Dead Sleeping Shaman (16 page)

I muttered obscenities as
I drove home. I steamed, certain that smoke was coming from my ears as I sped back across M72 despite the slippery roads. Then a turn on to County Road 571—even darker and rainier. A few more turns and I was down my gravel drive. I slammed the car door behind me and made my way through the mud and rain without a raindrop landing on me. I was too fast, and too hot. If rain had hit, it would have sizzled.

Sorrow was the best kind of listener. He sat at my feet as I told him, with expressive epithets, what Jackson had done, yet one more time. Embarrassing me. Making me the bad guy.

“Poor Jackson,”—this said with proper mocking pity, which seemed to please Sorrow; at least his ears stood up—“to think that I, bitch of the universe, wouldn’t aid and abet him in his newly chosen career. I wouldn’t throw my hopes to the wind in order to place before the world his stupendous talent. Yet another victim of female selfishness.”

I sat with my Christmas afghan across my legs and a writing pad on my lap. I wrote letter after letter to Jackson telling him what a boorish, self-centered piece of crap he was; what colossal nerve he had; what a rude son of a bitch he was—bringing that girl, unasked, to Bill’s dinner party; and how lucky he was that Bill was a gentleman and never mentioned he had to reset the table since Jackson had presented the problem of Regina. And then to try to pin me down, wanting to contact the woman who might—possibly, maybe, with any luck—be my agent. There were no words …

But I found plenty.

I steamed all night as I gave up the letter writing and simply told Jackson, in my head, to take a flying leap, to never call me again, to stop treading on my life—things like that, until finally I fell asleep and didn’t wake up until the next morning when Sorrow leaped onto the sofa, beside me, warning that the phone was ringing.

I got up at what was a very slow and grudging pace. I looked around, hunting for my list of pithy things to say to Jackson, in case it was him, calling to apologize.

It wasn’t. Only a very sweet-voiced lady from the phone company wondering if I’d sent my monthly payment in as yet. Late. Of course! Oh dear! Foolish me! I would have smacked my forehead with my palm but the gesture would have been lost on the sweet person who couldn’t see me anyway. I agreed I would take care of the payment that afternoon. I’d thought I was safe from sweet-voiced ladies on a Saturday morning but figured even telephone companies were getting desperate. I wrote out a check immediately, fearing that if I didn’t get them their money they would soon be out of business.

I went to stand on the deck while Sorrow squatted, peed, and nosed leaves into the air, snapping at them as they fell back to earth. The morning light was a pink gold; the sun, coming over the trees, struck the leftover rain clouds. A rainbow formed directly across the lake. If I were a superstitious person, I thought, I would say that Fate was telling me my gold was right there, in my backyard, in my own lake. But I’m not usually superstitious and I’d given up cheering myself with sugary garbage, so I enjoyed the rainbow until it began to fade.

The rain of the night before hadn’t stripped the trees. That would come in a week or so. A heavy wind would take them, swirl them into piles, or send them flying to wherever the wind stopped. I leaned against the deck railing, watching my world waken, and wondered where the wind ended and what was piled in mountains there and what would future archeologists think of us, all our parts in those piles.

That was enough of that. Abstract thought cleansed my mind of flimflam—like anger at Jackson. The phone rang again. I hurried in. It was Bill, wanting to make sure I was all right. “Guess you two don’t get along as well as I thought,” he said.

I agreed and apologized. “We’re kind of friends but Jackson has never had a sense of boundaries … ”

“I don’t really think he’s the kind of guy I want to get too close to either. Last time it was my friend, Ramona Sheffield. Ramona told me what happened when you showed up and found them together. That stunk. Ramona felt terrible about it but still … she could have been smarter. Now he brings this woman. She seemed nice enough to me. I guess I didn’t realize there was a history. Beyond the divorce, I mean.”

“Yeah, Bill. There’s a history.”

“Why do you bother? You’re divorced. Keep him out of your life.”

I sighed. Same question I asked myself. “Complicated.”

“He’s kind of a sad guy. That’s not the way he comes across at first. But who am I to judge?”

“Ever been married?” I asked.

“Nope.”

“Ah, you wait. What a treat you have in store.”

