As we were walking back to the station, Mrs. Penn asked me why I bristled up whenever the officer was around. ”Don’t you like him?” she asked. “He’s single and well-thought of. No vices that I know of. And he’s taken with you.”
I put on my brakes and stopped. “What?” I practically shouted. “He hates me. He glares at me and growls at me if I move too quickly. He makes me feel like I’m guilty of something, even though I can’t think of a single thing I’ve ever done that would make a policeman think I committed a crime, unless he treats me like that just because I’m a stranger.”
Mrs. Penn laughed. “You are completely oblivious, aren’t you? That man is eyeing you like you’re a chocolate sundae with nuts. He certainly doesn’t hate you.”
She took my arm and led me forward. “I gather that you haven’t had much experience with men, have you?”
I shook my head. “Only with the village mayor. He was married, but he kept trying to get me alone so he could . . .” I stopped. There I was blabbing again. I needed to burn the edge of my tongue quiet.
“He propositioned you?” Mrs. Penn said quietly in case anyone was close enough to hear our conversation.
I nodded, embarrassed. “I tried never to be anywhere near him, especially when no one else was around, but he kept slipping up behind me, and then he’d say things he shouldn’t. That’s why I left. Well, part of the reason. It was time, anyway. I needed to see the world and find someplace new.”
Mrs. Penn nodded. “Very wise,” she said. “Perhaps Tinkle Town might have been your destination all along, and you just didn’t know it.”
That was a strange thing to say, but we’d reached the police station, and she was already opening the door, so I couldn’t ask her to explain.
The moment we walked in, we saw that the boys were rough housing with the belly laughing Officer Krugle — right inside the station’s main room. They’d pushed back the chairs and desks and were playing some kind of touch football.
“Boys, calm down,” Mrs. Penn said briskly, and I think she was including the man she called Frank in that forceful command.