The Bell Tower

by R.J. Ellory

Genres: Historical Thrillers

Synopsis

LIFE ON DEATH ROW TAKES ITS TOLL.
UNTIL YOU CAN'T TAKE IT ANYMORE...

Death Row duty comes with three simple rules:
Do not make it personal
Do not question the system
Do not take justice into your own hands
Garrett Nelson will break every one of them.

Injured during a drug bust, Deputy Garrett Nelson finds himself out of the Sheriff's Department. Uncertain of his future, he takes a job at a Florida Penitentiary. Situated on the grounds of an old Spanish mission, the bell tower is now an execution chamber.

After a dangerous manhunt for escaped convicts through the Everglades, Nelson's belief in the justice system is tested to the limit. In a heartbreaking conflict of duty versus conscience, he must decide whether he's willing to let the State execute an innocent man, or risk his own life and family in order to find the truth.

Gripping and heart-breaking by turns, and beautifully set against the backdrop of Florida's Everglades, THE BELL TOWER is the latest literary suspense novel from the award-winning, internationally bestselling author of A QUIET BELIEF IN ANGELS.

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PRAISE FOR R.J. ELLORY

'Beautiful and haunting... A tour de force' MICHAEL CONNELLY

'Beautifully written novels that are also great mysteries' JAMES PATTERSON

'A uniquely gifted, passionate, and powerful writer' ALAN FURST

'In the top flight of crime writing' SUNDAY TELEGRAPH

'The master of the genre' CLIVE CUSSLER

Release date: March 28, 2024

Publisher: Orion

Print pages: 448

Sample

The night before the shooting, Garrett Nelson slept like a man awaiting his own execution.

Varnished with sweat, the damp sheets a tourniquet around his awkward limbs, he twisted in and out of wakefulness. Jolting upright with a start, he was sure of sounds that then proved to be nothing. Actuality and imagination, each of them reflected in a strange funhouse of mirrors, became seamless. In one moment, he believed himself to be elsewhere; in another he was younger; in yet another he was walking through a darkened house looking for someone whose name he didn’t know. Shadows moved with him, but he could not see who cast them.

Later, he would think those fractured and half-forgotten dreams were a premonition of what lay ahead, both in the following days and subsequent months.

When light at last separated the sky from the land, Nelson rose and showered. He tried to remember what he had seen, the sounds he’d heard, but they evaporated like mist from the surface of a river.

Nelson had been Deputy Sheriff of De Soto County, Florida, for a little more than eight months. His predecessor, Walt Barrow, had served only one four-year term, and then – his wife pregnant with their third child – he’d been persuaded by his in-laws to pursue a less demanding and potentially dangerous career. As far as Nelson knew, Barrow now worked in sanitation and was as miserable as a man could be.

At the end of that same term, Sheriff Eugene Bigsby had been re-elected for a second. He was a fair and honest man. When he asked Nelson if he would step up to the plate as deputy, Nelson had no difficulty in accepting.

Nelson possessed no yearning for the post of Sheriff. It seemed to him an administrative function, each action and reaction answerable to some faceless politician. The duty of law was both public and personal, and no distant bureaucrat could profess to understand how the world worked when their own world was so divorced. The decisions a man made when faced with the worst that humanity had to offer were his and his alone. Ultimately, a man answered only to himself and the law. Only he would ever know if he did right or wrong.

A little after eight on the morning of Wednesday 4th, Nelson left his house on the outskirts of Fort Haines for Arcadia and the Sheriff’s Department.

The sky promised nothing but more humidity and heat. Here in Florida, storms did not clear the air but served only to thicken it.

As was his routine, Nelson stopped at a diner on Lakes Avenue to get coffee and a bear claw. Timing was everything. Too early and the coffee was a brackish stew that had simmered through the early hours. Too late and it was strong enough to strip the rust from highway signs.

