworth nodded in the direction of the security camera mounted on the wall close to the ceiling. “What about that?”

Axel followed his eye. “Oh, yeah.”

“You got security video from that night?”

“We should. System banks it for a week or so. It’s kind of good to have in case something goes down, you know. Fight breaks out, or someone thinks they got their pocket picked, stuff like that. The owner says it protects us, too, in case somebody tries to sue us for something that didn’t happen.”

“I’d like to see two nights ago. That be okay?”

“Sure,” Axel said. “Need to go to the computer in the back. I’d check with the owner, but when I tell him it’s you, fuck, he’s gonna tell me to do everything I can to be accommodating. You know why?”

Duckworth waited.

Axel leaned over the bar and said softly, “His sister was one of the ones who died from the water.”

“I’m sorry.”

“If he was here, he’d be offering you free drinks till the end of time.”

Duckworth smiled sadly. “Let’s go to the instant replay.”