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voice in monologue came from Roz's office, and Kate paused to ask the young
man sitting at the desk marked (humorously, Kate hoped)secretary if she could
go in.
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"If you really want to," he said ominously.
"What's happened?"
"Oh, she'll tell you," he replied.
One of the cluster of women in the other corner muttered, "You mean there's
someone in the City who hasn't heard yet?" The comment sparked a flare of
nervous and quickly damped-down laughter. Kate marched over to the closed
door, rapped on it briskly and, without waiting for permission, turned the
knob and walked in.
Roz Hall stood bent over the telephone on her old wooden desk, wearing her
clerical collar, a suit that meant business, and a clenched look of absolute
rage. She jerked upright at Kate's unceremonious entrance, dragged her fingers
through her hair, and barked into the phone, "Never mind. I'll take care of it
myself," before slamming it down on the base.
Roz glared down at the quivering phone for several intense seconds. Then,
with an enormous effort, she gathered up the energies that were racing through
her and turned them on Kate who very nearly stepped back under the impact of
Roz's concentrated outrage until the minister suddenly and unexpectedly
smiled, and all the murderous antagonism in the room flipped back on itself
and slipped away into its box. Kate even caught herself smiling back, and
wondered at the ease with which Roz had switched off the stream of fury in
full spate to invite Kate instead to join her in a little self-deprecating
humor.
Machiavellian, Roz had described herself? Oh, no Machiavelli had nothing on
Roz Hall.
But still Kate smiled, in uncomprehending but true sympathy, and Roz shook
her head at herself and said, "What time is it? Not even four? God, I need a
drink. Join me?"
"No thanks."
"Coffee then. Grab a seat." She circled her desk, reaching out in passing to
give Kate's arm a quick squeeze that managed to express apology, affection,
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and gratitude all at once, and walked out the door. Kate pulled a chair away
from the desk, and as she was lowering herself into it, she glanced out into
the next room and saw Roz with her arms around the "secketary," wrapping him
in a long hug. After a long minute, she released him and went to the others,
giving each of them the benediction of her embrace. The level of tension in
the building plummeted, the faces started to beam again.
When each person had been given a hug, Roz stood back. "I'm sorry, everyone.
I'm a bitch and I don't deserve your help. Look why don't you all go out and
have something to eat? I don't know if it's lunchtime or dinnertime, but you
must need something after the kind of day I've put you through. Just stick the
answering machine on and get out of here. And Jory, would you be a dear and
put on a fresh pot of coffee before you go? Thanks. All of you."
She hit just the right note to let her acolytes know that she was okay, that
they were safe, and that whatever problems they had been facing would resolve
themselves. Tight mutters gave way to relieved chatter, and Roz came back in
and walked over to a cabinet.
"Have a seat, Kate. You sure you don't want something stronger than coffee?"
Kate shook her head at the proffered bottle. Roz splashed a generous amber
inch in the bottom of a glass, tipped it down her throat in a single gulp, and
shuddered as it hit. After a moment she poured another inch in the glass,
capped the bottle and put it away, and took her drink over to the three tall
filing cabinets that stood shoulder to shoulder against the wall. With a
minimum of searching she pulled out a well-filled ma-nila folder, handed it
over to Kate, and then dropped into a comfortable chair across from her guest,
who sat waiting for an explanation before committing herself to the folder.
Roz took a sip from her drink, put it on the low table between them, and
reached up irritably to peel off the stiff clerical collar. She dropped the
curling tongue-depressor shape of white plastic onto the table, loosened the
collar of the shirt itself, and sat back with a sigh, rubbing her throat with
her eyes shut. It was all done so naturally, Kate couldn't tell if Roz even
knew it was deliberate, this clear declaration that although the lesser beings
in the outer office could be given a pat and dismissed as the worshipers they
were, Kate was to be considered a near-equal.
A near-equal she wanted something from.
"Do you remember last week I told you about an Indian girl?" Roz asked.
Kate thought back; a week ago at dinner, it seemed like a lot longer.
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"Someone came to talk to you about the situation while you were at the women's
shelter," she remembered. "Amanda something."
"Yes. The Indian girl died last night. They're treating it like an accident,
although her husband has a history of violent behavior."
"Roz, what are you talking about?" Kate asked sharply.
"He burned the child to death," Roz said, her face as bleak as her voice.
"It's done all the time in India, and now they've done it here. Look at the
file, Kate. It's all there."
Now Kate looked at the folder, which bore the labelBride Burning. It
consisted of clippings from newspapers and magazines, most of them foreign,
and a number of journal reprints and articles downloaded from the Internet.
Kate picked out one at random and read the brief account, written in oddly
stilted English, of a sixteen-year-old bride from the Punjab district of India
who brought to her marriage a dowry of what to American eyes seemed a peculiar
assortment of goods, including a color television, a sewing machine, and a
motor scooter. She went to live with her new husband's family two hundred
miles from her village, under the same roof as his parents, his brother's
family, two unmarried brothers, and a younger sister.
Eight months later the bride was showing no signs of pregnancy, the
television was on the blink, and her in-laws were demanding that the dowry be
increased by three hundred rupees and a refrigerator. The girl's parents had
gone heavily into debt to pay for the wedding and the agreed-to dowry; they
would be very lucky to pay off what they already owed before they died, and
could afford no more.
Shortly after her first anniversary, the bride was dead in a "kitchen
accident" involving spilled fuel from the cook stove and a match. The groom's
parents were arrested, tried, and found not guilty due to lack of evidence.
That was not the end of the story, either. In a final, macabre twist that,
had Kate not been a cop she might not have believed, two years later the groom
was offered his dead bride's younger sister in marriage. The girl's family was
forever "besmirched" (the article's evocative word) by their daughter's death,
and could not hope to find a clean husband for the girl who remained. The [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]