The Bones of Old Carlisle (9 page)

Juarez, the only one who had stayed out of the melee, was
standing, pale and stone-faced, by the front door.
“Karl, can I let you go?” Hatfield asked.
“That would be my preference,” Arrowroot said. “I guess I failed
to communicate that earlier.”
“And you’re gonna sit down, right?” Hatfield asked.
“No, I’m gonna check on my daughter,” Arrowroot said. “Her
morning doesn’t seem to be going too well so far.”
“Okay, letting you go, letting you go,” Hatfield said
rhythmically as he slowly loosened his grip. Arrowroot, as soon as he
was free, fell to his knees beside Danielle, touching her hair,
relieved to see she was wearing a decent pair of shorts under her tshirt. She cried out but stayed still, and a sort of tentative peace
settled over the room.
“Karl,” Hatfield said softly, kneeling beside him. “Karl, you
okay?”
“Oh sure, Floyd,” Arrowroot answered, “now that the Gestapo’s
done tasering my family, the day’s looking up.”
“Glad to hear it, glad to hear it,” Hatfield said. “We’re just
here for the girl. We’re not here to arrest her, but we’ve gotta talk
to her. And you all sit with us, okay? No need for secrets here.”
“That’s outside protocol,” Stapleton interrupted. “We can’t
agree-“
Hatfield raised his hand and Stapleton fell silent.
“Listen,” the chief said, whispering. “There’s no nice way to put
this. The Army’s found two bodies at Fort Shergawa, and let’s just say
neither of them died pleasantly.”

Arrowroot cleared his throat. “Floyd, do you know— Do you have
any ID’s yet? On the bodies?”
“We’ve got nothing,” said Stapleton. “Both civilians though,
we’re pretty sure of that.”
“Where?” asked Arrowroot. “Where did you find them?”
“Here and there,” said Stapleton.
“Hmmm,” Arrowroot said. “Can’t narrow it down at all, can you?
Maybe a body in the general’s trash can, another draped over the front
gate perhaps, that kind of here and there?”
Stapleton snorted but said nothing.
“Both,” began Hatfield, “both at the old Carlisle place.”
“Oh,” Arrowroot said, as if he had just been punched in the
stomach. “Goddam. Oh.”
Danielle looked up at her father, her eyes filling with tears.
She said nothing but reached up to take his hand.
“So that’s what this is about,” Arrowroot said quietly. “Wish
you’d just said that up front. Okay, I’ll help you how ever I can.”
“Tell you what,” Hatfield said, turning to face the soldiers.
“Let’s let me and Karl go up there, just the two of us, and see if we
can bring her downstairs. I don’t think charging up there as a mob is
going to be all that constructive. Karl, can you do that? Can you go
up with me?”
“Okay,” said Arrowroot, rising to lead the way.
“We’re here if you need backup,” Stapleton said. “Just yell.”
Arrowroot and Hatfield climbed the stairs in silence, finding
Tamani still at the window, still wearing Arrowroot’s bathrobe. She
didn’t seem to have moved.
“Tamani?” Arrowroot said.
“Yes?” she answered without turning around.
“I hope that commotion downstairs didn’t, uh, frighten you?”
Arrowroot asked.
“I heard it,” she replied.
Hatfield and Arrowroot exchanged mystified glances.
“Do you remember Chief Hatfield, from yesterday?” Arrowroot
asked.
“Yes,” Tamani answered. “He refused to show me his guns.”
“Hello again, Tamani,” Hatfield said brightly.
“Chief Hatfield is here with some other people,” Arrowroot said,
“and they very much want to speak to you about something. Downstairs.”
“About what?” she asked, her voice betraying no emotion.
“Ma’am, we need to talk to you downstairs,” said Hatfield. “We’ll
tell you everything there.”
“I need to stay here.” she said.
“Tamani,” said Arrowroot, “we’ve got four folks here, and they
all want to talk to you very much. They have given me the impression
this is something they find important. I’m not sure what you’re doing
at the window, but you’re just one person. They’re four people.”
Tamani turned abruptly and approached the two men, glancing
briefly at each before she left the room and walked downstairs.
“How about everyone sit down?” Hatfield shouted from the top of
the stairs. “Let’s all grab some chairs and sit down, okay?”
“Let’s do that,” agreed Arrowroot, descending briskly to keep up
with Tamani. “There are more chairs in the dining room. Tamani, that’s
Major Stapleton, from Fort Shergawa. And Captain Bonaventure. And
Hernando Juarez. His friends call him Hernie.”
Stapleton offered Tamani a guarded handshake and turned to find a
chair. Danielle and Guillaume rose up stiffly from the floor and
plopped down beside each other on the couch, holding hands and staring
into each other’s eyes with expressions akin to mourning. Danielle
whispered something to Guillaume, and he nodded. Arrowroot returned to
his seat at the poker table, where his breakfast was still waiting.
