Out Of The Deep I Cry (13 page)

A hard, cold comfort, Niels thought. “Do you worry that you’ll be taking that away from them if we succeed in having Jonathon declared dead?”

She closed her eyes for a moment. He could see the beginnings of fine lines, the slight extra droop where her eyelid would someday sag onto itself. She startled him by opening her eyes and staring directly into his. “I love Mother and Father Ketchem dearly, and I wouldn’t hurt them for the world. But I’ve been saying that my husband is dead for seven years. It’s what I told Chief McNeil the day after Jonathon disappeared, and I knew it was true then as I know it’s true now. They choose to believe otherwise. I don’t think anything I do will change their minds.”

“What about your daughter?”

“Her father disappeared when she was barely six. She missed him something fierce at first, but seven years in a child’s life is forever. I can’t even recall when she last mentioned him. And now she’s getting to an age where she can hear the gossip, and be hurt by it, and I don’t want her to go through what I’ve had to go through.” She let her purse drop flat on her lap and leaned forward, her hands curling over the edge of his desk. “For seven years I’ve been not fish nor fowl nor good red meat. Not a widow and not a wife. Every soul in Millers Kill either pitying me because they think my husband abandoned us or wondering what I did to drive him away. I can’t have a cup of coffee with my brother-in-law or have Father Wallace pay a call without setting tongues clacking all over town. My friend Nain once overheard Tilda Van Krueger saying in the beauty shop that it was mighty convenient having an absent husband, because if I turned up in a family way, I could just claim he stopped back in for a visit.” She took a deep breath. “I want my respectability back, Mr. Madsen. I want to be able to set up a memorial stone for my husband and put him to rest once and for all.”

Niels Madsen thought about his client while he strolled home for a 12:30 dinner with his family. He paused at the walkway to his home, square and roomy and comfortable, and thought about her keeping her own roof over her head instead of moving back in with her parents or in-laws, as so many other women would have done. And when Marion, his oldest, danced past him with the suggestion of a kiss and an “Off to Helen’s house” tossed over her shoulder, he thought about the difficulties facing a single mother of a growing girl.

In the dining room, after a heartfelt thanks over a good lamb stew and quizzing the younger children on how their mornings went at school, he asked his wife if she had ever heard any gossip about Jane Ketchem.

“I heard Mrs. Ketchem took an ax to her husband and buried him under her cellar floor,” ten-year-old Pauline said. “When there’s a full moon, you can hear him moaning, ‘Give me back my head! Give meee back my heeeead!’ ”

Doris, who was eight and still slept with a night-light, shrieked.

“Girls!” Ruth Madsen said. “Quiet down this instant or you’ll both have bread and water in your room. What nonsense.”

The girls giggled, but resumed eating. Mrs. Madsen turned to her husband. “One does hear a few things around town,” she said. She glanced at Normie, who was clearly bristling with something to say but too intent on showing up his sisters with his good manners to just blurt it out. “What is it, Normie?”

“Lacey Ketchem’s in my class,” he said.

“I know that, dear.”

“Well, she says that her father was away on a trip and that he was set upon by desperate men. Probably murderous hoboes who didn’t have a thing to lose. She says that there would have had to be a lot of them, because her father was a big, strong man, and that they killed him and stuffed his body in a tree and set it on fire.”

“Good heavens!” Mrs. Madsen looked at her husband.

He shrugged. “You’re the one who insisted we buy the radio. It’s no wonder all our children sound like announcers for next week’s episode of
The Clutching Hand
.”

“Can we get down, Mother?”

“Can we get down?”

“May we,” Mrs. Madsen corrected automatically. “Normie, are you finished? I want you to walk your sisters back to school.”

Normie excused himself and pushed his chair away from the table. Niels reached one hand out and took his son’s arm. He looked directly into the boy’s face. “What I was discussing with your mother had to do with the practice. And anything concerning the practice-”

“-is not to be repeated outside this house. I know, Father.”

“Good boy. You can come by the office after school if you like.”

