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"Promise me that, Dave."
"I do."
"You mean it, no going back on it?"
"You've got my word."
She cupped my fingers in her hand and put her head under my chin. In the shadowy light I could see her heart tripping against her breast.
I PARKED IN THE LOT BEHIND THE OFFICE AND WALKED TOWARD the back door. Two uniformed deputies had just taken a black man in handcuffs into the building, and four others were drinking coffee out of foam cups and smoking cigarettes in the shade against the wall. I heard one of them use my name, then a couple of them laugh when I walked by.
I stopped and walked back to them.
"How y'all doing today?" I said.
"What's going on, Dave?" Rufus Arceneaux said. He had been a tech sergeant in the Marine Corps and he still wore his sun-bleached hair in a military crewcut. He took off his shades and rubbed the bridge of his nose.
"I'd better get back on it," one deputy said, flipped away his cigarette, and walked toward his cruiser.
"What's the joke about, Rufus?" I said.
"It's nothing I said, Dave. I was just quoting the boss man," Rufus said. His green eyes were full of humor as he looked at the other deputies.
"What did the sheriff have to say?"
"Hey, Dave, fair is fair. Don't lay this off on me," he said.
"Do you want to take the mashed potatoes out of your mouth and tell me what you're talking about?"
"Hey, come on, man," he said, chuckling.
"What the fuck, it's no big deal. Tell him," the deputy next to him said.
"The sheriff said if the governor of Lou'sana invited the whole department to dinner, Dave would be the one guy who'd manage to spit in the punch bowl."
Then the three of them were silent, suppressing their grins, their eyes roving around the parking lot.
"Drop by my office sometime today, Rufus," I said. "Anytime before five o'clock. You think you can work it in?"
"It's just a joke, Dave. I'm not the guy who said it, either."
"That's right. So it's nothing personal. I'd just like to go through your jacket with you."
"What for?"
"You've been here eight or nine years, haven't you?"
"That's right."
"Why is it that I always have the feeling you'd like to be an NCO again, that maybe you have some ambitions you're not quite telling us about?"
His lips became a tight, stitched line, and I saw a slit of yellow light in his eye.
"Think about it and I'll talk to you later, Rufus," I said, and went inside the building, into the air-conditioned odor of cigar butts and tobacco spittle, and closed the door behind me.
Ten minutes later the sheriff walked into my office and sat down in front of my desk with his arms propped stiffly on his thighs. In his red-faced concentration he reminded me of a football coach sitting on the edge of a bench.
"Where do you think we should begin?" he said.
