“I gave you a badge eleven days ago. And you took it out on a county road and used it on a woman going to church. You’re done. You can ride back to town with Dennis, and you can leave the rest of it on my desk.”
“Tom.”
My mother hadn’t raised her voice. She’d only used the other one.
The sheriff stopped the way a loaded truck stops. All at once and with a lot of weight.
“I’d like to ask for one thing,” she said. “Then I’d like to get these bars to the church, such as they are.”
“Anything, Shirley.”
“Don’t say anything until you’ve heard it.”
She got out of the car again. She didn’t have to. Nobody asked her to. But she did, and she stood up straight in the sun one more time, and every person on that road went quiet.
