Tuesday morning I slept in until almost eight. When I stumbled down to the kitchen, Jay was up, dressed, and on the phone. He had made coffee.
I poured a cup and sat in the nook, sipping and staring vaguely in the direction of the Cramers' mobile home. The sky was overcast, but it was not raining. The wind had died. Jay was talking to Dale, that much I registered without taking in specific content, and the conversation had been going on for a while. My coffee had cooled enough for me to work up to a real swallow before Jay hung up.
"Think you'll recover?" He retrieved his academic-tweed jacket from the back of his chair, shrugged into it, and smiled at me.
I gave a dignified nod. I had drunk one and a half glasses of wine and taken two sips of liqueur the previous evening, but I felt hung over. "Any news?"
He hesitated. "About the murder? Nothing definite yet. They'll be getting more of the technical data in, now that the holiday's over."
Technical data. I digested that. "Do you have a meeting?"
"Nine o'clock. Bye." He gave me a peck on the cheek and bolted out the door. After another, longer swallow of coffee, I heard the engine of his Accord starting and the crunch of its tires as he backed down the driveway.
Classes at the college were not scheduled to begin for another two weeks, an odd legacy of the agricultural past, but the faculty assembled for meetings, class preparation, and academic advising. Jay was supposed to present his law enforcement program to them that week. The program was on the books, but there was resistance to it from the humanities and social sciences. The professors didn't mind training nurses and accountants, but they weren't eager to educate police officers. That seemed strange to me. I thought educated cops were less likely to bash heads at random than uneducated cops.
The thought of head-bashing reminded me of Clara Klein's unexpected jab at Jay. I brooded about the painter's effect on my dinner party. In addition to giving my living room a classier image than I could have contrived on my own, she had deflected Annie. I hoped I was suitably grateful, but I felt used.
Clara had showed up because she wanted to retail her gossip to receptive ears. Fine. Jay had passed the word to Dale about Bob's date with Cleo. But why had Clara needed an audience? Why not just tell Jay in private? And why insult his profession?
I finished off my cold coffee and went for another cup. There was a light on in Matt's kitchen. I meant to take him some of the cold salmon for dinner and a slice of tart. I yawned and sipped, and decided to catch him later.
"Morning." Tom poked his head in.
"You look like leftovers zapped in the microwave."
He groaned. "Coffee?"
I got out a mug and poured.
"Thanks. I slept like a log for two hours last night, then woke up and remembered the novel. Naturally I had to read it." Like me, he was wearing jeans and a sweatshirt, and he did look underslept. He took a sip and grimaced at the sting of hot liquid. "I feel hung over."
"Me, too. I wonder why. Bob McKay is probably frisking around like a week-old colt."
"There is no justice."
I went back to the nook and sat. "How is it?"
He followed. "The novel? Awful. Dire. Bulwer-Lytton out of Danielle Steele. With touches of James Fenimore Cooper."
"Horrors."
He gave me a wry grin over the rim of his mug. "All writers go through a stage when they think what they've written is dreck. It passes. Tomorrow I'll be a genius again. At 2:00 a.m., though, I was reading the book through Annie McKay's eyes."
"I thought this one wasn't satire."
"It's not. It's a look at the thirties and forties, my grandparents' era. I'm having trouble with the language."
"Can't you just listen for your grandfather's voice?"
He sipped, silent. Then he said, "That's shrewd of you. I listen, but I keep hearing my mother making wise-cracks. She and Grandpa used to snipe at each other." He gave an amused snort. "My mother's voice and Annie's eyes. I sound like some kind of New Age channeler."
"I imagine writing a novel or a play must be a little schizophrenic--voices in your head."
"Yeah... Jesus, is it nine already?"
"Five of."
He shot to his feet and made for the back door. "I'm supposed to be at the house. The construction crew is set to show up any minute now."
"See you later," I called after him.
I thought about breakfast and thought not. We had straightened up the obvious mess the night before, so I didn't need to do much to the house but vacuum. Vacuuming was not my favorite activity. There was laundry. Also not fun. I went upstairs and tidied the bed.
