Fifteen

So then do not be downcast when I tell you that you all must die. Listen further to what I say. The name of the one that steals away your breath is S’hondowk’owa.

—ARTHUR C. PARKER, THE CODE OF HANDSOME LAKE

Chowder Kelly had always done things his way, a habit that had become only more pronounced after thirty years on the force. Byrnes may not have wanted Tom to be bothered with telegrams while he was off smelling pinecones but Byrnes hadn’t said a damn thing about the mail.

Chowder knew Tom as well as Byrnes did. Some things he knew better, things shared with Tom across a bar or in the basement of the precinct house. There were always things the chief didn’t need to know or didn’t want to know. Byrnes knew the score. Chowder was sure Tom would want to know more about this one. There hadn’t been a spectacular escape like this in years. There hadn’t even been a string of murders in a year or so.

To catch a man like Tupper, a man the Tammany bosses wanted badly, would be a huge feather in Tommy’s cap. That kind of success could carry a lot of weight, the kind of weight a man might put to real use. With rumors of another police corruption commission forming soon, it would be useful to be seen the hero. Heroes were damnably hard to prosecute.

He finished writing a note, adding his thoughts to the copy of the police report he’d already stuck in a large envelope. Tom would want to know what he guessed as much as what he knew, so he didn’t hold back. Sealing it, he got up from his desk, signed out, and headed for the post office. He knew a clerk there, a man who’d been a useful informant over the years. It was amazing how useful a postal clerk could be. In this case, all Chowder needed was to be sure the envelope got to Tommy without a side trip to the bottom of a bin in the bowels of the postal system. With any luck, it might actually get where it was supposed to go in a day or so. As Chowder handed over the envelope to the clerk, who was grateful he hadn’t been asked to do more, he couldn’t suppress a satisfied smile.

 

Tom hadn’t been sleeping, at least he thought not. He looked over at Mary, who seemed to be a sleep. He thought again about checking on Mike. He’d taken Lettie’s death hard and the news that he was a suspect harder still. Through the small hours of the morning Tom had resisted the urge. Now he found himself planting his feet on the cool floor and easing out of bed for fear of waking Mary.

Tom padded softly to the connecting door, opening it halfway. He slipped through, his eyes scanning the twin beds in the moonlight. ’Becca’s little form lay buried under the sheets with hardly one curly hair visible. She’d been exhausted after their climb and had collapsed into her bed after dinner, despite her curiosity about Mike. Mike’s bed was rumpled, the sheets and pillows bunched up, so that in the darkness it almost appeared that he was there. Tom looked again, then crept to the bed and felt the lumpy sheets. Mike was gone.

Tom was in his pants and shoes a moment later, dressing in haste. He wrote a quick note to Mary, who hadn’t stirred, then slipped into the dark hallway. The Prospect House was empty, the hallways echoed. The electricity had been turned off as it was every night, and Tom had to feel as much as see his way through the long, deserted corridors. He saw only one person, floating like a ghost in the dark, the meager glow of a candle lighting the way toward the two-story outhouse in the rear.

Tom wasn’t seen. He didn’t want to be. He searched the hotel, stalking every corridor, every room, even the bowling alley and the pharmacy, which was unlocked, to Tom’s surprise. In his heart he knew where Mike had gone, though he prayed he was wrong.

Tom slipped through the kitchen and out toward the black pile that had been the barn. His eyes strained in the moonlight, which almost seemed bright compared to the tomblike interior of the hotel. He stood motionless for a moment, watching. With a sigh, Tom turned toward the place he feared to go.

As he neared the icehouse door he saw a sliver of light at its edge, a razor cut in the blue-black night. Tom drew close and listened. He felt the cold oozing through, and despite the warmth of the night he shivered. A sob, so soft it seemed to come from the ground, broke the silence. Tom didn’t know how long he stood sentinel before that icy door. He only knew that it was not in him to disturb Mike’s grieving.

It had to run its course, find its natural release. Tom stood monument-still, listening to the breaking of a young heart. He could not stop his own tears from coming. They coursed down his cheeks, mingling with the rain. The two of them cried together, a heavy oaken door between.

At last Tom put his hand on the wrought iron latch, the city cop in him wondering why nothing ever seemed to be locked here. The latch rattled. The sliver of light disappeared.

“Mike, it’s me,” Tom said in a soft voice as he pulled the door open. There was no sound at first, just a cascade of deathly cold air, scented with candle wax.

“Mike?” Tom said again as he closed the door behind him. “Mike,” he said to the inky blackness, “I know you’re here.”

