Old Bones

by Trudy Nan Boyce

  “Come on, girl,” Wills said to her back as she left the table, walked out and down the hall to the library. She closed herself in, pulling the pocket doors together and leaning back against them. What if he gives up on me? she thought.

  Her eyes fell on the album and ledgers she and Wills had brought down from the attic. “Good Lord,” she said softly. She walked over, sat down on the floor next to the bottom shelf, and pulled out the album of old photos. A faded burgundy cord was threaded through heavy black pages and tied to the dingy, embossed faux-leather cover. The first photos were small portraits of people she believed to be distant relatives, all unidentified. One solemn man wore on his simple, plain suit what appeared to be a law enforcement star.

  Salt gently turned the pages, edges frayed and crumbling. The next page also held small portraits of formal and unsmiling men and women and families. She turned to scenes of people in front of meager, unpainted houses with exposed brick or rock pier-and-timber foundations. Children, faces pinched, cheeks hollowed out, sat with their legs over the edges of porches. The adults posed in open doorways.

  She heard Wills in the kitchen banging pots and pans, and the occasional scuffling and barks of the dogs.

  Toward the back of the album she began to recognize some of the faces: her grandfather alongside other men in uniform from World War II, studio portraits, hazy-edged, pink-tinted cheeks, women in pastel sweaters and dashing men, hair oiled and tamed.

  Wills pushed the doors apart. “Hey.”

  Salt patted the floor beside her, drew in her knees, leaned back against the bookshelf, the closed album in her lap.

  Wills sat down. “I thought you might need a minute to yourself.”

  “You?”

  “Just gathering my thoughts, trying to find the best way for us to do this,” he said. “What did you find?” He nodded at the album.

  Salt lowered her knees, letting the album fall open. She turned a few pages. “I don’t know who most of these people are, relatives, I suppose. A few I recognize.” She turned to the back. “My grandfather.” She pointed to the photo of him standing alone, tall and lean.

  “Go back,” Wills said. He leaned over. “One more back. There.” He touched the page under a photo. “Is this . . . ?”

  Salt looked closely. In the foreground were three white men in suits, one of them the man who’d posed for the studio photo with the star affixed to his suit. In this photo the star was barely visible, the photo out of focus where he stood. Also in the photo were two black men in overalls seated in the field to the right of the men standing. The photo appeared to have been taken from where the road was now, facing the slight rise up to where the foundation and frame of a house was under construction, this house. “This house.” Salt held the album, looking at the photo, turning the pages, trying to match faces, and then back again. “Is it inference or deduction?” she said, coldly eyeing the men in the photo, imagining their relationship.

  Wills took the album from her, closed it, and put it back on the shelf. “You do need to leave this house.” He pulled her to standing. “Let’s go take the dogs for a walk and figure out a plan to outflank these motherfuckers.”

  LYING LOW

  If there was a way to feel pale, as if her blood had been drained, that was how Salt felt. At her desk she completed the deactivation e-form and added it to the electronic file for Mary’s case. She printed the hard copy and added it to the red-cover murder book—red being the color for this year’s cases. Everywhere you looked were fire-engine-red books. She closed the file and rested her hand on its cover.

  She and Wills were together now only when they could meet without risking someone from the department finding out. A couple of times he’d caught a ride to her house with Pepper and his boys when they were coming for aikido. They had no way of knowing if their houses were being watched or if they were being followed. Someone in the department, high up, was eager to get her out of the way.

  She was frightened, not only about being fired, charged, and found guilty of a crime. It was everything: getting married, being reassigned if she wasn’t fired, leaving her home, even worrying whether Wonder would be all right without his sheep. And Mary. What about justice for Mary?

  “Let’s go.” Felton stood beside her desk, fedora in hand, coat slung around his shoulders.

