Scattered Graves

nothing; she simply gazed back at him thinking that, no, she wasn’t in trouble; the police de partment was—one of their officers just went berserk and tried to kill her.
‘‘Have you nothing to say?’’ he asked.
‘‘You haven’t asked a question,’’ said Diane. She was wondering why she was being treated as a perp instead of a victim. ‘‘I told the policeman on the scene what happened.’’
‘‘We’re not going to forget that you’re responsible for Harve’s death,’’ Pendleton said. He had his fists curled, like he wanted to fight.
Diane wondered how ‘‘not forgetting’’ was going to manifest itself. Were Delamore’s friends going to stalk her? Pull her over every time they saw her? What?
‘‘How do you think I am responsible?’’ she asked him.
‘‘He’s dead because of you,’’ said Pendleton.
‘‘How?’’ repeated Diane. ‘‘I tried to get away from him. He shot at me, beat my face in, tried to push me off the cliff, and tried to kill me with rocks and a knife. All the while, I was trying to get away. If you blame me because I wouldn’t die, then you need to seriously rethink your values. I’m sorry you lost a friend. Truly I am. But I did not push him or in any way entice him to follow me out onto the cliff. He did that all by himself in an effort to harm me. Now, I’m really too tired for this.’’
She started to rise.
‘‘You aren’t going anywhere,’’ said Peeks, ‘‘until we get some answers.’’
‘‘Then ask me questions,’’ she said. Diane put a hand on her throbbing head and closed her eyes for a second.
Peeks looked surprised, as if he hadn’t expected co operation, as if he would have preferred to hammer some kind of confession out of her instead.
‘‘You said he was on the cliff when he fell. Why was he there?’’ asked Peeks.
‘‘He was there because I was. He was chasing me.’’ I thought we covered this , she thought.
‘‘On the side of the cliff? Are you saying you were running from him on the side of the cliff in Chulagee Gorge? See, that doesn’t make sense.’’ Peeks looked back at Curtis and Pendleton, who were standing be hind him near the wall. ‘‘Does that make sense to you guys?’’
‘‘It doesn’t make sense to me,’’ said Pendleton.
Diane was wondering if they thought she lured him out to the cliffs and threw him over the edge. Did they not remember how big he was compared to her?
Curtis said nothing, just stood smiling, as if he was enjoying himself. Actually, of the three of them, he looked the most friendly.
‘‘Why would you go there? Do you know how steep that cliff is?’’ said Peeks.
‘‘It’s a five point seven,’’ said Diane.
The three of them looked blank, startled, and clearly puzzled.
‘‘What?’’ Peeks said.
‘‘You asked me if I know how steep it is. I assume you were asking me about the degree of climbing dif ficulty. So, yes, I know.’’
Diane realized why they didn’t believe her story. They didn’t think that she, in her nice azure pantsuit and Hush Puppies, would climb out onto the side of a steep cliff—or anybody would for that matter. They had a point.
‘‘I’ve climbed that cliff many times,’’ said Diane. ‘‘I’m a caver and I do a lot of rock climbing. I thought if I went out on the cliff, he wouldn’t follow. I was wrong. He thought that if I could do it, he could too, especially since he was an ex–football player. That’s what he was doing out there. He didn’t fall from the top. He wasn’t pushed. He was about fifty feet down on the face of the cliff, coming after me. He panicked and fell. I was twenty feet away from him at the time.’’
‘‘You said he panicked,’’ Pendleton said after a mo ment. ‘‘He just suddenly panicked? Why?’’
‘‘He looked down,’’ said Diane. ‘‘Rock climbing isn’t a sport he had experience in. We were almost five hundred feet up on the side of a cliff. He didn’t realize how frightening it would be when he looked down. It happens. I tried to talk him out of the panic.’’
‘‘You told Officer Wallace that he attacked you. Now, why would Officer Delamore do a thing like that?’’ asked Peeks.
‘‘I have no idea. He didn’t say. He just kept calling me a bitch,’’ said Diane.
Peeks leaned forward, glaring at Diane. ‘‘You know, I’m having a hard time buying your story,’’ he said. ‘‘There’s a lot of holes in it. A lot of holes. And you’re going to stay