High Season (6 page)

“If I wanted to investigate homicides, I'd go back to Baltimore. They pay better.”

“For Christ's sake, Coffin,” Boyle said. “Are you refusing a direct order?”

“A second ago, it was a favor.”

Louie squinted. “A second ago I thought you'd say yes.”

“You'll get your unmarked car back,” Boyle said. “And if you get results, we'll talk about your office.”

“Forget it,” Coffin said.

“Look, Frankie,” Louie said, “we're family, right? I don't want to play hardball with you. I'm a big fan of yours, you know that.”

“If you say no, you're fired,” Boyle said.

Coffin took a breath, let it out. His eyes felt gritty; he had a slight tickle in his throat. “I'll need Officer Winters pretty much full-time. I'll need office support. I'll need relief from the rest of my caseload. And you can stick the car up your asses.”

“You're doing the right thing, Frankie,” Louie said. “This protocol deal with the state is all bullshit, anyway.”

“You can mention that to Mancini,” Coffin said. “When he indicts me.”

The phone buzzed. It was Arlene, Boyle's secretary. “Chief?” she said through the intercom. “Channel Five News is on line one.”

Boyle's eyebrows shot up. Then he sighed. “Tell them we can't comment at this time. Tell them to refer all questions to the state police or the Cape and Islands district attorney's office.”

“Okeydokey,” Arlene said.

“Funny thing,” Boyle said after he'd switched off the intercom. “The raid last night on the dick dock? No one was there. Like they knew we were coming.”

“Funny thing,” Coffin said, opening the door.

 

_______

 

Coffin found Lola on the ground floor, talking on the pay phone outside the squad room. He waited just out of earshot until she hung up. She was frowning.

“Everything okay?” Coffin said.

“Struck out again,” Lola said. “What am I, radioactive or something?”

“Sorry,” Coffin said.

Lola waved a hand. “Same old same old,” she said. “No big deal.”

“You got your wish,” Coffin said. “Boyle wants us to investigate the Merkin homicide. Off the books.”

“Wow. Why?”

“Boyle owes his job to the powers that be, and the powers that be are very nervous.”

“About Merkin? How come?”

“Good question. I asked our fine town manager the same thing. Apparently it's bad for the business climate.”

“I'm moved,” she said, “by the depth of their concern for the deceased. When do we get started?”

“Tonight,” Coffin said. “We're going to a drag show at the Crown.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

C
offin trotted down the wide, stone steps in front of Town Hall and stepped out into the slanting light of a Cape Cod afternoon in August. The air was cooling after the noontime heat; the breeze had turned and was blowing off the bay, rich with the smell of the incoming tide.

Beautiful as it was, summer was still Coffin's least favorite season in Provincetown, August his least favorite month. From a midwinter population of around three thousand, the town swelled to as many as sixty thousand shopping, whale-watching, partying, cruising, beach-going souls in the high season. All of them had to eat, drink, sleep, and park; all of them were determined to have fun, the meaning of which varied wildly from one out-of-towner to the next. True, the tourists brought a huge influx of cash, the town's economic lifeblood, a necessary evil now that the fishery was all but dead. But like most year-rounders, Coffin resented the sweating press of them—their pink skin and bovine progress down Commercial Street, camcorders whirring. Every summer, by mid-July, he found himself longing for winter, wishing the tourists
would all go away and never come back, wishing they would just send the money without bringing their dogs and strollers and RVs and most especially their dumb-ass tourist selves.

On the sidewalk, Coffin shouldered through a knot of stout retirees in matching T-shirts. They had gathered to watch a Boston television news crew setting up in front of Town Hall. The sound man, cameraman, and producer all huddled near a serpentine tangle of cable. The hair-sprayed reporter straightened his tie, which he wore with a sport coat, sky blue shirt, and khaki shorts. The TV remote van was parked illegally along Commercial Street, big antenna unfurled from its roof like an alien sunflower.

A black Lexus sedan sat idling in the narrow parking lot, blocking Coffin's Dodge. The driver's side window slid silently down. Mancini and the brown-suited state police detective were inside. A younger detective in a gray suit sat in the back.

