Kindness Goes Unpunished

7

We had made it through only one box. The one thing we were able to discern was that Cady was involved with an awful lot of cases and that we knew little actual law.

Henry rubbed his eyes. “What time is it?”

I glanced back over my shoulder at City Hall. “Coming up on ten.”

He closed his folder. “We are looking for some personal connection in one of her cases?”

“Yep.”

“Someone who thinks that killing Devon Conliffe would help Cady?”

“Yep.”

“May I see the note again?” I pulled it from my pocket and handed it to him.

I waited, but he didn’t speak. I gestured toward the card. “We can deduce through this that the killer knows Cady, that the killer knew of Devon, and that the killer knows us.”

He was looking at a photograph of Cady and a young woman with long, dark hair. They were on horseback, and there was a sign that read Gladwyne Stables in the background. “A warning?”

“A threat?”

His eyes came back to mine. “And you think it is someone connected to her through work?”

“It’s the only criminal element that she has any contact with.” I shrugged. “When I’m looking for candy, I go to a candy store.” We looked at the boxes. He stood, moved toward the door, and stretched his back. “What are you doing?”

“I am going to go get two cups of coffee…” He turned the knob, opened the door, and slipped into the hallway. “And a lawyer.” Like a fool, I figured he would come back with only the coffee.

I leaned back in Cady’s chair and looked at the city stretching out along the Delaware River, the only dark band in what seemed like an ocean of diamonds on a velvet pad. It was easy to make out the Benjamin Franklin Bridge, with its blue cables and yellow buttresses stretching over to New Jersey, where I doubted life was any easier.

Who could have gotten him up there? The signs on the walkway said that the gates were closed and locked at 7 P.M., so it wasn’t a casual meeting. Somebody had wanted Devon Conliffe on that bridge, somebody who had wanted him dead.

I thought about the people I’d talked to earlier. Jimmie Tomko obviously held no great love for Devon, but in our brief interview he didn’t strike me as the type to toss people off bridges. It would be interesting to go to the firing range the next night to broaden the suspect pool. Ian O’Neil was intriguing-a young man with a past-and I figured he had a thing for Cady, but that’s about as far as that went as well.

I closed my eyes and listened to the skyscraper, to the elevators rattling up and down their shafts, to the retreating surf of the air conditioning, and to the building itself, sighing and shifting with the breeze like some colossal ship at dock.

I leaned back and felt as if I too were coming unmoored. Out of my element, it was possible that the deductive process I had always relied on was now leading me astray, or maybe it was just that I couldn’t stop thinking about Cady. I thought about walking over to the other side of the building to look out one of the windows so that I could find her. It felt like up here, with our ships anchored in the sky, I might be able to catch a glimpse of her as she used to be.

I could hear more than one pair of footsteps padding along the carpet. The door opened, and Henry stood there holding a bassinette; beside him stood a young woman with long, dark hair. She wore jeans, sneakers, and a western-style rhinestone belt; her hair was pulled back into a ponytail, but she was the same woman as the one who was in the photograph.

“I got us a lawyer.” I stood up as he handed me a cup of coffee. He looked at the baby. “This is Riley Elizabeth Fitzpatrick, and this is Joanne Fitzpatrick, an associate of Cady’s.”

I noticed the way he used the word associate, like it was a friendship rather than being at the bottom of the firm’s food chain. Cady would have noticed, too. I took off my baseball cap and held out my hand. “Walt Longmire. I’m Cady’s father and potential felon.”

She laughed, then put her hand to her mouth and looked out the partially open doorway. She glanced at her daughter, Henry, and then me. “I understand you need some help.”

The current case on Cady’s agenda was one that involved the SEC and didn’t seem personal enough to get anybody thrown off a bridge. The only criminal case we had stumbled across so far was a pro bono one that concerned an inmate of Graterford Prison, a maximum-security facility in eastern Pennsylvania. He had a religious grievance, and Cady had named the file WHITE EYES. Henry was the first to ask. “How many Indian cases does the firm handle?”

She shook her head and looked a little nervous, the way Easterners do when talking about Indians to an Indian. “Hardly any, but Cady’s the one who would get the pro bono stuff concerning Native Americans. The plaintiff is one of those cell block lawyers with about forty-seven grievances.”

Henry looked up from the file. “If this William White Eyes is Indian, why is his vita marked Caucasian?”

Joanne shrugged, still looking slightly anxious. “White Indians. It’s really big in the prison system.”

