Death by Chocolate

turned and
walked to the door. ‘That’s fine,” she said with the enthusiasm of a bored
convenience-store clerk. “Let’s get going.”
     
    The offices of San
Carmelita Youth Corrections were on the outskirts of town, where the warehouses
and car repair shops gave way to orange groves and strawberry fields. Off the
main highway, down a road lined with eucalyptus trees, sat a low, flat, and
rambling building that looked like any other office complex until you noticed
the heavy-gauge steel netting over the windows.
    “Not a very cheerful
place,” Cordele remarked as they pulled into the parking lot and stopped in a
space marked visitors.
    “It’s not supposed to be
cheerful,” Savannah told her. ‘The idea of winding up here really shouldn’t be
attractive. An overnight stay will hopefully dissuade any budding delinquent
from burglarizing his neighbors’ houses or selling drugs to her schoolmates.”
    “Troubled kids need help,”
Cordele said.
    “That’s very true,” she
agreed as they got out of the car and walked to the entrance. “But
unfortunately, a certain percentage of them have to be locked up until some of
that help ‘takes,’ to keep the rest of society safe. We don’t lock up children
for turning over outhouses around here. Some of these kids are hard-core
gangbangers who’ve committed murder as an initiation ritual.”
    “They still need help.”
    “That’s why there are
people in the world like you... and the lady we’re going to see now.”
    Once inside the building,
Savannah and Cordele had to pass through a security checkpoint that hadn’t been
in place before 9-11. Even in the small, sleepy town of San Carmelita, the
world had changed.
    Down a hall and to the
right, they found a door that bore the name angela
herriot. Savannah knocked, and within seconds the door was opened
by an elegant black woman of generous size.
    Angela would have stood out
in any crowd, not only because of her exceptional height and weight, but
because of her brilliant personal adornment. An orange and yellow caftan
swirled around her, reaching to the floor, and her jewelry was equally
oversized: enormous copper earrings that dangled nearly to her shoulder,
several strands of colorful beads around her neck, and rings on every finger,
including her thumbs. It was safe to say that Angela Herriot was no shrinking
violet. She was more like a glorious giant parrot tulip.
    “Come in, Savannah, come in,”
she said, waving them inside the small office that was cluttered with books and
stacks of papers everywhere. Having visited her office before, Savannah
suspected that Angela’s people skills were more acute than her organizational
ones.
    “This is my sister,
Cordele,” Savannah said. “She’s visiting me from Georgia. She’s studying to be
a psychologist.”
    Angela laughed, and the
deep sound of it filled the tiny room. “I don’t know whether to congratulate
you or give you my condolences. It’s the hardest work in the world, I believe,
but I wouldn’t do anything else.”
    Cordele blushed and nodded;
she seemed a bit overwhelmed by this larger-than-life persona.
    “Sit down, sit down,”
Angela said, pointing them toward a couple of metal folding chairs. “Sorry I
don’t have proper furniture, but, you know, budget cuts.” ‘Yes, Dirk has told
me all about the belt-tightening.”
    “I wouldn’t know about
that,” Angela said, pointing to her nonexistent waistline. “I gave up wearing
belts in nineteen-eighty.”
    She pulled her own chair
away from the desk and turned it to face theirs. “Sit, sit.”
    Savannah had noticed long
ago that Angela tended to say things twice, as though to make sure no one would
misunderstand what she was trying to communicate. She found the characteristic
endearing, along with Angela’s no-nonsense approach to almost everything.
    “How can I help you,
Savannah? You said you need a favor?”
    “Maybe, maybe not. I’m
worried about a little friend of mine, a six-year-old girl I recently met.”
    “Worried in what way?”
    “I think she’s—no, I know she’s being neglected. I just don’t know if it’s a case for Child Protective
Services.”
    Angela leaned back in her
chair and toyed with one of her earrings. “What sort of neglect are we speaking
of? Does she get enough to eat?”
    “Probably more pizza than
the FDA would recommend, but I don’t think she goes hungry.”
    “Is she clean?
Appropriately attired?”
    “She could stand to