Authors: Alan Glenn
A radio next to the hot plate was playing swing music, Benny Goodman, it sounded like. Sam went into the bathroom and sighed at the gray water in the sink. “What now, Walter? What did you do?”
“Nothing, my dear boy. Just preparing my evening meal. Nothing out of the ordinary, but there you go. The
sink overflowed, and I wanted to make sure it was repaired before it started leaking on your head.”
“Thanks,” Sam muttered. “Do you have a coffee cup or something I could borrow?”
“Absolutely.” Walter waddled off. He came back with a thick white coffee mug with a broken handle, and Sam started bailing the water out of the clogged sink. As he worked, Walter leaned against the doorjamb and lit a cigar. “What news of the Portsmouth Police Department?”
“Had a body out on the railroad tracks tonight. By Maplewood Avenue.”
“A suicide?”
“Don’t know right now.”
“How fascinating. Maybe you’ve got a real murder on your hands, Sam.”
Sam paused, the mug slimy in his hand. “What are you doing, Walter? Research for a detective story?”
Walter studied his cigar. “No, son. Detective stories are a tad too realistic for me. You know what I write. Science fiction and fantasy. That’s where my degraded tastes have led me. Stories about rockets and robots. Evil wizards.”
“Speaking of which, rent’s due on the fifteenth. Just so there’s no misunderstanding.”
The older man grinned. “No misunderstanding. I received a check from Street and Smith yesterday and expect another one shortly. The rent will be paid in full and on time.”
“Best news I’ve gotten today.” The sink was empty. He squatted down and said, “Can you get me a saucepan or something?”
“Certainly.”
Minutes later, Sam undid the U-joint with a wrench, and brown water rushed into the pan. He reached in with his fingers and winced in disgust as he pulled out the clog, greasy lumps of potato peelings. He dropped them in the saucepan, put the piping back into place, and worked the wrench, then stood up.
“Don’t peel your potatoes in the sink, please, Walter. Do it someplace else, okay? It just clogs the sink. You did the same thing last month.”
“My thanks, Inspector, my warmest thanks.”
“You’re welcome, Walter.” Sam dropped his tools into his bag, saw a worn leather valise on the floor nearby. He never saw Walter without the leather valise, in which the former professor carried letters, manuscripts, and God knew what else. On the table was a stack of magazines with names like
Thrilling Wonder Stories
and
Amazing Stories
and
Astounding Stories
. He picked up
Astounding Stories
, studied a garish spaceship, fire spewing from its nozzles. There were three names on the cover, and he was startled to see one he recognized: Walter Tucker. He set the pulp magazine down. “How’s the writing gig going?”
“It’s a living of sorts. I’m sure the overpaid and quite cowed professors at Harvard would turn down their noses at what I do, but it can be a lot of fun, frankly. You have to tell a story quickly and to the point. Actually, I’ve learned an extraordinary amount the past few years. About astronomy, biology, atomic theory, and archaeology. Among other things. Anyway, once you’ve been blackballed, that’s it. Even industries that need workers with a scientific background won’t touch me. And the
secret satisfaction of science fiction and fantasy is that you can also write about forbidden topics without worrying about censors and critics with handguns and nightsticks.”
Sam was silent, thinking about how tired he was.
“If you write a story about a suppressed group of knights who are working hard to overthrow a king from a swampland who has usurped the throne from the rightful king, who was murdered before his time, and how this swamp king has put his lackeys into places of power around the kingdom … and how they fight to return the kingdom to the old and free ways … then it’s just a fantasy. A tale that no overseer or censor will worry about … a tale that won’t get the author into trouble.”
“Or into a labor camp.”
“Exactly,” Walter agreed, dropping the magazine back on the table. “Speaking of labor camps, how’s your brother?”
The second mention of Tony in one evening. Must be a record. “Got a postcard from him last month. Seems to be doing well.”
“Glad to hear it. And I’m glad he has a brother who’s handy with tools.”
“I’ve got to get going. Remember, no potato peels in the sink.”
“Duly noted. No peels in the sink. Thanks again, Inspector.”
“You’re welcome. And make sure that you—”
“Yes, yes, I know. The rent on the fifteenth.”
