The Silence of Murder (15 page)

“This is where you come to get water?” his dad asks.

“I’m sorry.” Chase frowns. “I didn’t know I wasn’t supposed to bring friends over to the house.”

“Friends?”
He shoots me a look that clearly states I’m no friend of his.

“Dad, please?”

I recognize something in Chase’s eyes as he talks to his dad. It’s the way he tries to please him, not just make peace with him like I do Rita. Chase still wants to please his father, and that makes me sad. I gave up trying to please Rita a long time ago. Maybe I’m not sure if I’m sorry for Chase still hanging on, or sorry for me having let go.

What I do know is that I don’t want to make things worse for Chase. “Sheriff Wells,” I begin, “this isn’t Chase’s fault. It’s all me.” Chase starts to object, but I keep going. “I wanted to find you.”

“You wanted to find me?” He’s not buying this. Not yet anyway.

I nod. “I guess I should have called, but I wasn’t thinking straight.” He’s staring holes through me, but I press on. “Somebody’s been stalking me, and I—”

“Stalking you?” Now he looks like he can’t decide whether to laugh me out of the house or force me out at gunpoint.

“I know it sounds crazy,” I admit. He nods in agreement. “But it’s true. Somebody’s been following me, watching me. And there have been phone calls too.”

“Phone calls?”

“Yeah. Heavy breathing. Hang-ups. That kind of thing.”

Sheriff Wells glares at his son. “What do you know about this?”

Before he can answer, I jump in. “I’ve told Chase most of
it. I think he got tired of me and went out to the garage for something. That’s when you came in.”

“What does your mother say about all this?” asks the sheriff, some of the fire drained from his eyes.

“I haven’t told her everything, but she’s seen the pickup.”

“The pickup?”

“A white pickup truck. Rita saw it parked on our street, and I’ve seen it a couple of times. It’s pretty scary. And I think that’s why it shows up everywhere. Somebody’s trying to scare me.”

“Why would anybody try to scare you?” Sheriff Wells asks, like I’m lying.

I shrug. “Maybe because I’m the only one who knows my brother didn’t murder Coach Johnson. The only one besides the murderer anyway.”

The fire shoots back into his eyes. “Are you insane?”

“No, sir,” I answer. He scares me to death, but I won’t let him see it.

Sheriff Wells squints at Chase. “Did
you
see this mysterious white pickup?”

“Not exactly,” Chase admits. “But I believe Hope.”

His dad reaches behind his neck and twists his head, exactly the way Chase does sometimes. “Do you have any idea how many white pickups there are in this town?”

“No, sir,” I answer.

“Or kids who make crank calls?”

“Dad,” Chase reasons, “could you just look into it, please? Maybe one of the patrol cars could drive by Hope’s house at night.”

“That’s a great idea,” I chime in.

“You think so, do you?” Sheriff Wells says, glaring at me.

“Absolutely. And I appreciate it. Thanks.” I turn to Chase. “It was a long walk over here. Would you mind giving me a ride to work?”

“Not a problem,” Chase says, following me out.

I smile back at Sheriff Wells. “I’ll be looking for that patrol car tonight. Thanks again.”

Once we’re outside, Chase whispers, “You were great in there!” He cranes his neck around so he’s staring into my face. “I never saw
anyone
stand up to my dad the way you did.”

“I did, didn’t I?” I’m every bit as amazed as he is. I don’t stand up to people.

“I wish I had it on film. Did you see his face when you told him you’d look for that patrol car tonight? You, Hope Long, are one brave lady.”

We walk the rest of the way to the car without speaking. My head is filled with what Chase said.
You, Hope Long, are one brave lady
. I have never been brave, not in my entire life. Only right now, for this one instant, as the car backs out of the driveway and onto the street, I feel brave. With Chase beside me, I feel so brave that I think I could reach up and stop Rita’s hand from touching Jeremy’s cheek.

Chase drops me off at the Colonial, and I head back to report in to Bob. The booths along one wall are full. So are two of the eight tables. I ignore the stares as I traipse through.

Bob’s pouring coffee behind the counter. Three of the four gray vinyl stools are taken.

“Hey, Hope!” he calls. “Thanks for coming in.” Bob
Adams looks like a happy-go-lucky butcher instead of a restaurant owner. I can’t remember if I’ve ever seen him without his full-length white apron. Under the apron are jeans that are too big or too small—I can never decide which. So much of the material is taken up by the front of him that the back of him gets shortchanged. When he bends over to get clean glasses, the unlucky customer behind him sees a lot more than he bargained for.

