Prayer for the Dead

Chapter 2

Seventy-five feet in the air over Route 87, clinging to a rock with all the dubious tenacity of a cookie magnet to a refrigerator door, Becker came to the conclusion that he must have been crazy. Would a sane man have decided to take up rock climbing at his age? Would a sane man have taken up rock climbing, period?

“There’s a little depression just above your right hand. Not more than eighteen inches.” The voice came from below, which meant it was Alan Something, the kid with the stringy hair. Alan could look at a bare rockface from the ground and see every handhold and piton strike all the way to the top, then leap at the rock as if it weren’t going up straight as a plumb line, and scamper up it with the agility and contempt of a kid vaulting over the neighbor’s fence. Becker didn’t care for Alan very much; he was the expert who had convinced Becker to take the lessons.

“Just eighteen inches. But if you feel you can’t, you don’t have to.” That voice was Cindi’s, the girl who had preceded Becker to the top in what seemed like a minute and a half, finding the holds, wedging the pitons into the cracks so Becker could secure his rope and have a “safe” trip up. Her hair was as stringy as Alan’s, but on her it looked better. “No one will think any the worse of you if you don’t want to try,” she said.

“Except me,” said Becker. His words were muffled by the rock against which his face was pressed as if he could somehow cling to it with lips and cheek.

“Just reach up with your right hand,” said Alan from below. He was having a hard time concealing his impatience. Becker had been frozen in position three-quarters of the way up the one-hundred-foot palisade for almost a minute. To Becker it seemed the better part of a day. His left hand was extended to the side and down, gripping with only the fingertips an irregularity in the rock that was slanted toward the ground. His left klettershoe was firmly planted-or as firmly as anything was ever planted in a sport that sought insecurity as its challenge-but only his right toe had the slightest purchase on a nub of stone. If he reached for the next hold with his right hand, he would have to release his left foot, which was the only thing keeping him up in the air. The other two grips had as much purchase on the rock as tail flaps on a jetliner. They might steer him a bit but they certainly wouldn’t hold him up.

“Your muscles will cramp if you don’t move,” called Alan.

“He’s right,” said Cindi in a softer tone. She was nearly as good in her way as Alan was in his, but with none of his arrogance. Becker liked her, but didn’t want her to see him in this position. The muscles in his left arm and right leg had been dancing for the past several seconds already. He either had to move or be kicked off the rockface by a muscle spasm. The question was, move where? Upward and onward to glory, or the ignominious climb back to the base. “What did you say?”

Cindi was on her stomach on top of the rock, leaning out as far as she could to watch Becker. If Becker rolled his eyes upward, he could just make out the bright red of her helmet. Crash helmet. If Becker kept his eyes strained upward long enough to make out her features, he got dizzy. It seemed a poor choice of pastimes for a man with a tendency to vertigo, which confirmed Becker in his suspicion that he was crazy.

“I can’t hear you,” said Cindi.

“Golf I said golf,” said Becker, turning his lips from the rock so he could be heard. “I could have taken up golf.”

His right leg began to jerk involuntarily.

“What is he doing?” Alan demanded.

“He’s joking!” Cindi called.

“Choking? I know that.”

Cindi lowered her voice so Alan could not hear.

“Do you want me to come down and get you? There’s no disgrace in it. It happens all the time in the beginning.”

“Or tennis,” Becker said. “I actually like tennis.” Tilting his head a fraction more, he could see what Alan was referring to as a handhold. With luck, Becker could get three fingertips on it. That would give him three fingertips and the toe of his spasming right leg to support his weight-to lift his weight- until he found something for his left side. Not only crazy but a danger to himself.

“I’m coming down for you,” said Cindi.

Becker pushed off with his left leg and reached for the handhold. He caught it with the last three fingers of his hand as he straightened his right leg. The edge of rock sliced into his fingers as his body kept swinging to the right, pivoting around his right toe. His hip struck the rockface, his fingers leaped off the grip, and he fell headfirst toward the highway.

