Storm Prey

Weather woke up to go to the bathroom and saw what time it was, and came down, and I told her what happened. She said if I called a couple pals of mine from the St. Paul cops, they could come over ...”
    “No. Virgil. Stay there.”
     
     
    THEY LEFT in a convoy of sixfour-wheelers, vans, and SUVs and one truck, eight SWAT guys and four unarmored investigators. St. Paul Park was southeast of the Cities, along the Mississippi, right down Highway 61, the same highway famously revisited by Bob Dylan. They were good as long as the light poles lasted, but after that, it was a matter of staying inside each other’s headlights.
    Lucas rode down alone, Shrake and Jenkins riding with the rest of the SWAT team; the snow felt soft and slick under his tires: he turned on the radio, picked up Tanita Tikaram singing “Twist in My Sobriety,” a good old golden oldie; he’d last heard it trickling out of an overhead speaker at a gas station, years earlier.
    Twenty minutes after they left, moving slowly, they crawled past the Ashland refinery, the gas flares burning weirdly through the pounding waves of snow. Close now, he thought, watching the nav screen. They planned to hook up with St. Paul Park cops in the City Hall parking lot, and walk from there, four short blocks.
    The first of the trucks took the off ramp, the rest followed, down through the quiet town. The local cops were waiting, and they all went inside, where the SWAT team commander, John Nelson, took the locals through the program.
    “As we understand it, the house is owned by an old lady named Ann Wilson, and she probably sleeps in a bedroom in the back, and rents the bedroom upstairs. We’re not going to rush the place because the noise will wake the guy up, and at this point, he’s got no reason to give it up.
    “So, we’ve got the snow and the dark going for us. We’ll set up outside, around the house, and wait for him to come out. If Miz Wilson comes out first, we’ll move her out. Then we’ll just see—but we’re putting the guy’s name and ID photo on TV, so we figure he’ll be moving early. He needs to get away from here.
    “We’re all going to go out and get set up, and then half of us will peel off and come back here and get warm and comfortable. We’ll change over every hour so nobody gets too cold. The whole idea, now, is to stay out of sight ...”
    Then there were questions, and when the questions stopped, Nelson said, “Everybody be cool. You all know about the grenades, and the crime-scene guys dug some buckshot out of the hospital walls this evening, so the guy’s got a shotgun going for himself. We think he’s hurt, but we don’t know how bad. The idea is to corner him, squeeze him. Nobody gets hurt. Nobody gets hurt.”
     
     
    THEY WENT OUT in four squads, like an army patrol, circling the blocks to come in from all sides of the house, Lucas tramping along with Nelson. The St. Paul Park cops took them in, and they set up at the corners of the house, a lot away, behind whatever barriers or cover was available. A light burned in the second-floor window, behind translucent bathroom glass, but there was no sign of movement.
    Nelson and Lucas set up behind a couple of large cottonwood trees across the street from the front door; they could see both the door and the front of the detached garage. Nothing happened for a half hour, when Nelson took a radio call, leaned over and said, “The Minneapolis guy is here. Sherrill.”
    “She’s always wanted to be one of the guys,” Lucas said, and, “I’m gonna sneak back there.”
     
     
    MARCY HAD BROUGHT two other investigators with her. She was wearing a ski jacket and had a pair of ski pants, rolled into a bundle, on the floor by her feet. She saw Lucas come in the door and walked over.
    “Should have called,” she said.
    “It’s more our jurisdiction than yours, but I don’t want to fight about it. We figured out who he probably was—”
    “I want to hear about that ...”
    And another cop, from St. Paul Park, called. “We got media. We’re gonna hold them here.”
    “Ah, man,” Lucas said. “Somebody’s been on the phone.”
    “Not me,” Marcy said. They stepped out in the darkened hallway and walked down to the front door, and saw a media truck from Channel Three, two guys standing outside talking to two cops.
    “Well, here’s your shot—you handle them,” Lucas said. “Be nice.”
     
     
    SHE WAS BACK in five minutes: “They say it was a tip, but they