He turned his head in the direction of her voice and said, ‘Right here, Mama.’ His voice stayed pleasant, even complacent, but to Sarah he rolled his eyes to the sky and shook his head in a gesture that said, ‘She’s such a fusser.’
Sarah got up and walked to where the woman stood peering over the bushes. ‘Come in, Mrs – I’m sorry, I don’t know your name.’
‘It’s Pettigrew,’ the little woman said, ‘Jean Pettigrew. And this, if he hasn’t told you, is my son, Stanley.’ She was wearing a bib apron with a ruffle around the bottom, over faded jeans and a knit cotton shirt. Her short grey hair was permed in tight curls around her head. She cleared her throat and said, ‘I hope he hasn’t been bothering you.’
‘No, of course not,’ Sarah said. ‘We were just chatting about the weather.’
‘Oh? Well. One of his favorite subjects. Um …’ Her hands were busy making uncertain gestures. ‘Stanley’s been anxious to meet you. Somebody told him you and your husband were both on the police force, and he’s very interested in that.’
Stanley said, ‘It’s quite un … un …’
‘Unusual,’ Jean said.
‘I know what I want to say, Mother,’ Stanley said, and then turning to Sarah, ‘Unusual for couples to join up together, right?’
‘Oh, there are several married couples in the force,’ Sarah said, hoping to head off an argument, ‘but they mostly met each other at work, I think. They didn’t join together. And actually’ – this ought to take his mind off the weather – ‘Will and I are not married.’ She smiled, and asked Jean, ‘How long have you been living in the Dietrichs’ house? I haven’t seen you before.’
‘Oh, I’ve seen you lots of times, but you always look busy, so I never wanted to stop you to say hello. It’s the Pettigrews’ house now; I bought the place. Just Stanley and me, we’re the whole crew.’ She smiled at him fondly, edged closer and nudged his elbow, and he quit sulking at her and smiled at Sarah.
‘But you have an older woman living with you,’ Jean said. ‘Somebody’s mother?’
‘Mine. Yes. And my niece, Denny. She’s twelve.’ She considered a minute and decided to follow her hunch. ‘We all had special needs, so we moved in together to help each other out.’
Jean Pettigrew’s smile brightened and she said, ‘You see, Stanley, we’re not the only ones with special needs.’ She sent Sarah a conspiratorial nod. ‘We all find ways to cope, though, don’t we?’
‘We certainly do. We should get together and share some of our coping secrets, one of these days,’ Sarah said, standing up, gathering her laptop and cup. ‘But right now my break is over, I must get back to work.’ Aware she was being less than cordial, she smiled, managed part of a wave with her hands full, and added, ‘Nice to have met you both.’ She hurried back into the house.
Behind her, she heard Jean say, ‘Snack time, Stanley!’ From inside her open house door she watched them make their way back across the ditch to their own house. Dimly, she heard Stanley ask if they could have ice cream for a snack, and Jean reply that there was no ice cream, but she had a perfect orange they could split.
When Denny came home from school Sarah invited her mother and niece to the dining room table and poured lemonade for everybody. Seated in comfort in the bay window, she shared her afternoon’s discovery, that the ‘pesky neighbor’ Aggie had described, the ‘weatherman’ interrupting her afternoon siestas on the patio was a special needs person with a serious lisp and some mental limitations.
‘But he’s got one big asset, a loving mother providing home care.’
‘Oh dear,’ Aggie said. ‘I wish I’d known. I’m afraid I’ve been quite unfriendly toward that man. He just – his talk seemed odd and it put me off.’
‘I was pretty awkward with him too,’ Sarah said, ‘until I figured out what track he was on. I guess we all get defensive when people don’t conform to our expectations.’
‘You’d think by my age I’d be past that, but apparently not.’ Aggie pondered, tapping one hand with the other, and added, ‘His mother has a hard row to hoe, doesn’t she? He must limit her social life quite a bit.’
‘I suppose so. And she has the job for life,’ Sarah said.
‘Maybe I’ll ask her to have a cup of tea, if I see her out there.’
‘We could do that. Both of them, of course. Some day when there’s time.’
