The challenge for WAG 28 was little things. I’ve got a lot of little things here. Do they add up to anything? Continuing adventures of Kendra…
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She couldn’t help it. The first thing she did in a new place was buy the local paper and turn to the police log. It helped put things in perspective. Seneca County wasn’t the only place with more than its fair share of domestic violence call outs and drunk drivers. It told you more than you wanted to know about a place. Attenburg, Ohio was another one of those Anytown, USAs–a diner, a drugstore and a bank on Main Street and the same kinds of crime.
Kendra sat in the diner and read. The long-time church deacon was charged with embezzling funds (also front page news). Twenty-five cords of firewood were stolen from a farm. A deputy was called out last Tuesday to dispatch a rabid raccoon. A gang of underage kids were stopped in the state park for alcohol infractions. That’s what the paper called them. Infractions. Attenburg’s paper had a hall of shame too. Pictures of men wanted for non-payment of child support, armed robbery and check forgery. They all looked the same—skinny, mulleted, scowling. She took a good look at the picture of Nelson Arnold. Everyone was looking for him and this mugshot taken two years ago felt like as close as she might get to him.
The waitress brought her coffee and omelette. Kendra waved over Andy Mercer, her counterpart in Attenburg. There’d been three sightings of Arnold here in the last week, but the Sheriff’s department had come up with nothing. Both sheriffs thought there might be a mass hallucination—but Attenburg was only a forty-minute drive from Seneca so Kendra decided to cruise over on this Tuesday morning and follow up the lead.
Andy Mercer was a good policeman and friend. He and Kendra had worked cases together before and got to know each other fairly well. For a small town sheriff he had an impressive arrest record and had solved some serious crimes. He sat down with Kendra and smiled. A second later a coffee was placed in front of him. He ordered himself some eggs.
“I doubt anything’s going on here,” he said. “I’ll show you what I got back at the station. Not a heck of a lot.”
“I can add that to the next to nothing I got already,” said Kendra. She slammed her hand on the table, startling Andy. If she burst into tears now, she might as well give up on the case. This two-month crime spree and now a murder already had tested her patience and her frustration was beginning to show.