Dr. Norman Falconer had a house and surgery on the other side of the Bethany Inn, a sprawling white Victorian with a porch and an extension to the side for the surgery with a sign and separate entrance. Next to the door was a small pile of tennis balls.
Warren opened the screen door and immediately encountered the owner of the tennis balls, a husky tan-colored Labrador retriever, lolling in the entryway and blocking Warren’s path. Even when he used his foot to carefully push the dog’s tail out of the way, it continued snoozing, its breathing rough and snuffly.
“Oh, just step around him,” a woman’s voice called out and Warren awkwardly stepped over the dog. The owner of the voice was sitting behind the desk at the other end of the doctor’s otherwise empty waiting room. “Hello,” she said, a bit of a question in her voice, but with a smile. It was clear she didn’t recognize Warren and equally clear that she usually did recognize the patients who came through the door. Warren felt immediately at ease with her. She was fifty or so, his mother’s age, with blond hair streaked with silver cut short in a style that somehow reminded him of a nurse’s cap, and an open, friendly face. He imagined that she was good at calming people down when they needed calming, when they were afraid or in pain.
“Hello,” Warren said, smiling back at her. “My name is Franklin Warren. I’m the new detective stationed at the barracks here in town and I’m looking into the fire up at the Webers’ farm, on Agony Hill. I was hoping I could talk to Dr. Falconer.”
“Oh, it’s so awful,” she said. “Poor Sylvie … Well, Norm is in there struggling with his paperwork so he’ll be glad of an interruption. Here, I’ll show you in. Don’t worry, he won’t make you take off your shirt!” She laughed at that and led the way along a corridor that, like the waiting room, smelled of dog.
“Dear,” she called out as she pushed open the door. “Don’t bother pretending you’re doing your paperwork, I have a policeman here to see you about the fire up at Webers’.” The doctor, in shirtsleeves and khaki trousers rather than a white coat, did indeed snap his head up guiltily, rubbing at his eyes. He’d been napping in his chair.
“There he is, Mr. Warren. I’ll leave you to it. Norm, dear, don’t forget you have Mrs. Leary to go see at three.”
“Ah, yes, of course.” Dr. Falconer stood up and reached across the desk to shake Warren’s hand. “Sorry, you’re a policeman? You must be the new detective Pinky was talking about.”
“That’s right. Franklin Warren, but everyone calls me Warren. I just got here and I’m already looking into this fire. Do you mind if I ask you some questions about Hugh Weber and his, well, his state of mind?”
“Sure, happy to help. I was up there the next morning to have a look at Sylvie, his wife. She’s pregnant, you know, but she’s been through it before, four times to be precise, and I think she’ll be all right. Terrible thing for him to do to her.” He shook his head. “Can’t say it surprised me. I suppose that’s what you want to know.”
“It is. Why didn’t it surprise you?”
Dr. Falconer thought for a moment, then gestured at the chair. “Here, sit down. Well, he was an angry person, always upset about some perceived slight or insult. He was one of those people who woke up every morning thinking of himself as a victim of a great conspiracy by everyone around him to thwart his desires. Do you know what I mean?”
“I do. How was his health, mental and physical?” Warren asked, his pen poised over his notebook.
“Well, he was in the process of pickling his liver with gin and he’d started to have some normal, age-related arthritis. His knees bothered him, especially after hard work. I encouraged him to let the boys do the really taxing chores around the farm and I think he did, to some extent, but these farmers can’t exactly put their feet up, can they? I could tell you some stories about some of these old-timers working themselves right into the grave.”
“But nothing like cancer or a terminal diagnosis.” Warren was thinking of what Mrs. Bellows had said. “Was the drinking going to kill him anytime soon?”
“Depends what you mean by soon, but no, nothing like that.”
“What was your first thought when you heard he’d died in a fire up there?”
Falconer looked surprised at that. “Well, I thought of Forrest Germond. You know about him?” Warren nodded. “I suppose I said to myself, ‘Well, Hugh’s gone and done it.’ Do you know about his letters to the editor?” Warren nodded. “Well, he’d practically told us he was going to do it, hadn’t he?”
Having read the letters, Warren had to admit that in fact he had. “Were you concerned about his mental health? Did you ever think he was a suicide risk? Did he ever mention suicide to you?” He tried to ask it neutrally, not accusing the doctor of negligence.
