Old Chaos (9781564747136) Read online

  “Okay.” She subsided onto the passenger seat as he dealt with the sparse Saturday traffic.

  Since the hotel was in Hood River, Charlie drove on the Oregon side. It was a misty day. The mammoth basalt formations of the Gorge, hazed now with spring green, receded from vision like the landscape in a Chinese watercolor. There was plenty to look at. Someone had once counted twenty waterfalls on I-84 between the Sandy River, the western entrance to the Gorge, and Hood River.

  “I don’t want to leave either.”

  “What?” Charlie pulled around a semi with two long trailers. Road scum sprayed the windshield.

  “I like Klalo. I want to stay, but I won’t go back to Beaver Creek as long as Patrick is running things.”

  Charlie squirted wiper fluid on the windshield. “Good. You can teach me how to wind surf.”

  “If they’ll let me wind surf.”

  “Who’s going to stop you?”

  “Oh Charlie, I love you.”

  After an increasingly uncomfortable silence he said, “And don’t say that unless you mean it.”

  Beth spent the day clearing out Mack’s office and doing the paperwork of a real sheriff. There was quite a lot of it. She consulted Ramona when she wasn’t sure of what she was signing but would have preferred to talk to Rob. He wasn’t there, unfortunately.

  He had called her to say evidence had turned up in Two Falls that meant another organized search. Lt. Prentiss had agreed to facilitate a quick analysis of the sports-drink bottle Jack Redfern had found. “Quick” probably meant two or three days. Beth could see that thorough investigation involved maddening delays. Rob sounded resigned to the wait, at least for the analysis. The search was taking place as Beth sorted her husband’s belongings.

  Since Rob had not been around to drive her to the courthouse, Dany did. They made a quick visit to the hospital first. Peggy looked much better and was feeding Sophy with a bottle while Skip watched. It was a touching sight and somehow very private. Beth kissed Peggy and the baby, and Skip for good measure. Then she and Dany took themselves off.

  Dany helped her to Mack’s office and left with a box of odds and ends. Beth locked the door and sat at the desk, brooding. The previous night she had read through the bank statements—ten years’ worth—without enlightenment. It was a savings account in a bank they’d never patronized. Mack had been squirreling money away at the rate of about a hundred dollars a month during that time. There were a few larger deposits, but the largest amount was $250. On two occasions he had taken money out, the bigger withdrawal being $840. That was an odd sum. She wracked her brain but couldn’t remember anything they’d acquired that had cost that exact amount. The withdrawal had occurred five years ago. Was that when they’d replaced the television?

  Money talks. Beth wished this money would. She decided she’d have to show John the statements and ask for his expert opinion, even if it meant his father had taken regular tiny bribes. Having reached that unhappy conclusion, she unlocked the door, notified Ramona that she was open for business, and went on with her sorting.

  At midday Ramona brought her a pastrami sandwich and a Coke, neither of which Beth liked. She ate them meekly, used her walker to find the ladies’ rest room, and settled back into the badger den. She only discovered she had worked a full day when Ramona stuck her head in the door at five o’clock and said Dany was waiting.

  From long maternal acquaintance, Beth knew Dany was up to mischief. She was sure of it when she found her granddaughter Beatie sitting in the back seat of Dany’s car. Beatie had returned to Portland with her father after the funeral.

  “What’s going on?” Beth asked sharply.

  Dany grinned. “Do you mind if we swing by the old house?”

  “I’m very tired.”

  “Come on, Mom. It won’t take long.”

  “Okay,” Beth grumbled. “How are you, Beatrice darling? You’re wearing your bubble gum shoes.” Beth despised the little-girl fashion of Pepto-Bismol-pink costuming, but Beatie was proud of her pink plastic shoes. “And a tiara. Very regalitarian.”

  Beatie laughed and bounced forward to kiss her grandmother. Then she had to be induced to refasten her seat belt. The child was verbally precocious but abnormally normal in her tastes. She told Beth in detail how well she had taken care of her father and sister while Mom was staying in Klalo. By the time she wound down, Dany had parked in the driveway of the old house. A suspicious number of familiar cars littered the curbside. The house was lit from basement to attic.

