The Killer's Wife (21 page)
Authors: Bill Floyd
“I
f you insist on going through with this, I insist on you wearing it,” Carolyn said. “Duane and I both carry them in our cars, in case of confrontation. After what happened to him …”
f you insist on going through with this, I insist on you wearing it,” Carolyn said. “Duane and I both carry them in our cars, in case of confrontation. After what happened to him …”
As part of her efforts to keep me from going through with answering Carson’s summons, she’d spent a good deal of last night telling me, in lucid and excruciating detail, about how Duane’s career as a cop had ended. He’d been a detective by then, after serving his time on the street in a patrol car. He and his partner had gone to arrest a crooked
councilman; the councilman had been tipped that they were coming; he responded to the knock on his door by politely inviting the men in, then shooting them both from three feet away. Duane’s partner was killed instantly; Duane sustained wounds to the chest and head; the councilman then turned the gun on himself. That was how Duane Rowe had left the Reston, VA, police department with a full pension plus disability, and how he’d had the cash to start his own business. She’d met him while covering the story for the local newspaper, and the rest, as they say …
councilman; the councilman had been tipped that they were coming; he responded to the knock on his door by politely inviting the men in, then shooting them both from three feet away. Duane’s partner was killed instantly; Duane sustained wounds to the chest and head; the councilman then turned the gun on himself. That was how Duane Rowe had left the Reston, VA, police department with a full pension plus disability, and how he’d had the cash to start his own business. She’d met him while covering the story for the local newspaper, and the rest, as they say …
Carolyn reminded me of grave details now as she pulled the straps tight across my ribs and buckled the sides. She made her point with numbers: Duane sopped up nearly twenty pints of blood in the ER, underwent eight different surgeries over a period of twenty months, and endured four years of painful physical therapy during his recovery. The hair never grew back over the entry wounds in his scalp and that’s why he favored a baseball cap to this day.
I let my arms fall back. The Kevlar vest was bulky and uncomfortable, and I’d told her I didn’t want to do anything that might make Carson suspicious, but she wasn’t taking no for an answer. “His note didn’t place any specific restrictions on you protecting yourself,” she advised me, for the umpteenth time.
There was little point in reminding her that we weren’t dealing with a person who would be likely to consider whether or not I’d breached the prescribed etiquette; she knew. She was feeling impotent and frightened, because this wasn’t how she’d have scripted it. She wanted SWAT teams descending
from helicopters, snipers in the tree line. I only wanted my son safe and alive in my arms. It was my responsibility to get to him, even if it was only so that neither of us would be alone when Carson made his final move against us.
from helicopters, snipers in the tree line. I only wanted my son safe and alive in my arms. It was my responsibility to get to him, even if it was only so that neither of us would be alone when Carson made his final move against us.
Carolyn helped me put my coat on and then she stepped back and appraised me. “If he frisks you, he’ll know right away.”
“But it won’t matter, because you’ll be watching out for us.” I realized, dimly and remotely, that I had no expectations of survival at this point. Hayden was all that mattered.
“That’s the plan,” she said with a sigh. “You know, we’re doing all this without really knowing what we’re walking into. Every one of our assumptions could be wrong. He could be working with a second party. There could be booby traps at the house, he could see me when we drive in—”
I stopped her. “You’re right, we don’t know. So we better get moving with what we’ve got.” It was seven thirty. The drive would take between a half hour to forty-five minutes, and I wanted to have plenty of time in case we hit traffic or any other impediments.
Carolyn wore one gun in a shoulder holster, and another on her belt. She had a short knife clipped onto the belt as well. I carried the revolver she’d loaned me in my right front coat pocket.
She inclined her head toward mine and we stood there touching while her lips moved silently. When she said, “Amen,” I said, “Amen.”
W
e’d spent part of last night searching the Net and then going over satellite photos of the property Carson had specified in his directions. It was a small house in the middle of five acres of land, the title still owned by the bank but the mortgage held by one Mr. Abraham Locke. We found his number in the phone book. Carolyn included it, and directions to the house, along with a summary of our intentions, in a note we left behind for the cops to find, in case things went bad. We were operating on the assumption that Mr. Locke wasn’t a party to the kidnapping; he was most likely out of town or dead. Locke was seventy-eight years old, a widower for more than a decade. His one grown child lived in Florida.
e’d spent part of last night searching the Net and then going over satellite photos of the property Carson had specified in his directions. It was a small house in the middle of five acres of land, the title still owned by the bank but the mortgage held by one Mr. Abraham Locke. We found his number in the phone book. Carolyn included it, and directions to the house, along with a summary of our intentions, in a note we left behind for the cops to find, in case things went bad. We were operating on the assumption that Mr. Locke wasn’t a party to the kidnapping; he was most likely out of town or dead. Locke was seventy-eight years old, a widower for more than a decade. His one grown child lived in Florida.