“Got a minute, Coffin?” Mancini said from behind his blue mirrored lenses.

The Lexus's rear door swung open. Coffin climbed in next to the younger detective; he had high cheekbones and surprisingly long eyelashes. The interior of the car was cold, the air conditioner blasting a small nor'easter.

“Let's take a ride,” said Mancini, “and have a little chat. Have you met Detectives Pilchard and Treadway? Treadway's just started with us. Shut the door, Treadway.”

The young detective—Treadway—reached across and pulled the door shut. The Lexus slid into traffic on Bradford Street.

“I've been telling the boys here about your credentials,” Mancini said. “Top of your class in the Baltimore Police Academy. Perfect score on the detective exam. Star of the homicide division. Commendations from the governor. Blah, blah, blah. Very impressive.”

“That was a long time ago,” Coffin said.

“Still, the old instincts don't just disappear.”

“Like riding a bicycle,” Pilchard said over his shoulder.

Mancini turned on Alden, which was blocked by a UPS truck making deliveries. He looked at Coffin in the rearview mirror. “I'm curious about your take on the Merkin killing.”

“I don't know enough yet to have a take.”

The older detective turned around in his seat and smirked at Coffin. “I figure the wife did it,” he said. “Got some help from a boyfriend, maybe.”

“Maybe,” Coffin said. “Maybe it's a hate crime. Maybe it's a robbery, or a drug thing. Could even be accidental.”

Pilchard snorted. “An accident? You saw the body, right? Didn't look to me like he got caught in a piece of freaking farm equipment.”

“Erotic asphyxiation,” Mancini said. “That what you're thinking? Whoever was doing the scarf work got carried away?”

Coffin shrugged. “Stranger things have happened.”

“Interesting theory,” Mancini said, glancing at Coffin in the mirror with his blue sunglasses.

“It's not a theory,” Coffin said, “but it's possible, given what we know.”

“The wife's got motive,” Pilchard said.

“Have you talked to her?” Coffin said.

“Tried to take her statement an hour ago,” Pilchard said. “Couldn't get much out of her.”

“She was crying a lot,” said the younger detective.

“Could have been play-acting,” Pilchard said. “Putting on a big blubber-fest.”

“Maybe,” Coffin said.

The UPS driver climbed back into his truck and turned onto Commercial Street. Mancini followed him. The line of traffic was dense and moving very slowly.

“So tell me something, Detective,” Pilchard said after a few
moments of silence. “How'd a stud homicide guy like you get stuck here in Outer Queeristan?”

“I grew up here. I've still got family in the area.”

“The detective's mother is in the local nursing home,” Mancini said.

“You do your homework,” Coffin said.

“I try.”

“Okay,” Pilchard said. “Grew up here. So you moved to Baltimore and became a cop? How come? Why not be a fisherman, or sell cheap crap to tourists like everybody else?”

“I never liked boats,” Coffin said, the thought of them making him feel slightly queasy. “My ex-wife got accepted into Johns Hopkins, pre med—so off we went.”

“But why a cop? Why not a cabdriver or an accountant or a doorman?”

“My uncle was a cop. It seemed like an interesting job.”

“It was,” Mancini said. “The way he did it.”

Pilchard scowled. “So you ace the academy in Baltimore, get kicked up to homicide, then come back to this godforsaken freak show to do what—write speeding tickets? Because of your sick mother? Talk about dropping a bomb on your career.”

“Maybe he missed the local flavor,” Mancini said, as five heavy-set men in jean shorts, flannel shirts with cutoff sleeves, and work boots ambled across the street in front of them.

“Family comes first,” Coffin said. “A good Republican like you should appreciate that.”

“Hey now,” said Pilchard.

“A word to the wise, Coffin,” Mancini said, blue sunglasses in the rearview mirror. “Just in case your curiosity threatens to get the best of you. We're not in Baltimore, and this is not your investigation. Hear what I'm saying?”

“You're the boss,” Coffin said.

“If it was just some local yokel, I wouldn't mind,” Mancini said, “but this one's big. You know how it is.”

“Someday, the White House,” Coffin said.

“Governor first,” Mancini said. “After that, who knows?”