“Cynical,” he said.

“You’re right. Some marriages stink. Then there are marriages so warm they make me jealous I can’t be in that kind of relationship.”

“Yeah. Me too.”

He asked about the other ghost towns I planned to visit for my article. He seemed a little hesitant, as if afraid I might come up with a dead body everywhere I went. I assured him I’d get at it as soon as possible and keep him up to date on everything I was covering.

“If you want someone to go with you—just to … maybe, the first one. I could do it tomorrow.”

“I’ll be ok. I know it seems that dead people seek me out, but they don’t. And I can handle the rest of the towns alone.”

I hung up reluctantly. He’d made me feel better—about myself, about who I was, and about life in general.

What I wanted to do next was find the tractor salesman who’d moved to Kingsley—Jimmy Little. That’s what I needed to keep my mind occupied with something other than Jackson. After grabbing a quick breakfast of tea and toast, then walking Sorrow, I sat down with the area phone book and called a John Deere store in Kingsley. The man who answered didn’t recognize the name but he called back to a guy name Bob, asking him if he knew what happened to Jimmy Little. Bob came on the line and told me Jimmy Little still lived right outside Kingsley. He looked the number up for me and told me to drop by if I had any tractor needs. I assured him I would, hung up, and dialed the number he’d given me.

“Yeah!” a man’s deep voice answered the phone.

“Jimmy Little?” I asked.

There was a hesitation. “Ya know, if yer sellin’ something I’m hanging right up.”

“No,” I said quickly. “I’m not selling anything. My name is Emily Kincaid. I’m with the
Northern Statesman.
It’s about a murder that happened out in Leetsville. I understand you used to sell tractors there. This would be years ago now.”

“Well, sure, my territory at one time. But what’s this about a murder?”

“Your name came up.”

“Hope to hell nobody thinks I’d do a thing like …”

“No, not in that connection. I’m looking for information or some background …”

“What’d you say yer name was?”

“Emily Kincaid.”

“Well, Emily, why don’t you come on out here and we’ll sit down and I’ll see how I can help you. That ok? Me and the missus will be here all day.”

“About two o’clock?” I asked. He agreed and gave me directions. A good hour or more to get there but I was intrigued. It was the “missus” I most wanted to meet. I couldn’t believe Winnie had lived in the area all these years and never contacted any of her children. But then I only knew one of them—Marjory. Maybe Arnold and Paul had known about her all along.

Before I could get my tennis shoes on and get out of the house, Crystalline called, wanting to know if they were supposed to sit there in the motel room or if they were going to come help me. I suggested we meet at EATS at six o’clock and we’d plan what to do next.

Then I swallowed my pride and all my hurt feelings and called Dolly at the station. Lucky was on the board and put me through to her in her patrol car.

“I’m going out to Kingsley to talk to that tractor salesman Marjory’s mother ran away with.”

“How’d you find ’im?”

“Harry told me to go over to the Feed and Seed, see if any of the old farmers remembered him. A few of them did, at least they think he’s the one. I talked to him and I’m going there. He mentioned that his wife would be with him. You think it could be her? Winnie Otis?”

“Who knows?” She sounded distracted, not quite interested in what I was telling her.

“You want to go with me? We haven’t been putting in much time on this—at least not together.”

There was a long pause. “Can’t today, Emily. I’m on duty right now. Then I promised Sister Sally I’d get out to the campground and help set up for tomorrow morning’s service …”

“Why? What’s going on? You’re acting … I don’t know. You’re not getting caught up in this thing, are you?”

“Just looking into … And I’m not as … what do you call it?”

“Cynical? Not as cynical as I am?”

“Yeah, as cynical as you.”

“Come on. You know better than that. You’re not a scared person who can’t take a step unless somebody tells you which way to walk. Dolly, look, I need your help here.”

“First I got to go out there with Sister Sally. I told you, I promised her and I keep my promises.”

“What about your promise to me?”

“What promise?” her squeaky voice went up an octave. I could tell she wanted me off the phone, and in a hurry.

“You know what I’m talking about. I’m doing all the work and I didn’t want to get involved in the first place.”

“I know.” There was a long hesitation. “I really appreciate it but sometimes there are greater things …”

“I think you’ve gone nuts.”