Freddy was still asleep, so I couldn't bug him about the mess in the spare bedroom where he'd assembled the computer. I didn't want to bug Freddy anyway. I felt restless, pointless, impatient with nothing to be impatient about. I didn't want to strip wallpaper, but I wanted to do something.
I stood for a while by the doors to the balcony, looking out at the ocean. Bonnie's house was dark, drapes drawn. As I watched, Matt backed out of his driveway and turned his old Pontiac toward town. I wondered how Lottie was getting along. I could visit her. Matt had said she was out of intensive care. I could take her flowers, some of Tom's flowers. He wouldn't mind.
Feeling more cheerful, I pulled a jacket over my sweats, chose a nice vase, found a pair of shears, and went out to the Toyota. I drove down the block and pulled over onto the grassy shoulder by Ruth's mobile home.
She was standing in the doorway talking to a heavy-set man in a plaid shirt and jeans. I gave her a wave and crossed to Tom's driveway where a white van with Kemmel Construction lettered on the driver's door sat behind Tom's pickup. There were noises from the house. Tom taking his crew on an inspection tour, probably. I skirted the vegetable garden, which was edged with marigolds to discourage bugs. The asters and zinnias flared in brilliant color along the east wall of the garage. I snipped a nice variety, trickled water into the vase from Tom's hose, and started back toward my car.
Ruth's door slammed and a pickup roared to life in her short driveway. A large pickup with an electric blue bug shield. I gaped at it as it backed around into the east-bound lane and rumbled off. Mud obscured the license plate. There was a gun rack.
I watched the pickup mount the crest and disappear over the ridge. Was it the same vehicle? I couldn't be sure. My pulse beat out a tattoo. I set the flowers on the floor behind the front seat, wedged the vase in with my squidgy purse, and got into the car, meaning to give chase. Then I hesitated.
I hadn't really looked at the man in the plaid shirt. For that matter, I hadn't had a clear look at the driver of the side-swiping pickup either. I fastened my seat belt with shaking fingers. Ruth's logger son? I knew ought to knock on her door, ask her who the man was, but I didn't want to. I didn't want the villain to be Ruth's son.
I drove to town on Highway 101, eyes peeled for pickups, nerves jangling. I did not like my thoughts.
I was too early for visiting hours, though Matt had been allowed to go on up. I stood in the lobby of the hospital, irresolute, then spotted the pay phones. I went to the first and dialed the college. Jay was still in his meeting. If I called Dale Nelson...if I didn't call Dale...if...if...if... I carried my vase back to the car and drove to the mall. I bought a copy of the Oregonian and read it over a cup of coffee at the bakery. The murder of Cleo Hagen was definitely buried in the back pages. I saw no sign of the short reporter's color story, and I couldn't focus on world news. My mind kept returning to the pickup. There was a phone outside the bakery. I tried Jay again without result and gave up. Time to visit Lottie.
She was lying, propped, in a two-bed ward, and Clara Klein was sitting with her. Matt hovered by the single window. The other bed was empty.
"Hi, Lark." Clara was holding a flat box with a felt surface. "I see you've brought Lottie some of Tom's asters. Aren't they bright, Lottie?"
Lottie blinked.
I gave her a smile and said hello, but I was shocked by the change in her appearance. Though the nurses had decked her out in a pretty pink bed jacket, one side of her face was drawn in a frozen grimace, almost a snarl, and her head had been shaved for the surgery. She wore a turban of bandages. I realized I had never seen Lottie without the neat gray wig which she wore curled in a fashion that had died somewhere around 1956. Without the wig, she looked stern, austere. She had lost her cuddliness.
Matt cleared his throat. "I enjoyed the dinner, Lark. Good company, good company."
I said, with more conviction than I felt, "It was nice that Annie McKay could come--and Clara." I did not mention Bob.
Lottie was blinking rapidly.
"Do you want to try the letters again? How about this one?" Clara placed a felt L on the board.
No blink. No message for Lark.
