Cold Service

8

HAWK WASN'T RUNNING yet. But he could walk a ways. So, in the week before Thanksgiving, we were walking with Pearl along the river in back of where I lived. Actually, Hawk and I were walking. Pearl was tearing around, looking for something to hunt or eat or sniff or bark at.

"Like you," I said. "Dark, slick, and full of energy."

"I still dark and slick," Hawk said.

It hadn't been cold enough long enough for the river to freeze, and the gray surface was ruffled with small whitecaps.

"Two out of three," I said.

We weren't passing a lot of people, but Hawk wasn't bent over anymore, and he didn't move anymore like an elderly man with bad feet.

"The blood count is creeping up," I said.

"Slow bastard," Hawk said.

Two young women ran by in luminescent tights and wool hats pulled down over their ears. They both glanced at Hawk as they passed.

"That's a good sign," I said.

"Lucky they didn't stop," Hawk said. "Best I could do is talk dirty for a minute."

Pearl had located an old french fry beside a trash barrel. She ate it proudly and came over and jumped up and gave me a kiss that smelled vaguely of fryalator.

"Tracked it down and ate it," Hawk said. "Dog's a savage."

"It's in the genes," I said.

It was midday. Traffic on both sides of the river was easy. The sun was almost above us in the southern sky. It was a pallid winter sun, and it shed little heat. But it was cheery enough.

"Quirk called me," I said. "Bohdan got it."

"Good," Hawk said.

"They were taking him from his cell down to the visiting area to see his lawyer. Two guards. They were moving some other prisoners in from the exercise yard. They passed each other. It got a little crowded for a minute."

"And somebody shanked him," Hawk said.

"In the throat," I said.

"And nobody saw nothing," Hawk said.

"All of a sudden there's lots of blood and Bohdan is down," I said. "And you're right. Nobody and nothing."

"Same lawyer come to see him 'fore he changed his story?" Hawk said.

"Quirk says yes."

"Bunch of dumb foreigners, they got some reach," Hawk said.

"They knew when the exercise was over. So they knew when the corridor would be crowded. And they had a guy there ready and able to cut Bohdan's throat."

"And they knew which guards going to be on the scene," Hawk said. "They knew they'd cooperate."

"You're not cynically suggesting," I said, "that the keepers are sometimes as corruptible as the kept?"

"Jug is its own place. Got no connection with how people live anywhere else. Everybody in the jug a prisoner. The guards just get to go home nights."

"Well," I said, "it's not like we're surprised."

"Nope."

"Leaves us four more," I said.

"If Bohdan was telling the truth."

"Instead of lying about some friends of his to get himself a deal?" I said.

"Hard to trust people these days," Hawk said.

"In which case," I said, "instead of killing him because they didn't trust him, they might have killed him because he framed them."

"Need to know," Hawk said.

"Well, we got a list," I said.

"And we'll be checking it twice," Hawk said.