Bill Pronzini - Savages

“But he-”

“Quiet, I said.”

He took her arm, steered her back into the camp. The cruiser bucked to a stop behind Runyon’s Ford. Kelso was alone; he came out fast, unsheathing his weapon, moving ahead with it in his hand. Big, tough, his face flushed, his stride hard as if he were stomping something with each step. A cowboy, all right. Runyon stopped himself and Sandra next to one of the shacks, let Kelso come to them.

“What the devil are you doing here, Runyon?”

“Same thing you are. Looking for Jerry Belsize.”

“Is that so? Where is he?”

“Gone.”

“Gone? Gone where?” Then, to the girl, “Where is he, Sandy?”

She was coming down off her high; she stood tense and frightened. “I don’t know. I swear I don’t.”

“But you knew he was here. Knew it when I talked to you Friday night.”

“No-”

“Yes, by God.” Kelso made another visual sweep of the area, then jammed his weapon back into its holster. His fury was a tangible thing; you could see it in the play of muscles in his face, the blade-edge cords in his neck. “You, Runyon. How’d you know to come out here?”

“Sandra asked me to come.”

“Oh, she did? What for?”

“Talk to Jerry, try to convince him to come in voluntarily.”

Kelso didn’t like that. “Why you?”

“Look at her. She’s terrified of you.”

“She has good reason to be, harboring a fugitive.”

“That’s not exactly right,” Runyon said mildly. “Belsize isn’t a fugitive; he’s only wanted for questioning. Unless some new evidence has turned up to change his status.”

Kelso didn’t respond. He glared at the girl. “You shouldn’t have lied to me,” he said.

“I’m sorry, Mr. Kelso, honest, but Jerry didn’t set those fires, he didn’t kill anybody, he-”

“He’s guilty as sin.”

Runyon said, “Either way, guilty or innocent, he’s just as afraid of you as she is.”

“What do you know about it? You don’t know squat.”

“If you say so.”

“I say so. You should’ve reported it when the girl told you about this place. Did your duty instead of hotfooting it out here, sticking your nose in where it doesn’t belong.”

“Maybe so.”

“No maybes about it. I ought to report you for withholding information in a criminal case.”

“Go ahead. But I told you why I came. If Jerry hadn’t listened to me, I’d’ve taken him to Rinniak anyway.”

“That’s what you say.”

“It’s the truth. Ask Sandra.”

“That’s right,” she said. “He told me that before he-”

“Shut up, girl. You speak when you’re spoken to. I haven’t made up my mind what I’m going to do about you yet.”

Runyon said, “Can I ask you a question, Deputy?”

“I don’t have to answer questions from you.”

“How’d you know to come out here?”

There was a heavy silence before the deputy said, clipping the words, “Anonymous phone call.”

Sandra sucked in her breath. “Oh God. Was it a man or a woman?”

“What difference does that make?”

“It’s a reasonable question,” Runyon said.

“Disguised voice, not that it’s any more your business than hers.”

He returned the deputy’s hard stare without blinking. Before long the stare moved back to the girl. She shrank under it, looking down and away. The acrid marijuana fumes had dissipated, but her eyes still had the glaze. Kelso didn’t seem to notice. Too wrapped up in his anger and frustration.

“Stay here, both of you,” he said finally. “Don’t go anywhere.” He hitched up his Sam Browne belt, swung away from them to prowl the camp.

When he was out of earshot, Runyon said to the girl, “Did you tell anybody besides me about Jerry being here?”

“No. Nobody, I swear.”

“How about Friday night? Were you alone when Jerry showed up?”

She nodded. “He was sure nobody followed him. How could anyone else have known?”

Question begging an answer. He said, “You have any more pot on you or in your car?”

“Pot?” She whispered it, glancing furtively toward where Kelso was poking around the rusted trailer. “No.”

“If you do and he finds it, he’ll make it hard on you.”

“I know. But I don’t have any more.”

“If you’re smart, you’ll keep it that way.”

Kelso vanished inside the trailer. He didn’t stay long. When he came out he made straight to where Runyon and the girl waited, a tight little satisfied smile on his mouth. “Marijuana butts in there, plenty of them. Drugs as well as arson and murder.”

Runyon said nothing. Neither did Sandra.

“Now he’s not just wanted for questioning,” Kelso said. “Now he’s wanted for possession and probable sale of marijuana.”

“Jerry never sold any grass!”

The deputy withered her with another of his stares. “You know where he went, girl, you’d better tell me right now.”

“I don’t, I swear to God.”

“You’d better pray for His mercy if you’re lying to me.”

Runyon said, “Why don’t you give her a break, Kelso?”

“Don’t try to tell me my business.” The deputy’s voice held a belligerent dare. “I don’t like it. I don’t like you. Keep sticking your oar in, I’ll lay an obstruction charge on you. You hear?”

“I hear.”

“All right then. Sandra, you get in your car and follow me back to town. Stay right behind me all the way.”

“Oh shit, Mr. Kelso, you’re not arresting me?”

“Watch your mouth. I don’t stand for foul language from you or any other kid. You just do what I tell you.”

“But I don’t know anything!”

“Get in your car. Now.”

The girl threw Runyon an anguished look of appeal. He took it stoically; there was nothing he could do. In spite of the heat, she folded her arms across her breasts as if she were suddenly chilled, slunk away to the Chrysler.

Kelso poked a finger in Runyon’s direction, stopping it just short of his chest. “I’ll be seeing you again. Count on it.”

Runyon didn’t trust himself to respond.

He stood watching Kelso back his cruiser around, Sandra maneuver her Chrysler into position behind it. She glanced over at him again just before they pulled out, her face pale and sweat beaded. He gave her a thumbs-up gesture that she didn’t acknowledge. She had the fearful look of a prisoner awaiting sentence by a hanging judge.

Sunday mornings are quiet times in my household. We’re not churchgoers, but that doesn’t mean, no matter what the hard-core religious right would have you believe, that we lack spirituality or traditional family values. Organized religion is fine for some people; for others it’s restrictive and unnecessary. There’s a wryly funny and sage comment in an Agatha Christie film I saw once that pretty much sums up my position, and Kerry’s. One of the characters in the film tells Miss Marple that an odd young man of her acquaintance was once arrested for exposing himself in St. Paul’s Cathedral. After a thoughtful moment, Miss Marple replies, “Well, we all worship in our own way.”

I got up first and cooked breakfast, and Emily and I spent some quality time together, talking about this and that, things that matter to eleven-year-old girls and their doting adoptive fathers, while Kerry had her breakfast in bed and read everything in the Sunday paper except the ads. She doesn’t share my anti-news philosophy. Her attitude is the generally accepted one that the better informed you are, the better able you are to cope. We’ve had any number of discussions on the subject, my stance being the generally unaccepted one that the better informed you are, the more frustrated and crazy you’re liable to become. Unless you’re a dedicated activist, there’s damn little you can do about such matters as global terrorism, indefensible wars on foreign soil and escalating body counts, widespread political corruption, drug-related gang violence, and all the other insanities that make up the daily news. Cast your vote, contribute to appropriate causes, raise your public voice now and then, try to make a difference in small, work-related ways, and hope for the best-that’s about it. You don’t need daily details of barbarism and polarized op-ed columns and strings of depressing statistics to do any of those things. One man’s opinion. We all worship in our own way and we all get through the best way we can.