Mad River Read Free Page B

you say they were wearing bikini bottoms, they were also, like, wearing the tops, right?”
    “Nope, just the bottoms,” Virgil said.
    “Fuck me,” Davenport said. “Anyway, you bring anything back home?”
    “Jesus, I hope not,” Virgil said.
    “I meant fish,” Davenport said.
    “Oh. No. No, I didn’t.”
    Cooper offered Virgil a ride home, but Bob-Bob said, doubtfully, “That don’t sound like a real good idea,” and Virgil said, “Thanks, anyway, Cornelius. I can use the walk.”
    •   •   •
    VIRGIL LIVED THE BEST part of a mile northeast of downtown, a cool walk in early April, but he was wearing an insulated Carhartt jean jacket over a black Wolfmother T-shirt, jeans, and boots, and was comfortable enough as he ambled along through the dark. He lived in a small two-bedroom frame house with a double garage. A fishing boat was usually parked in the driveway, in this case, an almost-new fishing boat, a Ranger. The boat had been purchased with some fear and trepidation about ethics, from a friend of the governor of the state of Minnesota.
    Virgil’s previous boat had been blown up by a mad bomber. Virgil had crawled away from the wreckage, unhurt, by the very skin of his teeth. The governor had offered to help out by locating the Ranger, two years old, but with only thirty hours on the motor. Virgil initially declined, because he thought that the boat broker might be doing a favor for the governor, some kind of political deal, and he didn’t want a part of that.
    But the governor had come back to him, said he appreciated Virgil’s ethical conundrum, and insisted that there was no deal, he’d only done it because he imagined that he and Virgil were friends and he felt bad about the bomb. No payback was expected or required from anyone. Virgil got a letter from the director of the BCA saying it was okay, and he bought the boat, because, the fact was:
    He hungered for it.
    It had been love at first sight. A Ranger Angler, red with black and gray trim, eighteen feet, six inches long with a ninety-eight-inch beam. There was a rod case under the front deck with space for six rods, plenty of storage in the side lockers, a Minn-Kota trolling motor on the bow, a 175 Merc on the back.
    Virgil had to put up the whole insurance payment on his old boat and motor, plus he’d financed twelve thousand dollars over four years through the state credit union. That was cheap, he thought, when it came to true love.
    And now, as the saying went, he could pad his ass with fiberglass, a big change from his old aluminum boat.
    •   •   •
    VIRGIL WAS A TALL MAN, an inch or two over six feet, slender, with blue eyes and blond hair worn long for a cop, but not too long for farm country, where he usually worked. Like country people, he had a tendency toward ball caps, barn jackets, and cowboy boots, especially in the spring, when he needed to be mud-resistant. He’d been born out on the prairie, in Marshall, Minnesota, where he’d lettered in football, basketball, and baseball. He still looked like a competent third baseman.
    He got back to the house around twelve-thirty, clear of mind if not fresh of breath. He patted the boat on the nose and said, “Hey, baby,” went in the house, started a pot of coffee, brushed his teeth, threw a few days’ worth of shirts, jeans, and underwear in a satchel, along with a dopp kit. He got his pistol and a shotgun out of the gun safe, and some ammo, took the whole pile of gear out to his truck, a Toyota 4Runner, and packed it away. That done, he hooked the truck up to the boat, backed the boat into the garage, unhooked it, and locked the garage door behind himself.
    Back inside the house, he poured a cup of coffee, put the rest in a thermos, sipped at the coffee, and went back to the second bedroom he used as a study and dug out his Minnesota atlas.
    Shinder was a small farm town of a few hundred people, ordinary enough, as far as he knew, out on the prairie in western