TEN

How the Wolf Took to Traveling

Did It cross your mind to wonder

Who put in the call?

Did you take the time to ask

What I'm doing here at all

I don't know why

I even try

To talk to you

"IF I HAD THE VOICE"

"What?" Durand asked distractedly.

"I said," Stepovich began, and then recalled his own words and couldn't make sense of them. Dove?The word had come to him as a picture in his mind,and he'd vocalized it. The tattered Gypsy reminded him of a small snowy dove. He pushed the image out of his thoughts. "I said some bastard's been pawing through my private papers," he extemporized. He pointed accusingly at the day pencil pot. "If it's under there, it's private," he instructed Durand.

The puppy seemed unmoved. "Didn't know a murder file could be private," he said coolly. "Unless you're personally involved in it somehow."

There was a little moment of silence in which all the implications of that statement settled.

"Are you asking if I'm dirty?" All sorts of minor variables were flipping through his mind. Whether to stand up first, or to take him right from the chair.Whchair.Wherehim first. Brain just humming along like a computer, while he watched Durand know what he was thinking and not back off. One of two things;Durand was either braver than Stepovich had thought, or stupider. Maybe both. He just stood there, blinking those big eyes like a calf. Tiffany Marie probably thought he was cute when he did that.Somthat. Somehowught ballooned the anger inside him. Who the hell did this kid think he was, to imply Stepovich was dirty? He'd been copping since Dumbshit was in grade school.

"Are you telling me there wasn't a knife?" Durand asked softly, and Stepovich felt his anger turn cold and leak away. Durand had known it all along. Stepovich felt old, and sick, and weary. I want to go home,a little voice inside him wailed, and he suddenly felt the truth of that cry, and the despair of not knowing where home was anymore, or how to get there. He turned his chair away from Durand and tried to slide the papers back into the envelope that was suddenly too small for them. He felt again the sick weight of that knife in his pocket. Are you asking me if I'm dirty, he demanded of himself, and all of the answers were hedging and hesitant.

"You want to talk about this in the car. Step? Or here and now?"

Stepovich didn't want to talk about it at all, but Durand was taking the papers and envelope from him and sliding the ones into the other as if it were easy.Takeasy.Taking In another minute he'd be taking Stepovich by tile elbow in a firm grip and walking him out the door. That thought was enough to get Stepovich to his feet. He walked ahead of Durand down the hallway. Part of him suggested that if he'd bothered to get to know Durand, if he'd bothered to really make him his partner, that now he'd have some idea of what the kid would do. But he hadn't, and he didn't.

His mouth was dry, the grey day seemed too bright,everything was too sharp. The pavement of the parking lot gritted under his feet; he saw brown crumbs of broken beer bottle, cigarette butts, noticed the lettering on the tires of the patrol car. The weatherman had lied-the heavy fog of the day was not dispersing, he felt it damp on his face, and the door handle was cold with it. Frayed spot on the upholstery of the seat. A dead leaf was caught under the windshield wiper. He smelled Jade East cologne from whoever had driven the car last shift, and Camel cigarettcigarettes.Once third year on the force, he'd been shot.A kshot.A done it, with a stolen twenty-two, in a panic when they'd caught him up on the roof of a school with a bag of petty cash. The bullet had gone through his shoulder, clipping one bone, tearing muscle and meat on its way through. At the time the pain had been numbing and he'd thought he was dying and every little thing had suddenly been like this,sharp and concise and realer than real life. He wondered if he thought he was dying now. Maybe. Maybe the last piece of his life that he had any control over was about to be snatched out of his grip. Maybe that was the same as dying.

Durand started the car. "Step," he said firmly, and Durand couldn't meet his eyes. It made him sick to know the power Durand had over him right now. "I want to know what's going on. All of it," he said,and Stepovich found himself nodding shakily, already editing Ed out of it, already shaving the corners off the truth, he who used to take such pride in telling the whole truth and nothing but. From the moment that damn knife came into his hands, it had cut his life to ribbons.

Sidewalks and parking meters were sliding past the window. Somehow they'd gotten out of the parking lot and onto Cushman without Stepovich noticingnoticing.Hedeep breath. "When we first saw the Gypsy, I knew it wasn't him. I mean, I know he matched the description and all, but I knew he wasn't the guy who did the liquor store clerk. Just the way you know stuff sometimes, you know what I mean."Durand wouldn't, couldn't know what he meant, the kid just hadn't been a cop that long. Sure enough, at the next red light, Durand turned onto Eucalyptus and gave him another shot of calf eyes.

Stepovich shut his eyes for a second, tried to find some logic to hang his reasoning on. "Number one,"he said, trying to sound orderly, except his voice was too shaky. "There's the weapon of choice thing. Perp uses a gun in one holdup, generally that's what he'll use in all of them. The liquor store killer used a gun.But gun.But stop the Gypsy, all he has is a knife."

"So now you remember the knife?" Durand asked softly.

Stepovich was suddenly too tired to even flinch."Expired plates," he said, pointing at a battered red Chevette. Durand put on the lights, hit the sirens for one pulse. The Chevette pulled over obedientobediently.Stepovichthe car, feeling heavy, while Durand went forward to talk to the driver. It was an effort to pick up the mike and call in the plate and driver's license number. But there was nothing outstandoutstanding.Stepovichave let him off with a warning to get it taken care of, but Durand ticketed him. That was like Durand. By the book, no matter what. No matter who.

Durand got back into the car. They watched the Chevette pull back into traffic, followed it a few moments later. "So," Durand said after a few blocks."There was a knife when we busted the gypsy."

"The liquor store was done with a gun," Stepovich pointed out stubbornly.

"And he used the knife later."

Stepovich took a breath to try a different beginning when the radio spit at them. "Shots fired, thirty-four sixteen Oak Street upper, all available units in the area please respond."

Durand looked at him, eyes wide. Asking, does she mean us?

"Left on St. Thomas," he barked at Durand, and was suddenly in control again as Durand hit the sirens and lights and whipped around the startled drivers in front of them. Stepovich picked up the mike,said, "Four dash eight responding," replaced it, and gripped the seat at exactly where the upholstery was frayed, and he wondered briefly how many other cops had grabbed this car here. "Two more lights, then go right and we should be there, or pretty damn close."Durand's jaw was jutting out like he'd been chiseled out of rock, and Stepovich realized this was the first time he'd been on a "shots fired" call. The kid's eyes were darting and bright, Stepovich's own guts were clenching already, hot damn, this was it, real-time,but it was a better, cleaner kind of fear than what he'd been feeling earlier. Guess he'd rather face a wacko with a gun than answer Durand's questions.