“Looks like you got some sun, Hope,” Bob observes.

Maybe I did. Or maybe my face is red from embarrassment. I hate people gawking at me.

“I need you at the tables this afternoon, I’m afraid,” Bob says. “Sorry. I thought Rita was coming in.”

“That’s okay.” We’re lucky to have this job. I know he would let me hide in the kitchen if he could. Rita calls in sick all the time, or just doesn’t come in, and still Bob doesn’t fire her.

I put on an apron and backtrack to table four. Two little boys are shooting straw papers at each other while their mothers whisper to a woman behind them. I clear my throat, and the chubby mom with short brown hair wheels around.

“Oh, I’m sorry.” Her face gives it away that the whispers were about me. “Um … we’ll just have fries.
French
fries.”

“
French
fries? Not Spanish fries?” I ask, going for humor because humor translates into tips, nine times out of ten. “Or English fries?”

“No. Just French fries,” she answers, without cracking a smile.

Behind me, a chair squeaks, followed by footsteps. I turn
to see a well-dressed woman in her forties. I recognize her from church, but I can’t think of her name. I brace myself for whatever she’s going to say.

She leans forward and gives me a hug. “How are you holding up, Hope?”

It’s about the last question I expected. “Hanging in there, I guess.”

“Well, good for you,” she says. “I want you to know that we’re praying for you and for your brother. For your mother too. Tell Jeremy we miss him, will you? Give him our love?”

“I will,” I manage.

“Tell him God hasn’t forgotten him,” she says. “But I’m sure Jeremy knows that if anybody does.”

“Thank you.” I want her to hug me again. I’d hug her back this time.

Things get crazy busy for a couple of hours. After supper, the restaurant finally calms down. About an hour later, it empties out totally, and I can retreat to the kitchen. I would rather wash a thousand dishes than talk to one more human.

As if sensing what I feel, Bob walks to the front door and turns over the closed sign. Then he joins me at the sink. “Tough, isn’t it?” he says.

“Yep.” I hand him the dish towel, and he starts drying glasses I’ve washed and set to air-dry.

“How’s your mother doing with everything?” Bob asks this like he’s twelve and has a crush on the homecoming queen.

“Rita? She’s just Rita, I guess.”

Bob has a dishwasher, but he doesn’t like to run the extra load at night. So when there’s time, we do the leftover dishes
by hand. I switch to the scrub brush and start in on the plates. “Bob, how well did you know Coach Johnson?”

“John? Pretty well when we were in school. We weren’t close or anything. And we didn’t get any closer over the years, I guess. I’m not sure why.”

“Did you go to school with him and my mother?”

“Sure did. Your mom was really something.” The angles of his face soften when he says this.

“Did Mr. Johnson think Rita was really something?” I dump in more green liquid soap and run the hot water.

“We all did. John was no exception. Heck, even Matt had an eye for your mother.”

“Matt? Sheriff Wells? And Rita?” I can’t picture it, not now, not then. I shut off the water before the suds overflow.

“Uh-huh. She had those Wooster boys going too.” Bob takes a plate from me, holding it in one hand with the edge of the towel and wiping swift circles with the other end. “You should have seen her, Hope. She was a looker, I’ll tell you. And the only girl in that whole school who knew how to flirt, I suspect.”

I’d love to ask him more about Rita and Sheriff, or Rita and Coach, but I don’t because I’m pretty sure Bob had a crush on Rita in school. I believe he still does. I can tell by the way he always asks about her and the look in his eyes when he says her name.

We’re quiet for a few plates. Then he says, “I’m pretty nervous about testifying in court.” He takes another plate to dry. “You know that lawyer’s calling me as a character witness, don’t you?”

“Yeah. Thanks, Bob. You’ll do great.” But I have to admit that I just don’t get Raymond’s trial strategy. First, he tries to prove Jer’s crazy. Then he calls witnesses to show what a good character my brother is? Raymond says he wants the jurors to like and trust Jeremy, but he still has to get in enough stories so the jury can call Jeremy insane if they need to. I guess it’s all part of that “kitchen sink” defense, as in throwing in everything but the kitchen sink. I don’t think I’d make a very good lawyer.