The blueprints available online gave the impression of a small, cozy house, albeit one with few hiding places. There were closets and a workroom, but the whole place was just the single ground floor and a basement. Carolyn thought the basement was the most likely place for Carson to be holding Hayden; the photo had certainly been taken there. I agreed, but I couldn’t look at that picture for more than a few seconds at a time without feeling sick. Carolyn kept forcing me back to it. She asked what I saw. Where were the possible exits? How would we get downstairs and find Hayden and get him out? We went through scenario after scenario; all the outcomes seemed hopelessly bad.
But now there was no more time, so we went into the garage and I didn’t lock the door behind me. I told Carolyn I planned to bring Hayden back home before the day was out.
S
he stopped briefly and got out to chat with the cops parked on the street. “I’m going to get her car serviced,” Carolyn said, leaning on their cruiser and talking through their window. “She set up an appointment for a brake job before everything happened, and I need some fresh air anyway. Don’t bother her, though, unless it’s important. I made her take a Xanax. The lady needs sleep.”
he stopped briefly and got out to chat with the cops parked on the street. “I’m going to get her car serviced,” Carolyn said, leaning on their cruiser and talking through their window. “She set up an appointment for a brake job before everything happened, and I need some fresh air anyway. Don’t bother her, though, unless it’s important. I made her take a Xanax. The lady needs sleep.”
After we’d driven out of the neighborhood, I crawled up from under the blanket where I’d hidden in the rear floorboard. “I hate that you had to do that,” I said.
“I do, too.”
It was a cold, cloudy morning, overcast, right on that frosty verge of heralding either a cold rain or a wet snow. Traffic on the interstate was fairly heavy, typical for a weekday. I stared out the window at the commuters in their cars, babbling into cell phones or crooning along with whatever song was playing on their radios. I thought very clearly:
My God, they have no idea. No idea that I may be on my way to see my son for the last time
. No idea that traveling this same road with them was someone like me, who’d once been among their cheery and clueless ranks but was now fighting for the very life of the one she loved most. I wished I could tell them all to slow down—didn’t they know how easily accidents happen, all the unintended consequences that could come from taking your eyes off the road to answer that phone or adjust the station? I wanted to warn them to hold the people in their lives extra-tight, especially the children,
to overlook those nagging everyday nuisances and celebrate each moment they shared. I’d come up short with Hayden, hadn’t watched over him as closely as I should have, hadn’t encouraged his passions, hadn’t memorized his eyes or his laughter as he grew. You do all those things when you’re a new parent, but as time goes on, you forget that they’re changing and every day is one less day you’ll have with them. Oh, God, my dear sweet son.
My God, they have no idea. No idea that I may be on my way to see my son for the last time
. No idea that traveling this same road with them was someone like me, who’d once been among their cheery and clueless ranks but was now fighting for the very life of the one she loved most. I wished I could tell them all to slow down—didn’t they know how easily accidents happen, all the unintended consequences that could come from taking your eyes off the road to answer that phone or adjust the station? I wanted to warn them to hold the people in their lives extra-tight, especially the children,
to overlook those nagging everyday nuisances and celebrate each moment they shared. I’d come up short with Hayden, hadn’t watched over him as closely as I should have, hadn’t encouraged his passions, hadn’t memorized his eyes or his laughter as he grew. You do all those things when you’re a new parent, but as time goes on, you forget that they’re changing and every day is one less day you’ll have with them. Oh, God, my dear sweet son.
I prayed for him to be all right. I prayed that all these rushing motorists, who appeared to me as clever imitations of the living, closed off from everything outside their speeding vehicles, would get smart and become more diligent, so that they’d never feel this gnawing terror I felt inside. How many of them were at this very moment suffocating from denial of unspoken suspicions, some vague unease perhaps driven by the behavior of someone close to them? How attentively did they watch their own children, and how many were hiding their own secrets? A part of me wanted to envy them in their obliviousness, but now, at this late stage, I recognized that impulse as the most dangerous of seductions. It was my own resolute refusal to face reality that had led me to this very moment.
