Nobody's Fool

Making her way up the very center of the street, dressed in a thin housecoat and fuzzy slippers, was an old woman whom Miss Beryl immediately recognized as Hattie. She was bent forward as if into a gale, her housecoat billowing out behind her in the breeze. “Oh dear,” Miss Beryl said to herself. “Dear, dear God in Heaven.”
    Sully was outside in the hallway, struggling on with his boots as quietly as he could. He’d looked out the window and seen Clive Jr.’s car at the curb below. The last thing he needed in his present hungover condition was to encounter Clive Jr. True, if he ran into Clive now, it’d save him a trip later in the day, but right now, the way his head felt, he didn’t want to raise his voice. Also, he preferred to spare Miss Beryl. Just before falling asleep last night Sully’d caught a whiff of Clive Jr.’s perfumy after-shave lingering in the apartment, which meant that he’d been up there snooping around. Clive Jr. had been warned about this before, and now he’d have to be warned again. Later in the day Sully might even enjoy warning him. Clive Jr.’s fear of Sully was always rewarding. But Sully wanted to be fully awake and not hungover to appreciate it. And so, when his landlady’s door opened, Sully was relieved to see Miss Beryl emerge and not her son. “Good morning, Mrs. Peoples,” he said, struggling to his feet with the help of the banister. “You aren’t going to slam that door, are you?”
    â€œThank heaven you’re still here,” Miss Beryl said. “Hattie’s escaped again.”
    â€œUh-oh,” Sully said, not terribly alarmed. This would make the fourth time the old woman had flown the coop this year. She never got more than a block or two. He flexed his knee, just to see if it would. “You remember what we did with the net?”
    â€œHurry,” Miss Beryl insisted. “She’s in the middle of the street.”
    â€œHurrying isn’t what I do best, at least first thing in the morning,” Sully reminded her, putting some weight on the knee, which belted out a hearty hello. “Isn’t that The Bank’s car I saw outside?”
    Miss Beryl’s own coat was hanging just inside the door. When she started to put it on, Sully saw that his landlady was genuinely distressed.
    â€œStay put. I’ll get her,” he assured Miss Beryl, zipping his overcoat and locating his gloves.
    â€œHurry,” Miss Beryl said again.
    â€œI am hurrying. It just looks like slow motion.”
    â€œShould I call the daughter?”
    Sully was half out the door. “No,” he said. “I’ll just take her back. I was headed there for coffee anyhow, since I can see you don’t have mine ready again.”
    â€œHurry!”
    â€œTell The Bank I’ll be by to see him later. Tell him he’s in trouble again,” Sully said, and closed the door before Miss Beryl could tell him to hurry again. He consulted his watch. Not quite seven o’clock. Way too early for this shit.
    Hattie was only vaguely aware that she was in the middle of the deserted street. Her vision was dim at the edges of her milky cataracts, and anyway she was looking down at her slippered feet and watching them go. The sight impressed her, suggesting, wrongly, rapid flight. She’d made her break a full fifteen minutes ago and in that time had traveled a block and a half. The wind billowed her thin housecoat behind her like a sail. She was unaware of the cold or the fact that the slush had begun to seep through her slippers. She was bound for freedom.
    Sully, who didn’t feel like chasing anybody first thing in the morning, was grateful to be chasing Hattie, perhaps the one person in Bath he could catch before his knee loosened up. Since Miss Beryl had spied her coming up the middle of the street, Hattie’d traversed another twenty feet and wasnow directly in front of the house. Her stride, Sully calculated, was about six inches, but her feet churned dutifully, and she darted furtive glances over each shoulder to check for pursuit. She did not notice when Sully fell into step alongside of her.
    â€œHello, old girl,” he said.
    Hattie let out a little cry and ran faster, as if on an exercise treadmill.
    â€œYou running away from home?”
    â€œWho are you?” the old woman wanted to know. “You sound like that darn Sully.”
    â€œRight on the first