There was a clatter of shoes and a general banging of the door, three, four, five times. Niels had never been able to figure out how three children could sound like a horde of Huns ransacking a town.

Satisfied that their offspring had well and truly departed, he turned to Ruth. “So, what sort of things does one hear around?”

“I’m curious. Why the sudden interest in Jane Ketchem?”

“She’s asked me to petition the court of probate to have her husband declared legally dead.”

Ruth arched her brows. “Interesting.” She broke open a roll and buttered it. “The general consensus among the gossips-not that I’m one of that number, mind.”

“Of course not.”

“Is that Jonathon Ketchem ran off on her. The disagreement is whether he took off because he couldn’t find work, because he had a girl waiting, or because she drove him away.”

“Huh. I hadn’t heard the story about there being another woman involved.”

“Oh, people say he was paying a lot of attention to one of those Henderson girls whose father worked on Ephraim Ketchem’s farm. I forget which one. Evidently, she did leave shortly after he disappeared. Supposedly headed out west to seek her fame and fortune.”

“That makes sense.” He helped himself to another serving of butter beans. “I never could believe it was poverty that made him take off for a shoe-leather divorce. Things were starting to get tight around here in ’30, but the younger Ketchems got a reasonable price for their farm when the dam was being raised. Certainly no worse than anyone else caught up in the shuffle. There should have been enough to buy new land elsewhere or start himself in a business.”

“Maybe he ran off with the money, too.”

“Maybe.” He thought about Jane Ketchem’s shoes and outdated dress. “What’s this about her driving him away?”

His wife looked at him speakingly. “Consider that the Ketchem girl was six when her father disappeared. Same age as Normie.”

“So.”

“So, in the six years after we had Normie, I had two more babies and lost a third. Maybe it was just that God chose not to bless the Ketchems with any more children…”

“Or maybe there wasn’t any chance for any more. I see your point.” He folded his napkin and stretched. “I’ll see what I can do for her, poor lady. If she did damp the fire down until he left for good, she’s paid dearly for it.”

Ruth stood and began to stack the dishes. “Can you really argue for Jonathon Ketchem to be declared legally dead? When no one except Jane and her daughter believe it? What on earth are you going to say to the judge?”

“Oh, no problem with that.” He grinned up at her. “I’ll just bring in Normie and have him testify as to how Ketchem was set upon by murderous hoboes.”

Russ hung up his parka in the mudroom, pried off his boots, and walked into his darkened kitchen on stockinged feet. Lord, he was tired. He had pulled two shifts a day since Friday, and his body was letting him know he was too old for that schedule. Contrary to his less-than-charitable thoughts, Lyle, like Noble, really had been knocked out by a nasty stomach flu. His deputy chief had told him over the phone that he hadn’t been more than five feet from the bathroom since the thing started.

He flicked on the light and went to the refrigerator to see if there was anything to eat. Linda was gone again-off for a week to visit her sister in Florida. Her girlfriend Meg had driven her down to Albany to catch the plane, because covering one-fourth of his department hadn’t left Russ with enough time to do it himself. That rankled. He hated not being there for her when she needed him.

He pulled a Coke out of the fridge, nudged the door shut, and wandered into the pantry, hoping there would be some Tuna Helper or something. Although he normally enjoyed cooking, to night he wasn’t up for anything more than opening a box and a can. Thank God he had had the sense to assign his two part-time officers tonight duty. If he’d had the patrol tonight, with its homeward-bound tourists getting lost and running into each other, or its domestic calls, which were always worse on Sunday nights, after a weekend of togetherness with another crappy Monday morning staring people in the face… he’d probably have driven off the Route 100 bridge into the river.

No Tuna Helper. He slid a box of macaroni and cheese off the shelf and got a pan from under the counter. He should have just told his mom he was coming over for dinner tonight, but the price for a hot meal would have been listening to her razor-thin slices at Linda for abandoning her hardworking husband for sun and fun with a divorcée. He had pointed out that he was welcome to join Linda on her annual sisterfest. The last time he had gone had been two years ago, and the pleasure of escaping from the cold March weather hadn’t made up for the boredom of hanging around a Fort Lauderdale condo while the two women shopped and got their nails done. Plus, he called the station house so many times to see how they were doing without him that Linda claimed flying back home would be cheaper than the phone bill.

