Kay wasn’t sure she had heard correctly. Didn’t they want to take Lunde alive? Who werewe? And who weremy bosses? She had a feeling she wouldn’t get any answers if she asked Springer. On the other hand, maybe Springer was making all this up because he would prefer a dead body to a live terrorist telling the whole world how he’d tricked Springer. Lunde had given the MPD and the JTTF all the leads they needed, but still Springer’s anti-terrorist group hadn’t managed to stop him kidnapping the mayor’s family.
Kay glanced across at Walker. He looked a little less upset than she did. Was it because he knew something she didn’t, something to do with having a top job at city hall, and knowing what it takes to climb even higher? Something about how not to trip up? Or was she just under pressure and seeing daylight ghosts?
“Give Bob five minutes,” she said. “Or I’m going over there…” Kay nodded toward the KSTP-TV bus farther down the street. “And I’ll tell them exactly what you just said, Springer.”
Kay wasn’t looking at Springer, she was looking at Walker. His head was on one side, and he was smiling at her. Notencouragingly, not happily, but proudly. And regretfully. The way he might smile at someone who’s done the right thing, something he perhaps would have done himself back in the day, when he had the guts for it. The way you might smile at someone you’d like to help back onto their feet, but when winter comes, and a place like this gets iced up, all you can do is look after number one.
53
Hunting Trophy, October 2016
“I made a hunting trophy for Karlstad a couple of years ago,” said Mike as he folded his hands behind his head. Like someone who’s finished a piece of work, thought Bob. “A buck he wanted above his fireplace. I didn’t know then that he was a local big shot in the NRA. I went to his house out in the suburbs to have a look at the fireplace. Wife, three children. Cody Karlstad had everything I didn’t have. In his opinion what we needed to reduce crime was more guns, not fewer. He thought the gun was our foremost symbol of liberty, he thought we should be like certain other countries, have an automatic weapon as part of our flag.”
“Did you hate him?”
“No. Actually I quite liked him. He seemed a caring kind of person.”
“But still you shot him?”
“As I said before, it’s about more than revenge.”
“The message.”
“Yes.”
“Which is?”
“That sooner or later the gun you forge yourself will be aimed at you.”
“And the dead are to communicate this message?”
“That’s what taxidermists do.”
“Do you really think people will listen to your message?”
Mike shrugged. “The noise level is so high these days you have to shout loudly to be heard. Which is why I hope people will understand my use of such radical methods. But those involved at least died for a good cause. Even that corrupt detective became, in the end, a part of the work of art.”
“Oh?”
“I gather an anonymous artist has exhibited him in Arb Park. Minus his head.”
Bob studied Mike’s face, not sure whether he was speaking metaphorically or meant it literally.
“What happened to the head?”
“Ah, I wanted to cleanse it of everything it has ever seen or heard. And done. Cleanse it completely.” Mike turned his innocent blue eyes on Bob.
Bob swallowed. “So now the head is…?”
Mike nodded toward his workshop. “The leather beetles are busy.”
Bob took a deep breath. Was about to ask the name of the detective but changed his mind.
“The gun. Who is it pointed at now?”
“At me.”
And sure enough, Bob saw that the barrel was pointing at Mike Lunde’s own chin. “Tell me, Mike—wasIever a part of the plan?”