The nylon rope secured to Cindi’s piton with a carabiner caught him after a fall of six feet, and he swung into the rock like a speeding pendulum. Becker took the blow with his head and shoulders, rebounded, then bounced in a second time with his helmet. Stunned, he hung upside down for a while before slowly righting himself He dangled in space, the climbing harness digging into his thighs and buttocks. By the time his head cleared, Cindi was at his side and Alan was halfway up the rock.

“Are you all right?” Cindi asked. Becker tried to smile; he was not yet ready to speak. His back was to the rockface now and he saw the police car pull to a stop.

“How is he?” Alan called from below, climbing. “All right, I think.”

Alan was already analyzing the mishap and gave Becker the benefit of his thoughts as he moved upward.

“The problem was you’re not ready for that kind of move yet. You shouldn’t have tried it. That was an advanced intermediate move. You’re not that good, Becker.”

The cop got out of his car and leaned against it, looking up.

“You told him he could do it,” said Cindi.

“I just told him where the handhold was. He’s got to be the judge of whether or not he can do it.”

Alan was just below them now. It seemed to Becker that the young man had made the trip up in three bounds.

Cindi was looking into Becker’s eyes, swinging out from the rockface on the end of the rope she had secured atop the palisade.

“How do you feel now?”

“Stupid.”

“That’s a good sign,” she said.

“You took the wrong route,” said Alan. “That’s where you went wrong.”

“Where I went wrong was getting out of the car,” said Becker.

“You’re obviously all right,” said Cindi.

“The route to the left is much easier. You should have gone that way.”

“I went that way last week,” said Becker. “I thought I’d try something harder.”

“You got the stones for it,” said Alan with a touch of admiration. “I don’t know if you’ve got the aptitude, but you’ve definitely got the stones.”

“You don’t need stones for it,” said Cindi.

The cop lifted his hand and waggled his fingers at Becker.

“Looking good,” said the cop.

Becker put a hand over his crotch and tugged.

“And stylish, too,” the cop said.

“Friend of yours?” asked Cindi. She pulled gently on Becker’s arm and he turned, weightless, to face the rock.

“This has been cleared with the police,” Alan called down. “We got permission already. We don’t need any hassle.”

“Who does?” said the cop. “I’m just watching. This is a spectator sport, isn’t it? I’ve never seen anything quite as graceful as Becker there. I saw a pig on ice once, but that’s as close as it comes.”

“You want to try it?” Alan called heatedly.

The cop chuckled. “Just as soon as you put in a staircase.”

“I don’t like cops,” Alan said in a voice markedly softer.

“Neither do I,” said Becker. “That’s why I resigned.”

Cindi had placed Becker’s hands and feet on secure holds on the rock.

“The next hold is eight inches down with your right hand. I can put your hand there if you like. We’ll just take it one step at a time, and I’ll be right here with you.”

“You’re sure this is the macho thing to do?” Becker said. “Oh, please.”

“Are you sure a real man wouldn’t go right back up and try it again?”

“A real man would be home making soup and humping his woman,” said Cindi. “He wouldn’t have to be out here demonstrating his stones.”

Becker laughed. “I’ve got a new crockpot at home. Want to come over and check it out?”

“You must have hit your head harder than I realized,” said Cindi. “What’s it going to be? Down or dangle here and flirt?”

“Down, please,” said Becker,

“They look like spiders,” Tee said. He was officially Thomas Terence Terhune, but he had long since reduced it all to an initial.

They were sitting in the police car, watching Alan and Cindi clamber up and down the rock, retrieving their ropes and equipment.

“You, on the other hand, looked like a window washer.”

“Thank you.”

“What possessed you? There are so many nicer ways to kill yourself. That girl would probably do you in in about an hour in bed, for instance. Less, in the back of a car.”

“Cindi’s a nice girl,” said Becker.

“So? Nice girls don’t fuck? Is this a new thing? As I understand it, nice girls fuck nicely. Look at her arms.”

