Dead Street

Chapter Four

The new black Ford was identified with a lettered logo on its front doors that read

SUNSET LODGE

SECURITY

Beneath it in smaller letters it said,

Darris Kinder

Captain/Manager

All very simple. Nothing ostentatious. The only difference was the sound the engine made. It wasn’t an ordinary Ford vehicle at all. This was a highly refined chase car that could match any vehicle the state of Florida had on the highways. The sound wasn’t noisy. It radiated power. Maximum power.

Darris Kinder came out from under the wheel, scanned the area quickly and quietly and shut the door very softly. No dome light had gone on over his head when the door opened and I felt a touch of identity with the “Captain/Manager.” He was a rangy, fifty-ish guy with a dark crewcut, light blue eyes and Apache features. When he walked up the path to my porch, it was with a military tread.

I held out my hand and said, “Semper Fi, Captain Kinder.”

He grinned back at me and answered, “It shows?”

“Only to another old gyrene. Come on in.”

Before he walked through my door he gave another long glance around the neighborhood, then walked in and parked himself in the big rocker.

I said, “How long were you a cop?”

“Fifteen years in Newark. Made Lieutenant before I got this deal offered to me down here. Instant Captain, a fivefold increase in pay and a budget bigger than a lot of cities set aside for their police departments.” He paused, his eyes searching my face, “You had a great record, Captain Stang.”

“Call me Jack. I’m retired, Captain.”

“I think you know better than that,” he said. “We never really retire, do we?”

My answer was silence and a grin.

“I always make courtesy calls to new arrivals, but you are not new to me at all. When Dr. Brice purchased Miss Brice’s house, he made me a confidant in the situation that had occurred, and to what would happen... if any word of this leaked out.”

“And?”

“It’s not very comfortable,” he told me.

“She’s been here years,” I stated, “and there’ve been no leaks.”

“That damn pack of hoods never gives up. You know that. They aren’t dumb, either. They were able to tuck old Jimmy Hoffa away in a place where all the resources of the U.S. Government couldn’t find him. They influence political activity and control industrial actions through union membership and they don’t take too kindly to anyone throwing a wrench into their machinery.”

I thought for a moment, then nodded. “How thoroughly did you research the facts?”

“I didn’t raise any red flags. The organized crime bunch haven’t shown any interest. Yet. According to all recorded information, Miss Bettie Marlow died in the wreck of that truck in the Hudson River.”

“Than you’re the only one who knows she’s still alive.”

“You do,” Kinder said softly.

“So?”

“I understand that she has something heavy that could wreck mob operations.”

“That’s what the ones who grabbed her suspected, not knew.”

Kinder wiped his hand across his mouth and stared hard at me. He said, “I found out a certain Mafia family kept a close watch on all your activities for twelve years after her supposed death to see if you had acquired any information she might have had.”

“I didn’t acquire shit,” I said, “and the mob boys know it. They’re pretty efficient. We have our own sources inside their operations.”

“They haven’t given up, you know.”

I asked him, “What good would it do them to poke around here, even if they knew enough to? Bettie Brice has lost every trace of her memory. There’s nothing she can say or do that could implicate organized crime any more. All that was twenty years ago.”

“But it isn’t over yet.”

“Isn’t it?”

“You’re here now.”

“Retired.”

“Noted.”

Invisible fingers seemed to walk up my back, nails leaving little dents in their trek, not hurting, barely annoying, but indicating something was there that I should recognize.

My voice didn’t quite sound like me when I half-whispered, “What do you know, Darris?”

A few seconds passed before he said quietly, “Nothing that would hold up in court.”

“I didn’t ask you that.”

“You know how cops are, Jack.”

“They’re all retirees here.”

“Sure. That doesn’t stop them thinking. They don’t say much, but they think, all right. They aren’t under orders here any more than you and I are. But we’re still cops and you don’t shake all that training and action. We still obey some rules that were never written.”

I grinned at him.

He scowled. “What’s so funny?”

“How come we’ll never be plain old civilians again?”