There was a rustle of hay and then the awkward clasp of strong arms about his shoulders. It startled Tom, and he flinched at first, but Mike held on, his head against Tom’s chest. Neither of them spoke, though for Tom there were volumes to say.

Somehow none of the words seemed adequate and they lingered in his throat, slipping about as he struggled to grasp only the right ones. He felt a coward for not saying them, not even in the dark. He didn’t know that, for Mike, just his being there was enough.

They separated at last, Tom saying, “I know how—I mean I can imagine how you must feel, but you can’t stay here.”

Mike didn’t answer.

“You took a chance coming,” Tom said. “Who knows what the hell people might think if they saw you. You understand? You’ve got to go back to the room. Go through the bathhouse. If you’re seen there, nobody’ll think anything of it.”

“Okay,” Mike said in a whisper.

Tom patted him on the shoulder. “I’ll be back in a few minutes. I need to check a couple of things.” The door closed behind Mike with a dull thud and Tom made sure it was pulled tight before he struck a match. Turning to find Mike’s candle, he saw Lettie Burman.

“Jesus!” he muttered.

Her fire-ravaged form lay half uncovered on her pier of ice. He thought of Mike, alone with her. He shuddered so hard he had to try twice to light the candle.

“Mike. Mike,” he sighed, shaking his head as if to erase the image from his mind. This was the way of madness. He wondered how much damage the boy had done to himself coming here.

As for Tom, he’d seen death before. He was as used to it as a man could be, as if a protective callous had grown around his mind. He needed that defense now. He looked at Lettie, trying to picture her in life, trying to humanize the grizzled form she’d assumed.

“Lettie?” he said, holding the candle close so the shadows moved in her empty sockets. “Lettie, I’m Tom Braddock, Mike’s dad.” The only sound was the shuffling of Tom’s nervous feet in the hay. “He needs your help,” Tom said, as if she might hear and come to his aid.

“I’m thinking maybe you can do that,” he added. The candle flickered and the corpse seemed to grin in the shadows. “If you don’t mind, girl, I’ll just have a look at a thing or two,” he said with a hand on her shoulder. “I promise not to hurt you,” Tom said as he began his examination.

The first gray hint of dawn had begun to light the eastern sky as Tom climbed back into bed. He took the untouched note off the pillow, grateful that Mary had slept through the night. Though he’d washed up before coming back to the room, Tom still felt unclean. Lettie’s body had told him two things. He couldn’t know yet whether they might prove significant. He’d need to know more before he could make those kind of conclusions. He had guesses, though, and even more questions. He lay awake as the new day crept through the windows. Theories and possibilities banged about inside his head like rocks in a rolling can. Two things he decided: He’d need a microscope and he’d need to talk to Mike.

 

Chowder couldn’t figure what the hell Braddock would want with a microscope. He looked at the telegram once more as if expecting more information to magically appear. A low hum rumbled in the back of Chowder’s throat. The damn telegram had been on his desk when he got back from court in the afternoon. For a moment he imagined that Tom had already gotten the envelope he’d sent. He realized as he’d read it that that wasn’t possible. It would be tomorrow at best till Tom got that. Tom’s message mentioned nothing about Tupper, the escaped murderer. Instead it asked that Chowder send him a microscope as soon as one could be located, or, failing that, the most powerful magnifying glass he could find.

“Not like Tommy at all,” Chowder mused as he sat on the corner of his desk. He decided to send Tom a magnifying glass that afternoon. He knew he could borrow one from one of the detectives who specialized in forgeries. A microscope might be a bit more difficult, but that, too, could be had in another day or so. There wasn’t much that Chowder Kelly didn’t know how to lay hands on in New York, one way or another.

He set to work rounding up a magnifying glass along with a box to ship it in, all the while wondering at the request. Tom hadn’t taken a sudden interest in science, he was sure. Chowder knew him better than that. This was about a case. It had to be. But it was not about Tupper. Chowder decided it was time to send Braddock a telegram. Tom was onto something, vacation or no, and once he got Chowder’s envelope his vacation was likely to get a lot more complicated.

“Better to give Tommy a bit o’ warnin’,” he mumbled as he went down to the basement telegraph office.

 

The morning had passed in unnatural calm. It was hot and sunny and the sky was the clearest pale blue Mary had ever seen. After breakfast Tom said to her and Mike, “I’ve got to take a look at where Mike and Lettie met that day. I want to see it before any sheriffs go tramping about.”

“Wouldn’t the rain have washed things away,” Mary said, “tracks and whatever?”

