lungs fully behind the iron doors.
The Indian girls bloomed and faded quickly, like the morning glories that clung to the trellis outside his trailer. Their cheekbones soon blurred with fat, then-burnished skin turned putty color, and their reedlike bodies became trapped in a burgeoning cocoon of their own flesh. The Indian men buckled too under the pressures of the white man's culture, but Sam didn't feel sorry for them the way he did for the women. 49
Wanda Moses hadn't meant to kick him personally; he'd just been part of the enemy. Tomorrow she'd wake up in the women's section of the jail with a grinding headache, puking, and she would have no memory of how she'd gotten there.
Danny's voice pierced his reverie. "You ready to split, pard?"
Sam slid the original of the FIR into the box marked "Undersheriff," and the carbons into the in-take file, and then limped toward Danny with the pretense of a man in excruciating pain. Danny laughed, and Sam wished for the thousandth time that there was some way to delay the moment when they'd head out on the highway in Danny's pickup. He loved Danny, as he'd loved all his partners, all the men who had stood between him and harm, all the men whose lives he, in turn, had felt responsible for.
Neither of his wives had understood the strength—the need—in that bond between males.
Penny had screamed at him once, "You care more about that goddamned Al Schmuller than you do about me! He gives you more of a hard-on than I do!"
That had been true, in a way. Not the last part. But Al knew where he lived and how he lived and what a tenuous grasp each of them had on staying alive when they worked the Tact Squad during the riots of the sixties. He and Al had faced ugly things together, and then drank together at the Greek's afterward. And three martinis barely blurred the memory of firebombs lobbed from roofs of old buildings at Twenty-third and Pine.
When he walked out, he'd thought that it would be temporary, but she'd never let him come back. Three days after the divorce, she'd married a civilian.
He'd thought Gloria would be different because she worked in the records section, and because she was a cop's widow. It had been O.K. as long as they worked the same shift. Had he loved Gloria? It was hard to remember. He'd loved her kid and had probably stayed with the mother longer because of the boy. But the marriage had started to erode from the moment he was assigned to second watch.
50
When it was over, he missed the kid more than Gloria. And then there was only the job, and he was all right. He was good. He could concentrate and learn, and he went to every seminar he could sign up for: death investigation, narcotics, bomb search, even a weird demonstration of blood patterns when Englert, the expert from Oregon, showed up with the real stuff (and Lord knows where he got it) and explained how to tell from the spatters whether it was high-or low-velocity impact blood spray.
Sam found he could limit his drinking to a beer or two. When he moved into the homicide unit, it made up for a lot of his losses; it was what he was meant to do. It seemed as though he was always working, but nobody cared anymore if he was home at dawn or at noon. He had the knack. That it was a knack to see through the intricate puzzles of violent death did not seem strange to him. He reveled in his skill, and accepted the commendations from the brass and the respect of his peers casually. There were women in his life again, women who wanted him, the thirty-five-year-old Sam Clinton who had it all together after the long bad time. Their faces blended into a melange of sexual satisfaction and escape. He called them all "Sweet Baby," and he was neither committed to or involved with any of them, although he tried to stay long enough so that they were not one-night-stands in their own minds, and not so long that he might inflict harm when he left. He grew adept at knowing when to leave. He could no more have
The Indian girls bloomed and faded quickly, like the morning glories that clung to the trellis outside his trailer. Their cheekbones soon blurred with fat, then-burnished skin turned putty color, and their reedlike bodies became trapped in a burgeoning cocoon of their own flesh. The Indian men buckled too under the pressures of the white man's culture, but Sam didn't feel sorry for them the way he did for the women. 49
Wanda Moses hadn't meant to kick him personally; he'd just been part of the enemy. Tomorrow she'd wake up in the women's section of the jail with a grinding headache, puking, and she would have no memory of how she'd gotten there.
Danny's voice pierced his reverie. "You ready to split, pard?"
Sam slid the original of the FIR into the box marked "Undersheriff," and the carbons into the in-take file, and then limped toward Danny with the pretense of a man in excruciating pain. Danny laughed, and Sam wished for the thousandth time that there was some way to delay the moment when they'd head out on the highway in Danny's pickup. He loved Danny, as he'd loved all his partners, all the men who had stood between him and harm, all the men whose lives he, in turn, had felt responsible for.
Neither of his wives had understood the strength—the need—in that bond between males.
Penny had screamed at him once, "You care more about that goddamned Al Schmuller than you do about me! He gives you more of a hard-on than I do!"
That had been true, in a way. Not the last part. But Al knew where he lived and how he lived and what a tenuous grasp each of them had on staying alive when they worked the Tact Squad during the riots of the sixties. He and Al had faced ugly things together, and then drank together at the Greek's afterward. And three martinis barely blurred the memory of firebombs lobbed from roofs of old buildings at Twenty-third and Pine.
When he walked out, he'd thought that it would be temporary, but she'd never let him come back. Three days after the divorce, she'd married a civilian.
He'd thought Gloria would be different because she worked in the records section, and because she was a cop's widow. It had been O.K. as long as they worked the same shift. Had he loved Gloria? It was hard to remember. He'd loved her kid and had probably stayed with the mother longer because of the boy. But the marriage had started to erode from the moment he was assigned to second watch.
50
When it was over, he missed the kid more than Gloria. And then there was only the job, and he was all right. He was good. He could concentrate and learn, and he went to every seminar he could sign up for: death investigation, narcotics, bomb search, even a weird demonstration of blood patterns when Englert, the expert from Oregon, showed up with the real stuff (and Lord knows where he got it) and explained how to tell from the spatters whether it was high-or low-velocity impact blood spray.
Sam found he could limit his drinking to a beer or two. When he moved into the homicide unit, it made up for a lot of his losses; it was what he was meant to do. It seemed as though he was always working, but nobody cared anymore if he was home at dawn or at noon. He had the knack. That it was a knack to see through the intricate puzzles of violent death did not seem strange to him. He reveled in his skill, and accepted the commendations from the brass and the respect of his peers casually. There were women in his life again, women who wanted him, the thirty-five-year-old Sam Clinton who had it all together after the long bad time. Their faces blended into a melange of sexual satisfaction and escape. He called them all "Sweet Baby," and he was neither committed to or involved with any of them, although he tried to stay long enough so that they were not one-night-stands in their own minds, and not so long that he might inflict harm when he left. He grew adept at knowing when to leave. He could no more have
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