“Anyone else want coffee?” he asked, taking a sip. “Anyone?”
No one did.
Tamani took a chair beside Arrowroot. With all of them seated,
they formed the rough outline of a rectangle, Arrowroot at one end,
Stapleton at the other, all facing each other with expressions ranging
from impassivity on Tamani’s part to Danielle’s hostile suspicion.
“Okay,” Stapleton began, “thank you, Chief Hatfield, Mayor
Arrowroot. Let’s see if we can get this done professionally and
calmly.”
“I agree, Ma’am,” Arrowroot said pointedly. “Professional all the
way.”
“Good,” she said. “Captain, you ready to get this down? Okay,
Tamani, do you know why we’re here?”
“No,” Tamani said softly.
“I understand you were at Fort Shergawa within the past week?”
“I think so,” replied Tamani. “Yes.”
“And Tamani, can you state your full name?”
“Tamani.”
“Do you have a last name?”
“Tamani is my name.”
“Do you know where you’re from, Tamani?”
“No.”
“Do you know why you don’t know where you’re from?”
“I have amnesia,” Tamani replied. She looked at Danielle, but
Danielle was looking down, staring at hers and Guillaume’s hands.
“How far back does your memory go?” Stapleton asked.
“Just since yesterday morning.”
“Where were you then?”
“I was at,” Tamani said haltingly. “I was at Fort Shergawa.”
“Were you wearing shoes there?”
“No.”
“Was anyone else there with you?”
Tamani clenched her jaw and took a deep breath. “No,” she said.
“Not anyone living.”
“Was there anyone there who was-” Stapleton began. “Was there
anyone there who had died?”
“Yes,” said Tamani. “I think one person, maybe more. I don’t
know.”
“And do you know how any of them died?”
Tamani looked down and closed her eyes. “No. No.”
“Would it surprise you to know that we found the remains of two
individuals there?” Stapleton persisted.
Tamani, eyes still closed, made a fist and raised it to her
mouth. “No, hmmm, hmmmm,” she said, rocking back and forth. “No.”
“Tamani,” said Stapleton. “Tamani, I need you to listen. We need
your help. Can you help us?”
Tamani opened her eyes and looked at Stapleton, her arched
eyebrows conveying curiosity, although she mostly seemed to be afraid.
She said nothing nor nodded.
“We need you to go with us back to Fort Shergawa,” Stapleton
said. “We need to know what happened, and we think you are the only
one who can tell us.”
Tamani was rocking again, her fist against her mouth.
“Tamani,” Stapleton said. “Tamani, can you do that? Can you go
with us now?”
Tamani stood abruptly and looked down at Danielle. “I need
clothes,” she said.
Danielle nodded and whispered something to Guillaume. He nodded
too, they disentangled their hands and she stood up slowly and
followed Tamani up the stairs.
“I’m going out there with you too,” Arrowroot said, two bloodless
fists balled in his lap.
“No you’re not,” Stapleton fired back.
“Yes, I am,” Arrowroot said. “Give me five minutes to get
dressed.”
He was dressed in three minutes, and he met Danielle and Tamani
in the hall and walked back down the stairs behind them. Danielle had
found Tamani a pair of jeans, a black flannel shirt and a pair of
hiking boots, all more or less adequate fits. Danielle was almost a
foot shorter than Tamani, so Arrowroot guessed they were a friend’s
clothes, or something Danielle had bought and never had taken in, or
something else. Women always had more clothes than they needed and
less than they wanted, he reminded himself.
The officers all stood. Guillaume remained sitting and Danielle
reclaimed the space beside him on the couch. Then Tamani made her
announcement.
“I won’t be going back there,” she said.
“You don’t have a choice in this, Ma’am,” Stapleton said.
Bonaventure put his hand on his taser and moved slowly around
Stapleton, taking up a position to Tamani’s left.
“I don’t want to go,” Tamani replied, “and it’s not safe for me
to go.”
Stapleton’s voice betrayed steely impatience. “If you won’t go of
your own free will, we are authorized to take you into custody.
Captain Bonaventure, go ahead.”
“Hold on, hold on here,” Arrowroot protested, sensing more mayhem
was on the way. “I wouldn’t—“
Bonaventure had drawn his taser out, and he may have even applied
it to Tamani, but something happened, it wasn’t clear what, and
suddenly Tamani was holding the device with one hand while, with the
other, she held Bonaventure by the right shoulder of his fatigues. It
wasn’t clear to Arrowroot if she was just helping Bonaventure stand,
or if she was actually holding him up. His eyes were open but his
expression was oddly detached. He merely stared into the distance,
seeing nothing.
