The Bones of Old Carlisle (10 page)

He only tried to make good on the promise once, on a Saturday
morning in April, a day not too unlike this day almost 20 years hence.
He’d been gone for at least 15 minutes before anyone noticed.
He’d left his shoes off and opened and closed the front door in utter
silence.
“Daddy, Robert’s gone,” Danielle announced, with the matter-offactness 6-year-old girls use sometimes to reveal horrible things.
Arrowroot was in his bedroom, painting the crown molding, but he
was on his feet and out the front door in seconds. The bushes grew
thick and close to the road on Nander Lane, and a little boy walking
on the edge of the street could easily escape a driver’s notice until
it was too late.
But Robert was still alive. He’d made it only to the corner,
where he’d stopped, waiting to be rescued.
“Boy, what the hell you trying to do?” Arrowroot shouted,
stomping toward his son. “You wanna end up with a damned knobby tire
grid where your face used to be?”
“My footprints hurt,” Robert said, and then he burst into tears.
The boy cried all the way back home, a wordless lament that might
have been about sore feet, jarring change or just not getting enough
sleep the night before. Arrowroot put the boy in his room, shut the
door and informed his wife and Danielle that the deadbolts would be
engaged on all doors in the house until further notice.
Soon after that, it became a regular question around the
Arrowroot home. “Do your footprints hurt?” Arrowroot would ask
Danielle if she were walking slowly. “Did you leave the dishes in the
sink because your fingerprints hurt?” And when Robert was old enough
(or really, not quite old enough) to be talked to that way, Arrowroot
was fond of observing, “Boy, as long as you been watching that TV, I
know your assprint’s gotta hurt.”
In the first moments after Tamani slammed the door, Arrowroot’s
mind conjured this memory, and he couldn’t help wondering if he might
find the same thing at the corner today, Tamani standing there in
Danielle’s clothes, unable to go further.
“Hey, Tamani, what the hell you trying to do, get yourself shot
up by the dang US Army?” Arrowroot would ask her.
Tamani would look up of course, admit to having sore footprints,
and cry again.
For once, a thought concerning Robert was merely funny. The first
sound, therefore, after Tamani slammed the door was Arrowroot,
laughing.
The second sound was Major Stapleton screaming at Danielle, who
had run to the front door and reached for the knob.
“Don’t open that!” Stapleton commanded. “Not until we know where
she is.”
Danielle backed away, for once apparently agreeing with
Stapleton.
Captain Bonaventure, again conscious and functioning, pushed
Juarez away and rolled to his side, groaning.
“Oh, damn,” he said. “Oh, damn it.”
“Emil, what did she do to you?” Stapleton asked.
Bonaventure raised his hand. “Wait,” he gasped. “Still catching.
My breath.”
Juarez stepped over to Hatfield and the two men inspected the
chief’s hand. There was probably a sprained finger but nothing worse.
Bonaventure rose up to his knees and slowly stood. Then he sat
back down on the couch, looked up at Stapleton and pointed to his
solar plexus. “Lucky shot,” he wheezed. “I haven’t been hit like that
since middle school.”
Stapleton, fuming, walked to the window, peering out from behind
a heavy set of royal blue curtains.
Arrowroot laughed again as he set his couch aright. “Oh my God,”
he said. “That girl just blew through you all like a tornado at a tent
convention.”
“It’s not funny, Daddy,” Danielle protested. It wasn’t the first
time his sense of humor had embarrassed her.
Hatfield offered half a chortle, not quite ready to be amused.
Stapleton, for her part, was not at all amused. She stepped away from
the window, aimed her sunglasses at Arrowroot and spoke icily.
“You’re going to tell me everything you know about her,” she
said, looking first at Arrowroot and then at Danielle.
“I don’t know much,” admitted Arrowroot, “but I ain’t saying
another word until we’re on our way to Fort Shergawa.”
“Okay, okay,” Stapleton said. “You’re impeding a federal
investigation. And that’s a federal crime. You wanna go to the brig at
the fort or out to Leavenworth?”
“I’ll go to both, if you don’t mind,” Arrowroot said, “see which
one is nicer. Now, Mr. Bonaventure, I hope you keep a spare taser
handy, as I’m not going without a fight. Maybe one with fresh
batteries, since you damn near burned out your other one torturing my
family.”
“Connie,” Hatfield said. “Connie, I’m not backing you up on
this.”
Stapleton turned and glared at Hatfield, but said nothing.
“Seriously, Ma’am,” Arrowroot said, “I’m offering you my full
cooperation. Just under a few minor conditions. I’m ready to go now if
you are, and you’re gonna hear all about it, about the wedding dress,
the way she eats, her hobby of tossing folks into rivers, all of
that.”
