After getting Earl admitted to the emergency room at Timberry Trails, Broker used a pay phone in the waiting room to call Jolene.
He told her that Earl was her friend again, like she wanted, and he’d be moving his stuff out of her basement. And maybe she should send him some flowers because he’d just been admitted to the hospital after having his arm broken by an ostrich.
“That’s what I said,” he repeated. “An ostrich.”
He said he’d be at the farm until Sunday afternoon, and then he was returning to Ely. He said he hoped everything turned out all right.
He said good-bye. Then he realized something and turned to Amy. “You have a plane to catch.”
Amy shrugged, grinned. “Let’s blow it off. We have an escaped ostrich to find, remember?”
“Right. How do you find an escaped ostrich?”
They laughed, then, remembering Rodney in the barn, Broker made a fast call to John Eisenhower at the Washington County sheriff’s department. After quick pleasantries, Rose, John’s secretary, said she could squeeze him in for ten minutes if he hurried.
Rushing through the hospital parking lot, Broker explained, “I know that other guy who ran. Rodney. I need to check something with the local sheriff.”
On the road, he said, “John and I go way back. I was working on his task force when I arrested Rodney three years ago. He’s supposed to be in jail.”
Pushing the Leper Colony, he drove eighty mph on back-county roads, leaving Timberry, skirting through Lake Elmo and Oak Park Heights, and turning onto Highway 36 where it made its turn approaching the St. Croix River on the outskirts of Stillwater. A few minutes later he turned into the parking lot for the Washington County Jail and the sheriff’s office.
“This will only take a minute,” he assured Amy. He jogged into the red-brick jail complex and was buzzed through a security door. Rose waved him in. “Make it quick, he has to talk to the Elk’s Club in ten minutes.”
John was standing in front of his desk in gray dress slacks and a T-shirt breaking starch on a fresh white dress shirt. Broker hadn’t seen him since last May when he’d come up to Broker’s Beach for the fishing opener. John was running for reelection next month and he’d been spending time in the gym. He had trimmed his blond mustache and the ten desk pounds that he used to wear around his waist had migrated back to his chest and shoulders as muscle.
They shook hands warmly. Then John’s hand went to his pocket and he handed Broker a campaign button: REELECT THE SHERIFF.
“Kind of Nixonian,” Broker said.
John struck a pose, and framed an invisible subject in the air with parenthetically cupped hands. “I considered going with ‘Reelect Ike,’ but decided that was a little over-the-top.” He finished buttoning his shirt and tucked it in. “I heard about that business in the canoe area. .”
Broker nodded. “Reason I’m in town; I brought the guy’s car back.”
John walked around his desk and took two ties from the back of his chair. He held them up next to the charcoal suit coat hanging from the shelves behind the desk.
“I’d go with the blue one,” Broker said.
John nodded and began to knot his tie. “I, ah, also heard from Tom about you and Nina splitting the blanket.” Tom Jeffords was Broker’s neighbor, the Cook County sheriff.
“Our latest standoff,” Broker said, clipping off the words.
“Not real good for your kid,” John observed.
“I hear you.”
John snugged up his Windsor and reached for his coat. “So what’s up? You didn’t pop in to help me pick ties,” he said.
“About two hours ago I ran into Rodney on the street. You remember Rodney.”
“Oh yeah.”
“I thought he was doing some serious federal time?”
“Don’t quote me on this, but law enforcement is still a pretty snitch-driven business. After you left the picture, everybody-local and federal-was hurting statewide for a contact in the outlaw end-of-the-gun culture.”
Broker grimaced, disbelieving. “Rodney flipped?”
John grinned. “Yeah, he’s kinda, like, the new you. He’s working deep informant to reduce his sentence.”
Broker groaned but he now understood Rodney’s disappearing act. Rodney wouldn’t be telling Earl anything.
A black phone sitting off to the side on John’s desk rang.
John eyed the phone, checked his wristwatch. “Shit.” He picked up the phone and spoke in the receiver, “I’m tight for time. Whatta you got?”
