'One hopes Plan B will work better than Plan A. At this moment, I believe the President's appointee is feeding the multitudes at Sweet-briar Rose. Chicken a la king is the rumor.' She could see the lights down the street, and her belly rumbled.
'Will you listen and pass on a message?'And she heard what he did not add: You contentious bitch?
'Happy to,' she said. Smiling. Because she was a contentious bitch. When she had to be.
'We're going to try an experimental acid. A hydrofluoric compound, man-made. Nine times as corrosive as the ordinary stuff.'
'Living better through chemistry.'
'I'm told you could theoretically burn a hole two miles deep in the bedrock with it.'
'What highly amusing people you work for, Colonel.'
'We're going to try where Motton Road crosses - 'There was a rustle of paper. 'Where it crosses into Harlow. I expect to be there.'
'Then I'll tell Barbie to have someone else wash up.'
'Will you also be favoring us with your company, Ms Shumway?'
She opened her mouth to say I wouldn't miss it, and that was when all hell broke loose up the street.
'What's going on there?' Cox asked.
Julia didn't reply. She closed her phone and stuck it in her pocket, already running toward the sound of yelling voices. And something else. Something that sounded like snarling.
The gunshot came while she was still half a block away.
6
Piper went back to the parsonage and discovered Carolyn, Thurston, and the Appleton kids waiting there. She was glad to see them, because they took her mind off Sammy Bushey. At least temporarily.
She listened to Carolyn's account of Aidan Appleton's seizure, but t!he boy seemed fine now - chowing ever deeper into a stack of Fig Newtons. When Carolyn asked if the boy should see a doctor, Piper said, 'Unless there's a recurrence, I think you can assume it was brought on by hunger and the excitement of the game.'
Thurston smiled ruefully 'We were all excited. Having fun.'
When it came to possible lodging, Piper first thought of the McCain house, which was close by. Only she didn't know where their spare key might be hidden.
Alice Appleton was on the floor, feeding Fig Newton crumbs to Clover. The shepherd was doing the old my-muzzle's-on-your-ankle-because-I'm-your-best-friend routine in between offerings.'This is the best dog I've ever seen,' she told Piper. 'I wish we could have a dog.'
'I've got a dragon,'Aidan offered. He was sitting comfortably on Carolyn's lap.
Alice smiled indulgently. 'That's his invisible F-R-E-I-N-D.'
'I see,' Piper said. She supposed they could always break a window at trie McCain place; needs must when the devil drives.
But as she got up to check on the coffee, a better idea occurred. 'The Dumagens'. I should have thought of them right away. They went to Boston for a conference. Coralee Dumagen asked me to water her plants while they're gone.'
'I teach in Boston,' Thurston said. 'At Emerson. I edited the current issue of Ploughshares! And sighed.
'The key is under a flowerpot to the left of the door,' Piper said. T dc^n't believe they have a generator, but there's a woodstove in the kitchen.' She hesitated, thinking City people. 'Can you use a wood-stove to cook on without setting the house on fire?'
'I grew up in Vermont,'Thurston said.'Was in charge of keeping the stoves lit - house and barn - until I went off to college. What goes| around comes around, doesn't it?' And sighed again.
'There'll be food in the pantry, I'm sure,' Piper said.
Carolyn nodded. 'That's what the janitor at the Town Hall saidf
'Also Joooon-yerl Alice put in.'He's a cop. A foxy one.'
Thurston's mouth turned down. 'Alice's foxy cop assaulted me,' he said. 'Him or the other one. I couldn't tell them apart, myself.'
Piper's eyebrows went up.
'Punched Thurse in the stomach,' Carolyn said quietly. 'Called us Massholes - which, I suppose, we technically are - and laughed at us. For me, that was the worst part, how they laughed at us. They were better once they had the kids with them, but,..' She shook her head. 'They were out of control.'
And just like that, Piper was back to Sammy. She felt a pulse beginning to beat in the side of her neck, very slow and hard, but she kept her voice even. 'What was the other policeman's name?'
'Frankie,' Carolyn said. 'Junior called him Frankie D. Do you know these guys? You must, huh?'
'I know them,' Piper said.
7
She gave the new, makeshift family directions to the Dumagens' - the house had the advantage of being near to Cathy Russell if the boy had another seizure - and sat awhile at her kitchen table after they were gone, drinking tea. She did it slowly. Took a sip and set the cup down. Took a sip and set it down. Clover whined. He was tuned in to her, and she supposed he could sense her rage.
Maybe it changes my smell. Makes it more acrid or something.
A picture was forming. Not a pretty one. A lot of new cops, very young cops, sworn in less than forty-eight hours ago and already running wild. The sort of license they had exhibited with Sammy Bushey and Thurston Marshall wouldn't spread to veteran cops like Henry Morrison and Jackie Wettington - at least she didn't think so - but to Fred Denton? Toby Whelan? Maybe. Probably. With Duke in charge, those guys had been all right. Not great, the kind of guys apt to lip you unnecessarily after a traffic stop, but all right. Certainly the best the town's budget could afford. But her mother had been wont to say, 'You buy cheap, you get cheap.' And with Peter Randolph in charge -
Something had to be done.
Only she had to control her temper. If she didn't, it would control her.
She took the leash from the peg by the door. Clover was up at once, tail swishing, ears perked, eyes bright.
'Come on, you big lug. We're going to lodge a complaint.'
Her shepherd was still licking Fig Newton crumbs from the side of his muzzle as she led him out the door.