Known Dead_ A Novel - Donald Harstad [37]
Doc Z was his usual self, hearty and cheerful. The kid turned out to be in fairly good shape, a little dehydrated, hell of a diaper rash, but nothing that was life-threatening.
‘‘We’ll keep her for observation for a day or two,’’ said Henry. ‘‘I’d like to keep her longer, but the insurance people won’t let us.’’
‘‘Yep.’’
‘‘You want my report to copy, don’t you?’’
I grinned. ‘‘Well, to include, more like.’’
‘‘Anybody getting charged with this?’’
‘‘Have to be both Mom and Dad, but, yeah, they are.’’
‘‘Can I look forward to court again?’’ he asked.
‘‘No. They’ll plead to a serious misdemeanor. No problem.’’
‘‘Good,’’ said Henry. ‘‘I hate court.’’ He paused. ‘‘You might want the baby’s hair tested for marijuana residue.’’
Grounds for child abuse, if they found it. Smoking dope in the kid’s presence was a hazard. The problem was, it had been declared obligatory to remove the child. No room to negotiate. I hated that. Plus, Human Services would now know that the couple used dope, and the couple’s usefulness as informants or as buyers would be compromised.
What the hell. Maybe Human Services would listen to reason.
‘‘Sure, Henry. Might as well send in a sample.’’
Kerri was at the hospital, but Human Services was all over her. I decided to talk to her again, later.
By the time I got back to the office, Thursday was about shot. I put off the report until Saturday, and thought about our murders. I mean, here I was getting just a little bit excited over the fact that a child neglecter had been a buddy of Turd’s and his dope dealer had gotten really scarce. A lead? Maybe, but probably not. If it was, we’d have to be careful. If it was, we might have independent information in our pocket. I called Hester, but she was out. I thought about the ‘‘lead,’’ and drank coffee. I should have written the report.
Saturday, I started off with my report for Human Services. Took less than an hour to type it up, even including Henry’s summary. While I was doing it, I figured that I could take a cheap shot at Hank and Kerri with the test on the baby’s hair. The county attorney would, if it was positive, have two abuse charges, and surely would sort of lump them together. The neglect charge was the one with the clout. I felt I could use the hair clippings test for THC to push old Hank into telling me who his dealer was.
It was Saturday, so Hester was off. Unwritten rule; don’t contact on a day off unless you really need help.
I got in the car and told dispatch I was doing a follow-up on the neglect case. I was at the little trailer in about twenty minutes.
I explained to them about the hair test. Turned out that Human Services had told Kerri about it yesterday but she’d been afraid to tell Hank. Hmm. Since she’d been told that marijuana smoking in the presence of the kid was what would show up, and was now afraid to tell her husband . . .
After Hank whined, ‘‘Jeez, man, this scares the shit out of me to do this,’’ about five times, he told me his dealer was one Howler. Well. Imagine that. He also told me something else.
‘‘You know who killed Turd and the cop, don’t you?’’
‘‘Not yet, but we will.’’
‘‘Hey, I know. I really do, man.’’ He actually looked around, inside the damn trailer, before he hoarsely whispered, ‘‘It was Navy SEALS, man. They got him.’’
There are leads, and then there are leads. We needed to talk in private, so we left the trailer and stood outside in the long grass by a small metal garden shed. I was half afraid he’d ask me to step inside it.
‘‘They been working that area for a while, man.’’ He was very quiet, and hard to understand. ‘‘Howler told me. He said it was Army-Navy SEALS. You know, the ones in the cammo stuff, with their faces painted, they can kill anybody before they know they’re dead?’’
‘‘Howler told you that?’’ I asked.
‘‘Yeah, man, he seen ’em. Twice.’’
‘‘If Howler saw ’em, how could they be so sneaky?’’
‘‘He did, man, he really did. He seen ’em in the woods.’’ He looked around again. He was really nervous. Outrageous as it was, he believed it. ‘‘He knows all about that