“Yes,” Arnold said hoarsely. He nodded vigorously.
“You always told me it was bad for her back. Oh, and Daddy! How about this day? You remember?”
Charlotte was younger suddenly, her hair long and straight. She was slender, her nose freckled. And she looked worried.
“Remember how I was so nervous about defending my dissertation before the committee?” She held up a foil-wrapped package of chocolates. “And you said eat chocolate, Charlotte, you’ll feel better. And you sang that stupid song. About sex, chocolate, and females.” Charlotte tilted her head sideways, her laugh deep and gusty. “That song ran through my head the whole time, Daddy. It drove me nuts!”
Arnold’s smile was painful.
“How about this one?” Charlotte was plump-tummied and tan, hair slicked back. She stood at the edge of a swimming pool, the blue water shimmering with sunlight.
“I’m going to dive, Daddy!”
Charlotte was suddenly an adult again. “I don’t know why.” She shrugged, face full of good humor. “These are the ones that stuck in my mind.” Her smile faded.
David felt sweat prickle his palms.
“Here it comes,” Mel said.
David nodded. The psychiatrist had particularly warned them about the next section, which she herself had prepared and spliced in, according to the class four court order they had obtained. Class four was mild. There would be no sudden accusations, no surprise reenactments of the death scene. Which was just as well, David thought. Arnold didn’t deserve it. He didn’t deserve any of this. It was interesting, though, that Mark was in none of the happy memories.
Something somewhere didn’t sit right.
Charlotte’s lip trembled. “Why did this have to happen to me, Daddy?”
Arnold wiped his eyes with a handkerchief that was crumpled in his fist.
“Please, just tell me what I did.”
Arnold was shaking his head. “My fault,” he whispered.
Mel leaned forward.
“It was me they were after. It should have been me.”
David let air escape from between his teeth. No apologies. No confessions. Arnold’s pain-wracked face convinced him. Whatever was tainted here wasn’t Stephen Arnold.
“Take care of the boys for me, Daddy.”
Arnold was nodding.
“Take care of my babies.” She turned away, then looked over her shoulder. “Still one more,” she whispered, a half smile on her face. “The best one, ’cause she was there. You remember, Daddy? The night you and me—and Mom was there, too? The night I thought the moon was close enough to get to. I thought if we could just walk far enough, we could go and get it.” Charlotte’s voice softened. “I wish you could come with me, Daddy. Like we did that night.” She smiled at him over her shoulder. “Going to find the moon. All kids get that notion, sometime or other. When mine do, will you take them looking, Dad?”
“Yes, Charlotte. Yes.”
And she was gone. David caught a glimpse of a man and a woman walking over a hill, a heavily diapered toddler between them clutching both their hands, taking large and uncertain steps up a grass-covered hill.
TWENTY-FIVE
The funeral was a bad one.
Ogden had alerted the press pack—he would be there and he would make a statement.
He was magnificent, as always. His suit was sober and expensive, and his shoulders broad. He took up a lot of room. A cluster of cops stayed close.
“Oh, la,” Mel said. “Take a look at the queen bee.”
“These are not normal police,” String said. “Watch them. They are … they are protecting.”
David folded his arms, one shoulder higher than the other. He spotted Wendy McCallum. She wore a dark grey dress and a hat. Hats were popular again. She looked pretty in it—feminine and dignified.
She was flanked by two small boys. David recognized George and Mickey, Charlotte’s children. Mark’s too, he reminded himself. Somehow it was Charlotte who stuck in his mind.
The boys’ hair had been wet down and combed back, making them look fresh and young. They wore suits and shiny black shoes, new.
A knot of reporters stopped the three of them, clumping around Wendy McCallum, who edged backward. David got a quick glimpse of her white, panic-stricken face before she was swallowed up.
David turned to Mel. “Who’s doing crowd control?”
“Hell, I don’t … looks like Van Meter over there.”
“He’s doing a lousy job. Go over and see what you can do.” David moved quickly, heading for Wendy McCallum.
