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Purity, Maine, 1972

On the last day of his life, Purity police officer Randy Pelletier ordered a cup of coffee and a blueberry muffin at the Marigold Café.

It was what he always ordered after getting off the night shift, his reward to himself for the lonely hours spent in his cruiser, keeping the streets and back roads of his town safe from drunk drivers, speeding tourists, and the occasional rabid raccoon. He sat at his usual corner table next to the window, where he could enjoy the warmth of the morning sun while keeping an eye on the activity on Main Street. A good cop never stopped being watchful, even while off duty. Just as important, people walking past the café could see him in the window, keeping an eye on things. Visibility was important to the community, and if any problems arose, the town knew exactly where to find their local peace officer: sitting right here, at the window table in the Marigold.

“Refill?” said the waitress, her coffeepot poised over his cup.

“Sure thing, Carla.”

“How was it last night?” she asked, pouring her usual rich, black brew.

“Pretty quiet.”

She laughed. “And we like it that way!”

“We sure do.”

“Why don’t I bring you another muffin? Fresh batch just came out of the oven.”

His waistline might not appreciate it, but his growling stomach would, so he didn’t refuse her. Who could refuse Carla, who kept the town well supplied with gossip and baked goods? As she went back to the kitchen, he unfolded his copy of the latest Purity Weekly and scanned the headlines on the front page: Summer Reservations Hit Record High ... Black Bear Sighted on Oak Street ... Car Crash Sends Two to Hospital . He turned the page to the local police blotter, on page three. Not that he needed to read it; he already knew the details of just about every traffic citation, every 911 call, over the past week.

Cory, James, Boston, MA: speeding

Simpson, Richard, Purity, ME: expired registration

Allen, Jonathan, Augusta, ME: public drunkenness

Wiedemann, Scott, Albany, NY: public urination

All in all, a typical week in July, when half the people in town were tourists from away, here on vacation, uninhibited and often drunk. Every summer they invaded, from Massachusetts and New York and beyond, streaming into Maine to escape the heat and stink of their cities. It was Randy’s job to keep them from hurting themselves or others and then to wave them back home, hopefully with their wallets a little lighter.

The doorbell tinkled. Randy looked up to see two of those out-of-towners walk into the Marigold. He knew the two men weren’t locals because they were both wearing black leather jackets when it was almost seventy degrees outside. They paused inside the door and scanned the café as if casing the room. They spotted Randy and momentarily froze.

That’s right, gentlemen. Law enforcement was watching.

“Table for you boys?” said Carla. A fellow could be eighty years old, and not only would Carla still call him a boy, she wouldn’t be above whacking him on the behind for bad behavior.

“Um, yeah,” one of the men finally said.

Randy watched as Carla led them a few tables away, close enough for him to keep an eye on them. They both picked up plastic menus and studied the breakfast offerings a trifle too intently, as if trying to avoid Randy’s gaze. Another detail that made him think these two bore closer watching. He was more accustomed to dealing with rowdy teenagers and drunk drivers, but he knew that big trouble sometimes found its way even to small towns, and he liked to think he was ready to handle it. He could even imagine the headline, splashed across the Purity Weekly . No, make that the Boston Globe :

Maine Police Officer Single-Handedly Captures Wanted Duo

He didn’t know if these men were armed, but it never hurt to be prepared, so he reached down and quietly unsnapped his holster. They were studying the menu, which was only a page long and offered nothing more exotic than French toast and fried eggs. It was yet another clue that something was not right about this pair.

The shorter man suddenly glanced over his menu at Randy. It was just a flick of his eyes, but in that instant, their gazes connected. Held. In the periphery of his vision, Randy saw Carla walking back toward their table, coffeepot in hand. Heard the roar of an engine on Main Street.

He was so focused on the two men that he did not see the white van streak past the window.

He heard the screech of tires, the sickening bang of metal slamming into metal, and he turned to the window. Saw shattered glass littering the street, and—sweet Jesus, was that a body ?

“Oh my God!” cried Carla, still clutching the coffeepot as she stared out the window.

Randy scrambled to his feet and ran out of the Marigold. The first body lay only a few yards away in a spreading pool of blood. It was a man, his spine so grotesquely twisted that he looked like he’d been taken apart and reconstructed all wrong, his feet pointing backward. Across the street was another body, a woman, her pink blouse shorn open, one ripe breast indecently exposed for all to see. Randy dragged his attention away from the bodies and looked down the street, toward the sound of a blaring horn. A third body was splayed across the road—another woman, this one with her chest cage crushed almost flat, oranges and apples spilling from her shopping bag.

At the end of the block was a white van, its front end embedded in the side of a parked blue sedan.

The world around him seemed to halt on its axis. He moved past horrified pedestrians, their hands clapped over their mouths, past the two men in leather jackets, who’d followed him out of the café and now stood with mouths agape in horror. Through the freeze-frame of carnage, across shattered glass and blood-spattered pavement, Randy alone seemed to be in motion. As he drew closer to the crashed vehicles, he saw Tarkin Fine Carpentry printed on the white van. He knew this van. He knew the driver. Black smoke was rising from the engine, a terrifying harbinger of more disaster.

Through the driver’s window, he saw Sam Tarkin tilted forward, face down against the steering wheel. Randy yanked open the door. He couldn’t see any blood, any obvious injuries, but Sam was moaning, shaking.

Randy reached across Sam’s lap and released the seat belt. “You need to get out!” Randy yelled. “Sam? Sam!”

Suddenly Sam’s head snapped up, and Randy stared at a man who looked like Sam Tarkin, with Sam’s dark hair, Sam’s angular face, but the eyes ... what was wrong with his eyes? The pupils were dilated to black, bottomless pools. An alien’s eyes. No, this sweating, shaking creature looked like someone else. Something else.

Randy glanced at the black smoke billowing out. He had to get him out, now. He grabbed Sam’s arm and pulled.

“Get away!” Sam shrieked. “Get away from me!” He clawed at Randy, and his fingernails gouged flesh.

Face throbbing, Randy jerked away and felt blood trickle down his cheek. What the hell, man? Enraged now, he wrenched Sam out of the van, and they both went sprawling onto the pavement. Even then, Sam kept fighting him, thrashing. Desperate to control the man, Randy grabbed Sam’s throat with both hands and squeezed. He squeezed so hard that Sam’s eyes bugged out and his face darkened to a horrifying shade of purple.

“Stop it!” Randy yelled. “Stop fighting me!”

He did not feel Sam reach for his holster—the holster he’d already unsnapped. Suddenly there it was, staring at him: the barrel of his own gun.

“Don’t,” he said. “Sam, don’t.”

But it was not Sam Tarkin looking back at him.

And it was not Sam Tarkin who pulled the trigger.