Kindle County: Reversible Errors Part 34

"Why don't we all think about it?" said Harlow. He summoned his minute clerk and dictated a brief order, stating that Arthur's motion was entered and continued, and then sent them on their way. Muriel hurried off, her face compressed by cold indignation. As soon as she was gone, Pamela could not resist throwing an arm around Arthur and giving him a robust squeeze, further emphasized by another of her glimmering smiles.

"This was brilliant," she said. Arthur for the moment was her hero.

He declined any credit and sent her back to the office to draft a brief status report on today's proceedings for the Court of Appeals.

Chapter 37.

August 17, 2001 They Know WHEN MURIEL RETURNED to the office, she paged Larry, requesting he get here on the double; she also called the Detective Commander to be certain her message wasn't ignored. Immunity for Collins was the P.A.'s decision, but the case detective was ent.i.tled to be consulted. And it went without saying that it was past time for Larry to show his face. Angry and frustrated by Harlow, she had no more patience for Larry's juvenile antics.

But by the time he arrived an hour later, she had cooled. He appeared haggard, and she felt more or less as she had the last several days. In the past, Larry had often run away from her. She'd hoped both of them were different now, but they'd gotten to the crunch and no, apparently not. The whole thing"the mis-perceptions and the complications"left her feeling sad and, at moments, humiliated. But she'd departed from church on Sunday ready to believe it might be for the best that things between Larry and her were not going to work out.

At the moment Ned Halsey, the bantam P.A., with his bowlegs and white hair, was holding forth. Ned was famously affable, but he was exercised now. Halsey motioned Larry to close the door, then continued addressing Muriel, who was at her large desk set against the bay window.

"Kenny Harlow was an a.s.shole when I went to law school with him forty-five years ago," said Ned. "He became an even bigger a.s.shole when they gave him a robe. And at this stage, he's such a gigantic a.s.shole that he deserves his own solar system. So if you're asking me will he actually behave like an a.s.shole, the answer is yes."

"I still don't think the Court of Appeals will let him stuff an immunity down our throats, Ned," Muriel answered. As had been true throughout her life, the pathway from anger led to resolve. Stand up. Fight back. Those were her father's mottos in dealing with arrogant powers.

"He'll eat the flesh right off your bones before then, Muriel," said Ned. "'Judge Says Chief Deputy Lied.' Never mind yourself and the permanent damage he'll do to you. Do you care to see the office endure that? I know I don't."

"What?" asked Larry.

She explained in a few strokes what had gone on in court. Larry responded with pique.

"Christ, Ned, you can't give immunity. G.o.d knows what Collins is going to say. This far from events, he can basically make it up as he goes. We'll never be done with this case."

"Larry," said the P.A., "we can talk all we want about office policy. It still looks like we're hiding the truth. The guy as good as told you that he helped frame Gandolph."

"What if he was involved with the murders?" Larry asked.

Even Muriel wouldn't buy that one.

"Larry, there's no evidence tying Collins to the murders. No forensics, no statements. Besides, how can the state argue that somebody else might have been involved in the murders when we're trying to execute Gandolph for committing them? Christ, we make that argument, we oughta just build a pine box and jump in."

Ned, being Ned, patted Larry's shoulder rea.s.suringly on his way out. From the door, he pointed at his Chief Deputy.

"It's your case, Muriel. I support you either way. But my vote is to try to cut a deal with Arthur. Offer the immunity in exchange for an end to all further appeals, if it turns out Collins doesn't help them."

She didn't think Arthur would bite on that.

"Good," replied Ned. "At least you'll have some political coverage if you decide to go mano a mano with Kenny."

Ned was a good man and wise. She liked his solution. Larry and she watched the P.A. close the door behind himself.

"So," Muriel said. "Was it something I said or something I did? No cards. No calls. No flowers?" A moment ago, she expected to say nothing at all, and even beginning to speak, she had thought she could manage to sound carefree. But the acid virtually sizzled. She placed both hands on her desk and took a deep breath. "Don't worry, Larry. That's not why I called."

"I didn't think so."

"I just wanted to hear you out about Collins."

"You can't give him immunity, Muriel. d.i.c.kerman finally got back to me on that gun."

"When was that?"

"Last week?"

"Last week! h.e.l.l, Larry, doesn't it say somewhere in the police manual that the prosecutor gets to know the evidence in the case? I filed a response with the judge on Tuesday saying we'd turned over everything we had concerning Collins. When were you figuring on telling me?"

"As soon as I knew what to say about the rest of it."

"'The rest of it.' Is that a personal reference?"

"I think that's what you'd call it."

Here, in the office, they had the advantage of a cooler, more abstracted tone. Across the desk from him, she folded her arms and asked if he thought what had happened between them last week had been a mistake.

"If I knew what I thought, one way or the other, Muriel, I'd have come around and told you. That's the truth. What do you think?"

She swam through the murk of her feelings for a moment, then lowered her voice.

"I thought it was wonderful to be with you. I was sky-high for a couple of days. Until I realized I wasn't going to hear from you. What's that about?"

"I can't take a lot more of this," he said.

She asked what 'this' was.

"f.u.c.king around," he answered. "Me and you. Either we're going to go for it or forget it. I'm too old to live in between."

"I don't want to be in between, Larry. I want you in my life."

"As?"

"As someone I'm connected to. Intensely connected to."

"Part time? Full time?"

