“It’s in a different county,” I said. “Why would you ever have business down there?”
“I wouldn’t. That’s just it. The only time I might have gone there was back in the day, when I was a state cop with Raz and I happened to come up here for something.”
“Something you can’t remember.”
“Right,” he said. “But what if…”
I waited for him to finish.
“Come on,” he said. “It’s not that far away. Let’s go see if I’m crazy.”
Sault Ste. Marie to St. Ignace. From the top of the eastern UP to the bottom. Not even an hour away, straight down I-75. It’s the busiest road in the state, the main artery running up from Detroit, all the way into Canada, so it’s always the first to be cleared. Plus the speed limit is seventy, so I’ll routinely buzz it between 85 and 90, even in wintertime.
It was early evening. I could have been having Jackie’s famous beef stew, I thought, along with the first of several cold Canadians. Sitting by the fire with my feet up. Yet I was here with Chief Maven again, and I wanted to see how this played out.
It didn’t take long to find the state police post in St. Ignace. It’s not a big town-just a few streets with some shops and gas stations and restaurants, and the docks for the ferries that run back and forth to Mackinac Island. When the ice finally melts, anyway.
The state police post was right there on the edge of the water, overlooking the Mackinac Bridge. We pulled up to the building. It was getting dark now, and here where the two peninsulas came together there was a narrow strait where Lake Michigan flowed into Lake Huron. Cars have been blown off the bridge before. It’s not an urban legend. It really happened. The wind wasn’t strong enough to flip cars that day but still, we could feel it rocking the truck and we both knew that we’d be suffering as soon as we stepped outside.
I took a deep breath and opened the door. The wind tried to slam it shut so I had to wedge my way through and then I was out in the open air, moving as quickly as I could to the front door. Maven was right behind me. A hundred feet of hell. When we were safely inside, we stomped off our boots and rubbed away the numbness from our ears.
“Remind me again why we live up here year-round,” he said.
“Because we’re idiots?”
There was another set of doors, to help keep out the elements. When we went through those we were in the main lobby. To me it was like any other police lobby, with the semi-comfortable furniture and the brain- numbing fluorescent lights. There was the standard waist-high barrier keeping everyone safely corralled outside the main offices, with the one narrow gate leading right past the main desk, where a trooper was sitting. The trooper didn’t look more than twenty years old.
“Can I help you guys?”
Maven didn’t answer him. He kept looking around the room.
“Got a question for you, Trooper,” Maven finally said, without looking at him. “Have they redone this place in the past few years?”
“Redone it?”
“Yeah, you know. Redecorated? Made it look different?”
“Oh, sure,” the trooper said. “There was a big contest. The best interior designers from all over the world submitted their plans.”
Maven locked eyes on him.
“What, are you some kind of joker?”
“Just tell me what’s going on, okay?”
Then the young trooper did a double take.
“Wait a minute,” he said. “You’re Chief Maven from Sault Ste. Marie, right?”
“Have we met before?”
“I don’t believe so. But I’ve seen your picture in the paper.”
“That’s great,” Maven said, “but here’s the thing, I was a state man, back when you were in diapers. I’m trying to figure out if I’ve ever been here before. Hence the question. You want to give me the real answer now?”
“I honestly don’t know,” the trooper said. “I’m kinda new here.”
“Any old-timers around?”
“Sergeant Avery is here. He’s forty-five.”
“For God’s sake,” Maven said. “Just let me look around the place, all right?”
Maven went past the desk, down the hallway. I followed him.
“What do you think?” I asked him.
He was lost in thought, going back so many years, trying to remember if he had once walked down this same hallway as a younger man. Being this far north, for whatever reason, with his partner Razniewski. Steele and Haggerty in the building, as well. If he could start with that memory, everything else might come back to him. It had seemed like a crazy idea on the way down here, but now that he was here… yeah, it made sense. Or at least it was exactly the kind of thing I’d do myself.
“I don’t know,” he finally said. “It’s a police station, you know? How different can it look from every other one?”
“The agents were going to call down here, remember? With everybody working on it, somebody’s gonna remember something.”
“It’s too many years, McKnight. Nobody will remember.”
“Come on, let’s go.”
“Gimme a second.” He pushed open the door to the men’s room and stepped inside. I figured it wouldn’t be a bad idea, with another hour to go before we were back home. So I pushed open the same door and stepped up to the urinal next to him.
He was looking up at the ceiling.
“Look how high that is, McKnight.”
I looked up. He was right. The ceiling was a good twenty feet above us, with a wide oblong skylight obscured by the snow. What a strange anomaly in a bathroom where everything else was pretty much standard issue, from the gray tile on the walls to the white porcelain sinks to the automated paper towel dispensers.
“I stood right here,” he said. “Raz stood next to me. Right where you’re standing now.”
“You’re sure?”
“Positive.”
He stepped away, washed his hands, and took a paper towel from the dispenser.
“It really did happen, McKnight. Whatever it was, it must have happened right here in St. Ignace.”
He wadded up the towel and held it tight in his fist.
“So what the hell happened here? Why can’t I remember?”
And we’re rolling…
… I think we have just enough light for this.
… Yes, with the lake in the background there. That ambient glow should work just fine.
… Okay, now cue the rope. Pull on that thing!
… Get him up there. That’s it. A little higher.
… Oh yeah. Now that’s a shot. Let’s do a walk-around here. That’s it.
… Close on the face. A few snowflakes. Perfect.
… Way to start things off, Charlie. That was wonderful. I’m crying, that was so beautiful.
… Now where’s that snowmobile? It’s cold out here!
And cut.
