Not only did he lose his bid to move up the political food chain, he got turfed as mayor in the next election. Didn’t take it well, either. He made his concession speech after downing the better part of a bottle of Dewar’s, and referred to those who had abandoned him as “a cabal of cocksuckers.” The local news stations couldn’t broadcast what he said, but the uncensored YouTube version went viral.
Finley vanished from public view for a time, nursed his wounds, then started up a water-bottling company after discovering a spring on a tract of land he owned north of Promise Falls. While not quite as big as Evian—he had named it, with typical Randall Finley modesty, Finley Springs Water—it was one of the few around here that was doing any hiring, mainly because they did a strong export business. The town was in economic free fall of late. The Standard had gone out of business, throwing about fifty people out of work. The amusement park, Five Mountains, had gone bankrupt, the Ferris wheel and roller coasters standing like the relics of some strange, abandoned civilization.
Thackeray College, hit by a drop in enrollment, had laid off younger teaching staff who’d yet to make tenure. Kids finishing school were leaving town in droves to find work elsewhere, and those who stayed behind could be found hanging around local bars most nights of the week, getting into fights, spray-painting mailboxes, knocking over gravestones.
The owners of the Constellation Drive-in, a Promise Falls–area landmark for fifty years that had engaged in combat with the VCR, DVD player, and Netflix, were finally waving the white flag. A few more weekends and a small part of local history would be toast. Word had it that the screen would be dropped, and the land turned into some kind of housing development by developer Frank Mancini, although why anyone wanted to build more homes in a town where everyone wanted to leave was beyond Duckworth’s comprehension.
This was still the town he’d grown up in, but it was like a suit, once new, that had turned shiny and threadbare.
Ironically, it had gotten worse since that dickhead Finley had stopped being mayor. For all his embarrassing shenanigans, he was a big booster for the town of forty thousand—actually, more like thirty-six thousand, according to the latest census—and would have fought to keep failing industries afloat like he was hanging on to his last bottle of rye.
So when Duckworth saw who wanted to talk to him, he opted, with some regret, to take the call.
“Hello,” he said.
“Barry!”
“Hey, Randy.”
If he was going to turn into the doughnut place, he’d have to hit his signal and crank the wheel now, and he knew if he entered the drive-through he wouldn’t be able to stop himself from ordering a soft, doughy circle of heaven. But Finley would hear his exchange at the speaker, and even though the former mayor did not know he’d embarked on a diet, Barry didn’t want anyone gaining insight into his dietary indiscretions.
So he kept on driving.
“Where are you?” Finley asked. “You in your car?”
“I’m on my way in.”
“Swing by Clampett Park. South end. By the path.”
“Why would I want to do that?”
“There’s something here you should see.”
“Randy, maybe, if you were still mayor, I’d be at your beck and call, and I wouldn’t mind you having my private cell phone number, but you’re not the mayor. You haven’t been for some time. So if there’s something going on, just call it in the way everybody else does.”
“They’re probably going to send you out here anyway,” Finley said. “Saves you going into the station and then back out again.”
Barry Duckworth sighed. “Fine.”
“I’ll meet you at the park entrance. I got my dog with me. That’s how I came across it. I was taking her for a walk.”
“It?”
“Just get over here.”
The trip took Duckworth to the other side of town, where he knew Finley and his long-suffering wife, Jane, still lived. Randall Finley was standing with his dog, a small gray-haired schnauzer. The dog was straining at the leash, wanting to head back into the park, which bordered a forested area and beyond that, to the north, Thackeray College.
“Took you long enough,” Finley said as Barry got out of his unmarked cruiser.
“I don’t work for you,” he said.
“Sure you do. I’m a taxpayer.” Finley was dressed in a pair of comfort-fit jeans, running shoes, and a light jacket that he’d zipped up to his neck. It was a cool May morning. The fourth, to be exact, and the ground was still blanketed with dead leaves from the previous fall that had, up until six weeks ago, been hidden by snow.
“What did you find?”
“It’s this way. I could just let Bipsie off the lead and we could follow her.”
“No,” Duckworth said. “Whatever you’ve found I don’t want Bipsie messing with.”
“Oh, yeah, of course,” Finley said. “So, how ya been?”
“Fine.”
When Duckworth did not ask Finley how he was, the ex-mayor waited a beat, and said, “I’m having a good year. We’re expanding at the plant. Hiring another couple of people.” He smiled. “You might have heard about one of them.”
“I haven’t. What are you talking about?”