“You’re kidding.” I rubbed my nose, which had started itching. I peeked in the bassinette, but Riley Elizabeth continued to sleep peacefully.

“No, I guess their experiences with our society didn’t work out so they decided to go over to the other side.” She glanced at Henry. “No offense.”

He smiled. “None taken.”

“He’s even got a 1983 filed with the DOC for not having a sweat lodge available to him in pursuance of the right to freely practice his religion according to PRP Act 71 P. S. 2402.”

Whatever that meant. “What are the pendings on this William White Eyes?”

“It looks like he’s been released, but he’s just a cook; no violent crimes.”

“Cook?”

“Designer drugs. Looks like William is a pretty smart kid with chemicals, but I doubt he’d know which end of a gun to point.”

Everybody tossed the files into the open box on Cady’s desk. “Jo, do you ever go shooting with Cady and that bunch?”

She looked at me, then shook her head. “Thursday nights? No, that was more of a Devon thing.” She thought for a moment and then glanced away. “There’s a guy from the district attorney’s office who used to go with them. Vince Osgood.”

“Vince Osgood’s the assistant district attorney who was suspended in the Roosevelt Boulevard incident?” She nodded. “Can you think of anybody who might want to protect Cady, to the point of going after Devon?” She looked at the Bear and me a little too long. “Besides us.”

She thought about it. “Not really. I mean, everybody loves Cady, and nobody was really crazy about Devon, but strongly enough to push him off the BFB? I don’t know.”

“Can I ask you another thing?”

“Sure.”

I glanced over at Henry, looking for a little backup. “Why was she dating him?” He smiled and shook his head, but I thought it was a pretty good question.

She paused for a second. “He wasn’t that bad of a guy, and I think he was a reclamation project.” She looked at me. “I don’t have to tell you; she was like that.” I stayed silent. “I mean, she knew about his problems…”

“And what were those?”

“I’m not sure how much of this I should really be telling you.”

“Please?” Begging, I have found, can be a very persuasive tool in law enforcement, not to mention with women.

She looked from me to Henry and then went ahead. “There was a drug problem a while back…”

“Does that include the Roosevelt Boulevard incident?”

She nodded her head. “Yeah, it was about then that they booted him out of the firm.”

“This firm?”

“Yes.” She crossed her arms, and I thought she might stop talking, but she didn’t. “Booted is probably too strong of a term. He was a recreational cocaine user that let the stuff get the better of him. His work was suffering and, when his yearly review came around, it was considered best that he pursue his career as counsel elsewhere.”

“Where did he go?”

“Hunt and Driscoll.” We tried to look blank. “It’s a very good firm.” She went on. “That’s how they met. Devon still had a few acquaintances here, and he and Cady went out to lunch with a mutual friend.”

“Who was that?”

She sighed and looked at the filing cabinets. Her eyes came back to mine. “I introduced them, but I didn’t tell them to start dating.” She took a deep breath. “I’m sorry. I’m just feeling bad about the way that things turned out.”

I smiled, just to let her know that I didn’t consider her responsible. “I think everybody is.” I picked up my coffee from the desk and took a sip; I wasn’t drinking it because I was thirsty. “So, you knew him pretty well?”

She looked at me, Henry, and then back at me. “He was very kind to me in a period when I needed it.” Unconsciously, her hand went out and touched the bassinette. “I dated him a couple of times before Cady. Nothing serious.”

“What was he like?”

She bit her lip. “I think he wanted people to like him; he just didn’t know how to get them to. I think he was already chemically imbalanced, and once you added the cocaine…”

“Where did he get the stuff?”

Her eyes sharpened. “I really wouldn’t know.”

“Who would?” I was pushing, but it was part of the job.

She watched me for a moment and then sighed. “There was the guy I mentioned, Vince Osgood, Oz. There was a story on WCAU about him where he said he liked to go out with the boys and kick some butt. Word has it he was trying to get himself appointed by the new governor as assistant attorney general, but he’s still under suspension for being involved in the Roosevelt Boulevard thing.”

“Was anybody prosecuted in that case?”

“One of the guys in the other car.”

“Do you know any details, like their names, and whether they were convicted?”

“I’m really not sure.” I made a face. “You don’t believe me?”

I cleared my throat, trying to soften the tone of what I said next. “I find it odd that you were dating but that you don’t know any more.”

She stiffened a little in her chair. “Like I said, Oz and I weren’t dating; he was just helping me out.” Her hand was still on the bassinette.