“Most likely,” Tom said, “but I feel like I’ve got to do something. I’m gonna go crazy just sitting around waiting for some hick cop to show up.”

“I’ll go with you,” Mike said. “You’ll never find it otherwise.”

They walked out the road a mile or more. They made no secret of what direction they were headed, and no one seemed to pay them any mind. They reached the spot where the old maple stretched across the road and Mike stopped.

“The path’s here someplace. It’s hard to spot.”

“Hold up a second,” Tom said, putting a hand on his arm, the first words he’d said since they left the hotel. “Let’s take a look at the ground first.”

The side of the road was still a little damp from the rain, the grass retaining some moisture. Tom got down on his knees. There wasn’t much to learn from the dried-out roadbed, but he hoped that the earth along the edges might still hold some evidence of Mike and Lettie having been there. Tom grunted as he examined the grassy margin. “Wagon been here,” he said. “If you look this way you can see the track where it bent the grass.”

Mike looked too. “Pretty well washed away,” he said.

Tom got up. “Yeah. Couldn’t say whether it stopped here or just went off the side of the road a bit, maybe passing another wagon or something. You don’t remember seeing a wagon, do you?”

Mike shook his head.

“Might be nothing,” Tom said. “This the path?” He pointed to a faint trail that disappeared into the woods.

“Yeah. I think so.” Mike squatted down, looking at the ground as Tom had. “See this?” he said. “I think that’s me, my footprint I mean. Rain’s washed it mostly away. And that’s Lettie.”

Tom had a hand on Mike’s shoulder, looking where he pointed. “Good work,” he said. They’re faint, but I think you’re right. Hold your foot next to that one.” Mike did, and it was a clear match. Tom just nodded, but then he looked closer.

“So, who in hell was that?” he said, pointing to a third track, larger and broader than the other two. It was a few feet further on. “See how the grass is bent under the footprint, the way the dirt’s washed away at the edges just like yours? I’d say this was made the same day.”

“A fisherman or something,” Mike said. “We didn’t see anybody though, not all afternoon.”

Tom just made a low sound, deep in his throat as he stood up. He looked about, staring up and down the road and across at the woods on the other side. He shrugged his shoulders at last and said, “Let’s go look at where you two…” He let the words trail off as Mike led the way into the forest.

Tom tried to follow the bigger tracks, but it was next to impossible on the forest floor. They went slow, but all they could see was an occasional ghostly depression, while Mike’s and Lettie’s prints were somewhat clearer in the center of the faint trail. At last the third set of tracks disappeared entirely.

“You sure you didn’t see anyone?” Tom asked, looking about on his knees.

“Nope,” Mike said again. “Certain,” though he scratched his head and shrugged.

Tom got up. “You were over that way, under those big pines?” he asked, guessing by the pretty look of the spot where Mike and Lettie had gone.

“Yeah. It was nice there. Smelled great. You can see all down the lake from there,” Mike said.

Tom didn’t say anything. He just moved forward toward the stand of pine. They looked it over carefully, going over the ground on their hands and knees.

“I lost a button here,” Mike said after a minute. “Looked for it but didn’t find it.”

“Where from?”

“My pants,” Mike said, not looking at Tom.

“Not here,” Tom said. “Must’ve lost it someplace else.”

“No. It was here. Lettie, she…” Mike stopped, embarrassed.

“Uh-huh. Well, it isn’t here now,” Tom said, amused at the color in Mike’s cheeks. “Mike, do you know why Lettie wasn’t wearing any ah, well any underclothes? I noticed it last night when I looked.” Tom stopped, not wanting to give Mike too many details of his examination. “There were remnants of her dress still intact but no pantalets, or—anything.”

Mike didn’t look directly at Tom. He just shrugged and said, “Maybe whoever killed her—maybe he…”

“Yeah,” Tom said. “That’s probably it.”

After a while longer they retraced their steps out to the road. Tom took another look at the wagon tracks, going further up and down the road to see if he could tell anything about them.

“Appears as if the wagon pulled off here. I can’t be sure, but I think it stopped. The hoofprints are different here than they are back there. Not as kicked up, like the horse was standing still.”

“You can tell that from these tracks?” Mike said, his brow knitting into a frown.

“I’m no goddamn Daniel Boone, if that’s what you’re asking,” Tom said with a wry grin, “but I think it’s a fair guess.” He showed Mike what he meant about the hoofprints, then looked again at the other side of the road. “May as well check over there, too,” he said.

