The Alpine Obituary (11 page)

Permanently, I’d wondered?

Heather personally delivered our drink orders to the bar. Maybe she was overcome by Spence’s charm.

“You beat me again today,” I remarked, trying not to sound annoyed.

“That’s radio,” Spence said, removing a pack of Balkan Sobranie cigarettes from somewhere inside his oatmeal-colored cashmere sweater. He proffered the gold-tipped cigarettes. “I forget, do you . . . ?”

“Yes,” I shot back and took one out of the pack, which was actually a box, black, with gold lettering. A very tasteful way to kill oneself. I hoped they cost at least a buck apiece. I planned to smoke several of them.

“What do you think?” he inquired, leaning over to light the cigarette for me. “A hermit? A hiker? A poor lost soul?”

“There’s no way of knowing until an ID is made,” I said.

“You can speculate,” Spence said. “Not in print, of course.”

I shook my head. “It’s pointless. It could be anyone. A berry picker, a mushroom gatherer, a treasure seeker with a metal detector. That’s not uncommon around here. But you know that.”

Spence, who had finally removed his sunglasses, managed to make his brown eyes twinkle. Maybe he had batteries in his head. “Oh, I’ve picked up a lot of local lore in the past two years. I’m good at that. I absorb things, like osmosis.”

Grudgingly, I admitted that I understood. “In journalism, you have to be a quick learner. When I came to Alpine, I was overwhelmed by all the names I needed to know. By the time I got out my first edition, I could breathe a little easier. Having Vida helped immensely. But eleven years later, I still can’t keep track of who’s related to whom, not to mention the exes and stepchildren and the family feuds.”

“In some ways,” Spence said, “it’s easier in a big city. There, you only have to know the VIPs. The rest of the news makers come and go.”

“That’s true,” I agreed. Then, because the story we’d done on Spence when he arrived in town had been deliberately cursory, I asked which big cities he’d worked in over the years.

“I started out in Salinas, the lettuce capital of the world,” Spence replied, his gaze fixed not on me, but the glass mural of the northern lights behind the bar. “Over a period of five years, I made the circuit of small-town California radio. Finally, I caught on with an FM station in Sacramento.”

He paused as Heather presented our drinks, a bourbon and water for me, a dry martini for Spence.

“How long were you in Sacramento?” I asked after Heather had gone back to her post by the bar’s entrance.

“Three years,” Spence replied. “Frankly, I didn’t like doing FM. It was a classical station, and in those days, you had to sound very highbrow, almost effete. Like this—‘Now we have Dmitri Shostakovich’s Symphony Number 5, Opus 47, performed by the London Symphony Orchestra, Pierre Monteux conducting’.”

Spence recited the announcement in a mid-Atlantic voice I barely recognized. I couldn’t help but laugh. “So you returned to AM radio?”

He nodded. “In Milwaukee. I had the morning drive-to spot. It was the post-Woodstock era. Everything was crazy. I got a little crazy, too.” He stopped, glanced at me, then stared at his glass. “This tastes more like vodka than gin. Can you see who’s tending bar?”

I twisted around in the booth. Behind the artificial trees that flanked the bar, all I could see was a white-shirted arm. Heather, however, was eagle-eyed: She rushed over to ask if something was wrong.

After Spence stated his complaint, Heather apologized. “The regular bartender took the week off. You know, to extend the holiday weekend. Fred Iverson’s taking his place, since the Venison Inn is closed right now. Frankly, I don’t think Fred’s much good at mixing drinks, even if he does say he subs for Oren Rhodes at the inn.”

I vaguely recalled seeing Fred behind the bar when Oren was sick or on vacation. As co-owner of the Venison Inn, Fred usually ran the kitchen at night.

Heather was back in a flash with the proper martini. She apologized again, but Spence gallantly soothed her and sent her on her way.

“Milwaukee,” I said, resuming our conversation where it had left off. “Where did you go after that?”

“Chicago,” Spence answered, carefully studying his drink. “How about you? I understand you worked for a long time in Portland at
The Oregonian
.”

“Almost twenty years,” I told him, a little surprised that he’d gotten off the subject of himself. “I was in a rut, and when the chance to buy my own weekly came along, I jumped at it. How did you get from Chicago to Alpine?”

“It wasn’t a direct route,” Spence said, again staring at the mural, which depicted fjords and trolls and other Norse symbols. “Mainly, I got tired of working for other people. Like you, I suppose, I was in a rut.”

“It couldn’t have been easy,” I pointed out. “That is, there was no radio station here until you started KSKY. You had to apply to the FCC for the license, buy the property, build the plant—that takes entrepreneurship.”