A faint grin twisted his mouth. “Would you want to?”

When I shook my head, the grin reached his eyes.

Then Kinder reached into his back pocket and brought out a small leather pad. He opened it, wrote a few things in it, took down some personal information related to my police work, then handed me the three sheets to sign.

I frowned at what I saw.

Kinder only smiled and nodded again. “I am authorized by the state of Florida to issue permits to carry a concealed weapon to properly trained personnel. I assume you have your own personal pieces with you.”

“A Colt Combat Commande... .45 caliber, a Colt 1911 model and a regulation old fashioned Police Co... .38 revolver. If you want samples of fired slugs, I’ll get them to you.”

“Nice, but not necessary. However, I’ll appreciate the effort. There’s a range on the west end of the village.”

I studied the ice-blue eyes. “How come you don’t trust me, Captain Kinder?”

“They used to call you the Shooter, didn’t they?”

“Only the ones who stayed alive.”

Kinder’s response was to watch me close, a knowing smile on his lips.

“Everything was legal, buddy. Justified and approved,” I said.

An eyebrow hiked. “Sure got you one hell of a reputation.”

“In case you’re wondering about it, I have no intention of improving on it.”

A tiny shrug. “Good enough.”

“Now, can I ask you something else?”

“Sure.”

“Sunset Lodge has got the highest concentration of cops, firemen and even retired federal law enforcement in the USA. They have equipment here that most cities would envy.”

“Anything wrong with any of that?”

I shook my head. “No, but how did it get that way?”

“Sunset Lodge was founded by a wealthy man who had been abducted by the old Dutch Schultz outfit in NYC. Two dedicated police officers tracked down the abductors, rescued the victim after a wild shootout, during which both the cops were wounded. The well-off victim became such a great friend of the police, and, by association, the firemen who had assisted in his rescue, that this place was his gift to Civil Service retirees. If you qualify, cost here is minimal. We are independent and well-funded. Well-protected, too.”

“Good enough,” I remarked.

“You’ll learn more as you go along,” he said as he stood up. He handed me a card and told me, “I can be reached through any of these three numbers. Call me for any information.”

“Tell me something now.”

“Shoot.”

I smiled at his choice of word and said, “What’s with this Garrison Properties outfit down the road?”

“They’ve been in business for fifteen years. Some upper-echelon mobsters are among the retirees, but we have no evidence they’re any more influential in Garrison than the retired dentists and lawyers. Lately they’ve been trying to class up their act — expanding their land holdings and putting in major lots, putting up major housing. And trying to capitalize on this place, I’d say.”

“But it’s been around fifteen years?”

“Yeah, and the clientele pre-existing those new fancy estates isn’t very classy. A couple of youth gangs operate out of there and word has it they’ve been selling drugs.”

“Any arrests?”

“Several, but money bailed them out in a hurry.”

“That’s all?”

“A couple of cars were stolen. One was recovered in Tampa and the other was in a ditch off the road. No damage to the vehicles, but two empty bottles of booze were found on the back seat of one.”

“Prints?”

“None that could be identified at this point.” He shrugged. “Probably juveniles.”

“Well, I’m glad to be here,” I said, rising. “Nice to be with the good guys.”

He got up, we shook hands, exchanged respectful if wary glances, and Captain Kinder was gone.

I took a two-hour tour of the Sunset Lodge compound until I had the area pretty well defined in my head. I saw four faces I recognized from Manhattan precincts but I didn’t call out to them. I passed the S.L. Station House, spotted one old sergeant who’d retired when I got my first promotion and two retirees from the Two-Two and suddenly I was feeling very much at home.

Then I turned at the end of the block and retraced my path to the building that looked so old but was so new. It was a surprise to see no uniforms showing, but everybody going in and out had that identical cop walk and when you looked at their feet, only two were wearing fancy footwear. The others still held on to their old brogans.

Parking was behind the building and I found a place, backed into it like everyone else did, making a quick getaway easy. Habit is a hard thing to break. When I got out of the car I hadn’t gone ten feet when a voice said, “Damn, look who’s here!”

