“Nana?”
He follows the sound of the TV.
“Nana? We have a new addition to the family.”
Sykes has been on the phone for more than an hour, getting bounced from one old-timer to the next. Twenty-three years ago is forever. So far, no one at the Asheville Police Department remembers Detective Mark Holland.
She dials another number as she drives west toward Knoxville, approaching headlights confusing her, reminding her what a rip-off it is to get old. She can’t see worth crap anymore, can’t read a menu without glasses, her night vision awful. Damn airlines. Damn delays and cancellations. The only rental car left, one with four cylinders, got the pep of a sea cow.
“I’m trying to reach Detective Jones,” she tells the man who answers the phone.
“Been quite awhile since I was called that,” the voice pleasantly says. “And who’s this?”
She introduces herself, says, “As I understand it, sir, you were a detective with the Asheville PD back in the eighties, and I’m wondering if you might remember another detective named Mark Holland.”
“Not well because he’d only been a detective a couple of months when he got killed.”
“What do you remember about that?”
“Only he’d gone to Charlotte supposedly to interview some witness in a robbery case. You want to know my opinion, he wasn’t no accident. I think he just didn’t want to take his own life in a place where one of us would have had to work his case.”
“You have any idea why he might have wanted to take his own life?”
“The way I heard it, his wife was cheating on him,” he says.
Nana is asleep on the couch, in her long, black robe, her long, white hair loose and splayed over the cushion, Clint Eastwood on the TV, making somebody’s day with his big, bad gun.
Win sets down Miss Dog and she instantly puts her head in Nana’s lap. Animals always react to her like that. She opens her eyes, looks at Win, holds out her hands to him.
“My darling.” She kisses his face.
“You didn’t have your alarm on again. So I have no choice but to give you a guard dog. This is Miss Dog.”
“Welcome my friend Miss Dog.” She pets her, gently pulls on her ears. “Don’t you worry, Miss Dog. She won’t find you here. That nasty woman, I can see her plain as day, could use a few teeth, couldn’t she.” Petting Miss Dog. “Don’t you worry, my little one,” Nana says indignantly. “I have ways of taking care of people like her.”
If you want to incur Nana’s wrath, treat an animal badly, incite her to go out on one of her mysterious missions late at night, flinging 999 pennies into a bad person’s yard, a payment to the old crone goddess Hecate, who knows how to take care of cruel people.
Miss Dog is fast asleep in Nana’s lap.
“Her hips are hurting,” she says. “Arthritis. Gum problems, pain. Depressed. She yells at her a lot, that big, unhappy woman, not a nice person, treats her the same way she treats herself. Terrible. Poor baby.” Petting her as she snores. “I know all about it,” she then says to Win. “It’s all over TV, but you’re all right.” She takes his hand. “You remember that time your father beat up that man who lived three streets over?” She points. “He had no choice.”
Win isn’t sure he knows what she’s talking about, nothing new. Her world isn’t always obvious or logical.
“You were four and this man’s son — he was eight — shoved you to the ground and started kicking you, calling you awful names, calling your father awful names, racist names, and oh, when your father found out, he went to their house and that was that.”
“Did Dad start it?”
“Not your father. But he ended it. It happens. And you’re all right. If you go back and look around, you’ll find a knife.”
“No, Nana. It was a gun.”
“There’s a knife. You know, the kind with a handle that’s got a thing.” She draws it in the air. Maybe she means a knife with a guard, like a dagger. “You look. The one you killed, and you mustn’t blame yourself for that. He was very bad, but there’s another one. He’s worse. Evil. I tried the honey on a muffin this morning. Tennessee is a pure place with lots of good people, not necessarily good politics, but good people. The bees don’t care about politics so they like it there, are joyful making their honey.”
Win laughs, gets up. “I think I’m going to head down to North Carolina, Nana.”
“Not yet. You have unfinished business here.”
“Will you please set the burglar alarm?”
“I have my wind chimes. And Miss Dog,” she says. “Tonight the moon is aligned with Venus, has entered Scorpio. Misconceptions abound, my darling. Your perceptions are veiled, but that’s all about to change. Go back to her house and you’ll find what I’m talking about and something else.” She stares off, says, “Why am I seeing a small room with rafters overhead? And a narrow staircase, maybe plywood?”
“Probably because I still haven’t gotten around to cleaning out your attic,” he says.
11
The next morning Sykes and the director of NFA, Tom, are squatting, moving through the grass like crabs, picking up brass.
On the Knoxville Police Department firing range, no one is above picking up after himself, and everyone is expected to live up to the privilege of attending the Academy. Showing up for class goes without saying. Sykes is sleep-deprived and depressed as she glances around at her classmates, fifteen men and women in blue cargo pants, polo shirts, and caps, returning firearms and ammo to the golf cart, finishing up an eight o’clock session of analyzing trajectories, cartridge case ejections, marking evidence with tiny orange flags and taking photographs like they do at crime scenes.
Sykes is humiliated, dejected, certain the other students are shunning her, have no respect for her. The way it must look to them, she’s a fair-weather crime scene investigator, turns up when there’s something fun going on like firing the AK-47, the Glock, the 12- gauge riot gun, blasting away at what she calls the ugly bastard targets, her favorite because it is far more gratifying to rip into a paper thug pointing a pistol at her than to go for a bull’s-eye. She clinks several brass cartridge cases into the plastic bucket she and Tom share, the air humid and heavy, the distant Smoky Mountains hazy, living up to their name.
“So far it’s not making the Knoxville PD look good.” She is trying to explain, sweat running into her eyes.
“Yesterday was blunt-force and pattern injuries,” Tom says, clinking in another cartridge case.
“Kind of funny,” she says, parting grass, plucking out more brass. “That’s what killed her. Blunt force.” Clink. “And she had pattern injuries.” Clink. “Win says she had holes punched in her skull, like maybe somebody went after her with a hammer.” Clink. “So I’m learning about it anyway, even if I missed class.”
“You’ve missed drug-abuse deaths. SIDS. Child abuse,” Tom goes on, moving through the grass, clinking more brass into the bucket.
“You know I’ll make it up.” She’s not sure she can and Win isn’t here to help her.
“You’ve got to.” Tom gets to his feet, stretches his back, his young face serious, maybe more serious than he really feels.
He’s not the hardhead he pretends to be. Sykes knows. She’s seen him with his kids.
“What about the PD, exactly,” he then says.
She explains about Jimmy Barber’s basement, about a case file that should never have been taken home and now is missing, tells him about what is seeming like an incredibly careless and inept investigation of an incredibly vicious murder. She’s a bit dramatic, emphatic, hoping he’ll understand the importance of what she’s doing instead of focusing on what she’s not doing.