Cindi was splayed across the rock as if she had been hurled there. The spandex of her climbing outfit seemed to accentuate her musculature rather than hide it.

“Look at any of her,” Tee continued. “If she can do that on a mountain, imagine what she can do in bed. I like a bit of muscle on a girl, don’t you? I remember when they first came out. I was turned off by the biceps, the Navratilova look, you know? But now, I like it. Hell, I like anything. Muscle, fat, body hair, you name it.”

“You getting along all right with your wife, are you. Tee?”

“We get along fine. I don’t bother her and she doesn’t bother me. This kid, Cindi, she’s attached to Spiderman there?”

“Alan’s in love with himself, as far as I can figure out.”

“He shows rotten taste, doesn’t he? How about some coffee.”

“You had enough rockface eroticism. Tee?”

The police car was already moving. Tee swung into a sharp U-turn and headed back toward Clamden.

“What do you think she’d do if I put a move on her?”

“Cindi?”

“Yeah, who else we talking about?”

“Probably call a cop.”

“She can call me anything she wants,” said Tee.

“How about correspondent?”

“You’ve got a cold streak, you know that, Becker? You’re just not a fun-lover. No wonder people try to kill you.”

“So finally we’re getting down to business,” said Becker.

Tee adjusted his holster to ride on the front of his thigh before sliding into the booth. Once in, he spent several seconds adjusting the flashlight, radio, and other equipment on his webbed belt until he was comfortable.

“Shit was designed for Robocop,” he said.

“There’s no way a human can sit down without feeling like an asshole with all this crap hanging down and sticking you in the kidneys. Makes me feel like a telephone lineman.”

“It’s very becoming, though,” said Becker. “It gives you that heterosexual look.”

“You don’t think I need to add a nightstick? Kind of as an image enhancer?… Janie?”

The waitress passed them by without looking back.

“I always wondered what would happen to a cop if he fell into the ocean with all that hardware on. The hobnail boots alone would pull you down.”

“I got my belt attached with Velcro,” said Tee. “In case I have to punish a suspect in her bedroom, rrrrip, and I’m ready.”

“You get a lot of that, do you. Tee? Consoling widows, comforting victims, that sort of thing?”

“Not yet, but I’ve only been a cop for fifteen years. How about yourself? Were you ever called upon-in the course of your duties-to stuff it to one of those ragheads or whoever you were chasing?… Janie?”

The waitress passed them again.

“I take it she knows you,” said Becker.

“She wants me.”

“You’re a strange sort of chief of police. Tee.”

“Why?”

“Your uniform fits, for one thing. There were no doughnuts in your cruiser, for another. I checked. A kind of suspicious trail of ants leading to the glove compartment, but no doughnuts.”

“So let me get this straight,” said Tee. He shifted his weight, tugging again at the belt. “You hang upside down on a rope, then swing into a rock with your head? This doesn’t hurt?”

“Hurt? Why should it hurt? It’s no worse than slamming your fingers in the car door… Miss?”

The waitress stopped abruptly in her passage.

“Two coffees,” said Becker.

“Two coffees,” said the waitress before moving on.

“I get it,” said Tee. “Her real name is Miss, not Janie.”

Tee grew quiet and Becker realized the waiting period was over. Real questions would be next, or requests. Becker did not look forward to either since they usually amounted to the same thing. Whatever Tee wanted, it would make demands upon Becker and demands were exactly what he had spent the last six months avoiding.

The two men sat in a strained silence until the coffee came and Janie had retired to the other side of the room.

“Tell me again exactly what it is you do?” Tee asked, trying to sound casual as he lifted the coffee cup to his lips.

“Again? I don’t believe I ever did tell you exactly, did I?”

“Not while you were doing it. Now that you’ve stopped, why don’t you tell me?”

“Is this an official question?”

“Come on, Becker. Don’t give me a hernia over this. You’re not doing it anymore, I’m not asking for any secrets. Just give me the outline.”

“You know the outline.”

“I asked around some, yeah.”

