The Witness

leafy stuff, in case it came up again.
    “I need to go into the station for a couple hours,” he began.
    “Good. Go away.”
    “Need anything? I can pick whatever up on the way back.”
    “I have everything.”
    “I’ll see you later, then.” Brooks rolled his eyes at Bert on his way out as if to say, Good luck dealing with her.
    He’d barely gotten out the door when his phone rang.
    “Gleason.”
    “Hey, Chief. There’s a little to-do over at Hillside Baptist,” Ash told him.
    “I don’t handle to-dos on my day off.”
    “Well, it’s a to-do with Mr. Blake and the Conroys, so I thought you might want in on it.”
    “Hell. I’m rolling now.” He jumped in the car, backed it up with the phone at his ear. “What level of to-do?”
    “Shouted accusations and bitter insults, with a high probability of escalation. I’m rolling, too.”
    “If you get there ahead of me, you start heading off that escalation.”
    He thought, Hell—and hit the sirens and the gas when he swung onto the main road.
    It didn’t take him long, and he pulled up nearly nose-to-nose with Ash as they came in from opposite directions.
    “You shaved off your …” It couldn’t rightfully be called a beard, Brooks considered. “Face hair.”
    “Yeah, it got too hot.”
    “Uh-huh.”
    As Brooks had judged, the to-do had already bumped up to a scene, and a scene was one finger jab away from a ruckus, so he decided to wait to rag on Ash about the haze he’d scraped off his face.
    Lincoln Blake and Mick Conroy might’ve been at the center of it, but they were surrounded by plenty of people in their Sunday best, lathered up and taking sides on the newly mowed green slope in front of the red-brick church.
    Even the Reverend Goode, holy book still in his hand, had gone beet-red straight back into the sweep of his snowy hair.
    “Let’s simmer down,” Brooks called out.
    Some of the voices stilled; some of the chest bumpers eased back as Brooks moved through.
    Blake had brought his stone-faced assistant, and Brooks had no doubt he was packing. Arkansas still had laws against guns in church—Christ knew for how long—but it was short odds some of those gathered on that green slope wore a weapon along with their tie and shined-up shoes.
    Add guns, he thought, and a to-do could go from a scene to a ruckus to a bloodbath in a heartbeat.
    “Y’all are standing in front of a church.” He led with disapproval, laced with a thin cover of disappointment. “I expect most of you attended services this morning. I heard some language when I got here that’s not fitting at such a time and place. Now, I’m going to ask y’all to show some respect.”
    “It’s Lincoln here started it.” Jill Harris folded her arms. “Mick no sooner walked out the door than Lincoln got in his face.”
    “A man’s got a right to say his piece.” Mojean Parsins, Doyle’s mother, squared off with the older woman. “And you oughta keep that parrot nose of yours out of other people’s business.”
    “I could if you hadn’ta raised a hooligan.”
    “Ladies.” Knowing he took his life in his hands—women were apt to leap and bite, and were as likely to be carrying as their men—Brooks stepped between them. “It’d be best if you, and everybody else, went on home now.”
    “You entrapped our boy, you and that Lowery woman. Lincoln told me just what you did. And the Conroys here, they’re trying to make a killing off a bit of teenage mischief.”
    Hilly Conroy elbowed her husband aside. From the look of her, Brooks decided she’d finally found her mad. “Mojean Parsins, you know that’s a lie. I’ve known you all your life, and I can see on your face you know that for a lie.”
    “Don’t you call me a liar! Your boy’s run that hotel into the ground, and you’re trying to make my boy pay for it.”
    “You don’t want to stack your son up against mine, Mojean. If you do, and you try spreading those lies, you’ll be sorry for it.”
    “You go to hell.”
    “That’s enough.” Mojean’s husband, Clint, stepped forward. “That’s enough, Mojean. We’re going home.”
    “You need to stand up for your boy!”
    “Why? You’ve been standing in front of him his whole life. I apologize, Hilly, Mick, for the part I played in making Doyle the embarrassment he is. Mojean, I’m going down to the car, and I’m driving home. You can come or stay, that’s up to you. If you stay, I won’t be home when you get there.”
    “Don’t