I glanced up at the photo of her on horseback and then back to mother and daughter. There were parts here, but I wasn’t quite sure how to put them together yet. “Do you mind if I ask who your baby’s father is?”

Her eyes looked directly at mine. “Yes, I do.”

When we got downstairs, two cops were standing in the middle of the lobby. “Hello, Michael.”

“How you guys doin’?”

“We’re all right.” I glanced back at the two security guards. “They call you?”

“Yeah, they thought it was suspicious that you went in with the lady, and then she came out without you.”

I waved at the security guards, but they didn’t wave back. I was beginning to think that Philly was just not a waving kind of town. “Who’s your friend?”

Michael gestured toward his partner. The young man beside him was roughly the same size as Michael and in very good shape. He looked like he was enjoying himself, too, and I figured we’d have to fight them because we’d never outrun them. “This is Malcolm Chavez. Malcolm, this is Sheriff Walt Longmire and his Native American sidekick, Henry Standing Bear.”

“Actually, I’m his sidekick.” Henry didn’t seem to care one way or the other. “Aren’t you guys out of your district?”

“Yeah, we heard about the wild west show on the radio and called it in ourselves.”

I looked at the Bear’s fringed jacket. “It’s your fault.” He didn’t seem to care about that either. “Are we in trouble?”

“Well, we have to file a report even if you didn’t do anything.”

“We didn’t do anything.”

“Yeah, well, we have to file a report which means you’re probably going to hear from Vic the Father.”

“Our Vic and this one’s dad.” Henry nodded, continuing to give the cops the wooden Indian treatment. I put my hands in my pockets and looked at my boots. “Do Katz and Gowder work for him?”

“Yes, they’re Homicide North, but I heard that Katz had switched over to Internal Affairs.” He glanced at Chavez, who nodded. “I’m not sure why he’s back with Gowder in homicide, but it must’ve been some real juice from upstairs. I’m sure Vic Senior ain’t happy about it.”

I looked back up. “I got a question for you. Does Vic the Father get along with anybody?”

It was the first time I’d seen him smile without any warmth in it. “I gotta feeling you’re gonna find out.”

We filed through the revolving doors and back onto the street. Chavez opened the back door of the cruiser for us. “You guys are just giving us a ride, right?” He nodded, and we got in.

It was the beginning of the late watch, so they dropped Henry off at the Academy and drove me over the bridge into their own district. The lights on the Schuylkill River reflected the buildings along the west side of the city, and I got a quick glimpse of the Philadelphia Museum of Art and the stairs that Sylvester Stallone ran up in Rocky. Just past the museum, the eerie outline of Boathouse Row gave the empty impression of haunted houses, and I tried to think about something other than how the back seat of the cruiser smelled.

I watched the back of the two patrolmen’s heads through the screening, the high and tight haircuts and the perfect uniforms; they even wore their hats in the car. Most of my stuff was pretty threadbare, like me. I couldn’t even remember the last time I’d requisitioned a duty shirt.

Chavez responded to a call on the radio as we drove past 30th Street Station on the way to the hospital. Michael leaned back, laid his arm across the seat, and looked at me through the rearview as we waited at a stoplight. “We have to make a little detour.”

“As long as your mother doesn’t mind staying with Cady a little longer.”

Michael looked at Chavez, who smiled back at me. “Hey, man, did he just say something about your mother?”

They both exhaled a laugh and then turned on the light bar and sirens. We turned up 34th and turned left on Lancaster Avenue. I called Lena. She said to take my time, that there was no change, and that she was reading a Margaret Coel and was fine. The neighborhood began changing from the late-night bustle of Market and the colleges as we headed west; the buildings became smaller, rundown, and dirty. People began disappearing, and the streetlights grew farther apart. We were in a place like the Indian reservations back home, a place where dreams would die unquestioned, a place for the quick and, more than likely, the dead.

We traveled a ways up Lancaster before Michael responded to another call and slowed the cruiser to a stop, turning off the lights and siren. We parked in a deserted gas station. There was a wig shop across the street at the end of the block with only one unbroken window. Michael switched off the headlights and let his eyes adjust to the dark. He peered past the corner, but I had to lean forward to see where he was looking.

It was an abandoned lot, unwanted and unoccupied except for the usual urban detritus. There had probably been more than one building there at one time, but they had collapsed or burned. Only a three-story row house was still standing. I could tell that it had been something in its day, but the years of neglect and abuse had left it looking decrepit and dangerous. There were no lights in the building, only the mirrored illumination in the broken windows, which reflected the glow of the one streetlight left lit half a block away and the close shine of the low-flying clouds. There was garbage everywhere, and a barricade of dumpsters overflowed across the street.

