“Forget it, honey,” the nurse told her. “What ails these clothes no dry cleaner in the world is going to fix.”
With that, she started with what was left of Joanna’s panty hose and began working her way up.
Only when she got as far as the bulletproof vest and shoulder holster, was the nurse stymied enough to let Joanna remove them under her own steam.
Jenny arrived at the emergency room, big-eyed and frightened, as the doctor finished cleaning and bandaging Joanna’s stained and lacerated feet.
“Mom, are you okay? What happened?”
Two more people were dead - Amy Baxter and Holly - in addition to Harold Patterson. Joanna was struggling to figure what part of the responsibility for those two additional deaths was hers alone.
“It’s a new job,” Joanna said. “I think it’s going to take a while to learn how to do it.”
Eva Lou Brady appeared and said she was taking Jenny home with her and that she’d make sure the dogs got fed. “Thank you,” Joanna told her.
The phone in Joanna’s room rang almost before the nurses lifted her off the gurney and loaded her into the bed. “How long are you in for?” Adam York asked.
“Just overnight I think. How did you know to call me here?”
“I tried to call you about Yuri Malakov’s prints. He checks out, by the way. According to my sources, there’s nothing to worry about as far as he’s concerned. When I called your office to let you know, they told me there’d been a problem with you. What the hell happened?”
Joanna told him.
“Tombstone Courage,” he said when she finished. “Not a fatal case, at least not for you, but all the same.”
“What’s that?”
“Have you started reading that book I sent you?”
“No. Not yet.”
“Where is it?”
“Back at the house.”
“Have someone go get it and bring it to you. You read every word of that book before you leave that hospital. Understand?”
“Yes, sir.”
Marianne Macula brought the book to the hospital later that evening along with a suitcase of toiletries. Despite the disapproval of the nurses, Joanna read Officer Down all the way through. It was an awful book. An appalling book. One at a time, it listed and gave horrifying examples of the ten fatal errors police officers make.
Number eight was Tombstone Courage. Failure to call for backup. Adam York was right. Sheriff Joanna Brady had been guilty as charged.
It was Wednesday of the following week when Joanna had her appointment with Burton Kimball to make arrangements to draw up the guardian ship. Once she had asked Jeff and Marianne and they had agreed to serve, she didn’t want any time to pass before getting the details ironed out. Joanna knew now that lightning did strike the same place on occasion, and she wanted to be prepared.
She was due to leave for Peoria the following Monday to take her six-week county-paid training course, and she didn’t want Jennifer’s guardian ship hanging fire while she was gone.
When Joanna looked up from signing the last documents, she caught Burton Kimball staring at her. “I’m glad you weren’t hurt worse than you were,” he said.
Joanna blushed and looked down at her feet.
She was still clunking around with bandages covered by rubber-soled splints.
“I never saw Holly going after Amy Baxter until it was too late. If I had seen her in time, maybe I could have stopped her.”
“No,” Burton said. “Don’t blame yourself. It wasn’t your fault, any more than it was anyone else’s. Everyone did the best they could under terrible circumstances.”
“Was it deliberate, do you think?” Joanna asked. “Or was it an accident?”
“It doesn’t really matter, does it?” Burton Kimball said. “What does matter now is that it’s over.”
“Is a tragedy like that ever over?” Too many people were dead, Joanna thought. Too many lives were changed.
Burton Kimball sighed and opened his desk drawer. “I think such things can come to an end,” he said. “Ivy gave me this. It’s a letter she found in Uncle Harold’s safety-deposit box. She told me it was up to me whether or not I showed it to you.”
He put it on the desk, but Joanna made no effort to pick it up. “What is it?” she asked.
“It’s Aunt Emily’s confession,” he said. “To my father’s murder. She didn’t want anyone else to be blamed. She caught my father…” He broke off and couldn’t continue.
Joanna picked the letter up and read it. Afterward she gazed thoughtfully out Burton Kimball’s window at the gray mountainside. Finally she put the letter back in the envelope. “I don’t think anyone else needs to see that letter, Burton,” she said quietly. “You never mentioned it, and I never saw it. Understand?”
He nodded. “Thank you,” he said, and put the letter away.
