Countdown City: The Last Policeman Book II (Last Policeman Trilogy) Read Online Free PDF Page A

This has been going on for a few weeks now, someone’s bright idea that caught on: people taking turns, waiting patiently, a nonstop recitation of the things that we will miss about the world. There are two policemen, anonymous as robots in their black riot gear, machine guns strapped across their backs, keeping silent watch over the scene.
    “Ping-pong. Starbucks,” the speaker says. People hoot, clap, and nudge one another. A skinny young mother with a toddler balanced on her arm stands behind him, waiting to say her piece. “Those big tins of popcorn you get for the holidays.”
    I am aware of a sarcastic counterdemonstration being held onand off in a basement bar on Phenix Street, organized by a guy who used to be an assistant manager at the Capital Arts Center. There, people announce in mock solemnity all the things they will
not
miss: Customer-service representatives. Income taxes. The Internet.
    I get back on the bike and go north and then west, toward my lunch date, thinking about Brett Cavatone—the man who got to marry Martha Milano, and then left her behind. A picture is forming in my mind: a tough man, smart, strong. And—what was Martha’s word?—noble.
He must be doing something noble
. One thing I know, they don’t let just anybody become a state trooper. And I’ve never met one who left to work in food service.

3.
    “So this lady’s at the doctor, she’s got this strange pain, the doctor does all the tests, says, ‘I’m sorry, but you got cancer.’ ” Detective McGully is gesticulating like a vaudeville comedian, his bald head flushed with red, his throaty voice rumbling with anticipatory laughter. “And the thing is, there’s nothing they can do about it. Nothing! No radiation, no chemo. They don’t have the pills and the drip-drip machines don’t work right on the generators. It’s a mess. Doctor says, ‘Listen, lady, I’m sorry, but you got six months to live.’ ” Culverson rolls his eyes. McGully goes in for the kill. “And the lady looks at him and goes, ‘Six months? Terrific! That’s three months longer than everybody else!’ ”
    McGully does a big freeze-frame comedy face on his punch line, waves his hands,
wakka-wakka
. I smile politely. Culverson scrapes honey into his tea from along the rim of the jar.
    “Screw you both.” McGully dismisses us with a wave of his thick hands. “That’s funny.”
    Detective Culverson grunts and sips his tea and I go back to my notebook, which is flipped open on the table beside our pile of unread menus. Ruth-Ann, the waitress here at the Somerset Diner, has kept the menus meticulously updated, editing them week by week, scrawling in changes, crossing out unavailable items with a thick black marker. McGully, still chortling at his own joke, takes out two cigars and rolls one across the table to Culverson, who lights them both and hands one back. My friends, chomping on their cigars in virtual unison: Middle-aged bald white man, middle-aged paunchy black man, peas in a pod, at their ease in a diner booth. Men in the lap of forced retirement, enjoying their leisure like octogenarians.
    What I’m doing is reviewing my notes from this morning, remembering Martha, chewing on her fingernails, staring into the corners of the room.
    “That’s a true story, by the way,” says McGully. “Not the bit where she says about the six months. But Beth has got a friend, just diagnosed, forty years old, not a goddamn thing they can do for her. True story.”
    “How is Beth?”
    “She’s fine,” says McGully. “She’s knitting sweaters. I tell her it’s summer, and she says it’s going to be cold. I tell her, what, you mean, when the sun is swallowed by ash?”
    McGully says this like it’s supposed to be another joke, but nobody laughs, not even him.
    “Hey, you guys hear about Dotseth?” says Culverson.
    “Yeah,” says McGully. “You hear about the lieutenant governor?”
    “Yeah. Nuts.”
    I’ve heard all these stories