As soon as we got off I-40 and wound our way past Chapel Hill and into Chatham County, the number of cars dropped off and the roads became narrow two lanes threading through the rolling fields and forests. I kept checking my watch; last night, it felt like time was moving so slowly that it was maddening, but each second elapsed far too quickly now.
We followed Carson’s directions onto Old Lystra Road. An empty, crumbling farmhouse, overgrown by kudzu, marked the turn. Just over a mile farther on, we saw the border of Abraham Locke’s property. A beige metal mailbox stood among the trees at the end of a gravel driveway. Carolyn drove past it at speed and continued down the road until we found a suitable side road where we could turn around. The landscape out here was thick with dense stands of trees, and all the homes seemed to be set well back from the road. Only a few miles behind us, sprawl was eating away the countryside, but out here the natives were so far holding fast.
Which was too bad for us, because once we turned down Locke’s driveway, we’d largely be out of view from the road. Carolyn put the car in park and we traded places. She lay down under the same blanket that had hidden me as we left my house. My hands felt cool and clammy inside my gloves, even though we had the heater blasting. I reversed out of the turnaround and started slowly back down Old Lystra toward Locke’s driveway. It was ten minutes before nine. I kept telling myself I’d have Hayden back soon.
“One more time,” Carolyn said from behind me.
We’d been over it more times than I cared to count, but I recited what I knew she wanted to hear: “If he comes out to search the car and Hayden isn’t with him, you’ll shoot him right there and we’ll hope for the best.” I couldn’t help but sound skeptical of our half-assed contingency plan. “Otherwise, I go in alone. You’ll wait ten seconds after I’ve entered the house, and then you come in behind me. If
Hayden isn’t within Carson’s reach, I’ll say, ‘Where is he?’ loudly. You’ll go around and check the basement door, which should be accessible from the backyard if the blueprints were accurate. But Carson will most likely have Hayden with him if he means to negotiate his release.”
Hayden isn’t within Carson’s reach, I’ll say, ‘Where is he?’ loudly. You’ll go around and check the basement door, which should be accessible from the backyard if the blueprints were accurate. But Carson will most likely have Hayden with him if he means to negotiate his release.”
“Which he doesn’t, or he’d have indicated it in his note.”
“We don’t know anything for sure.”
Carolyn decided it was time for tough love. “Yes, we do. He means to kill you both. I won’t move in until we know Hayden is alive, but if either of us gets a clear, unobstructed shot at Carson Beckman, we need to take it. Don’t shoot to wound him. Aim for the dead center of his chest or forehead. The chest area is a much bigger target, so go for that if you can.”
She’d made these points over and over. “What if he’s wearing a Kevlar vest?” I asked.
“Then aim for his fucking eyes.” Her voice was flat and cold and exactly what I needed to hear. “Is your safety off?”
I checked for the third time. I told her I was good to go. In a lifetime of lies and denial and willful blindness, it was among my biggest ever.
A
t five minutes until nine o’clock, I took the turn into Locke’s driveway. It was as though we could hear each individual shard of gravel grinding beneath the tires. The
narrow drive bent slightly toward the right, then the house came into view. It was exactly as we’d imagined from the blueprints; a one-story ranch with trees close in the yard, in some cases with their branches brushing the weathered shingles. The driveway terminated in a two-car garage. A Toyota Land Cruiser and a Lincoln town car shared the bay. Carolyn, still hunched down in the rear, asked me what I was seeing. I described it to her through tight lips.
t five minutes until nine o’clock, I took the turn into Locke’s driveway. It was as though we could hear each individual shard of gravel grinding beneath the tires. The
narrow drive bent slightly toward the right, then the house came into view. It was exactly as we’d imagined from the blueprints; a one-story ranch with trees close in the yard, in some cases with their branches brushing the weathered shingles. The driveway terminated in a two-car garage. A Toyota Land Cruiser and a Lincoln town car shared the bay. Carolyn, still hunched down in the rear, asked me what I was seeing. I described it to her through tight lips.
“Lane Dockery owned a Land Cruiser,” she recalled.
