Double Take

other morning. He was a neighbor of the Pallacks so he knew all of them, Thomas Pallack, and his parents. For years. And I realized he must know Thomas Pallack better than anyone else living. If anyone can fill in the blanks, I figure it’s James.
    “Then we hit all the excitement with Makepeace and I had to put him on my mental back burner.
    “But the thing is, even though it’s only been two days we’ve been on this, I’m worried about Dix. He’s so frustrated he looks ready to burst out of his skin. I have this hope, Sherlock,” and he raised her hand to kiss her fingers, “that since we’re stopped dead in our tracks in San Francisco that maybe, just maybe, Courtney James will have something to say that will break up the roadblock.”
    “What could he tell us? All his knowledge, his memories of the Pallacks, is thirty years old.”
    Savich sighed. “I know, I know.”
    “But you’re hopeful.”
    He kissed her, said against her mouth, “Yep, I’m hopeful. We’ll see.”
    Sherlock hoped so too, although she couldn’t imagine what Courtney James would tell them that would be of any use. She yawned. Even though both of them were good sleepers on planes, the last few days had wiped them both out. It had to come to an end soon, she thought, it simply had to. She leaned her head back, closed her eyes, the sound of the helicopter blade rumbling through her head, and imagined the three of them playing on the beach in Aruba.
    An hour later Bobby set them down on the rippled asphalt helipad at Tomlinson Field, the small airport outside Attica, and waved them to a nondescript beige Ford Escort parked at the edge of the tarmac. He gave them both a sharp salute and a lazy smile, said he was glad neither of them had been big yakkers, and in the next breath added, “Hey, maybe we can have some more fun on our return trip.”
    “Can’t wait,” Savich said. “I was just thinking the ride over was smooth as my treadmill.”
    Sherlock said, “Yeah, I especially liked how my stomach heaved up to my ears when you banked halfway over to set us down.”
    Bobby smiled. “I’ll have to do something about that, won’t I? I wouldn’t want you two big shots to be bored on the way back to the big bad city.”
    The sun had disappeared behind darkening clouds thirty minutes before, and was still a no-show in western New York. The wind kicked up occasional gusts that dusted up the dirt beside the road. The trees, they saw, were greening up nicely with the spring rains. The land was flat, cows thick in pastures, and Alexander Road was light on traffic. Savich drove past the Attican Motel thinking he’d like to turn in, pull the shades down in a room, and sleep with Sherlock until Monday. Coming east on the red-eye wiped you out.
    Two guards and an administrator escorted them to the hospital, a basic three-story red brick building, like most of the other buildings in the vast correctional facility. There they met Warden Daniel Rafferty, who adjusted his thick glasses to closely check their I.D.s even though they’d already been checked twice, and shook their hands. “Courtney was having problems breathing during the night so we brought him here to check him out. He’s had some heart problems for years now, but never anything life-threatening. Still, we like to be careful. He’s on the third floor. This way.”
    Sherlock whispered behind her hand when the warden was a goodly distance ahead of them, “We’re met by the warden himself, who refers to our mass murderer as Courtney? It sounds like they’ve given him such fine care he might fund a new building if he’s ever paroled.”
    Warden Rafferty laughed, turned, and grinned at her. “The acoustics in the hospital are truly phenomenal. You’re right, of course. Courtney James is in a class by himself. Do you think he’s really a mass murderer?” The warden shrugged. “He’s here for life, so what does it matter? Fact is, I like the old guy. I’ve never been able to see him committing any random murders because some odd voice told him to do it. Come this way.”
    Savich and Sherlock followed the warden through two sets of secure doors, both manned by guards who dropped their looks of hard-eyed intimidation when Sherlock nodded and smiled at them.
    Warden Rafferty ran into a doctor coming out of Courtney James’s room, which was private, he remarked, because none of the other prisoners wanted to crowd in on the old man’s space. “The doc here will tell