A grave denied (33 page)

Looked like progress to Jim, and he turned and looked down the hill. Spruce, birch, and alder interrupted now and then by a cluster of mammoth cottonwood crowded the hillside. The dark green roof of the Niniltna Native Association offices was about a thousand feet down on the left, and after that it was pretty much all trees for half a mile until they ended abruptly in the airstrip, a jumble of Niniltna rooftops, and the Kanuyaq River. It was a bright, clear day, the sky washed clean by a morning shower, and everything looked as bright and shiny and inviting as a king salmon hitting fresh water for the first time.

The foreman came up to him, a thickset man in his middle thirties with big, calloused hands and brown skin that was half race and half making his living outdoors in all weather. He removed his hard hat, revealing a head shaved down to the skin, and wiped his arm across his forehead. “If the weather holds I don’t know why you can’t be in by this time next month. It’s not that big a project.” He spat. “You say something about a house?”

“Yeah, Jim,” a voice said, “you say something about a house?”

He looked around to see Dinah standing next to him, a smile that was a little more nasty than it was nice on her face. “Haven’t got a site for the house yet,” he told the foreman.

“Really?” Dinah said innocently. “What about that acre you bought from Ruthe, down on the river? Plenty of room for a decent size house, I’d‘ve thought. You’ll want three bedrooms, of course, one for you and the missus, one for your office, one for hers.”

“Missus?” the foreman said. He was from Ahtna, and Ahtna knew all about Chopper Jim Chopin. The foreman was married with three children, and like many such had given the occasional wistful thought to the freedom of his bachelor days. It comforted him to know that Chopper Jim was out there living them for him, and he was caught between amazement and a slight sense of betrayal at the thought that his idol might have fallen from his pedestal. He couldn’t prevent a look of deep reproach.

Jim set his teeth. “Is there something I can help you with, Dinah?”

She gave him a sunny smile. “Now that you mention it, yes.” She motioned him to one side. “It’s about Kate.”

He was immediately wary and it showed.

She flapped a hand. “Calm down. This is about her cabin.” Her voice sunk to a confidential murmur. He listened, his suspicions gradually fading. At one point he held up a hand. “Wait a minute,” he said, and went to talk to the foreman. “Okay with him,” he said, coming back a few moments later. “Turns out a while back Kate helped find his sister when she ran off to Anchorage.”

“We’ll get a lot of that,” Dinah said. “Good, great. I’ll talk to Auntie Vi and Bernie. How about you?”

“How about me? How about I get back to work?”

“How’s it coming? Any breaking news on the Len Dreyer/ Leon Duffy front?”

He sighed deeply. “So, you’ve heard.”

She gave him a look of total scorn.

“Yeah, yeah,” he said.

“A lot of people are upset about his record.”

“They worried about their kids?”

“I was just up at the school. I did a video for the freshman health class and I took it up for the teachers and the principal to preview. They’re all talking about Duffy.”

“Maybe that should be my next stop.”

“Maybe it should. I would think a pissed-off parent would have the best motivation for murder in the world.” She added, “And there have already been a few parents up there, banging around, wanting to know what’s being done.”

“Great,” he said.

“They’re scared,” she said, somber, “and I don’t blame them. They’re terrified what horrible things might have been done to their children, what they might have allowed to happen. And when you live in the Park, this kind of thing is such a shock. There are so few of us in such an enormous space, we depend so heavily on each other. You just don’t think the neighbor who repairs your roof at cost plus a cord of wood is going to attack your child when your back is turned. No, I don’t blame them,” she repeated. “If Katya—he was on our roof for four days straight, Jim. If Dreyer had touched Katya, if he had even looked at her
the
wrong way, I would have burned down the house with him on top of it. And that’s only if Bobby hadn’t gotten to him first.”

She spoke with an intensity and conviction that demanded both belief and respect. He touched her shoulder, a gesture of comfort. After a moment she was able to smile. “Sorry. It just gets to me.”

“Which parents were up to the school?”

