Empire Falls

get back to the restaurant,” Miles told him.
    “Won’t take a minute.”
    “Go ahead,” Max said. “I’ll just sit here by myself and wait. You go with Jimmy Minty and swap secrets.”
    Miles followed the policeman over to his patrol car, where he rolled the toothpick in his mouth as if considering how to begin. “I shouldn’t be doing this, but we go back a long ways,” he said. “I was going to mention it back inside, but then your old man came back and I didn’t want to worry him.”
    “What is it, Jimmy?”
    “Here’s the deal,” Minty said, working his toothpick. “There’s a lot of dope around town right now. Tell your brother to be careful.”
    Miles felt himself instantly bristle, more at the presumed intimacy than the implied accusation. “Why should David be careful?”
    “Hey. I understand. He’s your brother. I’m just saying.”
    “No, Jimmy. What are you saying?”
    “I’m just … nothing. Forget it. I’m just saying. Word to the wise is all.”
    The toothpick still twirled thoughtfully. Miles considered grabbing it and running it through the man’s bottom lip and tying it there in a splintered knot. “And I can’t help thinking how bad your ma would feel if—”
    Rather than punch an armed cop in broad daylight in the middle of Empire Avenue, Miles turned on his heel and strode back to the Jetta. The suddenness of this movement apparently caught his father by surprise as he was rummaging through the Jetta’s glove box. This discovery had the unintended effect of sending Miles back to Jimmy Minty, who hadn’t moved. “Look,” he said, “you don’t know the first thing about my mother, okay, so don’t bring her up in any more conversations.”
    “Hey—”
    “No. Shut up and listen, Jimmy,” Miles said, feeling his fury rise in his throat—the taste was anger, after all, not fear—and the blood pounding in his cheeks. “You … didn’t … know … her. Say it for me, so I know you understand.”
    Jimmy Minty’s face had gone pale. “Hey, okay. I didn’t really know your mother.”
    “Fine,” Miles said, some of the rage draining out of him, replaced by the knowledge that he’d overreacted. “Terrific.”
    “You shouldn’t tell me to shut up, Miles,” Minty said. “Not out here in public like this. This uniform entitles me to some respect.”
    “You’re right,” Miles admitted, flushed with shame yet unwilling to surrender his anger. “You’re right, and I’m sorry. Just don’t pretend you knew my mother.”
    “Hey, I thought she was a great lady. That’s all I was saying—” But he must have seen Miles’s color rising again, because he stopped. “Your brother should be careful is all I’m saying, okay? Everybody knows he’s growing marijuana out there in—”
    “See?” Miles said. “That’s where you’re wrong. Everybody does not know that. I don’t know that, for instance.” Which was true. He didn’t know it, not for sure.
    “How come you’re getting so bent outta shape, Miles? I try to do you and your brother a favor—”
    “No,” Miles interrupted him, feeling suddenly calm. “I don’t believe that. I have no idea what you’re trying to do, Jimmy. I don’t know why I’m suddenly seeing you everywhere I turn lately. I don’t know why my name should come up in your conversation with Mrs. Whiting at the courthouse, either …”
    Minty squinted at this, then glanced away.
    “But I do know you aren’t looking out for my well-being. That much I’m sure of. So from now on, if you want to do me a favor, stay away from me and my family. That goes for your kid too. There are lots of girls in Empire Falls. As far as I’m concerned he can choose any one he likes. There’s just one he can’t have, and that’s Tick.”
    A sly smile began to steal over the policeman’s features, and Miles turned away, fearing the temptation to remove it.
    “How come you don’t like me, Miles?” Minty called after him. “I’ve always wondered why.”
    Miles answered without turning around. “Call it the habit of a lifetime.”
    Back in the Jetta, Miles waited to turn the key in the ignition until Minty’s cruiser disappeared down the avenue.
    “God, what a prize dunce he was,” Max recalled fondly.
    “He wasn’t stupid, Dad. He was sneaky and mean and envious and dangerous. He still is.”
    “Don’t get mad at me,” his father said. “It’s Jimmy Minty you’re mad at. I’m just a useless old man.”
    Miles