Harold Kemmerer wore his thin hair in a combover like windrows of damp wheat. In his left hand he clutched a crumpled porkpie hat--the sort you find on the back shelf of Burman's Variety, on clearance for $9.99. His other hand was wrapped in bandages stained red, laying in his lap while he slouched in a straight-backed chair.
"Well, I've really done it now, ain't I? Yes I have." He lifted the thick wad at the end of the wounded arm to scractch an itch on his nose.
"Some men from Denver are coming to get you, Harold. We'll hold you here until they arrive." Sheriff Burke, the prime and chief lawgiver of Lincoln County--every state has a Lincoln County--fiddled with a button on the dark brown of his shirt.
"Uh-huh."
"Why'd you do it, Harold? Why'd you kill your wife?"
"Well she had it comin', Sheriff. She did. I told her I was gonna do it. Oh, but she harped and harped and nagged and nagged and, well, I had enough and I stuck a letter opener in her. Only so much to the value of a hot meal."
"And?"
"She said she was sick of the airplanes. Tired of the models and the glue and me fiddling with 'toys'. Well, every man's got a right to relax after they're home from work, don't he, Sheriff? Don't he?"
"Not by killing your wife, Harold." Sheriff Burke lit a cigarette in the doorway of the cell. Light from the match flickered and flared, spilling an orange glow across the metal frame of the jamb. "You can't kill your wife." He pulled the heavy door closed, and the latch caught with a quiet and smooth click.
"Sheriff?" Harold stood up and peered through the small window of the jail cell's door.
"Yeah?" The sheriff, his face dimly afire from the glow at the end of the cigarette, cocked his head to listen to Harold's request
"You'll see they get a good home, won't you? The model kits? My family can't get 'em. They'll just throw 'em away. Maybe down at the VFW...." He trailed off.
"We'll see, Harold. We'll see."