Not Dead Enough (18 page)

“What's your totem?” I asked, but I could already see the answer in her eyes.

“That's the weird thing. It's a wolf. I've been drawn to them for as long as I can remember. I'm sure you noticed the pictures of wolves hanging on my walls.”

“I did.” I tried a smile, but it only went halfway. I didn't necessarily buy into Indian lore, but for some reason her revelation made me uneasy. “As long as the sniper's out there, you have to be careful. The only good news is that the heat's really on him now.”

She closed the distance between us and said, “Am I still on the free hug plan?”

I took her in my arms and held her there as lightly as I could. This is just a hug, I reminded myself. Finally, in self-defense, I stepped back and said, “Speaking of cops, have you heard anything from your friends in Portland about the Ferguson murder?”

“No. Nothing since I got my car and my computer back. But Detective Adams said they'd probably want to talk to me again. He didn't say when.”

“Good. No news is good news on that front. It means they haven't found anything to tie you to the scene. If they call you back, don't talk to them without me, okay?”

I glanced at my watch. Leaving now would put me in Dundee by two-thirty. I made eye contact with Arch and let him know we were leaving with a flick of my head. A quick exit seemed the best course. God knows, I needed time to regroup. I turned to her at the door and smiled. “Can you record that Sahaptin chant for me?”

She laughed. “Grandmother's version was better than mine, but if you need it, just call.”

As Archie and I walked to the car, I was dogged by a feeling that I'd told Winona more than I should have. Some things are best left unspoken, after all, particularly when they reveal our own mistakes and vulnerabilities. But at the same time, I felt a certain lightness, like a heavy weight had been lifted from my shoulders, and the air had a sparkle to it I hadn't noticed earlier.

A stiff breeze was blowing in a westerly direction along the river. “There'll be whitecaps today, big boy,” I said to Arch. “Should be a beautiful drive through the Gorge.”

Chapter Thirty-seven

Jake

Jake never should have made it to the Oregon coast. What did the Old Man always say? It's better to be lucky than good? He was lucky, for sure. After stashing his truck at the abandoned farm, he waited in the partial shade of a rocky overhang for the sun to set. At around nine that night the moon disappeared behind a layer of low clouds. He moved into the darkness, staying parallel but well off the highway heading into Spray.

There was no shortage of trucks in Spray, and on a dirt road on the east side of town he found what he was looking for—a mid-eighties Ford Ranger like the one he used to own before his current rig. It was parked in front of a tired looking double-wide with a dead tree in the yard and no lights on. He'd lost the keys to his Ranger once, and a buddy of his taught him how to hotwire it. Those old Fords were simple—remove the plastic cover on the steering column, find the brown wire for the starter and the red wire for the battery. That's all you needed to know. But this Ranger wasn't locked, and he found a key under the floor mat.

He got in it and drove off. Lucky.

He headed east out of Spray and planned to take Route 19 south down to 26, where he would take side roads to skirt around Prineville and Bend, and then over the Cascades via Route 20 and on to the coast. He would be in good shape as long as no one missed the old Ford, he figured. He hoped that would be a long time.

Just north of Kimberly, a motorcycle coming the other way blinked its headlights, the universal signal that a cop or road block was up ahead. Fuck. Jake's heart raced as he swerved off the road, turned the truck around, and parked behind a closed roadside stand he'd just passed. He got out and worked his way back up the road in the shadows. Sure enough, a road block had been set up around a sharp bend.

Thank you, dude on the motorcycle. He hunkered down in the shadows off the road and watched as two patrol cars stopped traffic in both directions.

It was a boring, agonizing wait, and it felt like a noose tightening around his neck. Will they stay there all night? What would I do then? His anxiety got so bad he thought he might puke. But at around two-thirty, a woman stopped in the eastbound lane who was so drunk she could hardly get out of her car, let alone walk a straight line. She was placed in one of the patrol cars and driven away. Not ten minutes later, a call came in for the second car, and it took off with lights flashing and siren screaming.

End of blockade. Lucky.

***

It was nearly nine a.m. when Jake reached Depoe Bay, a tiny port city on the central Oregon coast. He was freaked out about driving around in broad daylight, but he had no choice and hoped the old Ford hadn't been missed yet, or if it had, the theft had been chalked up to joyriding locals. The cabin was on the east side of Highway 101 at the end of a dead end street of vacation homes. They all looked deserted. He pulled in the driveway and found the keys under the planter on the left side of the door, just where they should have been. He used one key to put the Ford Ranger in the garage and lock it up and the other to unlock the back door and let himself into the house. He was confident no one had seen him arrive. When he clicked the door shut, he felt better than he had in a very long time.

Lucky. Very lucky.

Chapter Thirty-eight

At the farm that evening the setting sun torched a hole in the cloud cover and lit the horizon in gold and deep red flames. Sipping a glass of pinot, I watched from my study as the flames died and the rose afterglow became indigo then violet, and lights began winking on in the valley. In the background, Thelonious Monk toyed around with “Ruby, My Dear,” the fifth track on Solo Monk. With Monk you never knew what was coming next. Kind of like my life lately.