April Sherman was at the counter. She and Nelson had dated a couple of times in high school. She was no longer a Sherman, having married into the Griffin family. April’s husband – an auto mechanic someplace down off of North East Roan – was a drunk. Living with someone like that left you with a strange kind of hopelessness. April had that on her like a shadow. With two little ones to fend for, she was tied into that deal for keeps.

Nelson took a bar stool at the counter.

‘Hey, April. How’s tricks?’

April managed a tired smile as she bagged his pastry. ‘Keepin’ the train on the tracks. You know how it is, Garrett.’

Glancing back from the door as he left, Nelson saw she was still watching him. He remembered her as a teenager. She was a firework in a bottle. Whatever had lit that girl’s spirit had long-since been dulled by the blunt reality of living.

Fort Haines sat northeast of Arcadia. Much the same as any other town in the Florida Heartland, it had little to recommend it. Looking something like the abandoned back lot of a once-grand film studio, it featured buildings started and left incomplete. With time, those buildings took on the appearance of things going to ruin rather than things unfinished. With its fair share of juvenile delinquency, drug dealers, liquor store robberies, domestic violence, abandoned children and auto theft, the task of policing it was a matter of predictable routine. Just like Haines City, a good seventy miles north by crow, it had been named after Confederate Colonel Henry Haines. Haines City itself was a different animal. Back a couple of years, they’d opened Circus World, some Ringling Brothers enterprise that generated huge sums from tourist revenue. Nelson didn’t doubt that such an investment had brought with it that usual roll-call of crooks and thieves. The brighter the lights, the darker the shadows. As of now and for the foreseeable future, he was just fine where he was.

Arriving at the office, Sheriff Bigsby was standing in the doorway behind reception.

‘Come on back, Garrett,’ he said soberly.

Nelson followed him, glancing at the receptionist, Marla Cooper. Marla, now in her early fifties, had been holding the fort for more than two decades.

‘Maybe you’re gettin’ yourself fired,’ she said. ‘Maybe he heard about your gamblin’ and drinkin’ and womanisin’.’

‘Yeah, an’ maybe we’ll add a murder to that list just before I leave.’

‘My boys’d come for you. They’ll be fishin’ your guts out of Lake Placid.’

‘Garrett!’ Bigsby hollered from his office.

‘Run along now, sonny,’ Marla said.

‘How any man could love you, I do not know,’ Nelson replied.

Bigsby was standing by the window. He turned as Nelson entered.

‘We got ourselves a mess over in Highlands County,’ he said. ‘Sheriff there, you know him?’

‘Sam Cox. Know of him, sure.’

‘He’s a man down. Asked for our help with somethin’.’

Nelson took a seat.

‘What’s goin’ on?’

‘Don’t have all the details, but it’s drugs. Truckstop off 27 near Venus. Seems to be a switching point for cargo. Shipments coming up from Naples. Sam thinks they’re getting stuff in across the Gulf by boat, unloading it, then by road to Orlando. Changing vehicles en route. He’s got DEA involved, Feds more an’ likely, but he wants his own presence. Asked if I could send you over to pitch in.’

‘If they’ve got DEA and Feds, why does he need Sheriff’s Department?’

‘Hell, I don’t know, Garrett. It’s Sam’s bust, I guess. You know how folks are. They get territorial about this stuff. Anyway, he’s an old friend, and he asked me for help. I ain’t gonna tell him no.’

‘Sure, no problem. You want me to head over there now?’

‘Yeah, soon as. Go to the office in Sebring. If they need you to stay over a day or two, they’ll get you a place. Keep Marla up to speed.’

Nelson got up.

‘I know you’ll do a good job, Garrett, but keep your wits about you. Drugs is bad business and it’s bad people who do it.’

Nelson took 70 east, then headed north on 27 once past Lake Placid.

Arriving at the Highlands County Sheriff’s Office a little after ten, he was ushered into a briefing room.

Sam Cox was holding court.

‘Sheriff Bigsby send you over, son?’ Cox asked.

‘Yes, sir. Deputy Nelson.’

‘Welcome to the party. Take a seat.’

