Empire Falls

he stood that Timmy was racing frantically around inside the Lincoln, from window to window, as if she had a fat wager on the outcome of these hostilities.
    Down at the mill, Mrs. Whiting and the limo men had gone inside. Miles stood over Minty, unsure what was supposed to happen next. The policeman was leaning back on both hands now and staring up at the gray sky, probably in the hope that his blood wouldn’t flow uphill. He sniffed four or five times, then sneezed mightily, dappling both Miles and himself.
    “Well, how about that?” he said. “Ol’ Miles Roby committing a violent act. Won’t people be surprised.”
    Miles stared down at him, recalling his father’s advice about cops: the worst they could do to you wasn’t that bad. Miles found it more than a little disconcerting to be following his father’s counsel in an important matter, but he was still a very long way from regret, which he had a feeling there’d be plenty of time for later on.
    After a minute, the worst of the nosebleed having stopped, Jimmy Minty got to his feet. He was wobbly, but also, Miles saw, determined. “Come on over to the car,” he said. “Let me put the cuffs on you.”
    “Not until I’ve talked to Mrs. Whiting.”
    “I have my orders.”
    “Well.”
    Minty drove his fist into Miles’s midsection, doubling him over. Another punch he didn’t even see dropped him to one knee. He was still trying to get his breath back when Jimmy hit him behind the left ear, setting off an explosion in his skull. He slumped onto the brick path then, and when no further blows followed, he rolled over and saw that Minty had returned to the Camaro and was rooting around in the glove box, which suggested to Miles that he must’ve blacked out, at least for a few seconds. By the time the policeman had located the handcuffs, Miles had managed to get back to his feet.
    “You’d do better to just set back down, Miles,” Minty advised. His nose was swelling and turning gray. “You created your disturbance, and now I’ve quelled it.”
    It occurred to Miles that despite his broken nose, this was a richly rewarding experience for Jimmy Minty. He easily slipped the next punch Miles flung, and then Miles was back on his knees, cradling his stomach, retching onto the bricks.
    “Now straighten up and put out your wrists,” Minty said, but instead, twice more Miles struggled to his feet, and twice more found himself back on the ground.
    By the time Mrs. Whiting and the limo men returned up the walkway, one of Miles’s eyes was completely closed, the other a mere slit. Both men were seated, facing each other, on opposite curbs, looking like they’d been on the same losing side of a fight, the victors having unaccountably run away. The handcuffs still dangled from the policeman’s fingers, and Miles could tell it embarrassed him. “You go on along, Mrs. Whiting,” Minty said, his breathing sounding strangled. “I’ll finish up with this after I’ve caught my breath.”
    The businessmen, clearly nervous, gave the two locals a wide berth, walking well off the brick path onto the grass to circle around them.
    “You amaze me, dear boy,” said Mrs. Whiting. “What was so important that it couldn’t wait until tomorrow?”
    Across the courtyard, Miles could hear the limo’s doors open and close, the solid, well-made sound of money sealing itself off. Since she was probably expecting him to say something about Callahan’s, he decided to disappoint her. “I just came by to give you my notice,” he told her. “You’ll have to find someone else to run the Empire Grill.”
    Jimmy Minty quit fingering his broken nose to listen to this.
    “You appear to have been visited by some sort of revelation, dear boy,” Mrs. Whiting observed. “Here’s my suggestion, though. Why not think things over? Passionate decisions are seldom very sound.”
    “When did you ever feel passion?”
    “Well, it’s true I’m seldom swept away like those with more romantic temperaments,” she conceded. “But we are what we are, and what can’t be cured must be endured.”
    “What can’t be cured must be avenged,” Miles said. “Isn’t that what you mean?”
    She smiled appreciatively. “Payback is how we endure, dear boy. Now, before you say another word in anger, for which I should have to punish you, you’ll want to stop and consider not just your own future but your daughter’s. She may require assistance with her university expenses in a