“No, you don’t. You just think you’re smarter than everybody else. There’s lots of things college don’t teach you.”

“Yeah, like how not to make a big fat ass of myself.”

“Look, you do what you want, ok? I’ve got to do what I have to do …”

“Did you talk to that Officer Winston? Brent assigned him …”

“No time. Got so much going on …”

“I’ve never known you to be so lax …”

“Not lax. I got my own way of doing things,” was all she said, then seemed to snap her mouth shut.

“Need I remind you—this isn’t my job? I thought we were friends, Dolly. I mean, you’re scaring me, apart from the murder, there’s something going on with you that … ”

“Gotta go,” she interrupted. “Some kids are teasing a dog on the other end of town. We’ll talk later.”

I hung up. To make my day complete, I called the nursing home in Bellaire and asked for Cecily Otis. The nurse told me Cecily was under the weather and couldn’t see anybody until the beginning of the week. She wanted my name. “Cecily doesn’t get any company. It will perk her up to know you’ll be coming.”

I said I’d call back. I knew my name wouldn’t perk Cecily, or anybody else, up. All I could do was get Sorrow out to the car, in case we found a good spot in Kingsley to run, and get on the road.

Saturday, October 17

10 days still to go

Kingsley was a typical
small Michigan village. Neat little houses. Short streets going nowhere. A block of businesses that had seen better days. You drove through Kingsley to get to Traverse City, going north, or down to southern Michigan. There wasn’t much reason to stop as you made the turn at the blinker, except that life there went on just fine without tourists or the flourishes of arugula salads and cappuccino shops.

Jimmy Little’s house was a mile out of town, set back under tall blue spruce that had almost overgrown the gravel driveway. The house was yellow, with white trim. A yellow breezeway connected the main part of the small house with a yellow garage. In the front flowerbed, now filled with dying roses, was a bend-over—one of those board rear ends of a female gardener showing off frilly underpants. I hadn’t seen a bend-over in years. There was a heart-shaped WELCOME sign next to the front door and a pinecone wreath around the welcome sign. Somebody in the house was either into crafts, or was a devotee of summer craft shows.

I’d left Sorrow scrambling back and forth on the back seat, expecting a walk, not a long sit. I rang the bell. The door was answered almost immediately by a tall, nice-looking older man in a dark blue turtleneck shirt and dark blue pants. He had graying blond hair and the wide, open face that goes with a Nordic type. He nodded, smiled, and pushed the metal storm door open, inviting me in.

The house was comfortable. Two upholstered La-Z-Boy chairs stood before a yellow brick fireplace. There were many little tables around the room with lamps and framed photos. The walls were covered with wedding, baby, graduation, skiing, picnic, and swimming pictures—every kind of family photo you could imagine. A woman sat in one of the rocking La-Z-Boys. I looked at her, wondering if I was seeing Marjory’s mother.

“Welcome,” Jimmy Little said, a hand on my back, his other hand gesturing me into the living room. “So, you’re Emily Kincaid. I think I’ve seen your byline on stories in the paper.”

I laughed, nervous for no reason.

“Cover a lot of murders, do you?” Jimmy asked.

I laughed again, not knowing what the best response to that question might be.

“I’d like you to meet my wife.” He guided me farther into the room and up to the tiny woman. I felt my heart skip a couple of beats. It could be her. Age seemed about right. Maybe this was the woman who began all Marjory’s misery—by the selfish act of running away.

The woman looked at me with confusion written across her face. Her eyes went to Jimmy’s, begging for help.

“I told you, Mother. The woman from the newspaper. Remember? She’s got questions for me? I told you this morning.” He gave me a knowing smile as if expecting me to catch on and say nothing. It was obvious the woman had Alzheimer’s or some form of memory loss. I was an anomaly in her very small world and confusing the heck out of her.

“Winnie …” I bent down close to get a look at her face.

She stared back, blue eyes filling with tears. I thought I must be onto something. The name had moved her for some reason.

“No, no,” Jimmy said. “Her name is Hilda. She wasn’t the one you came to see, was she? I got the idea it was me. Anyway, Hilda is Hilda. If you’ve made a mistake … well … I don’t think I said anything to mislead you.”

