Superior Storm (Lake Superior Mysteries) (7 page)

“What if you can't get into Silver Bay?”

“Then we'll go from Bayfield,” he said. “Listen, if you schedule this with your folks, I'll make sure it happens, one way or the other.”

“Fair enough,” I said.

I was beginning to think that Red Hollis might have a pretty good idea. There are no magic bullets when you are dealing with real live people, but it couldn't hurt to get some couples on a yacht in the mid
dle of Lake Superior
and threaten to throw them off the boat unless they started behaving like adults.

Another couple had called, again out of the blue. They were new to the North Coast. Apparently
,
the wild beauty of the cliffs, the impossibly clear water
,
and
the
golden autumn on the ridges had not yet solved their marriage problems.
Aside from my occasional fits of frustration, I did enjoy counseling couples, and it was often a good way to connect new folks with our church community.

She was small
,
with
dark
hair and olive skin,
bursting with suppressed energy. She stalked into the main church office like a cat, looking all around her, touching books and running her hand along the reception desk.

She turned, quick and smooth, when she saw me. “I'm Jasmine,” she said, holding out her hand. Her grip was firm and cool.

He was medium height, badly cut brown hair, with broad shoulders and a powerful handshake. His face was coarse, his features blunt, and quite frankly, he was ugly to look at.

“Tony Stone,” he said.

Where she seemed to be full of energy and curiosity and passion, he seemed reserved and distant.

“Come on in to my office,” I said. I offered them coffee, but they both declined. The pot was half-full however, so I figured I
had
better drink some without them. The pot was always half-full
,
with me.

Jasmine Stone
walked
around my office, looking at pictures, and always touching something – my books, my desk or stroking chairs as she moved past them. Tony stood impassively.

“Please sit down,” I said to them. They sat next to each other on
the
little love seat in the sitting area in front of my desk. I sat in one of the armchairs in front of them.

“So how long have you been in Grand Lake?” I asked.

“Actually we live north a little ways,” said Jasmine.

“Well, how long have you lived there?” I asked.

“Not long,” said Tony Stone.

There was a pause.

“So what brought you up here?” I asked.

“Business,” said Stone. It was quiet again. Usually when I wait, people will start talking.

“Oh
,
let's cut the crap,” said Jasmine, tossing her hair. “We're miserable.” She looked at Tony with shining eyes and stroked his arm. “We need your help.” She turned back to me. Tony sat impassively in the love seat. His legs weren't crossed
,
and he looked completely comfortable.

“What seems to the problem?” I asked.

“We fight all time,” she said. “Don't we
,
honey?” she added in a little-girl voice, squeezing Stone's arm.

He stirred, as if coming out of a daydream. “Yeah,” he said. “We fight a lot.”

“What do you fight about?”

“Money,” said Jasmine quickly, her eyes flashing.

Stone seemed almost to smile slightly. He looked straight ahead, not at me, not at her. “Yeah,” he said. “We fight about money.”

We all sat there for a moment and contemplated this.

“Anything else?” I said at last.

“Oh, we're just all messed up,” said Jasmine. “We fight all the time
,
and we're unhappy. We need some serious help. Like
,
if you could lock us up in a cabin somewhere or something, off away from it all and help us work it out.”

Stone looked at her speculatively and nodded slightly.

“Well
,
I'd want to know more about you before I had you locked up,” I said. Jasmine locked eyes with me and gave me a stunning smile that
,
for some reason, made me want to blush. Stone's lips twitched slightly.

I asked some more questions, and we talked further, but when they left an hour later, I still had no clear handle on what their problem was. We scheduled another appointment for the next week.

A lot of North Coast towns don't really understand what they have in terms of tourist potential. Granted, the season is short, but even so, many of the little towns along
H
ighway
sixty-one
between Duluth and Canada almost ignore the fact that they have a drop-dead gorgeous freshwater ocean right in front of them. You have to look hard even to find a restaurant with a water view. Grand Lake is an exception. Some far-sighted town planners purchased a nice strip of waterfront downtown, a little north and east of the old ore docks. They turned the lake
-
front into a nice park. The street running behind the
park is filled with restaurants, bookstores, little touristy craft shops
and a small indoor mall set in a renovated lumber mill. Several of the restaurants look out to the park and lake.

Dylan's is one of these. It's a small café and coffee house, named in honor of the North Coast's most famous son, Duluth native Robert Zimmer – better known to the world as Bob Dylan. Dylan's is the perfect combination of a Starbuck's, a French café and a log cabin. Leyla and I were having lunch there.

“You know,” I said, “the chicken salad its
elf is as I good as I can make –
”

“High praise,” murmured Leyla. I ignored her.

“But the brilliant thing is to put a slice of aged
Swiss
on it. I don't know why nobody else puts
Swiss
cheese
on
chicken salad.”

“You sound like you are eighty years old,” said Leyla. “Are you going start talking about your intestinal health soon?”

“Aren't we crabby,” I said. “The fact is, I love food. I love to create it, to smell it, to taste it, and yes, talk about it.”

“Sorry,” she said briefly. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. I took the moment to enjoy watching her. She opened her eyes.

“Why do you look at me that way?” she asked.

