Free Gods and Fathers by James Lepore

receipt.”
    “I do. At home.”
    “The copy machine was turned on.”
    Crow’s face was pitted and rough looking, like someone had tried without much success to sand over smallpox scars. His eyes were dark and quietly penetrating.
    “I confess.”
    “What did you copy?”
    “My time sheets. I don’t trust the U.N.”
    “That’s all?”
    “Hey Bill… Can I call you Bill?”
    “Sure. First name basis.”
    “Is something missing? Am I being charged with something?”
    Davila’s tone was not disrespectful. He knew that he, himself, at five-six, one-sixty, with his scrawny goatee, did not look very tough. Not like Crow, who looked like he had survived Custer’s Last Stand. He was as tough as Crow, though, this he knew. But not now, he thought, stay cool. What you copied last night could get you killed.
    “What happened last night?” Crow asked, ignoring Davila’s question.
    “The guy came out with his cannon and sprayed the car.”
    “How did he know you were there?”
    “The guy in the Hummer must have called him, or maybe he looked out the window.” Or maybe they knew in advance we’d be there, ‘observing and communicating.’ That Mach .45 Ingram came out awful fast.
    “Fuchs has some questions,” Crow said. “A couple of things don’t line up.”
    “Like what?”
    “Like there’s no blood in the car, no other forensics. Like Loh was shot outside.”
    “Did you see the windshield?” Davila replied. “I got lucky, Nick didn’t.”
    “Fuchs is on his high horse,” Crow said. “But to me, what difference does it make if Loh was shot inside the car or outside?”
    “We followed orders,” Davila said. “The guy just came out and started blasting. No warning.”
    “Did he step over the dead body?” Crow asked.
    “He knelt behind it.”
    Davila had had no qualms about lying to Fuchs last night, and none about lying to Crow. He was not going to let Nick Loh’s death in the line of duty be blemished in any way. Nick did what a cop should do, try to save lives.
    “When’s Loh’s funeral?” the agent asked.
    “Saturday.”
    “That’s a rough thing that happened.”
    “Let me ask you something?” Davila said.
    “Sure.”
    “Why do you think they left the third guy in the Hummer?”
    “I have no idea.”
    “I feel like they knew we were there, that he was a lookout.” Like they knew about ‘observe and communicate.’
    Crow took a sip of his coffee, put the chipped china mug down and took a pack of Camels out of the inside pocket of his suit jacket.
    “You want one?” he said to Bob, shaking a cigarette free and pointing the pack across the table. Davila was sorely tempted. He loved to smoke, but his father and older brother, heavy smokers, had both died young of lung cancer. He had quit a hundred times in the last few years, the last time only a week ago. He knows I want one, the fuck, Bob thought, seeing the brief flicker of light in the F.B.I. agent’s eyes.
    “No thanks.”
    Crow lit his cigarette, and took a deep drag. “You think there’s a rat on the team?” he asked, exhaling a long stream of white smoke up into the air.
    Davila did not answer immediately. He was ready to leave. He had not spoken to Nick’s wife, Patti, and was heading to her house right after this meeting with Crow. He knew there was a security camera at the School Street building’s front entrance, but if there had been one in the small apartment they had been using as a command post, he’d have been arrested by now.
    “Why not?” Davila replied, finally. “The U.N. goes by quotas, doesn’t it? So there has to be at least one rat on every team. By the way,” he continued, after a short pause. ”Did you read the paper? They’re saying it was a robbery.”
    Crow stubbed his cigarette out and leaned closer to Davila, his hands clasped on the table in front of him. “Let me tell you why I came up here, Bob,” he said. “Fuchs’ operation is something we support very much. By we I mean