It had grown dark without my realizing it. I switched on the lights and brought some wood in from the porch to make a small fire to take the chill from the room. I was hungry, but the cupboard was bare again. I settled for a three egg omelet to which I crumbled in smoked salmon and goat cheese together with chopped green onion and a last slice of bacon that I'd nuked up nice and crisp. I wolfed the omelet down with some delicious bread I'd recently discovered, baked by a guy in Portland named Killer Dave, who'd done prison time and was now into making whole grain breads. Only in Portland.

After eating I opened the folder containing the newspaper articles Winona had found and looked again at the picture of Sherman Watlamet and Royce Townsend with the dead mountain lion. The date of the article—February 2, 1956—meant they knew each other at least a year before Nelson Queah disappeared. Cecil Ferguson may have worked for Braxton Gage, but who did Watlamet work for? I also wondered who'd be in a better position to rip the Corps off, Gage or Townsend?

Maybe Fletcher Dunn would have an opinion on that. I made a mental note to ask him. Clearly, I had two angles to work now.

Later that evening, I let Archie out after feeding him with my usual admonition to him not to get skunked. A few minutes later, I heard him barking somewhere up along the fence line. It was a scolding bark that told me he was warning something off in no uncertain terms. A chill traced its way down my back like an icy finger. I went up to my bedroom and got the pistol Philip had loaned me. It was loaded, and the steel felt cold in my hand. I went back to the front door, turned the porch light off, and stepped out. Arch was still barking, which meant whatever he was upset about was still out there.

“Archie, come here, boy,” I yelled into a drizzle so fine the drops hung in the air like fog.

He kept barking.

I called him again, and to my relief he came. We went inside. I bolted the door and did a quick sweep of the house to recheck all the locks. I slept restlessly that night with the loaded gun on my nightstand, secure, at least, in the knowledge that my dog would hear anything suspicious well before I did.

***

Later that week, Braxton Gage's secretary called to tell me that he would see me for an hour that Friday. I had called earlier and she was quite accommodating. George Lone Deer was a man of his word. We settled on a three p.m. meeting time, and I resigned myself to another trip through the Gorge to The Dalles.

An hour later I got a call from Jason Townsend inviting me to a strategy session of his nascent campaign team. The meeting was scheduled for Sunday night at the headquarters of Townsend Enterprises in Portland. Jason seemed relieved when I agreed to come. He surprised me by asking if I would join him for lunch at noon that day. He was at his dad's place on the Willamette River and offered to drive down to Dundee. I suggested we meet at the Brasserie and gave him directions.

I parked behind the Brasserie and went in the kitchen door. It was eleven-thirty and the place was bustling with activity and filled with the smell of good food. Bettie James stood at the stove with her back to me, stirring a large pot with a wooden spoon. She wore a white apron over a maroon and black African caftan, and her buzz cut was short enough that she didn't bother with a chef's hat. I stopped next to her and inhaled deeply. “Umm, that's gotta be paella.”

She dipped a spoonful out of the pot and said, “Taste this. It needs somethin'.”

I blew gently on the steaming broth in the spoon and sipped it with my eyes closed. “Saffron, maybe. Not much, though. You're damn close.”

Bettie nodded, stirred in a pinch more saffron and offered me another taste. “You're there,” I said. “I'm having that for lunch.”

She gave me a hug and inspected the fresh bandage covering my wounded arm. I'd gotten the stitches out the day before. I slipped out of the kitchen and into my favorite booth at the corner of the bar. Bettie joined me a few minutes later with a bottle of Lange pinot gris and two glasses. “So, Calvin, what's the latest on this mess you're in?”

I shook my head. “You don't want to know, Bettie.” My friend knew about my close call in the quarry, but I didn't feel like going back over what had happened out in that canyon with Big C. Instead, I said, “Is there anything that can't be forgiven?”

She scrunched her brow up, tilted her head back slightly, and gave me a look. “Depends on the forgiver, how big the heart is.”

“What about self-forgiveness?”

She laughed and rolled her eyes. Laughter was Bettie's first response to any tough question, and for that matter anything else life cared to toss at her. “Oh, that's a lot harder. That takes a big, big heart. We're always toughest on ourselves.” She chuckled and looked past me. “Lord knows, I've done some things in my life that I'm still tryin' to forgive myself for, and I'm no spring chicken.” She laughed again, then eyed me for a moment. “You workin' on some self-forgiveness issues, hon?”

I nodded. I hadn't told her much about my past, just that I was a widower. “Early stages. Didn't think it could happen, but I met someone who showed me it might be possible.”

Her smile turned a bit sly. “Would that be the tall lady that was in here the other day with you?”

I nodded again, surprised at her insight. “How did you put that together?”

“Oh, I don't know. There just seemed to be somethin' between you two.” She chuckled. “I could feel it.”

Our conversation was cut short when Bettie was called back into the kitchen. Shortly after that Jason Townsend wandered in from the dining area. “There you are, Cal,” he said, extending his hand and beaming his boyish smile, “Good to see you.” He was taller than me by a couple of inches and in the manner of some tall, modest men, leaned forward slightly as we shook hands. His eyes were pale blue—like glacier ice—and his blond hair was parted cleanly and combed to the right in a boyish wave. He wore freshly pressed jeans, tassel loafers, and a checkered button-down.