  “What?” Beth demanded.

  Dany winked. “A little surprise.”

  After Dany and Beatie had helped her up the steps and in the front door, a wave of greeting swept over Beth. All three of her sons were there with their wives and younger children, and Dany’s husband and smaller daughter. Only John’s two teenagers had stayed home in Portland. There was as much hugging and kissing as there would have been if Beth had not seen them in months.

  The interior of the house looked suspiciously different. In December, before they moved out, Beth had started to prepare the place so it could be put on the market. She had shampooed the old carpet and given away as much of the furniture as the family wanted. Now she was torn between laughing and crying. She had tried for years to get rid of that furniture. It was back in place, polished and even reupholstered.

  A sofa she didn’t recognize sat across from the fireplace. Her daughters-in-law had hung new drapes. Beth wasn’t sure she liked the fabric, and the swag was a tad pretentious, but the curtains gave the big living room a fresh look. She eyed a reupholstered chair and decided she wasn’t the kind of woman whose belongings matched anyway. When she collected her wits, she said how delighted she was, but that wasn’t enough.

  “Come on, Mom. You have to see this.” John’s wife, Lindsey, took her arm.

  “Let the sheriff use her walker,” John murmured.

  Beth smiled at him. He had always been the most empathic of the three boys. She lurched the few steps to the dining room, and there it was, a huge, circular oak table of the kind her parents had had at the ranch. She had been looking for one before Mack took it into his head to buy the plastic palace.

  “Oh, yes,” she said. “Oh.”

  “I found it at an estate sale,” Lindsey boasted.

  “But you’ll want it for your own house,” Beth protested. John and Lindsey had bought a great old Victorian off Thurman in Portland and were slowly filling it with period furniture.

  “We need something with knobs and gargoyles,” Lindsey said breezily. “Oak fits this house.”

  “Does it have a leaf?”

  “Two!” Lindsey crowed. “And enough chairs for all the grownups.”

  Beth kissed her. “I love it.”

  “Look at the rest!”

  The rest comprised a heavy oak sideboard and china cupboard, the latter filled with what looked like a service for twelve in Blue Willow. In the mudslide Beth had lost her favorite Franciscan ware and the everyday Mikasa. She could get used to Blue Willow.

  “All this stuff—it must have cost a fortune.”

  John said, “Insurance will cover it, Mom. I’m going to see if I can salvage your silver when the inspectors are through sifting the ruins. For now we found a good set of stainless.”

  “And a raft of glasses at that estate sale,” Lindsey said happily. “They’re in here.” She led Beth into the kitchen, which was the same crummy old room it had been, except that the girls had cleaned and polished everything. They had stuffed the cupboards with cookware and utensils, probably taken from their own kitchens, and a boring set of everyday china she recognized. Someone had given it to Jimmy’s wife when she married, and she’d been trying to get rid of it ever since. A new coffeemaker gleamed beside the old gas range. A nice little breakfast table and chairs sat in the nook that overlooked the backyard.

  The sight of her old kitchen ought to have depressed Beth, but didn’t. It was wonderfully familiar. The counters sagged beneath a fa
mily feast, casseroles and salads and pies and a huge ham. Clearly her offspring expected to sit down at the oak table then and there, with a couple of card tables set up elsewhere for the kids.

  Beth took a deep breath. She wanted to slink back to Rob’s house and go to bed, but that wouldn’t do. She looked around, catching their eyes, Jimmy and Mike and John, Dany and her daughters-in-law and Dany’s sweet husband. She smiled. “I love you all very much. Thank you, and let’s eat.”

  A good two hours later Dany drove her back to Rob’s house. “Tired?”

  “Yes,” Beth admitted. “Very tired. Where are they staying?” At that moment the idea of all those wonderful people swarming into Rob’s place was intolerable.

  “At your house.”

