Steven Havill - Statute of Limitations

“Yes, sir,” she said, and managed a limp salute.

Moments later, as she walked out of the building to her car, she realized that she was bone tired, but wide awake. At home, Francisco and Carlos would be snoozing soundly, their world incomprehensibly simple from an adult point of view. If Dr. Francis wasn’t home yet, he would be soon. He would tumble into bed and be asleep before his head settled into the pillow.

Estelle paused with her hand on the door handle of the Crown Victoria. If she went home now, she would lie in bed staring at the ceiling, kept awake by the cacophony of images swirling in her mind, trying to discover answers in the mess. There certainly should be something more productive than doing that, she thought.

She knew who else would be awake, his insomnia honed by long years of practice. The Don Juan de O-ate Restaurant was long closed, so she couldn’t bring former sheriff Bill Gastner one of his beloved burrito grandes as a middle-of-the-night snack, but at least she could bring him a puzzle or two.

The yellow plastic cone that announced caution on one side and cuidado on the other was placed dead center in the hospital’s main hallway, and behind it, Stacy Cunningham guided the floor polisher in gentle, sweeping arcs. He allowed the pad to nuzzle right up to the rubber wall trim on one side, then with a little shift of weight and pressure on the handlebars, encouraged the machine to float back the other way.

Cunningham saw Estelle enter and out of reflex looked over his shoulder at the large clock.

Taking two seconds to wait for the machine to complete its arc to the left, he then shut it off, letting his weight settle on the handles as if he had been expecting exactly this old friend to walk through the doors. “Hey, Merry Christmas,” he said cheerfully. “But I guess officially it’s over.”

“A whole new day,” Estelle said, and paused near the cone.

“Oh, you can walk on it. It’s dry. I’m just giving the final buff.”

“Thanks.”

“I was sorry to hear about Chief Martinez. He was a cool old guy.”

And you would know , Estelle thought. Stacy Cunningham had been one of those high-school students whom most teachers had fervently hoped would drop out and go away…the sooner the better. He had done neither. Estelle had had a number of conversations with Principal Glenn Archer and Police Chief Eduardo Martinez over the years about various students who had somehow run afoul of the law, or gotten themselves killed when their cars slammed to a stop before they did. Stacy had been the subject of conversation more than once, but somehow he had managed to survive the pitfalls.

“We’ll miss him,” Estelle said. “He was a good man.”

Stacy shifted his weight on the handlebars of the floor polisher. “Yep, he was a cool old guy,” he said. “I wish I’d taken more time to talk with him.” Estelle looked at him with some surprise. With the wash of freckles across his angular, homely face, the unkempt red hair, and too-thin body…and his history…it was easy to dismiss the young man as an empty vessel stuck with a job that no one else had the patience or inclination to do.

“Yes, he was,” Estelle agreed.

“He never threw his weight around, you know what I mean?”

“I know exactly what you mean,” Estelle said.

“He could’ve,” Stacy reflected, and Estelle wondered what incident he was remembering. His face brightened. “Big chief in a small town. But he didn’t.”

“No.”

“Do you know when the funeral is going to be?”

She shook her head. “No, Stacy, I don’t. That’s something that the family will have to decide.”

“Yeah, that’s right,” he said philosophically. “I’d like to go, you know? No special reason. But I’d like to. He cut me some slack a few times when he didn’t need to.”

Estelle nodded, and felt a pang of regret. On several occasions, she had lost her patience with Eduardo Martinez, and more than once had thought-even if she had never voiced it-that Eduardo was content as long as his school zones were enforced. With a kid like Stacy Cunningham, Eduardo had managed a delicate balance that most cops wouldn’t take the time for, keeping the leash just long enough that the kid had survived his howling teens without serious damage to himself or anyone else.

“Your husband’s already left,” Stacy said as Estelle stepped around the coil of yellow extension cord.

“I hope so. That’s what I should be doing, is leaving.”

Cunningham grinned, showing faultless pearly whites that lit up his face. “We got ’em all, don’t we?” He saw the puzzled look on Estelle’s face. “I mean, I was here last night when they brought in Sheriff Torrez, but I guess he went to Albuquerque. And Mr. G is down there in 112.”

“Ah,” Estelle said. “Mr. G?”

“Sheriff Gastner. He’s another cool old guy. I was talkin’ to him a little while ago. I don’t think he was supposed to be up, but he decided to cruise the hall for a little bit. We talked for a while. Can’t believe somebody socked him in the head like that.”

“There’s all kinds, Stacy,” Estelle said, wondering how much information Stacy gleaned from his informal conversations.

“He’s cool, though.”

Apparently the two categories were “cool” and “uncool,” Estelle thought. She noticed that current Sheriff Robert Torrez hadn’t yet been categorized.

“I’ll get out of your way,” she said. “Good talking to you, Stacy.”

“You take care,” he said. As she continued down the hall, the soft swooshing of the polisher resumed.

The nurse’s station at first looked abandoned, but a head appeared as Estelle reached the Plexiglas window. The young nurse, homely and overweight with heavy features and too much makeup, was in the process of picking up the contents of a folder that had spilled on the floor.

“I’m just stopping in to see Mr. Gastner for a bit,” Estelle said, reading the girl’s nametag. “I know it’s a bad time, but it’s important.”

“We’re going to need to tie him down,” Tabitha Escudero said gruffly, tapping the folder back into compliance. She evidently knew who Estelle was, not surprised in the least that, at two in the morning, Bill Gastner would have visitors. Tabitha’s expression hardened just a bit into that look of control that the medical staff assumed when a civilian was tampering with the hospital’s due process. “But if he’s finally asleep, I hope you won’t wake him.”

“Absolutely not, Tabitha. Thanks. I’ll just peek in.”

The nurse fluttered her fingers in dismissal, turning toward a box stuffed with more folders.

The door of 112 was ajar a finger’s width, and Estelle nudged it open far enough to see the bed. Gastner lay with the unpunctured arm up on his pillow, hand resting on the top of his head. As the door moved, she saw him turn just enough to be able to see her.

“Hey,” he said, and jerked his arm down in that reflex motion to pull the sheet higher up. “What the hell are you doing nosing around at this time of the goddamn night?”

“Trying to think, sir,” she said.

“Well, that’s not a bad thing. Any success?”

“ Trying is the operative word.”

“So who the hell did you arrest for giving me this headache?”

“Nobody yet.”

“Ideas?”

“I was hoping you’d have a list of grudges,” she said. She rested her hand on his, tapping the back of it with her fingertips.

“We need to get out of here and go to work,” he said.

“I was party to one of those escapades a few years ago, as you’ll remember. I don’t think I want to do it again.”