Читать книгу Safety Harbor - Chuck Cooper - Страница 13

Carmelita Biffle was born Carmelita Alessandra Sanchez in Antigua, Guatemala. When she was seven, her parents and three siblings moved to Long Beach, California. There, they joined Carmelita’s mother’s family, who had begun a construction business. Her father became the foreman of the company’s projects.

Although a welcome change in the fortunes of the family, it was a traumatic move for them. They left behind many friends and a large extended family on her father’s side. There were a number of Guatemalans close by, but Southern California was a big, strange place that seemed to waver between disinterest and hostility.

School was difficult. Racism was rampant in the elementary school among both students and faculty. By Middle School, she had learned how to survive, and by high school she had gained enough confidence to thrive, despite the prejudice.

After high school, she went to Long Beach Community College. During this time, she had decided she wanted to be in law enforcement and transferred her credits to a college in San Diego, where she enrolled in the police academy program.

There, she met Cliff Biffle, one of her professors. The attraction was strong but they kept it cool until she graduated. Within three months they were married.

Carmelita landed a job on the police force in Chula Vista.

Three years later, Cliff had an opportunity to take a position at Jefferson University in Ashland. Now, here she was again, a stranger in a strange land.

She found a place of comfort at Our Lady of the Fields Catholic Church. There, she made her first friends and joined a women’s group that specialized in working with undocumented workers. They visited camps around the valley where people often lived in the shadows and needed, among other things, basic medical care.

One of her friends informed her after Mass one Sunday that there was a law enforcement position open in the little village of Table Rock. Carmelita applied. To her surprise, she was called for an interview, which turned out to be one of the strangest experiences of her life. Three members of the City Council interviewed her, two of whom, she would discover later, were facing a recall election in two weeks.

The interview was laced with verbal jabs by the interviewers at one another. One of the two male members of the interview committee asked to be excused to smoke a cigarette and never came back. Twenty minutes after her interview, she was hired as the Chief of Police. She was flabbergasted and at the same time grateful for employment.

“The last Chief lasted only about eight months,” said the Chair. “It’s a tough town and a tough job. You have your work cut out for you.”

She wanted to talk to Cliff but she was afraid not to accept the position, so she did, telling herself that she could always back out.

Table Rock had one deputy, part time, Rodney Klein, who had been on the force now for eleven years. The next Monday Carmelita showed up for work in the building on Main Street that also housed a pharmacy and an antique store. Rodney was sitting in the chair in the Chief’s Office with his feet up on the desk. He didn’t get up.

“Well, well,” he said. “This time they hired a woman! Will wonders never cease!”

“You’re in my chair,” she said without blinking an eye or saying good morning.

He looked up, obviously surprised.

“Well, it’s been my chair in the absence of a Chief.”

“There’s a Chief of Police now. That would be me. So, get up.”

Slowly, deliberately, as if he were a young boy reluctantly obeying his mother, he moved. Scowling, he retreated to his own desk in the reception area. Silence prevailed.

Eighteen months later, she fired Rodney and sixteen months after that, she was removed from her position. She later learned from Conchita after Mass one day that Rodney had been reinstated, this time as Chief.

“The safety of all the citizens of Table Rock hangs in the balance with that kid in charge,” she told Cliff.

“You can’t change much in a small town,” said Cliff. “People don’t want it. Even if they’re miserable. Their misery is at least familiar.”

She hated to leave Our Lady of the Fields and her many friends when, five months later, she landed the job as Chief of Police in Safety Harbor. Cliff couldn’t leave Ashland. Professorships were too rare these days. So, they made a pact to keep their marriage intact, long distance.

She got an apartment in Safety Harbor while Cliff lived in their house in Ashland. He had been in town for a month now this summer and it was both good and annoying to have him around, good because she missed him and annoying because he got in the way.

Even though she was gone a lot during his visit, she let him know where she was. She had called him and told him about Keith and that they were currently at the Monastery of the Unsettled.

She couldn’t tell whether he was interested or not.