The Writer (29 page)

“And you want to do the same
thing?”

“Why not? I’ll just sit
where you sat, draw on that same psychic energy.”

“Wow,” she said carefully.
“You know what? I haven’t noticed any energy like that in my
apartment. Too small, I guess. Sorry, but I think you’ve come to
the wrong place. Perhaps you could try somewhere else?”

“But you did it, my dear
young Sophie. You described his life without knowing him. You did
that. Right? That’s what you told me.”

“Except for one thing. I
didn’t write any of it on my computer.”

“What’s that?” Dan asked,
not seeing that one coming.

“I used a typewriter. My
grandmother’s old one, up in Gendry.”

“You didn’t write
here?”

“Guess there’s more psychic
energy up there, huh?”

“Her typewriter is in her
house?”

“In Gendry.”

“Like in the story. I should
have known that.”

“Is this actual police
business?”

Dan knew that he needed to
leave. Her apartment wasn’t his only option. “You need to be
careful with your attitude,” he warned her as he left, taking care
that he didn’t spill anything from the cardboard box.

“My ...
attitude?”

“You’re very close to
hindering a police murder investigation.”

She watched him leave
without having any idea what to think of the visit. One thing she
was certain of, it was not any kind of official
investigation.

The box was lighter by
exactly one third when he arrived at Max’s door. Dan needed to take
a second before he knocked, feeling the pain in his chest get
stronger. In the car the pain had come and gone, and it was worse
whenever he was not eating. If he had stopped to think about it he
would have seen that his frustration was not so much in feeling the
pain, but that the pain was reminding him that he was not
eating.

The door opened before he
had a chance to knock. Max had seen him coming and he looked at him
like he was a curiosity. He was prepared to answer his questions,
and let him do whatever he wanted, if it would help to get him out
of his life.

“Detective, this is a
surprise,” Max said in a way that only he knew it was sarcasm. “Is
there something else I can help you with?”

“I need to use your
computer,” Dan said quickly, feeling out of breath.

“Why would you—“

“That’s where you do your
writing, isn’t it?” Dan interrupted, walking past him. “You don’t
go anywhere else, like your grandmother’s place, do you? No? You do
it here, do you? Then I will need to use it.”

“What does where I do my
writing have to do with anything?”

“Longbottom was hit by a
speeding driver, right? Who speeds in that town? Better question
is: who is
allowed
to speed in that town?”

“I have no idea,” Max said,
completely lost.

“Yeah, I know you don’t. But
your computer does.”

“My computer does
what?”

“Don’t you see? That’s where
the answer is.”

“The answer to
what?”

“I’ll show you,” Dan said
with a playful laugh, like an excited child. “You’re not going to
believe this. Right under your nose the whole time.”

Dan went and sat at the
computer, placing the cardboard box at his feet. He then glanced at
Max to see if he had any interest in the box, like a cornered dog
guarding a bone. He tried to find the computer’s word processor
programme, without success.

“What is it you’re doing?”
Max asked, not believing what he was seeing.

“The only thing I can,” Max
said as he grabbed another muffin from his box and then quickly
closed it. “Got any coffee? Any sort will do.” He put the muffin on
top of the number keys on the far right of the keyboard, which
annoyed Max even more.

“I suppose, yes,” said Max,
hoping no crumbs would fall between the keys. “But can you please
tell me what you’re doing?”

“You wrote your story here,
right? And it was true. You didn’t even know it, but it was all
true. Sophie, Craigfield, Longbottom; all true. And there she was
at the same time, the exact same time, writing all about you and
your wife and
Craigfield
. How amazing is that? What’s more,
I know it. When you were doing it you didn’t know it. But now I
have a chance to do it knowing what’s happening.”

“Didn’t we agree my book’s
not real?”

Dan found a simple writing
programme and with satisfaction swallowed the rest of his muffin.
“Where shall we start?”

“You will need to tell me
what’s going on,” Max said more firmly.

“Finding the murderer,” Dan
said with all seriousness. “With your nice little magic computer.
Let’s start with the speeding car, shall we?”

“I’m really not following
you.”

Dan quickly typed a few
words as he always did, using only his two index fingers. “That’s
working. Look at that.”

He typed a sentence and that
led into another one. After a minute he had a paragraph and then he
was on the next. Max read over his shoulder and stopped himself
from making corrections.

“Is writing always this
fun?” asked Dan. “Now we’ll do the impact, and describe that in
detail. It’s the details you’ve got to watch, right? Get them
wrong, they stand out like sore thumbs. But get them right, they
make the whole story.”

He wrote more and got
carried away with his description.

“The driver is drunk,” said
Dan. “And he sees he’s killed someone.”

Another paragraph followed.
Then three more. He was on a roll.

“But then he panics. Who
panics? Who speeds in Gendry? Who is
allowed
to speed there,
and so no one notices, or points fingers? Who conducted the
investigation? And then lied about it in his report? Yes, this is
coming together, just as I thought it would. You are such a help
for us, Max, you have no idea. If we had this months ago, we’d have
him in custody real easy, and Gendry will be breathing safe
tonight.”

“What are you saying?” Max
asked, looking over what he had written. It took great restraint to
not point out a couple of typos. Anything to prevent the man
staying any longer than he had to.

“The one person who could
successfully cover it up. The police in charge of the
case.”

“Are you suggesting Sheriff
Handisides was responsible? How can you be sure of
that?”

“The computer says
so.”

