“I won’t take much of your time, and it might help us find out who killed Elizabeth and Sheryl Hendricks. I think that is something everyone wants.”
Another lengthy pause; if I were charging by the hour, Richard Davidson would be getting a mortgage right now. “I’m sorry, I have nothing to say to you, Mr. Carpenter.”
Click.
This isn’t going as well as I had hoped.
My next call is to the First Centurion Church, and the receptionist answers and wishes me a “fine and healthful day.” I ask for Keeper Clayton Wallace and tell her “Andy Carpenter” when she asks who is calling.
Within moments a man’s voice comes on the line. “Stephen Drummond.”
“I’d like to speak to Clayton Wallace, please.”
“I’m sure you would, Mr. Carpenter, but that’s not likely any time soon. So how can I help you?”
“That depends on who you are,” I say.
“I’m a resident of Center City, as well as legal counsel and vice president of the First Centurion Church. So, again, how can I help you?”
“Well, I’m representing Jeremy-”
He interrupts. “I’m aware of that.”
“Then I’m sure you’re also aware that I’m attempting to learn everything I can about the victims, including information about the town they lived in and the religion that was apparently so important to them.”
“Fair enough. I’m your guy.”
I’m pleasantly surprised by this open invitation, and we make arrangements to meet tomorrow in his office. Right now I feel like I should be doing something, but there’s nothing else I can think of to do, so I take Tara for a walk.
I’m starting to like these walks; I may even be starting to like Findlay. The air is crisp, fresh… for some reason every time I go outside I feel like tailgating and throwing a football around. I’d better be careful, or in a few weeks I’ll be wearing a plastic piece of cheese on my head and rooting for Brett Favre.
There seems to be more of a spring in Tara’s step as well. She’s been showing some signs of age, although that is not terribly significant, since Tara will live forever. But she seems more cheerful since she’s been here; it’s possible she might be a small-town dog at heart.
When we get back to the house, I am pleasantly surprised to find Laurie waiting for us in the living room. “You left the door open,” she says. “I figured you wouldn’t mind if I waited inside.”
“Make my home your home,” I say.
She looks at the pictures on the walls of various people doing various things, like having picnics, going to amusement parks, and mugging for the camera. “Who are these people?” she asks.
“I would guess they’re friends and relatives of the dead woman who used to live here,” I say.
She smiles. “I love how you’ve given the place your personal touch.”
“I even watered one of the plants the other day.”
“You missing home?” she asks.
I think about that for a moment and am surprised by what I come up with. “No… not really. Not yet. I’m becoming very involved with the case, so I haven’t had much time.”
“Everybody’s talking about how you beat up on Lester in court today.”
I shrug. “No big deal… I had the facts on my side. When I don’t, he’ll beat up on me.”
She shakes her head and smiles. “I’ve seen you in action, so I know better.”
I’m not real big on compliments; they’re the one thing that can effectively shut me up. So I don’t respond.
“You made Parsons look pretty bad up there,” she says. She can’t be happy about this; he works for her, and his performance reflects negatively on her department.
I nod. “He deserved it. He should have gotten a search warrant; he knew there was no reason to rush into that house.”
She doesn’t agree. “There were two dead young women at that house, Andy. They could have still been alive, and that would have been plenty reason to rush.”
I’m not about to back down on this one. “He did what he did, and then he made up reasons for doing it after the fact. That’s called lying, and he did it under oath. That’s called perjury. So I’m not going to feel bad that I embarrassed him.”
“He’s a good cop, Andy.”
“Look, I’m not saying he wasn’t trying to serve the cause of justice. I’m saying he didn’t follow the rules.”
This is not the first time that Laurie and I have disagreed in this manner. She is a law enforcement officer, and I’m a defense attorney. Not exactly two peas in a pod. “You want to go out to get a bite to eat?” I ask. It’s my version of being conciliatory.
“I can make dinner,” she says, a little tentatively.
Then it hits me. “You let yourself in here because you didn’t want people to see you waiting outside. And that’s why you don’t want to go out to eat. You’re worried about being seen as being on my side, because of our previous relationship.”
“This is a small town, Andy, and people depend on me… on my doing my job.”
“Hey, it’s okay, Laurie. You’re in a bad spot.”
“Worse than you think. Lester has gone to the mayor and told him about our relationship. He doesn’t trust me.”
“What did the mayor say?” I ask.
“That Lester should worry about his own job and let me do mine. But that could change, Andy. If I give him half a reason…”
“Laurie, you called me, I didn’t call you. I’m here because of you.” After I say it, I realize that she could take that last sentence one of two ways: that I’m here because she told me about the case, or that I’m here because I wanted to be near her. I don’t know which is true, so I don’t clarify it.
“I know,” she says, “and I’m glad you are, really I am. Jeremy will get the best defense possible, and I won’t have to miss you the way I have. I just don’t know how to behave, Andy.”
“You mean in your job?”
“In my job, but out of my job as well. If we want to go out to dinner, I don’t want to have to worry about how it will look. I want people to trust me enough to know that I’ll live up to my responsibilities as a police officer, no matter what is going on in my personal life.”
“Anybody who doesn’t trust you is an idiot.”
She’s not about to just accept that. “And it’s not just trust, Andy. I want people to respect me. I want my fellow officers to respect me. Some of them got passed over for a promotion because I was brought in. I want them to respect that decision. I need them to.”
I walk over to her and hug her. Hugging is not an act that comes naturally to me, but this time I do it without even thinking. She looks at me, and for a moment I’m afraid she is going to cry. “I don’t want to screw this up, Andy. Not any of it.”
I hold her tighter. “When you’re young and so alone as we, and bewildered by the world we see, how can we keep love alive, how can anything survive, what a town without pity can do.”
She looks at me strangely. “What?”
As further evidence that I am unable to control my mouth, I’ve just been inappropriately song-talking, a game that my friend Sam Willis and I play back home. The object is to work song lyrics smoothly into a conversation. “That’s ‘Town Without Pity.’ Gene Pitney.”
“My life is going up in flames, and you’re song-talking?” she asks incredulously.
I nod. “Not bad, huh?”
She laughs. “Not bad at all.” Then she kisses me, perhaps unaware that she is providing positive reinforcement to my childish behavior.
“You know, I’ve got an idea,” I say. “We behave professionally out there in the world, but we meet back here maybe ten or twelve times a day to have secret sex.”