We exchanged pleasantries, and when Bettie came back out from the kitchen ordered up the paella, salad, and some sourdough bread. I poured him a glass of the pinot gris and slid it across to him. He furrowed his brow. “Winona told me there was another incident, a deputy sheriff was shot. My God, are the police doing enough to catch this madman?”

I shrugged. “At this point they don't have much to go on. The crime spree's spread across three jurisdictions. I doubt there's much coordination, frankly. You know how it goes.”

He shook his head and shot me a look of frustration. “I see it all the time in the State Legislature—east of the Cascades versus west, liberal versus conservative, environmentalists versus loggers—any damn excuse to draw a line. The gridlock's killing us.”

“You'll get gridlock on steroids in D.C.”

He laughed, but I saw a fleeting wince of what? Pain? “Oh, for sure. It's a national disease, I'm afraid.” Then he grew serious. “But I'd still like a shot at changing the culture in Washington. You know, I'd like to be part of the solution.”

The words were there, if a bit on the cliché side. “How's the campaign shaping up?”

“That's what I wanted to talk to you about, Cal. This meeting Sunday night's pretty important. We're going to brainstorm the key elements of my platform. I'm going to try to stay above the fray if I can. But I want to make sure we get a strong dam-removal plank in there.”

He paused, but I waited for him to continue.

“I was hoping you might be willing to make sure dam removal comes up. You know, sort of advocate for it at the meeting.”

I nodded. “I can do that. It might piss off your campaign manager, Sam DeSilva, though.”

“Oh, no doubt about that. And my father, too.” Jason smiled to lighten the comment, but I could see tension in his eyes. “But don't worry, I'll handle them. Look, I'm not some wild-eyed dreamer on this issue. I think we should start with the four dams on the lower Snake. The science is clear—those dams are doing the most damage to the salmon runs. Sure, it'll cause disruptions, but the pumping technology exists to irrigate the wheat fields up there without huge reservoirs. Once that's done, we can consider how to tackle the Columbia. Imagine it, Cal. Imagine Celilo Falls restored. The falls are still down there, you know.”

I pictured The Dalles Dam gone and the falls roaring again. The lift it gave me was not unlike the feeling I had after I poured my heart out to Winona. Not all dams are made of concrete and steel, I realized.

Bettie served us lunch, and we went on to discuss the issue in detail. I saw it in stark, gut-level terms. If we let such beautiful creatures as Pacific salmon and steelhead become extinct, could the human race be far behind? I didn't think so. Jason had pretty much the same take, although as a politician he couched his arguments more in terms of economic and recreational benefits. We both agreed that breaching the Snake River dams was a critical step in saving the fish. By the time we'd ordered coffee, I still wondered about his appetite to play down and dirty in Washington, but I certainly liked the man and the way he thought.

I had another item on my mind, too. I said, “Your father has a colorful history. I understand he used to be quite a hunter in his day.”

“He was that. Tried to interest me in hunting and shooting when I was a kid, but it never took.” Jason laughed and shook his head. “I remember the first and only time he took me hunting. He shot a magnificent elk, and we spent the rest of the day following the trail of blood left by the wounded animal. We never found it.” Jason dropped his eyes and studied the tablecloth between us for a few moments. When he looked up there was pain in his eyes. “I spent the next three weeks crying myself to sleep over that poor animal.”

“I can understand that.”

“Well, my father couldn't. He's had a hard time accepting that I'm different than what he had in mind.” Then, as if realizing he'd said too much, he leaned in and added in a conspiratorial tone, “When he married my stepmother, the first thing she did was make him get rid of all his big game trophies. Cleaned them out, every one. I never thought I'd see the day.”

When he finished chuckling, I asked, “You remember any of his hunting buddies or guides?”

“No. Not really. I was just a little squirt.” Then he gave me a puzzled look.

I took a sip of coffee and waved a hand dismissively. “I thought I might know some of the people he hunted with.”

Glancing at his watch, Jason said, “I've got to run, Cal. I told you pretty much all I know about breaching dams. If you need any more technical information before the meeting, call Winona. She knows a lot more than I do. I'm seeing her tonight, and I'll fill her in on our conversation. Oh, and Sunday night you can park under the Tower. Here's a pass.”

Since he'd brought up Winona, I decided to fish a little, although a part of me feared what I might learn. I said, “Winona's a real asset for your team. How did you manage to recruit her?”

“Believe it or not, she came to us and volunteered her services. It was a stroke of good fortune for me.”

I decided to lay it out there. “I've heard people say you two make a striking couple.”

A shadow crossed Jason's face, although it cleared so fast I wondered if I'd really seen it. He smiled a little too broadly. “That's what my father says. I have to admit I'm quite taken with her.”

After Jason left, I sat pondering the situation over a second cup of coffee. I hoped to learn a bit more about Royce Townsend's hunting habits, but Jason wasn't much help in that regard. I should've been planning what to do next, but instead I found myself pondering Jason's comments about Winona.

Quite taken with her? Give me a break.