“Carson must’ve changed the plates, then.”
I cut the engine and tried to swallow but my throat only clicked dryly. I took off my gloves, put one hand in my pocket, and took hold of the pistol grip. A door was visible in the garage past the Land Cruiser, or I could take the brick walkway leading around the garage to the front door.
Carolyn asked, “Do you see him?”
“No.”
“I’m sure he can see you. Get moving.”
I finally managed to unlock my muscles and climb out of the car. My breath streamed past my face and I thought I might be sick. Stillness shrouded the world, with only that impersonal, arctic sound of wind moving the tree branches high overhead, the brittle creaking and clattering as the boughs bent and scraped together. I walked stiffly around the garage, down the walkway out front. The curtains were tightly drawn across both sets of windows I could see. Off to my left there was only a thick encroachment of trees, intermittent views of the road fifty yards away. No cars passed.
At the unadorned front door, I lifted my hand to knock when a voice came clearly from the other side: “Who were you talking to out there?”
“Myself,” I answered without hesitation.
“Come in with your hands up, where I can see them.” Tremors all through the words, like whoever spoke them was as frightened as I was, although I didn’t think that was possible. I was so intensely terrified that I felt high, removed from my physicality, liable at any moment to disintegrate into a clutch of ghosts.
The front door opened onto a dim hallway, with a large living room off to my right. An absence of lighting and the drawn curtains cast the scene in an underwater gloom, and it took my eyes a moment to adjust. But the smell was rank and immediate. As the shadows resolved themselves in the dimness, I saw a body lying in the hallway that led back into the confines of the house; it was wrapped in a clear plastic tarp, so I couldn’t see any features, but it was man-sized, not child-sized. Blood coagulated along the edges of the liner, and a pair of yellowed feet with long, curling toenails was exposed at the end of the roll. I briefly wondered how Abraham Locke had died, whether Carson had simply knocked on the door and greeted him with a slashing fury, or if he’d broken into the house during the night. Had the old man come awake in time to see the blade descending toward him? And had he retained his eyes, did they still peer out from within that opaque shroud?
I remembered Randy’s letters to Carson, advising him to prey on the old and weak because they were isolated and
more likely to go without being reported as missing for much longer than a younger, more connected person. Locke had probably met his death for no more reason than that his home was far enough off the beaten path to suit Carson’s designs.
more likely to go without being reported as missing for much longer than a younger, more connected person. Locke had probably met his death for no more reason than that his home was far enough off the beaten path to suit Carson’s designs.
The floors were hardwood, the walls papered in a pale beige pattern that might have been cheery in the years before it had faded to a dingy jaundiced cast. The stucco ceilings showed water stains and cobwebs clung in mossy strands in the high corners. It was chilly in here, the temperature not much warmer than outside. Somewhere back in the farther rooms of the house, a clock ticked loudly.
I turned to my right and saw Carson Beckman seated in the living room, perched on a worn faux-velvet easy chair in front of a cold, empty fireplace. He was watching me with rapt attention in the gloom, evaluating the degree of my fear, and a flash of pleasure tightened his face when I gasped at seeing him there. A sizable bass was mounted above the mantel behind him, a twisted silvery fish shape with gaping mouth and empty marble eyes. Framed family photographs on the walls, Locke with his late wife and child, all dressed in the fashions of an earlier decade. A couch underneath the curtained windows, an old gray blanket or quilt stretched across the cushions. Carson wore a body harness and my son was strapped across the front of him. It was obviously a makeshift contraption, as Hayden was too large for it, but as Carson stood up, it became apparent that it was also effective; my son’s body moved in concert with his captor’s. Hayden’s hands were taped together in front of him, and he was
wearing the same tape across his mouth. Both of his eyes were covered in gauze. His feet were free, though, bare and kicking, and a soft involuntary moan escaped me at the sight of his utter vulnerability. Hayden heard it and started squirming, screaming against his gag. Carson carried a sawed-off shotgun, which he now leveled at me.
wearing the same tape across his mouth. Both of his eyes were covered in gauze. His feet were free, though, bare and kicking, and a soft involuntary moan escaped me at the sight of his utter vulnerability. Hayden heard it and started squirming, screaming against his gag. Carson carried a sawed-off shotgun, which he now leveled at me.