  “But there aren’t any beds upstairs!” They had set up a temporary bedroom for her downstairs in what had been the office/library, originally a second parlor, though everybody understood that she wasn’t ready to come back yet. When she and Mack had moved house, the beds upstairs had either been shifted to the basement level of the Prune Hill house, or in the case of the four battered, swaybacked twin beds from the big sleeping porch, taken to the dump. Beth had not inspected the second story of the old house at all, not wanting to tackle the stairs. “What have they done?”

  Dany laughed. “Nothing very startling. Each of us furnished a bedroom. Lindsey did two.”

  “But you did it so fast!”

  “Two days,” Dany said with an air of understandable self-congratulation. “Lindsey bought the dining room set and the drapes yesterday after I measured things. We all had extra beds, mostly doubles. The boys rented the truck last night, drove to each house, and loaded up. They got here by eleven this morning.”

  “Wow.” It amused Beth to think of the extra beds. The fashion now was for queens and kings. Beth supposed the kids had been married long enough to want to discard the original bedroom sets from long-abandoned apartments and starter homes.

  “Four different styles, all of them, uh, somewhat the worse for wear.” Dany got the giggles. “I made the guys promise to replace the mattresses, so the beds should be comfortable enough. What the hey, Mom, you believe in recycling. The stuff is usable, it doesn’t cost you anything, and my set even comes with its own coverlet and curtains. When you get tired of your new’ furniture you can call Goodwill with a clear conscience.”

  “St. Vincent de Paul,” Beth corrected. She had to laugh, too.

  “The kids had a great time this afternoon clearing a play space in the attic.”

  Beth groaned. She’d meant to go through the attic before they moved but hadn’t had time. God only knew what was up there. “My grandmother’s armoire!”

  “It’s okay. Genie was with them.” Genie was Mike’s wife. “The kids will use the sleeping porch, too, of course.” The sleeping porch had been the boys’ dormitory when they were young, with a spare bed for whatever friend wanted to stay the night.

  When Beth and Mack had bought the house, the porch had been open to the elements. They had glassed it in and insulated it. It ran the width of the house and was just about large enough for three active boys. Beth supposed half a dozen smaller grandchildren would fit into it nicely. She didn’t want to know how it was furnished—bunk beds?—so she didn’t ask. And the attic would transform into a game room, no doubt, with computers and all the impedimenta of modern child-life. It was a good idea. Maybe the grandchildren would come more often than just for holiday dinners. Maybe they could spend the summer…Good God, she thought, I’ve taken leave of my senses.

  When she got home and collapsed onto Robert Guthrie’s re-cliner, it occurred to Beth that she had forgotten to tell John about the bank statements. Dany was off in the kitchen making tea. Beth reached for her cell phone, saw that she had messages, and called the first number, which she didn’t recognize.

  It was Karl Tergeson.

  Beth said, “It’s Elizabeth McCormick, Karl. You called me.”

  “It’s not true. It can’t be. Not my little girl, not Inger.”

  “Karl, I don’t—”

  “They found her. They’re saying she killed herself.” He began to sob, the terrible wrenching sound of a man who was unaccustomed to crying. “You have to stop them saying that. It’s not decent.”

  Beth cleared her throat. “I’m sorry, Karl. I’ve been out of touch for a couple of hours. I hadn’t heard.”

  “Call yourself a sheriff?” Karl broke the connection.

  Beth phoned Rob. “Karl Tergeson just told me Inger’s body had been found,” she said without preamble.

  “That’s right.” Rob’s voice was flat and the connection wasn’t good. She heard odd whooshing noises. “I just came from telling the Tergesons. We found her about two hours ago on the east bank of the Choteau, just below the turnaround where the car was abandoned—on the other side of the river. Jack Redfern thought the current might take her there if she went in farther upstream. I left a message on your voice mail.”

  “I’m sorry, Rob.”

  “Me, too. Christ, Jake, watch the fucking road.”

  “Did she commit suicide?”

  There was a crackling pause. Rob’s voice came through stronger when he finally spoke. “You know I can’t say what caused her death at this point. We don’t even know for sure that she died from drowning.” He drew an audible breath and added, wearily, “The body was battered. Lots of rocks in the Choteau. We found a piece of paper in one of the zip pockets of her track suit. It’s probably illegible. May be a suicide note.”