Nelson did as instructed. He surveyed the room. Eight uniformed men sat around the table, a further two suits stood with their backs to the window. Nelson guessed they were federal.

‘Now, this is a DEA operation,’ Cox said. ‘We ain’t here to give anything but support. Last thing we need is heroics and drama.’ Cox nodded toward the suits. ‘Florida Bureau is here in an advisory capacity, but the Drug people take the lead on this, no matter what happens, okay?’

There was a murmur of consent from the gathering.

Cox turned to a map of the area around Venus. Beside it were photos of the truckstop in question.

‘We got four trucks,’ Cox explained. ‘Two men per cab, a third in the trailer. There are three ways out of there. North and south on 27, then west maybe three or four miles to the junction of 17. From there, 731 is a straight run south into Glades County. That’s wild country, as you know. There’s cars all around that truckstop, couple o’ bikes too. We know there’s keys in them and they’re fuelled up. You’re gonna have a dozen men doin’ everythin’ possible to evade capture. We got ourselves a bottleneck here, so there’s a hope we can corral ’em up, but that could also work against us. These ain’t the sort of fellers who are gonna give it up easy for a quiet life in Southern State.’

Cox paused and looked around the room.

‘Any questions?’

There were none.

‘Okay, so you all know who you’re riding with ’cept for you, Deputy Nelson.’

Cox indicated a man across the table.

‘That there’s Travis Faulkner. He’s one o’ mine. You’re goin’ out to where 17 and 731 meet west of Venus. The likelihood of you seein’ anythin’ but countryside is slim, but you never know. Keep your wits about you. We’re all on the same radio channel. Anyone gets out of there, it’s gonna be your job to stop ’em.’

Nelson nodded at Faulkner. Faulkner raised his hand in acknowledgement.

‘Those trucks’re comin’ in around three,’ Cox added. ‘That’s the schedule they work on. Everyone needs to be established by noon at the latest.’

Out behind the office, Nelson waited for Faulkner to appear. The other men dispersed in twos and threes. The Feds hung back and had words with Cox.

‘So what did you do to get dragged into this mess?’ Faulkner asked as soon as he came out of the door.

‘Dumb luck, I guess,’ Nelson replied.

‘Well, I reckon we got ourselves a few hours of nothin’ followed by a few more of the same.’ He smiled, extended his hand. ‘Travis,’ he said.

‘Garrett,’ Nelson replied, and shook the man’s hand.

‘Let’s get your gear and head out. We can stop by a place I know and get some coffee and sandwiches.’

Travis Faulkner was personable and talkative. He was a handful of years younger than Nelson, and had been in the Department just shy of a decade.

‘Never wanted to do nothin’ else,’ he said, ‘save get drunk and fool around. But hell, you can only do that for so long before you wind up in too much trouble to get out of. Now I got myself a nice girl, a place to live, and we’s set on havin’ ourselves a family. You got yourself a girl?’

‘No,’ Nelson said. ‘I’m still workin’ on that one.’

‘You don’t want a family?’

‘I’ve thought about it, sure.’

‘Well, maybe you need to think about it some more. Only thing a man can’t beat is the passage of time.’

Nelson didn’t reply. He looked out of the window.

‘Hell, it ain’t none of my damned business,’ Faulkner said. ‘We ain’t known each other but a minute. I don’t mean to get all up in your face.’

‘It’s not a problem,’ Nelson said. ‘And you’re right. Maybe I should think about it some more.’

The car slowed, started to turn.

‘Well, all we need to think about right now is those sandwiches. This here’s the best place in the county for pulled pork an’ slaw.’

Faulkner and Nelson arrived at their assigned station off of 17 and 731 well before noon.

Faulkner radioed in to confirm their arrival.

The day was humid, the temperature in the high eighties. It was a choice between sitting in the car with the fan circulating steam or remaining outside and at the mercy of mosquitoes, midges and chiggers.

An hour passed, and then a second. Every thirty minutes or so, Faulkner would radio in to report that nothing was happening.