Joe Pender had retired as a sergeant when he had put his full time in on the Job. Sergeant was as high as the husky redhead had wanted to go — his pension was adequate and he had made an outside job with another cop, renovating old buildings and renting them, so he wasn’t hurting for money.

I said, “Good to see you, pal. I didn’t know you’d retired down this way.”

As we shook hands he told me, “The wife’s doing. She’s a real Florida lover. New York got to be too much for her. You moving in?”

“Got a place over on Kenneth Avenue.”

“Fancy, man!” he laughed. “That’s where the brass have their digs. Got an old commissioner at the far end of the street with a pair of inspectors right beside him.”

“They still giving orders?”

“Hell no. This time we have a very democratic club.” He paused and nodded toward the building behind him. “Damn, Jack, let’s get you in and on the rolls.”

“I just got here yesterday.”

He wrapped his fingers around my arm and said, “And now is when you get back on duty.”

“Duty?”

“Sure. The guys would flip out if they tried to hide their cop background and just be plain civilians. We rotate helping Kinder out on security stuff. No rank, no roll calls, plenty of shooting matches on our own firing ranges.”

“Who buys the ammunition?” I asked him.

“We have reloading equipment. All calibers. Even the women get in on this action.”

“They safe to keep around?”

“Buddy, there hasn’t been a divorce since anybody’s been here. This retirement scene is the greatest. Jeannie and I damned near broke up until we moved here. Now we’re kissing and hugging all over the place.”

And Joe Pender was right. Sunset Lodge was a brand new beginning for a bunch of streetwise old police officers who had brushed the grime of New York and New Jersey off their clothes and took to the shorts and sunshine of Florida.

But they couldn’t brush the concept of police action from their station house. The walls still held typed and handwritten memos for member activities and in two locations were official mug shots of current criminals somebody in the big city was forwarding to the clubhouse.

“Like it?” Joe asked me.

“Like I never left home,” I remarked.

“Right. Now let’s get you signed up. Hell, you even get a badge again. Miniature, of course, but you get five percent off your bills over in the big cities. Just show the tin.”

I shook my head and followed him to the reception desk where I became semi-official in this new land of make believe.

I said so long to Joe and went back outside. A half dozen matrons in tennis outfits were squealing like little kids, all anxious to get to the tennis courts for their tee off times or whatever they called it. I had to stare for half a minute before I fully recognized them. The last time I had seen them they were two-hundred-pounders who had to shop in the big and tall ladies’ stores, emphasis on the big. Sunset Lodge had turned them into chorus cutie size again. I sure hoped their husbands appreciated them. Damn.

I got back in my car and pulled out of the parking lot.

When a cop went on the street for the first time, he felt like I do now.

Everybody was looking at him. He was being sized up.

The locals would need several takes. Is he good enough? they would ask themselves.

The bad guys would know right away. Would he hesitate to kill them? No. Not this one... not the Shooter....

I’d thought I had shrugged those reflections off a long time ago, but I guess I hadn’t. I drove down to the intersection of my street, slowed down and made the turn.

I’d never had a big dog in my life. Where would you walk one on a leash? How long would you stay out? I circled the block twice without seeing any signs of Bettie and her greyhound, then finally turned in to my driveway and went up on the porch and eased into a rocker. I sat there for five minutes and it was like waiting for a snake to strike. I was tense all over. My muscles had tightened into a ready position, poised, balanced, raring for the go signal.

Then I heard the yip and looked to my left. It was a short sound and it had come from a full-throated animal who had spotted something that pleased him and let out a noise to show his appreciation.

Like water spilling from an overflowing jar, the tension went away when I saw Bettie and Tacos come into my direct line of vision and I got up, walked off the porch and waited for her on the sidewalk.

Tacos told her she had company ahead. I heard the nearly muted whine of pleasure.

How the heck would a dog know about us?

So I wouldn’t startle her, I said, “It’s me, your new neighbor,” then added softly, “Jack.”

She wore black sunglasses and their blank lenses bore down on me. “I heard all about you a little while ago. The ladies over at the station house keep everyone well informed.”

