The Posture of Innocence, day 31.5
The Lancasters fully indulge in the futility demonstrated in the "Futility" freewrite -- they boast and blab and share way too much information for their own good with Captain Lee and Lieutenant Jackson ... but after that, Commissioner Scott and Lieutenant Jackson combine their efforts to make sure Captain Lee is taken care of.
To get totally caught up on The Posture of Innocence, here are the prologue, day 1, day 2, day 3, day 3.5, day 4, day 4.5, day 5, day 5.5, day 6, day 7, day 7.5, day 8, day 9, day 9.5, day 10, day 10.5, day 11, day 11.5, day 12, day 12.5, day 13, day 13.5, day 14, day 15, day 16, day 16.5, day 17, day 18, day 19, day 19.5, day 20, day 20.5, day 21, day 22, day 22.5, day 23, day 23.5, day 24, day 24.5, day 25, day 25.5, day 26, day 26.5, day 27, day 27.5, day 28, day 28.5, day 29, day 29.5, day 30, day 30.5, and day 31!
Lieutenant Jackson tagged along on the tour the Lancasters gave Captain Lee, of course, and just marveled as his captain did a slow-motion version of what he did during an interrogation … he just talked so slow and smooth and asked all kinds of questions like that, and the Lancasters just gushed as if they had known him all their lives and corrupted him years ago. After all, police officers were their friends … they had entertained so many in the last 12 years … all names coming up in the investigations connected with the murder of John Soames and many other cold cases …
Then Captain Lee turned the corner smoothly into the Lancasters' personal matters, and again, they kept on gushing. Mr. Lancaster had been sick, and so the captain commended Mrs. Lancaster on her managing of so many affairs. Both Lancasters laughed.
“Oh, my, no,” she said. “I don't know a ledger from a lemonade – Francis manages all that sort of thing when Thomas can't!”
Francis Lofton – a shrewd financier with a taste for sure profits. His name had come up in the investigation as well, fittingly as a manager of moving profits to departments and officers who were of use to one of the most profitable projects he had managed in the last 12 years...
Since nobody was paying attention to Lieutenant Jackson, he was discreetly doing what had so frightened Mrs. Lancaster earlier: using his phone to take photos and videos of the Lancasters' home and grounds. Per his captain's instructions, he took a great sweep of each room or sector, but then concentrated his photography efforts on places that might have space for a bunch of secret papers and stashes of cash. He also noted spaces of that type that may have been recently disturbed, because someone had to give the order to Captain Calvert to go retrieve and destroy certain evidence. Others may have been preparing to destroy evidence as well. Indeed: there were some spots that appeared to qualify.
But, whatever had been moved had likely not been moved again; word had not gone out yet that Captain Calvert had been arrested, and those who were most interested thought he had succeeded in destroying the evidence on the police side. The Lancasters, and those above them, were quite comfortable, and would be until the next day, when word of the eight total arrests in Internal Affairs began to leak out. Even then, they would not nearly appreciate their position, or the significance of all the information they had given to their two police visitors.
The Lancasters, after all, were in the second rank of Lofton County's high society, not high enough for the Slocum-Loftons to think to warn them that they had a grandson who, if ever he came around that neighborhood, meant absolutely no good to anyone there. The Lancasters had no clue, and so, yielded up bushels of information that Captain Lee and Lieutenant Jackson could now use to confirm the data they were already in command of.
Captain Lee was indeed off duty at 2:00pm, owing to him having pulled both an 8-5 the previous day and then from midnight to 2:00pm – 22 of the past 48 hours. Lieutenant Jackson marveled at how alert and together he was as at last they drove off and stopped in order to complete their notes. Captain Lee had heard more and his lieutenant had seen more, but there was a great deal of overlap, and a solid set of data had been obtained by their visit.
Commissioner Scott called at 2:15pm.
“Lee, where are you?”
“Lieutenant Jackson and I are on our way back to the station, sir. A very productive visit.”
“Excellent. You are off duty until 10:00am, Captain. Make your report tomorrow, and have Lieutenant Jackson drive you home. Lightfoot, Carter, and Anderson have everything in your division under control, and Lieutenant Longstreet and Mr. Black did fantastic work on what we retrieved last night until I had to throw them out five minutes ago. You six have got to stay rested – no mistakes from over-tiredness. Go home, Captain.”
“Yes, sir. Thank you, sir.”
Captain Lee put down the phone, and Lieutenant Jackson spoke softly but firmly.
“I know you would want to be updating your big set of data this afternoon, sir. Rest easy, sir. We've got this – we your lieutenants, we've got this, and we've got you. Everything in your big true set will be updated by tomorrow morning, how you taught us to do it. We've got this, Captain. Go get the rest you need, and you don't need to be worried about it.”
Captain Lee was very near his physical and emotional limits, the effort of staying calm in his birth neighborhood having taken a great deal of his remaining energy. Therefore, the words of his lieutenant nearly brought him to tears.
“My confidence in all of you will allow me good rest,” he said after a colossal effort to compose himself. “If you and Carter, and Anderson, and Lightfoot have to stay over, pull all the overtime necessary. That is Commissioner Scott's policy – use it while we have it.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Is there anything that you left at the office that you need me to bring to you at home?”
“No, Lieutenant, thank you. I am at the Rosewood Apartments, no. 413.”
Lieutenant Jackson made note of the fact that the captain had mentioned the number, and combined it with the fact that the captain was just a wee bit unsteady on his feet when they got out of the car. He had not been sitting around for a lot of that 22 hours of work. He had not eaten since the dinner the previous evening, 16 hours earlier. Of course he was exhausted.
“I'll walk you up, sir, if you don't mind – I'd like to know if there are special data points to enter first as priority items.”
Captain Lee summoned the answer to the question, in detail, as they climbed four flights of stairs instead of taking the elevator – be that as it may, Lieutenant Jackson was glad to do it, just to make sure Captain Lee made it safely home.
Captain Lee had been praying and asking for just one thing: quick sleep, so that he did not have to contend, in his complete exhaustion, with all the memories stirred up by visiting his old neighborhood. His request was granted; he made it to his bed and fell in, out like a light for several hours of deep, dreamless sleep.