  Salt rolled her chair back, silent, the muscles of her throat so tight she couldn’t speak. She got her hat and coat and followed Felton through the office and out to the reception area. Rosie beckoned with a long pink fingernail. “This too shall pass,” she said in a low voice, covering Salt’s hand with hers. Salt turned up her mouth in what she hoped was a grateful smile.

  In Felton’s unmarked they rode in silence, Salt becoming more and more self-conscious about her anxiety, which made it worse. She wondered if this was what it was like for her father. Staring out the window at the passing night, her vision began to tunnel, until finally in desperation she said, “I’ve lost my voice.”

  Felton steered into the empty parking lot of a church and put the car in park. “You know, all these years I’ve been in Homicide I never had a partner. The reason is because I had what old folks called ‘spells.’ Not about physical danger.” He turned to face her.

  Salt nodded.

  “I asked you to partner with me, Salt, because if . . . no, when my next ‘spell’ comes, you are the one person I trust to understand.”

  “Till the spell is broken,” she said.

  “There’s little anyone can say that helps.” He put the car in gear. “Now let’s go eat.”

  • • •

  After their meal Felton drove them to the Narcotics offices. He’d been eager to join Wills and Pepper in finding the source, the person putting on pressure to get Salt out of the way and why. Besides, it was his case, the quarry, that was being muddied. He had been pursuing what he now realized was the perfect smoke screen, gathering the lists of city employees who officially had access to the quarry. And Salt as his now official partner acted as if she were only marking time waiting for her next case.

  Formerly an elementary school, the Narcotics building was surrounded by a high fence topped by razor wire. Felton entered the code for the gate and drove through. They parked, walked through the covered walkway, and pressed the buzzer for admittance. Pepper appeared from down the lit hall and came to let them in. “Ain’t nobody here but us chickens.”

  Salt was already in debt to his commander, Mary Shepherd. She’d helped, above the call of duty, when Salt needed it last year. The seasoned lieutenant had fondly recalled a kindness Salt’s father had shown her when she was a rookie, and she took helping Salt as an opportunity to return his favor. “LT is on board and covering for me for as long as it takes,” Pepper said.

  Wills was waiting in one of the former classrooms. When the three of them came in, he took Salt’s coat, lightly touching her shoulder with his fingertips, careful not to treat her as if she were fragile but reminding her of his support. They circled some teachers’ chairs rounded up from other rooms.

  Pepper began, “I was telling Wills, my oldest boy plays basketball with Jarvis McPhee’s boy. Jarvis is a family guy, divorced now, but not a playa. His boy is all to him. He and I are not like every-day-of-the-week buddies, but we connect. He’s said nice things about appreciating cops, my job.”

  “Basketball player?” Wills asked.

  The rest of them looked at him without saying anything.

  “Okay, okay. So I don’t know sports.” Wills ducked into his shirt collar.

  “McPhee has said stuff from time to time—I never followed up—that he didn’t like some of the ‘action,’ was the way he put it, that professional athletes here are offered from time to time in some places.”

  “You think he could get you an introduction?” Felton asked.

  Pepper leaned in. “Right to the source, baby. Right into
the playpen.”

  • • •

  It was one of those bright winter days with the sun high in a blue-white sky. There was a chill wind, but when it slacked, the sun’s warmth felt like a gift. It was just her, Wonder, and the sheep in front of the house, in the half acre that she and Wills, Ann and Pepper, and Mr. Gooden had fenced with posts and lumber, now whitewashed.

  Pepper and his boys were on the way, but she had time to put Wonder through his paces. “Away.” She gave the command at conversational volume, his hearing keen, sending him wide along the fence. His outrun, circling the little flock, was flawless. “Stand.” He froze, staring at the five sheep, now huddling. “Walk up.” He slowly put one paw in front of the other, pushing the sheep to her.

  Pepper’s minivan threw up dust as he turned off the highway to her drive. The boys waved wildly from the back passenger window.

  “That’ll do,” she said to the dog, then knelt to wrap her arms around his shining black fur, warm from the sun. “What will you do without sheep?”

