E. Doctorow - Loon Lake

The police chief nods. It’s cold in this room. I sit shivering in my coat. There’s a clock on the wall, like the clocks in grade school. The minute hand leaps forward from one line to the next.

The chief is not cold. He sits at his desk in a short-sleeved shirt. Arms like trees. His wrist watch appears to be imbedded in the flesh. His badge, pinned to his shirt pocket, pulls the material to a point. He’s enormous but with an oddly handsome unlined face prominent jawline straight nose. He is a freak who has managed to make himself a full life out of being born and raised in Jacksontown. I try to look as if this is not my opinion. He goes back to reading his file.

I have been very cooperative. Even though they did that to me I have told my story as completely and accurately as I can.

I hear the minute hand move on the clock.

We’re in some room on the ground floor that looks into the courtyard. A couple of cops are standing around out there. The window has bars.

I don’t even ask to smoke. I show no impatience. I don’t want to give them anything to work on, if I don’t seem to be in a hurry they’ll be quicker to let me go.

A cream-white La Salle with whitewall tires pulls up in the courtyard just outside the window. The driver holds open the rear door and the man who gets out immediately has the attention of the cops. He wears a dark overcoat with a fur collar. A pearl-gray fedora. They seem to know him, they come over, they seem eager to shake his hand. He says something and one of the cops moves out of my view.

“Are you deaf, son?”

“What?”

“I said where are you from?”

“I’m from Paterson. Paterson, New Jersey.”

“Like your name.”

“Yeah.”

He nods. “I see. What was your last job?”

“What? I rousted for a carnival.”

“Whereabouts.”

“Uh, upstate New York. New England.”

“What carnival?”

“What?”

“What was the name of it?”

“I don’t remember.”

“You don’t remember the name?”

“No.”

“Well, how long did you work for them?”

“I don’t know. Listen, is this going to take much longer?”

“It’s up to you. You worked at this carnival?”

“Yeah. A couple of months. It was a summer job. Some lousy carnival.”

“And before that?”

The man in the courtyard sees something. He removes one gray kidskin glove, takes off his hat. He’s a short man, dark-complected, his black hair shines, shows the tracks of the comb. He is shaking his head, he seems genuinely relieved, he raises his arm, lets it fall. His eyes are large, dark, glistening, with long black lashes, they are shockingly feminine eyes.

There is Clara.

They look at each other, a wave of emotion overcomes them both and they hug. He holds her at arm’s length and he laughs. He is charmed by her. He shakes his head as if to say, Oh what am I going to do with you!

“Sit down, son.”

Side by side they lean against the cream-colored car and they talk. Clara’s wearing her fur jacket. He says something to her, he smiles and holds her arm, whispers in her ear, it is as if he is in some night club somewhere at a dark table, and the intimate things he has to say are covered by the music of the swing band.

I am at the window.

“Son of a bitch, what does he see out there?”

“Clara!”

She has pulled her arm away, I hear something, I hear the high wordless whine of impatience with which she sometimes fends off the male approach.

“Clara!” I pound the window. He seems undismayed by her response, as if he knows too well it is a ritual, that it is in fact a form of encouragement.

“CLARA!” My arm, I am jerked back, a cop is pulling down the dark shade, is this my last sight of her head half turned as if she’s heard something hair blowing back from her face eyes shining the winter courtyard as if she’s heard something in her past, someone, just losing hold in her consciousness?

“Boy, don’t you know you’re being interrogated? Don’t you understand that?”

I am slammed back in the chair.

“I gotta talk to Clara Lukaćs. She’s out there.”

“All in good time.”

“It’s important! Look, I’ll answer anything any goddamn questions you can think of just let me talk to her a minute.”

The cop is still behind me I have risen from my chair he presses me back down.

Another cop has come in and places Red James’ gun on the desk. He takes up position with his back to the door, his arms folded.

The chief examines the gun. “A very serious piece of equipment. This is what the department should be carrying,” he says to the cop. “Not the shit we got.”

“Never been fired,” the cop says.

Do I hear a car door slam? If I am to remain sane I must believe she is not leaving. I must believe she is handling things in her own way. I must believe that she is capable of dealing with Tommy Crapo as she knows he must be dealt with to get him off our backs. I will believe these things, and take heart and deal for my part with the situation in this room. An hour from now we’ll be on our way. We’ll make a slight detour down to Tennessee and then head for California. We’ll be laughing about all of this. We’ll be talking about the adventure we had.

“Where’d you get this, son?”

“It’s his. Red James’.”

He shakes his head and smiles. “Didn’t do him much good, did it? You take it off him?”

“No, it was in his house. It was hidden behind the radio.”

“Yesterday you went down to Mallory the pawnbroker’s. You collected six hundred dollars on the deceased’s insurance policy.”

“That’s right. The money belongs to Mrs. James. I’m holding it for her. She’s fifteen years old and we’re taking her home to her folks.”

He nods, not to indicate he believes me, but as if to maintain the rhythm of the questioning. I look at the clear-eyed, steadfast face of the police chief, the lean face carved from his mountainous self. I’ve underestimated him.

“You expect them to give you trouble?” he says.

“Who?”

“Her folks you’re taking her home to. That you were packing this thing.”

“It wasn’t for that.”

“What was it for, then?”

“I was glad to find it. I sat up all night guarding the door with it.”

“Why?”

“Until we got out of town, in case someone came after me.”

He gives me his full attention. “Who?”

“I don’t know who. Whoever killed Red.”

“Why would they do that?”

“I don’t know. If they thought I saw them? If they thought I could pin it on them?”

“Could you?”

“I told you. I didn’t see anything. I got hit from behind and went down and it all fell on top of me. Could I see my girl, please?”

“Well, if you were afraid, why didn’t you call the police? You think this is the Wild West?”

The policemen guffaw.

“Why would anyone want to kill him, anyway?” the chief says.

“I don’t know.”

“You’re in the union, ain’t you?”

“You have my billfold!”

“Maybe you killed him,” he says.

“What? Jesus H. Christ!”

“Sit down, son. And watch your language.”

“Oh, this is swell. This is really swell. No, I didn’t kill him, he was my friend, we lived next door to each other!”

“Did you fool with his wife?”

I hear the ticking of the school clock. From far away comes the metallic screech and thunder of the car couplings as they make up the trains at the freight yards.

“Answer, please. Did you fool with his wife?”

The way is open for my full perception of official state-empowered rectitude. I am suddenly so terrified I cannot talk.