‘Yeah. Before the bulbs arrive.’
Denny schlupped up the last of her lemonade through a noisy straw and said, ‘O boy, you bought some of those new LED bulbs, huh? Can I have one for my desk lamp?’ She stared at their sudden laughter and said, ‘What’s funny?’
They brought in the charts and showed her where they meant to put the bulbs. She was delighted and declared her eagerness to help. Unlike Aggie, it never occurred to Denny to worry about the work. What she wondered was why they thought planting bulbs would interfere with asking the neighbors to tea.
‘But then she’s never had a backache, has she?’ Aggie said, talking to Sarah while Will and Denny did the dinner dishes. ‘Twelve is really a wonderful age.’
‘In so many ways. Sometimes I wish she didn’t have to grow up. I’d like to keep her just as she is.’ She looked at Aggie, at work on a quilting square under the light. ‘I don’t suppose you ever wished that when we were growing up, did you? You were so busy, you must have wanted us to grow up and help.’
‘Oh, no mother’s that busy. There were some ages … I remember thinking nine was perfect, for you and Robert both.’
‘My brother went through a lovable stage? Really?’
‘Now don’t start that. You and Robert each had several stages where I wanted to keep you as you were. But Janine – I was always praying for Janine to grow up. I still am.’
In this house, Denny’s mother is our special need. We’re all waiting for Janine to grow up and come home.
The story of the shooting appeared in the Sunday Star. It got only a few column inches but was featured prominently, above the fold, on the front page.
Aggie made a funny noise, a kind of angry gasp, when she discovered it. Sarah, making French toast in the crowded kitchen, heard the sound and looked at her in alarm, afraid she was choking. When she saw her mother, standing at the counter, slide the front page under the sports page, she knew at once what the trouble was. She went on resolutely dipping bread slices into beaten eggs and turning them on the griddle, but the morning had darkened for her. She had to work to keep her voice steady as she called her family to pick up their plates.
They sat down at their accustomed places at the table in the bay window, and tucked into the good meal, making happy noises over toast with maple syrup and the bacon Denny had so carefully broiled. Sarah barely tasted her meal but chewed like a soldier so as not to ruin the treat for the others. As soon as she finished, though, she walked out and slid the hidden front page off the bottom of the pile of newspapers and stood at the counter to read it.
‘Well,’ she said when she finished, ‘it’s not terrible.’ The very fair and balanced if not quite accurate account began, ‘Two Tucson detectives were attacked in the Intensive Care Unit at St. Mary’s Hospital Tuesday as they delivered an arrest warrant to a patient there.’ No mention of the fact that Jason was never attacked, but the head nurse was – that it was the attack on Judy, in fact, that had started the incident.
Would she ever be able to explain that to a skeptical board of enquiry? She read it again, wondering – did it seem like … like I just got hysterical and fired my weapon? Even knowing that was not the case, she thought, If I was reading this without any prior knowledge, would I wonder why the police had to shoot a man who only had a knife?
Still, it was not a negative story. It said two police officers had been attacked and had responded appropriately. Delaney must have been consulted and had defended his crew with a straightforward account. She had no cause to complain.
Absurdly, it was her picture at the top of the page that really bothered h
er. She had not worn the uniform to work in half a dozen years, since she made the detective rating. So why had Delaney chosen that old photo to publish? She’d always hated the way she looked in the hat, had kept it off her head as much as possible. But there it was, squashed on good and tight for some official portrait, making her look, she thought now as she always had, like a dweeby traffic patrolman.
Denny looked over her arm, stared, and said, ‘Well, you’re safe on the street, Aunt Sarah. Nobody will recognize you from that picture.’
It was just Denny being Denny, clever and humorous, but for a few seconds Sarah wanted to tear up the paper. She tightened her grip on the page she was holding and clamped her jaw shut. Then Will was beside her other shoulder, saying, ‘What have you got here? Oh, it’s the … well. Can I have it next?’
She handed him the section.
‘Why don’t we all sit down,’ he said, ‘and have another cup of coffee? Bring the whole paper over, will you, Denny?’
