A nurse, Miss Hendrie according to the small name-plate on her breast, walked up the corridor on faintly squeaking crepe soles, weaving her way gracefully among the toys which littered the hall.
When Alan came in, half a dozen kids, some with limbs in casts or slings, some with the partial baldness he associated with chemotherapy treatments, had been playing in the hall, trading blocks and trucks, shouting amiably to each other. Now it was the supper hour, and they had gone either down to the cafeteria or back to their rooms.
"How is he?" Alan asked Miss Hendrie.
"No change." She looked at Alan with a calm expression which contained an element of hostility. "Sleeping. He should be sleeping.
He has had a great shock."
"What do you hear from his parents?"
"We called the father's place of employment in South Paris. He had an installation job over in New Hampshire this afternoon. He's left for home, I understand, and will be informed when he arrives.
He should get here around nine, I would think, but of course it's impossible to tell."
"What about the mother?"
"I don't know," Miss Hendrie said. The hostility was more apparent now, but it was no longer aimed at Alan. "I didn't make that call. All I know is what I see-she's not here. This little boy saw his brother commit suicide with a rifle, and although it happened at home, the mother is not here yet. You'll have to excuse me now-I have to fill the med-cart."
"Of course," Alan muttered. He watched her as she started away, then rose from his chair. "Miss Hendrie?"
She turned to him. Her eyes were still calm, but her raised brows expressed annoyance.
"Miss Hendrie, I really do need to talk with Sean Rusk. I think I need to talk to him very badly."
"Oh?" Her voice was cool.
"Something-" Alan suddenly thought of Polly and his voice cracked.
He cleared his throat and pushed on. "Something is going on in my town. The suicide of Brian Rusk is only part of it, I believe. And I also believe that Sean Rusk may have the key to the rest of it."
"Sheriff Pangborn, Sean Rusk is only seven years old. And if he does know something, why aren't there other policemen here?"
Other policemen, he thought. What she means are qualified policemen. Policemen who don't interview eleven-year-old boys on the street and then send them home to commit suicide in the garage.
"Because they've got their hands full," Alan said, "and because they don't know the town the way I do."
"I see." She turned to go again.
"Miss Hendrie."
"Sheriff, I'm short-handed this evening and very b-"
"Brian Rusk wasn't the only Castle Rock fatality today. There were at least three others. Another man, the owner of the local tavern, has been taken to the hospital in Norway with gunshot trauma. He may live, but it's going to be touch and go with him for the next thirty-six hours or so. And I have a hunch the killing isn't done."
He had finally succeeded in capturing all of her attention.
"You believe Sean Rusk knows something about this?"
"He may know why his brother killed himself. If he does, that may open up the rest of it. So if he wakes up, will you tell me?"
She hesitated, then said, "That depends on his mental state when he does, Sheriff. I'm not going to allow you to make a hysterical little boy's condition worse, no matter what is going on in your town."
"I understand."
"Do you? Good." She gave him a look which said,just sit there and don't make trouble for me, then, and went back behind the high desk. She sat down, and he could hear her putting bottles and boxes on the med-cart.
Alan got up, went to the pay phone in the hall, and dialled Polly's number again. And once again it simply rang on and on. He dialled You Sew and Sew, got the answering machine, and racked the phone. He went back to his chair, sat in it, and stared at the Mother Goose mural some more.
You forgot to ask me one question, Miss Hendrie, Alan thought.
You forgot to ask me why I'm here if there's so much going on in the seat of the county I was elected to preserve and protect. You forgot to ask me why I'm not leading the investigation while some lessessentialofficer@IdSeatThomas,forinstance sitshere,waiting for Sean Rusk to wake up. You forgot to ask those things, Miss Hendrie, and I know a secret. I'm glad you forgot. That's the secret.
The reason was as simple as it was humiliating. Except in Portland and Bangor, murder belonged not to the Sheriff's Office but to the State Police. Henry Payton had winked at that in the wake of Nettle and Wilma's duel, but he was not winking anymore. He couldn't afford to. Representatives of every southern Maine newspaper and TV station were either in Castle Rock right now or on their way. They would be joined by their colleagues from all over the state before very much longer... and if this really was not over, as Alan suspected, they would shortly be joined by more media people from points south.