Her shotgun wounds, the pesticide she may have ingested, the heat, the stress—one of those, or some combination, or all of them together could explain it, Dr. Patel told her. Or possibly some other cause entirely. There was no way to be certain.

Later in the day, she had visitors, each one bringing something she could focus on. Denise came by before her dispatch shift and smacked a kiss onto her forehead and delivered to her, first, Leroy Fanta’s file folder of Jim Golly’s letters to the editor, and then a joke.

“How do the Golly brothers tell when a girl is old enough to breed?”

“I don’t think I want to hear this.”

“You do. They make her stand in a barrel. If her chin is over the top, she’s old enough. If she isn’t, they cut the barrel down a bit.”

“Oh, God, that hurts. You are so bad, Denise.”

“Builds scar tissue, hon,” Denise told her. “How we women survive.”

It was the subtext of the ugly joke that made them both quiet for a while. They had no place to put Patience Goodgolly, no relatives to take her, no confession or expression of remorse, nothing beyond the eerie calm yet angry stare of an abused young woman that the sheriff had first seen when Patience explained in German that she was walking on Liberty Hill Road because she couldn’t fly.

At least she hadn’t killed anyone.

At least she wasn’t dead like Kim Maybee.

At least, according to security footage, she had gotten drunk, played with dolls, plucked out her mustache hairs, drank soda, rolled bowling balls, and had sex that she wanted with a boy her age—kind of a scrambled, high-speed childhood, it seemed, before she planned to pay back Barry Rickreiner for the pain he had caused. She would have to testify against him. Based on motive and opportunity, she would likely face charges for stabbing her father-uncle, Jon Golly. It wasn’t clear yet whether Faith could have done it, and there were no other suspects. Perhaps the boy in the security footage would know something, but so far Patience either didn’t know or wouldn’t say who he was or how he was involved. He had been seen last night wearing her dress and traveling on her horse through a pasture in Richland County. Deputies there hadn’t found him yet.

“So I read your mind,” Denise said finally.

“You are way too good at that.”

“I took a detour coming in to work and stopped by your neighbors the Glicks. I kind of had to beg them, but Dawdy Glick made the call, and he said that for now, yes, until we figure things out, Patience can stay with them…”

Bender showed up later that afternoon, saying he happened to be in the neighborhood after arresting Jon Golly in his hospital bed, his first official business as acting sheriff.