He paused. I waited.
“I thought it was my fault somehow. Should have reminded him one more time, him not being a natural at this sort of thing. But people kept dying, and I figured if we carried that around with us, it was only gonna make our job harder and get even more people killed. It was self-indulgent, you know? People get killed. And a lot of times somebody’s standing next to them. That doesn’t mean—”
“I get it,” I said. “I’m fine.”
There was a long pause, Clair’s way of saying he knew I wasn’t.
“Speaking of robberies,” he said.
“Yes.”
“On the Louis front.”
“What?”
“Marta called and told Mary the woods were weirding her out.”
“And?”
“And Mary said, ‘Come up here, dear. We have this big empty house.’ ”
“Huh. You talk to Louis?”
“Yeah. He said she won’t be alone. Follows him closer than the dog.”
“They found her,” I said. “And somehow she knows.”
“Louis asked her that and she said no. She’s just going stir-crazy.”
“I don’t like it.”
“Too late,” Clair said. “They’re on their way.”
“I don’t want her near my house,” I said. “I don’t trust her.”
“A lot of half-truths, for sure.”
“As in, she’s lying her ass off.”
“I’ll deal with her. And he’s my problem, not yours.”
“Semper Fi?” I said.
“That’s right.”
“I don’t know, Clair. There’s a time and a place for all this loyalty stuff. My gut says this isn’t one.”
23
k
Renys was in a strip mall in Ellsworth, behind fast-food joints, next to a movie theater. I walked in, located the jeans, flipped through the piles and found my size. I checked to see if they were skinny jeans. They weren’t, so I went and bought them.
The high school girl at the register said they didn’t carry Band-Aids, glanced at the rip in my jeans, and held my money with two fingers like she might catch something. I stuffed my bloody jeans into the trash can outside the dressing room. A woman on her way into the dressing room looked at the bloodstains and then at me.
“Nothing to see here, folks,” I said. She stepped into the room and slammed the louvered door shut.
I smiled. It was just the send-off I needed.
The ride to Mount Desert Island was a straight shot east. There were deserted motels, a petting zoo that was closed for the season, ice-cream shops boarded up like a hurricane was bearing down.
In ten minutes a cove appeared on the left, more planks of ice tossed topsy-turvy onto seaweed-covered rocks. Then there was another bigger cove on the right, and I was onto the island. The road forked, the left lane going to Bar Harbor. I took the right, figured Rod Blaine’s headquarters would be on the backside of the island. He might be making money, but it wasn’t old enough to get him into Northeast Harbor.
I pulled into the lot of an antique barn, closed for the winter, the old stuff in the window getting older by the minute. On my phone I found Spruce Rock Construction in West Tremont, on the southwestern edge of the island. I pulled out and continued south, the road leading to the village of Somesville, all green shutters and white clapboards. A few disoriented tourists were wandering the deserted street like tropical birds blown off course.
I kept driving, reached Southwest Harbor, more shops, snow-covered B&Bs, a single sailboat on a mooring by the marina. The road swung southeast and I followed it, the carefully picturesque houses giving way to trailers, an abandoned farm, a couple of ranch houses with lobster traps stacked by the driveway.
There was a sign for Tremont and I turned right, followed a road that kept the shoreline at a safe distance. There were houses tucked into the woods on the inland side, driveways through the trees. Then the landscape opened up and there was pasture flanked by spruce and fir. After a crest in the road, there was a spread with a new house on the right, a horse barn on the left, the property bounded by a long split-rail fence.
I remembered Barrett talking about Silk—that Rod had built her a barn and bought her horses.
I slowed and turned in.
The house was two stories and oversized, three dormers on the second floor facing the road, and a separate two-story garage with truck-sized doors and a workshop on the side. There was a black Land Cruiser parked in the pull-off in front of the garage, and I pulled between it and the house and got out. The drive and paths were neatly cleared, showing a bed of pea-sized white stone, everything lined by cobbles.
Not cheap.
I walked to the front door of the house and pushed the bell. A dog answered, a small one, yipping excitedly, then another coming in late, same bark. They scratched at the other side of the door for a few minutes, barked louder when I rang the bell again.
But no one came.
I turned and looked out across the road to the barn. There was a new Toyota pickup parked there, also black. A matching set. I walked down the drive and across, fifty yards to the barn. The door was closed but I could hear music playing. Some sort of New Age chiming. I knocked once, slid the door open, and stepped inside.
It was a big open space that smelled of raw wood and horses. There was tack hanging on the walls, a saddle on a stand, like you’d put a quarter in and your kid could go for a ride. I said, “Hello,” and heard a woman’s voice, but she wasn’t talking to me.