  • • •

  Salt trod the old wide-plank floors, listening to the familiar creaks and groans, mindful that these days might be some of the last, that every day brought her closer to leaving, to letting the house go. She inhaled the unique smells in each corner mixed with the overriding cedar from the shelves in the library.

  The boys slammed through the porch and kitchen doors. Pepper, hauling their gear bag, called out, “Hold your horses. Both of you get back out here and go in like you have manners.” Wonder danced around the boys, his energy a match for theirs.

  “You guys need something to drink?” she asked.

  “I’m amped enough. Water’s fine. Both of you go outside and run some of that energy off,” Pepper said. The boys yelped with joy and once again slammed out of the house.

  “Here you go.” Salt handed him a glass and they stood watching the boys, now at her tree, climbing the wood rungs nailed up the trunk. Wonder barked below as they climbed out of reach.

  “How’s Ann?” she asked.

  “Better now that I’m not on twelve-hour shifts. I also cut back on the extra job hours.”

  “That’s good.”

  “The boys will just have to make do with more of me and less electronics.” He unzipped the gear bag and shook out the black hakama and the boys’ white gis.

  She went to the bedroom, changed, then went up the stairs to the dojo and sat seiza waiting for Pepper and the boys. The boys’ shouts and laughter surrounded the house and filtered through the walls. She could feel the bark of the tree, the smell that surrounded the limb where she’d been sitting when she was a ten-year-old and heard the shot that killed her father. She sat on the mat, underneath which she imagined were still the faint stains of her father’s blood. As she turned from lighting the candle on the altar, Pepper and the boys bowed in.

  Theirs was mostly a silent practice. Pepper led by demonstrating what they should do and began their warm-up with rolls and falls; the only sounds were from their exertions and the swishing of Pepper’s thick hakama.

  The sun’s rays pitched deep into the room, lighting the bamboo wall opposite the windows halfway up. They practiced in pairs, mostly the boys as a pair and she and Pepper as another. Today Pepper was struggling to counter her, Salt making up in speed and ferocity what she lacked in skill and technique. He wore an expression of joy, eyes matching the curve of his smile, each time she showed her mastery. He let the practice go on longer than usual. An hour and a half later their faces dripped sweat as they ended their session sitting seiza. Salt’s face in the mirrored wall had gone from pale to bright pink. The scar along the side of Pepper’s face stood out in contrast to his dark, now slick skin. They each bowed to one another, then to the sensei’s picture on the altar shelf.

  The boys tumbled down the stairs, throwing belts and gi jackets as they went, Salt and Pepper picking up behind them. “That was a good practice,” Pepper said as they watched the boys run outside. He straightened his hakama. “I think it’s time you found an advanced practice. You’re ready to learn from another sensei.”

  PARTNERS

  Hand-lettered in blue marker on pink poster board, the sign read AME CHURCH ANNUAL YARD SALE. Salt turned the Taurus on to the small street and stopped at the old stone church. The cold month had continued sunny, allowing the church folks to set up tables in the parking lot. People milled, neighborhood hangers-about, church members, mostly older women, and Saturday-morning kids. She spotted Sister Connelly at the linens table and parked along the ditch that paralleled the asphalt street. Greeting a few people as she got out, she made her way to Sister.

  “Remember Wednesday nights when you’d come by here in your patrol car?” Sister said without any preliminary greeting.

  “In the summer the church windows would be open and I could listen to you and the choir practice.”

  “Always knew you were up to no good.” Sister grinned while fingering a crocheted tablecloth.

  Each window of the church depicted one of Jesus’ disciples. In one, St. Peter wore a cardboard patch. Alongside Peter were the windows of John, the beloved disciple, hands over his heart, and Judas, leading lambs to slaughter. Salt pictured the other windows around the building, Simon, Matthew, and James. This had been Salt’s place, where she’d come to finish paperwork or to meet up with Pepper—those days of fearlessness.

  “So, what’s got you?” The old woman asked. “That old man said you was going to leave your house.”