"Jeez Louise, Larry. I'm talking about a need, not a battle plan."

"I'm not sneaking around again, Muriel. Either we're in or we're out."

"What's 'in' and what's 'out'?"

"I'm talking about you leaving Talmadge, me leaving Nancy. I'm talking about saying once and for all we made a mistake, a big mistake, way back when, and that we'll try to rescue what's left to be saved."

"Wow," Muriel said. She touched her chest where her heart was now hammering. "Wow." Her thinking had not gone much further than the next opportunity for romance, which until a few seconds ago she'd accepted was likely to be never.

"I'm serious."

"I can tell."

"And I'm not 100 percent sure I want that. But I'm more certain that when I put it to you like this, there won't be anything for me to reckon on."

"Tellin it like it is, Lar."

"I'm trying to."

He was angry, as he was so often, already smarting from the rejection he'd presumed. As for her, she'd left him last week troubled, of course, sad about many things, and brittle with guilt. But in spite of that, percolating to the surface was an airy happiness. She was free of something. For all the danger and stupidity and selfishness of what she had done, she felt herself reaching outward. In the face of his subsequent silence, she was saddest about losing that.

"I'm glad you said this," she said. "I mean it." She spoke calmly, but within, panic still prevailed. So many things were suddenly piled precariously on top of one another. Her marriage. Her job. Her future. Who she was. s.h.i.+t.

Was love worth not having the life you wanted? That plainly, the question zoomed at her out of the back of her mind. Was love"real, tumultuous love at the advanced age of forty-four"enough to make up for all the other things she aspired to? The poems and the storybooks declared that the only answer was yes. But she wasn't certain what grown-ups said. At least this grown-up.

"I need to think about this, Larry. Think hard." She could see it was the first remark she'd made that pleased him.

"Yeah," he said. "Think hard." He looked at her a little longer. "But you probably won't be talking to me."

"And why is that?"

His anger was abruptly behind him. He collapsed in the oak chair at the corner of her desk.

"Because," he answered, "I still haven't told you what Mo said about that gun."

Larry had spent most days in the past twenty-plus years chasing around the most dangerous so-called humans in this city. He'd pursued them down dim gangways and around dark corners, even led the charge in full-body armor years ago when they pinched Kan-El, leader of the Night Saints, who was holed up with a cache of weapons he'd somehow bought from the Libyan army. Larry was always exhilarated on those occasions, dancing along on his nerve endings, a feeling reprised from game time when he played high-school ball. He never felt the dread, or the sick gastric backup in the rear of his throat he was experiencing now. The person in the world who scared him most, he realized, was seated across the room. It was suddenly inconceivable why he hadn't told her about the gun last week. The truth, near as he could figure, was he'd just been sick of letting Muriel make all the rules.

As he spoke, she shrank back and grew hard and cool as a stone.

"And what did you do with d.i.c.kerman's report?" she asked when he'd finished.

"Let's say I lost it."

"Let's say." She rested her forehead against her hands.

"It doesn't matter, Muriel. Squirrel did it. You know he did it. If he did it with Erno and Collins, he still did it."

"That's a theory, Larry. That's your theory. Maybe it's our theory. But their theory is that Erno did this alone. And their theory is maybe just an eensy-teensy little bit more persuasive when you add in that his fingerprints are in blood on the trigger of the murder weapon."

"Maybe the murder weapon."

"I have a hundred dollars it is, Larry. Have you got a hundred it isn't? How about ten?" She burned him with her stare. "How about fifty cents?"

"Okay, Muriel."

"Jesus," she said, and sat winding her head. "What the h.e.l.l were you thinking, Larry?"

"My bad," he answered.

"Don't give me any c.r.a.p, Larry. I want that revolver to Ballistics this afternoon. And to Serology the minute they're done with it. And get ATF to do the trace on the serial number."

"Yes, ma'am."

"You're lucky the way this fell out. If Arthur had discovered this, you'd have ended up in Rudyard as an inmate. Do you understand that?"

"Spare me the melodrama, Muriel."

"I'm not kidding."

"f.u.c.k that stuff, Muriel. I'm telling you now. It's a few days late. The prosecutor never knows everything. You don't want to know everything."

"Meaning what?"

"Come on, Muriel. You know how this works. You don't go to the butcher and ask for his sausage recipe. It's sausage and you know it's sausage. There's nothing in it that'll kill you."

"What else don't I know, Larry?"

"Forget it."

"No mas, Larry. We're not gonna play Trust Me after this."

"Is this truth or dare?"

"Call it what you want."

It was a contest all right, as he'd always known, and he was going to lose.

"Fine. Do you think that cameo was really in Squirrel's pocket?"

He shut her up with that. Even Muriel the Ferocious showed a reflex of fear.

"I did."

"Well, it was."

"f.u.c.k you," she said in relief.

"But it wasn't there the day I arrested him. It was there the night before and some light-fingered copper took it home. I just sort of replaced it. That's what I'm talking about. Don't tell me you're shocked."

She wasn't. He could see that.

"Larry, hiding fingerprints on the murder weapon isn't the same thing as tightening up the case. You know that." She faced the forward panel of the bay window behind her. "What a mess," she said.

Larry watched her knocking a thumbnail on that gap between her front teeth as she thought it through. In a second he could see her good sense, like a life jacket, beginning to bring her back to the surface.

"I'm going to give Collins immunity," she said then.