I walked in that direction, went through a doorway and saw a long passage, box stalls on the left side. The voice was coming from the second stall and I approached and looked in.
A woman was brushing a big horse. The horse was dark brown with a white blaze and looked fit and sleek and expensive. The woman had blonde hair pulled back in a ponytail that protruded from under a black knit cap. She was wearing a black down vest over a red fleece sweater, tall rubber boots, and leggings. She looked sleek and expensive, too.
“Hi, there,” I called, and she looked up and flinched, put a hand on her chest.
“Oh my God, you scared me,” she said.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “The music.”
The horse snorted and waggled his head. She patted him.
“I’m Jack McMorrow,” I said. “I’m looking for Rod Blaine. I’m from the New York Times.”
She smiled, said, “Oh, great. We were hoping we’d hear from you.”
At last, a warm welcome for the press.
She led the horse to the far end of the stall, put a scoop of grain in a bin on the wall. The horse lowered his head and started to eat. She put the brush on a shelf and hurried to the gate, opened and stepped out, and shook my hand.
“I’m Silk Salsbury,” she said. “Rod’s partner. He’s on a job site, but I can tell you where to find him.”
Huh, I thought. Maybe not the monsters Barrett Hines had described.
We walked to the big room and crossed to some sort of separate office. There were photographs of horses on the wall, some with Silk, too. She was less pretty in person but still very attractive. Very different from the sturdy, fifty-something, sensible-shoed Lindy Hines.
There was a framed map of the island on the wall with the horse pictures, and Silk stepped up to it, tapped the glass with her finger.
“Rod’s at the job in Seal Harbor,” she said, like I should know about it. “Do you know the island?”
“I can GPS it,” I said.
“It’s easy. All the way back to Somesville, right on Route 3, and stay on that all the way past Northeast, then, like, two and half miles to Seal. There’s a Spruce Rock sign by the road. You take that right and it’s like a quarter-mile down to the point. You’ll see our trucks.”
“Okay,” I said.
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I was about to ask her thoughts on Lindy’s death when there was a booming sound from the stalls, a young woman’s voice saying, “Silk. Are you there?”
Silk turned, said, “Oh, Minotaur. He’s having a bad day. I gotta go. But listen, do you have Rod’s cell?”
She was headed for the door, snatched a business card off the desk and handed it to me. “In case you get lost,” Silk said.
And then she trotted off. I glanced at the card. Rod Blaine was president of Spruce Rock Construction, LLC. Silk Salsbury was VP. Both of their cell numbers were listed.
They hadn’t wasted time consolidating.
I left the barn, walked up to the house and got into the truck. It started with a rumble and I backed up, headed out. From the top of the rise, through a gap in the trees, you could see a glimmer of shimmering ocean. It was quite a spread, a far cry from the Riverport condo.
It was almost twenty miles up and around the island, and I had time to think about Lindy in this new light. Had she been bitter, leaving her marriage, and business, just as the latter was taking off? How would Rod Blaine justify jettisoning his wife for a newer model? Did he feel any responsibility for her death? Was he eager to talk to me because he wanted to get something off his chest?
I drove north on the coast road, passed a place called Pretty Marsh, which was pretty, but I couldn’t see the marsh from the truck. Then I backtracked through Somesville, started down the east side of the sound. This was old-money territory, discreet signs at the top of long driveways down to the ocean, names for the houses that dated back to a time when people did that. Naming your McMansion was pretentious; here, back in the days when the Rockefellers moved in, it had been de rigueur.
I skirted the village of Northeast Harbor, another village of shops and galleries, understated as the preppie clothes in the windows. The ocean, big and gray and empty, was on my right as I drove the last couple of miles to Seal Harbor. I watched for the Spruce Rock sign, and finally spotted it. The logo of tree and mountain from the card.
I stopped too late, backed up, and drove slowly down a steep gravel driveway through dark, dense woods. And then the woods opened up, and there was big shingled manse, pickups parked off to the left. Beyond the pickups was a massive carriage house, with raw new shingles, rising three stories. I parked by a new Ford pickup, the gold Spruce Rock logo on the door. It was a $60,000 truck, all the bells and whistles. Rod’s ride.
I collected my tools, pen and notebook, and got out and went to the door. I could hear compressors running, nail guns banging, guys shouting over the noise. Stepping in, I smelled propane heaters and varnish and, when my eyes adjusted, saw the ocean through the glass rear wall of the place. The glass wall gave way to a vast veranda where workers were cutting what looked like mahogany or some other exotic wood. I pushed a glass door open and walked out. Scanned the deck and picked him out.