Chavez turned his head to look at me, putting his palm out flat to introduce the scene. “May I present Toy Diaz’s Fort, the Wanamaker’s of crack houses.” I could make out patterns of movement in the shadows as he spoke. “The seller takes the money from the buyer, the seller goes into the building to give the money to the holder, the holder gives the stuff to the seller, and the seller comes back out and gives the stuff to the buyer. Pretty slick, and according to the letter of the law, at no time is the seller on the street with the money and the stuff…”

I finished the statement for him. “Which means possession, but not possession with intent to distribute.”

Chavez laughed. “There’s a new sheriff in town.”

I watched as Michael’s jaw clenched like Vic’s. “Some scumbag realtor in the Northeast owns the building, and he gets a monster kickback from the whole deal.”

“Who is Toy Diaz?”

“Salvadoran refugee, truly a grade-A asshole. His brother caught some time a few years back, but we’re still trying to get the devil himself.”

Chavez pointed. “With all the open space around the building, we can’t get near the place without somebody giving the high sign. We come roarin’ up and they just pitch the stuff and the guns.” They were silent for a moment. “There’s a lot of guns in there.”

“Tell ’em about the 32s.”

“That’s what we were just responding to on the radio. Business gets good, and they just call in a 10-32 on the other side of the district to keep us distracted.” Even with my limited knowledge of the city ten code, I knew a 10-32 was a man with gun and a priority call. “They keep about twenty vials out on the street, hidden all over the place. I found one in an empty potato chip bag one time. They sell those out, then they go back in and get more, usually during a shift change.”

Michael shook his head. “They don’t even walk away when we roll on ’em anymore. We’ve hit that damn place a dozen times now; we hit ’em twice this evening. Nothing.”

We watched as the shadowy figures went about their business. I wanted to get back to Cady but started thinking about what the Cheyenne would do in this situation. “Do you think they count?”

Both of the young officers turned to look at me. “What?”

“Do you think they count how many cops go in during a bust, and how many cops come out?”

They called a point-to-point for some of their buddies so that the radio signal wouldn’t reach Central. The eleven officers who showed up were like Moretti and Chavez-young, hopeful, and pissed off. Michael started to describe the plan.

Three cruisers would make their standard run at the place, with the fourth parked close but not within view. Nine of the eleven officers would rush the Fort, and the two men in the fourth car would call in a 10-32, pretending they’d gotten the call from the district. The cops would race out of the place, jumping in their units to respond to the fake point-to-point that no one else in the district would hear besides them and the drug dealers monitoring the police radio. The trick was that four officers would remain on the roof of the building and wait about five minutes for the dealers to reacquire their weapons and restock from inside.

Malcolm Chavez wanted to be on the roof squad, but Michael convinced him that he could go better undetected by the dealers since all white guys look alike. Chavez and another officer by the name of Johnston would do the fourth car position and call in the thirty-two at the appropriate time. Only the radios in the immediate vicinity would receive the call, but that would include the spotter the drug dealers were using, who would watch as the cops all piled out of the house, jumped in their cruisers, and sped off. At least all the cops he knew about. Then the ones on the roof would rush the building from behind. My job was to sit in the back of the cruiser on my hands and try not to think of why I was here and not with my daughter.

“So, when you were planning your trip to Philadelphia, did you ever think you’d be sittin’ in the ghetto with two brothers?”

“You bet.”

Rayfield Johnston was a likable sort, a little older than the others. He had been an elementary school teacher but had grown restless and decided to switch careers. I told him about my experiences reading to Durant Elementary School students. He thought it was pretty funny.

Johnston shook his head and compared notes. “We got the Police Athletic League, and I umpire up north of Belmont…”

Chavez blew air out. “Shit…”

Johnston laughed. “Combat pay, man. Combat pay.”

The radio broke in with Michael’s voice. Static. “Unit 18, 10-34, Lancaster and Pauley.” We listened through the open windows as the sirens of the associated units sped toward the Fort about two blocks away. You could actually make out the blush of the surrounding buildings as the flicking red lights caromed off the uneven surfaces of the derelict row houses.