Broker watched John’s eyes roll up in a Why me, Lord expression. “So?” he fumed. Then he shook his head. “How the fuck should I know.” Then after a moment, he jerked alert. “No, no, don’t shoot it. The animal-rights nuts will be all over my ass, especially with the goddamn election.”
Shaking his head, John lowered himself to his chair, planted his elbow, and knuckled his forehead. “Try and keep track of it and call the DNR. I know it’s not wild, but they have tranquilizer rifles. Ask to borrow one. Okay, okay. Page me in an hour and let me know. Right. Later.”
John dropped the phone to its cradle. “You talk to J.T. lately?” he asked after a few beats.
“Sure,” Broker said in a neutral tone.
“Is he missing any birds that you know of?”
“Can’t say,” Broker said. Carefully.
“Well, there’s only a couple ostrich operations in the county and one of them is missing a bird because this really big-ass ostrich just did some broken-field running through traffic on I-94 near the Manning Trail and we got a twenty-car fender bender. Luckily just cuts and bruises so far. Hey, Rose,” he yelled. “Get me J.T. Merryweather’s phone number.”
“I think I better go; you look kind of busy right now,” Broker said.
Over a quick beer at the Trapper’s Lounge in downtown Stillwater, Broker struggled to keep a straight face as he recited John Eisenhower’s one-liners: “Is he missing any birds? Well, call the DNR.”
“What are you going to tell J.T.?” Amy asked.
“I don’t know.”
“How are they going to round up Popeye?”
“Probably nail him with a tranquilizer dart. So we better get back to the farm. The phone’s bound to be ringing. And I’d just as soon you answered in case it’s John who calls.”
“Okay, I’ll help you till we get the bird back. You did tell me to shut the barn door and I didn’t,” Amy said.
“Right. Except if you would have shut that door we’d be in the hospital with Earl,” Broker said.
They clinked glasses.
A message was waiting on J.T.’s voice mail from a Washington County deputy who was checking around about missing ostriches. Amy returned the call and explained that the owner was gone and she was house-sitting, and she confirmed that a large male was missing from his pen.
Broker crossed his fingers. The more he thought about it, he worried that a county cop would overhear somebody at Timberry Trails Hospital talking about an ostrich-kick casualty. It was the kind of loose grounder that John E. would run out. He was on the verge of calling the sheriff’s office and personally confessing when the phone rang.
The deputy again; they’d found Popeye kicking an abandoned horse barn apart in Dellwood and they had darted him with a tranquilizer gun. Could someone come pick him up?
Amy said her trailer was in Iowa. The deputy said give him a few minutes. He called back and said they’d found a local farmer who’d cart Popeye for one hundred dollars. Coached by Broker, Amy gave the deputy J.T.’s address, fire number, and directions.
An hour later, a Dodge Ram pickup pulled into the yard. Popeye, groggy and twitching, lay in the bed. They backed into the barn, up to the stall, and lowered the tailgate. Broker and Amy helped the driver drag the bird over it. Popeye weakly raised his head, blinked, and resumed his nap. The amused driver took his fee and left.
Walking back to the house Broker and Amy stopped, jolted by a sudden temperature drop of twenty to thirty degrees. Broker hunched his shoulders and squinted into the bitter northwest wind. “Weather Channel,” he said.
Inside, rubbing their red hands, they studied the televised Dopler map. The cold front bulging down from North Dakota and Saskatchewan had purple edges and a bone-white heart.
“Jesus, it’s already ten below in International Falls,” Amy pointed at the map.
There was no snow in the forecast, just polar cold.
Unloading Popeye left them exhausted after their jag of a day. They went into the kitchen and couldn’t face the rest of the ostrich chili in the refrigerator. So they ordered a deluxe pizza. When it arrived they split the bottle of Pepsi, settled down in front of the TV, and raided J.T.’s movie library. They were arguing about whether to watch Erin Brockovich or Contact with Jodie Foster when the phone rang.