Constable Molly Smith 01 - In the Shadow of the Glacier

at it.”
    “I’m sorry, sir,”
    “Never apologize, Molly,” Keller said. “I’d have thought that your mother would have drilled that into you as you lay in your cradle. ‘Never apologize. Never explain. Get the job done and let them howl.’ I think the quote goes something like that.”
    John Winters looked out the window. The blinds were drawn but one of the slats had not met with its neighbor and there was a good-sized gap. A laughing crowd passed under the streetlights.
    “It might not be as bad as you think, Paul,” Winters said. “Ashcroft looks unhinged to me. First he’s trying to get Molly to speak against the garden, and thus by implication her mother, and when that doesn’t work, he tried to rile her up by insulting her parents. He doesn’t show the baiting, but the way in which his interview flies from one point on the compass to another makes him look like a man desperate to get whatever angle he can.”
    “His fans won’t see it that way,” Keller said.
    “I don’t imagine there’s anything that could make them see the situation any other way than how he intends them to see it.”
    “Probably not. Good of you to stay, Jim. Molly. A couple of minutes of your time, John.”
    The office door clicked shut behind Smith and Denton.
    “When’s Lopez back?” Keller asked.
    “Next week.”
    “You getting anywhere with Montgomery?”
    “No.” Winters decided to keep his suspicions about the bike thief and his apparent relations with Molly Smith to himself for now. They’d found a correlation between the times she was on the beat and the stealing of bicycles from the downtown area. Unfortunately, not only did that not bring him any closer to finding the thief, there was no guarantee that even if they found the guy, he’d know anything about the Montgomery murder.
    “I have to ask the Yellow Stripes for help with this park business, John,” the Chief said. He picked a pen off his desk and ran it between his fingers like a baton twirler. “People have been arriving all day, taking one side or the other. There’s likely to be serious trouble on Wednesday when the damned fool we have for a deputy mayor announces the council’s decision. And as long as I’m asking for the Horsemen’s help, I’m going to ask them to send someone from IHIT as well. We need fresh eyes on the Montgomery case, John.”
    “I agree,” he said. Although it burned him, deep inside, to say so. He was supposed to be the hotshot homicide detective from the big city. Blessing the minuscule Trafalgar City Police with his presence. And he couldn’t solve the first murder that had happened in this backwoods town all year. He’d come here to escape from the memory of his own failure. And now he’d failed again.
    ***
    The wheel of the shopping cart caught in a rut in the parking lot. Lucky wrenched it free with a curse. When she looked up a man was standing beside her car, arms crossed, watching her. Her heart leapt into her throat. It was a midweek afternoon; the parking lot was full, people were coming and going with their groceries. A red-faced woman dragged a little boy by the hand. He was screaming and trying to fall down. She swatted him on the bottom.
    Lucky stopped walking.
    “Mrs. Smith,” the man said.
    “Yes?”
    “Do you know who I am?”
    “Of course I do, you’re Brian Harris. Come to Trafalgar to make trouble.”
    “The way I see it, Mrs. Smith, you’re the one making trouble. You and that ridiculous committee.”
    “What do you want?”
    “To talk,” he said with a smile that didn’t touch his eyes. He wore a blue baseball cap and the corner of his left eye twitched.
    “We have nothing to talk about. I have to get these groceries home before the ice cream melts.” She tried to calm her breathing. Surely Harris wouldn’t attack her? In the middle of town in the middle of the day. He stepped toward her. She gripped the handles of her shopping cart and made sure it was between them: the shield of a twenty-first century warrior.
    “No one wants trouble, Mrs. Smith.”
    “Then go away and leave us alone. This is our town.”
    “You’re part of a larger world. Although you peaceniks don’t seem to be able to see the big picture. Peacenik—isn’t that what they called you back in the day, Mrs. Smith?”
    “And we were proud, still are, to be on the side of peace.” She felt some confidence returning. It had scared her, badly, to see him watching her, arrogance written all over