spleen.'
'I shot hun,' Jacob said, looking from one policeman to the other.
'Jake,' his brother said. 'I don't think you should say any more.'
'According to the paramedics, you also saved his life in the ambulance,' said Acardo.
'Thank God,' said Isaac Berry, patting his brother's hand.
'Sorry to do this, Doctor,' Applegate said, 'but we've got to read you your rights.'
'Wait a minute…' Isaac Berry said, rising from the vinyl seat that whooshed as he left it 'No,' his brother countered.
'They would have killed my brother if he didn't have that gun,' Isaac insisted.
'Officer Matthews disrupted the robbery, not Dr. Berry,' said Applegate evenly. 'We're not really here to argue the merits of the charges, just to deliver them.'
Acardo droned off the Miranda while Isaac Berry did his best to look angry and the still-seated Jacob Berry looked through (he window over the shoulder of the pretty Hispanic woman.
'Possession and firing of an illegal weapon,' Applegate said. 'Assault with said weapon. Assault-'
'Wait,' said Isaac. 'Assault with a deadly weapon?'
'Charge has been brought by one Albert Davis, one of the three men who entered your brother's office this morning. He claims he was unarmed and Dr. Berry shot him. My guess is that Officer Matthews shot him, but we'll see when they finish getting the bullet out of Davis's leg.'
'This is crazy,' said Isaac Berry, raising his voice. 'A man comes into my brother's officer to rob and maybe kill him. The man gets shot and he wants Jacob to… He can't do that.'
'I'm afraid he can,' said Applegate. 'Was he unarmed, Dr. Berry?'
'Don't answer him, Jacob,' Isaac said.
'The little one with the crazy face had the gun,' said Jacob dully. 'One of them, I can't remember which, had a… the heavy one-he had the knife.'
'You sure?' asked Acardo.
'I'm sure.'
'You're going to have to come to the station with us, Doc,' said Acardo, looking at both doctors to be sure there would be no trouble.
'Fine,' said Jacob, rising slowly with Applegate's help.
'Jake, don't say anything more, not a word. I'll have a lawyer at the station as fast as I can.'
'I think we should go now, Doctor,' Applegate said gently.
'This is illegal, a clear violation of my brother's rights,' Isaac insisted.
'No, sir,' said Applegate. 'It may not seem fair to you, but it's perfectly legal.'
'How would you know? Are you a lawyer?' Isaac said, stepping between the detectives and the exit to the waiting room.
'Yes, he is,' said Acardo.
'DePaul University Law School, nineteen-eighty-four,' said Applegate. 'Now, I know you're distraught, but if you even touch one of us, you will be obstructing justice and we'll have to fill out a lot of papers and this could get very complicated.'
'Isaac, please. It'll be all right,' Jacob Berry said, touching his brother's arm.
'Oh, Jake, what'd I do? I talked you into coming to this goddamn city and now…'
'I'll be all right,' Jacob said, moving toward the door with the two policemen. 'The officer's not dead. He saved my life and I shot him. Can you imagine?'
Jacob's eyes met those of the pretty Hispanic woman. He thought she was, indeed, trying to imagine, and a look crossed her impassive face mat made it clear that her imagination matched his deed.
Applegate and Acardo flanked Jacob Berry and ushered him down the blue-carpeted corridor.
It was Applegate's opinion, shared only with his partner and based on almost fifteen years of experience, that Dr. Jacob Berry would be a bigger television news splash than the Dana Rozier murder. Public indignation, the fear of invading blacks, and the gun control flap would make Dr. Berry a hero or a martyr. The sagging man between him and Acardo would probably walk away from all of this with a suspended sentence and a fine. The American Medical Association would probably issue a note of censure, but that wouldn't keep Berry from practicing. He'd have to leave the city, but Acardo doubted if at this point that meant very much to the young doctor. Applegate and Acardo had seen it before. Slightly different script, but same story. They could save a lot of time and taxpayers' dollars by packing Dr. Jacob Berry's things and putting him on the next train to Lordsburg. But that wasn't the way things worked.
'We're stopping for a coffee on the way back,' said Acardo. 'You want one?'
They stepped into the empty hospital elevator.
'I don't know,' said Jacob, looking at Applegate. '1 don't know.'
Lonny stood in the parking lot and looked at the entrance to the convenience store. An ad for Virginia Slims showing a lean, light-skinned black girl with the whitest teeth and the fullest lips in the world glared at him from the store's stone wall. Next to it was a sign that announced a dollar off on a six-pack of Coke.
Lonny didn't try to find shelter. He was soaked through and tired. He just stood behind a car and waited till there were no customers inside. Then he looked around to see if anyone was heading toward the store before he hurried across the lot and opened the door.
The whole day had been a bad dream. It was just continuing. Lonny Wayne did not carry guns. Lonny Wayne did not rob stores. Lonny Wayne didn't get drug dealers angry with him by stealing their wheels. Lonny Wayne just wanted a few dollars in his pocket, a car, and the girl he'd met last night in McDonald's. What was her name? He had it written down on a sheet in his wallet His ambitions were small. He wasn't even asking for the fox in the Virginia Slims ad.
Lonny grabbed something from a shelf, some Dolly Madison cupcakes. He brought them to the counter, where one of those people from India or somewhere stood waiting, watching Lonny drip on the floor.
'Anything else?' the thin, dark man said.
Lonny put the cupcakes on the counter and pulled his few dollars from his pocket. The man behind the counter, who had seen derelicts and addicts, robbers, and madmen and women in his four years in the store, was suspicious, but dozens with Lonny's vacant look came in every day. Money was money. The man opened the cash register to put in the two singles and give Lonny his change. Lonny saw bills hi the tray. He had to be sure that there was a chance at the three hundred before he pulled this.
Satisfied, Lonny took the gun from his pocket and leveled it at the man.
'I have a wife, a mother, and three small children,' the man said, as he had said the last two times he was robbed.
'I ain't no widow maker,' Lonny said. 'Just put bills on the table, fast All the bills, under the tray too, and don't go pushing no buttons or buzzers or that shit, you understand?'
'Yes,' the man said and began removing bills and laying them on the counter.
Gun in his left hand leveled at the frightened man, Lonny scooped bills and shoved them into his jacket pockets.
'You know who I am?'
'No,' said the man.
'Good,' said Lonny. 'We keep it that way. You wait five minutes before you call the cops, you hear?'
'Yes,' said the man.
'And you ever see me again you keep sayin' you don't know me, understand?'
Lonny was backing toward the door.
' 'Cause you ever ID me I'll get you or my friends will. You understand?'
'Yes,' the man said again.
This is easy, and I'm good at it, Lonny thought. I get that car, head for Georgia, and do this again when I need cash. Me and Dalbert and lago should have done this a long time ago.
He reached behind him for the door, and turned his head to look into the lot to be sure no one was coming. Far away in the hospital lot a man was running through the rain for his car.
And then Mohammed Achman Izar shot Lonny Wayne and ended Lonny's dream.
