“No. I’d much rather have you there with Jenny right now. I’m all right, really. I had to leave the hospital for a little while to try to get myself sorted out, but I’m on my way back there now. I’ll come home as soon as I can.”
“Call if you need me,” Marianne told her. “I’ll stay by the phone.”
“Thanks, Mari. I will.”
After hanging up, Joanna detoured through the hotel restroom where she used a handful of tissues to wipe her face and blow her nose. Looking at her image in the mirror, she was shocked by what she saw there-by the deep, dark circles under red, puffy eyes, by the gray pallor of her skin, by her lank, dirty hair. She still hadn’t had a chance to shower or change out of the blue dress and the yellow smock, and her teeth were crying for a toothbrush. But all that would have to come later. For now she had to go back to the hospital and handle whatever needed to be handled.
Again, the walk back to the hospital seemed to take forever. As she entered the lobby, she felt shabby and dirty and ill at ease. She felt even more so when a well-dressed young woman fell into step beside her.
“Mrs. Brady. Could I please have a word with you?”
The woman was a stranger yet she seemed to know Joanna by sight. “Who are you?” Joanna asked.
“Sue Rolles. I’m a reporter with the Arizona Daily Sun.”
“What do you want?”
“About your husband’s suicide…”
“Murder,” Joanna interrupted, correcting the reporter the same way she had corrected Dr. Sanders hours earlier.
“But I was under the impression that the case was being investigated as a suicide.”
Joanna stopped in mid-stride and turned to face the reporter. Hurt and rage, the two war-ring emotions that had simmered hot and cold inside her all morning long, combined into a volatile mixture and came to a sudden boil. “You can talk about suicide all you want,” she declared, “but not to me, and not about my husband. Do I make myself clear?” The re-porter nodded.
“Andrew Brady was murdered,” Joanna continued. “He was an experienced police officer. Cops know all about how guns work. When they set out to commit suicide, they know how to get the job done-they usually blow their brains out. I believe that’s a statistic l read in an article in your very own newspaper.”
“I’m here to tell you that Andrew Brady never shot himself in the gut. He wouldn’t have done something like that in the first place, and even if he had, he never would have done it where I’d most likely be the one to find him.”
Properly chastised, the reporter moved back a step just as Ken Galloway materialized out of nowhere.
“What’s going on?” he asked, extricating himself from a crush of homeward-bound people exiting an elevator.
Joanna turned on him as though he were as much an enemy as the reporter. “I’ll tell you what’s going on,” she said. “Andy’s dead and I’m sick and tired of people telling me he committed suicide. I don’t want to hear it anymore. I won’t listen.”
“Who’s this?” Ken asked, nodding toward Sue Rolles.
“A reporter,” Joanna answered. “With the Sun.”
“Maybe you’d better go,” Ken Galloway said hurriedly to Sue Rolles. “I think Mrs. Brady has had about all she can handle for one day.” To Joanna he said, “Your mother sent me down to see if I could find you. She’s waiting for you upstairs. Come on.”
He started away, but Joanna didn’t move. Right that moment there were few people Joanna wanted to see less than she wanted to see her own mother, but she could hardly tell Ken Galloway that. When Joanna didn’t move, Galloway came back.
“I’ll be up in a little while,” Joanna said. “I need to stop off at the billing department and make arrangements to pay the bill.” It was a lame excuse but enough to delay the inevitable confrontation with her mother for a few minutes longer.
“But what should I tell your mother? She’s waiting to give you a ride home,” Ken explained. “She said you rode up here with Sheriff McFadden last night and that you didn’t have a way back to Bisbee.”
Wearily Joanna passed her hand over her eyes. “Ken, you know my mother, don’t you?” “Some,” he admitted.
“Well enough to know how much of a pain she can be at times. You may think I’m a terrible daughter, but I’m just not up to riding home with her right now. Too much has happened. I need some time to sort my way through things, some time to think without her constantly yammering at me. You’re here, Ken. You have a car, don’t you?”
“Yes.”
“Maybe this sounds crazy, but couldn’t I ride back home with you? Be a friend. Go upstairs and tell my mother that I’ve got things to do. Make something up if you have to. Tell her I’ve got to go see the Medical Examiner or talk to someone from the Tucson PD. Tell her anything, whatever you want. Just so I don’t have to ride in the same car with her for the next two hours. I couldn’t stand it.”
Ken nodded sympathetically. “Sure,” he said. “I understand. There are times when the last thing you need is a mother. You go on over to the billing department and do what-ever you have to do. Then wait for me down in the cafeteria. I’ll come get you as soon as she’s gone. Is that all right?”
Joanna nodded. “It’s what I want,” she said, “but you must think I’m crazy.”
“No,” Ken Galloway said with a pained expression on his face. “You forget. You’ve been away from the hospital for the last two hours. I’ve spent that whole time upstairs in the waiting room with your mother and her pal Margaret Turnbull. I know exactly what you mean.”
Ken hurried back to the bank of elevators and Joanna followed the signs to the billing department. She was enough of an insurance bureaucrat to understand how many things could go awry in paying a hospitalization claim. To head off as many difficulties as possible, Joanna wanted to be sure everything was in the best possible order to begin with. First she asked the clerk on duty for a computerized printout of all current hospital charges. With that in hand, she’d be able to check any subsequent bills for possible discrepancies. Her second precaution was to verify that the paperwork reflected that Andy’s policy with the county would provide primary coverage, while Joanna’s insurance from work would finish paying any bills that hadn’t been handled in full by Andy’s carrier. Finally she picked up the small plastic bag containing Andy’s personal effects. She didn’t even look inside it.
Having done all that, she made her way to the cafeteria. By this time it was late afternoon and the place was deserted except for a few stray hospital workers taking off-hour breaks. She bought herself a cup of coffee and took it to a table near the door.
Too tired to feel guilty about ditching her mother and too wrung out to feel apologetic about her outburst with the young reporter, Joanna stared vacantly down at the cup of coffee without even bothering to lift it to her lips. Beyond tears and almost beyond thought, she tried desperately to grapple with the reality of Andy’s death, but every attempt left her with a gaping hole in her being that was beyond her ability to fathom. Maybe, if she’d been there to see him before they took him away, it wouldn’t be so hard for her to believe that he was really gone.
Ken Galloway turned up, startling her out of her reverie by placing the battered suitcase on the table in front of her.
“Your mother’s gone,” he announced. “She and Margaret are going to caravan back to Bisbee. They told me that they’ll be stopping at the Triple T for deep-dish apple pie in case we want to catch up with them on our way out of town. I said I didn’t think we’d make it, that you had papers to sign, things to do.”
Joanna breathed a sigh of relief. “Thank you, Ken. I’m not nearly as irrational as I sound. It’s just that I couldn’t face dealing with my mother right now.”
“No problem. I understand completely.” He settled down on the chair opposite her and earnestly studied her face. “You look like hell. How’re you doing?”