Mohawk

stool.
    Officer Gaffney did not dare sit, though his rump hovered mere inches from the round stooltop, his legs bowed like a cowboy’s. “Hell, Harry,” he complained. “You can’t refuse to serve me—”
    “I can do anything I want. This is my place, paid for by me, run by me, according to my rules.”
    “Hell, Harry.”
    “Anyhow, I wasn’t refusing to serve you. I was answering the question you’ll get around to asking when you’re through pissing and moaning. No, I didn’t see Billy. No, I don’t have no idea where he is. No, he’s not downstairs hiding in the basement or the storeroom. And no, you can’t just look around to make sure. No.”
    Gaffney squirmed, still astraddle the stool and unsure if he had permission to sit. “It ain’t like we don’t trust you, Harry. Everybody admires the hell out of Harry Saunders, and nobody’s been better to that boy than you. We just need to talk to that boy for his own good.”
    “No,” Harry said.
    The officer lowered himself subtle fractions until he felt the stool. “Hell, Harry, I understand. Why wouldn’t I understand? We’re friends for God’s sake. It’s just I can’t help being what I am. I got to enforce the law. A policeman’s just got to.”
    Harry stopped working on the grill and turned. “We aren’t friends, Gaff. Don’t say so, because it ain’t true. And don’t talk about the law, because that’s not it. If you’re all worked up about the law, there’s a game upstairs right now. Gambling’s still against the law, so you can start right here where it’s convenient. And when you’re finished, there’s some other things. I can tell you about who’s stealing leather over to the Tucker Tannery, and who’s cutting and selling it, too. Unless maybe you already know. And then you can go after Old Man Tucker himself and jail his ass for all that shit in the crick that’s making the whole county sick. You could clean up the whole town, Gaff. Be a
regular
goddamn hero instead of chasing around the goddamncounty after unfortunate retards like Billy that nobody cares nothing about until there’s trouble.”
    Officer Gaffney blanched under Harry’s onslaught and would have retreated a step or two if he hadn’t settled onto the seat. The gleaming spatula Harry was using for emphasis was fluttering in front of his nose like a demented metal bird. It didn’t seem right that anybody would talk to a peace officer in that tone, but Gaffney couldn’t decide what to do about it in this particular case. Here he had come in to patch things up with Harry, and was worse off than ever. He was misunderstood, and that’s all there was to it.
    “The law … bullshit, the law,” Harry fumed, though calmer now, having said his piece. He set the spatula down and returned to the brick. “Bill’s nothing but a goddamn monthly check for your shit-heel brother. When was the last time he ate a bowl of soup under his old man’s roof? When was the last time Rory gave him a pair of socks? It’d be a hell of an idea if somebody called them state people and asked them if they knew what happened to the money they sent every month.” Harry was slowly working himself back into a fit. Chunks of the lava brick were crumbling onto the grill, whose surface shone angrily through the black ash. “The law—”
    “I never meant for you to get all worked up on Thanksgiving,” the policeman said. “I just come in for a cup of coffee and company.”
    “I hope you enjoyed the company, cause you ain’t getting no coffee,” Harry said without turning around.
    Defeated, Officer Gaffney slid off the stool and left.
    When Harry finished with the grill and refrigerated the perishables, he locked the front door and stuck the CLOSED sign on the window before turning off thelights. Then he peered outside between the blinds. On the other side of Main Street a cigarette briefly glowed red in the doorway of the drugstore. Two men stood in the shadows. One would be Officer Gaffney, and Harry had a pretty good guess who the second, larger man would be. They were positioned to see both the front entrance to the grill and the rear door on the alley. Harry smiled and watched as the cigarette glowed bright, then faded, then dropped to the pavement where it was extinguished. Finally, the larger man came out of the doorway and headed up Main in the direction of the firehouse.
    The wind, which had been whistling all day, now howled up the corridor between the buildings