Their car was off beneath an overhang of trees, visible solely for the few seconds it would take to pass it. Aside from two pickups and a motorcycle, the only other movement on the road was a child on a bright yellow bicycle. Moving like molasses, that bicycle appeared to their left and made its slow-motion way across their field of vision. The boy riding it couldn’t have been more than eight or ten. Where he’d come from and where he was going was anyone’s guess. It was an incongruous sight, and both Nelson and Faulkner followed his laborious progress for a good three or four minutes without saying a word.

When the boy spotted the patrol car he came to a halt. He stayed motionless, straddling the bike and looking at them intently, as surprised to see them as they were to see him. He just stared for a good thirty seconds, and then he slowly raised his hand and waved.

Without thinking, both Nelson and Faulkner raised their hands and waved back.

The boy started off again, moving even more slowly than before.

‘What the hell?’ Faulkner said.

‘Maybe that was their point man,’ Nelson said.

‘Then I’m guessin’ that’d be the outlaw, Babyface Redneck.’

Nelson laughed. Faulkner too. They spent the next fifteen minutes making up names for a notorious mob of four-foot gangsters.

The first indication that things had gone awry came over the radio just before three-thirty.

The sound of muffled gunfire was unmistakable between the frantic and urgent calls for back-up.

Faulkner tried to reach Sheriff Cox but to no avail. He suggested they head back towards the truckstop to give assistance.

‘We stay here,’ Nelson said.

‘You hear that?’ Faulkner asked. ‘Sounds like they need all the help they can get.’

‘I hear it, Travis, but we need to stay put in case anyone makes it out of there.’

They went back and forth on it and finally reached a compromise. They would head towards the truckstop, maintaining no more than ten or fifteen miles an hour. The road was narrow, and if something was coming their way they could turn and block the escape route.

They started moving a little after three forty-five. Nelson drove. Faulkner kept trying to reach Cox.

At 3.51, a message came through to them directly from Cox’s deputy, Scott Helm.

‘Travis? Travis, you there?’

Faulkner fumbled with the radio, dropped it. Nelson came to a stop.

‘That you, Scott?’

‘Got a car coming your way,’ Helm said. ‘All hell broke loose. Got a bunch of men down. I think Sheriff Cox got hit.’

‘What car?’ Nelson asked.

Faulkner relayed the question.

‘Christ, I don’t know, Travis. It’s dark. Black, maybe. It’s gonna come right at you, and it’s gonna be fast.’

There was more gunfire – short bursts, and then a single crack. The radio went dead.

‘Scott? Scott, you still there?’

Faulkner released the call button. He looked at Nelson.

‘I’m backing up,’ Nelson said.

Reversing the car and then turning sideways to block the road, Nelson switched off the engine. Exiting the vehicle, he told Faulkner to get both shotguns.

Moments later, the pair of them crouching at either end of the car – Nelson taking cover behind the hood, Faulkner behind the trunk – they waited.

Nelson felt his heart in his chest. His mouth was dry, his hands slick. He wiped them on his pants, held the gun steady, looking back along the road in the direction they’d come.

He looked at Faulkner. Faulkner’s face was bleached of color.

‘Stay with it, Travis,’ he said. ‘They ain’t gettin’ past us.’

Faulkner nodded involuntarily. Everything about the man exuded blind panic.

More than ten years in the Sheriff’s Department, Nelson could count on one hand the number of times he’d had to draw his sidearm. Only once had he fired it, and then it had been nothing but a warning shot. This was now gearing itself up to be a stand-off, and the man to his right seemed even less assured than himself about how this would play out.

The air was heavy and hard to breathe; perhaps nothing more than the tension of the situation, but Nelson felt his chest rising and falling far faster than normal. Crouching there, he was aware of every muscle, every sinew, every nerve. He was wound tighter than a clock spring.

When the sound of the engine became audible, something changed.

‘Here we go,’ Faulkner said.

‘Easy now,’ Nelson replied. He pulled the stock of the shotgun tighter into his shoulder.