They looked at the margin of the road, not finding anything, then plunged into the verge of trees, checking the ground for any prints. “I don’t know why we’re doing this. I told you we didn’t see anybody else,” Mike said after a while.

“Well, you’re probably right. Who knows, that wagon could have been here hours after you were gone. No way to be sure. One thing I can tell you, though, is if you find a piece of evidence that’s out of place you have to check it. Hardest thing about doing an investigation is keeping an open mind. You gotta let the facts lead you, not the other way around.”

Mike shrugged and looked around in a disinterested way. He started to walk out toward the road when he stopped. “What’s this?” he said.

Tom saw him point to a tree and he walked over to get a better look. There, on the trunk of a young, smooth-skinned oak, was a series of small holes, the yellow wood below the bark showing through. Tom put his nose to the marks.

“I can smell the sap. It’s fresh,” he said. He looked at the ground and could see a number of footprints at the base of the tree and behind a bigger tree a foot or two away. “Somebody was here,” he said.

“Doing what?” Mike said, looking around.

Tom stood behind the tree and looked at the road. There was a clear view, though it was plain that anyone behind the tree would have been hard to spot from the road. “Watching. Maybe watching,” Tom said.

He took another look at the marks on the tree.

“And killing time. He stuck his knife into this tree. Bored,” Tom said to himself. “Tracks say he was here for a while. How long were you and Lettie over there, Mike?”

“Couple hours, I’d guess.”

“Couple hours,” Tom said, running a hand through his hair. “He’s bored. He’s hiding. He’s sticking his knife into this tree. Maybe the tree’s not the only thing he sticks his knife into,” Tom said, regretting it as soon as he saw a dark cloud pass across Mike’s face.

“Sorry,” Tom said.

“But why? None of this makes any sense. You’ve got what, two men now—following me and Lettie around, looking to kill us—or her, or what? Why? Nobody wanted to kill her, and I know nobody wanted to kill me, so what the hell would somebody be following us for? This is all just guessing. This stuff,” he waved his hand at the tracks and the trees, “it just happens to be here. Who knows why? But it don’t have anything to do with me and Lettie.”

Tom shrugged. “Maybe you’re right. Maybe there’s nothing to this,” he said, looking closely at the marks on the tree while he talked, noticing for the first time their slightly triangular shape, “but, in my experience, coincidence is just a cover for the guilty.”

 

Late in the afternoon Frederick Durant knocked on Tom and Mary’s door, apologizing for the intrusion.

“I just wanted to inform you that in all likelihood a sheriff won’t be able to get here until tomorrow at the earliest,” he told them. “It seems our closest was at Lake George, and he’s on a fishing trip somewhere up the lake.”

“Hmph,” Tom grunted with an annoyed shrug.

“I know how hard this is for you both,” Durant went on. “But there’s no helping it. I’m truly sorry,” Frederick added with formal awkwardness.

Tom nodded, saying nothing at first, but finally he said “Doesn’t make me like it any better. That doctor of yours is jumping to conclusions. A man gets a thing fixed in his head in such a way he’ll only see things that fit with it.”

“I understand, Tom,” Frederick replied. “I, too, am more than a little concerned with that. I worry about the, um, how shall I put this—the objectivity of local authorities, if you understand me.”

“I do,” Tom said. “Your doctor may carry a lot of weight up here, and it seems his mind is made up. God knows what kind of sheriff you’ve got. And judges, let’s face it, backwoods judges are always a roll of the dice, from what I hear.”

Frederick nodded. “I’m not without influence, Tom. My cousin also has friends we can rely on for fair treatment before the law.”

“That’s good to know,” Mary said with an appreciative but worried smile.

Frederick nodded, turning to go. “Oh, I almost forgot. You have another telegram.” He handed it to Tom. “Came in just a little while ago, I understand.”

Tom sat by the window a minute later and read the message.

“What is it, Tommy?” Mary asked, watching him closely.

“Message from Chowder. About that prisoner that escaped the day we left. May be coming our way. Says he mailed me all the information he’s got on the case and the magnifying glass I asked for.”

“What do you mean? Coming to the Adirondacks?”

“Well, the prisoner, he was an Indian called Tupper, and he used to live up here somewhere, according to Chowder. Chowder thinks he’s headed north.”

Mary looked increasingly concerned as Tom told her this. It seemed to her that he was taking this telegram too seriously. “You’re not thinking of going after him, are you? What are you supposed to do, go off chasing this man and leave Mike to fend for himself?” Mary said.

Tom looked at her in surprise. He hadn’t thought to act on the telegram. He’d simply thought it interesting. He could understand her reaction, though. It wouldn’t be the first time he’d dropped something for the job. Tom shrugged.