“I thought he was an angry bastard, but no … I suppose I never thought he was in immediate danger of doing himself in, if that’s what you mean. I would have been compelled to intervene if I had. He liked to say, ‘When I’m gone, they’ll all be sorry.’ That sort of thing.” He looked up quickly. “I think he was referring to people in town, not his family. It was a bit like he saw himself as some sort of prophet and he felt we weren’t heeding his call.” Warren wrote that down. That certainly sounded like someone who might do himself in to make a point.
Warren watched the doctor’s face. “Did you ever imagine he was a danger to anyone else?”
“Like his wife, you mean?” Falconer gave a small smile. “I always wondered. But I never saw any marks on her and her pregnancies were healthy, her boys well-cared for, even if their parenting was … unorthodox. They all tiptoed around him a bit, I think, because of his temper, still I never saw anything that made me think he was physically abusive. But … they kept to themselves up there. They weren’t much for modern medicine; he liked to treat things with natural remedies. Honestly, I’m not sure there’s anyone who really knows what went on in that house. Does that answer your question?”
“Yes, it does.” Warren shifted in his chair. “The boys, were they in school?” It had just occurred to him that because it was the summer, he hadn’t wondered about how they got to school. But they must go, mustn’t they? And where was the school? Warren hadn’t noticed one in his limited wanderings around town.
As if he knew what Warren was thinking, Falconer said, “We’re down to three primary schools in Bethany now. At one time we had twenty. If some of us get our way, that will be only one in a couple of years. It’s easier to deliver a high-quality, modern education if you bring all the pupils to one building, but there are some who say it would be the end of the world. Hugh Weber was one of them. He wrote letters about that too. His boys walk down to the Goodrich Hill School. There are twenty-five students in that building, all from the western districts of town, and two teachers. My daughter Barbara is one of them.”
“Could I talk to her, do you think?” Warren asked. “I’d like to get a perspective on the boys and what she might have seen of their home life.”
Falconer studied him for a moment. “You don’t think there’s something wrong about that fire, do you? I get called out to look at suicides from time to time and I know you have to ascertain state of mind before making a determination, but you seem to have some questions about this one.”
Warren smiled. “Just trying to make a good impression in my new job, Doctor.”
“Ah, I can see that. Well, Barbara’s in there.” He pointed vaguely toward the house. “Our Labrador bitch had puppies a few weeks back by that magnificent fellow in the waiting room and she’s in with them. Rose can show you.”
Warren stood up. “Thank you, Dr. Falconer. It was nice to meet you. And I appreciate the help.”
“Welcome to Bethany, Mr. Warren. I hear you’re living at the vicarage. I’m sure I’ll be seeing you around.” He opened the door and called out to Rose, who Warren now understood to be both his wife and the practice’s nurse, to show Warren into the house so he could talk to Barbara.
“Barbara, dear, are you with the puppies?” Rose Falconer called out, leading Warren through a connecting door behind the desk in the waiting room and into a neat mudroom, coats and skis and winter boots organized against one wall, and then a kitchen, quiet but for the ticking of a clock and, from somewhere in the house, a radio. “Go on through to the porch, Mr. Warren, she’ll be out there,” Rose Falconer said. “Just tell her I said to go through. I have to get back and make sure Norm doesn’t sleep through his next appointment.”
Warren thanked her and went hesitantly into the room she’d pointed to, a formal living room, newly carpeted in pale blue, with shining furniture in a combination of good antiques and newer pieces, including one from Warren’s father’s latest living room collection, New Classics by Winchester. On the fireplace mantel was a row of family photographs, a wedding portrait of the Falconers in black and white, a portrait of a young man in an army officer’s uniform—a son, perhaps—and a studio portrait of a beautiful young woman with a blond bouffant and a strong resemblance to Rose Falconer. Another formal portrait showed her standing next to a different man, also in a dress uniform, her left hand prominently displaying a diamond engagement ring.