Arrowroot raised his arms over his head like he was lifting
something very heavy. “Fella must’ve weight 300 pounds, she just
hoists him up, like this, just picks him up—“
“I need a place where I can talk privately,” Stapleton
interrupted.
“My office is right over there,” Arrowroot said, dropping one arm
to point. “Knock yourself out.”
“Just picked him up, like this,” Arrowroot continued, “he’s
screamin’, ‘Don’t do it, Gawd, don’t do it,’ but she did anyway. Right
into the drink. Damndest thing. Damndest thing.”
Stapleton strode to the office and Bonaventure rose to follow
her, but she stopped him with a gesture. “I’ve got this, you just take
it easy.”
Bonaventure settled back down, then Arrowroot sat, Stapleton
slammed the door, and a thick, awkward silence descended over the
room.
Danielle, sitting at the bottom of the stairs with Guillaume,
drew in her breath as if she were about to speak, when Stapleton’s
furious voice rang out from Arrowroot’s office.
“Hey, Eddie, yeah, this is Connie. Yeah, Connie,” Stapleton said.
“I wanna know who you sent me after today.” There was a pause, and
then more anger. “You know what I’m talking about. Yeah, some kinda
special ops is what she is. Uh huh, I know, probably a bunch of ‘em
out there, she’s the one who lived. Probably killed the rest of ‘em.
Uh huh, yeah, picking her up didn’t go so well. Yeah, she’s gone, took
two guns with her. Taser too. Shit. Uh huh, you sent two people. Two
fucking people. We needed six at least, okay? Uh huh. Yeah. Maybe you
don’t know who trained her, but someone knows. Okay, if it wasn’t
Army, what were they all doing at the fort?” Another pause, then,
“Bullshit she’s civilian. Bullshit!” Pause. “No, not even an Olympic
athlete’s gonna do what she did. Oh, and since when are Olympic
athletes training at Shergawa?”
Danielle peered at Arrowroot victoriously. Bonaventure noticed
and, although he was probably as eager to listen in as the rest of
them, he launched himself stiffly from the couch and to the door of
Arrowroot’s office, where he knocked twice.
“What?” Stapleton shouted.
Bonaventure opened the door. “Everyone can hear you,” he said.
“Shit. Eddie, gotta go, not a secure line,” Stapleton said. “But
we’re gonna talk some more about this. Yes, I already told you,
subject resisted, left the property and is at large.” Pause. “Yes, she
resisted, damn it, and now she’s at large.” Pause. “I’ll tell you how
she resisted later. But it wasn’t what any civilian’s gonna do. Take
my word for it.”
Bonaventure shut the door and returned to his chair, wincing.
“I’m pretty sure she broke a rib,” he said, looking down, unbuttoning
his shirt and raising his t-shirt, exposing a dark, hairy belly.
Juarez poked around a little. “That hurt?” he asked. “That hurt?”
Bonaventure answered yes and no and Juarez agreed the rib was at
least dislocated, if not broken. For the first time that morning,
Bonaventure smiled.
From somewhere down the mountain, an ambulance wailed.
Stapleton burst forth from the office. “That the ambulance you
called?” she asked Chief Hatfield.
“Most likely,” Hatfield replied.
“Got a broken rib,” Bonaventure announced.
“They’re not safe,” she said. “They need an armed escort.”
“Aw, hell, that’ll take hours!” exclaimed Arrowroot, and before
Stapleton could stop him, he took three long strides to his front door
and threw it open.
“Tamani!” he shouted, stepping onto the porch. “Come on back,
Tamani. We were just kiddin’.”
Stapleton rushed to the door, then stopped as Arrowroot pointed
down. Laid neatly, side by side at the edge of the porch, were
Hatfield’s service revolver, Stapleton’s .45 and Bonaventure’s taser.
“Seems like she wanted you to have your stuff back,” Arrowroot
observed. He looked toward his driveway and the street, surprised by
what he didn’t see.
“Hey, where’d you park?” he asked.
“Down the street,” Stapleton said, pointing to the right. “In
front of your neighbor’s house. Standard procedure.”
“Hmmm,” Arrowroot said to himself. “That’s odd.” Then, out loud
to Stapleton, he asked, “Think we oughta clear out all that weaponry,
you know, so the EMT’s don’t trip on it?”
“Leave those there,” Stapleton instructed. “We’ll need to dust
them.”
Still wailing, the ambulance reached the end of Arrowroot’s front
walk, stopping there and falling silent.
“Oh, you’re in for a treat,” Arrowroot whispered to Stapleton
when he saw the man and woman exiting the vehicle.
