Holly waited while Doug took his glasses on and off, rubbed the back of his neck, and rearranged the papers on his desk. "So what do you want me to do?" she asked at last.
"I don't want you to do anything."
"I was going to go see the Pfeiffer family this morning, over on Tiggetts Southeast."
"Helen will do that for you."
"Meaning what?"
"Meaning that Helen will do that for you: You're suspended."
"Suspended? Doug, what on earth are you talking about? I can't be suspended: I have a full caseload this week, and next week's even worse."
Doug stared at her and she couldn't even be sure that it was really him. He was more like Doug taken over byThe Bodysnatchers. "Sorry, that's the decision."
"So what's going to happen to Daniel Joseph? And who's going to give the expert assessment in the Heilshorn case?"
Doug kept his eyes lowered but he said, "Not you, that's for sure. We can't take the risk. If a court holds the city liable for what happened to Daniel Joseph or Sarah-Jane Heilshorn, we could be looking at compensation that runs into tens of millions of dollars."
"So how long is this suspension going to last, if you don't mind my asking?"
"I don't know at least until these two cases have been cleared up."
"I see. So what do you expect me to do now, go home and play solitaire?"
Doug shrugged. "I'm sorry. That's all I can say.Myjob's on the line too."
"All right. You have my number if you need me. Maybe we can talk about this later, out of office hours, as friends."
"Well, ah, there's something else I wanted to say. Not related to work."
"Yes?"
"It's difficult to know how to put this, but Saturday night, up at the cabin "
"Yes, go on. What?"
"You weren't entirely truthful about the reason you left so suddenly, were you?"
Holly stared at him. She couldn't work out what this was leading up to, but Doug was obviously very uncomfortable about what he was going to say next.
"The thing of it is, Holly, Ned told us in confidence about your going into his room."
"Ned saidwhat?"
"He was very embarrassed. Didn't really want to mention it at all. But he thought we ought to know about it, in case well, in case we ever invited you to Mirror Lake again, with some other man who might not be so laid-back about it."
Holly could feel her cheeks flushing. "Laid-back?Do you want to know what really happened that night?"
"Holly, I really don't want to discuss this any further. I think we have enough departmental difficulty here without getting involved in any personal unpleasantness."
"No, wait up, Doug. Let me get this straight. You and Katie really believe that I tried toseducethat bozo?"
"Ned's been a very dear friend of ours for years, Holly. He's as straight as an arrow."
"So what am I?"
Doug was about to answer when his phone flashed. He picked it up and said, "Yes. Yes, Mike, I've told her. Well, of course she's not happy about it. None of us are happy about it. At ten? Okay. And, Mike, I just want to say again how sorry I am. We all are. The whole department."
He put down the phone. "Mike Pulaski."
"I gathered."
"We're having a damage limitation meeting at ten. See what we can do to-"
"-limit the damage?"
Doug nodded.
Holly took out her ID card and tossed it onto his desk. "The damage is already done, Doug. You haven't had the guts to support me in either of these cases, and on top of that, you have the barefaced nerve to accuse me of acting like a slut. If this is the kind of man you are, I'm very, very glad to be suspended. In fact, I quit."
"Holly-"
"What?" she challenged him.
"Nothing. I'm sorry it had to turn out like this, that's all."
As she was clearing out her desk drawer, Emma came in.
"What's happening?" she asked, wide-eyed.
"I quit. I'm leaving. I've had enough."
"Really?"
"Really. It's this Heilshorn case. Well, the Joseph case too. Doug's going to throw me to the wolves."
"I can't say that I'm surprised. I overheard them talking this morning and Doug was saying something about a sacrificial lamb."
"That's right,me."
"They'll ask you back, you know," said Emma, sitting on the edge of her desk. "They can't run the Children's Welfare Department without you."
Holly shook her head. "I wouldn't come back if Doug Yeats crawled into the room stark naked withSORRYwritten on his ass and kissed my feet."
"Yuck, neither would I."
Holly reached over and picked a ballpoint pen out of her jelly jar. "Here: Write down your cell phone number. I don't want to lose touch."
She cleared out the last of her desk. She found a very old packet of Jelly Bellies in the back of her drawer, so old that they had all turned crusty-white. She dropped them into the wastebasket along with her Japanese Garden calendar and a plaster statuette of Little Orphan Annie that Doug had given her. "By the way, did you find out where Casper Beale is being treated?"
"No," said Emma. "I was going to tell you about that. I called every cancer unit in the Portland area and none of them had anybody called Casper Beale on their records. So I looked up the Casper Beale Cancer Fund on the Internet. There was a story about it in thePortland Tribuneon October 17 last year. According to that, Casper was being treated at the Tasco Clinic in Seattle, which has a very highly specialized unit for treating children with cancer."
"And?"
"The Tasco Clinic had never heard of him, either. Or anyone like him."
Charity Begins at Home
Late that afternoon, she drove back across the Ross Island Bridge to Southeast Boise. This time there was no Mrs. Beale outside in the driveway, washing her brand-new Malibu, or overweight children playing on the sidewalk. In fact, the entire street was deserted, except for a mangy orange dog and the ripped-up pages of anIncredible Hulkcomic scattering in the wind.
She rang the doorbell. She hoped that it worked, because she had no way of telling. She waited but there was no answer. She cupped her hands around her face and peered in through the yellow glass window beside the door. She was sure she could see somebody moving around inside. She rapped on the glass with her keys and shouted out, "Mrs. Beale? Mrs. Beale? Can you open the door, please?"
Almost a minute went past and then the door was opened, only five or six inches. She could see Mrs. Beale in a white satin bathrobe covered in splashy scarlet poppies, like August Moon's blood-spattered shirt at the Chinese supermarket. A cigarette was hanging from between Mrs. Beale's lips, so that one of her puffy eyes was closed against the smoke. It looked as if she were giving Holly a long, knowing wink.
"It's you again. What the hell do you want? I thought I told you to leave me the hell alone."