Before the Fall(57)

“Can you—” he says, “anything about the flight, about her, you can tell me?”

Her last moments, he is saying.

Scott thinks about what he can say—that she served him a drink? That the game was on and the two millionaires were jawing and one of the millionaire’s wives was talking about shopping?

“She did her job,” he says. “I mean, the flight was, what, eighteen minutes long? And I got there right before the doors closed.”

“No, I understand,” says the father, bowing his head to hide his disappointment. To have one more piece of her, an image, to feel one more time that he can learn something new, it’s a way to keep her alive in his mind.

“She was kind,” Scott tells him.

They stand there for a moment, nothing left to say, then Michael nods, offers his hand. Scott shakes it, tries to think of something to say that could address the grief the other man must be feeling. But Michael, sensing Scott’s turmoil, turns and walks away, his back straight.

The agents approach Scott on his way back to the cab. O’Brien is in the lead, with Gus Franklin on his heels—one hand on the agent’s shoulder as if to say, Leave the f*cking guy alone.

“Mr. Burroughs.”

Scott stops, his hand on the taxi door.

“We really don’t want to bother you today,” says Gus.

“It’s not called bothering,” says O’Brien. “It’s called our job.”

Scott shrugs, no way around it.

“Get in,” says Scott. “I don’t want to do this on camera.”

The cab is a minivan. Scott rolls the door back, climbs inside, and sits on the back bench seat. The agents look at each other, then climb in also. Gus in front, O’Brien and Hex in the middle jump seats.

“Thank you,” says Scott. “I’ve lived this long without being captured by helicopter camera—”

“Yeah, we noticed,” says O’Brien. “You’re not a big fan of social media.”

“Any media,” says Hex.

“How’s the search going?” Scott asks Gus.

Gus turns to the driver, a Senegalese man.

“Can you give us a minute?”

“It’s my cab.”

Gus takes out his wallet, gives the man twenty dollars, then another twenty when that doesn’t work. The driver takes it, climbs out.

“Hurricane Margaret is moving north from the Caymans,” Gus tells Scott. “We’ve had to call off the search for now.”

Scott closes his eyes. Maggie, Margaret.

“Yeah,” says Gus. “It’s a bad joke, but they name these things at the beginning of the season.”

“You seem pretty upset,” says O’Brien.

Scott squints at the agent.

“A woman died in a plane crash and now there’s a hurricane named after her,” he says. “I’m not sure how I’m supposed to seem.”

“What was your relationship with Mrs. Bateman?” asks Hex.

“You guys have a way of saying words that’s very judgmental.”

“Do we?” says O’Brien. “It probably comes from a deep-seated philosophical belief that everybody lies.”

“I might give up on conversation entirely, if I thought that,” says Scott.

“Oh no. Makes it fun,” says O’Brien.

“People are dead,” Gus snaps. “This isn’t a game.”

“With respect,” says O’Brien, “you focus on what made the plane go down. We’ll zero in on the human factor.”

“Unless,” says Hex, “the two things are actually the same.”

Scott sits back and closes his eyes. They appear to be having this conversation without him now and he feels weary. The ache in his shoulder has subsided, but there is a headache creeping up the rim of his brain, a deep-tissue echo of the swelling barometric pressure outside.

“I think he fell asleep,” says Hex, studying him.

“You know who sleeps in a police station?” says O’Brien.

“The guy who did it,” says Hex.

“You boys should get your own radio station,” says Gus. “Morning sports. Traffic and weather together on the eights.”

O’Brien taps Scott’s chest.

“We’re thinking of getting a warrant to look at your paintings.”

Scott opens his eyes.

“What would that look like?” he asks. “A warrant to look at art?” He pictures a drawing of a document, an artist’s rendering.

“It’s a piece of paper signed by a judge that lets us seize your shit,” says O’Brien.

“Or maybe come over Thursday night,” says Scott. “I’ll serve white wine in paper cups and put out a tray of Stella D’oro breadsticks. Have you been to a gallery opening before?”

“I’ve been to the f*cking Louvre,” snaps O’Brien.

“Is that near the regular Louvre?”

“This is my investigation,” says Gus. “Nobody’s seizing anything without talking to me.”

Scott looks out the window. All the mourners are gone now. The grave is just a hole in the ground, filling with rainwater as two men in coveralls stand under a canopy of elm and smoke Camel Lights.