I thought about the people in the little buildings, dwarfed by the towers of Center City only a short distance away. You could see the tops of the skyscrapers from here, hovering over the moat of the Schuylkill like some magical kingdom. I wondered what they thought about the activity just outside their doors. Would they be happy that this little cottage industry of poison was being interrupted, or were we just another event in a constant cycle of tired desperation and civic stupidity? I looked at the heads of the two men in the front seat and thought about Johnston being screamed at by over-enthusiastic parents and coaches, and about Chavez returning to a place he had fought so hard to escape. Hope is what it always comes down to, whether it’s a trailer home on the other side of the tracks in Durant, Wyoming, or a tiny row house in the Wild West of Philadelphia. I smiled to myself and hoped my thoughts wouldn’t carry to the patrolmen up front-they would laugh. Far beyond the badges and the guns, hope and laughter were their most powerful weapons.

Chavez started the car, and it seemed like he was in slow motion as he lifted the mic to his lips. “Unit 41, I’ve got a 10-32 at 52nd and Market.” We listened as the sirens fired up again and the light show increased its intensity. The cavalry had made its charge and now appeared to be retreating.

Chavez hung the mic back on the dash and slipped the cruiser into gear. “Here we go.”

We slipped through the remaining blocks to another corner, made a left, and were looking straight at the back of the row house. There were partial balconies at the rear of the building all the way up to the third floor, with a flight of stairs winding their way from the righthand side. The remnants of aluminum awnings cast shadows across the back of the structure, making it difficult to see where anyone might be stationed. There was an abandoned car with its wheels removed and what looked like the remnants of an old chain-link fence stretching across the backyard. It was like a demilitarized zone, and all I could think of was the amount of guns that were about to converge there.

When Chavez slid the cruiser behind a derelict van, he and Johnston got out of the vehicle; the young officer reached back and lifted the handle to allow me to join them on the street.

“Lose your batons and hats.”

Johnston turned and looked at me, neither of them having heard a word I said. “What?”

“Lose the batons and hats; they’re going to fall off anyway. Turn your jackets inside out so that none of the metal reflects.” They both looked at me for a moment more and then did as I told them. They looked so young.

Chavez, having prepared himself, studied Johnston. “You still look like a cop, man.”

Johnston smiled. “Yeah? Well, you do, too.” They both turned to look at me. “He doesn’t.” I smiled and took off my Phillies cap, placing it on Chavez’s head.

He pulled it off at an angle, gangsta style. “You gonna be all right while we’re gone?”

I looked up and down the street, where there was only one light on in a second-story window at the end of the block. “Looks pretty quiet in my part of the neighborhood.”

“That could change.” He reached back in the open window and unlocked a black Mossberg 590 DA 12-gauge and handed it to me. “You know how to use that?”

I checked the breech and safety. “Yep.”

He smiled. “I bet you do.”

The requisite amount of time had passed, and in the next few minutes Michael and his team would begin a very noisy descent from the roof. We were counting on it.

I watched as Chavez and Johnston moved around the discarded van and started working their way across the street and over the sagging fence. They stayed apart, and I didn’t hear any warning sounds coming from the Fort as they slowly covered the fifty yards to the abandoned car.

I draped the Mossberg down along my leg after rechecking the safety, resting the end of the barrel on the toe of my boot. I figured if anybody were looking out the window, it would be prudent to not advertise the shotgun. I moved along the side of the van for a better vantage point and watched as the squad cars returned after pulling a quick U-turn. Michael and his group should now be descending the stairwell inside the building.

I could hear the thud of the back door being kicked in and watched as Chavez and Johnston disappeared into the darkness. People were yelling all over the place, and I could make out someone from inside shouting that they were the police and that whomever they were talking to should freeze. There was more yelling, and I watched as the beams from the cops’ Maglites flashed inside the row house, some on the third floor and some on the second.

There were people running everywhere; the patrolmen coming from around the front tackled a few. Some of the more lithe individuals were able to slip by and disappeared into the streets and alleys beyond.

It was then that I heard the first shot, that cattle-prod reaction to the sharp sound of gunfire. It doesn’t sound like in the movies; it is more like a quick smacking sound that makes you second-guess. I heard the sound again and was pretty sure it was coming from the second floor. I looked down at the 12-gauge in my hands, noticing that I had already clicked off the safety.

I moved across the street and was approaching the sagging fence when I saw some commotion at the second-story window and heard the report of a handgun. I sped up.