Spence shot me a sly look. “And money? That’s what you’re really thinking, isn’t it?”

I tried to look innocent. “I inherited the money to buy the
Advocate
. Raising a child on my own didn’t give me the luxury of socking away serious savings.”

“I had a windfall, too,” Spence replied, then held up his drink. “Now this is a real martini. Beefeaters, I think.” He looked straight at me again. “What’s going on with this story about Jack Froland getting murdered?”

“June Froland temporarily lost it,” I said. “That’s my guess.” I glanced at the bar where I could see Fred Iverson serving Cal and Charlene Vickers. After Labor Day, Cal always closed his Texaco station at six o’clock. If your needle was hovering on empty during the evening, your only hope was Gas ’N’ Go by the Icicle Creek Tavern. “I suppose we could ask Fred what he thinks.”

“He’s pretty busy right now,” Spence said, “especially for a guy who can’t tell vodka from gin.”

“You’re right,” I said. “Let’s discuss our mutual media situations.”

“Ah.” Spence paused to eat one of the two olives Fred had put in his drink. “Why not do that over dinner? They serve in the bar.”

I accepted another expensive cigarette from Spence, which gave me time to consider the offer. It was Friday night, I was already here, and so far Spence hadn’t annoyed me very much.

“Fine. We split the tab.”

“Of course.” Spence looked amused. “This is an alliance, not a partnership.”

“What’s the difference?” I tried not to cough. The Sobranies were stronger than the ultra lights I smoked. When I smoked. When I wasn’t quitting.

“The difference?” Spence again gazed at the mural. “A partnership would mean we’re in this together, all the way. An alliance hedges our advertising bets. We’ll still be trying to cut each other’s throat some of the time.”

“What do you have in mind?” I asked, raising my hand as a waitress I didn’t recognize came away from the table next to us. More and more of the local restaurants seemed to be drawing on the labor pool provided by the community college students. “Menus,” I said to the dark-haired girl. “We need menus.”

She nodded and scurried off.

During the meal we discussed ideas and strategies. Combination ads for radio time and newspaper space. Discounts for the upcoming holiday season. Attempts to get more national advertising to promote mail order catalogs. And—something Kip kept nagging me about but I put off— a joint Web site on the Internet.

“I can’t believe you haven’t done that yet,” Spence said as the bill arrived in a tasteful green folder with a pen that featured a troll on top. “I had a student at the college put ours together a month ago.”

“So why isn’t it online?” I inquired.

“There are still a few bugs,” Spence replied, scanning the bill. “Besides, I’ve been meaning to discuss a combination site for some time. I didn’t want to rush you. That is, I knew you had other things on your mind.” He paused and looked up from the bill. “You owe thirty-two dollars including tip.”

“I’ll have to write you a check,” I said. “I don’t have that much cash on me.”

“That’s fine, I’ll card it.” He reached into his wallet and withdrew a platinum Visa card.

I wrote the check and handed it to Spence. “I appreciate your thoughtfulness,” I said stiffly. “I mean, about not . . .” I couldn’t quite get the words out. Maybe the second drink had made me emotional.

Spence shrugged and stood up. “I’m not a completely insensitive boob. Besides . . .” Now he stopped, then shrugged again and put on his sunglasses. “We’ll touch base Monday, bring Leo into the loop. Okay?”

“Sure,” I said as we nodded farewell to Heather. “Leo’s very good at what he does.”

“I’ve noticed,” Spence said as we exited the ski lodge. It was almost dark. “If Leo weren’t so good, I wouldn’t have to worry about the competition.”

Spence walked me to my car. “It’s a funny thing,” he said as I clicked the remote door opener. “When I first got into radio thirty-odd years ago, I wondered why. It seemed as if television was taking over the airwaves. But radio’s survived and come on even stronger.”

“It’s the print media that’s a dinosaur,” I said, slipping into the driver’s seat. “I meant to ask you—why Alpine?”

Spence looked up at the clear night sky with a trillion stars so close they seemed within reach. “Oh—just lucky, I guess. Good night, Emma.”

He closed my door and strolled off to his Beamer. I had been pleasantly surprised by our dinner together. Maybe Spencer Fleetwood wasn’t as big a jackass as I’d thought he was. There were qualities in the man that I hadn’t yet seen until tonight.

But there were also many things I didn’t know about him. That bothered me, because I realized that Spence had eluded several questions during the course of our get-together. I wondered why.

I arrived home at a quarter after eight.

I’d forgotten to stop at Parker’s Pharmacy and get my prescription for Paxil.