Kathy Hogan Trocheck - Truman Kicklighter 01 - Lickety-Split by Kathy Hogan Trocheck

know where he is. He’s all mixed up. And he’s scared. So scared.
    “Mr. Seabold,” she said, turning to Howie, “why won’t they let me stay with him? Or let me take him home? We’d bring him back in the morning.”
    Howie patted Pearl’s arm awkwardly. “Mrs. Wisnewski, it’s a murder investigation. First thing in the morning I’ll call the district attorney. I’ll talk to him. We’ll get Mel’s doctor back in Pittsburgh to call and tell the police about the Alzheimer’s. I don’t think they’re really going to want to go to trial. I’m sure of that. Not with a senile seventy-six-year-old.”
    Pearl and Truman both winced at Howie’s choice of words.
    “I’m sorry,” Howie said. “But his age and medical condition are the two strongest things he has working in his favor. You folks go home. Get some sleep. They’ll keep him in an isolation cell here. Nobody else to bother him.”
    With Truman on one side and Jackleen on the other, Pearl walked out to the car. There was nothing left to say.
    Truman drove home again. He switched on the radio. The eleven o’clock news came on and the announcer started talking about “death at the greyhound track.” Truman reached out to switch it off, but Pearl caught his hand. “No. I want to hear. I need to know what they’re saying my Mel did.”
    The dead woman’s identity was being held pending notification of next of kin, the announcer said. And then he went on to announce that Derby Lane’s Big Q would have paid a record-breaking $280,000 except that nobody had cashed a winning ticket.

Chapter NINE
     
    “Where’s the judge?” Pearl wanted to know. She glanced nervously around the courtroom at the rows of prisoners who lolled around on the benches, waiting their turn. Mel sat in the front row, slightly away from the others, who were all younger.
    There was no judge’s bench, no witness box, no tables for the state and the defense. Just rows of dark polished wood benches holding prisoners, with uniformed sheriffs deputies and bailiffs stationed around the room.
    “There’s a television camera,” Howie Jr. explained, pointing to the front of the courtroom. Truman quit staring at the other prisoners and looked at a plain pine podium and a metal tripod holding a camera aimed at the podium.
    “The judge is in his courtroom over at the county courthouse,” Howie explained. “He’s got a television too. He can see each defendant and hear what they say, and in that television monitor up there, the defendant can see the judge and the state’s attorney.”
    “It’s on TV?” Pearl cried. “Does that mean everybody back at the Fountain of Youth will know what’s going on? I’d die, I’d just die if everybody knew Mel had spent the night in jail.”
    “No, no,” Howie reassured her. “It’s closed-circuit. Just the judge and us.”
    It was the damnedest thing Truman had ever heard of, and he said so. “Looks like these judges could at least get off their keisters and come to court,” he said. In his day, courtrooms were solemn, well-appointed places.
    “It’s supposed to save the taxpayers money,” Howie said. He looked around and frowned. “Although I’ve got to admit, I don’t like it worth a damn either.”
    “What happens next?” Pearl asked, clutching her purse like a life preserver in a monsoon.
    “This is an advisory hearing,” Howie said patiently. “They’ll formally advise Mel and me of the charges against him. I’ll ask that Mel be released on his own recognizance—ROR, they call it. Normally, with a homicide, the state’s attorney would oppose it. But I’ve talked to my friend Jean Reilly and told her about the circumstances, and she’s agreed that jail is not the place for Mel.”
    “Did you talk to Dr. Shrader back home?” Pearl asked. “Dr. Shrader knows all about Mel’s problem. He’s the one who gave us those pills, I forget what they’re called.”
    “Cognex,” Howie said. “He told me everything and