“Okay. I advise you not to talk about what happened tonight. Wait until you have a lawyer. Understand?”

“Yes sir.”

“Now, you asked about your mother, right?”

“Yes sir. Is she alive?”

Ozzie glanced at Tatum, who shrugged and said into the recorder, “As far as we know, Josie Gamble is alive. She was taken from the scene in an ambulance and is probably already at the hospital.”

“Can we go see her?” Drew asked.

“No, not right now,” Ozzie said.

They rode in silence for a moment, then Ozzie said, in the direction of the recorder, “You were the first on the scene, right?”

Tatum said, “Yes.”

“And did you ask these two kids what happened?”

“I did. The boy, Drew, said nothing. I asked his sister, Kiera, if she knew anything, and she said her brother shot Kofer. At that point I stopped askin’ questions. It was pretty clear what happened.”

The radio was squawking and all of Ford County, even in the darkness, seemed to be alive. Ozzie turned down the volume and went silent himself. He kept his foot on the gas and his big brown Ford roared down the county road, straddling the center line, daring any varmint to venture onto the pavement.

He had hired Stuart Kofer four years earlier, after Kofer returned to Ford County from an abbreviated career in the army. Stuart had managed a passable job in explaining his dishonorable discharge, said it was all about technicalities and misunderstandings and so on. Ozzie gave him a uniform, put him on probation for six months, and sent him to the academy in Jackson where he excelled. On duty, there were no complaints. Kofer had become an instant legend when he single-handedly took out three drug dealers from Memphis who had gotten lost in rural Ford County.

Off-duty was another matter. Ozzie had dressed him down at least twice after reports of drinking and hell-raising, and Stuart, typically, apologized in tears, promised to clean up his act, and swore allegiance to Ozzie and the department. And he was fiercely loyal.

Ozzie had no patience with unpleasant officers and the jerks didn’t last long. Kofer was one of the more popular deputies and liked to volunteer in schools and with civic clubs. Because of the army he had seen the world, an oddity among his rather rustic colleagues, most of whom had hardly stepped outside the state. In public he was an asset, a gregarious officer who always had a smile and a joke, who remembered everyone’s name, who liked to walk through Lowtown, the colored section, on foot and without a gun and with candy for the kids.

In private there were problems, but as brothers in uniform his colleagues tried to keep them from Ozzie. Tatum and Swayze and most of the deputies knew something of Stuart’s dark side, but it was easier to ignore it and hope for the best, hope no one got hurt.

Ozzie glanced in the mirror again and looked at Drew in the shadows. Head down, eyes closed, not a sound. And although Ozzie was stunned and angry, it was difficult to picture the kid as a murderer. Slight, shorter than his sister, pale, timid, obviously overwhelmed, the kid could pass for a shy twelve-year-old.

They roared into the dark streets of Clanton and soon slid to a stop in front of the jail, two blocks off the square. Outside the main door to the jail a deputy was standing with a man holding a camera.

“Dammit,” Ozzie said. “That’s Dumas Lee, isn’t it?”

“Afraid so,” Tatum said. “I guess word’s out. They all have police scanners these days.”

“Y’all stay in the car.” Ozzie got out, slammed his door, and walked straight for the reporter, already shaking his head. “You ain’t gettin’ nothin’, Dumas,” he said roughly. “There’s a minor involved and you ain’t gettin’ his name or his picture. Get outta here.”

Dumas Lee was one of two beat reporters for The Ford County Times, and he knew Ozzie well. “Can you confirm an officer has been killed?”

“I ain’t confirmin’ nothin’. You got ten seconds to get outta here before I slap cuffs on you and haul your ass inside. Beat it!”

The reporter slinked away and soon disappeared into the darkness. Ozzie watched him, then he and Tatum unloaded the kids and hustled them inside.

“You want to process them?” asked the jailer.

“No, we’ll do it later. Let’s just get ’em in the juvenile cell.”

With Tatum bringing up the rear, Drew and Kiera were led through a wall of bars and down a narrow hallway to a thick metal door with a narrow window. The jailer opened it and they stepped into the empty room. There were two sets of bunk beds and a dirty commode in one corner.

Ozzie said, “Take off the handcuffs.” Tatum snapped them off and Drew immediately rubbed his wrists. “You’re gonna stay here for a few hours,” Ozzie said.

“I want to see my mother,” Drew said, more forcefully than Ozzie expected.

“Son, you’re in no position to want anything right now. You’re under arrest for the murder of a law enforcement official.”

“He killed my mother.”

“Your mother is not dead, thankfully. I’m about to drive to the hospital and check on her. When I come back I’ll tell you what I know. That’s the best I can do.”

Kiera asked, “Why am I in jail? I didn’t do anything.”

“I know. You’re in jail for your own safety, and you won’t be here long. If we released you in a few hours, where would you go?”

Kiera looked at Drew and it was obvious they had no idea.

Ozzie asked, “Do y’all have any kinfolks around here? Aunts, uncles, grandparents? Anybody?”

Both hesitated then slowly shook their heads, no.

“Okay. It’s Kiera, right?”

“Yes sir.”

“If you had to call someone right now to come get you, who would you call?”

She looked at her feet and shook her head. “Our preacher, Brother Charles.”

“Charles who?”

“Charles McGarry, out in Pine Grove.”

Ozzie thought he knew all the preachers but perhaps he had missed one. In all fairness, there were three hundred churches in the county. Most were small congregations scattered throughout the countryside and notorious for fighting and splitting and running off their preachers. It was impossible for anyone to keep score. He looked at Tatum and said, “Don’t know him.”

“I do. Good guy.”

“Give him a call, wake him up, ask him to get down here.” He looked at the kids and said, “We’ll leave you here where you’re safe. They’ll bring in some snacks and drinks. Make yourself at home. I’m goin’ to the hospital.” He took a breath and looked at them with as little sympathy as possible. His overwhelming concern was a dead deputy and he was looking at the killer. Still, they were so lost and pathetic it was difficult to want revenge.