He put water on to boil and collapsed into one of the kitchen chairs with his Coke. Linda had done something different with a St. Patrick’s theme. There was a new tablecloth on the table, new place mats and napkins, and curtains festooning the windows. All green-and-white fabrics, tweed and tiny gold-edged shamrocks and presumably Irish shepherds helping Irish shepherdesses over a stile. Their house was a laboratory for Linda’s burgeoning drapery business, which meant they were more or less in a state of constant redecoration. At least she had farmed out some of the work-three neighboring women stitched away at ruffles and blinds and whatnot, so Linda could meet her orders without sewing eighteen hours out of twenty-four.

The rattle of the lid on the pot told him the water had come to a boil. He heaved himself out of his chair and poured the macaroni in, stirring it with a big wooden spoon. Maybe he should have just said the hell with it and gone to Florida. Maybe he would. Just fly down there, surprise her. They could go out to dinner together, take a long walk, rent a boat and get out on the ocean. Well, no, she didn’t really care for long walks and she didn’t do too well on the water unless she was in something pretty big. Okay, he could swallow his dislike of sunbathing and lie around on the beach with her. He could make the ultimate sacrifice and take her shopping. Anything. They just needed to spend some time together and talk about something other than who bought the groceries and who was going to the bank.

He drained the pot, went upstairs, and changed out of his uniform into sweats. Back downstairs he ate his mac and cheese in front of the TV, flicking from one lousy show to another, wondering why the networks couldn’t schedule one of the NCAA finals on a night when he was at home. He rinsed out his bowl and loaded the dishwasher. He wandered down to his cellar workroom, but the thought of putting in time on one of his projects made him feel as if a lead blanket had been placed on his shoulders, so he went back upstairs. He thought about calling a few airlines to see how much it would cost for a last-minute ticket to Florida. He thought about calling his sister Janet, catching up with what his nieces were doing. He thought about calling his mom.

He picked up the phone and dialed Clare’s number.

She answered on the second ring. “Hello?”

“Hi, it’s me.”

“Russ.” He could hear her smile. “I knew it was you.”

“How did you manage that? I didn’t know I was going to call until I had finished dialing.”

“I’m your Psychic Friend.”

He laughed. “Does that mean I’m being charged by the minute for my call?”

“Yeah, but think about it. Isn’t a dollar ninety-nine a minute a small price to pay to have all your secrets revealed?”

“God, I hope not. I don’t think I could live with all my secrets revealed.”

“Mmm.” There was something-an audible quality to Clare’s listening. He couldn’t ever put a finger on what it was, just that he could hear the force of her attentiveness. “What’s the matter?”

“Oh, nothing. I’m beat to the ground from working double shifts for the past few days, and Linda’s left for Florida, and there’s nothing on TV, and I guess I’m feeling pretty sorry for myself.”

“Why don’t you invite yourself to stay at your mother’s? She’d love to fuss over you.”

“I don’t need fussing over. I just need…” He wasn’t sure how to finish the sentence.

“A little human connection.”

“Yeah.” He pulled another Coke from the fridge and strolled into the living room. “What have you been up to lately?”

“Let’s see. Robert Corlew and I met with the roofing guys. It’s going to be a big job. The engineer says the chances are good that water has been spreading through the roof laterally, so there may be additional structural damage they’ll have to replace and more framing before they actually get to the reshingling and gutters. He quoted us some material costs. My Lord, you wouldn’t believe how expensive this waterproof-barrier stuff we’re getting is.”

He sat in his favorite chair. “I’ve checked it out myself. I believe it.”

“I have to confess, I’ve been feeling guilty as sin over taking Mrs. Marshall’s trust fund money and stiffing the clinic, but I walked away from the meeting so grateful that we at least have that option. I got the impression that the whole north aisle was ripe for a cave-in.”