I kept my hands up. Carson beamed, a shark’s smile from the bottom of the black ocean floor, and gestured with the shotgun. “I can’t buy one of these in Illinois, because of my mental health background. Good thing the homeowner kept this one in his closet. I fired it a couple of times yesterday, out in the backyard. Thing will cut a tree in half. So don’t fuck with me.”
I couldn’t look away from Hayden. He was struggling and Carson wove an inch or two to either side, trying to keep his balance against the fifty pounds of child trying to pull away from his chest. “Oh, God, baby,” I breathed. “Mommy’s here.”
This was not the same Carson who’d been in court the last time I saw him. Not the same even as the haunted loner on the ID badge Matthews had shown me. He was more gaunt, lankier, reduced somehow despite his height, like he’d been eaten away at the center and might snap in two if he tried to bend over at the waist. He wore jeans so baggy they threatened to trip him up, and unlaced hiking boots too large for his feet. Probably he’d found them in the same closet as Locke’s shotgun. His face in the shadows was ravaged, lined and pitted with traces more pronounced than those of men twice his age. Blackened pouches surrounded
eyes that held entire dead worlds of swirling ash. He stared at me, a sad, serious smile spreading across his face like the fissure in a mountainside giving way.
eyes that held entire dead worlds of swirling ash. He stared at me, a sad, serious smile spreading across his face like the fissure in a mountainside giving way.
“Let him go,” I demanded.
Carson aimed the gun at me. He said, “He’s going to be so proud of what I’ve done.”
That was when I knew he was going to kill me. Instinct took over. I flinched sideways as I moved toward him, trying to reach Hayden. Not a good idea, since the Kevlar protected my front and back but didn’t extend to the sides, where there were only the canvas straps and buckles. The blast from the shotgun was huge and somehow flat, like a stone wall collapsing onto a marble floor. I took the full force in my right rib cage, and slammed off the wall in the entrance hallway. My legs went out and I sprawled facedown. I couldn’t breathe. I heard his footsteps approaching, and rolled over onto my back. My right side was completely numb; I couldn’t move that arm. The pistol was in that pocket. My chest heaved, trying to inhale against what felt like a metric ton of pressure squeezing the air from my lungs.
The ringing in my ears nearly blocked what Carson was saying as he came and stood over me, smoke still trailing out of the barrel he’d fired. The other one was less than a foot away from my face, and I could feel the gun’s heat.
“I was going to kill you both, last week,” he said, smiling in a remote kind of way now. “But then I followed you to school when you went to pick Hayden up, and that’s when I saw the teacher. That lady was
exactly
my type. She got
highlighted and I shifted my plans. I bet your husband was sort of pissed about that. Still, it was only a postponement.”
exactly
my type. She got
highlighted and I shifted my plans. I bet your husband was sort of pissed about that. Still, it was only a postponement.”
I tried to say, “my ex-husband,” but it was impossible with no breath.
I didn’t hear whatever it was that he heard right then. But his head snapped up and he turned quickly, with surprising agility for a man with another person strapped to his chest, and fired his second barrel through the front window. The curtains blew apart and glass shattered and I saw Carolyn’s hand flailing as she went down. She’d been approaching the front door, crouched over, but he’d heard her coming. I tried to scream and breathed fire. Hayden was still shrieking against his gag and Carson slapped him on the side of the head before turning back to me.
“No fair,” he chastised me. “You were supposed to come by yourself. Not that I expected you to. But that one’s down, and I’m ready for however many more you’ve got coming. God, isn’t it great to
feel?
” He knelt and smoothed a hand over my hair. It came away bloody and he showed it to me. The world spun and Hayden’s kicking foot brushed my arm. I tried to grab hold but Carson pushed my hand away as he stood and broke the breech on the sawed-off. He chucked the empty cartridges and pulled two more shells from the pocket of his jeans.
feel?
” He knelt and smoothed a hand over my hair. It came away bloody and he showed it to me. The world spun and Hayden’s kicking foot brushed my arm. I tried to grab hold but Carson pushed my hand away as he stood and broke the breech on the sawed-off. He chucked the empty cartridges and pulled two more shells from the pocket of his jeans.
