Eastern Wisconsin put them out of our reach, at least for a while. “Well,” I said, trying to make the best of it, “we can always let you beat up Toby.”
She laughed at that.
It occurred to me that, while she might be out of our reach, Jessica Hunley was now within the grasp of one Investigator Harry Ullman, Conception County's best. A silver lining, maybe.
I'd pretty much decided to spend Columbus Day playing catch-up with the case, anyway. That originally had meant interviewing Jessica Hunley and Tatiana Ostransky, the five remaining residents of the Mansion, and then sorting through all the garbage I'd dumped into the evidence room last night. Since Jessica and Tatiana were gone, I thought I might as well go straight to the garbage, to see just what we had, and then get to the five sometime in the early afternoon. Very early if the garbage search didn't pan out.
The phone rang again. “Hello?”
The familiar pause, and then “My name is Senator Tom Harkin, and… ”
Click.
I always stayed on just long enough to hear who the recording was. It was becoming a big thing at the post office, kidding each other about what important recording had called. It had kind of a baseball trading-card aspect. “Hey, I got two Colin Powells, but no Jimmy Carters.” “Really? I got a Jimmy and a call from Tipper. Beat that!”
I got to the office at 09:09, where I met Borman, who was standing at the counter and talking with Sally in Dispatch.
“Ready to get going?” I asked him.
“Not really.” He was acting kind of funny, not looking right at me, and obviously pretending to fiddle with some papers on a clipboard.
“There a problem?” I really hated to ask.
He didn't say a word. Sally broke the awkward little silence with “He's been suspended for a day.”
Well, damn. It had to be the warning shots from last night. “With or without pay?” was the first thing I asked. It was important, but not for the money. Without, and he only had one more screwup and Lamar would fire him. With, and he'd be able to erase it with good performance over the next three months.
“With.” He was honest-to-God petulant. Twenty-five years old, and pouting.
“Well, that's good,” I said. “Why don't you just go home, and come back in tomorrow like you had a day off?” He'd gotten off pretty easy, I thought, because warning shots were prohibited by department policy.
“He wants to ask you something first,” said Sally.
I looked at her. Her tone of voice told me she was at least half on his side, for some reason.
“Well, go ahead,” I said, remembering in the nick of time not to say “Shoot.”
“You had to tell Lamar, I suppose,” he said. “Didn't you?”
Honest. That's what he said.
“You shouldn't even have to ask that,” I replied. “Of course I did. I was present, I was senior officer, and it was my responsibility and duty to do so. You know that.”
Silence for a few seconds. Then he asked what I considered the second dumb question in a row. “I don't suppose you could have waited for me to tell him first, then, could you?”
It wasn't only a dumb question, there was resentment creeping into his voice. If I hadn't liked him I just would have told him to grow up. Instead, he got a bit more than he bargained for.
I looked at my watch. “Okay. Sit down.” He looked blank. “I said to sit down.”
He did.
“Deadly force is justified only to protect your life or that of another, right?”
“Sure.” He couldn't really say anything else. That was the fact of the matter.
“And only if there's no other way to accomplish that protection. Right again, no?”
“Yeah,” he said, “sure. Of course.”
I looked at Sally. “Since you're carrying a gun as a reserve, you knew that, too, didn't you?” She nodded. She damned well better have.
“This is for you, too. Sort of a refresher. The most dangerous shot you can fire is a warning shot.” I was warming to my task. “Let me tell you why. Number one: You have absolutely no business discharging your weapon if deadly force is not justified. It can't be justified, because you are making a deliberate effort not to hit the individual. You with me?”
He nodded, but was beginning to look bored.
“I'm doing this because I think you have potential, so listen up. Number two: You have no goddamned clue as to where those bullets went, do you?”
“I shot into the air,” he said.
“Exactly. Unless they defied gravity, they came down. Do you know where they came down?”
“No.”
“Damn right, you don't. In some departments, where they have more people and could afford to have you off for a while, you wouldn't get back off suspension until you produced both rounds for the sheriff's inspection. Did you know that?”
No, as a matter of fact, he hadn't.
“Number three: When the bullets stop, if they should because they hit somebody, it damned well isn't anybody who you'd be justified in shooting, is it? We had two reserves in the yard around the other side of the Mansion. What in hell would you have done if one of 'em had come down and hit Old Knockle in the head?” I waited a second. “How about an answer?”
“I don't think they went in that direction.”
“You don't think? Well, that's swell. Do you know?”
“No,” he said, “I don't know, but I know I didn't hit Knockle.”
“That's really lame,” I said. “But don't let's stop there. Number four: The suspect who got you to pop two warning shots may very well have killed Edie in the preceding twenty-four hours.” I saw he was going to say something, and held up my hand. “No, we're not sure. Just a good bet. At the same damn time, the son of a bitch had just slashed you across the chest with a very sharp object, and would have severely injured you if you didn't wear your vest. Right?”
“Yes, but that's why we wear 'em.”
He was starting to piss me off. “Did it ever occur to you,” I said, very slowly and distinctly, “that he was trying to cut your throat, just like he did to Edie? That he just missed because he was in a fucking hurry?”
He got pretty pale, pretty fast. Obviously, it hadn't occurred to him at all.
“So, he was still facing you, he cut at you, and you shot in the air. Assume for a second that you had hit Old Knockle.” I let him think about that for a second. “Can you imagine me telling Lamar that you'd killed Knockle because the man who probably murdered his own niece, and tried to kill you… ” I stopped, and let it sink in. “Now imagine this. Imagine that I'd said to myself, 'Carl, why don't you wait and see if Borman can tell Lamar on his own?' You with me?”
“Yeah.”
“And Lamar hears about this from somebody else. Before you tell him. Now, wouldn't that look like we were both trying to cover it up?”
“It might.” He looked up. “Yeah, it would. I'm sorry. You're right, Carl, you had to do it.”
I turned back to Sally. “You understand this, too?”
“Oh, yeah. You betcha.” She smiled. “Got it.”
“Okay, then.” I looked over at Borman. “Go home. Come in tomorrow fresh and ready to go.”
“You still want me with this investigation?” He sounded genuinely surprised.
“Of course I do. So does Lamar.” But I made a mental reservation. The sulking, plus the arguing, followed up by the sudden agreement and phony “… you had to do it… ” apology really pissed me off. Insincerity? Maybe. Whatever it was, he'd showed me a side of himself that I hadn't seen before. He'd also had Sally half convinced that he'd been wronged by both me and Lamar. That was a new talent he'd revealed, and one that I didn't want to see again. I still thought he should be on the case, because he knew quite a bit about the thing, and because I still had a good impression of him from before it began. Stress might be a factor, but I was going to be watching him.
My little stint as wise and fearless leader over for the morning, I collected Hester from the main office, where
