The Groaning Board

the shock, definitely the shock. She heard herself plead,
“Don’t die, Micklynn. Please don’t die.”
    “Stand back, people, give her some
air.” Bill Veeder took charge of crowd control while Silvestri began artificial
respiration. Some water dribbled from Micklynn’s blue lips.
    “Get outa here, Les,” Silvestri
growled, between pushes.
    “Anything?” Veeder asked him.
    “Nothing. She’s gone.” Still,
Silvestri rolled Micklynn over and began the kiss of life, just as the two EMS people came running, pounding on the dock so hard she could feel the vibrations in the
soles of her feet. Wetzon clasped Micklynn’s icy hand.
    “We’ll take it from here,” one EMS worker said.
    “She’s gone,” Bill said. He lifted
Wetzon to her feet. “She’s gone,” he said again, this time to Wetzon.
    Behind them A.T. let out a horrific
groan. “Why?” she cried. “We could have worked it out.”
    “No!” Ellen pushed through the crowd
and tried to kneel beside Micklynn, but Hem pulled her away, murmuring into her
hair. “You can’t,” the girl cried. “Not yet.” She looked up with limpid eyes.
“Please.”
    Only Minnie Wu was missing, but not
for long. Standing in the boat, she took one look at Hem and Ellen and began
gathering steam. Screaming, “Bitch!” she jumped to the dock, then without
warning she was flying right off the dock into the Bay as the fireworks in the
sky formed themselves into a sparkling, red, white, and blue American flag.
    While Minnie Wu thrashed around in
the murky water, Smith stood wide-eyed on the pier, her hand rubbing her elegant
ankle. Someone threw Minnie a life preserver tied to a pole and pulled her onto
the dock.
    “That was naughty,” Wetzon said,
drifting back to her partner.
    “Someone had to do it.”
    Silvestri came toward them, a towel
around his neck, fine wisps of dark hair across his brow.
    “Micklynn?” Wetzon asked. She
couldn’t remember whose gun was in which pocket. She fished one out.
    “Dead. It’s the other one.” He pulled
on his sneakers, leaving them untied, then took his weapon.
    “I don’t understand how it could have
happened with everybody, including you, on the boat,” Wetzon said.
    He ignored her, moving back toward
the entrance to the pier, where Micklynn lay surrounded by cops and medical
personnel. Crime Scene Unit at work. Wetzon followed him slowly, paying no
attention to the people standing on the other boats, staring, shouting
questions. She still had Bill’s gun in her pocket.
    An ambulance now stood where the EMS wagon had been. A couple of uniforms had come onstage. She saw Bill Veeder shaking
hands with a gray-haired man in a rumpled suit.
    When she got to Veeder, he and
Silvestri were in the handshaking process. They both turned and looked at her.
“I’m sorry,” she said, not knowing what she was sorry for or about. I’m
sorry Micklynn’s dead. I’m sorry about us, Silvestri. I’m sorry you ’re
together. She gave Veeder his gun. His shirt clung to his pecs; his khakis
were soaked.
    “I’ve got a change in my car,” he
said to Silvestri. “I’ll be right back.” He offered Wetzon his hand and
Silvestri stepped between them.
    “She’s not going with you,” he said.
“Get back on the boat, Les.”
    “Don’t tell me what to do,
Silvestri.”
    “Do as he says, Leslie,” Veeder said.
“It’s his case. I’ll be right back.”
    “Silvestri,” the rumpled suit said,
beckoning. “A minute, if you please—”
    “But I wasn’t even here when it
happened,” Wetzon protested. “He knows that. He’s just—”
    Bill gave the back of her neck a
brief caress. “It’s okay. Let him do his thing. Go on back to the boat.”
    But she was curious, so she took her
time. In fact, she bent to tie the lace of her white sneaker, which was already
tied. She was close enough to hear what was being said.
    The M.E. was kneeling beside
Micklynn. “What are you saying, Silvestri?”
    „...I want directed testing.
Toxicology compared to the Gelber case...”
    The M.E. looked up, cleared his
throat, jerked his head at Wetzon.
    “Get the hell out of here, Les,”
Silvestri said.
    Straightening, spinning around,
Wetzon ran down the pier toward the Bread Pudding, where everyone now
waited. The rest of what Silvestri had said kept repeating and repeating in her
mind like a loop of tape:
    “She was probably dead before she hit
the water.“

Chapter Forty-Two

     
     
     
    SO THERE THEY ALL WERE, IN