* * *
Outside, the night air was damp and chilly. The lights from the shipyard reflected yellow and white against the low clouds, and he could now make out the faint sounds of workmen putting together the latest class of navy submarines. He stood there, seeing a place that had built ships for a century and a half, a place his father had worked after his service in World War I and a place his brother, Tony, had worked until … Sam again felt that flush of embarrassment of a law officer having a brother who had been arrested three years ago and charged with illegally trying to unionize the shipyard workers. A quick star-chamber-type trial, and now Tony was serving a sentence at a federal labor camp near Fort Drum, New York. Besides the shame and concern for his older brother, there was also anger, for he was certain his brother’s arrest had very nearly sidetracked his promotion to inspector.
The crack of a gunshot down the street startled him, the hollow
boom
echoing and re-echoing about the frame houses. He didn’t move. Another example of what was called by his fellow cops “a shot in the dark.” Like the gunshot at the railroad tracks, these firearm discharges—scores being settled, somebody being robbed, an argument ending—were ignored unless they were officially reported. Not a way for a good cop to respond, but he had no choice. Besides, he had his hands more than full with a corpse, the pile of paperwork on his desk, and his convict brother.
One could pick one’s friends, but one could never pick one’s relatives. Or in-laws. And both were giving him a headache.
At the bottom of the steps, he tripped over a small
shape. He turned on the back porch light and stooped to see what had tripped him.
By the steps were three rocks piled on top of one another.
Three rocks.
He was positive they hadn’t been there when he had gone up to Walter’s apartment.
He bent down, picked up the rocks, then tossed each as hard as he could out into the darkness. Two fell within the yard, and he had a moment of satisfaction as the third splashed into the Piscataqua River.
* * *
The radio was off, as were most of the lights, and he moved through the silent living room and into the kitchen and to their bedroom. The only light came from the bedside radio, which was on. Sarah liked to fall asleep to the sound of the radio, music or news or a detective tale. He, on the other hand, couldn’t fall asleep if the radiator was ticking.
Sarah had laid his pajamas out on his side of the bed. He changed clothes and slid in under the sheets. Sarah murmured and he leaned over and pressed his lips against her neck. “Sorry,” she murmured. “I know you had something in mind tonight … I just couldn’t stay awake …”
“Don’t worry, dear, I’ll take a rain check—if you offer one.”
She sighed, took his hand, and placed it on her breasts, the soft lace of the nightgown pressing against his palm. In the darkness, he smiled. Sarah could stretch
a food budget or a utility budget, but she never skimped on nighties and lingerie. She called them her tools for keeping Sam in place, and he had to admit they did a very good job of at least keeping him in bed.
“Rain check offered, then,” she murmured. “Just make sure you use it and don’t lose it.”
He moved up against her, his hand on the softness of her flesh and the delicacy of the lace. “Rain check accepted, and it won’t be lost. Not ever. Good day at the school department?”
“Not bad. Getting ready for another round of budget cuts.”
“Anything I should know about?”
He felt her tense under his touch. “The usual.”
“Sarah …”
“I’ve been careful, honest. Nothing going on just right now, though we’ve heard rumors of a refugee roundup sometime soon. Have you heard anything?”
“No. But watch yourself. Leaflets stuck under windshield wipers, registering new voters, dropping off pamphlets at the post office at night. That’s one thing for you and your fellow revolutionaries.”
He waited for a reply and heard nothing but cold silence from her and soft music from the radio. He gave her a squeeze and said, his voice a low whisper, “But Sarah … being a stop on the Railroad, that’s another. We’ve got to close it down. Now. Besides the marshal dropping that big-ass hint to me earlier, we’ve got Long’s Legionnaires in town, watching things. I ran into two of them tonight, at the Fish Shanty. Two losers and they made everyone in the restaurant freeze in their seats, scared out of their wits.”
Unexpectedly, she turned her head and kissed him, hard. “Sam … I don’t know what I can do. There’s one in the pipeline coming to Portsmouth in the next couple of days. I just got word this afternoon.”
“Can you delay it?”
“I don’t know. I can try, but sometimes it’s hard letting the right people know.”
“You’ve done enough already. Time for somebody else to take up the burden. We can’t take the chance, Sarah. We’ve got to close it down.”
