Stephen Hunter - Night of Thunder

“Mr. Swagger,” he said after the firm handshake and the direct look to the eyes without evasion or charm, “nice to meet you, though of course I wish the circumstances could be better. How is your daughter at this point?”

Bob told him, succinctly, keeping it tight and straight, as if he were himself back in service, reporting to a superior.

“Well, we all hope she’s going to be all right. I hope Detective Fielding has kept you abreast of our efforts. If you need any help, please feel free to contact us. Sometimes a criminal act is harder on the victim’s close relatives than on the victim herself. I know how the thought that someone tried to hurt your child can haunt a father or a mother. So please, feel free to call us. For our part, we’ll work hard to keep you in the loop. I know how tough it can be to go weeks without hearing a thing from the police. I’ve ordered all my officers to call each victim or next-of-kin once a week to keep them up-to-date on any investigation or legal proceedings. That’s our policy, and maybe you’ve guessed that although I am a sheriff by appointment I am still a full-bird colonel by inclination, and when I set a policy it is followed.”

“You sound like a straight talker, Sheriff, so can I ask you a straight question or two and set my mind to ease?”

“You surely can. Go ahead, Mr. Swagger.”

“I expressed this to Detective Fielding, as well. I know you’re all caught up in busting meth labs and you’ve got this big race in Bristol and you’re part of the manpower commitment for security on such a big deal, and I do worry if there’ll be time to investigate my daughter’s situation hard, given all that.”

“It’s true most of our issues are manpower issues, that plus the goddamned coal dust on everything. But given the size of the department, it’s a hard thing, patrolling a county that’s several hundred square miles in area, most of it wooded, much of it mountainous, what with our problems with narcotics interdiction and this damned race. So we’ve got a lot on our plates. But please know that I try and run a professional department, and we will give this thing our best effort as time allows. My motto is: No back burner in my department. Everything’s front burner in Johnson County. You have my word on that.”

“Thank you, Sheriff.”

“Now, I did want to say something to you. Detective Fielding mentioned to me that you had these doubts, which are entirely appropriate, because I know how upsetting something of this nature might be. But she also said that you had mentioned poking around on your own.”

“That is my nature, sir. I am a physical man. Though you may still hear some Arkansas in my voice, I live in the West, and in the West, we are used to doing things for ourselves. It’s not that I doubt Detective Fielding, or the department. I just know, however, that there’s only so many hours in a day, and there are pressures on you all the time. So, yes, it was my idea to poke around a bit. Is that a problem?”

The sheriff said, “Look, Mr. Swagger, I don’t mean to be disrespectful, but that newspaper and your daughter weren’t beloved among some people around here, any more than I am. I take my chances, I suppose you could say she took her chances. She was focusing a light on methamphetamine in Johnson, and folks don’t like that. If I had known she was going to some of the places she went-she was a brave girl, I don’t think there’s any doubt about that-I might have cautioned her or sent a unit into the vicinity just in case. Now it looks like you might be poking in those places too. I’m talking the places where the meth addicts do business, where the trade is practiced, where the stuff is cooked, all of them unsavory places, all of them volatile. So I really don’t want to be worried about you too. My mission is to close these places down, not look after an older fellow in over his head.”

“I see what you’re saying. Still, if someone tried to hurt my daughter, I’d want to get him off the street and into jail as fast as-”

“Sir, you might rile somebody, and a fellow of your age wouldn’t stand much of a chance against young toughs with secrets to hide. Were you in the service?”

“Did a spell in the marines a while back,” Bob said.

“Well, don’t let that give you delusions of grandeur. Some of these hardscrabble Tennessee boys are tougher than nails and they can go off fast and do some bad damage. Put some liquor in ’em or some crystal or both hootch and crystal and they can be downright mean, even murderous. I’d hate to find you beaten to a pulp in a ditch or, worse, dead in a ditch.”

“Me too,” said Bob.

“I was a soldier for many years, Mr. Swagger. I was executive officer for an armored combat brigade and went to Iraq twice, three times if you count my time in the sand in the first war when I was a lieutenant. It’s part of my brain. And I still am a soldier, only now the war’s against crystal meth. But I have sadly seen a lot of violent death in my profession. There’s a saying-‘When the shit happens, it happens fast’-that’s entirely accurate. I’m telling you, around here in some areas, it can go to combat fast. Combat is fast and scary and it takes a trained professional to survive, much less prevail, in that environment.”

Bob sat still, working hard to keep his face uninteresting. But he knew that colonels were very rarely in combat. They supervised, they controlled, they kept radio contact, they took reports, they laid plans and bawled out lieutenants and captains when things went wrong. But they didn’t look through the scope, squeeze off the round, and watch a man jack hard then melt into sheer animal death. They didn’t see what the shells did to the people they caught in the open, how it made a mockery out of any notion of human nobility when you were just looking at freshly butchered meat. They didn’t know boys who’d never been fucked, not even once, died screaming and calling for mommy. There was a whole lot about war colonels didn’t know.

“Yes sir.”

“Do you get my drift?”

“You are trying to be polite, but you are telling me to keep my nose out of things or I might get eaten up.”

“Just about that, yes. Let the trained professionals handle it, do you hear?”

“Well, I’ll be careful, I swear to you. Fair enough?”

“I’d rather have your word that you’ll go sit by your daughter’s side. That’s where you’re needed.”

“Yes sir, I hear you.”

“But I don’t hear you agreeing.”

“I have a nature to follow, that I can’t deny, sir.”

“Now you are being polite and telling me to go to hell. Mr. Swagger, you can get yourself in so much trouble so fast around here. I miss my command imperative to reassign you to kitchen duties or public information. But I do know trouble comes in two forms. Trouble with them, meaning the bad guys, trouble with us, meaning the good guys. It’s dangerous for an inexperienced man. Were you ever in combat?”

“I did some time in-”

“I tell you, Mr. Swagger, it’s not pretty. You cannot believe what a bullet can do to a human body.”

“Yes sir,” Bob said.

“Well, I’m not getting from you what I want and I can’t compel you to give it to me. But I have to warn you that we don’t recognize righteous lawbreaking, meaning I can’t cut you any slack. I can and will arrest you on a lot of silly little things like impeding a lawful investigation or disobeying a lawful order if I find you poking around. I’m so hoping I don’t have to go that route on a man of your age.”

“Yes sir,” said Bob again. “Now let me ask you one last thing. My daughter had personal effects with her that day. I’m guessing you retrieved them from the wreck. I’d like to have them.”