An uneven image crowded the window, and I watched in horror as what looked like two men scrambled and then tumbled from the second story. They crashed through the partial aluminum awning of the first floor and slid onto the back porch. There were more shots with a lot of screaming and yelling before one of the figures stood and leapt from the stoop, clearing the back of the collapsed porch in one leap. He turned as other people crowded the doorway and reached for something at his waistband. He tripped but converted the fall into a lope that brought him back up on a course for where I now stood.

It appeared as if his eyes were right on me as I stood there at the fence with the shotgun trained at his middle. I could make out Chavez’s voice screaming for him to stop and prayed that they wouldn’t open fire with me directly in line, but no bullets came whizzing from the Fort, only a half-naked man who still seemed to be fussing with something in the low-hanging pants at his midriff.

The police behind him screamed again, but he wasn’t listening, intent only on his line of escape. As he got closer, I could see the well-defined muscles that covered his body and figured he was roughly my size, but in a lot better shape.

I looked over the shotgun and then thought about what I was doing and where I was. I clicked the safety back on. As he got closer, I could see the tattoos that seemed to cover his body. He was a monster. I stayed alongside the abandoned car for a moment and then took two steps, catching him halfway over the fence.

There were two things they taught me when I was an offensive lineman at USC back in the Dark Ages. One: after a holding call, grab anything that moves because they’re not going to make two holding calls in a row. Second: never underestimate the power of a good clothesline tackle. I felt the liquid thump of a body giving way as my right arm came up and caught him in the middle of the chest, forcing the air out of him,

He didn’t make it over the fence, but what was in his waistband did; a small 9 mm semiautomatic pistol that struck the sidewalk and skittered over the curb and into the street, next to a sewer grating.

I watched as he gurgled for a moment, then breathed in an unsteady motion, clutching his abdomen and rolling from side to side; I noticed in a moment of irony that he was wearing black alligator cowboy boots. As one of the cops made it to the fence, I slipped the shotgun under my arm and walked into the street to look for the automatic, but I was pretty sure it’d dropped into the sewer.

There was a gaggle of police vehicles and EMTs, all with their gumballs going, at the front of the Fort, so before anybody with more authority could get back to where we were, I handed the shotgun to a patrolman named Fraser. His partner rolled the already complaining man over and cuffed him.

“This one had an automatic, but I think it dropped into the sewer grate.”

Fraser smiled. “We’ll light it up and take a look.”

“Everybody okay over there?”

“Moretti stepped on a nail, so the big pussy’s going to have to get a tetanus shot.”

The large man in the cuffs cocked his head and stopped groaning long enough to yell toward me. “Hey, motherfucker, my ribs are broken!”

I looked back at Fraser. “What was all the gunfire?”

“Hey, motherfucker, who are you?!”

He motioned to the drug dealer. “One of his buddies threw a few into the stairwell before shooting himself in the leg.”

“Motherfucker, I asked you a question!”

The other cop yanked him a little to the side. “Shut the fuck up, DuVall!”

“Who went out the window with this guy?”

The patrolman looked serious for a moment. “Johnston.”

Two of the EMTs were working on Rayfield by the time I got there. He had dislocated his shoulder and broken a collarbone, but he was smiling when I leaned against the porch, eye to eye with him. They were stabilizing his arm and preparing a gurney to transport. “How you feeling?”

He groaned. “Like shit. How’d we do?”

I looked around at the assembled cops, spotting Chavez and some of the others smiling like guys who had gotten away with something. “I think pretty good.”

My nostrils flared, and my nose hurt. I rubbed it cautiously and looked at Cady. I thanked Lena and apologized for being late, but I didn’t ask the usual changing-of-the-guard question, whether there had been any improvement, and Lena hadn’t volunteered any information. I wondered if that was the first phase in giving up, if I had passed over some threshold of hope. I didn’t want to start saying Cady as I had said Martha, with a level of such misery and despair that I just couldn’t say it without people looking away.

I sat in the chair by Cady’s bed and remembered a game we used to play when she was around eight. If I would get home late, later than her bedtime, I would carefully make my way down the creaking hallway of our rented house, softly push apart the painted surfaces of the door and jamb, and stand in the backlight of the doorway. She was supposed to be long asleep, and she was a very good actress, but I could tell. If I thought it was a performance, I’d walk over to the bed and place my face only inches from hers, say the magic word, and be rewarded with an explosion of giggles.

I scooted my chair over and rested my chin on the sore arm that I had carefully placed on Sleeping Beauty’s bed. I leaned in very close to her face and whispered. “Faker.”

She didn’t move.

Craig Johnson

Kindness Goes Unpunished