“Who would that be?”

“Guy named Hatcher, at FBI. Says he knows you.”

“Hatcher is an anal retentive.”

“I know that-whatever that means. He’s a little prissy, too, but he knows things-or can find them out.”

Becker drank and looked at Tee over the rim of his cup. “And?”

“Is this a guessing game? You going to make me tell you what I know and then you tell me if it’s right?”

“It’s your game, Tee. But I am curious to know what Hatcher found out.”

“You worked for the government, all over the place. At one time or another since leaving the FBI you’ve been listed on the payroll of at least half a dozen agencies, including the Defense Department and the National Security Council staff. This within five years. Right?”

“Right. So?”

“So in each of these capacities you were authorized to carry a weapon, which means, to me anyway, that you were probably performing essentially the same job for each of them. And doing it well since you weren’t dismissed from any of the agencies and obviously had no trouble finding a new place-in fact your GS rating went up each time you moved. You were making some pretty fair change at the end.”

“You working for the IRS, Tee?”

“To me, the pattern looks like you were a trouble-shooter.”

“Very good. Tee. No wonder you’re a cop.”

“Actually, I’m a cop because of you. Or partly because of you. I’m serious about this. When you joined up with the FBI, that made you a hero to some of us. Not only a hero, but glamorous, too. It was an inspiration-don’t grin, I’m serious about this-”

“This isn’t a grin.”

“-a kid from Clamden out doing battle with the bad guys, chasing Commies, whatever it was then. It made an impression.”

“I joined the FBI because I didn’t want to go to Vietnam.”

“Yeah, well, that wasn’t altogether stupid, either.”

“I didn’t want to kill anybody and I didn’t want anybody to kill me.”

“This was reasonable. Anyway, my point is, you were a factor in my applying for the FBI myself a couple years later. Did you know I applied?”

“No.”

“I didn’t pass the test.”

“Many are called but few are chosen. You’re better off.”

“Yeah, well, I made my peace with it a long time ago. The feds don’t get to wear these nifty belts, for one thing. My point is… I forgot my point.”

“You want me to do something.”

“Did I get to that part already?”

“I couldn’t stand the suspense.”

“I understand you’re retired. You put in the twenty, plus you got a disability of some kind. That much Hatcher could find out. There’s a whole lot of other stuff he couldn’t find out. Which is surprising since that’s his job and he’s authorized to do it. Find out stuff. It seems your personnel file is full of No Access signs. Even for someone with Hatcher’s clearance.”

“Hatcher is not very bright.”

“Well, neither am I, John. That’s probably why Hatcher and I get along so well… Look, I don’t know what kind of work you did and obviously you don’t want to tell me. I assume it’s either something very hush-hush or it’s something messy. Either way, it doesn’t matter. You obviously know things. You got access, you know how to do things… John, I need your help.”

Becker placed a napkin under his cup to soak up the coffee that was pooling there.

“I want you to help me find somebody.”

“A missing person?”

“Sort of, yeah. Yeah, a missing person.”

“Somebody from here?”

“Yeah.”

“Tee, you’re a cop. You’re the chief of police.”

“I’m a Clamden cop, John. I’m not even a Hartford cop. How big was Clamden when you left-what’s that, twenty-two years ago? Maybe twenty-seven thousand, twenty-eight? We’re now thirty-five thousand. That’s how much things have changed in two decades. I know how to work this town. I’m good at it, but that’s all I know.”

“Who’s missing?”

“My nephew. My wife’s nephew to be precise. Mick Seeger.”

“Little Mick?”

“Not so little anymore. Mick’s twenty-eight.”

“Christ, how old are we?”

“Whatever it is, I’m still two years younger than you.”

“The whole world is two years younger than I am. How long’s he been missing?”

“He’s been gone for a week.”

“That’s not missing; that’s just absent.”

“Well, I’d agree except he’s not the only one. Two months ago Timmy Heegan disappeared. Timmy’s twenty-six. Six months before that, Larry Sheehan, age thirty-two.”