I’m not sure what I would be good at. It’s not that I’ve never wanted to be anything. Maybe I’ve thought about being too many things. I wanted to be a dancer once, but you can’t make a living at it. Well, at least I’m pretty sure
I
couldn’t make it pay. When I was little, I wanted to be a teacher, but that was just because I liked my first-grade teacher so much. I like art. My sea glass creations are pretty good, and I’m not that bad at drawing. But the things I try to draw never look as good on paper as they do in my head. I think I’d like photography.

Bob and I start in on pots and pans.

“I hear Rita has to testify too,” Bob says, pulling my thoughts back to dishwater. I hand him the broiler pan.

I start to explain about how it’s my fault Rita has to take the stand, but there’s a loud knock at the main door.

Bob ignores it. We closed at eight-thirty instead of nine, but Bob’s used to closing when he feels like it. The knock gets louder. “They’ll give up pretty soon,” he says.

But they don’t. They switch to the window and tap, banging with something metal, probably car keys.

“Go away!” Bob shouts. “Dang fools are going to scratch
my window.” I’ve seen Bob’s temper blow a couple of times. Once, he threw a customer out—and I mean threw him. I don’t want to see that temper now.

The scratch-tapping continues.

“I’m warning you!” Bob hollers through clenched teeth. “Stop doing that right now!”

But apparently, the wannabe customer has never seen Angry Bob. Bob flings the towel down, unties his apron, and throws it to the floor. “That’s it! I warned him!” He strides to the door in four giant steps.

I peek around the corner and see Bob grab the doorknob and yank the door open.

A young guy in a white shirt and black pants almost falls on his face. He scrambles to keep hold of the camera he’s tucked under one arm. “I thought you were open until nine,” he says. “Is that girl still here, the Long girl?”

Bob pokes the guy in the chest and keeps his finger there, drawn like a gun. “There’s a closed sign on that door. Can you read, Mr. Ace Reporter?”

“Easy, fella,” says the reporter. “I just want to ask her some—”

“What’s your name?” Bob demands.

“Why?”

“Because I’m going to sue you, your publisher, and the pony you rode in on. Now get out of here!” He shoves the man backward and slams the door so hard the glass rattles.

When I leave the restaurant
a little before nine, I head north to walk home. A car starts up, and I turn to see Chase’s Stratus parked under the streetlight a few feet away. Surprised, I wave and wait for the car to pull up alongside the curb. Tiny bugs swirl in the headlight beams.

“Not stalking you, I promise,” Chase says out his window. “I drove by a couple of times and saw you in there. Thought you ought to have a ride home.”

Nobody’s dragged Chase here. Not this time. He’s here because he wants to be. I feel my grin stretch too wide.
My
teeth aren’t perfectly straight and white like his. “Thanks.” I jog around the front of the car and happen to glance up. The sky has cleared, and the stars are so bright I can’t look away.

Chase sticks his head out the window. “You okay?”

I move around to the door and get in. “Sorry. It’s the stars. They’re amazing tonight.”

“I didn’t notice.” He puts the car in gear.

“You didn’t notice? How could you not notice?” A picture flashes to my mind—Jeremy and me lying on our backs, trying to count the stars. “Jer and I used to spend hours picking out constellations.”

“You can do that?”

“Yeah.… Can’t you?”

He shakes his head. “We live too close to the city in Boston. I’ve seen a lot of stars here in the summers—don’t get me wrong. I just can’t pick out the shapes everybody talks about.”

Nobody should go through life without knowing how to find the Bears—the Big and Little Dippers. Or Leo the Lion? Or Draco the Dragon! I snap my seat belt. “Drive,” I command.

“Where to?”

“To the greatest show on earth.” I direct Chase to Jeremy’s and my secret stargazing spot, an Amish pasture on the edge of Grain, where lights are not allowed unless they come from the sky.

When we get there, I spread out the picnic blanket and lie down on my back. Chase sits next to me. It was so hot in the Colonial that my shirt clung to me like plastic wrap. Now a breeze rustles the grass and fans us. Bullfrogs croak from a creek I can’t see but know is there, even in August droughts. A chorus of crickets gets louder, then softer, then louder, like someone’s messing with the volume control. Somewhere far away, a horse whinnies, and another one answers. “Jeremy loves it here.”

“I can see why,” Chase says, his head tilted up to take in the sky. “The greatest show on earth.”