“I know a lot of them.”

“So they mentioned. They all like you too. Did you know that?”

“Well, I’ve never been arrested.”

“They don’t arrest policemen, do they?” she asked me.

“The heck they don’t,” I told her.

She was carrying some mail and a few grocery items in an ornamented wire basket and I slid my fingers under the handle and took it from her. Was the mail in Braille, or did someone read it to her, I wondered.

I said, “You handle your dog and I’ll carry your groceries up the stairs. First good deed I’ve done all day.”

Slowly, she turned her head and appeared to look down at Tacos. “Strange,” she said softly.

“What is?”

“Tacos never moved to stop you from taking my basket from me.”

“Should he?”

“He’s extremely protective.”

“So am I,” I said with a grin. “He knows a kindred soul.”

I don’t know why, with her heightened senses, she couldn’t hear my heart beating. My own breath seemed muffled and the muscles in the small of my back had tightened annoyingly. But the oversized greyhound seemed to realize that something was happening and his eyes met mine for an instant’s inspection, then he tugged at his leash and walked to the porch steps, Bettie following him closely.

At the door she slid the key into the lock, turned the knob, let the dog enter ahead of her and said to me, “Won’t you join us for a cold drink, Jack?”

I didn’t answer her for a few seconds and she said, “We are neighbors now, you know.”

“And you have one oversized greyhound dog with big vampire teeth, if anyone made any moves against you.”

“Yes,” she agreed quite pleasantly. “That’s because he loves me.”

The minute delay in my answer almost spoke what was in my mind but hadn’t reached my tongue yet. I asked her, “How heavy is Tacos anyway?”

“A hundred and twenty pounds,” she told me. “All muscle, extremely bright, but too big to race and not enough dog plumage to stay warm while pulling a sled in heavy snow.”

“Where did you get him?”

“He was about to be put down. I rescued him at the track just in time. I wish I could have taken more of the animals, but this one licked my hand and gave me a knowing, pleading look and he became mine and I became his.”

“No offense,” I said, “but what is a ‘knowing’ look, when you’re blind?”

Without hesitation, she said, “Just that he knew I was blind. And that we both needed each other.”

I nodded and said a quiet, “Oh. I see.”

Her head turned and she looked at me. Behind her dark glasses I knew her eyes had somehow found mine. “Do you really?”

“Really,” I murmured.

“Have we met?” she asked abruptly.

“Now why would you ask that? This is my first time here.”

Without answering me, she walked to the kitchen. The layout of her place was the same as mine, the two houses built on identical architectural plans.

I heard the refrigerator open and shut and she came back with two glasses of iced tea and handed me one.

Then she sat on the edge of a big ottoman, sipped her tea a moment, and said, “A long time ago I had an accident. That is what I have been told. I have no memory of it at all, nor anything prior to twenty years ago.”

“Aren’t you interested in finding out any details?”

Bettie shook her head gently. “I’ve been told I have no living relatives.”

“Somebody pays your way here.”

“Yes,” she agreed. “He was the one who... let’s say adopted me after the accident. He’s gone now. Passed away, but he had everything set in motion.”

“There were no inquiries about you, over the years?”

“I understand there were. With the mental state I was in, I couldn’t care less.”

“I’m sorry about that,” I said.

Her head turned and she was looking right into my eyes again. It was as though she had echo location like a porpoise and could zero right in on any sound. I wondered if she could hear me blink.

“The body can compensate for loss,” she murmured. Then, out of the blue, she asked, “Say my name.”

I waited a long moment, took in a deep breath, then quietly said, “Bettie.”

Unlike this young woman, I could see, supposedly. I had been trained to observe and fit pieces together so that any puzzle made sense. I could do all that, but this time I was drawing a blank.

She didn’t draw a blank, though. “Since you first spoke to me this morning your voice has had a familiar sound.”

“Like how?” I asked.

“Like how I know every sound my dog, Tacos, makes. I know what he is trying to tell me. I recognize his mood, his likes and dislikes. He recognizes mine. Somehow I seem to recognize your speech patterns.”

