by Bill Hopkins
dangerous situation. She could’ve died. Would you hand me my glasses, please?”
Father Mike’s ready smile—what Rosswell could see of it—and his patience impressed the judge. The priest searched for a moment until he discovered the trifocals on the floor and handed them to Rosswell. Once he had put on his glasses, the priest came into clearer view.
“Judge Carew, is your death imminent?”
“No.” Able to see now, Rosswell studied the man’s face more closely. “It’s a superficial wound. I’m going home today. Or in the morning at the latest.”
“I can’t hear your confession, but I’ll be glad to talk to you. Let’s start with what Benita said. You have other problems?”
“Leukemia. I’m in remission, but if I don’t get a bone marrow donor or go through some kind of experimental treatment, I’m a goner.”
Father Mike moved the bedside table out of the way to stand closer to him. “You say you put someone in a dangerous situation. But did you do serious harm to someone?” He’d no doubt heard about Tina getting shot.
“Benita said there was a rule about death.” Rosswell felt like he was in grade school again with a grownup hovering over him while he worked on a problem at his desk. This must be what it was like to attend Catholic school. “She said all of us are going to die. I’m going to die.”
“Yes.” Father Mike pulled a quarter from his suit coat pocket, flipping it end over end in one hand like a magician practicing a coin trick.
Outside the window, a pigeon landed on the ledge. The gray bird, boasting an opulent white chest, ogled Rosswell, sharing a soft coo. It strutted up and down, making a clicking sound as it pecked the window a couple of times, then flew off.
Rosswell drank from his water glass. “I know I’m going to die.” He removed the eyeglasses and rubbed his face some more. Before speaking again, he put his glasses back on. “I hope it won’t be soon.”
The priest drew up a chair next to the bed and sat. He flipped the quarter in the air where it disappeared, folded his hands together, and contemplated Rosswell before he answered. “What else is on your mind?”
“What am I supposed to say?”
“Explain the things that are bothering you, and I’ll listen until you finish. It’s all confidential.”
Rosswell commenced, starting with the cigarette he smoked behind the barn when he was six, the money he’d stolen from his mother’s purse when he was eight, the sex he’d had when he was fourteen, and on and on in lurid detail, including Feliciana’s death and putting Tina in harm’s way.
Rosswell said, “All of those are bad things, but then there’s the big one.” Up until now, his list of sins probably sounded like myriad other confessions Father Mike had heard.
The priest, his face impassive, retrieved his quarter, seemingly grabbing it from thin air. “Tell me.” The quarter turned into a dime, then a nickel. Rosswell wondered if he did that in the confessional.
“I was in the military in the Middle East.” Rosswell punched the pillow behind him, trying to make himself more comfortable. The pain meds continued dripping, helping the hurt in his arm, although the dope wasn’t strong enough to make him lose control of his faculties. “On patrol, I rounded a corner where I discovered a little girl hunkered in a red chair with a bomb strapped to her.” Clearing his throat and wiping his eyes bought him a little time before he reached the big one. “She grabbed for a wire on the bomb and I shot her.”
Rosswell fell silent. The priest asked for no details, but also fell silent, marching the quarter through his fingers at a slow pace.
Rosswell said, “What kind of monster puts a bomb on a little girl?”
“The kind,” Father Mike answered, “whose mind I can’t understand.”
Rosswell removed his eyeglasses again. “I knew if she set that bomb off, she’d kill twenty people.” He wiped his face, hoping that his hands could erase the hideous memory. “I had to choose between shooting her or letting her murder twenty other people. That’s why I killed her.” Rosswell stared at the eyeglasses in his hand. “The bomb people said it was a fake.”
“God knows what was in your mind.”
“There wasn’t any choice. If it’s a sin, then I’m sorry.” He replaced his eyeglasses and scratched his thin mustache. “Killing another human being is never right.” He fell back on the bed. “I’m through.”
Father Mike shifted the quarter to his other hand and flipped it through his fingers for a few seconds before he continued. “God will have mercy on you.”
Rosswell hoped the priest would have solutions. Father Mike not only had no solutions, he gave Rosswell a cliché for comfort. The old saying that nothing in life is free is wrong. Just the opposite. If it’s free, it’s nothing.
Rosswell said, “I lost Feliciana because I was drunk and made her drive. I don’t want to lose Tina by doing something wrong.”
