“Four or five wannabe Spielbergs. Anyway, I pointed my gun at the ceiling and fired what was supposed to be a warning shot. It might have been a bad decision, but in that moment it seemed like the right one. The only one. There are hanging lights in that part of the mall. The bullet hit one of them and it came down dead-center on a lookie-loo’s head. The kid with the gun dropped it, and as soon as it hit the floor, I knew for sure it wasn’t real because it bounced. Turned out to be a plastic squirt gun made to look like a .45 auto. The kid who was on the floor getting kicked had some bruises and a few cuts, nothing that looked like it would need stitches, but the bystander was unconscious and stayed that way for three hours. Concussion. According to his lawyer he’s got amnesia and blinding headaches.”
“Sued the department?”
“Yes. It’ll go on for awhile, but he’ll end up getting something.”
Sheriff John considered. “If he hung around to film the altercation, he may not get all that much, no matter how bad his headaches are. I suppose the department landed you with reckless discharge of a weapon.”
They had, and it would be nice, Tim thought, if we could leave it at that. But they couldn’t. Sheriff John might look like an African-American version of Boss Hogg in The Dukes of Hazzard, but he was no dummy. He was clearly sympathetic to Tim’s situation—almost any cop would be—but he’d still check. Better he got the rest of the story from Tim himself.
“Before I went into the shoe store, I went into Beachcombers and had a couple of drinks. The responding officers who took the kid into custody smelled it on my breath and gave me the test. I blew oh-six, under the legal limit but not good considering I had just fired my sidearm and put a man in the hospital.”
“You ordinarily a drinking man, Mr. Jamieson?”
“Quite a lot in the six months or so after my divorce, but that was two years ago. Not now.” Which is, of course, what I would say, he thought.
“Uh-huh, uh-huh, now let’s see if I got this right.” The sheriff stuck up a fat index finger. “You were off duty, which means if you’d been out of uniform, that woman never would have run up to you in the first place.”
“Probably not, but I would have heard the commotion and gone to the scene anyway. A cop is never really off duty. As I’m sure you know.”
“Uh-huh, uh-huh, but would you have had your gun?”
“No, it would have been locked in my car.”
Ashworth popped a second finger for that point, then added a third. “The kid had what was probably a fake gun, but it could have been real. You couldn’t be sure, one way or the other.”
“Yes.”
Here came finger number four. “Your warning shot struck a light, not only bringing it down but bringing it down on an innocent bystander’s head. If, that is, you can call an asshole filming with a cell phone an innocent bystander.”
Tim nodded.
Up popped the sheriff’s thumb. “And before this altercation occurred, you just happened to have ingested two alcoholic drinks.”
“Yes. And while I was in uniform.”
“Not a good decision, not a good . . . what do they call it . . . optic, but I’d still have to say you had one insane run of bad luck.” Sheriff John drummed his fingers on the edge of his desk. The ruby pinkie ring punctuated each roll with a small click. “I think your story is too outrageous not to be true, but I believe I’ll call your previous place of employment and check it for myself. If for no other reason than to hear the story again and marvel anew.”
Tim smiled. “I reported to Bernadette DiPino. She’s the Sarasota Chief of Police. And you better get home to dinner, or your wife is going to be mad.”
“Uh-huh, uh-huh, you let me worry about Marcy.” The sheriff leaned forward over his stomach. His eyes were brighter than ever. “If I Breathalyzed you right now, Mr. Jamieson, what would you blow?”
“Go ahead and find out.”
“Don’t believe I will. Don’t believe I need to.” He leaned back; his office chair uttered another longsuffering squall. “Why would you want the job of night knocker in a pissant little burg like this? It only pays a hundred dollars a week, and while it doesn’t amount