“People do this sometimes…”

“I know people do this, John. But none of these guys was young enough to run away, they weren’t thumbing their nose at mom and pop, they all had jobs, Mick has a baby.”

“Debts, marital problems…”

“John, I admitted I’m not a supercop, but give me some credit. In Clamden over the past four years, six men have disappeared. Statistically curious, but not phenomenal, I agree. But in Branford, six miles from here, five men in the last three years. In Guileford, eight miles away, three in the last eighteen months. In Essex, one, three months ago. That’s fifteen men in four years within a radius of twelve miles. None of them had been recently fired, divorced, involved in any great scandal or was in any particularly heavy debt. I’m not saying they hadn’t had fights with their women, those that had women, and I’m not saying they were all happy in their work, but fifteen in four years from an area with a total population of just over a hundred thousand-Hatcher tells me that’s statistically significant.”

“Hatcher would know. This is why you were palling around with him?”

“He doesn’t like you, either.”

“But the Bureau can’t help you, right? No federal crime involved, no apparent crime of any kind. Have you tried claiming this is a civil rights case? We’ve shoehorned a lot of things in that way.”

“First of all, I’ve got no reason to contend anybody’s been deprived of anything, but more to the point, all these men were white

… John, one thing Hatcher said-he said it was just rumor, but he seemed to believe it-he said you were assigned to a case where you heard some raghead was sent over here to assassinate the President. He said you had practically nothing to work on but somehow you found this character in New York and took care of it.”

“Took care of it?”

“Well… killed the guy… That’s what Hatcher said.”

“Interesting.”

“I don’t know that he said killed. That was the implication. One guy. You had squat for information and you found this one guy in New York City. How’d you do that, John? Was the guy painted green or something?”

“Hatcher put this forth as rumor, is that it?”

“He was impressed. It’s true, John. He didn’t understand how you did it. He said you worked with a Ouija board or a crystal ball or something.”

“Or something. What else did Hatcher tell you?”

“Nothing. But I did get the impression that he thought you were damned good at what you do-and that he was scared shitless of you.”

“I’ll tell you about Hatcher some day.”

“Will you help me, John?”

“Have you noticed how you call me ‘Becker’ when you’re ragging me, and it’s ‘John’ when you want something?”

“Do I do that?”

“If those are the rules, I prefer ‘Becker.’”

“Just take a look at it, that’s all I’m asking. I’ll get you the sheets. I’ll bring them to your house; you don’t even have to come to the station. Just look at the sheets; maybe you’ll see a pattern, something I can start with.”

“Your computer will show you patterns.”

“My computer? This is Clamden. My computer shows payroll and traffic citations.”

“Tee, I’m retired. I retired for two reasons. One, I didn’t want to do it anymore. I didn’t want to do it full-time nationally, I didn’t want to do it part-time locally. I didn’t want to do it for pay and I don’t want to do it for a favor. Two, I retired for my health.”

“I didn’t know you were sick.”

“I’m sick of doing it. It’s not good for my health.”

“You got a condition, John?”

“Well, okay, if that’s your understanding of the term ‘health,’ then, yeah, I’ve got a condition. I didn’t quit and come back to my hometown just so I could start aggravating my condition.”

“Tell you what, Becker. Why don’t you not do it.”

“You think?”

“ ’Cause I wouldn’t want you to aggravate your condition. Putting in an hour of your time? That would be asking too much of a man in your delicate condition, I can see that. So why don’t you just say no and we’ll both feel a whole lot better about the whole thing. I’ll just tell Mick’s wife you’re unable to assist us in this matter due to failing health.”

“Thanks for the coffee. Tee.” Becker slid out of the booth.

“The rock climbing is for therapy, then, is that it?”

“As a matter of fact, it is… I just realized you don’t pay for the coffee anyway, do you?”

“As a matter of fact, I do. Wouldn’t want anyone to think Janie was trying to exercise undue influence.”

“As I said, you’re a strange chief of police. Tee.”