He thought he was lost, until he heard laughter coming from the next room and he followed it out onto a screened-in porch at the back of the house that looked out onto the same brook or small river that passed behind his own house. A large yellow Labrador, the feminine counterpart to the one in the office, lay on her side in a shallow box, a wriggling mass of small tan puppies contained in the curve of her body. A woman who must be Barbara Falconer was sitting cross-legged on the floor, picking up puppies trying to escape and putting them back. When Warren said, “Hello, your mother told me to come through,” she turned and looked up and smiled widely.
“Come in. Are you interested in one of the puppies?” she asked. “They won’t be ready for weeks yet, but you’re welcome to have a look. Aren’t they just the loveliest?” The puppies varied in shades from pale beige to a darker gold. Their bellies were fat and rounded, full of milk.
“No, I … I’m not here about the puppies. I’m the new detective with the Vermont State Police. My name’s Franklin Warren. I wanted to ask you about the Weber children, who I understand are students of yours at Goodrich Hill School.”
“Oh, good Lord, I’ve got things the wrong way around, haven’t I?” She laughed and stood up, putting out a hand for him to shake. She was tall, nearly his height, wearing a yellow oxford shirt, the sleeves rolled up and the shirttails tied at the waist of her yellow ankle-length trousers. Maria had had a pair of pants like that, blue, Warren remembered. “Sit down and we can keep an eye on these little devils while we talk. I’m Barbara, by the way.” He shook her hand.
“What a nice view you have,” he said, gazing out at the river. It was a small tributary of the Connecticut, he assumed, slim and shallow and lazy today as it meandered through Bethany. “You’d never know you were right in town.”
“You must be able to see the brook from the vicarage,” she said, then looked embarrassed for a moment. “I know you’re living in the vicarage because Pinky was telling my mother in Collers’ Store. Pinky seems to think he’s going to be your assistant. He said you’re going to teach him to investigate crimes and everything. He was quite proud, I think.” She smiled. “I’ve known Pinky forever. He was the same class as my brother Greg.”
“So, you had all of the Weber boys? I don’t know how it works at these small schools.”
“Well, there are two teachers at Goodrich Hill School. I teach the little ones and Jean Webster teaches the older ones up to fourteen, when they finish.”
“Don’t they have to go to high school?”
“Some of them do go on to the high school here in town, but some of them, farm kids and anyone who’s going to the machine shops, the ones who have jobs to go into, well, they finish up after eighth grade. That’s changing, though.”
“So you had the Weber boys—sorry, I don’t have the names right here. What are they like?”
She smiled. “Scott, Andy, Louis, and, well, Daniel won’t come to school for a few years yet. They’re nice boys, they really are. Quiet, you know. Scott was a solid student. We, Jean and I, encouraged him to go on to the high school, even though he wants to work on the farm. Hugh and Sylvie thought he should too. I hope this … the fire, won’t change things. He’ll feel a lot of responsibility now and with Sylvie pregnant, I don’t know how they’ll manage.”
“What about the other boys?”
“Oh, Andy is quite intelligent. He’s a wonderful student. Louis can be a little devil. He reminds me of the puppies, always wriggling and pushing. He’s sweet. They’re all quite sweet. But the other kids could be cruel and I think it’s made them wary.”
“What do you mean, the other kids were cruel?”
“Well, they’re different. The rest of the kids come from farms too, but they would be more … traditional, I guess you’d say. Even if they were poor, their clothes are neat and they have haircuts and they know how to behave and they go to church on Sunday. The Weber boys are … different. On the one hand, they came to school already knowing how to read, how to write. They had been read to and they had memorized poems; they were quite far ahead. But the other kids make fun of their strange clothes. Sylvie lets their … she lets their hair grow long, like girls’ hair. They have funny manners. I had to teach them to say please and thank you when they came to school. Scott told me once that their father had told them not to say thank you unless they really meant it. He didn’t want them to adopt insincerity or something like that. He was … he was a strange man. But I expect you’ve already heard that from others?”
He nodded. “What about her? I gather she wasn’t from Bethany?”
Her face did something complicated. “No, neither of them were. She might be Canadian, I think I heard that somewhere. And I heard he came from New York City, that his family had money, and yet he chose to … well, to live as though he didn’t. He had unconventional ideas about things.”
“Do you think he was ever abusive to her or to the boys?”