They saw the dust before they saw the vehicle. Helm had been right. It was coming at speed.

Nelson leaned into the car and switched on the cherry bars.

The sound of the approaching engine grew louder. It would crest a rise in the road just a couple of hundred yards away, and – once the police car was sighted – they would need another twenty or thirty yards to come to a stop. And that was if they chose to stop. Each side of the road gave onto rough scrubland, much of it waterlogged and thick with underbrush. An evasive maneuver to skirt the patrol car and make it back onto the road would not be wise, but desperate people rarely made rational decisions. The sole intention of the occupants would be to evade capture. If officers had been killed back at the truckstop, then this was already a capital offence. A chance of escape, even if they risked their own lives in the process, was a far better option than the inevitable consequence of arrest.

‘Don’t fire unless they try to get past,’ Nelson said.

Faulkner didn’t respond.

‘Travis!’

Faulkner snapped to.

‘You hear me?’

‘Yes, yes, I hear you,’ Faulkner said.

The car came into view through a tornado of dust. Almost without hesitation, the brakes were applied and the car started to turn.

‘They’re heading off the road!’ Nelson shouted.

The sound of the oncoming vehicle was a roar in Nelson’s ears. He heard nothing else. He rolled sideways and away from the hood of the patrol car. He was up on his knees, the shotgun levelled. He was unaware of Faulkner, seeing nothing but what was directly ahead of him. Steadying himself against the fender, he aimed for a point beyond the edge of the road across which the car would pass.

The thunder of the suspension as the car headed into the scrubland was punctuated by the sudden retort of a pistol. A bullet shattered the rear passenger window of the patrol car.

Nelson glanced back. Faulkner was flat to the ground.

‘The other side!’ Nelson shouted.

Faulkner hesitated before moving, but then he was on his feet, ducking low and moving around the trunk of the patrol car.

Nelson aimed for the rear wheels of the car. He fired, fired again. The second shot took out the taillight and part of the wheel arch, but the car didn’t slow.

The engine screamed, the wheels fighting to gain traction on the wet ground.

Nelson got to his feet but stayed low, using the hood to support his gun, releasing another shot that hit the trunk. He aimed higher, took out the rear window, and then dropped to the ground as another volley of pistol shots erupted from the back seat.

The car was almost past them, rapidly gaining speed and set to make it back onto the road.

Nelson moved quickly, Faulkner in lockstep behind him, and just as the car came back out of the scrub, the front tires once again meeting the road and gaining purchase, they fired in unison. The rear driver’s side wheel blew out, the rubber spiralling off the hub. The metal hit the hard surface. A Catherine wheel of sparks erupted.

Faulkner fired again, hitting the rear door broadside. The car slewed, out of control now, and spun twice before hitting the opposite edge of the road and flipping onto its side.

The engine still running, the wheels still spinning, a wide cloud of dust obscuring their view, both Nelson and Faulkner hung back, shotguns shouldered, awaiting any sign of movement.

Nelson indicated that Faulkner should approach from the rear. Faulkner moved cautiously.

Moving to the left and just as tentatively as Faulkner, Nelson made his way along the road until he stood parallel to the front of the car. If anyone was alive in there, they would have to come up and out of the side of the car. Such a thing was unlikely considering the force with which the thing had overturned, but there was also the possibility that an occupant could have been thrown clear. Barely six feet from the edge of the road, Nelson slowed down.

Still there was no sound beyond the engine, now a faint rumble, and the still-revolving wheels, the spiral of rubber from the blown tire slapping against the wheel arch.

Nelson reached the front of the vehicle. The windscreen was cracked, but within he could make out the slumped form of the driver. The pistol shots had come from the back seat. Whoever had fired them could still be in there, still conscious, all set to let loose again in some futile attempt to evade the law.

‘If someone is back there, show yourself!’ Nelson shouted. ‘Ain’t no way out of this! You got a weapon, you better set it down and show your hands!’

