“Back here, help us,” a woman’s weak voice wailed followed by sobbing. “Hurry! My God! Please help. They shot him!”
BC reached through and opened the door with his left hand, his gun ready in his right. Dan joined him while Ben hung back. After the two officers entered, Ben took a position at the door.
Dan’s eyes fell upon a man’s ashen face clothed in pajamas lying on his back. A woman in her late sixties knelt beside him stroking the balding white hair of the overweight victim. She wore a light terrycloth full-length nightgown. Its white pristine softness smeared with gooey shades of scarlet. The stillness was broken by her sobbing.
They were the owners of this “Mom and Pop” candy store and lived in the upstairs apartment. They addressed patrons by first name, and gave unlimited samples to the children. Year after year they worked to eke out a simple life; his now draining away amid her tears. Her panic wrinkled brow and sunken cheeks bore holes through Dan as she pressed the wadded hem on the man’s chest wound. The grapefruit sized bundle of cloth oozed. “Help him please! Do something – please! Oh, why? Why’d they do it?”
The aroma of chocolate in the air and the menthol of peppermint on Dan’s tongue collided with the images in his eyes. Dan’s mind momentarily went blank. He hesitated.
The woman cried out again, “Help us, please!”
Dan shot like a bullet from a magnum to her side. Blood had left a crimson trail down the victim’s side to the floor. Kneeling he checked the victim’s wrist for pulse. Very weak. Checking the chest wound he saw the frothy blood. Not a good sign! The sucking sound of the last sip through a straw reached his ear. He grabbed some plastic wrapping from the counter to seal the wound. Placing it over the hole, he reapplied the compress with as much pressure as he dared. Bending his ear over the man’s mouth listening for breath, he saw a long nose hair flutter. He’s alive!
Then came an angelic whisper, “Can you see it? Glorious…never imagined…” The voice faded, his eyes flickered as a candle and went dark.
Dan gently pulled the edge of the compress away. Blood no longer flowed from a now silent wound. He replaced it. “Keep pressing. The paramedics are on the way.”
BC looked into Dan’s face. It told him what he needed to know. He knelt at the lady’s side, “Did you see who shot him?”
“No,” she shook her head. “I was upstairs. I heard shots. Ran down… saw Henry…lying there. A dark car squealed off through there,” she looked out the main doorway. Hearing approaching sirens, her eyes locked there in anticipation.
“What’s Henry’s last name?” BC asked.
“Tolson and I’m Miriam,” she answered between sobs. “I told him not to go. Call the police. He couldn’t hurt them. I begged him. Why’d they shoot him? Only forty seven-dollars in the drawer. He did everything they said. He’ll be okay—won’t he?”
No one answered her.
Dan avoided her pleading eyes. How can I answer? How do I explain wanton depravity?
The paramedics arrived. The “WHAP” of their bags dropping mirrored their urgency. Dan greeted them without moving. “Gun shot. No pulse. Sucking chest wound. Sealed it with plastic.”
Rick, a paramedic, pulled at Tolson’s night-shirt. It tore open with the sound of a hissing snake. He checked under the compress. His partner, Phil, prepared paddles. Maybe he’s got a chance, Dan dared hope, but noticed Rick raise his thumb inconspicuously in an ever so slight circling motion. He understood the signal, Circling the drain. Lost cause. Phil knelt with the paddles.
“Clear!” KAZAP!
Miriam cried out between sobs, “Why! Forty seven-dollars”
“Clear! KAZAP!
Dan put his arm around Miriam’s shoulder nudging her trembling body aside. Both remained fixed on the flurry of action. Serenaded by the sobs of grief the medics worked frantically to resuscitate Henry Tolson.
“They wouldn’t be trying so hard if there were no hope,” Dan lied to her thinking, too many times I’ve encountered violent death at the door; shoving, pushing, unrelenting. Almost never is it repelled!
After several minutes the medics stopped, silently shook their heads, and rose from the body. Their extraordinary efforts were inadequate to bar the door; powerless to call him from beyond. Dan counted the eyelets in the medic’s shoes not wanting to face the eyes around him. His stomach quivered, and he stood emotionally empty. He no longer tasted nectar of peppermint. Taking Miriam’s hand a tear slid down his cheek denying his stoic facade.
“I’m sorry.”
The sounds of the medics preparing to leave, bounced off the walls of an empty cave. She collapsed sobbing into Dan’s chest. Dan first felt the stab of this ice-cold knife when it killed the sweetness in his life. Felt it when his wife informed him, “I’m going to leave you soon. I have cancer. I will not get better.” He had suffered it many times, each time it twisted less. Once more, in a place known for sweet refreshment, death carried in its sour misery.
A silent awkwardness fell on the normally jovial officers. Their work turned all business.
“Don’t stand around,” Dan shouted at two other officers who had arrived. “Go out and catch those gristle-gutted mongrels of hell!”
They did search. Every available car searched for witnesses, door to door, from flat to flat. They stopped suspicious vehicles and identified the occupants, filled out field interrogation reports, and executed endless paper work. When it ended they had nothing, but a description of a ghost in the night. In time, Homicide responded and Dan and Ben were relieved.
“You were right earlier tonight,” Ben said. “Tragedies wear on even us. Life shouldn’t be like this. It’s--as if--it’s cursed.”
“My Dad used to talk about it that way—cursed.”
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