Her hands were tightly entwined in the small fingers of her grandsons, but she was answering questions with becoming dignity. It was the boys that worried him. Their eyes were huge and dark. They looked dazed.
David stuck his left elbow into the ribs of the man closest, then felt a prick of guilt when he saw it was Arnie Bledsoe—definitely a nice guy. David worked his way to Wendy McCallum’s side.
“Commander Ogden is arriving,” David said. He pointed at random to the right. He didn’t know the man getting out of the station wagon, but it wasn’t Ogden. Ogden had already arrived, and he favored limousines.
The reporters ebbed away. Wendy McCallum took a deep breath.
“Detective Silver. Thank you very much.” She bent close to the boys. “George? Mickey? This is Detective Silver.”
George extended a hand. David leaned down and shook it. George frowned at his brother.
“Shake,” he whispered.
Mickey gave David his hand. It was ice-cold.
Wendy McCallum was looking toward the street. “Law is parking the car,” she said. “Why are all these people here?”
“Curious,” David said. “And Ogden’s called a press conference.”
Wendy McCallum frowned. “Is there news?” She glanced at the boys.
“No,” David said. “When there’s news, I’ll come and tell you myself.”
“Thank you. I appreciate how kind you are.”
“He’s our departmental sweetheart.” Mel was loud, as always, but he smiled at Wendy McCallum and shook her hand. “I’m Burnett. Me and David work together.” Mel glanced toward the crowd. “It’s time you went in, Mrs. McCallum. I’m supposed to tell you your husband is already inside, waiting. We’ll keep the news folks out of the church for you, but the grave site will be something else.” Mel reached down absently, ruffling the hair of the littlest boy.
George gave him a stern look, and smoothed his brother’s hair back in place.
Mel nudged David. “It speaks.”
Ogden stood on the steps of the church, pausing dramatically halfway up. He turned and faced the cameras. It was cloudy and overcast, and someone was shining a light. David frowned. The light was held by a cop. Good job for a cop, David thought. No point in the man wasting time trying to actually catch these killers.
“Jesus Christ, he’s wearing makeup.” Mel grinned. “Let’s go see what it says. Maybe he’s solved the case.”
Ogden was looking concerned, but competent. He raised his right hand. “There is no doubt now that these killings are political.”
Mel groaned. “Here come de FBI. Thanks, Ogden, I love you, too.” Mel blew a kiss.
Ogden straightened his back. “I myself have received no less than three death threats in the last two months.” He swept a hand toward the men and women clustered around him. “And can go nowhere, without this security force.” He smiled bravely. “Whether I like it or not.”
“Surely got more than three,” Mel said. “I sent him one myself.”
David clenched his fist.
“We are close to naming names,” Ogden said.
A grating female voice rose in the air. “Are these killings done by the Elaki Izicho?”
Enid West, David thought.
Ogden paused. He gazed off to the horizon for a moment, then looked Enid West in the eyes.
“I cannot directly comment on that question at this point in time.”
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“But you don’t rule it out?”
“No, Ms. West.” Ogden looked solemn. “I don’t rule it out.”
David stepped forward, and Mel grabbed his arm suddenly, his grip tight and painful.
“Stay out of it,” Mel said. “It won’t do no good. Plus, one phone call, and he’ll have your career.”
“Welcome to it.”
Mel let go of David’s arm, and glanced over his shoulder at the crowd. “Where’s Gumby, anyway?”
“Missing,” David said. “As usual.”
“He’s getting damn hard to trust,” Mel said. “I wish I knew why I still trust him.”
A fine drizzle, barely more than mist, came in on the breeze. David hunched his shoulders and turned away from Ogden. It was then that he saw her—getting out of a limousine where she had been sitting—so human—beside Stephen Arnold. Must be a shortage of Elaki limos, David thought. If there was such a thing. Arnold held the door, and Angel Eyes touched him lightly with her fin as she rolled out.
David frowned.