I thought the felt-board process must be maddening for the patient, it was so slow. "Are you a therapist, Clara?"
Clara kept her eyes on Lottie. "Volunteer. I've done work with stroke patients. Mother had a series of strokes. Not M? Okay, D, then. Do you want a drink?"
Lottie stared at her stonily.
Matt had turned to look out the window.
Clara sighed. "Well, let's be methodical, begin at the beginning." She took an A from her neat pile of letters.
I went over to Matt. "Annie and Darla were discussing the injunction the Nekana Council is bringing to stop work on the resort site. It will be served this morning."
"That's good. Good." Matt didn't turn from the window. "She's a fine woman."
"Annie? She certainly cares about the environment."
Clara and Lottie were up to D again.
"A heroine, a leader." He turned to me, eyes glittering. "I'd do anything for her. Anything. To help her," he added. He must have seen that his intensity made me uneasy. "I worked for Fisheries, you know, man and boy, for thirty-five years. First the dams went in. Then the clear-cutting and building. They've killed the salmon runs, killed them."
I cleared my throat. "So I understand."
"The hatcheries did some good." He was listening to himself, off somewhere in his youth. "I helped set up eight of them, three on tribal land. Still, it wasn't the solution. We needed a leader."
"Like Annie?"
He turned to me. "Somebody like Muir. Somebody like Gifford Pinchot. Somebody with the courage to say enough. There are too many people. Too many."
It seemed ironic to me that Matt agreed with Annie. If she had her way, his mobile home would be the first to go.
"Lark, I think Lottie wants to see your husband." Clara sounded cheerful. "She likes the letter J."
I turned to the two women with some relief. Matt's passion was disturbing, though I could understand his sense of loss.
"That's very possible, Clara. Jay visited Lottie before the operation, brought her flowers."
"I see. Do you think--"
"I'll leave a message for him at the college. He can drop by on his way home."
Lottie's eyes closed.
Clara stood up. "That's enough for now. She's doing very well, Matt."
He gave Clara a tired smile. "Lottie and I appreciate your efforts, Clara. Wonderful. Thank you, Lark."
I said goodbye to him and added, for Lottie's benefit, though I thought she was asleep, "And I'll call Jay right now."
She opened her eyes and blinked hard.
Clara walked down to the lobby with me. "She'd do better if Matt would stop haunting her."
"He's devoted to her."
"Of course he is, but he ought to leave her a little space. What that man needs is distraction. Make him take you clamming, Lark."
"Clamming? I thought they postponed the razor clam season."
"For steamers," Clara said. "And a lecture. Matt used to haul newcomers out in a rowboat on Shoalwater Bay. They'd come back with a mess of clams and a burning desire to save the estuary. He's really very knowledgeable."
"I'm not crazy about clams."
"So feed 'em to the red-headed kid, whatsisname, Freddy."
I considered that. I really did not want to go out in a rowboat with Matt, but I could see Clara's point. "Bonnie's the newcomer. Fishing runs in her blood. He should take Bonnie." I didn't know if grubbing for steamer clams qualified as fishing.
Clara shrugged. "Great. Whatever. Matt needs an afternoon off--and so does Lottie."
"Does she really want to see Jay?"
"Maybe. A felt board's not an exact form of communication, but it's better than no communication. Imagine being locked in your own consciousness with no way to let anyone know what you're thinking." She shivered.
I felt some of my reservations about Clara melt. "I was glad you came last night, but I have the sinking feeling it wasn't my salmon that drew you."
"I'm worried about Tom." She didn't smile.
"We all are."
"Did he tell you he's been arrested three times for assault?"
I gulped.
"More to the point, did he tell your husband?"
"Jay didn't say anything... That's awful." It was awful so many ways I didn't want to think how awful it was.
Clara was saying, "The charges were dropped all three times. I don't know if they're even on record, but somebody around here is bound to remember. The first two times were right after he got out of the army, once here and once in Los Angeles. The third time was at his grandparents' funeral."
"Shit."