“God knows that.” Father Mike drew a small gold crucifix on a silver chain from his pocket. “I’d like you to have this. It’s a crucifix blessed by the Pope.”
“Would you put it around my neck?” It felt warm against Rosswell’s bare skin.
Father Mike’s cellphone beeped. He lifted it out of the holster on his belt, read the screen, and said, “Oops, that’s my reminder. I’ve got an appointment in fifteen minutes.”
The priest left before Rosswell could tell him that if Tina died, Rosswell would make sure he himself was right behind her.
Chapter Ten
Tuesday morning, continued
Frizz was right. Rosswell had accepted that he had no reason to be involved in a murder investigation. True, he’d found the bodies. It was also true that Frizz now had the impression of a tire track that may or may not be from a suspicious car, thanks to Rosswell. And Tina.
What Rosswell needed to do was relax, lie in the clean-smelling hospital bed, enjoy the dope, heal, and let the cops do all the worrying. Then, when he left the hospital today or tomorrow, he’d kick back and enjoy the rest of his vacation. Sipping coffee at Merc’s and listening to Ollie sounded pleasant to his drug-addled brain. Ultra sweet coffee and Ollie droning on would be the cure. Sitting around all day, working on a caffeine sugar high and chatting, staring out the windows at Merc’s, watching Marble Hill plod along. The perfect daydream.
The only worry he nurtured was whether he and Tina would be killed by whoever invaded his house.
That terrifying possibility stabbed him out of his stupor.
Outside the hospital, a distinctive sound signaled that a Harley had exploded to life, its two-piston engine popping. Rosswell knew about the Harley’s unique sound. A hog’s crankshaft has only one pin, and both pistons connect to it. The way the pistons are arranged, they fire at unequal intervals. No other internal combustion engine sounds like a Harley. On the street, the first motorcycle was joined by what sounded like another hundred. Then the whole flock growled their way to somewhere else.
Harley riders, their pockets filled with money, had already begun zipping throughout Bollinger County. The locals loved Harley riders. The couple of hundred riders might spend hundreds of dollars each, keeping the county’s economy healthy. Most of the riders camped at Foggy Top State Park. Rosswell hoped the clues were all recorded, because by now they’d been destroyed by the crush of bikes and riders.
The murder investigation wasn’t progressing. Rosswell needed to do something. Progress happens when you’re out and about, seeking a goal you’ve set. Progress doesn’t happen when you’re stoned in a hospital bed. That revelation kicked Rosswell in the butt.
He jerked out the dope line feeding the vein in his arm, tumbled out of bed, dressed himself, and gathered his belongings. Later, when he sobered up, he knew he’d hurt like nine kinds of hell. Future pain didn’t matter. He had places to visit and people to comfort.
He wandered all over the hospital. When he discovered Tina’s room at the end of a hallway next to a staircase, he barged past Junior Fleming, the city cop he loathed, and saw he
r.
The cop jumped up from his seat in the hallway and stood in the doorway. “Judge, the nurse said can’t nobody go see her.”
“Tina.” Rosswell leaned over and kissed her cheek. She stirred yet didn’t open her eyes or make any other reaction. He ran his fingers through her hair. “Tina, it’s Rosswell.” Nothing. She lay there inert but still alive. “I’m so sorry, Tina. Can you hear me?” Her voice could heal him. For the moment, he couldn’t hear that voice.
“Judge?”
He turned around to face the nurse in charge of everything. “Yes?”
“You can’t be in here.” The woman, stick thin and homely as a mud fence, couldn’t have been any older than Tina.
“Why isn’t she awake?” Rosswell asked the nurse, whose name tag said she was Priscilla Brewster.
“Sometimes anesthesia affects people differently. She’s just sleeping.”
“Anesthesia? Did she have an operation?”
“No, just a precautionary procedure. No one knew at first if her wounds were serious. The doctor checked her thoroughly. All she needs is rest.”
“I put this woman here,” Rosswell said to the ugly stick.
Priscilla pursed her lips. “From what I hear, she’s not hurt as bad as you were.” Rosswell thought she delivered the line as if it were some kind of moral failing that Tina wasn’t hurt badly, so why was she taking up space in the hospital?
“If you want me out, then you have Junior there arrest me.”
“Do you want to