  “You and Mr. Gooden seem to have struck up a friendship.” Several times Salt had seen her neighbor and Sister out in back of his house, in the garden or with his chickens or cows.

  “He gives me manure for my garden.” Sister looked down at the embroidered pillowcase edge between her thumb and finger. “We went in his woods and found some mushrooms I’d told him to look for.”

  “You don’t have to explain.”

  “Ain’t.” Sister walked off to a table of lamps and glassware.

  Following, Salt said, “I’m going to marry Wills.”

  Sister picked up a fluted pink bud vase and turned it over to look at the bottom. “You need to get out that haunting anyway.”

  The weight on Salt’s chest let up some. “It’s been my home.”

  “No, it ain’t.” Sister put the vase down and turned to face her. Age had taken a few of the tall woman’s inches, so that now she was just a few inches above eye to eye with Salt.

  • • •

  In preparation for the unit’s move, Felton had cleared his desk and cubicle of everything: files, personal items, a rainbow flag, and the photo he’d thrown in the trash. The surfaces and fabric walls were all a monochromatic gray, which made the only object on his desk stand out dramatically: Glory’s red murder book. He’d kept it updated with the log sheets and lists of people who’d had access to the quarry; all of the documentation was to show anyone, especially Huff, that he was getting nowhere. The “King of Clearance” finally had a whodunit he didn’t seem able to crack.

  Salt sat in the vacant cubicle across from him. “This is ruining your reputation. You partner with me and immediately your clearance rate takes a dive.”

  He flipped the top page of one of the lists. “I’m enjoying the misdirection.” He unfastened the bottom button of the black vest he always wore and leaned over the file. “Any time I can bring bullies to justice, it’s a win. Imagine how it was—a gay kid named Manfred Felton.”

  A FINE BALANCE

  “She give me them shoes,” Lil D said.

  JoJo, worry all over her face, was on the beige-carpeted floor scooting one of Danny T’s trucks alongside the boy. “I don’t know, D.”

  “She ain’t like just any cop.” He stood at the door ready to go out to catch the bus. “I know La like you here helpin’ with Danny T an’ all.” He nodded at his son, who had picked up one of the books
Man had given him and was turning the pages for himself. “Man my homes. I ain’t gone lie to him.” Man had ways of finding out everything anyway. He didn’t know what Man would think, or do, when he found out JoJo had been staying with them. He didn’t know or want to know why JoJo was so scared, or who was scaring her. Maybe she didn’t even know. Maybe it was cops. “Salt always been straight. She even owe me.” Last year he came across Salt about to get shot. ’Course, he might owe her. He started thinking about his dad, Big D. “I’m gone.” He bent over, bumped fists with his son, kissed him with a loud smack, and was out of the apartment.

  • • •

  Wonder, snout on his paws, lay stretched out a few yards from where Salt was shoveling dirt from the spot she and Wills had chosen for the cedar tree. Wills was inside making a late breakfast. The dog’s eyes went back and forth between what she was doing and the goings-on of the sidewalk and street below Wills’ house. She rested her foot on the shovel. “Think you could be happy here without your sheep?” she asked the dog.

  “What will the neighbors think?” Wills came out on the porch. “My girl does the yard work and talks to the animals.”

  “Come on.” She motioned to him. “Let’s do this.” Wills came down the steps and over to her. “Hole look about right?”

  “Looks like a hole to me.” He separated the little cedar from its container and stood holding it aloft. Clearing his throat, he said, “One of us has to be the sentimentalist. So, Sarah Diana Alt, with this tree I thee wed.” He plunked the root ball into the hole.

  Salt hefted a shovelful of earth. “And we shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, that brings forth fruit in our season; our leaves will not wither.” She dumped the dirt over the roots. “And whatsoever we do,” she said, adding more dirt, “will prosper.”

  Wills put his hand on hers and they threw the next shovelful together. “What was that you were quoting?”