by Kit Ehrman
Chapter 21
I had been drifting in and out of consciousness for what seemed a very long time. I had no idea what the time was, wasn't even certain of the day.
Someone cleared his throat. I opened my eyes. Detective Ralston was standing at the foot of the bed. His suit was wrinkled, and he'd loosened his tie.
"How's Dorsett?" I said.
"Better. He regained consciousness yesterday morning."
"What about brain . . ."
"He'll be fine. The bullet grazed his skull. He has one hell of a headache and bruised ribs where his vest stopped the other slug, but all in all, he was damn lucky."
"Hmm." My mouth felt like cotton.
Ralston gripped the footboard with both hands. His fingers were splayed and his skin looked pale against the industrial-steel gray. He gestured to the bed and medical gadgetry. "Sorry about this."
"It wasn't your fault."
"I should have handled it differently." He glanced at the ceiling, then rubbed his face. "I shouldn't have let another night go by without setting up a detail."
I shook my head. "If I hadn't left my new number with the . . . guard," I blinked, "I'd be downing some Millers and watching the Orioles."
Ralston grunted.
I fingered the cotton blanket that was draped across my lap. The damn thing must have been washed about a million times.
If I had only stayed in the loft that February night. An hour earlier, an hour later, would have made all the difference in the world. Harrison might still have targeted Foxdale, but he wouldn't have cared about me. Wouldn't have become fixated.
My lungs felt as if they had collapsed into a tight ball in the center of my chest.
Ralston straightened and walked around the room. He looked at the IV bag, the monitors mounted on a trolley, the curtains that provided privacy. He briefly looked at my chart, then he dragged a chair closer to the bed and sat down. Light brown bristles darkened his chin, and his eyes were bloodshot behind his wire-rimmed glasses.
"Are you up to giving me a statement," he said, "start to finish?"
I nodded.
He had a tape recorder with him that I hadn't noticed. He checked the cassette and switched it on. "Did you see who shot Richard Harper?"
"Yes." My voice was hoarse. "Harrison did."
"Which one?"
"Oh, John."
He hesitated. "Do you know which one of them killed the guard?"
"No. Harrison," I shook my head, "I mean, John Harrison said that Robby cut the guard's throat." I swallowed. "Any word on Robby, yet?"
"No. His car's been recovered. The Virginia State Police found it disabled on 211, just west of Warrenton. What happened after you went to your friend's house?"
I told Ralston about the phone call and the rest of it, and when I was finished, I was exhausted. "I was thinking," I said. "Something Mrs. Peters mentioned. I think her husband reported Harrison. Maybe to the AHSA or--"
"The what?" Ralston said.
"American Horse Show Association. Maybe Harrison was scamming insurance companies, too, and Peters caught on. Or maybe Peters reported him to the Humane Society." I told him what Nick had said about Harrison whipping a horse.
Ralston scribbled the information down and closed his notebook. "I'll let you get some rest."
"Wait," I said as he turned to leave. "Did the horse make it back okay?"
He shook his head. "He slipped as he turned onto Rocky Ford and broke his hip. Had to be destroyed."
"Damn," I mumbled.
"I'm sorry, Steve." Ralston turned toward the door and said, more to himself than to me, "About everything."
The door swung shut and, in a moment, the resultant current of air swirl across my skin. I stared at the faded pattern in the curtain and remembered the thrill I'd felt when Chase had caught sight of that white, picket fence. I thought about the joy I'd felt flowing from his mind when faced with a fence and the torment he'd lived with otherwise. A sad, screwed up horse.
I leaned back on the pillow. More than anything, I wanted to go back to sleep. But Harrison kept getting in the way, and a hundred other things I would have just as soon forgotten.
On the sidewalk that night, as I had lain against the cold block wall, I had looked at Harrison's face after he'd died. His mouth had hung slackly open, his eyes staring blankly toward the sky. Raindrops fell on his face and trickled into his mouth, but what I remembered most was that his expression had been one of pure astonishment . His sick, perverted mind had driven him to take that last, his final, risk.