“Closure, Ted. Dr. Delaware and I would like some closure.”
Dinwiddie bit his lip again and tugged his straw mustache. “Closure,” he said.
“You took psychology,” said Milo. “Or was it sociology? Either case, that should mean something to you. Man’s search for meaning and finality in a cruel, ambiguous world? Man trying to figure out
He grinned and put his hand on the doorknob.
Dinwiddie said, “And after that, what?”
“That’s it, Ted. Scout’s honor.”
“I don’t believe much in honor anymore, Detective.”
Milo lifted the bill of his baseball cap and wiped the sweat from his forehead. Brushed away black hair and exposed white, sweaty skin, knobbed and scraped and scabbed.
Dinwiddie winced.
Milo tapped his foot. “Lost your innocence, huh? Well, bully for you, Mr. Clean, but there’s still plenty of explaining to do.”
A voice sounded behind Dinwiddie, the words incomprehensible but the tone pure question mark. The grocer looked over his shoulder and Milo took the opportunity to grasp his shoulders, move him aside like a toy, and walk into the house.
Before Dinwiddie realized what was happening, I was inside too. Small kitchen hot as a steambath, with white cabinets and counter tops of yellow tile laid diagonally and bordered with wine-colored bullnose. Open doorway to a paneled room. Yellow enamel walls, white porcelain sink, four-burner gas stove, a Pyrex carafe half-filled with water on one of the burners. Five big paper double-bags printed with the name of Dinwiddie’s market sitting on the counter. A sixth bag, unpacked: boxes of cereal, bags of whole wheat flour and sugar, sausages, smoked meats and fish, spaghetti, tea, a jumbo mocha-colored can of deluxe-grade Colombian coffee.
Holding the can was a boy wearing a baggy T-shirt and cutoff jeans. I knew his age, but he looked younger. Could have been a high school senior. Varsity letter in basketball.
Mocha-colored himself. Very tall, very thin, light-brown hair worn in a two-inch Afro- longer than in his photo. Full lips, Roman nose. His father’s nose.
Almond eyes full of terror.
He lifted the can as if it were a weapon.
Milo said, “It’s all right, son. We’re not here to hurt you.”
The boy darted his head at Dinwiddie. The grocer said, “These are the two I told you about, Ike. The cop and the psychologist. According to the papers, they’re on the right side.”
“The papers,” said the boy. Aiming for defiance, but his voice was reedy, uneven, adolescent in its lack of confidence. Big hands tightened around the can. His legs were skinny and hairless- cinnamon sticks perched on bare feet.
“I don’t want to talk to you,” he said.
“Maybe so,” said Milo, walking up to him and standing on the balls of his feet to go eye to eye. “But you owe us, son. You owe someone else, too, but it’s too late for that. At least this is a debt you can pay.”
The boy retracted his head and blinked. The hand holding the can faltered. Milo reached up and took it from him. “French roast,” he said, examining the label. “Only the best for a super-hip fugitive, huh? And look at all this other good stuff.” Motioning toward the counter. “Granola. Pasta- what is that, tagliarini? Looks like you’ve got yourself hunkered down for the long haul, son. Comfy. Lot more comfy than where Holly ended up.”
The boy clenched his eyes shut and opened them, blinked again. Several times. Harder. A tear rolled down his cheek and his Adam’s apple rose and fell.
“Ike,” said Dinwiddie, alarmed, “we’ve been through that. Don’t let him guilt-trip you.” A cold look at Milo. “Hasn’t he been through enough?”
Milo said, “Tell it like it is, Ted. Wasn’t that an axiom you once lived by?”
The flush had returned to Dinwiddie’s complexion and his thick forearms were lumpy with tightened muscle. He was sweating heavily. I realized I was sodden. All four of us were.
Dinwiddie tugged at his mustache and lowered his head like a bull about to charge. I smelled confrontation. Said to the boy: “We’re not your enemies. Once in a while the papers do get it right. We know what you’ve been through, son. The running. Looking over your shoulder. Never knowing who to trust- that’s got to be hell. So no one’s saying anyone in your shoes could have handled it any better. You did exactly what you had to. But what you know can be useful- to get rid of the evil that remains. Draining the whole swamp. Terry Crevolin’s agreed to talk, and he’s not exactly Mr. Idealistic. So how about you?”
The boy said nothing.
I said, “We’re not going to force you- no one can. But how long can you go on like this?”
“Lies,” said a brittle voice from the doorway.
A very small old woman, wearing a gray-and-pink print shift and over that, despite the heat, a coarsely woven porridge-colored cardigan. Beneath the shift, bowed legs encased in supp-hose ended in flat sandals. Her face was wizened and sun-spotted under a halo of white frizz. Big dark eyes, clear and steady.
I wasn’t surprised by her appearance. Remembering Latch and Ahlward’s reaction when I talked about their plucking her off the street and disposing of her body.
Blank stares from both of them. No smirking, no jumping to take the credit…
My educated guess…
But something did surprise me.
Steady hands in one so tiny and old. Gripping a very big shotgun.
She said, “Cossacks. Lying bastards.”
Clear eyes.
Beyond lucidity. A flame that had burned too hot for too long.
Ike said, “Grandma, what are you doing! Put that down!”
“Cossacks! Every Christmas a pogrom, raping and killing and giving the babies to the Nazis to eat.”
She aimed the weapon at me, held it there for a while, shifted it to Milo, then to Dinwiddie. To Ike, then back to Dinwiddie.
“Come on, Sophie,” said the grocer.
“Back or I’ll blast you, you cossack bastard,” said the old woman, eyes jumping from one imaginary foe to the other. Hands shaking. The shotgun vibrating.
Ike said, “Grandma, enough! Put that down!”
Loud, a little whiny. A teenager protesting unfair punishment.
She looked at him long enough for confusion to finally settle in.
“It’s okay,” said Dinwiddie, pushing down with one hand in a calming gesture and taking a step forward.
Her eyes shot back to him. “Back! I’ll blast you, you goddammed cossack!”
Ike called out, “Grandma!”
Dinwiddie said, “It’s okay,” and walked toward the old woman.
She pulled the trigger. Click.
She stared down at the weapon with more confusion. Dinwiddie put one hand on the walnut stock, the other on the barrel, and tried to wrest it away from her. She held on to it, cursing, first in English, then louder and faster in a language I guessed was Russian.
“Easy does it, Sophie,” said Dinwiddie as he carefully pried her fingers from the gun. Deprived of it, she began shrieking and hitting him. Ike ran to her, tried to restrain her, but she struck out at him, continued to curse. The boy struggled with her, absorbing blows, taking pains to be gentle, tears streaming down his face.
“Unloaded,” said Dinwiddie, handing the shotgun to Milo as if it were something unclean. To Ike: “I took out the shells last time I was here.”
Ike gaped at him. “Where? Where’d you put them?”
“They’re not here, Ike. I took them with me.”
Ike said, “Why, Ted?” Talking loud to be heard over the old woman’s invectives, his tall body canopied over her tiny sweatered frame. Trying to contain her with his spidery arms while fixing his attention on Dinwiddie.
Dinwiddie held out his hands and said, “I had to, Ike. The way she is- how she’s gotten. You just saw
