Except his mingling felt more desperate than fine.
9
On Monday the job became official. Having been duly sworn, uniformed, and equipped, Garreth started six months of probation and re-acclimation to the bulk of body armor and weight of the gear belt. The sun setting before the shift started made it a comfortable patrol — no need for his glasses — but it felt odd riding alone. Yes he wanted this and it gave him freedom to pursue his own agenda, but he also missed Nat. Whom from here on he would likely see only when he came on duty and Nat briefed him about the day’s activity and wants and warrants.
Solo worked well, though, when he went looking for three minors who managed to steal a bottle of peach brandy from Hartzfeldt’s Liquor. Luckily the clerk recognized two, not by name but as boys he had seen skate-boarding on south Beach. Reasoning the boys wanted to hide but remain close to home where they felt safe and comfortable, Garreth slipped on foot around the Hammond greenhouses, which sat behind houses on the east side of Beach’s 200 block. No need for a flashlight with his night vision, and soon he just followed his nose, tracking the mixed brandy and blood scents to the trio squatting between bushes and the rear wall of one greenhouse. Garreth Mikaelian, semi-human bloodhound, he reflected wryly.
Twenty minutes later their parents met him at the station. With the brandy paid for, the store owner declined, against Garreth’s advice, to press charges. Watching the boys being dragged away by parents apparently less outraged by the theft and drinking than by the lies that let each think the boys were studying at another’s house, Garreth wondered if juvenile proceedings might not be more humane than the verbal flaying and grounding for life that awaited them at home. If those parents were anything like his father and Grandma Doyle.
As the shift wore on, he found himself welcoming passing contact with Duncan…pulling up window to window with him a couple of time to pass on information…or just listen to Duncan complain about the “little Dreiling shit” flipping him off again, or reveal he was switching shifts with Maggie on Friday in order to watch his nephew play in the big Homecoming game against arch rival the Bellamy Cougars.
Maggie working at night? “Danzig’s allowing the switch?”
Duncan nodded. “Yeah, since she won’t be working alone. And he understands why I want to be there since he knows I’ve been like a father to my sister’s kids…and his son is playing, too.”
The switch ought to make Maggie happy and make her feel she was finally being given a chance to play with the boys.
Later Duncan radioed: “Hey, Dr. Doolittle, I’ve got a loose dog. Come do the voodoo that you do.”
“Loxton’s dogs again?”
“Nope, an ankle-biter. He got out a door Mama left open for the cat and won’t come to her or me. Mama is hysterical because her baby is out near 282 and might get run over.”
The dog did not come to Garreth, but it let him walk up to it and pick it up.
“Damn, you need to show me how you do that,” Duncan said, and frowned when Garreth could only shake his head.
“I don’t know how it works; it just does.”
Returning the dog to the tearfully grateful owner, Garreth asked to see the door the dog used for its escape. When she invited him in — one more dwelling entry accomplished, hundreds yet to go — he examined the door. Teeth marks on the rubber doorstop told him how the dog opened the door enough to escape.
“Why not let the cat use a window,” he said. “Put a trellis or something outside that the cat can climb but is too flimsy for a person, and when you know how far you want the window open, drill a hole through each upper corner of the lower sash into the edge of the upper sash and pin it with 16-penny nails. That will prevent anyone outside from opening the window farther and climbing in. Soon the department will be offering free residential security checks and at that time we’ll be happy to come back and make suggestions for the rest of your home.”
“Is that for real?” Duncan asked as they left. “Who’ll be doing the checks?” Not him, he clearly hoped.
“Me. Can you think of a better way to get to know everyone?”
Duncan looked undecided between admiring Garreth’s ingenuity and considering it suspicious zeal.
Garreth sighed inwardly. Between this and not being able to pass on the dog control secret, they had some tension building. He needed to defuse it so they could work together. “Hey, you’d like to get the Dreiling boy for giving you the bird, right?”
Duncan grimaced. “Oh, yeah…but unfortunately that ain’t illegal.”
“Not flipping you off, but…I just remembered something that worked for me once. If Scott’s using his left arm and happens to be at a corner, that looks like a right turn signal. If he then fails to make the turn, it’s an illegal signal.”
Duncan blinked. “You actually got away with writing someone up for that?”
Garreth shrugged. “Mostly because the punk was stupid enough to mouth off to the judge. If Scott defends himself by saying he wasn’t signaling a turn, just contempt of cop, who knows if he could still buy himself some trouble. You have to be patient and catch him just right…and you never heard it suggested by the probationary officer.”
Grinning, Duncan gave him a thumbs up and drove off singing in a surprisingly pleasant baritone. Garreth recognized a Kenny Rogers tune but the words he made out before Duncan moved out of range sounded like: “I write up your life…”
Grinning, Garreth returned to patrol, making a point of driving down Pine past Anna Bieber’s house. He planned to do so regularly, to create the opportunity for a seemingly unplanned reconnection with her. He had identified an orange Chevy Vega wagon sitting in the driveway the day he visited her as belonging to her daughter Dorothy Vogel. Riding with Nat, he looked for the vehicle around town. Most evenings it sat in Dorothy’s own driveway but he had seen it downtown one Thursday, and out at Dillons this last Thursday, then in Anna’s driveway later. Hopefully, it indicated Dorothy regularly shopped for her mother on Thursday evening. With luck, he could take advantage of that.
For now he focused on the job…checking out a loud music complaint and convincing the offender to turn it down, taking a car vandalism report…a keyed hood on a car at the Cowboy Palace, the scratches spelling bastard. Someone with a beef against the car’s owner Marvin Jacobs, obviously, though Jacobs claimed ignorance of who might do this.
On the next pass down Kansas, he noticed Castle Drugs next to the Main Street still fully lighted despite being closed and brought the car around to park in front. After checking the notes he made riding with Nat for the name of Castle’s owners, he went to look in the windows. A woman bent down behind a display case against the left hand wall. Since she made no attempt at stealth, he doubted her presence was felonious, but he knocked on the door and attracted her attention, just to be sure.
She came carrying a box with a rosary visible through its clear plastic top.
“Mrs. Wiest?” he said. “I saw your lights on. Is everything okay?”
“Fine.” She peered at him, forehead furrowed. “I haven’t — oh, I have see you before, with Nat Toews. Aaron said we were getting a new officer. My husband’s on the City Council. Yes, I’m fine, just putting out some stock we’ve gotten in for Christmas. This is a good time to do it…no interruptions. Usually,” she added with a smile.
“I wanted to be sure. If I might offer a suggestion for store security, your stock shelves sitting parallel to the front of the store as they do provides concealment for an intruder. Orienting the shelves at right angles to the front would reduce the area for concealment to just the far end of the row and give us an otherwise clear view all the way back to the pharmacy.”