"That's right. Lots of witnesses. One of them called the police. Quentin McKay, Bob's brother, made Tom an offer for the house. The old McKay place has associations for that side of the family, too, you know, whether Annie's little committee wants to classify it as historical or not."
"And?"
"And Tom knocked him cold. I was there."
I shivered. "You've known Tom a long time. Is he--"
"Violent? Not habitually, and he doesn't drink a lot, not any more, not since the funeral. The sheriff owes the last election to the McKay family, though, and they persist in regarding Tom as some kind of black sheep. And never mind," she added with fierce intensity, "that he has more talent in his little finger than that lot lumped together. Annie runs a good paper but she can't write a decent paragraph."
"Her style is a little turgid." There we were standing in the lobby of the Shoalwater Hospital worrying about Annie McKay's prose style while Tom was in imminent danger of arrest. I edged toward the door.
Clara followed me out to the parking lot. I hadn't spotted her Karman Ghia. It crouched next to Matt's Pontiac.
Clara stood by the car door, keys in her hand. A gust of wind lifted her grizzled hair from her forehead. "What I said about cops last night was damned rude."
"People react. Usually they sort of laugh and say they feel guilty around policemen."
"Well, I don't. I was rude, though. I apologize. Jay seems like a nice guy. For that matter, Dale is a nice guy, but the police always support the status quo. That's natural enough, but it can be vicious. Around here, the status quo means the Enclave, and the Enclave means Bob and Annie McKay. And Quentin. Unlike Bob, he is not a lush." She unlocked her door and wriggled behind the wheel. "See you later."
I was so preoccupied by what she had told me of Tom that I forgot to call the college until I got home. Jay was in another meeting by then, so I left a message and fixed Freddy a sandwich. He wanted to go in to Darla's office to see what had happened about the injunction. I hardened my heart and made him take the bus. I thought I might need my Toyota.
I stewed and brooded and brooded and stewed. Finally, disgusted with myself, I crossed the road and knocked on Bonnie's door. She had been reading Starvation Hill. The book lay face down on the arm of her easy chair.
"Time for coffee?"
"I guess." I perched on the edge of her scaled-down couch while she fetched mugs from the kitchen.
"God, that's a sad book. Beautiful but sad."
I agreed, vague, my mind on the author. It was Jay's contention that all of us have the potential to be killers, if not murderers, given the triggering circumstances. I resisted the idea, partly because it was so sweeping and partly on philosophical grounds. Although I had not had a religious upbringing, my father's family were Quakers with a long history of peaceful living. I could not imagine my grandfather killing anyone, even in self-defense. My own temperament was much hotter. I suppose I idealized Grandfather Dailey because he seemed immune to the passions that made me see red.
Could Tom kill? He had been a soldier, so he was trained to. If he had taken a swing at his cousin for trying to buy the house, it was obviously a flashpoint. Still, his attempt to place the house under the protection of the Historic Trust--and the letter I had glimpsed addressed to the state historical society--suggested he had tried to think of rational ways to save the place. When Cleo Hagen had made her offer, he had not known his application to the Trust would be refused.
That thought cheered me.
"Don't you agree?" Bonnie had been describing the pathos of the young girl abandoned to an alien society by her own father.
I said hastily, "It's horrifying but no worse than modern cases of abuse we read about in the papers. And Greek and Roman parents sold their children into slavery all the time, especially girls."
Bonnie sighed. "I wish Tom hadn't made it so real."
"It's a terrifying talent. I mean, it must be terrifying to have that talent."
Bonnie cocked her head. "I suppose so. What's the matter, Lark? You're awfully quiet."
I'm afraid you may be infatuated with a killer. I could have said that. Instead I described my visit to Lottie and Clara's presence in the sickroom. I also mentioned Clara's suggestion about clamming. To my surprise Bonnie fell on the idea with enthusiasm. She wanted me to come too.
I said I'd think about it. Bonnie was ready to hunt down waders and clam guns.
"Good heavens, we haven't even asked Matt. He probably won't want to."