“I can't help it,” I confessed.

She shook her head and looked away like she was a bit angry. “I don't get you, Jonah Borden.”

“I'm sorry,” I said. I had no idea what for, but it seemed like a good thing to say.

I chewed some more chicken salad. “A couple came in the other day,” I said. I told her a little bit about Jasmine and
Tony Stone, without naming them.

“I don't know what to make of it. I mean, she seemed almost excited
. If
it didn't sound so weird, I'd even say, 'turned on.' He sat there like a pile of bricks, but at the same time, he didn't seem uncomfortable or anything.”

“Is that unusual?” asked Leyla.

“Well
,
yeah. I mean
,
normally
,
there's quite a bit of tension between couples who come in. But I didn't get that. It was almost like they were coming to marriage counseling just because they felt like they should, or something, but not because they really need it.”

“Maybe we need counseling, Jonah,” said Leyla suddenly.

“What?”

“Maybe we should get counseling.”

“We aren't married,” I said.

She gave me a withering a look.

“Look,” I said, “maybe
I
need counseling, but I'm not sure
we
do. It's my own hang up, Leyla. I'm working on it.”

“Are you?” she asked.

“Well, it's only been a week since we talked about this,” I said. I admit, it even sounded lame to me.

She looked out over the lake. It was a gray day
, and the
heaving
water lay like pewter
out to the horizon. When she looked back at me, she had tears in her eyes.

“I can't help thinking that I'm the one who screwed this up.” She wiped at her eyes. “We had a good thing going, and then I was so ready to believe the worst about you. Well, I don't anymore
,
Jonah. I believe the
best
about you. But now
you
are
thinking the worst about
me
.”

“I'm not, Leyla.”

“Then can you even try and explain what the problem is?”

I thought about it. All I knew was that there was some kind of hesitancy, a slowness to give in to what I knew I could feel for Leyla, if only I let myself.

“I don't want to say it wrong,” I said. “Maybe we should agree on some date, on that day, or sooner, I will tell you about it.”

She shook her head, and covered my hand with hers. “I'm sorry
,
Jonah,” she said. “I don't mean to push you. Let's talk about something else.” She took a deep breath, and seemed to mentally shake herself out of something.

“All right,” I said, “how about I tell you how Dan Jensen asked his wife Janie to marry him?”

She pursed her lips. “I suppose.”

“I thought chicks loved engagement stories.”

She flipped her hair back. “So now I'm just a chick?”

“Possibly a
b
abe,” I said. “
But
definitely not a broad.”

“Are you going to tell the story or not?”

I pursed my lips. “I suppose,” I said. She hit me.

“Okay, okay,” I said. “So Dan and Janie have been dating for a
while. Things have gotten pretty serious
,
and she can just tell it's only a matter of time before he pops the big question.”

Leyla nodded sagely. “Women know these things.”

“Anyway, he takes her to this really fancy restaurant in Duluth.”

“What restaurant?” said Leyla.

“I don't know,” I said. “One of those really fancy places, you know with thirty-dollar entrees.”

“You don't know which restaurant it was?” she asked.

“No.
What's the difference? It was –
”

“You're telling me an engagement story,” she interrupted, giving me with a withering look, “and you don't know which restaurant they went to?” For some reason
,
she seemed to be on the attack. “What was she wearing?”

“Wearing? Are you crazy? How could I possibly know that?”

“If you were a woman
,
you would know it.”

“I am definitely not a woman.”

She smiled a sudden and mischievous smile. “I have noticed that, actually.”

“Do you want to hear this story or not?” I said.

“I suppose.”

“You are walking on thin ice, lady,” I said. “Okay. I don't know what anyone was wearing, and I don't know the actual restaurant, but it was the kind of place you go to ask someone to marry them.”

Leyla offered the faintest hint of a sniff.

“If I may continue?” I said. “So all through dinner, Janie is expecting something. Dan is acting nervous. She's chewing her spaghetti carefully in case there's a ring in it.”

“They paid thirty dollars a plate for spaghetti?”

“Okay, so I don't know what they ate either – or what they drank, for that matter. Do you really want to hear this story?”

“I'm enjoying the story,” she said blandly.

“I don't know whether to laugh or cry,” I said.

“It's about time someone gave you some of your own medicine.” After a moment
,
she added, “go on.”

“So Dan is a bit nervous. He keeps acting like he's going to say something important, and then ends up just asking for the ketchup.” Leyla opened her mouth. I held up my hand quickly. “No, they did not put ketchup on their spaghetti, or even have ketchup, or spaghetti, for that matter. The point is, he's not asking the question, but she thinks he might be trying to work up to it.”

“You're doing fine,” said Leyla. “Someday, maybe you'll even be able to make your living in public speaking.”

“Thankfully, people like you don't interrupt when I'm preaching,” I said.

“Go on.”

I waited.

“Please,” she said, her eyes sparkling. “We're having so much fun, aren't we?”

“One of us is, anyway.” But
,
truthfully, I was glad to see her back on an even keel. I took a breath. “Anyway, they leave the unnamed restaurant, after having eaten anonymous meals, wearing unidentified clothes. The question has not been asked. They go down to the shore to watch the sunset.”