Sarah got busy pouring second coffee, Aggie began to denounce the state tax plan featured on the front page, and the moment passed. Denny got the funnies and giggled over Dilbert while Will read Sarah’s story carefully, handed the page to Aggie and said, ‘It’s not bad, Sarah.’ So then Aggie was able to read it without having a tizzy, and in fact said, as she put it down, ‘Yes, you can live with this, can’t you, sweetheart?’
‘Sure,’ Sarah said. ‘I lived with that damn hat for seven long years, I can stand another day.’ And her whole family laughed happily, because Sarah was being a good sport, bringing up that ridiculous hat. As if it could possibly matter to a woman who had just saved her own life by shooting a man.
EIGHT
Sunday–Tuesday
The rest of Sunday passed, as Sundays do – some chores, some shopping, a movie Denny liked and the three adults agreed was terrible. They were all together for the entire day, so it was possible for Sarah, at times, to forget she was on leave. Reality came crashing back Monday morning, when Will and Denny got off to work and school and Sarah stayed home. Aggie went back to her usual routine, too, taking her own sweet time to get dressed and eat breakfast in her casita.
Sarah carried a second coffee to the little desk in the bedroom, sat down in the merciless silence and opened her laptop. She brought up some notes about ongoing cases and began cleaning up the language and shifting them into folders. Always great to get the files cleaned up, she told herself as an hour passed. When she was growing sleepy with boredom her cell phone rang. She picked it up before the first ring ended and Will said, ‘Sarah, this has got to be quick, so just listen. Banjo got the M16 he was waiting for and tested it first thing this morning. I don’t know what this means to your case yet, but I just got word it’s not a match with those bullets he dug out of the van. But close, he says. So he’s still looking for the right M16.’
‘Oh, good. Not bad anyway. Thanks, Will.’
‘Talk to you later,’ he said, and was gone. Never a chatty man and really in a hurry today. Oh, I’m lucky to have him just as he is.
She went back to work and made rapid progress on the file sorting for half an hour. When her cell chirped, she picked it up absent-mindedly and said, quickly and quietly, ‘Burke.’
‘Hey there,’ a warm-sorghum voice said, ‘how’s my favorite investigator today?’ There was a lot of noise in the background, loud arguments, a crying child and a barking dog.
‘If this is Sergeant Bobby Lee Pratt,’ Sarah said, slowing down and warming up, ‘how I am is delighted. To what do I owe this nice surprise?’
‘Heard you had a spot of trouble.’
‘I did. Quite a big spot. More like a splash.’
‘What’s your schedule like today? Got any time to visit?’
‘Time is what I have the most of right now, Bobby. You know I got put on leave?’
‘Yup. And I was proud to hear you got through the whole first day without having a spasm. But, uh, I get off this shift about three. Any chance you’ll be home?’
‘If you’re coming to see me, I’ll be home, absolutely.’
‘Then look for me right around three-thirty.’ A click and he was gone, back into one of the chaotic street scenes he so enjoyed keeping under control.
She smiled, remembering the key role Pratt had played during that crazy first day at Fairweather Farms. She’d been doing her best to sort out the looney-tunes crime scene when Pratt appeared, smiling benignly with the manager in tow, and order began to emerge out of bedlam.
She abandoned her file-sorting and started to get her thoughts organized again. She wanted to be ready to give a clear account of the shooting to the unshakeable Bobby Pratt. Going over her notes jogged her memory and she added one more item to the bottom of her growing list: to ask DeShawn about the Russell Sexton name she had found in the shoe.
She was still hard at it when Aggie came in the back door. Sarah paused in her work to tell her mother they were due for company later.
‘You look a little nervous,’ Aggie said. ‘Is this man going to be judging you?’
‘Oh, no, he’s just coming to help, he’s not entitled to oversight – in fact, I outrank him now. Amazingly enough.’ She blew a stray hair out of her eyes.
‘Why is it amazing?’
‘Well, he was my field training officer when I started, and that’s kind of like first grade, you know. There are things you never forget. Like did you like your teacher.’
‘Did you?’