"Oh, come on. I'll bet Tom has all kinds of gear stowed in the garage. Let's go ask him. Then if Matt doesn't want to take us out, you and I can rent a boat, and we'll be set. Tom says there's public access to some of the clam beds off Coho Island."
I felt a stir of interest. I hadn't done much exploring yet on the bay side of the peninsula. The oyster beds for which the bay was famous were privately owned, but Coho Island was supposed to be spectacularly unspoiled, with some areas open to the public. Uninhabited except for black bears and deer, the island boasted a stand of old-growth cedar that was mentioned in the guide books. Bald eagles nested in the area, too, and blue herons fished the shallow waters of the bay.
"We'll have to consult the tide tables." Bonnie had finished off her coffee and was making for the door. I shoved myself up and followed her.
A big dumpster sat on the grass in front of Tom's house. His crew was going at it hot and heavy, and he was poking around in the garden. I confessed my theft of the asters, and he said he wished he'd thought to take some to Lottie. He seemed happy to supply us with whatever clamming gear we needed, though he laughed when Bonnie mentioned clam guns. It seemed the long slim shovels were only used for digging razor clams. Clam fanciers raked the steamers or used an ordinary shovel.
We helped Tom weed until I yanked out a stalk of New Zealand spinach. Tom said it was time to water.
"Hello there, neighbors." Ruth was leaning on the fence.
The sight of her jolted my memory, and I gave her a confused greeting. While he moved the sprinkler, Tom filled her in on the house repairs, so I had time to sort out my thoughts. At the first lull in the exchange, I said, "I think I saw your son this morning, Ruth."
"This morning? Who?" Ruth laughed. "Benny and them left yesterday. Kids had school today. You saw somebody this morning it was Kevin Johnson."
I must have looked blank.
"Melanie's old man, remember? He's back, more's the pity, and he came over to rank me down for calling the Methodists. His family don't need no charity. My ass. I gave Kevin a piece of my mind, and he went off in a huff. That boy is always going off in a huff. He was bragging about having plenty of cash, though. Must've found him a job after all."
Some job. I said, "I think his pickup was the one that almost ran me off the Ridge Road." And almost killed Freddy and Darla.
Bonnie said, "Did you call Dale Nelson?"
Tom was frowning. "Kevin? He's a blow-hard, but he wouldn't--" He looked at his house. The odds were good that the sideswiper had also tossed the fire bomb.
Ruth's hair stood up in indignant tufts. "Land sakes, no child of mine would do a thing like that. My Ben wouldn't hurt a fly."
She sounded so shocked I had to apologize. "I didn't think your son could have done it either, Ruth. That's why I didn't report it."
"You'd better report it," Bonnie said grimly. "Before the maniac runs Jay off the road or burns my house."
Tom was still brooding. His thoughts darkened his face. "I wonder who hired him?"
"I don't know. Donald Hagen?" I had been wondering the same thing since Ruth mentioned Kevin's cash. It was somehow more frightening to think of the sideswiper as a hireling than as a disgruntled citizen acting on his own out of prejudice. What else had he been hired to do?
Ruth said, "Better use my phone, honey."
"What is this, a conference?" Jay had reached the yard unnoticed. He slipped around the fence into the garden. He must have been home for a while because he had changed into jeans and a t-shirt.
"I saw what may be the pickup that ran Freddy off the road," I said. "Ruth was offering me the use of her telephone."
"When did you see it?" He skirted the marigolds.
I explained the sequence of events, and he swore under his breath. "I tried to reach you," I added, defensive.
He tugged at his mustache. "Well, you'd better come home now and give Dale the whole story."
"Okay. Did you stop by the hospital?"
"The hospital?"
"I think Lottie wants to see you. I did leave that message with the secretary."
"I knew I should have checked with the office before I left campus." He did a double-take. "How do you know Lottie wanted to see me? I thought she couldn't talk?"
I explained Clara and the felt board as we headed home together. Bonnie showed no disposition to leave the garden. She hadn't weeded out spinach. As we went off, Ruth called out, "He would never do a thing like that, not my Ben."
I gave her what I hoped was a reassuring wave. Tom started the sprinkler.