  “Karl is terribly upset that somebody is saying she committed suicide.”

  Another pause. Rob cleared his throat. “If you think Karl is upset, you should see Larry. We had to get the medics to sedate him. I’m on my way home. Shall I stop in and brief you?”

  “If it’s not too much trouble,” Beth said. “Thank you, Rob. I’m sorry you had to break the news.”

  “Me, too.”

  ROB SHOWED UP less than half an hour later. Dany brought him in to Beth and left them to their talk. He didn’t sit.

  “You’re in pain,” Beth said sharply.

  “I went off without a supply of pills this morning, and it’s been a long day.” He took up his post behind the high-backed chair, leaning on his good arm. “Don’t concern yourself, Beth. I stopped off and took a Vicodin before I came here. It’ll knock me out in the next half hour, so let’s get this over with.”

  “All right. I’m listening.”

  “We found Inger’s body about six-thirty.” He fiddled with the blue sling, avoiding her eyes. “Jack found her—washed up in an eddy on the far shore—after we’d searched every inch of the west bank.”

  “I see. Karl said—”

  “Prentiss is convinced that she killed herself sooner than face arrest. He had already asked Judge Rosen for a warrant. Now he’s trying to decipher the note we found in her track suit.”

  “A warrant for murder?”

  Rob shook his head. “Prentiss isn’t investigating murder. He meant to charge Inger with suppressing the hazard warning. She may have done that. I don’t know. I’m pretty sure she didn’t kill Drinkwater, or jump in the river and drown. I’m gambling that the postmortem will show she was dead, or at least doped, when she went into the water.”

  “And?”

  “Who killed her? I can’t give you the name.” He shut his eyes, forced them open. “I don’t have a shred of proof. I should be getting some early next week. Lab results, financial records.” He drew a ragged breath. “Goddamn, I hate weekends. I hate—”

  “I’m sorry.”

  He stared at her. Tears glazed his eyes.

  “You are not to blame yourself for failing to make an arrest before she disappeared, whatever foolishness Larry and Karl may be saying in their grief.”

  “But—”

  “Listen to me.”

  He buried his head in his sleeve. She could see his hand cramp on the back of the chair.

  “Listen,�
� she repeated. “You don’t know what was going on in Inger’s life, what chances she was taking, who she trusted and should not have. She was a remarkable woman, in some ways, and perfectly ordinary in others.”

  He didn’t reply, but she thought he was listening.

  “I never taught her,” Beth mused. “She had finished high school before I started teaching, but even then she was visible, a personality. And beautiful, of course. If you think she was good-looking at forty, as a teenager she was a goddess.”

  He raised his head, his face pale but composed. “I’m five years older. I was out of high school, and out of town, before she appeared on the radar.”

  Beth nodded. “The boys swarmed. In spite of that, she always had female friends.”

  “And she married Larry Swets.” Rob frowned. His hand still gripped the chair as if he might fall over.

  “Inger’s father was protective and conventional. Utterly conventional.” Rather like Mack, she thought.

  He straightened up and stared at her.

  “I’ve no idea whether Inger was a lesbian,” she said mildly. “I doubt it. I wouldn’t be surprised if she was bisexual, but I don’t know if she ever acted on it. With Larry on the river, she was alone a lot of the time. I’m just saying that she was not necessarily as conventional as Karl wanted her to be.”

  “She was scornful when I asked if she’d had an affair with Fred.”

  “What did she say?”

  “That the voters wouldn’t forgive her if she played around.” Both of them had a good idea what the voters would say to a lesbian relationship, let alone a simple extramarital affair with a man.

  After a moment, Rob went on, “Darla told me Inger had a ‘fling’ with Fred last summer. I took that to mean a dirty weekend at most.”

  “‘The voters wouldn’t forgive her,’” Beth repeated. “I don’t know about the voters. Her father wouldn’t. Well, he would, but he’d agonize. It’s hard to be adored.”

  Rob mouth relaxed in a faint smile. “I wouldn’t know.”

  “I wish we’d get over our sexual pruderies. Including Karl and the pope.”