I stepped away from the poor, confused woman. Not Winnie Otis after all. Not the woman I was learning to detest, for what she had done to her children. This woman had walls of memories. Walls of children. And a good husband taking care of her. I had no right here. That need-to-know thing had driven me to intrude. I wished I could turn and leave without comment; change the thing I’d done out of mistaken hope.

“I’m sorry. I thought you told me your wife’s name was Winnie.” I looked down at the woman. “Hilda.” She looked up, blinking. I said her name again, and got a confident smile in return. The tears were only because I’d rocked her world, taking her own name from her. I felt lousy for even being there.

Jimmy Little asked me to sit, then offered coffee, which I declined, wanting badly to leave and feeling not very good about myself.

“You said this was about a murder.” He settled into a recliner across from me.

“A woman was murdered out in Deward, an old lumbering town between Mancelona and Gaylord.”

He nodded, hands clasped between his knees. “Used to be my territory—that country out there. Sold tractors and all kinds of farm equipment. Hardscrabble life—farming. Had a lot of good friends.”

“This woman—the dead one. She grew up in Leetsville …”

He nodded again, though I thought I saw a hint of suspicion in his eyes.

“A long time ago her mother left her. It seems she ran off with a tractor salesman, thirty-five to thirty-eight years ago. What I’m trying to do is find the woman. There were other children. I’m looking into a connection between the dead woman and the town. Deward. Something that might have brought her back there.”

Jimmy sat forward in his chair and fixed me with a look. He wasn’t a stupid man. “You thought Hilda, here, was that woman’s mother? And I was the tractor salesman she ran off with?” He shook his head.

I opened my mouth, hoping to come up with an easy, comfortable lie. All I had to do was look into his uncomplicated and disgusted face to know no lie was going to work.

“Well, I hate to break it to you,” he said. “But Hilda’s been my wife since right after high school and I never ran off with anybody.”

Jimmy stood and put his shoulders back, rearing away then looking down at me as if smelling something not real good smelling.

I stood too, falling over my own feet. “I didn’t think …” Oh hell, I was already standing in a pile of my own making. “I’m sorry,” I said instead. “But do you remember something like that happening? It would have been about thirty-five years ago.”

Jimmy, his friendly face much less friendly, thought a moment, chewing at the corner of his lower lip. He shook his head. “I’m telling myself you didn’t come here hoping to catch sinners living out an old sin. So, what I’m doing is taking your question serious because, as you say, there’s a dead woman who must need justice or you wouldn’t be going around trying to trick people.”

I shook my head, assuring him I wasn’t without feeling, without concern (though I felt that way).

“To tell you the truth, Emily. If some man in my business, back then, had done something like that … I’d say in the whole state of Michigan. I mean, we were like a small town just ourselves—men who sold heavy equipment to the farmers. I knew if one of my clients bought something from Trace Cornfelt down in Grand Rapids, or Wilfred Dawson over to Ludington. Knew everybody in the business. And never once did I hear anything about one of ’em running off with a woman from Leetsville.”

He shook his head as he put his hand on my back again, guiding me toward the front door.

I was out of there as fast as I could go. Thank-yous and all of the niceties aren’t necessary when you’ve hurt somebody’s feelings.

At a small park on Garfield Road I let Sorrow out of the car to squat and pee then run through the leaves. I trudged along behind him, thinking how I didn’t want to get into any of this to begin with and here I was, by myself, no Dolly Flynn Wakowski in sight. And wasn’t I making a fine mess of everything I touched.

What I didn’t know about investigating a murder would fill a football stadium. I kicked at the leaves, sending a shower of them into the air for Sorrow to chase and bite. The breeze was warm, but with ice at its heart. Kind of like me.

What I did was get so deep into self-pity I forgot what I’d been told by Jimmy Little. There’d been no running off with a tractor salesman. Winnie Otis had disappeared, but not the way everyone was told. What I had to do was find Arnold Otis or Aunt Cecily and clear up the confusion. Maybe the guy hadn’t sold tractors. Maybe he’d sold brushes, or pots and pans. Or maybe he’d never existed and one mystery had just become two.