She sighed. “Sam, I said I’d try. It’s not like I can make a phone call and stop it cold. And look, we’re just a bunch of schoolteachers. And secretaries. That’s all.”
“There’s a whole bunch of schoolteachers from Hyde Park in New York, breaking rocks in the Utah desert because they were suspected of harboring FDR’s widow, Eleanor. Your pretty hands and face won’t last long in the desert.” He heard the cruelty in his voice and winced. “Look, Sarah, I worry about you. We need to think of Toby.”
She moved some, and he thought she was rolling over in anger, but she surprised him again by raising up her face and giving him another, deeper kiss. “All right, Sam, I’ll be careful. I’ll try to stop the visit here. You be careful, too, Inspector.”
“I’m always careful.”
“If you’re right about what the marshal said and those damn Legionnaires being in the area, then I don’t know. Even the careful ones can get into trouble.”
Sam lay there, blankets and sheets pulled up to his chest, as his wife’s breathing slowed. The radio was on his side of the bed, the shallow glow of light from the dial
reassuring. He could reach over and shut it off, but instead, he listened. It was the top of the hour, and time for the news. He closed his eyes, started to feel himself doze away, while the headlines droned on through the static.
“… bombing raids upon Berlin by a number of long-range Ilyushin bombers took place tonight. Officials reported that no military targets were struck but that a number of homes and hospitals were destroyed and scores of civilians were killed
.
“On the Russian front, house-to-house fighting continued in the city of Stalingrad, while Russian armored units have reportedly engaged German panzer groups on the outskirts of Kharkov
.
“In London, Prime Minister Mosley met again with German Foreign Minister von Ribbentrop. The talks were conducted to review terms of the armistice agreement signed between Great Britain and Germany two years ago. One of the main areas of disagreement, according to Washington diplomatic sources, is the number of German troops that are allowed to be based in Great Britain and some of her overseas possessions
.
“In Montreal, a surprise visit from a trade delegation from the Soviet Union raised suggestions in some quarters that the government of Canada may be seeking closer ties to its neighbor to the west
.
“Closer to home, President Huey Long signed a bill today ensuring that all Americans receiving federal assistance of any type sign a loyalty oath to the government, guaranteeing, as the President said, that patriotism will continue to thrive during his second term. The bill, called the Patriot Enhancement Act, will be enacted into law
immediately. A violation of the loyalty oath will mean an automatic prison term
.
“On Capitol Hill, Treasury Secretary Henry Morgenthau, fresh from his attendance at a meeting of the World Jewish Congress, was unsuccessful in his attempts to convince Congress to increase the number of Jewish refugees allowed into the United States this year
.
“Also from Washington, unemployment figures released from the Department of Labor indicate that more Americans are working today than at any time before and that—”
Sam reached out and switched off the radio. News of the world. Mostly lies, half-truths, and exaggerations. Everyone knew that the unemployment numbers were cooked. Every month more and more Americans were supposedly working over a decade after the stock market crash. But he saw with his own eyes what was true, from the hobo encampments by the railroad tracks, to the rush of unemployed men at the shipyard gates when a rumor spread that five pipefitters had been killed in an accident, to the overcrowded tenements in town.
That was the truth. That desperate numbers of people were still without jobs, without relief, without hope. And nothing over the radio would change what he knew. He rolled over, tried to relax, but two thoughts kept him awake.
The thought of three stones piled up on his rear porch.
A series of blurry numerals, tattooed into a dead man’s wrist.
Both mysteries. Despite his job, he hated mysteries.
Now he was back in the shadowy streets of old Portsmouth, where there were lots of homes from the 1700s, with narrow clapboards, tiny windows, and sagging roofs. He kept to the alleyways and crooked lanes, ducking into a doorway each time he saw an approaching headlight. When he got where he had to be, he crouched beneath a rhododendron bush, waited some more. He thought about these old homes, about the extraordinary men who had come from this place, had gone out to the world and made a difference. Did they feel then what he felt now? The history books claimed they were full of courage and revolutionary spirit. But he didn’t feel particularly full of anything; he was just cold and jumpy, knowing that behind every headlight could be a car full of Interior Department men or Long’s Legionnaires.