“Are they competent?” Stapleton whispered back.
“Depends on how you define competent, but I’d say yes,” he
confided. “Just stay out of their way.”
Stapleton immediately rejected Arrowroot’s advice, storming down
the front walk to the ambulance. “This is a high threat zone,” she
announced. “You’re here at your own risk. We’ve got—”
“You the patient?” demanded a tall blonde woman.
“No, he’s—“
“Then get out of the way!” shouted the male EMT, dark-haired and
also tall, as he stomped up the walk to the front door, the blonde
right behind him. Stapleton had to jump aside to keep from getting
trampled.
“Don’t step on the guns,” Arrowroot said, holding the door open
for the pair. He pointed at Bonaventure as they crossed the threshold.
“Soldier on that couch,” he said.
Bonaventure raised his hand weakly as the couple entered. They
took one look at him and stopped in unison just inside the door.
“Is that a costume?” the male EMT asked.
“No,” Bonaventure replied.
“Then you’re active duty?” the woman asked.
“Yes, Criminal Investigation Divis-“
“Did your injury happen on duty?” the woman asked.
“Yes, attempting to—“ Bonaventure said.
“Who called this in?” the man demanded.
“Who called this in?” the woman echoed.
“I did,” Hatfield admitted. “He was unconscious.”
“He’s conscious now,” the woman observed sharply.
“How long has he been conscious?” the man demanded.
“Maybe five—,” Hatfield ventured.
“So you were too busy to call and cancel?” said the woman.
“Well yes, as a matter of fact, we had—“ Hatfield began.
“So let me get this straight,” the man said, his voice rising,
his smile almost manic with rage. “You got a military personnel on a
military mission who gets a little bump or whatever and you call the
only civilian ambulance on duty in the county this morning. Is that
right, Chief Hatfield?”
Hatfield stared in silence and Arrowroot braced himself. They
were a husband and wife with a Polish last name, Wizh-neeki or Wiksshneeski or other, but everyone just called them Barbie and Ken, since
they reminded people of the doll and her boyfriend in terms of
appearance, disposition and skin texture. To their faces, of course,
it was Sir and Ma’am, and if you were dying, there was no one you
wanted more than Ken and Barbie by your side. If you weren’t dying,
you gave them a wide berth. And if you were unfortunate enough to
cross paths with them when you weren’t dying, you just waited politely
until they’d said their piece.
“So chief, let me tell you something,” the man said, and
Arrowroot noticed that his hair was perfectly oiled, so that it made a
sort of black helmet around his head. The couple had been on the
emergency scene in Heligaux for at least a decade, but they both
looked to be in their mid-20s. Could orneriness be a preservative?
Arrowroot wondered to himself.
The man raised and lifted his case quickly, so that everything in
it rattled violently once. “I’ve got more medical technology in my
hand than existed in the whole world,” he said, “literally the whole
world, 50 years ago.”
“And that ambulance we pulled up in is so full of medical
miracles you could call it Jesus and not be far off,” said the woman.
At the mention of Jesus’ name, she and her husband put their hands
together and bowed their heads slightly. “So the next time—“
“you have a soldier on duty who’s sitting around not feeling
good,” continued the man,
“you let us know we can turn around,” the woman said,
“and maybe we can save a life that actually needs saving.”
“No one appreciates anything they get, no matter how wonderful it
is,” said the woman.
“They just take it for granted,” he added.
“Let’s go,” the woman said.
“Let’s go,” the man agreed.
The couple moved brusquely past Arrowroot and back out the door.
Stapleton, on her knees dusting the gun and the taser for
fingerprints, ignored them as they passed.
“You okay out there, Commander Stapleton?” Arrowroot asked,
making sure the couple got back in their ambulance and left.
“Fine,” she said without looking up.
“Alright, I’m gonna close the door, but you just let yourself in
when you’re ready to drive out to the fort,” he said. “I’ll be waiting
for you.”
Arrowroot closed the door and surveyed the room. Chief Hatfield
was still standing where he’d been when Tamani took his gun, flexing
his hand and bending his finger back and forth. Juarez was hovering
over Bonaventure, offering to do a more thorough check of his ribs.
Bonaventure was laughing weakly, obviously grateful someone cared.
Guillaume was seated at the foot of the stairs, but Danielle was gone.
“Floyd, you going out there today?” Arrowroot asked.
“I am,” Hatfield said. “But I’d just as soon not.” He paused and
drew in his breath. “You know, Karl, from what I’ve heard, it’s not
something I’d recommend. They’re telling me it’s a mess out there,
gonna give you nightmares. The victims—“