Still, there was nothing. The wheels had stopped moving. The sound of the engine was a faint growl.

Faulkner had come full circle and was facing the roof of the car.

‘I’m guessin’ they’re dead or out cold,’ he said.

‘I can see the driver,’ Nelson replied. ‘Can’t see anyone else right now.’

‘Gonna push the car back over,’ Faulkner said. ‘Give me a hand.’

Setting down their shotguns, Nelson and Faulkner leant their weight against the upper edge of the roof and the car fell back onto its wheels. Even as it toppled, they stepped back, picked up their guns, and levelled them at the rear window.

Whoever had been in the back seat was not visible.

‘Behind the front seats, more likely,’ Faulkner said.

‘Open the back door,’ Nelson said. ‘Slowly. And stay down.’

Nelson moved forward, the barrel of his gun pointing into the well behind the seats as Faulkner grasped the door handle.

‘After three,’ Nelson said.

Faulkner lost his footing. The door swung wide. Nelson’s attention was caught by the glint of sunlight off the wing mirror. It was a split-second distraction, but that second threw off his concentration.

Even as he saw the movement near the floor of the car, even as his finger tightened on the trigger, the flash and snap of the pistol came fractionally ahead of his own weapon.

A round of double-aught buck from a Mossberg 590A1 riot gun tore into the head and upper body of the man in the rear of the vehicle. At such close range, the damage was both devastating and immediately fatal. In that moment, reeling back from the door, Nelson thought it was the shotgun’s recoil that had thrown him. Only when he was on the ground did he understand that he’d been hit.

The gunman’s last act, firing low and no more than four feet from Nelson, had been to shatter Nelson’s right-side femoral shaft and dislocate the femur from the pelvis. The pain, searing through his entire body like a ragged blade, meant that consciousness lasted a mere thirty seconds.

The last thing he heard was Faulkner’s voice – ‘Stay with me, Garrett … stay with me for God’s sake …’ – echoing ever more faintly as he was swallowed by an abyss of blackness and silence.

‘You are a very lucky man,’ the surgeon said.

His name was Elliott Gardner. He wore a suit beneath his white lab coat. With his fine-rimmed spectacles and his thin grey beard, he possessed the demeanor of a retired schoolteacher.

Withdrawing a pen from his jacket pocket, he held it vertically.

‘This is the femur,’ he said. ‘It’s your thigh bone, basically. At the top there’s a ball and socket connection to the pelvis. At the bottom, it’s connected by cartilage to the tibia and fibula. The shaft of thigh bone is the strongest bone in the human body. It can withstand a huge amount of pressure and force.’

Gardner paused and smiled. ‘However, a .44-caliber bullet at such close range was forceful enough to fracture it. Which is what has happened to you.’

Nelson, his mind clouded with painkillers, frowned.

‘And how exactly does this make me lucky?’ he asked.

‘Because of the femoral artery,’ Gardner said. He traced a line down and around the length of his pen. ‘Had the bullet cut this artery, even nicked it, the blood loss would have been catastrophic. Compromise the integrity of that artery, and people go unconscious and die within minutes.’

‘I am thinking that not getting shot at all would have made me the lucky one,’ Nelson said.

‘Yes, of course, but I understand that some of your colleagues lost their lives.’

‘Yes,’ Nelson said. ‘That’s what I was told.’

‘Then you are indeed lucky, Deputy Nelson.’

Nelson didn’t respond. He’d been in the St. Petersburg hospital close to a week, much of that time so submerged beneath anaesthetic after-effects and morphine that he’d lost track of time. He knew that Travis Faulkner had come to see him. He’d been the one who’d told him that Sam Cox had died of his injuries. One of the DEA agents and another Highland County Officer had also been killed in the truckstop gun battle.