Barbara Falconer took a deep breath. Her hands twisted in her lap and when Warren glanced down at them, he saw the engagement ring catch the light. No wedding band. Engaged then. Not married. “It’s hard to know, Mr. Warren. I didn’t see bruises, if that’s what you mean, but he could be stern while at the same time being quite … well, laissez-faire, I suppose. He really was a strange man. When my mother told me about the fire, I thought to myself, She’s made him mad in some way and this was his way of punishing her for it. Do you see what I mean, he was the kind of man who instead of hitting her, would kill himself and burn their barn down? I’m sorry, I know that doesn’t make much sense, but it’s what I thought.”
He studied her for a moment. “No, that’s very interesting,” he said. “Thank you.”
“I don’t know if you know, but his brother has come to town. I was at Collers’ this morning and he came in, demanding to know where David Williamson’s office was. He was so angry, and rude, and I knew before he said it that he must be Hugh Weber’s brother. I wonder what their mother was like. She must have been a real witch.” Barbara winked at him and stooped to return a wayward puppy to the box. “Wouldn’t you like one of these puppies, Mr. Warren? They’re from a champion bloodline. My father will sing the praises of them as retrievers if duck hunting is your thing.”
Warren stood up too. There was something about her that lifted his mood. He couldn’t help smiling at her. “They’re beautiful, Miss Falconer. My job keeps me pretty busy, but I’ll think about it. And thank you for your help.”
Home again by seven, he decided to have his supper at the inn. Warren entered the tavern through a side door and told the waiter that he would eat up at the bar if that was okay. The man, who appeared to be the bartender as well, said that suited him just fine.
No one else came in.
He had half expected that Victor Weber might eat his supper here as well. After all, where else had he to go? But Weber didn’t show up in the tavern.
Warren ordered clam chowder and tried to make small talk with the waiter, but he seemed totally uninterested, so Warren finished his clam chowder and asked for the check.
“Room number,” the waiter, a dour older man, asked.
“No, I’m not staying here. I’ve recently moved to town.” The waiter nodded and silently handed over the check. Warren found some cash in his pocket and paid, waving away the change. As he left, he wondered where Victor Weber was having his dinner. There weren’t many options and he lingered in the lobby for a few minutes, looking through the tourist maps and information displayed against one wall, on the off chance, unrealized in the end, that they might meet.
The walk home through the quiet evening didn’t take long. Though the green was empty of pedestrians, he had the sense of being watched from behind the windows that lined it. When he passed the Falconers’ across the green, he found himself wondering if they were eating their dinner, if Barbara ate with her parents or with her fiancé, wherever he lived.
His own house—even he had started to think of it as the vicarage—was dark and silent. Next door, at the Bellowses, there was one light on downstairs. He poured himself a bourbon neat and sat in what was now his living room. He needed to call his parents and tell them he was settled and he thought about calling Tommy to discuss the case, then remembered he didn’t have a phone yet. Anyway, there wasn’t anything they could do about anything tonight. Tomorrow, he’d find out how much money Hugh Weber had had and whom he’d left it to.
Warren tried to read the Lawrence Durrell, which he’d picked up at a bookstore in Boston, but he kept losing his place and he finally walked around the rooms of his new house, shutting off lights, and then climbed the stairs to the bedroom.
His grief was strongest when paired with loneliness. It wasn’t just Maria he missed, but himself when he was with Maria. He missed the feeling of being partnered, of having a place to go, someone to be accountable to. Now, he merely … floated. The bedroom was stuffy, the night air from outside only a few degrees cooler than the air inside. The moon was full or nearly so and the light muscled into the bedroom. He finished the bourbon, lay there staring at the dark ceiling, finally slept.
He was awakened by a loud knocking on the door. It was deep into the middle of the night, heading toward morning, he thought when he spied the olive-green sky outside his window. His watch, fumbled from the bedside table, read three A.M. Warren pulled on a shirt and trousers and took the stairs two at a time.
This time it was Alice Bellows herself, wearing a flamboyant yellow-and-pink floral silk dressing gown, her dark-and-gray hair let down and in a thick braid over one shoulder. “There’s another fire up on Agony Hill,” she said a bit breathlessly. “Tommy Johnson called. Chief Longwell and Pinky Goodrich are up there now with the volunteer fire department and he said you’re to go up and meet them.”