I wanted to blurt it out. I wanted to yell it out loud, but she had a mind that was bent out of shape and I didn’t want to put any further dents in it.

I said, “Well Bettie, I’m just an old New York City cop who might spout a lot of idiomatic language or get into some tough street talk, but I don’t quite follow your drift here.”

There was something very strange about the way she smiled at me. “It will come to me eventually,” she said. “Things always do.”

Her hand reached out, squeezed my wrist and she asked me, “Can you imagine what it’s like, having a new friend?”

I laid my other hand on top of hers and the big dog gave an odd, throaty noise of pleasure.

“Tacos likes you,” she told me.

I let out a pleased grunt too. Then I said, carefully, “This may sound strange but... has anybody ever... tried to attack you?”

A frown creased her forehead while she thought, then shook her head. After a few seconds of further thought, she added, “I’ve never had any trouble with anybody. Everybody in this area knows everybody else. Everybody here looks after me, or tries to — I don’t really need much help.... Why?”

“Well, you’re a lovely doll, Miss Brice.” I tried to excuse my tone with a tight grin before I remembered she couldn’t see it. “I can see why the boys would keep an eye on you.”

“But you said attack.”

“These days,” I said, “the courts can label any type of action an attack. A lot of big-mouth wise guys draw some time for sounding off to unprotected women.”

“Tacos protects me pretty well,” she smiled back. “The only ‘big mouth’ I’ve run into lately was a young guy who made a nasty remark...”

“How young?”

“He wasn’t some old lecher. Since I couldn’t see him I can’t describe him, but his voice told the story. Anyway, he never came by again.”

“What did you say to him?”

“Nothing. I just gave him what I thought was a dirty look, only maybe he couldn’t tell with me in sunglasses.”

I made a small probe. “Mind if ask something?’

“No. We’re friends.”

“Why do you wear them? Sunglasses, I mean. Your eyes are lovely.”

She thought about that. “Sometimes I can feel the sun on my eyes — almost as if the glare is bothering me.”

“Is it?”

Her head turned and she seemed to look in the direction of my mouth. I felt like kissing her.

She said, “I don’t know.”

“Explain.”

“At the end of the day I... I think I can see a red sunset.”

“Oh?”

“The doctors said it was simply a mental reaction. I realized the time of day that it was and expected a red sunset. A sense memory.”

“What did you tell them?”

“I wanted to tell them that they were idiots. I saw something. And it was a sunset. Nothing definitive, but the colors were there. Something bright and beautiful was shining at me.”

“But what did you tell them?” I repeated.

“That I saw a sunset. They made me re-word it to I thought I saw a sunset.”

“When do you see a doctor again?”

“Never, as far as I’m concerned,” she retorted. “I am done with them. I’m blind. All they can say is there is no hope that I’ll ever get my eyesight back. So why should I bother with doctors?”

“You giving up?”

“Nope. I’m just going to make do with the best that I have.”

“And what is that?”

She thought about that, patting Taco’s head until he rubbed his big muzzle against her leg, then she said softly, “I don’t remember my past, so my present is always like living in a paper sack, and the future is all blank space.”

“That’s what you think?”

“Come on, neighbor Jack, what kind of future would I have if I hadn’t had a benefactor like my old veterinarian?” She gave me a sudden big smile and added, “How old are you, Jack?”

“I’ll never see fifty again.”

“I’m almost forty-three.”

“You’re a kid,” I said. “An infant, in this place.”

And it was as if something had stabbed her. Her head jerked in my direction and my eyes were suddenly locked into the black lenses shielding her sightless ones and a shudder touched her shoulders.

Then she took a deep breath and released what she was thinking. “What did you say?”

“I said you were a kid.”

There was a tautness to her expression, and her eyes seemed to search for me, then whatever she was looking for disappeared from her mental image and she whispered, “Strange.”

“What is?”

“Being called a kid,” she told me. “Why would I remember that?”