“Normally, you’d be right. There’s nothing normal about this situation, though. Mike’s my first priority. That’s all there is, plain and simple,” Tom said, laying the telegram aside. “Besides, there isn’t enough here,” he added with a nod toward the telegram, “to do much of anything about.”

Mary sighed. “I’m sorry Tommy,” she said. “I’m just—I mean, this whole situation has got me at sixes and sevens.” She came over to him and gave him a quick kiss. “Forgive me?”

“Of course,” Tom said. “I’m on edge, too. Who wouldn’t be?”

Mary nodded. Still, she had a bad feeling about that little sheet of paper, and was curious about something else.

“What was that about a magnifying glass? Have you been in touch with Chowder.”

Tom had held off telling Mary about what he’d found. He wanted to take a closer look and find out more before he told her anything that might raise her hopes prematurely. He abandoned that plan now. “Mary, last night I…” He hesitated for a moment, uncertain if he should tell her how he’d found Mike in the icehouse. “Well, I suppose you’ll find out anyway,” he said.

“Find out what?” she said.

Tom walked her out onto their verandah, where they sat and were able to look out over the lake as they talked. He told her everything of the night before, how he’d searched for Mike and how he’d found him, as well as what his examination had turned up. Mary put her hands up to her face as though she could hold back the image that Tom’s words had conjured.

“He was in there—alone with the body—with her? Dear God. Oh, dear God,” she said, almost sobbing the words. Turning red eyes to Tom, she said, “I hardly thought I slept at all last night. I should have been—I should have known, or something.”

Tom put a hand on hers. “You were exhausted. The climb, and then this. I don’t know why I went to check on him myself. Listen to me. This is nothing to worry yourself over. What’s done is done.”

Mary took a deep breath and looked out over the lake.

There was laughter on the broad lawn in front of the hotel. A group of girls played at some game or other. Mary wanted to scream at them. She dabbed at her damp face and asked in as calm a voice as she could muster, “What did you find out?”

He told her all there was, the fact that he’d found no pantalets on the body, and of his other discovery, a piece of plaid cloth that was not part of her clothing.

“I’ve got my theories about that, of course. That’s one reason I wanted a magnifying glass. I need to examine her more closely, scrape under her nails, look at the head wound, and give this a closer look, too,” he said.

“There’s always something, some piece of the attacker that is left behind—blood, a broken fingernail, flesh scraped off by a nail, something. I can learn more about the weapon, too. I’ve been trying to work it out, fit the pieces together, and at the same time handle how I’m going to use it once I’m sure. I worry about that doctor. If I tell him things too soon, I mean before I know more, he could dismiss it or invent his own theories, even destroy evidence. Anything’s possible.”

“You found this in her mouth?” Mary said with a queasy turn of her lip.

Tom nodded. “I think she bit it off in the struggle,” he said, looking closely at the piece of cloth in his hand. “You have a better theory on how it got in her mouth?”

The sun sank as Tom and Mary talked. The mountain, towering to their right, glowed orange. A steamboat rounded the point, tooting its whistle and setting the white buck charging about his pen.

“It seems ages ago that Mike got bit,” Mary said half to herself.

“Strange how things work out,” Tom replied.

“If he hadn’t been bit, perhaps he’d never have met that girl.”

Mary gave a little start. “I hadn’t thought about that. It’s true,” she admitted, looking down at the animal bounding about his enclosure. They sat and watched the white buck, the blue water, and the orange mountain.

The crack and echo of shooting jolted them out of their thoughts.

“Sounds like the Duryea boys are at it again,” Tom said. “Those two do more shooting than any ten men I know, me included.”

Mary seemed to be only half listening as the shooting echoed across the lake, bouncing off the mountain in answering volleys.

“We have to talk to him, you know,” Mary said at last.

Tom sighed. “I know. I’ve been putting it off. It’s been hard enough on him as it is,” Tom said.

“In a way, we’ve been lucky there’s been no sheriff close by. He’s had some time to mourn without having to deal with, well—whatever.”

“Charges,” Tom said, finishing her thought in a grim, low voice. “You’re right. We had a pretty good talk today. We’ll have to go over it all, though, learn whatever we can.”

Mary turned away for a second in a gesture Tom had come to know well. “I don’t think I should be there, Tom,” she said. “I think he’ll be more open with you. I mean about the girl and…”

“You’re right,” Tom said. “He’s more likely to tell me about the girl,” Tom said. “There’re things a boy doesn’t tell his mother.”