One Minute More - Softcover

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Robert Rotenberg is the author of several bestselling novels, including Old City Hall, The Guilty Plea, Stray Bullets, Stranglehold, Heart of the City, Downfall, and What We Buried. He is a criminal lawyer in Toronto with his firm Rotenberg Shidlowski Jesin. He is also a television screenwriter and a writing teacher. Visit him at RobertRotenberg.com or follow him on X @RobertRotenberg.

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Greene: 75 Hours More

GREENE 75 HOURS MORE

IF ONLY HE HADN’T agreed to take this foolish assignment, Ari Greene thought, he could have spent the long weekend sunning himself on the dock at his girlfriend Meredith’s family cottage north of Toronto. Or maybe the two of them could have taken a canoe and paddled over to their secret beach, where they could swim in private.

But no.

Instead, here he was heading down Rue Canusa, the main street of Stanstead, Quebec, a small town plunked squarely on the Quebec–Vermont border. His destination: the little US customs booth at the end of the road.

It was ten o’clock and the day was already warm. He opened the booth’s glass door, stepped inside, and heard it close behind him with a loud clang. The air in the small room was stifling. A red-haired border guard sat alone behind a steel desk that looked as if it had been there since Pearl Harbor. A metal nameplate on his otherwise empty desk identified him as Officer Trevor Hickey.

Greene looked around. The walls of the booth were painted a deadly dull shade of beige. The only decoration, if you could call it that, was a wood-framed photo of a beaming President Ronald Reagan and his wife, Nancy. The picture was too small for the wall, and it was hung higher than it should have been. The effect, Greene thought, was both absurd and sad at the same time.

He returned his gaze to Hickey, who gave him a look that seemed to be a toxic mixture of resignation and resentment.

“Good morning,” Greene said. He thrust his arm across the desk to shake hands. “Ari Greene, Toronto Police Force. I believe you were expecting me.”

Hickey gave a barely perceptible nod, as if to say he wasn’t going to agree to anything or even deign to speak to Greene. At least not yet. He made no effort to rise to greet Greene or to shake his hand.

“You’ll want to see my ID,” Greene said, pulling his hand back and retrieving his badge and police identification card from his wallet.

Hickey put his hand out for both items and, like a bored theatre usher taking a customer’s ticket before a show, glanced at them for a nanosecond. Still without saying a word, he rose from his chair. The man was tall and skinny, a long carrot-topped drink of water, Greene thought as he watched Hickey disappear through the door behind him.

Greene looked back through the glass door onto Canusa Street. A huge banner stretched across it announcing: WELCOME TO THE 1988 CAN/US JULY FOURTH PARADE. The sidewalk on the north side was filling up with rows of families dressed in red-and-white T-shirts, waving Canadian flags. On the south side, the scene repeated itself, with everyone wearing all-American red, white, and blue along with an equally healthy dose of American flags.

He heard the door behind Hickey’s desk open, and a moment later the border guard walked back in holding a piece of long teletype paper.

“Officer, would you mind rolling up the sleeve of your left arm?” Hickey asked Greene, breaking his silence at last.

He’s checking out my scar on the outer side of my arm to confirm my ID, Greene realized as he rolled up his shirt over his elbow. When he was a teenager, Greene fell through a glass door. The cut was so deep it took more than four hundred stitches to sew him back up, leaving a permanent scar. He had the habit of rubbing it when he was anxious.

Hickey glanced at the scar, handed Greene back his badge and his ID, and smiled. “I just got off the phone with Washington to check your clearance. You fit the description to a tee.”

He passed over the telex. Greene read: “Ari Greene, Caucasian, five foot eleven inches, 185 pounds, dark hair, blue-green eyes, right-handed, scar on left forearm. Police constable, Metropolitan Toronto Police Force, five years since 1983. Single. No dependents.”

Greene passed the telex back to Hickey without saying a word. It was his turn to remain silent.

“My orders are to let you cross the border during the parade, as you wish,” Hickey said. He checked his watch.

Greene nodded. He resisted the urge to rub his scar.

“They didn’t tell me why,” Hickey said.

Greene shrugged. He watched Hickey pick up a metal pen and twirl it between his fingers.

“Officer Greene,” he said, “I know you’re not at liberty to inform me of the purpose of your mission.”

Greene just looked at him.

Hickey pointed to the photo of President Reagan. “I also know that my president and the other G7 world leaders, and the Russian prime minister, are all gathering in your city, Toronto, soon.”

“They arrive later today.” Greene flashed his best smile.

That broke the ice. Hickey laughed. Clicked his pen open and shut, open and shut, gave a conspiratorial look around the customs booth.

“I for one am glad you’re here. For the last three years I’ve taken nothing but flack for trying to tighten up security during this parade.” He pointed through the glass door down the main street. “They’ve held this parade since the 1930s, and to the locals it’s the most important day of the year. As far as I’m concerned, it’s a nightmare.”

He pulled out a clipboard from his desk and passed it across to Greene. On it was a chart that Hickey had made of everything and everyone scheduled to be in the parade. It was meticulously detailed, each entry written in a tight, neat script.

Picky, picky, Greene thought, swallowing a smile.

“This lists what you can expect to see out there,” Hickey said, pointing to each item with the tip of his pen. “Sixteen floats, four marching bands, three police cars, two fire trucks, a bunch of local politicians, the Shriners clowns—all in colourful yellow upside-down clown costumes festooned with fluffy red balls, some driving in circles in their tiny putt-putt cars, others walking among the crowds. Those were the numbers last year. This year things aren’t as well organized. I tried. Believe me I tried.”

“Must be frustrating,” Greene said.

“No one wanted to listen, so now I’m grounded,” Hickey said. “Under strict orders to stay put in this booth until the show’s over.” He walked around the desk and came uncomfortably close to Greene.

This guy was more intense than a laser beam.

“I’ll watch from here and keep an eye on things,” Hickey said.

Greene nodded, trying to convey how thankful he was for the offer of assistance. But all he could think was: Calm down, Picky, it’s a meaningless small-town parade. And Greene was only here on this wild-goose chase to keep his boss happy.

“We’ll work together on this.” Hickey was speaking in a hushed voice now, still at close range.

“Sure.” Greene bit down hard on his lower lip.

Hickey took Greene’s hand and shook it firmly. “I’ll stay at my post. You’ll be on duty in the field.”

Hickey’s gaze was so fierce that Greene searched for somewhere else to look. His eyes wandered over the border guard’s shoulder to the photo of Nancy and Ronald Reagan. For a second, he thought he saw old Ronnie wink.