Nosh was quiet when Parker arrived, the bar settling comfortably into the lull between dinner and the arrival of the night owls who would drift in after music shows or late shifts in restaurants. He found a table with sufficient light by which to read, and flipped through the latest edition of The Portland Phoenix. Al Diamon, one of the state’s leading political commentators, and certainly the crankiest, was getting worked up over the quality of the prospective candidates for governor. Whatever their failings, at least the present incumbent—voted “America’s Craziest” by Politico magazine back in 2014, before he’d even begun his second term, one that would include a claim that out-of-state drug dealers were coming to Maine to sell heroin and “impregnate white girls”; challenging a Democratic lawmaker to a duel; and allegedly cutting in line to deprive a sexual assault victim of a therapy dog, which he subsequently named Veto—would have to recede into political anonymity, and Mainers could stop blaming one another for electing him. Except, of course, for the ones who had voted for him, although it was hard to figure out who they might be, seeing as how they now tended to keep quiet about what they’d done, probably out of a sense of embarrassment.
As for Al Diamon, Parker thought that it must take a lot of energy to be so exercised all the time, even if Diamon managed to be amused—and amusing—along with it. Like the Duc de Saint-Simon in the court of the Sun King, it was probably not a question of whether Al Diamon was annoyed on any given day, but simply with whom Al Diamon happened to be annoyed.
Parker flicked through the listings for upcoming performances at the various music venues around town before deciding he was too old for most of them because he didn’t recognize any of the acts. He’d long ago figured that you knew you were aging when you couldn’t hum any tune on the Billboard Hot 100. A woman seated alone at the bar smiled at him, and he smiled back before returning to the Phoenix. Perhaps that was another sign you were getting old: when you’d rather read the paper than take the time to talk to a strange woman in a bar. But he was also waiting for Louis, whose interest in conversing with strangers of either sex was negligible.
As if to silence any further debate on the matter, the man himself appeared. The woman smiled at Louis, too, making Parker feel a little less special. Louis ordered a dirty martini. Parker had barely touched his wine.
“Angel?” Parker asked, once Louis was settled.
“Sleeping a lot. The infection set him back some, but the doctors say he’s a whole lot stronger than he looks.”
“We could have told them that.”
“But good to have a professional opinion.”
They ordered burgers, and fries to share. Parker felt his arteries hardening pleasantly in anticipation.
“Does that mean you’re worrying less about him?” Parker asked.
“No. I’m just worrying in a different way.”
“Ah. How long are you planning to stay up here?”
“A couple of days. Just, you know. . .”
Parker let it go. They spoke of other things, including Louis’s growing affection for this coastal city.
“It’s the sea,” said Louis. “Once you get used to looking out on it from your window, you start to miss it when you can’t.”
Parker understood. It was why, no matter how often he considered selling the Scarborough house and moving to Portland itself, he always ended up remaining where he was, even after the sanctity of his home, and his own sense of security, had been undermined by the attempt on his life. It was the marshes, and the tidal channels running through them, and the smell of salt on the air. It was the light on the water, and the distant sound of the sea, like a whispering at the edge of the world.
And it was the knowledge that he and his dead daughter were connected by water. He had sat with her by a lake that fed into a sea, caught between living and dying. He had held her hand, and watched with her as a car pulled up on the road above, the shades of Parker’s departed mother and father within, inviting him to go with them, to take the Long Ride.
But he did not join them. Instead he returned—to pain, memories, the living. But still the sea called to him, just as it called to Jennifer. He remembered a child’s nursery rhyme, one he would read to Jennifer when she was barely more than a baby, as he knelt by her bedside and lulled her to sleep: “If all the seas were one sea, what a great sea that would be . . .” His sea and Jennifer’s were one, although each viewed it from a different shore. But when the time came they would enter it together, and all pain would cease.
The food arrived. The woman at the bar was still smiling, but now only to herself. Louis ordered a second martini while Parker shared with him the events of recent days, choosing to omit only what he had seen as he tried to follow Smith One from the Great Lost Bear. It was not that he feared Louis might doubt him—Louis, by now, had few illusions about the nature of Parker’s world—but because it was a component he himself did not yet understand.
“Any particular reason to believe the two Smiths might be linked to the discovery of the body in the woods?” asked Louis.
“I can’t think of any other cause for circling me. I have nothing more interesting on the books right now, unless the Smiths are fans of insurance fraud.”
“You’re interesting.”
“You say the sweetest things, but you’re not my type.”
“You know, if I could take back those last two words . . .”
“I’ll allow—even encourage—you to rephrase.”
“You draw attention. Your history draws attention.”
“So they came just to see the lion at the circus?”
“Well, when you put it like that, maybe not.” Louis chewed a bacon-dusted French fry. “Damn, these fries are good. They’ll kill you, but they’re good.”
A man joined the woman at the bar. He kissed her on the lips before taking the stool beside her.
“She smiled at me as I came in,” said Louis.
“She also smiled at me.”
“Which is disappointing. Maybe she’s just real welcoming.”
“It’s a welcoming environment.”
“Not that welcoming,” said Louis. “Back to the spectators from the Bear.”
“Gone to ground.”
“Permanently?”
“I didn’t get that feeling.”
“Concerned?”
“Marginally.”
“And no hits on Smith One?”
“None. I asked Dave Evans, but Smith One kept his face hidden from the Bear’s cameras. I think he knew where they were.”
The server arrived to clear their table. Parker ordered coffee.
“I still don’t get coffee with wine,” said Louis.
“In a world of hurt, you choose odd battles to fight.”
“I’m not fighting, I’m just saying. When do you leave for Indiana?”
“Tomorrow afternoon.”
“You think this Leila Patton will still be around when you get there?”
“If she’s a regular person,” said Parker. “Regular people find it hard to run at short notice. And Portland probably seems a long way from Cadillac. She might be worried about more calls, but not about me turning up on her doorstep.”
“You want some company? I’ve never been to Indiana.”
“I thought you’d been most places.”
“Most places, except Indiana.”
“Funny, I’ve been hearing that a lot.”
Parker’s coffee came. He chose to ignore the pained expression on Louis’s face.
“Under ordinary circumstances,” Parker continued, “I’d accept the offer, but instead I have a favor to ask. Moxie Castin is trying to get the man who buried Karis to come in, and if anyone can persuade him to show, it’s Moxie. But if someone is looking for Karis’s child, for whatever reason, this guy and the boy could be at risk.”
“You can let Moxie know I’m around if he needs me.”
“Thank you.”
“What about the country’s northernmost Confederate?”
“Billy? According to Moxie, he’s got himself new wheels.”
“Same taste in decoration?”
“Not yet.”
“Nice to think previous events might represent a positive learning experience for him.”
“Nice, but unlikely.”
Louis picked up the check. Parker thanked him.
“Don’t thank me, thank Moxie. I’m going to bill him for my expenses.”
“Moxie,” said Parker, “is going to be so pleased to see you.”