Dinah thought back. “Cindy and Ben Bingley. Demetri Totemoff. Arlene and Gerald Kompkoff. Billy and Annie Mike. The Kvasnikofs.”

“Which Kvasnikofs?”

Her brow creased. “All three couples, I think, and Eknaty Sr. and Dorothy, as well.” She counted mentally. “And a few I don’t know.”

He wrote the names down on a list. She watched him. When he was done, she said, “Jim, what if one of them did it? What if one of them killed Dreyer?”

“I know, Dinah. You have to remember that whoever killed Dreyer tried to kill Kate, too. And would have gotten Johnny as a bonus if he’d succeeded.”

“But he didn’t.”

“No. And he won’t.” He tucked the notebook away.

“Jim-”

She might have said more but for the four-wheeler roaring up, Johnny Morgan on board with Vanessa Cox clinging on behind. They veered off the road so abruptly that Jim and Dinah leapt back out of the way. The four-wheeler locked up and skidded sideways, sliding to a halt just inches away.

“Watch it, damn it!” Jim started to say, and then he got a good look at Johnny’s face. “What’s wrong?” he said instead.

Johnny swallowed hard, an agonized expression on his face. He opened his mouth and nothing came out.

Without knowing how it had happened, Jim found Johnny’s shoulders between his hands, Johnny’s feet dangling a good foot above the ground, and Johnny’s face, even whiter than it had been, two inches from his nose. “What. Is. Wrong,” he heard someone say from very far off. The hands gripping Johnny’s shoulders gave him a shake. It didn’t look like much of a shake, but Johnny’s head jogged back and forward again. “Where. Is. Kate,” he heard that other person’s voice say, louder now.

“Jim. Jim, let the boy go. Let him go now. Jim! Let the boy down, damn it! Jim!”

He felt a sharp pain in his knee and looked down with some astonishment to see Dinah pulling back to kick him again. “I’ll do it!” she said fiercely. “Put the boy down!”

He looked back at Johnny and realized it was his own hands holding Johnny in the air. “Oh,” that other voice said. “I’m sorry.”

He lowered Johnny to the ground without letting go of him. “I’m sorry, Johnny.” It hardly seemed adequate, especially when he looked over Johnny’s shoulder to see the Cox girl, her face as white as Johnny’s, still on the seat of the four-wheeler with her arms wrapped around her middle looking like she was going to vomit. “Christ,” he said. His hearing came back suddenly. “Christ,” he said again. “I’m sorry, Johnny.”

Some of the color returned to the boy’s face and he looked at Jim like he was seeing a human being instead of a monster. Jim knew a keen and sudden shame. “I’m sorry as hell, kid,” he told him. “What’s wrong?” He tried not to cringe while waiting for the answer, and didn’t question the wave of relief that threatened to swamp him when Johnny did.

“There’s a body,” Johnny said, “a man.”

“Dead?”

Johnny nodded.

“Where?”

“Up at Len Dreyer’s cabin. In back, in the woods. The magpies… the ravens…” He turned and took two steps and threw up neatly onto a currant bush just leafing out from the bud.

Jim waited until he was done and produced a handkerchief that he kept in reserve for moments like these. Johnny wiped his mouth and blew his nose and held it out. “Keep it,” Jim said. “Do you know who the man is?”

Johnny nodded. “At least I think so. Like I said, the birds… I think it’s the chiefs son.”

A cold knot grew in the base of Jim’s stomach. “Which one?”

Johnny looked confused. “I don’t know. The one who’s always around. The one who wanted to work Len Dreyer’s case with you. The one with all the girlfriends.”

“Dandy,” Jim said.

Johnny nodded. “He’s been there a while. Long enough for the…”

Jim put a hand on his shoulder. “I got it.”

Johnny took a wavering breath. “I think…”

“What?”

“I think he was killed the same way Dreyer was killed. He had a hole in his chest. A big hole. He…” He shook his head and went over to the four-wheeler and sat down. The Cox girl hid her face against his shoulder.

“Son of a bitch,” Jim said. He wheeled for his vehicle.

