see the downtown, only the narrow country road running beneath the blue sky and this police station, isolated from the minimal bustle of Choteau. It seemed out of place here among the foothills of the Lewis Range.
The police department was a meager, brick building. It was small, resembling a miniature version of a decrepit public school, only in place of yellow buses, there were police cars. We ascended the concrete steps, and Orson stopped me in front of the glass double doors.
'I’m the only one who talks in there,' he said. Then he grabbed me suddenly and pulled me into him, crushing my chest in an awkward embrace. He opened the door and I followed him inside, walking straight through the lobby, littered with cheap furniture on brown carpet. The walls inside were a darker brick, and they gave the interior the musty feel of a wine cellar.
There was a desk at the end of the room and behind it, a hallway, perpendicular to the lobby. On the brick between the two corridors, Choteau Police Department, was spelled out in bold, brass letters. A secretary was talking on the phone when Orson walked up to the desk. He snatched the phone from her hands and hung it up.
'I need to speak to a detective,' he said as she stared incredulously into his eyes.
Clearing her throat, she glanced warily behind her at the corridor. She was pretty, I thought, plain but pretty in her long, plaid dress. 'What is it regarding?' she asked.
'Are you a detective?'
'No, I’m a…'
'Then quit asking me fucking questions. Get me a detective right now.'
'Just a moment,' she said. She picked up the phone and dialed an extension. 'Roger, are you busy?… Okay… There’s a man here who wants to speak with you… I don’t know… He’s being rude… I don’t know… I’m fine.' She hung up the phone. 'He’ll be right with you,' she said. 'You can wait over there.' She spun around quickly in her swivel chair and began typing at a computer. Orson stood by the desk, tapping impatiently on the wood.
Less than a minute had passed when a tall, thin man in a dark blue suit emerged from the corridor. He stopped behind the desk and nodded to Orson and me.
'You asked for a detective?' he said, and Orson nodded. 'Come with me,' he said, and we walked past the desk down the hallway on the right. The brick walls were drab and undecorated. I followed behind Orson, watching his feet pound softly against the thin, hard carpet.
'I’m Detective Hartness,' the man said without turning around. 'Why were you rude to Jennifer?' He glanced at Orson, fire in his bleak, white face. His brown hair hung just above his eyebrows, and his ears were large and grotesque, like an old man’s.
'It doesn’t really matter,' Orson said. 'You’re about to become famous.'
If Hartness heard him, he didn’t show it. He kept walking, into a large, bright room full of desks and computers, where several men typed furiously, filling the room with a nervous, staccato pattering like raindrops hitting a hot microphone. We proceeded through the dark corridor on the other side of the workroom, and I could see the end now. There were three vending machines for coffee, soft drinks, and snacks lined up against the brick at the terminus of the corridor. But we stopped long before the end when Hartness turned suddenly and opened a plain, black door on the left wall. He held it open for us while we filed inside.
A boring little room with bare brick walls, a table stood in the center with four chairs slid underneath it. I thought it strange that a single, unshielded light bulb burned brightly overhead. We pulled out the chairs and sat down, Orson and me on one side, facing Hartness. The detective was removing his jacket when Orson broke the tense silence.
'Get a tape recorder,' he said. 'I’m only doing this once.'
Hartness hung his jacket on the back of a chair and began unbuttoning his cuffs. He was already sweating as he rolled up his shirt sleeves. 'We’ll get to that,' he said. “Why don’t…'
'Get the tape recorder or I say nothing,' Orson said, rage buried in his voice.
Hartness sighed and slid back in his chair. He got up and left the room.
'Orson…'
'Not a word, Andy.'
We sat in silence, and I drummed on the table until Orson glared at me. I wondered if there was really a dead police officer in the trunk of our car. After two minutes, the detective returned carrying a large tape recorder under his arm. He set it down on the table and plugged the long, black cord into a socket in the wall. Sitting down, he lit a cigarette and pressed a red button.
'Your name?' Hartness asked.
'Orson Thomas.'
'Well, Mr. Thomas, what do you wanna tell me?'
Orson had been leaning forward with his elbows on the table. Now he leaned back and removed his blood- stained fleece jacket. He threw it into a corner and smiled at the detective. Then he tossed the manila envelope onto the table.
'Have a look,' Orson said, his voice cold and emotionless.
The detective lifted the envelope and tore it open. Withdrawing a quarter-inch stack of photographs and newspaper clippings, he gazed down at the photographs, and his skeptical face turned immediately into shock. He laid a picture on the table and stared down at it, taking a long draw from his cigarette.
I managed to see the picture upside down--a five by seven, color photo of a woman lying naked on the ground, a gaping hole in her chest and a bloody mass in the palm of her hand. It could’ve been Shirley. It could’ve been any of them.
Hartness spread a dozen similar photographs across the table, and I could see him fighting to retain composure. He blinked more than usual and swallowed hard several times. I watched Orson watching the detective. There was a sick gleam in my brother’s eyes, as if he'd waited for this moment his entire life. The detective looked back up at Orson when he'd finished thumbing through the newspaper clippings.
'So,' Hartness said. 'What do you want me to do with this?'
'Are you a complete fucking idiot?'
Hartness said nothing. He just stared at my brother.
'You watch the news?' Orson asked, his voice more courteous.
'Yeah.'
'And you don’t know who I am? Washington D.C. Thirty-seven boxes. Ring a bell?'
'Look, I know what a crank is. I know when I’m being lied to. The FBI sent out a memo to every police station in the country. They receive around 90 cranks a day relating to the Heart Surgeon case. We’ve had one over the phone already this week.'
'That’s funny,' Orson said, livid. 'I had a feeling you wouldn’t take me seriously.'
'Good instinct,' Hartness said, rising to his feet. 'You just committed a felony, and I’m gonna arrest…'
'Barry Johnson’s in the trunk of my car you prick.'
The detective placed his hands on the table and leaned towards Orson. 'I don’t think you wanna take the credit for kidnapping that police officer,' Hartness said with a smug grin.
Orson reached into his jeans' pocket and tossed a shiny badge and a driver’s license onto the table. 'I killed him, too.'
The cocky, wise-ass smile vanished from the detective’s face. He looked down at the badge which rested face-up on the colorful photographs. Lifting the driver’s license, he stared at it a moment, then looked back down at the pictures. The burning cigarette fell from his lips, and he drew his gun. He pointed it at Orson, but my brother only laughed, nodding in approval.
'Stay right there,' Hartness said, his voice low, filled with malice, his hands shaking. He edged to the door and opened it.
'Want the car keys?' Orson asked. 'So you can get that smelly body out of my trunk. I waive my rights.'
'Take them out slowly,' Hartness said, and I reached carefully into my pocket and withdrew the keys. I tossed them to the detective and he caught them in his left hand as he pointed his 9mm at Orson. Then he slammed the door and locked it.
# # #
The detective had been gone two minutes when Orson straightened himself in his chair and turned towards me. He put his face into his hands and ran his fingers through his greasy hair.
