the harder voice of a cop. “What’s happened, Chris?
“It’s pretty weird.”
“Weird?” he said, savoring the word as though it were an unexpected
taste.
“I’d really rather not talk about it on the phone. If I come over to
the station, can You meet me in the parking lot?”
I couldn’t expect the police to switch off all their office lights and
take my statement by the glow of candles.
Manuel said, “We’re talking something criminal?”
“Deeply. And weird.”
“Chief Stevenson’s been working late today. He’s still here but not
for much longer You think maybe I should ask him to wait’,” “Yeah,” I
said. “Yeah, Stevenson should hear this.”
“Can You be here in ten minutes?”
“See You then.”
I racked the telephone handset, snatched my cap off the light cage,
turned to the street, and shielded my eyes with one hand as two more
cars drove past. One was a late-model Saturn. The other was a Chevy
pickup.
No white van. No hearse. No black Hummer.
I didn’t actually fear that the search for me was still on. By now the
hitchhiker would be charring in the furnace. With the evidence reduced
to ashes, no obvious proof existed to support my bizarre story. Sandy
Kirk, the orderlies, and all the nameless others would feel safe.
Indeed, any attempt to kill or abduct me would risk witnesses to that
crime, who would then have to be dealt with, increasing the likelihood
of still more witnesses. These mysterious conspirators were best
served now by discretion rather than aggression-especially when their
sole accuser was the town freak, who came out of his heavily curtained
house only between dusk and dawn, who feared the sun, who lived by the
grace of cloaks and veils and hoods and masks of lotion, who crawled
even the night town under a carapace of cloth and chemicals.
Considering the outrageous nature of my accusations, few would find my
story credible, but I was sure that Manuel would know I was telling the
truth. I hoped the chief would believe me, too.
I stepped away from the telephone outside the post office and headed
for the police station. It was only a couple of blocks away.
As I hurried through the night, I rehearsed what I would tell Manuel
and his boss, Lewis Stevenson, who was a formidable figure for whom I
wanted to be well prepared. Tall, broad-shouldered, athletic,
Stevenson had a face noble enough to be stamped in profile on ancient
Roman coins.
Sometimes he seemed to be but an actor playing the role of dedicated
police chief, although if it was a performance, then it was of award
caliber. At fifty-two, he gave the impression-without appearing to
try-that he was far wiser than his years, easily commanding respect and
trust. There was something of the psychologist and something of the
priest in him-qualities everyone in his position needed but few
possessed. He was that rare person who enjoyed having power but did
not abuse it, who exercised authority with good judgment and
compassion, and he’d been chief of police for fourteen years without a
hint of scandal, ineptitude, or inefficiency in his department.
Thus I came through lampless alleys lit by a moon riding higher in the
sky than it had been earlier, came past fences and footpaths, past
gardens and garbage cans, came mentally murmuring the words with which
I hoped to tell a convincing story, came in two minutes instead of the
ten that Manuel had suggested, came to the parking lot behind the
municipal building and saw Chief Stevenson in a conspiratorial moment
that stripped away all the fine qualities I’d projected onto him.
Revealed now was a man who, regardless of his noble face, did not
deserve to be honored by coins or by monuments or even by having his
photograph hung in the station house next to those of the mayor, the
governor, and the President of the United States.
Stevenson stood at the far end of the municipal building, near the back
entrance to the police station, in a cascade of bluish light from a
hooded security lamp above the door. The man with whom he conferred
stood a few feet away, only half revealed in blue shadows.