Was it being driven around town like a kid too young for a permit? Or struggling along sidewalks slick with muddy water and the last remnants of crumbling ice, praying he wasn’t going to fall on his ass? He had plenty of time to contemplate both while humping himself up the South Street sidewalk toward the free clinic. He hadn’t started out the day in the best of moods, and the rapidly falling barometer didn’t help. His leg registered every change in the pressure with a new ache or twinge. The search at Debba Clow’s home yesterday had turned up a big fat nothing, and he was getting that feeling, the one he hated, of chasing his own tail. “Isn’t this a great day, Chief?” Officer Kevin Flynn feinted side to side across the walk and up and down the stairs, dribbling and shooting an imaginary basketball. He had been detached to squire Russ around, on the grounds that shadowing the chief might be considered advancing his education in law enforcement. “I heard it’s gonna get over fifty!”
