The Sunlight Dialogues by John Gardner Page B

scraped at his hand with her stiff fingers. “The Lord bless you and keep you.”
    From the parlor came Miss Editha’s sharp whisper, “Tell them Shoo! Go away!”
    Clumly bowed and gave the younger of the ancient sisters a wave. Then, closing his hand firmly around his prisoner’s arm, he marched Boyle down to the car. There was another car parked down the street, across from the Adams place, and there was someone in it, smoking a cigarette. As he turned his own car toward Main he glanced in the rearview mirror to see if the car was following him, but it was gone. He would not think about it.
    “Good people, the Woodworths,” Clumly said with conviction.
    Boyle looked at him.
    After that, neither of them spoke. Clumly scowled and concentrated on his driving. He’d forgotten that Bank Street was one-way now, the wrong way. He caught his own reflection in the windshield, a face vague with consternation, and thought of his wife’s glass eyes.
    5
    At quarter-to-eight, back in his office, Walter Boyle safely in his cell again, Clumly could not shake the feeling that someone was watching him, following him, dogging his footsteps. Salvador was off duty, Miller was nowhere to be seen; only Figlow and one of the cops off the street were in the front office. Now that darkness had fallen, the stack of papers on his desk seemed less obviously harmless. It might be true (it was true, of course) that he knew more about running a police department than Mullen did, but Mayor Mullen was a great believer in paperwork, and it was a bad practice to bite the hand that fed you. Figlow had given him an odd look when he’d come in with Boyle—almost a dangerously odd look, it seemed to Clumly. They’d been talking about him, probably, Figlow and Miller and Salvador and whoever had happened along. They might perhaps be talking about him now. Without exactly meaning to, merely walking around, as anyone might do, cooped up in an office, Clumly worked his way over to the door, where he could hear what Figlow and the other cop were saying. He could hear their voices distinctly, but not the words, partly because of the radio there with them, partly because the old, high-ceilinged room was full of echoes. He pressed flat against the wall and pushed his ear up against it, but it didn’t help. After a moment, scowling, he stooped over toward the crack below the door. He could hear better now, but still it was not clear. He glanced around the office, though he knew there was no one there to see him, then quietly got down on his hands and knees and pressed his ear to the crack. Now the words came distinctly.
    “Salami,” Figlow said. “Same sandwich as yesterday and the day before.”
    The other cop grunted.
    “I don’t mean just the same kind, I mean the same exact sandwich. She sees I didn’t eat it, she puts it right back in the lunchbox.”
    “You should throw it away, then she’d give you a fresh one.”
    “Hell no! I hate salami, I don’t care if it’s fresh or stale.”
    A silence. The wax paper rustled, and then he heard the sound of coffee being poured into the thermos cup.
    “Just the same, fresh salami’s better than stale. Stale can poison you.”
    “Not if you don’t eat it.”
    “Well, just the same,” the other cop said.
    “You don’t get the point,” Figlow said. “It’s a war, see? Who’s gonna give in first, me or her?”
    “You,” the other one said.
    “You wanna bet?”
    “She’s a woman, right? Give up, Sarge. You’re beat.”
    Clumly got stiffly to his feet.
    At his desk, he considered calling his wife. She’d be worried by now, though of course she understood a policeman couldn’t be expected home the same exact minute every night, like some grocery man. But the supper would be cold, and she’d be cross. Persecuted. He put his hand on the phone, squinting, looking up at the cobweb in the corner of the room, then changed his mind. How’d that cobweb get there? he wondered. He tried to think of