“Should we put in a catheter?” the husband asked.

“First things first. We’ll take her directly to OR. Let’s roll, people. Stat!”

I understood “stat.” It’s an abbreviation of the Latin word “statim,” meaning “right fucking now!” The rest was all Greek to me.

They wheeled Alison down a dimly lit corridor and into a room designated simply Room One, where we were not allowed to follow.

“She’s in good hands,” a nurse informed us. The sheriff apparently wasn’t so sure and tried to stay with the gurney. The nurse stopped him, using both hands and all her weight to keep him from crossing the line of yellow tape on the floor that separated the receiving room from the rest of the emergency facilities. Reluctantly, he spun away and went to look out the door.

The nurse took a deep breath. “You can clean up in there,” she told me and gestured toward a rest room with her head. That’s when I noticed for the first time the blood that stained my hands, my jacket, my shirt, my jeans, my Nikes. I nodded and headed toward the rest room, stopping first at a water fountain. While I was drinking, the sheriff slapped a handcuff over my left wrist. I protested, but he wasn’t listening. He pulled me to a set of metal chairs that were anchored to the floor and wound the other cuff around an arm. Well, at least I could sit down.

He abandoned me without comment and stood vigil just behind the yellow tape, the tips of his black boots toeing the line, his eyes fixed on the closed operating room door. He stood there, not moving, for nearly twenty minutes, until the ambulance arrived with Deputy Rovick.

The receiving nurse poked her head inside the operating room, and soon the woman doctor emerged and went over to Gretchen. She loosened the tourniquet and examined the deputy’s wound.

“I know you’re hurting, but there’s someone else who needs me more right now,” the doctor said “Do you understand?”

Gretchen nodded.

The doctor gave quiet instructions to the nurse and then told Gretchen, “We’ll give you something for the pain, and I’ll be with you as soon as I can. Don’t worry. You’re going to be fine. I wouldn’t leave you otherwise.”

The deputy nodded again, and the doctor directed the ambulance drivers to wheel Gretchen into Room Two. Orman clutched the doctor’s elbow. She pulled away. “I need to scrub,” was all she said. She returned to Room One.

A moment later Deputy Loushine burst through the door like he’d had a running start.

“The scene has been secured for CID; we have bulletins on the car,” he announced.

“What about the plates?” I asked.

“They belong to a ham operator in the next county,” he answered as if he worked for me. “The sheriff over there is moving on it for us.”

“What about witnesses, Gary?” the sheriff asked his deputy.

“Just Gretchen, Mike, and him,” the deputy answered, indicating me. “The workers inside The Harbor claim they didn’t see anything.” He said to me: “Gretchen said you got off four rounds at the vehicle.”

“Hit it, too,” I replied.

“You’re under arrest,” the sheriff told me.

Loushine caged me inside a large tiled holding cell that resembled a locker-room shower. It was empty of all furniture except a lidless toilet that was hidden from outside view behind a low wall in the corner. The floor sloped gradually to a drain in the center of the room. Overhead, fluorescent lights were protected by a metal grating. The sole window looked out across the corridor to the fingerprint station. A blind was on the outside of the window. I sat on the floor in the corner directly across from the door. My hands were cuffed behind my back. I sat a long time. And as the hours flowed away, I found myself doing something I hadn’t done for years, not since my wife and daughter were killed by a drunk driver. I prayed. I prayed for Alison, beseeching God to intervene on her behalf. But just as hard, I prayed for myself—prayed that I wasn’t responsible for bringing the shooters down on her.

The sheriff arrived several hours later—at least I was guessing it was several hours. I had lost all track of time. Using the wall for support, I managed to shimmy to my feet. My legs were stiff from sitting, and I tried to stretch them as best I could without the use of my hands.

“How is she?” I asked.

The sheriff closed the door to the holding cell, thought better of it, and opened it again. He stepped out into the corridor and drew the blinds across the cell’s window. When he reentered the cell, I noticed that he was no longer wearing his jacket, Sam Browne belt, holster, gun, or badge.

“So it’s going to be like that,” I said.

“You’re going to answer my questions,” he told me.

“Gladly,” I said.

Only the sheriff didn’t ask any. Instead, he paced relentlessly in front of me, his hands clenched, then pointing, then resting on his hips. His face was red and twitching; his lips were pushed forward bearing his teeth; his breathing was fast and shallow. He was displaying all the classic signals of the first stage of aggression and ritualized combat—assault is possible—that I’d been taught to recognize while training to become a police officer. If I had been in uniform, with my hands free, I would have given him a good whiff of pepper spray.

“You brought them here,” he said at last.

“Brought who?” I asked.

“‘Brought who, brought who,’” he mimicked. “You know who. You brought them.”

“No, no,” I protested. I had thought about it a long time, and my brain—and my conscience—refused to accept responsibility. “It has to be a coincidence.”

“No coincidence,” The sheriff insisted. “They came with you.”

And suddenly it occurred to me that he knew all there was about Alison—where she had come from and why. I told him so.

“Her name is Michael!” he shouted. “Michael Bettich!”

He was in the final stage now—assault is imminent. His face went from red to white; his lips tightened over his teeth; his eyebrows slanted forward into a frown. He closed his hands and started rocking back and forth. His eyes darted quickly to my groin, my jaw—target glances.

“Listen,” I told him, talking loud and fast now, trying to reduce the threat verbally, “only two people knew I was going to Deer Lake and why. Neither of them knew about The Harbor, neither of them knew where Alison could be found. And I wasn’t followed; there was no chance of that. No one followed me to Alison, so it had to be—”

“Her name is Michael!” the sheriff screamed and lunged at me, catching my jaw with his shoulder. His momentum pushed me against the stone wall, jamming my cuffed hands against my spine and knocking the breath out of me. One, two, three blows to my stomach and then one to my face. Then another. I turned my head with the next punch, and his hand caromed off my chin into the wall. The sheriff cried in pain as I pivoted out of his reach.

He turned quickly and swung at my head, but I bobbed and danced away. His knuckles grazed the wall. The miss made him even more furious. He moved toward me with measured steps, his hands held high. When he was in range, I lifted my right leg into the chamber and snapped a kick to his solar plexus. But with my hands cuffed behind my back, I was off balance. When he fell, so did I, landing on my shoulder. I think I hurt myself more than I hurt him. I tried to roll to my feet, but it was too late. He was on me in a hurry, pounding my head, throat, and upper chest. I used my knee to push him away but the relief was only temporary; he resumed smothering me with punches before I could even get to my knees.

I was fading fast.

“Jesus Christ!” a voice shouted. “Jesus Christ, Sheriff! What are you doing?! Jesus Christ!”

A pair of hands gripped the sheriff by his shoulders and pulled him off me. I didn’t see who they belonged to until I was able to shake the sweat and blood out of my eyes.