“Blah de blah,” Mel said. He was still turned toward Ogden. “You listening to this? David, you—what?” Mel caught sight of Angel Eyes and Arnold. “Oh, ho. Make a nice couple, don’t you think?”
“They work together,” David said flatly.
Mel grinned. “You take me too seriously, sweetheart.”
David watched Angel. She was wearing a black jacket with satin lapels—expertly cut to hang properly on an Elaki frame. The jacket had no sleeves, but billowed out on each side, something like a cape. Arnold stayed very close to her. The press pack was getting restless. They picked up Angel’s scent, and moved, as one, in her direction.
Angel paused. She seemed oblivious, but David detected the stiffening beneath the scales. She could not be unaware that she had upstaged Ogden. He considered applauding.
She turned and saw him. Their gaze locked and she made a very small movement with her left fin. David nodded. She swept sideways and faced the press.
David grinned. He wished he could hear what she was saying. But the look on Ogden’s face was enough. And she had been perfect. Good timing, good entrance. He’d make a point of catching her later, on Enid West’s broadcast.
TWENTY-SIX
It was strange to be home. David parked the car in the barn, stopped to pet the calf, then looked around warily. No new animals. No ostrich.
Unless it was in the house.
David slid the barn door shut, noticing a mud-spattered Jeep parked behind the house. He stopped midstride, then went in through the back door.
They were sitting at the table, Rose and Haas, drinking coffee and talking fast. It seemed so natural, the two of them there, heads bent together. It was as if the last few months had never been.
“Haas?” David caught his breath.
Haas had lost weight, too much weight. There were deep circles of old dark pain beneath his eyes, and the blond hair was thinner. The deeply burnished tan on his forearms had faded, leaving the skin milky colored and splotchy.
“David.” Haas turned in his chair, a smile of pure pleasure on his face.
David felt a twinge of guilt. Why did the line “how the mighty have fallen” have to pop into his head?
Haas was moving slowly. But he was moving.
“You walking?” David asked.
“Show him,” Rose said. Her eyes were red; she’d been crying.
Haas lifted the bottoms of his jeans, showing ankles of flesh-colored plastic. “Artificial.” He touched both thighs. “From here to here.”
No wonder he walked funny. Haas shook David’s hand, but there was something dark in his face that hadn’t been there before. Something bitter.
“Couldn’t you wait? Couldn’t they fix it?”
Rose turned and looked at him. “David.”
“No, it is okay. You see, David.” Haas smiled apologetically. “It was not to be. I am at bottom of list. No medical priority. For each week nerves not repaired—less chance of ever working right, you see? And the farther down my chances go, the less priority I have. And I wind up back at bottom of list again. It is the old catch, you see. I have not the medical priority, they will delay the fix. And when they delay the fix, my odds go to no priority.” Haas sat back in the chair. “I cannot wait in these beds forever. In the warehouse hospital is a terrible place.” He smiled at Rose. “I am grateful to you, Rose, that you would try to adopt me.” He grinned at David. “It would be hard to be calling you Papa, even to get to the top of the lists.”
David grimaced. “I thought right up till the last minute there it was going to get approved.”
“Medical priority,” Rose said. “The only cop perk.”
“They’ll bury me free, too,” David said.
“Speaking of which.” Rose looked at him. “How was the funeral?”
David loosened his tie. “Sad.” Haas was sitting in his chair, so he hung his jacket on the back of Lisa’s chair, which, of the children’s, was the least sticky.
He poured coffee. “Haas?”
“Please.”
“Rose?”
“Warm it up.”
“You’ve been gone a long time.” David took a sip of coffee. “We didn’t hear from you. We were worried.”
“You were worried. Rose was not.”
“Why do you say that?” Rose asked.
Haas grinned at her. “Because I know you, Rose. You were not worried, you were angry. I think angry is better.” Haas looked at David. “For her, it is more natural.”
David’s coffee went down the wrong pipe. He choked and coughed, and Rose slapped him on the back. Hard. David sat and stretched his legs, back pressed against the lapels of his best suit coat.