Gently, almost tenderly, Tamani lowered Bonaventure into his
chair.
“Captain Bonaventure,” Stapleton said, her voice betraying alarm.
Bonaventure turned and looked at her, then he opened his mouth, but no
sound came out.
“Captain Bonaventure, are you okay?” Stapleton asked.
Bonaventure, his mouth still wide open, slowly shook his head no.
“Did the subject do something to you?” Stapleton asked, standing.
For the first time that morning, she seemed completely at a loss. “Is
this a medical situation?”
Bonaventure, with two questions fired at him in rapid succession,
stared blankly at Stapleton. Then the corners of his mouth turned up
slightly, as if he were smiling. His eyelids fluttered and closed, his
head fell back and he made a snoring sound as his cap dropped over the
back of his chair to the floor.
All the while, Tamani was standing directly over Bonaventure’s
sitting form, her hand on his shoulder, but now she stepped back,
announcing once again, “I’m not going to Fort Shergawa.”
“Get him flat, get him flat on his back!” shouted Chief Hatfield.
“Hernando, CPR him, I’ll call an ambulance.”
Danielle screamed and jumped to her feet, and she and Guillaume
leapt as one over the back of the couch and moved toward the foot of
the stairs, where they stopped and turned.
“Tamani,” Danielle said. Tamani looked at Danielle impassively.
“Tamani, did you do something to him?”
Tamani stared at Danielle, saying nothing, as Juarez dragged
Bonaventure out of the chair and to the floor. He was pumping his
first breath into Bonaventure’s lungs when Stapleton hopped over both
men, running at full tilt toward Tamani.
Tamani took one step to the left, grabbed the back of Stapleton’s
shirt as she passed by and lifted her off her feet.
“AHHHH!” Stapleton wailed, dangling helplessly. She reached up to
pull on the neck of her shirt so it wouldn’t choke her, and her legs
just flailed. “I’m gonna fucking kill you!”
“Literally,” Tamani asked, “or metaphorically?”
Arrowroot had backed away, moving to a place not far from where
Danielle and Guillaume had taken refuge, but with these words he
looked into Tamani’s eyes. Nothing there, he noted. Not a trace of
amusement. She was being serious.
“Both!” Stapleton choked. She had stopped fanning her legs
randomly and was now trying to aim her kicks, striving desperately to
connect one of her thick-soled combat boots with a shin or a thigh.
Tamani, still in possession of the taser, shoved it into her back
pocket, passed the soldier’s body to her other hand and shook her
violently, reducing the probability of contact to almost nil.
“Why do you want to kill me?” Tamani asked, and she looked
directly at Arrowroot, as if he had the answer. Arrowroot noticed that
the girls’ eyes had filled with tears, “Why are you so full of hate
and unhappiness?”
“Put her down, Miss,” Hatfield commanded. The chief had drawn his
service revolver and was pointing it at Tamani’s head. “You are
committing a federal offense. I’m empowered here. I’m empowered to—“
“Floyd!” Arrowroot shouted. “Goddam, Floyd, don’t you dare!”
“Uuuhh!” Danielle screamed. “Oh my god, Floyd, don’t! Don’t!”
Hatfield glanced at Danielle, and that’s all the time Tamani
needed. Still holding Stapleton up by the back of her shirt, she drew
the soldier’s .45 from her holster and aimed it at Hatfield’s face.
And then she screamed out a long, mournful wail that made Arrowroot’s
hair stand on end. “Why is it like this?” Tamani cried. “Why do you do
this?”
Sobbing, with Stapleton still in her grasp, Tamani was suddenly
standing a foot away from Chief Hatfield, using Stapleton as a shield.
In the next fraction of a second, she shoved Stapleton’s gun into her
back pocket, and snatched Hatfield’s weapon.
“Ow, goddam!” Hatfield shouted, looking at his hand as if he were
expecting to find some fingers missing.
Keeping a watchful eye on Juarez as he tended to Bonaventure,
Tamani backed away, wiping her eyes with the back of one hand and with
the other holding Stapleton, who had given up fighting and was just
trying to keep her shirt from cutting off her air supply.
Tamani was still sobbing when she reached the front door. She
shoved Stapleton toward one of Arrowroot’s cherry and silk couches,
and the officer and the furniture went down together. By the time
Stapleton was back on her feet and cursing, Tamani was gone, the door
slamming behind her.

Robert Arrowroot was almost four when his family moved into the
big Queen Anne on Nander Lane. The boy cared not a whit for the
architecture, the neighborhood or his spacious new bedroom at the top
of the stairs, and he swore to whoever would listen that he’d be
moving back to the old place as soon as he could walk there.