And then I remembered it. I used to call her “kid.” I’d hold her tight and kiss her, tasting all the sweetness that she had and we’d talk about what we’d do when she grew up.

No way would I have recounted any of those conversations to the guys at the station house. Career cops are funny people with the tightest association between partners and other cops, bonds nobody could break. But, hell, I couldn’t tell them I was wildly in love with a kid. The old-timers would have run me ragged. When Bettie disappeared in that wild abduction, the ranks closed behind me. I never let them open again.

And now here I was.

And who remembered anymore?

Somebody remembered. I could feel it! Damn it, the years were only a hiatus, a period of waiting, and now it was almost over!

Bettie said, “I have to feed Tacos. Would you like to help me?”

“You need help to feed your dog?”

“I need help to talk to my new neighbor. Your house has been empty ever since I’ve been here.”

I said “Okay, young lady....”

“You did it again.”

“What?”

“Called me a ‘young lady.’ That’s worse than ‘kid.’”

“You’re younger than me,” I said.

“Okay, no woman’s going to argue with that.”

And once again I took her hand in mine and, without realizing it, our fingers intertwined and started speaking a silent language that only special people can understand, and at the top of the stairs Bettie said, “Jack....”

“What?”

“Are you sure?”

“About what?”

Her face turned toward me and she reached up and took off her sunglasses. And there were those eyes. Hazel. Pure hazel. The brown and the green swirled in them. How she found the line of vision to mine was something I didn’t know. She was looking at me, watching me, then she let a smile touch her lips.

I snapped my fingers at the greyhound and damned if that dog didn’t smile at me. No tail-wagging, just a daggone smile.

Back in New York City my street was nearly ready for the macadam medical examiner. Nobody had to tell me. I knew the progression of the gravediggers that tore up the entrails of a city and spit them out in some abandoned area that developers would discover and build upon. What was strange was that I didn’t care any more. The city was in a state of flux, blowing up like a fat man who had once been skinny and raunchy and enterprising but now was dropping into the mire of his own wealth. He was fat now. He was going to get fatter.

Bettie said, “What are you thinking?”

“You wouldn’t want to know, doll.”

“Jack... you did it again.”

“What?”

“You... you called me ‘doll.’ “

“That’s you all over, baby,” I said.

Creases showed at the edges of her eyes and she told me, “It’s like hearing an echo. And echoes aren’t real.... Are they?”

“Something else was there first,” I said quietly. “Something real generates echoes... kid.”

She gave one of those girl shakes of the head that sent hair spilling across her face and her laugh had that Tinkerbell ring to it.

“Well, let’s give my big mutt two cans of his favorite dish and a big bowl of biscuits.”

I almost asked her what would come next but she beat me to the answer first. “Then you can tell me all about your past, since I don’t seem to have any.”

“Police officers are sworn to secrecy,” I growled.

“Baloney. They’re all writing books about it now. Some of them even made movies about their exploits. You ever know any of those cops, Jack?”

“Eddie Egan,” I fired back. “He was a great cop.”

“The French Connection episode?”

I nodded, even though she couldn’t see me do it. “Among a lot of others.”

“What did you do, Jack?”

“Routine stuff,” I said. “Everything’s based on established routine in police work. That’s why we almost always nail the bad guy.”

“And how was it when you had to leave your job?”

“Until now, it’s been lousy.”

She let out a little-girl giggle. “What’s happened to improve it?”

“I suddenly got a new neighbor. In New York City you never have a new neighbor. They’re always the ‘people next door’ or the person you nod to in the elevator every morning when you leave for work.”

She turned around and looked into my eyes. There was no identity recognition, just the crinkly movements at the corner of her mouth so that I knew she was intent upon every word I spoke when she told me, “I don’t want to be just... the person next door, Jack.”

“Bettie... you’re the very special person next door.”

Very lightly, her tongue touched her lips and they gleamed with a gentle wetness.

She filled Tacos’ bowl with a big helping of his favorite supper and put it on the floor next to the water dish. The dog never moved. There was a peculiarity in his stance that was hard to define. His eyes seemed to be nailed to mine and the tip of his tail gave a minute twitch.