Dinah trotted next to him. “Jim — ”

He had the door open and one foot in the Blazer. “Want to tell me again why I shouldn’t be looking for Dreyer’s killer, Dinah?”

She flushed. “No,” she said tightly. “I wanted to know who was going to tell Billy and Annie.”

He was shamed, and rightly so. “Ah, shit,” he said. “Okay, look. Take those two kids home to Bobby. Tell him and no one else. No one, Dinah, you hear?” He pulled himself inside the cab and reached for the keys. “If it really is Dandy, I’ll tell Billy and Annie myself.”

And then he stamped on the gas pedal and got away from the devastating sympathy in her big blue eyes.

₁₇

Kate knocked and the door opened. “Hi, Virgil,” she said. “Kate Shugak,” Virgil said, inclining his head with that inbred old-world courteousness displayed by male Park rats who had spent their formative years on a continent other than North America. “Won’t you come in? Telma,” he called out, “Kate Shugak is here.”

There were immediate sounds of industry in the kitchen, and she had coffee poured by the time they got there. As Kate sat down, Telma brought out a plate of cookies. She smiled at Kate.

“Thanks.” Kate munched and drank without appetite. Virgil sat down across from her. Telma took a sponge and Comet to what looked to Kate like an already spotless counter. Virgil watched her, touching her hand when she came within reach. “You should sit down, Telma,” he told her. “I do not want you to be tired out.”

“Good cookies,” Kate said, washing down the last bite.

Virgil smiled. “It is a special recipe my Telma makes, pumpkin and chocolate chip.”

“Really,” Kate said. “You’ll have to give me the recipe.”

Virgil’s smile broadened. “My woman, she does not give out the recipes, Kate Shugak. They are family recipes, meant to be handed down from mother to daughter.”

Telma paused in her scrubbing to shake out more Comet.

“I’ll have to bribe Vanessa, then,” Kate said with her own smile. “Actually, I came to talk to Vanessa. Is she here?”

“She is not back from school yet,” Virgil said. “Is something wrong with the girl?”

“No, no,” Kate said, hoping it was true and reluctant to alarm the Hagbergs over what might be nothing.

Virgil examined her with shrewd eyes.

“How has your breakup been?” Kate said brightly.

“Fine, fine,” he said. “I service the vehicles, you know, like always they are slow to start after a winter’s sitting in the garage. And I have the few projects I am doing.” He cocked an inquisitive eye. “You would have the more to do this breakup, I am thinking.”

She gave a glum nod. “That I would, Virgil.”

“You will be building a new cabin, I am thinking.”

She nodded.

“Something bigger, now that you have the boy with you.”

She nodded again. “I don’t know when, but yes, something bigger.”

“You are sleeping in the RV now? The one they got stuck on this side of the Lost Chance Creek bridge?”

She smiled a little. “That’s the one.”

“That is a very sharp turn, that turn coming off of the east end of that bridge. The gravel they put there keeps sliding down the bank. It is always muddy.”

“It is that,” Kate said.

“It is good that you have a place to sleep out of the wet, Kate Shugak, but I am thinking you will not be happy in that RV for very long. Nor the boy.”

“No,” she said, a little mournfully.

“So you will build again. You need the help, I am good with the woodworking,” he said.

She was touched. “That’s a wonderful offer, Virgil. Thank you.”

Telma finally finished with the counter, sat down next to Virgil, folded her hands on her lap, and smiled at Kate. Virgil put his hand on hers and squeezed. “My Telma,” he said fondly.

Kate helped herself to another cookie even though she didn’t want one. “I’ll need all the expert help I can get, especially with Len Dreyer dead.”

Virgil’s smile didn’t change. “A man cut down in his prime,” he said piously. “A sad thing, that.”

Not necessarily, Kate thought.

“You will catch the terrible person who shot him,” Virgil stated.

“That I will,” she said. “And more to the point, the person who burned down my cabin.” She looked at Telma. “These really are wonderful cookies, Telma. You’re an amazing baker. I hope you’re passing some of that skill along to Vanessa.”