‘You know Hemingway?’ Gardner asked. ‘He said, “The world breaks everyone and afterward many are strong at the broken places.” Bones are like that. They heal, but it takes time, of course. And then, in some cases, they are indeed stronger. You now have a metal pin running through your femur. You won’t be able to put your weight on it for six weeks or more. You’ll need a wheelchair, and then you’ll walk with crutches. You’ll need physiotherapy, and it will be demanding. It can take as much as six months for full recovery, but we need to maintain regular check-ups to ensure there is no permanent nerve or muscle damage.’

‘How long do I have to lie here?’ Nelson asked.

‘A few more days,’ Gardner said, ‘and then we’ll transfer you to an open ward. After a week or so, and as long as everything is in order, you’ll be able to go home.’

‘So, I’m looking at six months before I can go back to work?’

Nelson knew what was coming before Gardner uttered the words.

‘This injury has permanent consequences. Even if there are no complications, you’ll more than likely walk with a pronounced limp. For a long time, vigorous exercise, running, other such things will be out of the question. The simple truth, Deputy, is that it’s highly unlikely that you’ll be considered medically fit to resume your previous line of work.’

‘That’s all I know.’

Gardner reached for Nelson’s notes at the foot of the bed. Scanning them, he said, ‘You’re thirty-nine years old. Your general health is good. How long you have been in the Sheriff’s Department?’

‘Eleven, close to twelve years.’

‘And before that?’

‘A whole bunch of things. Drove a truck, worked in factories, a couple of years on a car production line.’

‘So law enforcement isn’t all you know.’

A wave of nausea rose from Nelson’s gut and filled his chest. He wanted to sleep. He wanted to disappear. He wanted to go back in time and tell Eugene Bigsby that someone else should be sent to Sebring.

‘You’ll need to make decisions,’ Gardner said, ‘but they don’t need to be made now. The only thing we need to focus on is your recovery and rehabilitation.’

Nelson felt like he was drowning. Flashes of sound and color interrupted any sequitur train of thought.

He could smell cordite, gasoline and sweat. He could feel the spray of blood as it erupted within the confines of the vehicle. He remembered the way in which the man’s head had almost evaporated in a hail of buckshot in the back of the car.

In that moment, the face of the perpetrator became the face of his own father.

The faint white ghost of Elliott Gardner grew smaller as he walked away. The sound of voices became a wash of unintelligible noise, an overlapping series of whispers, and somewhere within that, he could hear the faint echo of gunshots.

There was the beginning of things and the end of things. Everything in between was pain and shadows.

On the 12th of August, Nelson was moved out of post-op to intensive care. On the 14th, he was moved to a general ward.

Gardner told him they would be reducing his painkillers over the next week to ten days.

‘These things are highly addictive,’ Gardner explained. ‘The consequences of prescription medication dependency are just as debilitating and life-threatening as any other narcotic, legal or illegal. You will recover your strength if you do what’s asked of you, but you have to appreciate that this cannot be rushed. In my experience, those who recover most rapidly are those who have a reason to recover. That reason has to be your own. Only you can decide that.’

‘I just want to go home,’ Nelson said. ‘Right now, that’s all I want to do.’

‘You live alone?’

‘Yes.’

‘No wife, no family, no girlfriend?’

‘No.’

‘And you have interests, other activities besides work?’

‘Like what?’

‘Oh, I don’t know. Reading, hiking, restoring vintage automobiles. The things that people do.’

‘I don’t have anything like that.’

‘Then you should find something,’ Gardner said. ‘It will be some months before you are fully mobile again, and you need to occupy your hands and your mind with something constructive.’

‘I’ll give it some thought.’

Gardner nodded understandingly. ‘Do you feel depressed?’

‘No. Frustrated, sure. Not depressed.’

‘Are you worried about the future? About what will happen, where you’ll find work?’

‘I have some money saved,’ Nelson said. ‘And I guess I’ll get some kind of medical pension from the Sheriff’s Department. I have time to figure it out.’

‘You do, yes, but you won’t make it through this on your own. No matter how resilient and determined you are, your life needs to be something more than drinking beer and watching TV.’

‘Why does it matter to you what I do?’ Nelson asked.

‘Because your mental and emotional welfare has a great deal to