“Ogden was there,” he said. “At the funeral.”
Rose groaned.
“What is the Ogden?” Haas asked.
Rose pursed her lips. “Commander Ogden is now officially in charge of the investigation. I told you about it. The cho killings?”
“I have read of this.” Haas narrowed his eyes. “This Ogden. He is like the Barton Cavanelli?”
“No,” Rose said. “Not like that at all.”
David stared into space. They were cryptic as always.
“More like a Jeanette Hisle. You remember her?”
“But yes.” Haas glanced at David. “When Rose is leaving Drug Enforcement Agency, and we first work together for animal activists. The time we rescue the gorilla. Remember, Rose?”
She nodded.
“Jeanette was Rose’s commanding officer in the DEA. Always holding the press conference. She would jeopardize personnel and job—jeopardize Rose—if she can make the DEA look good, even though what she does is pulling the plug on what Rose is doing.”
“You never told me that.” David looked from Rose to Haas.
“But yes. Rose was almost hit when we were in England.”
“England?”
“After the gorillas,” Rose said.
“But you weren’t with the DEA then,” David said.
“I know. But there were still several contracts out on me. Three majors. Lots of little ones that didn’t count, but three that did.”
“Three?” David said.
“Not unusual for visible agents.”
“Jeanette exposed her when she should not,” Haas explained. “Then claimed her own life was in danger.”
“Like anybody that wanted her fat ass couldn’t have it,” Rose said. “She never went anywhere without protection.”
“Rose, did you never show him the T-shirt?”
David looked at her. “What T-shirt?”
“Is black, with red target on it. A good-bye gift from colleagues.”
David frowned. “This Jeanette sounds a lot like Ogden.”
“Bureaucrats,” Rose said.
“The man’s got me stumped,” David told her. “We’ve known from day one that these killings are probably political. But the biggies haven’t wanted to step on any E
laki toes—bottom fringes—whatever. And the Izicho is a tense subject. Now all of a sudden Ogden takes over, and the first thing he does is hold a conference and say he’s investigating the investigators—then he hints it’s been the Izicho all along. What’s he up to?”
“Covering his ass, for one,” Rose said.
Haas nodded. “The change of command, and then he immediately supports what everyone already knows.”
“I’m sure he’s brave and no nonsense about it,” Rose said.
“You say he cannot accuse the Izicho?” Haas asked.
David shrugged. “It would surprise me to see the department going up against the Elaki establishment.”
“Maybe,” Rose said. “Maybe he’ll wave his hands and find a scapegoat. He pounding your ass? Telephone calls, pressure, looking over your shoulder?”
David frowned. “No.”
Rose smiled, but it was nasty. “Then he already knows who did it.”
“The only way he could know, or think he knows, would be if it is Izicho.”
Rose frowned. “Halliday understand what’s going on?”
“Seems to. Up to a point.”
Rose looked at Haas.
Haas turned to David. “Watch your back, my friend. And consult with Rosey. She is most good on handling the bureaucrat.”
“Oh, yeah?”
“Hold up a mirror,” Rose said. “Turn their own methods back onto them.”
“Rosey, you remember—”
David yawned. “Where are the girls?”
Rose gave him a frown that he knew meant she was annoyed. “Kendra is sleeping over. Mattie and Lisa are in their room.”
David set his coffee cup down on the table, and went down the hall to the children’s room. He heard a dog whimper, and toenails scratch the wood door.
He knocked. “Open up in the name of the law.”
“Daddy?”
“You betcha.”
David heard the sound of small fingers fumbling a knob. The door opened a crack and Mattie peeped at him.
“Don’t let the animals out.”
“If they want out,” David said, “let them out.”
The door swung open and Hilde burst from the room. She jumped and raked David’s pants with her toenails, then sniffed and licked his fingers. Haas’s laugh, deep and resonant, sounded from the kitchen. Hilde cocked her head. Her ears pricked forward and she pushed off David’s legs and ran down the hall, tail wagging.
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