Jack Beale 00 - Killer Run

just under the surface.”
    “He didn’t know it was there?”
    “Oh, we all knew it was there. That was part of the excitement, the danger, to see who could get the closest without hitting it. Well, on that day the tide was dropping, it and must have been lower than they thought. Thomas hit the rock with his head and was killed.”
    “I’m sorry.”
    Charlie looked down, silent. Then he said quietly, “Thank you. Everyone was shocked and yet not shocked at all.”
    “What do you mean?”
    “It just made sense that Thomas was the one to die. As physically identical as they were, he was the wilder one, the more daring one. We used to joke that he was the evil twin, Alfred being the good one. It always seemed that when a prank went wrong or they got in trouble, Thomas always got the blame.”
    “Really.”
    “It was rough, especially on their mother. She was never the same, and neither was Alfred. He and Thomas were so close, and to all of a sudden be so alone. It was hard. I don’t think he ever fully reconciled the fact that his brother was dead and he wasn’t. He kept saying that it should have been him. He felt tremendous guilt knowing that maybe he could have prevented his brother’s death. I can’t imagine what he went through.
    “I know one thing though; there was always something off about him after. We grew apart and there was a stretch when I didn’t see him for several years.”
    “When was that?”
    “Oh, I don’t know. I guess it would have been when we were in our twenties. It was when I had just gotten married. Come to think of it, he didn’t even come to the wedding. Eventually we reconnected, but we were never as close as we had been as kids.”
    Malloy silently looked at Charlie. He had found out more that he had ever imagined about Alfred and all he had done was let Charlie talk.

CHAPTER 74
    AFTER ALFRED FOUND MALLOY’S card in his door, he spent a very long night driving around, thinking. He still didn’t have the quilt. He hadn’t talked with Max. And now this Lieutenant Malloy was looking for him. A voice in his head told him that whatever Malloy wanted to talk to him about couldn’t be good, and that he should be avoided. Alfred had trusted the police once and it had cost him dearly. He wouldn’t make that mistake again. By the time the sky had begun to lighten, he had an idea.
    He wanted the quilt that Max had, and that meant another trip to Rye Harbor. The rising sun brought with it a feeling of hope as it broke the horizon and shined below the layer of late Fall clouds that had moved in overnight. That bright, early sun infused him with energy and optimism, and he planned a quick stop at his shop for his notes and the quilt. He would need them for his plan to succeed.
    He drove in from the back way and parked behind the store to remain invisible from the main road, just in case. He could feel the warmth of the sun on his back as he opened the door and then stepped inside. The windows on the back of the building let in enough light so that he could move about easily, a task that would have been nearly impossible in the dark, even for himself. Ten minutes later, when he returned to his truck, he saw that the sun had hidden behind the clouds, a cold east wind had set in, and the world had turned a somber gray.
    With the quilt and his notes on the seat beside him, and his success in avoiding Lieutenant Malloy, his spirits should have remained buoyed. However, as he drove away from his shop, his mood became as colorless, cold, and gray as the day outside. His stomach began to rumble. Hunger and fatigue intensified the weight of his mission and the secrets he was hiding. His body ached, and his eyes wanted to close. He needed food and coffee. The Agawam beckoned as he drove past, but he needed to keep going, so he opted for the next fast-food place with a drive-thru window that he came to. Fortunately the line was short, and in less than five minutes he had a large coffee tucked between his legs and a breakfast sandwich beside him. This time he headed for the highway, and his mood brightened slightly.
    The combination of fatigue and sheer concentration about what he was going to do made him so distracted that he drove right past all the exits that would have taken him to Rye Harbor. He was well into Maine before he realized his mistake. A sign indicated that the next ramp marked the last exit before he would have to pay a toll. A second sign pointed the way to Route 1 and