Confederate Gold and Silver Read Free

and repetitive meetings each and every month listening to the ass kissers who agreed with every decision or with every new worthless program the commissioner and his civilian staff dreamed up, gave him heaping doses of administrative bullshit. During these meetings he often found himself daydreaming and wondering what cases his detectives were working. When he did pay attention during these meetings it was not for long. “No wonder nothing ever gets done at headquarters. All of these morons are sitting in meetings all day instead of being in touch with the troopers in the field. They are the ones who are doing the real work.” Paul had always tried not to invoke the mentality others in the field had when they referred to headquarters types of people, but now he found himself mixed in with them. “Guilty, but through association only and not for much longer!”
    Paul tried every way possible to cope with his headquarters assignment. He gave it a new chance every month or so, but after several months of trying, and after he had met with the state police commissioner for a second time to try to get back to the field, he realized the commissioner was simply a political hack of the governor. Even though he had just completed a long and difficult sensitive investigation, one the commissioner had personally selected him for due to his acquired investigative skills; it seemed as if his hard work did not matter. Despite his requests to be reassigned back to his previous assignment, one the state police had spent thirty years training him for, his requests fell on the commissioner’s deaf ears. He now knew the commissioner would only do what he thought was best for his own career and would do only those things which would keep him out of the governor’s dog house. The commissioner, who he had openly defended in the past from previous criticism, was someone who now proved to be a person who did not have the spine to do the right thing, not only for Paul, but for the department as well. He now had not only lost Paul’s confidence, but had also started to lose the confidence of many other senior command staff members as well. On the day he left his second meeting with the commissioner, he knew the end of his run had come. He went home that evening and told his wife, Donna, he was done. “They’re trying to fit a round peg in the proverbial square hole and it’s not going to be me. I’ve tried talking to Commissioner Cagney and I’ve tried reasoning with him, but it’s no use talking to him about something he won’t do anything about. Men with principle and conviction stand up for what they know is right, but he won’t ever stand up. I’m getting out as it’s time for me to do something else in life.”
    During the last week of Paul’s thirty plus years in law enforcement, few people learned of his decision to retire and many never knew he had left until after he was gone. Even the day before he retired, he had taken one of his former secretaries out to lunch to celebrate her birthday and had kept news of his retirement quiet even from her. He wanted it that way and he jokingly threatened those he had told about his retirement plans with bodily harm if they told anyone else. He had joined the state police department without any fanfare and now he wanted to leave the same way. Pomp and circumstance had its place, but he had always detested it being directed at him. He quickly nixed any mention of a retirement party.
    As he wound down the last couple days at work, Paul finished up the few loose ends which remained. This included turning in most of his gear and his assigned undercover car. “I guess I’ll have to go and buy a car now. I haven’t owned one in over thirty years,” he told Michael Smarz, manager of Fleet Operations for the state police when he turned in his Chevy Impala. Turning in his assigned gear, he only kept two souvenirs from his career; his state police badge and his Connecticut State Police ID card.