“One thing I can tell you that might help,” Carson said. “I couldn’t kill your boy. Randall told me that harvesting a child was special, they see special things, and it was like a delicacy. He thinks I’m just like him, but really I’m not. I couldn’t do it to a child. I didn’t even touch his eyes. That
was just to get you out here. I tried but I couldn’t do it. He’s too much like I was, back before all this started. I want him to have a chance, away from you and his father both. I’ll take him with me. He’s my brother.”
was just to get you out here. I tried but I couldn’t do it. He’s too much like I was, back before all this started. I want him to have a chance, away from you and his father both. I’ll take him with me. He’s my brother.”
I was gasping like a landed fish. I thought of the bass mounted above the fireplace, how it must have died straining in the filthy shallow bilge water of some flatboat.
“Your husband is the only one who ever recognized me for what I was,” Carson said quietly, rolling the shells between his thumb and fingers. “If anyone else had known, they’d have tried to lock me up, but Randall understands. He knows what it’s like to live completely alone, with no one there who could possibly know you, the reality of what goes on inside. All those years, ever since I really started to grow up, I knew something was wrong with me. I dreamed of doing things, awful, ugly things to people, and I knew it wasn’t right. I knew I couldn’t tell anyone. So I hurt other things instead. But then Randall Roberts Mosley came into my home and even after he left me alive he never really
left.
I kept dreaming of all those things I wanted to do, but now I dreamed about him, too. I thought about contacting him for years and years before I actually did it. That was the bravest thing I ever did in my life, just putting that first letter in the mail. When he wrote me back, when I realized he understood, even though we were writing in code … That was when I knew I could really
do
the things I’d always dreamed. He gave me the strength to quit fighting it, to accept who I was and seek out the face from my dreams.”
left.
I kept dreaming of all those things I wanted to do, but now I dreamed about him, too. I thought about contacting him for years and years before I actually did it. That was the bravest thing I ever did in my life, just putting that first letter in the mail. When he wrote me back, when I realized he understood, even though we were writing in code … That was when I knew I could really
do
the things I’d always dreamed. He gave me the strength to quit fighting it, to accept who I was and seek out the face from my dreams.”
“He’s … a piece of shit,” I managed.
Carson looked at me sadly. “I know,” he said. “But so am I.” He loaded the shells into the breech and tried to snap the shotgun shut, but Hayden kicked out again and this time his small, tender foot wedged between the stock and the barrels. He screamed. Carson laughed and moved his foot away. The front door opened. Carson turned as Carolyn shoved herself into the hallway, laid out on the floor, both hands on her gun and aiming steadily as she fired twice. The shots were tiny plosives in my ringing ears. Carson’s head snapped one way and then another, blood and tissue exploding as his face disintegrated. I screamed for Carolyn to stop, certain that Hayden would be hit. Carson twisted and fell over on his side, facing me. Hayden flailed in his grip and blood cascaded down across both of them.
Carolyn set her gun carefully on the thin carpet and looked at me. I saw that her back had been torn open by the buckshot, a large swatch of bare and bloody sinew above her waist. Blue smoke choked the air and she said, “Called … I called the cops before I got out of the car.”
I couldn’t answer her. I pulled myself across the floor on my fingernails. I made it to Hayden and Carson, tearing at harness straps and the strips of tape binding my son. He screamed when I pulled the tape off his mouth: “Mommy! Mommy!” I asked him if he was hurt but he just kept crying. I worked the straps until they came loose and he tumbled into my arms. He got the tape off his own eyes and blinked at me. I saw the full blue of his irises and that’s when I really lost it, screaming and crying along with him.
Finally he stopped sobbing and managed to say, “M-mom, you’re bleeding. Are you okay?”
I didn’t tell him that it was getting more and more difficult to breathe. I looked over at Carolyn and said, “Hayden? You need to go get that blanket off the couch and put it on her back, okay? Hold it there as tight as you can.”
He didn’t want to leave me but he did it. Carolyn made a painful sound when the blanket touched her skin, and I wasn’t sure it was the most sanitary course of action, but she was bleeding a lot more profusely than I was. She hadn’t been wearing a vest, and there’d been nothing to absorb the blast but skin and bone. She stared at me now, looking more exhausted than anything. I supposed she was in shock, and her next comment removed all doubt.
“I give you the vest and you manage to get shot in the one place it doesn’t cover you,” she said, sounding somewhat puzzled and amazed. “I’m probably going to be in some trouble for not calling the police sooner. You’d damn well better live long enough to explain all this to Duane.”
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