The Policewomen's Bureau by Edward Conlon

Author:Edward Conlon
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781948924085
Publisher: Arcade
Published: 2019-05-07T16:00:00+00:00

12 YOU’VE HEARD THIS SONG BEFORE

When a felon’s not engaged in his employment

Or maturing his felonious little plans

His capacity for innocent enjoyment

Is just as great as any honest man’s.

Our feelings we with difficulty smother

When constabulary duty’s to be done.

Ah, take one consideration with another

A policeman’s lot is not a happy one.

—“The Policeman’s Song” W. S. Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan

APRIL 25, 1963

1645 HOURS

Marie never learned the old doctor’s name. She found it maddening that she was so inept at finding another one, given her experience in the field. Had she spent the last three years handling bank robberies, she’d know how to rob a bank. And she’d know how not to get caught—what to do and not-do with guards and alarms and getaways—to remain a masked man instead of a face on a wanted poster. But AB cases weren’t whodunits—the girls had the names and telephone numbers of the perpetrators. Some even had receipts. The investigations could be demanding, but they weren’t difficult. A child could . . . Marie didn’t want to think about children. Not the one she didn’t want, by a husband she couldn’t stand, which would lock her into marriage she hated and keep her from the job she loved. At the very least, she had to ask Mrs. M. for reassignment. Whatever happened, Marie didn’t want to think about pregnancy during every waking moment.

Marie struggled against taking out her impatience on Sandy, but she’d told her, time and again, how to take telephone messages. To say only that “some lady called yesterday” was worse than no message at all, since it inspired a period of fraught and profitless speculation as to whether she’d missed a late notice for a court appearance, or if Carmen hadn’t taken her death threats to heart.

Katie delivered the same cryptic message the next day, and the day after that. She then followed a revised protocol, instructing the caller on the second day that Marie would be home on the third, at five in the afternoon, should she care to make her intentions plain. Marie suspected it was Carmen, or a friend enlisted to call on her behalf, especially when Sid appeared at home, at a quarter-to-five. “Hey, honey! You got a minute to talk?”

“No, wait—I have to—”

Marie didn’t know whether it was morning sickness again, or the twenty-four-hour-a-day revulsion she’d felt for him since he’d raped her, but she had to run to the bathroom when she saw him, and she didn’t rush back. She rinsed her mouth, but she hoped that her breath still smelled of bile when she returned. “Yes?”

Sid’s smile put her on guard. It was one she didn’t recognize from his repertoire. She knew the contrite Sid, boyishly abashed; the brash, leading-man grin he wore among other men; the cavalier smirk with which he favored waitresses. This one had aspects of all three. It was softly pushy but withholding, as if he were a salesman who hadn’t decided if she had any money. “Honey, you and me ought to get away for the weekend.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.