There was another long silence. Mancini navigated slowly down Commercial Street. Tourists packed the narrow sidewalks; drag queens strolled past, statuesque in platform heels and enormous beehive wigs, handing out flyers for that night's show at the Crown. Three muscular men on Rollerblades swooshed in and out of traffic, dressed only in rainbow-striped thongs, tanned bodies glistening.

“You're from here, right?” Pilchard said.

“Right.”

“So what's up with all the homos? What is it about this place?”

Coffin shrugged. “Turns out, gay people like going to the beach.”

“Lots of places have nice beaches,” Pilchard said.

“Two things,” Mancini said. “Artists and sailors. P'town's been a hangout for artists since the early 1900s. Wife-swappers, alcoholics, and drug addicts, mostly.” He made quote marks with his fingers. “‘Free thinkers.' Where artists go, homosexuals follow—like fleas on a dog. It never fails.”

What a bunch of dicks,
Coffin thought. The air-conditioning was giving him a headache.

Treadway, the young detective with the long eyelashes, gazed out at the glittering water as the Lexus rolled past MacMillan Wharf. “I don't see any sailors,” he said.

Mancini smirked. “You're looking at one of the best natural harbors in the northeastern U.S. Most of the North Atlantic fleet was parked here in both world wars. Anyplace there's a lot of sailors, you get homosexual men looking for a little rough trade.”

Pilchard scowled. “I got my own theory,” he said. “I think it's got something to do with obelisks.”

“Obelisks?” Coffin said.

“Yeah, obelisks. Stone towers. Everywhere you got a lot of homos, you got a big-ass obelisk. P'town's got the Pilgrim Monument. San Francisco's got the Coit Tower. Lots of queers in D.C.—most of 'em living a mile or two from the Washington Monument. New York's full of big tall towers. Paris has the Eiffel Tower. London's got the whatsis monument—Lord Nelson or whatever. It's like wherever you put up a giant stone schlong, homos flock to it.”

“For Christ's sake,” Coffin said, his head throbbing.

“The Eiffel Tower's metal,” Treadway said.

“Whatever,” said Pilchard. “You get my point.”

Traffic was stalled at a particularly narrow place along Commercial Street, a block from the post office. The driver of a battered van had stopped to chat with a pedestrian—a very old woman wearing a broad-brimmed hat from which pink and purple Christmas ornaments dangled. The line of cars waited patiently.

“This fucking town,” Mancini said, lips pressed into a tight line. “How the fuck does anybody ever get anything done?”

“They don't,” Coffin said. “That's the whole idea.”

 

It was one o'clock, and Jamie's advanced class had just ended. Soothing sitar music drifted from the wall-mounted speakers. The students were rolling up their purple yoga mats, putting on their shoes, filing out in twos and threes—almost all women, dressed in their bright spandex crop tops and stretch yoga pants, hair pulled back in ponytails. Several stopped to thank Jamie on their way out. The aerobics studio was hot, and Jamie had worked hard, putting them through their sun salutations, abdominals, and inversions. Her tank top was drenched with sweat.

She turned to leave, but a last, solitary student was blocking the door. It was Duffy Plotz, the town's recycling engineer—one of
only two men in her advanced class. He was tall and lean, with big hands and long, spidery fingers. His head seemed slightly too small for his body, floating above his shoulders on the long stalk of his neck. Standing there in the doorway, he looked to Jamie like a big, awkward bird.

“Can I help you, Duffy?” Jamie said, her heart sinking a little. Plotz had asked her out—and been rejected—four times in the last three months.
More than three and you're a stalker,
she thought.

“Well, I was wondering,” Plotz said, licking his lips and looking down, “if maybe you'd like to meet for lunch sometime this week. No big deal—just grab a sandwich or something.”

“Duffy,” Jamie said, crossing her arms. “What did I say the last four times you asked me out?”

“You're in a relationship and you don't date your students,” Plotz said. “But this isn't a
date.
It's just lunch. Friends having lunch.”

Jamie sighed. She felt a little sorry for Plotz. It had to be lonely, being a single, straight man in Provincetown—especially if you were socially awkward. “I don't think it's a good idea, Duffy,” she said. “I'm sorry, but I just don't.”