“He had help,” the agent said. “For sure he had help. Which is why we’re here.”
The agent walked to his car to get something and while they were distracted, Jackie whispered to Malcolm, “He looked into renting an apartment in Panama City. A company ran a credit check on him. He also looked into opening a Panamanian bank account.”
When the agent returned, he held out a driver’s license. “Do you recognize this man? We think he and Charles probably connected at the bar.”
Malcolm took the license from him, brought it close. An instinct kicked in and he made his face a blank, the face that drove Jess crazy.
“The photo is pretty small.” He could feel Jess at his side, also looking. The name on the license said Mark Duro. Tripp’s insurance beneficiary. An address about an hour upstate from Gillam.
“Duro has a bunch of social media accounts. When you search his name you see references to past employment, a charity 5k he ran. But no photos. His profile pic on most accounts is some famous temple in Japan. The interesting thing is that one of the accounts—the Facebook page—liked a post about the Half Moon a few months ago. A Halloween party.”
“Really,” Malcolm said. He brought the license closer still, as if he could communicate to the face in the photograph, as if he could speak to him in his mind. Roddy. His hair slicked back. A dress shirt. Glasses. But it was Roddy. His heart was hammering. Jess was leaning on him hard. He handed her the license.
“If it’s fake it’s a very good one,” one of the agents said. “It was in a drop box he rented at UPS.”
“Do you recognize the man on the driver’s license?” Jackie asked, looking back and forth between him and Jess. “Would you remember seeing him on Halloween?”
“I don’t think so,” Malcolm said. He thought quickly. If they found out it was Roddy and that he worked at the Half Moon, then Malcolm would ask how they could expect him to identify a face when he was worried about the bar, and when his estranged wife was standing beside him, a fact that anyone would confirm. He had bigger things on his mind. And the Roddy he knew didn’t look anything like the one in that photo. He made a mistake.
“You sure?”
Malcolm shrugged. “Sorry.”
“How about you?” she asked Jess.
She shook her head. “No, me neither. But I’m not at the bar much.”
Malcolm didn’t dare look at her.
He thought of Roddy clutching his phone, posting the Halloween party on five different social media platforms in under ten seconds. He was always looking at the thing, ordering this or that, figuring out new apps. He wasn’t dumb, his uncle had emphasized. He just didn’t seem to know how to apply himself. He remembered Roddy on Friday night, walking off into the storm in his ratty running sneakers, declining a lift because he preferred to walk.
Mrs. Tyrell from a few houses down came outside in her bathrobe and snow boots to yell at the driver of the plow, to ask if he was aware that he had taken out her mailbox on the last go-around, said the town should reimburse people for that, what a pain in the ass, her husband had sunk the post in concrete and now it was splinters, he’d have to dig the whole thing up.
None of them could hear the driver’s response, but his arm hung limply from the window of the cab, and whatever he said made Mrs. Tyrell even more angry.
“We need you to call us if you remember anything else,” the taller of the two agents said as he handed Malcolm his card. As the group broke up, the local officers made a plan to go eat. They mentioned two diners that were open as of that morning, and Malcolm made note of which one they decided on. Rob begged off, said he had to touch base with his mother and sisters about everything that was going on.
As they made their way to their cars, Mrs. Tyrell called over to Malcolm and Jess. “Am I right? Ridiculous the way they operate these plows. You guys don’t have any damage?” When the Tyrell boys still lived at home, the whole neighborhood used to hear her yelling at them.
Then she shaded her eyes and called over, “Is that you, Jess?” and began making her way up the driveway.
“Dear God,” Jess muttered as Malcolm said, “Christ.”
“How are you, honey? I haven’t seen you in so long!” Her long, bottle-red hair looked like it hadn’t seen a brush since the first snowstorm. “Want to come down to my house and sit by the heater? Have a visit? Jimmy has the kitchen snug as a bug. I can make you a cup of coffee? It’s just Nescafé in the saucepan but it’s hot.”
Malcolm waited for Jess to say no, to find an excuse. She looked exhausted, battle worn, pale. He thought of her at the hospital that time, the worst time, her legs in stirrups, the green of the paper gown harsh against her skin. How she looked beyond sad, like she had no life left, no fight. She didn’t speak. She didn’t cry. He saw her notice the tray of tools the physician’s assistant rolled in, saw her glance at them once more when the doctor came in a moment later.
But instead she said, “I’d love that. Give me a minute.”
“Really?” Malcolm said when Mrs. Tyrell was out of earshot.
Jess shrugged. “Sure. Why not?”
“If I go see about Roddy.” Malcolm tried to think of how best to put it. “Will you be here when I get back?”
“You think that’s smart? Going straight to Roddy? Can you explain all of this to me please? Don’t say it’s nothing.”
“I will. I swear. But not now.”
Backing out of his driveway, he realized she never answered his question.
* * *
He tried to remember where exactly Roddy lived. He knew it was in one of the apartments where the railroad tracks crossed the creek, but which? It was not nice over there. People piled junk on their balconies, and the natural shingle that had probably looked fresh thirty years earlier was now black with weather. A big OxyContin dealer had recently been arrested from there; his name and mug shot went out over the local patch.
Once he got to the parking lot, Malcolm texted Roddy, asked him to come outside if he was home. Three dots came up as if Roddy was typing a reply, but in the meantime Malcolm looked up, saw someone come to the window on the second floor.
You there? Malcolm texted, and the figure stepped back. I’m coming up, he wrote.
Upstairs, the hallway smelled like cats and mildew. He knocked on the door he estimated to be the right one but heard movement in the apartment next door, so he moved down one door and knocked again. He leaned forward and could hear breathing on the other side.
“You might as well open up,” he said.
The locks slid, a chain was drawn aside, the door opened.
“Oh, hey, Malcolm,” Roddy said, his hair the usual mess. He was wearing a long wool coat with a blanket draped around him like a shawl. “You didn’t have to drop them off.”
“Drop what off?”
“My headphones?”
“That’s not why I’m here.”
Roddy stared at him.
“Have you eaten?” Malcolm asked, glimpsing the chaos of Roddy’s apartment. “I heard Slice of Life is open. Let’s go see if they’ll seat us.”
If it occurred to Roddy that he could decline, that Malcolm was not the school principal, not his dad, he showed no sign. He followed Malcolm to his car. They drove to the diner in silence, parked between two utility trucks. There was a coffee station outside for utility workers to refill their travel mugs, and the line extended to the edge of the parking lot. Inside, it was warm. Malcolm greeted Sebastian, the owner, made small talk for a minute, and then asked if he could get a table. Once seated, Sebastian waved over a waitress who was circling with a pot of coffee. They put in their orders so she wouldn’t have to come back. Malcolm waited until the waitress walked away before he spoke.
“Roddy,” he said, sitting square to the kid. “Do you remember the guy giving us trouble on Friday night?”
“Yeah,” Roddy said, and Malcolm could see caution pass over his face.