Page 128 of If Looks Could Kill
“Well,” I said, “I was hoping for an Irish setter, but they’re hard to come by. You seemed like the next best thing.”
He laughed out loud, which left me feeling pleased with myself for a block and a half.
The question hadn’t been serious, but then again, perhaps it had.
“My family is English,” I told him. “I know the Irish aren’t usually fond of the English.”
“Ah, but I didn’t move to England, now, did I? I’ve got no gripe with Americans.”
“That’s odd,” I told him. “I’ve got plenty of gripe with most Americans I meet. Especially on the Bowery.”
“Come to think of it,” he said, “so have I. But that’s beside the point.”
We walked on in companionable silence for another block.
“Oh, Taibít,” Mike said. “I wish you weren’t leaving.”
“Me too.”
He stopped and looked at me. “Really?”
This surprised me. “Of course really.”
“You don’t want to go home?” he asked me.
“For Christmas, I suppose,” I told him. “But not forever. If… if I could stay, I would.”
He rested his forehead against mine. “Good,” he said. “That’s all I needed to know.”
“Why?” I asked doubtfully. “What are you planning?”
“Nothing,” he said. “I just like to know what I’m up against, is all.”
“Up against?” I pressed.
“Don’t mind me,” he teased. “I’m just over here, babbling.”
O’Flynn’s was in sight, less than a block away, when someone tapped me on the shoulder. “Tabitha Woodward?” a voice said. “This way, please.”
We both turned around to see a pair of blue-clad police officers frowning at us.
“Jimmy,” Mike said good-naturedly, “what on earth?”
“Hands up.” It was Officer Jimmy, whom we’d met the night before. “Don’t resist.”
“Resist what?” I asked. “Is this a joke?”
I raised my arms overhead and followed toward where the officers beckoned.
I’ve never been so painfully aware of all eyes turning my way to stare at me as I felt then. A new newspaper boy on the corner. A girl out walking a mangy dog. A man having a smoke.
They steered us both, prodding our backs with their wooden clubs, toward the doorway of a rag-and-bone shop, now closed.
“You’re under arrest, Miss Woodward,” Officer Jimmy said, “for stealing a valuable firearm last night from the residence of a private citizen, Mrs. Rose Hertzfeld, on Spring Street.”
Mike and I gaped at each other.
“Jimmy,” Mike said in a much more serious tone. “You’re making a big mistake.”
