by Barbara Paul
My ears started ringing. I got up to get two more beers, a blatant diversion to keep the Lieutenant from watching my face. My God, how inept we’d been! How clumsy! And … what if Goodlow should see that come-home-John ad I’d placed in Variety? Stupid, stupid! I put the beers on the table and sat down.
“Another? Thank you! But you haven’t finished your first. Well, cheers.”
What should I say to this man, what response should I adopt? Righteous anger? Puzzlement? But he hadn’t asked me any direct questions yet; better just shut up and let him do the talking.
“It was a woman who called the Emergency Police number, you know,” Lieutenant Goodlow said conversationally. “The officer who took the call said she sounded educated and wasn’t in the least hysterical. She reported calmly and clearly what had happened and exactly where the victim could be found. And then she hung up. No name, and no woman in the immediate vicinity when the ambulance got there. Now why do you suppose she wouldn’t give her name?”
“A bystander who didn’t want to get involved.” It didn’t sound convincing even to me, but he’d asked me a direct question.
“You may be right. People don’t trust the police the way they used to.” He drank some beer. “They blame us, you know, for what the courts do. Or fail to do. There’s a child molester we know about walking the streets this very minute. A rapist. We arrested him once, but the courts have decided this upstanding citizen shouldn’t be deprived of his freedom.”
I knew a cue when I heard one. “Why?”
“Why, because he’s cured!” the Lieutenant said sarcastically. “Fourteen months of psychiatric treatment as a guest of the state, and he’s cured. And now he’s back walking the streets, hanging around schoolyards, parks, wherever children congregate. We have to keep a man on him twenty-four hours a day. We’re not supposed to, you know. He’s cured.” He looked at me. “Isn’t that just wonderful.”
I was beginning, just beginning, to see a flicker of light. “I think it’s inexcusable,” I said.
Lieutenant Goodlow leaned back in his chair. “And so do I.” His gaze turned inward. Thinking of … what? “And so do I,” he repeated. “We’ve grown so afraid of punishing a man for something he can’t help, like mental illness, that we’re willing to sacrifice any number of innocents to him just to keep our own consciences clean.”
The flicker was growing brighter.
“But that’s only half of it,” the Lieutenant went on. “Our revolving-door justice has led to another problem. Vigilante action. More and more people are reaching for a gun instead of a phone to call for help. Do-it-yourself justice. What do we do about those people? They’re helping us with our job, sure. But they’re breaking the law themselves. What do we do about them?”
He waited; it was my turn to say something. “I hadn’t thought about it,” I hedged.
“What worries me,” he said, “is that a pattern of behavior might develop. You play judge and jury once and get away with it, you start thinking that’s the only way to handle your problems. You see what I mean?”
I saw. It was what he’d been leading up to all along.
“It’s a real danger,” he said, “a mistake I don’t like seeing decent people make. It does something to them—gives them a feeling of power. Power that they might be tempted to use again—that’s almost bound to happen, don’t you think?”
I looked him straight in the eye. “No.”
He returned my look. “Are you certain of that?”
“Absolutely.”
“No doubt at all?”
“None whatsoever.”
He gave an almost imperceptible nod and then fell silent. For a moment or two he seemed to forget I was there. Who knows what he was remembering, what had brought him to this point. I kept quiet.
Abruptly he came out of his brown study and put his glasses back on. His manner changed: he became brisk, businesslike. “One of the investigating officers was wondering why you three broke up housekeeping so soon after Odell’s death. I said it’s probably just a temporary thing. Is it?”
“Why, ah, yes—”
“Cavanaugh and Gunn both will be staying here when they get back to New York? At your place?”
“Ah, ah, yes, that’s right, ah.” I was stammering; couldn’t help it.
“I thought so,” he nodded. “I was sure there was nothing to it. Well, I’ve got to be going. Thanks for the beer—I was feeling dehydrated.” He stood up. “By the way, that was a smart move, putting that ad in Variety. The more of you who group together, the safer you’ll be. The police can’t watch forever, you know—you’ll be on your own again before long. Any answer to your ad?”
“No,” I said numbly.
“Well, it’s early yet. Oh, you won’t forget those tickets, will you?”
“No, no, I won’t forget.” I followed him to the door.
“Good. Well, goodbye—keep your door locked.” He started down the outside steps.
It had happened so fast; I still had no point of balance. “Lieutenant!”
He stopped, looking back up at me over his shoulder.
There wasn’t really anything I could say. “Thanks for stopping by.”
He gave me a smile and went his way.
About the Author
Barbara Paul is the author of numerous short stories and novels in both the detective and science fiction genres. Born in Maysville, Kentucky, she went on to attend Bowling Green State University and the University of Pittsburgh, earning a PhD in theater history and criticism. She has been nominated for the Shamus Award for Best PI Short Story, and two of her novels, In-Laws and Outlaws and Kill Fee, have been adapted into television movies. After teaching at the University of Pittsburgh for a number of years, she retired to write full-time. Paul currently resides in Sacramento.
All rights reserved, including without limitation the right to reproduce this ebook or any portion thereof in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 1979 by Barbara Paul
Cover design by Jason Gabbert
ISBN: 978-1-5040-3237-7
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