And yet, Holly held Amanda’s gaze as she reached over for the phone on Keller’s desk. Her finger found the dial. There was a slight tremor in her hand. She didn’t have to look down as she dragged the rotary back and forth. Holly put through calls for Keller all day long. She was silent as she waited for the line to engage. “Martha,” she said. “This is Holly up in Keller’s office. I need you to have a prisoner transferred to holding for me.”
Amanda watched her carefully as Holly relayed Dwayne Mathison’s information. She had to shuffle through the papers from Keller’s desk to get his arrest record, which had his booking number. Her hands steadied as they performed the familiar task. Her nails were short and clear-coated, like Amanda’s. Her skin was almost as white as Jane Delray’s, though of course absent any track marks. Amanda could see the thin blue lines of the veins in the back of the other woman’s hand.
She looked down at her own hands, which were clasped in her lap. Her nails were neatly trimmed, though she hadn’t bothered with polish the night before. The skin along the side of her palm was scratched. Amanda didn’t remember injuring herself. Maybe she’d scraped off the skin while she was cleaning her father’s house. There was a piece of metal sticking out of the refrigerator that always caught her hand when she cleaned it out.
Holly put down the phone. “He’s being transferred. It’ll be about ten minutes.” She paused. “I can call them back, you know. You don’t have to go through with this.”
Amanda had other things on her mind. “Can I use the phone while I wait?”
“Sure.” Holly groaned as she hefted the phone around. “I’ll be outside. I’ll let you know when they’re ready.”
Amanda found her address book in her purse. She should be scared about coming face-to-face with Juice again, but looking at her scratched hand had put a question in her mind.
She kept an index card in the back of her address book that listed the numbers she used on a daily basis. Butch was constantly leaving out details in his notes. Amanda had to call the morgue at least once a week. She usually talked to the woman who handled the filing, but today she asked for Pete Hanson.
The phone was picked up on the third ring. “Coolidge.”
Amanda considered hanging up, but then she had a flash of paranoia, as if Deena Coolidge could somehow see her. The jail was only a few buildings down from the morgue. Amanda glanced around nervously.
Deena said, “Hell-o?”
“It’s Amanda Wagner.”
The woman let some time pass. “Uh-huh.”
Amanda looked out into the typing pool. All the women were hard at work, backs straight, heads slightly tilted, as they typed the pages of a handbook that would more than likely be used as toilet paper by half the force and target practice by the other. “I had a question for Dr. Hanson,” Amanda said. “If he’s around?”
“He’s in court all day testifying on a case.” Deena seemed to lose some of her wariness. “May I help you with something?”
Amanda closed her eyes. This would be so much easier with Pete. “I had a question about the piece of skin found under the victim’s fingernail.” Amanda looked down at the scratch on her palm. “I was wondering—” She couldn’t do this. Maybe she would wait for Pete. He would probably be back in the office tomorrow. Jane Delray wouldn’t be any more dead by then.
Deena said, “Come on, girl. Don’t waste my time. Spit it out.”
“Pete found something under the girl’s fingernail on Saturday.”
“Right. Skin tissue. She must’ve scratched her assailant.”
“Did you analyze it yet?”
“Not yet. Why?”
Amanda shook her head, wishing she could just melt into the chair. It was probably best to just blurt it out. “If the attacker was Negro, wouldn’t the skin under the girl’s fingernail be black?”
“Hm.” Deena was quiet for a few seconds. “Well, you know, Pete’s got this special light. You shine it on the skin sample and it glows this kind of orange if it’s from a Negro.”
“Really?” Amanda had never heard of such a thing. “Did he test the skin yet? Because I think—”
At first, she thought Deena was crying. Then Amanda realized the woman was laughing so hard that she had started gulping for air.
“Oh, very funny,” Amanda said. “I’m hanging up now.”
“No, wait—” Deena was still laughing, though she was obviously trying to get it under control. “Wait. Don’t hang up.” She kept laughing. Amanda looked down at Keller’s desk. Cigarette butts spilled out of the ashtray. His coffee cup was rimmed in an orange nicotine stain. “Okay,” Deena said. “All right.” And then she started laughing again.
“I’m really hanging up now.”
“No, wait.” She coughed a few times. “I’m good now. I’m good.”
“I was asking a sincere question.”
“I know you were, honey. I know.” She coughed again. “Listen, you know that Pure and Simple lotion ad, shows the different layers of skin?”
Amanda couldn’t tell whether or not she was setting up another joke.
“I’m serious, girl. Listen to me.”
“Okay, I know the ad.”
“The skin basically has three layers. All right?”
“All right.”
“Usually, when you scratch someone, you get the upper dermis, which is white no matter who you are. In order to get the pigmented layer of skin, the black part, you’d have to scratch to the subcutis, which means the fingernail would have to go deep enough to cause some serious bleeding. And it wouldn’t be a sliver of skin you’d have to scrape out from under the fingernail. It’d be a chunk.”
Amanda detected Pete’s patient teaching tone in the woman’s words. “So, there’s no way to tell if the girl from Friday scratched a black assailant or a white one?”
Deena was quiet again, though this time, she wasn’t laughing. “You’re talking about that pimp they arrested for killing that white girl, aren’t you?”
Amanda saw a guard standing by Holly’s desk. He was gangly, with an untrimmed mustache and dark hair. Holly waved Amanda over. Juice was ready.
“Amanda?” Deena asked. “I’m not playing now. You best think about what you’re doing.”
“I assumed you’d be eager to help one of your own kind.”
“That murdering bastard ain’t got nothing to do with me.” She lowered her voice. “I’m eager to keep my head attached to my shoulders, is what I am.”
“Well, thank you for answering my question.”
“Wait.”
Holly’s waving took on an urgency. She was probably afraid Keller would return. Amanda held up her finger, indicating she needed a minute. “What is it?”
“Be careful. The same people protecting you right now are gonna be the same ones coming after you when they find out what you’re doing.”
There was a long silence after that. Both of them reflected on the words.
“Thank you.” Amanda tried not to read anything into Deena’s gruff goodbye. She hung up the phone. Her heart was thumping in her chest. The woman was right. Duke would be furious if he knew what Amanda was doing. So would Keller. So would Butch and Landry and possibly Hodge. Add the whole department to that if they found out she was trying to help a black man get out of jail. A black man who’d already confessed to murder.
Holly came to the doorway. “Hurry up, Mandy. Phillip’s going to take you down and stay with you.” She lowered her voice. “He’s not so bad.”
Amanda felt the urge to flee. Her bravado was going up and down like a piston engine. “I’m ready.”
She stood from the desk. She forced a smile onto her face as Phillip came into the office. He was wearing the dark blue uniform of the prison guards, a set of keys hanging from one side of his belt and a nightstick dangling from the other.
He was younger than Amanda, but he talked to her as if she was a child. “You sure you wanna be doing this, gal?”
Amanda swallowed past the lump in her throat. She wished that Evelyn were there to give her strength. Then
