A Tap on the Window by Linwood Barclay Read Free Book Online

well as a pen on a string.
    But the people who had signed, a considerable number, were not opposed to something, but in support. It was headlined:.
    “You can sign it if you want,” the kid said without enthusiasm. “Manager says I’m supposed to ask everyone.”
    I worked my nail under the plastic wrapping that hugged the top of the pill container as I scanned the form’s preamble, which sat below the headline, and above the names. It read: “We the undersigned are 100 percent behind the good men and woman of the Griffon Police Force and appreciate the terrific job they do! Our cops are tops!”
    I peeled away the plastic, popped the lid, struggled to remove the cotton. If I’d had only ten seconds to live, and one of these pills could have saved me, I’d have been a goner. Getting the cotton out of the way took the better part of half a minute. Then I shook out three red pills, cracked the cap on the water bottle, and washed them down.
    “You must have some headache,” the boy said.
    Holding the clipboard, I looked over the names of those who’d signed the top sheet, which was about half full, but didn’t see any I immediately recognized. There was a spot, alongside an individual’s name, where people were supposed to write down their home and/or their e-mail addresses. Not everyone had included this information.
    I flipped to the second page, which was full, as were the three behind it. About seventy percent had put down information other than their names, thereby making it easier for someone to authenticate the signatures, should they want to.
    “How many people who come in sign this?” I asked.
    The boy shrugged. “I don’t know. It’s mostly just the old people, anyway.”
    I smiled. “People like me.”
    “No offense,” he said. “When you’re my age, cops around here stop you all the time for doing nothing.”
    Scott had said the same thing, the last year or so. Not more than a week before we lost him, he’d come home telling us he’d seen a Griffon cop doing a pat-down body search of a girl behind Patchett’s. “She hadn’t done anything wrong,” he’d said. “Cop just wanted to feel her up.”
    I’d asked Scott at the time whether the girl was going to make a complaint. “She won’t do anything,” he’d said. “You can’t do anything about these guys. I don’t think he thought anyone saw him, so I shouted, ‘I know who you are, dickface.’ Scared him pretty bad. And then I ran like hell.”
    “You gonna sign it or what?” the kid behind the counter asked, bringing me back to the present.
    I saw a signature I recognized. “Donna Weaver.” I studied it a moment, even ran my finger along the page where my wife had taken this pen and signed her name.
    “No need,” I said.
    “You know what I think?” the kid asked.
    “Tell me.”
    “I think the cops are collecting these, and checking the names and the addresses, and figuring out which people who live here have signed and which ones haven’t.”
    “You don’t say.”
    He nodded wisely. “Oh yeah. That’s how they work.”
    “So I guess you’ve signed it, too? Just to be safe?”
    He grinned and shook his head. “Manager told me to, and watched me when I did it. But I wrote down ‘Dougie Douche.’ No way I’d ever sign something supporting these clowns.”
    “You’re not a fan?”
    “You ever had someone spray paint down your throat?”
    “Excuse me?”
    “I wasn’t even the one doing the tagging. It was my friend, but he took off, leaving me with the spray cans, when the local cops showed up. One of them decided to do some graffiti in my throat.”
    “That could have killed you,” I said.
    “Yeah, well, she just did a couple quick shots. Lost my breath for a few seconds. My teeth and lips were yellow.”
    “She?”
    Someone else came in to pay for gas. The kid grabbed the clipboard, told me to have a nice day, and turned his attention to the new customer.
    * * *
    I got back in the Honda, drank half