“No, really, how can you be
sure?”

“Max, don’t you see? What do
you think I’ve been doing? I’ve just been showing you how this
works. Your computer told me. I told you it’s right under your
nose!”

Max saw that he was serious
and he chose his next words with care. “It’s just a normal
computer. It’s getting a little old and I’ll need a new one
soon.”

Dan felt the pain in his
chest return and this time it was worse than ever.

“Are you all right?” asked
Max.

“Put together with you and
Sophie,” Dan said, ignoring both the question and the pain, “we
have a miracle machine. It’s a gold mine. We need to get this into
the office, with you and the girl. Believe me, this is big. Bigger
than anyone can know.”

“I’ll keep that in
mind.”

Dan resumed typing, fuelled
by inspiration and that he felt a little better. “So, he didn’t
mean to run the guy down, just an accident, because of his
drinking. But then he goes and hides the body, and no one questions
him. He’s the guy doing the questioning. Who questions the
questioner?”

“Who, indeed?”

When Dan finally finished
and went to leave, picking up the box and then deciding he needed
another muffin, he gave Max a warning. “Don’t touch
anything.”

“You’re leaving,
then?”

“Leave it just as I’ve
written it. It’s pure gold.”

Max raised his hands like he
would not be touching it. He watched Dan leave and then he shook
his head, wondering who he should call to report it.

“What was that all about?”
Jill asked from the kitchen, where she had decided it was safe to
hide until Dan had gone.

Max looked at her with a
bewildered smile. “I haven’t the slightest idea.” He then started
to laugh, nervously.

Jill went to the computer to
see what he had written. “What are we going to do with all that?”
she asked.

“Leave it there, I guess,”
he said.

At least until they were
sure that he wasn’t going to come back.

Andy Handisides opened the
door to see who had the gumption to speed down his main street and
then lurch to a halt in front of the station with such violence
that his building was pelted with pebbles. All that when the
morning was still dark. The first thing he thought was that his
town didn’t need another crazy speed racer.

When he saw Dan Ironwright
struggling to get out of the car he did not know if he should be
more surprised that he had come back, or how much fatter he had
become. Andy noticed that Dan grimaced as he stepped out, and
patted at his chest. The car jumped.

“Funny to see you here
again, Detective Ironwright,” Andy said with the expected slowness
of someone awake at five in the morning in Gendry. “The reason it’s
funny is ‘cause I got word from your boss a few days back that
you’re off the Longbottom case. In fact, you’re off any case at
all, isn’t that the fact? Seems this is one of those we just have
to shut the book on and put on the bottom shelf. So, what is it you
want that makes you bolt in here like this?”

“Where have you parked your
patroller?” Dan asked, fully alert after his night drive and
umpteen coffee breaks, and in no mood for small talk.

“My car? Why do you want to
know that?”

“Want to take a look at
it?”

“For what reason? You’re not
telling me you’ve come all the way up here to look at my car? Tell
me you’re not telling me that. And here I was thinking about going
about acquiring a new one, since it’s not much good for anything
anymore. Covered a lot of distance, and it caused no problems, but
when something gets old there comes a time to say goodbye.
Everything has limits.”

“You’re not hiding anything
there, are you, Handisides?”

Andy rubbed his chin, not
knowing what to make of him. “Are you here on official business or
not? Or are you just misapplying one of your days off? I can think
of better to do on my day off.”

“Where’s the
car?”

“In the back, in its parking
spot, where it always is when I’m not out on my run. Take a look if
you have to. I mean, if you really have to. Take as long as you
like, in fact, and have a nice time about it, why don’t
you.”

Twenty minutes later Andy,
who had been trying to ignore the presence of the large city
detective, could not take the suspense and had to go to the parking
area to see what Dan was up to.

“You still there,
Ironwright?” Andy called, not seeing anyone.

Dan had been lying on the
ground, picking around under the front of the car, although he
couldn’t get very far in due to his bulk. At the sound of Andy’s
voice he went to get up and took a long time about it.

“You have a dent, right
here, right in the front,” he said to Andy. “Got some paint
missing. Other than that, you’ve done good work in cleaning it. But
then, you’ve had plenty of time to clean it a couple of times,
right?”

“You say what?”

“I know what you hit,
Handisides. I know how and I know when. I know how fast you were
going and how much you drank. I know what you did after you saw
him, and I know the moment when you realised that you could get
away with it.”

“Now, wait a minute. Hold on
just a minute, why don’t you?”

“You can’t deny it. I have
all the evidence I need.
I have it in writing
.”

For the first time Andy
looked worried. “You have what in writing?”

“The murder of Longbottom.
Sure, it was accidental, but then you had to go and cover it up.
Was it because your were drunk? Was it because you like being the
guy in charge here and you didn’t want to lose your job? Or did you
just hate the thought of people knowing you let them all down by
running over one of their dwindling population? One of their own?
One of
your
own?”

Andy looked around and saw
that the only lights on were from the street lights. Certain that
no one was there, he leaned on the car and slowly took out a
cigarette and his large silver lighter. “Got it all figured out,
have you now?” he asked quietly. “This is the way they’re doing it
in the city? Place has gone further downhill than I
thought.”

“Got it in writing. All of
it.”

“Have you now? All of
it?”

“How does Craigfield Johnson
fit in to it? That’s what the writing’s not telling me. It’s there,
I can feel it. You can fill me in with the details now, to make it
easier. Either way, I’ll find out.”