I said, “Bettie, if I don’t kiss you I’m going to blow up like I swallowed a grenade.”

“Tacos will kill you if you touch me.”

“The hell he will,” I said and reached out for her, but not too far because she came right into my arms the way she used to and when our mouths touched it was like being smothered in fire of the most pleasurable pain possible. It wasn’t a long kiss. It only lasted for the years that had already gone by and absolutely made up for all the wild, crazy wait I’d had to sweat out, never knowing that this would happen.

You can’t sustain moments like that for too long. We just stood there, and even when I closed my eyes I knew whom I had kissed, but it was not to be told. Not yet. And Bettie was seeing that same invisible thing too and squeezed my hands gently.

I said, “Tacos didn’t try to bite me, kitten.”

I looked down at the dog’s head, which came up to my hip, and damned if that big old animal wasn’t wearing a grin as wide as a mile. His heavy tail gave two mighty thumps against the floor and he let out another of those pleased yips.

Very softly, Bettie said, “You’ve made another very good neighbor, Jack.”

I let her words hang in the air, then said, “I’m sorry.”

She answered, “Don’t be.”

“I’ve just gotten here. One day and look at what has happened. You know what I suddenly feel like? A heel is what I feel like, taking advantage of—”

With her forefinger she touched my lips and said, “Do you know what I suddenly feel like?”

There was no way I could answer that question logically.

“I have no memory at all of my younger days. I’ve been told that I was very pretty and bright and had young men constantly try to get... how do you say it?... next to me.”

And as suddenly as she mentioned it, she scowled, a brief flare of memory tugging up some hidden twist of recollection.

“What is it?” I asked.

For a good ten seconds she stood staring off into empty space. It was like a machine grinding away without sound. Wheels were spinning, but not propelling any energy to any of its memory banks.

Blankly, she asked me, “Jack... Jack, what just happened?”

“Something was coming back to you.”

She shook her head and wiped her hand across her eyes.

“From before your accident?” I suggested.

The shake of her head was final. “It was nothing. I can’t remember any of it. Every once in a while it happens like that.”

“Bettie... did that old vet ever get you in to see a psychiatrist when you were with him?”

A shadow of a frown touched her face again and she nodded. “Several times. Why do you ask?”

“Any conclusions on your case?”

“Yes. There has been some sort of brain damage. Nothing life-threatening, but critical enough to cause memory lapse.” She stopped abruptly and took her lower lip between her teeth. “Do we have to talk about that?”

Brain damage — two chilling words. The few amnesia cases I’d encountered over my cop years had been psychosomatic. Yet she seemed to be reacting to bits and scraps as I unintentionally jogged those brain cells, damaged or not....

I ran my hand up her forearm and gave her a gentle squeeze. “Of course not, doll. I was just being curious... and stupid.”

“No... it’s all right. I understand what sort of a curiosity I must be.” She smiled again and I wanted to kiss her again but didn’t push it.

Then she added, “You’re just being a cop, aren’t you? Always asking questions.” She raised her palm and held it to my cheek. “You’re smiling,” she told me.

“You’re pretty,” I told her.

This time she took my hand and drew me into the living room. No one would have ever have thought she was blind. She led me to a large leather-covered chair and eased me into it, then clicked on the TV without any difficulty and sat down on the couch opposite me. The Weather Station came on and we sat watching, or in her case listening, a while. She leaned back against the cushions, stretched her legs out until her toes touched mine and said, “Jack... you are the first real visitor I’ve ever had in my house.”

“That’s what neighbors are for.”

Even if I had had my eyes closed I would have known she was grinning at me. “What’s so funny?” I asked gently.

“It feels so natural, you and me.”

“Why do you suppose?”

“I don’t know.” She paused, then asked, “Do you?”

She couldn’t see what I did, but I nodded. And she knew it, too.

“And you’re not going to tell me, right?”

I said, “Right. And now it’s time to leave. Until tomorrow, anyway.”

But she knew I was hiding something. How do women always seem to know these things?