‘Boy, did I. He was so patient – but firm, too. He’d say, “You have to get this right, don’t try to fake it, your life is at stake.”’
‘Brr.’ Aggie shivered. ‘I’m glad I didn’t hear that. I was anxious enough as it was. Any time you were on a night shift, that first year you were in uniform, I got very little sleep.’
‘Poor Ma. I’m sorry I caused you to toss and turn.’
‘I was sure you were going to get killed on a night shift. My daughter, out there in the dark with the crazies. And now you finally have your big disaster in the middle of a sunny afternoon.’
‘Yeah, that’s law enforcement for you – full of surprises.’
‘But you say this trainer was kind to you?’
‘So good I couldn’t let him go, for a while. The first month after he signed off on me, I must have called him a dozen times. I’d say, “I should have asked you how you …” Something or other, and he would go over it again, taking his time, even though a lot of it was surely a repeat. He does a lot of bullshit joking – it’s his way to get people to calm down. But underneath the foolishness he’s a good, thoughtful cop who likes to help people.’
‘Wow. I don’t hear you talk like that very often.’
‘No? Hmm. I guess I am pretty critical. The job requires precision.’
‘I suppose.’ She got up. ‘Stay where you are, I’ll do lunch. Roast beef sands OK?’
‘Perfect. I’m going to finish this and then I want to run out and buy a couple of bottles of his favorite lager.’
‘I’m looking forward to meeting this teacher.’
Pratt had changed into civvies, so when Aggie answered the doorbell she got the full Door-full-of-Denim impression. Bobby Pratt in jeans and sneakers looked even bigger than he did in uniform. His blue denim shirt blocked out most of the clear blue sky behind him; his canvas-clad feet obscured the doorsill. And he was ready with his country-slicker charisma, bending over Aggie’s hand to say hello.
As Sarah came out of the kitchen carrying a cheeseboard and two longnecks, she heard him say, ‘Are you the Super Mom I’ve heard so much about? The one that used to ride in rodeos?’
‘Oh, well …’ Aggie said, but was soon persuaded to show him the picture on the front wall, of her holding a blue ribbon aboard Monty, her favorite barrel-racer the year before she got married. As soon as she’d said enough self-deprecating things about rodeo queens she declared nap time and retired to her casita, giving Sarah a little satisfied nod on her way out.
Sa
rah settled with Pratt at the round table, with the snacks and Sam Adamses. She opened her laptop and told her story, reading off the monitor at the spots where she wanted details to be accurate: how many feet away was he when he started the lunge? And the balisong – how big a blade? Humbly, she confessed how opposed she had been at Delaney’s insistence on getting a crime scene crew out to the hospital to measure and photograph everything.
‘Why wouldn’t you want a crime scene crew? You know that’s the best protection you can have.’
‘I know it now, Bobby. Somehow at that time I thought it was important that we manage the whole thing by ourselves.’
‘So the citizens shouldn’t find out we got killers on staff?’ His brutal use of the k-word took her breath away for a second and then revealed the hilarious wrongheadedness of her trying to keep the shooting in-house. ‘What, you went into brain-freeze?’
‘I guess. Been years since I had to actually use that Glock to shoot somebody – there’s a lot of stress, you know?’
And Pratt, who according to legend once brought a four-man burglary crew to their knees begging for mercy as they put the handcuffs on each other, said, ‘Uh-huh.’
‘OK, of course you know. But we were being very calm and helping each other, everything was going fine until Delaney arrived, and I guess I just wanted to go on making nice with my pals.’
Pratt enjoyed that explanation a lot, rocked back in his chair and had a belly-laugh, slapped his thighs and then high-fived Sarah as they laughed together. It was good to know she hadn’t thought anything that crazy for almost three whole days.
‘I just wish I knew who he was, the one I shot,’ Sarah said. ‘Jason took some car keys off his prisoner but I haven’t heard what’s become of the car.’ She jotted a note on her desk pad to add the keys to her list. ‘Gloria says the blood work’s done so they must be searching for a match on that, and the DNA report is due soon, so maybe we’ll get a name before long.’
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