John Casey - Compass Rose

And then Mary was on her feet, bustling Rose into her snowsuit, scooping her up off the floor, holding her face up to May’s to be kissed, then up to Dick’s, and Mary was out the door.

May sat down at the kitchen table. Dick got up. He put two biscuits on a plate, poured himself a glass of milk, and ate standing up at the sink. He washed his plate and glass and said, “I don’t want you going behind my back like that.”

May didn’t say the first thing that came into her head. After a bit she said, “All right, now you know. I want Rose to visit here.”

“Suppose the boys had come in.”

“I sent them off to Wakefield to the picture show.”

“So you’re pulling the strings.”

“I don’t want Rose to grow up not knowing us.”

“I’ve gone to see her.”

“I said ‘us.’ And when it comes time to let the boys know, it won’t be so hard on you if they see that I’ve come around.”

Dick jerked his head and stiffened. Then he sat down and stared at the floor between his feet.

May was tempted to push him down further. She could still say, “Who went behind whose back?” She also felt sorry for him — just not enough to say something that would make him feel better. She thought of Mary Scanlon, jollying him out of his snarls. Hugging him, teasing him, kissing him. Let him get squeezed by jolly Mary Scanlon if that’s what it took to get Rose over here.

Johnny Bienvenue called to say he’d like to talk to Elsie about a couple of things.

“Okay. Shall I come to Providence? Or are you in Woonsocket?”

“I’ve got to go to Sawtooth, so I can save you the trip. Are you back at work or still on leave?”

Elsie thought Jack must have been talking. “No. Another couple of days off.”

“So you’re okay?”

“Pretty much. If you want to come during the day, I’ll be at home.” She was about to ask why they couldn’t just talk on the phone. She kept her mouth shut … why miss another chance to get a glimpse?

He came the next afternoon. She said he could smoke his pipe — Rose was still with Mary. “So what are we talking about?”

“First off, in a while I won’t be able to help you represent Miss Perry’s interests. I can do it for the next several months, but then I’ll be running for public office.”

“Well, good. That’s what you’ve wanted. Your visit to Sawtooth have anything to do with that?”

“Jack wants to have a talk. See if I’d like to have dinner next week with some of his Sawtooth pals.”

“He gets into everything. Oh. Is it on account of Jack you know about my accident?”

“This is the hard part. I have independent knowledge. In Woonsocket a lot of people come to me with their problems. A lawyer came to me, said he needed some advice. He chose not to say who his client is. I had no idea this would involve you. It turns out his client is the guy who shot you.”

“So who is he?”

“I don’t know.”

“But this lawyer friend of yours knows. You could find out.”

“This lawyer of my acquaintance. At this stage, I can’t.”

“What’s going on here? How does this lawyer of your acquaintance know who I am? How does he know you know me?”

“Your first question — there’s only one female officer who patrols the Great Swamp and who’s on sick leave. Second question — he doesn’t know I know you. He just knows your name.”

“So why doesn’t the lawyer come see me?”

“The client is very cautious, so the lawyer is very cautious. The client is both fearful and wanting to make amends. Up in our corner— au coin —there’s a feeling that really bad things happen to people who get tangled up with anything official. So the client wants to make things right directly — pay your medical bills, something for pain and suffering.”

“And get off scot-free?”

“After he pays.”

“This is like a bribe. This is like hush money.”

Johnny looked down. He didn’t say anything for a while. He looked up and said, “I can see how you see it. I can also see how he may be seeing it.”

“What are you doing this for? How do you get involved?”

“Like I said, people come to me. They know I know people—”

“You’re like a French-Canadian godfather.”

“Not in the sense—”

“You’re asking me to lay off this guy … this gumba of yours.”

“Look, you’ve been hurt. The guy appears to be willing to come forward — at least part of the way. I don’t know why exactly he doesn’t want a public reckoning. He may have a rational reason, I don’t know. Or he may have an irrational fear. So tell me what you would like to see happen.”

“I won’t take his money. I’m paid to do my job, and my job is to do something about guys like him. He is a dangerous idiot. I want his hunting license and his gun. I want him banned from possessing a firearm.”

Johnny said, “Let me think. I’ll go light my pipe outside. It makes a lot of smoke at the beginning. It’s not so cold today. No wind.” He went out the front door.

She was surprised to see him making his way down to the pond. He tapped on the ice with a stick, shuffled out a few steps. He looked at the trees, the bullbriars at the far side. He looked all around. When he saw her at the window he waved, then beckoned for her to come down.

When she stepped off the bank onto the ice, he held her hand. He said, “I’m sorry. I forgot it might be hard for you.”

“I can walk perfectly well. I’ll try tennis next week. You want to know how bad it is? The extent of my injuries?”

“I’m not representing this man. I’m only asking.”

“I’ll be fine. But I’m not the point.”

“Okay. You want this man punished not for wounding you but because he broke the rules. He did something wrong in your woods. I’m impressed by your strictness.” He looked at the trees again. “I honest to God had no idea it would be you. But here we are.” He shrugged. “So are you saying you want a criminal case?”

“Well, maybe not the whole mess, his lawyers dragging it on and on, probably trying to make me look like a liar.”

“That might be the only way to ban him from possessing a firearm — to convict him of a felony. Proving criminal intent … that’s a reach. His lawyer says he called a rescue squad from a pay phone. He wouldn’t say that unless there’s a record. So leaving the scene of an accident is maybe not in play. But taking away his hunting license could be an administrative matter …” He let out a long breath that turned white in the cold.

She said, “You’re not smoking your pipe.”

“I changed my mind. I like the taste of the air, the air over a frozen pond. I played a lot of hockey on ponds.”

She said, “I’ve been in an administrative hearing. It was just like a trial. Lawyers digging up every detail. They pulled up a memo that said I was overzealous. And this time … could they make the doctor testify? Make him talk about my subcutaneous adipose tissue? Make him show the X-ray? It’s mostly bones, but it probably has a milky outline of my rear end. No, wait — all those pellets would show up. It’d be a connect-the-dots picture of my bare ass.”

Johnny’s head popped up an inch or two. He squeezed his mouth shut. He said, “I don’t think …” He stopped. He said, “I’m sorry. I don’t know where we are. I guess you’re asking about the admissibility of medical records.”

“You think it’s funny.”

“No.”

“I saw you trying not to laugh.”

“Okay. Just for a second there I thought of a kid with a big orange crayon and a Howard Johnson place mat with a connect-the-dots puzzle.”