Rod was tall and lanky, narrow hips and broad shoulders. He was wearing a brown canvas jacket, a baseball hat, and work boots. He was dressing down a young guy, saying, “Can’t you read a blueprint?”
I waited as they looked down over the railing, Rod pointing to some mistake. When he straightened and turned, I was there. I said, “Rod Blaine?”
He looked down at me dismissively, like I’d come to ask for a job.
“Who’s asking?” he said.
“Jack McMorrow. I write for the New York Times.”
His face broke into a grin and he held out his hand eagerly, took mine and shook it vigorously.
“Jack,” he said. “Glad you could make it up. What do you think?”
He gestured toward the building behind us, the spread of the deck.
“Beautiful,” I said. “It’s not what it seems from the other side.”
“That’s the magic. The reveal. You think it’s going to be a place for the cars, maybe a few rooms for the help. But you get in here and you’re right over the ocean. I mean, look at that view. With the original building that was here before, that was wasted. We’re removing the barrier that exists between us and the majesty of nature in a location like this. This is full immersion design, but still in keeping with the aesthetic tradition of these grand cottages.”
“Beautiful,” I said again.
“Want to do the whole tour? Is your photographer coming in?”
I looked at him.
“I’m thinking there’s some misunderstanding,” I said.
He stopped.
“What? You’re from the New York Times, right? You’ve been talking with Millicent?”
I smiled.
“The architect?” he said.
“I write for the Times, but I don’t write about houses.”
“Then what do you write about?”
“At the moment I’m reporting a story about the murder of your estranged wife, Lindy Hines.”
His smile dissolved, his face drained, ruddy to gray.
“I can’t talk about that. I mean, it’s horrible. I still can’t believe it happened. Me and Lindy, things didn’t work out, but she didn’t deserve that.”
“I know. So can you tell me more about her? What she was like as—”
“This has got nothing to do with me,” he said. “Nothing.”
Blaine looked around, grabbed me by the upper arm, and pulled me across the deck and through the door. He shut it, still holding me by the arm.
“Listen. We’ve been separated for two years. I’m with another woman now.”
“I know,” I said. “I met Silk. She gave me directions.”
“You told her you were writing about Lindy?”
“We never got that far. She did seem oddly happy to see me.”
Blaine looked away, then back.
“Jesus Christ,” he said. “What did you say your name was?”
I told him. He took a breath and regrouped.
“Jack, I can’t be in your story. I mean, I’m trying to put all of that behind me.”
I looked at him. “I don’t quite understand. I’m writing about Lindy, who she was. Your marriage may have ended, but you were a big part of her life. And your stepson’s.”
“Barrett? Is that who set you on me?”
“I didn’t need any setting,” I said.
“I don’t know what he said about me, but if you print any of it, I’ll sue you.”
I shrugged.
“Hey, if you can get some local lawyer to take the case, go for it. It’s your money.”
We stared at each other for a few long seconds.
“Okay. Let’s back up. It’s like this. Between us, I’ve got a deal in the works. A very big deal. Investors who want to take this, what you see here, and go national. Design-build on spec. The Northwest. Florida. North Carolina. These private equity guys are right at that tipping point, you know? And putting me right in the middle of a story about some crazy homeless guy who happens to kill my soon-to-be ex-wife—it’s not what I need right now.”
I didn’t answer.
“You get it, right? They see that, think, ‘What? Who is this guy from Maine? What else in his life is messed up?’ And they take their money elsewhere.”
I still didn’t answer.
“So no,” Blaine said, getting in my face.
“No comment?”
“No—as in, I don’t want my name in your story at all. I’m not with her. Hey, we grew apart. It happens. We were only talking through lawyers. What’s she got to do with me?”
A guy came through the door with a sheet of blueprint. Blaine waved him away.
“Still,” I said, “my job is to write about Lindy, explain who she was as a person. You were a part of who she was.”
“Was. As in past tense. Not anymore.”
“So you don’t want to talk to me? Don’t want to hear my questions?”
“I tol
d you. This crap has nothing to do with me. I mean, it’s too bad, sure.”
Too bad. Lindy’s head split open. It was all I needed.
“Your stepson told me for the record that he blames you, partly. He said that if you and Lindy had stayed married, she wouldn’t have been living on her own in Riverport, and she never would have crossed paths with Teak Barney.”
His face went red, jaw snapped shut. He leaned in and said, “You put that in your paper, I won’t sue you. I’ll beat the living shit of you.”
“You know this conversation is on the record,” I said.
“Fuck you and your record,” Blaine said. He leaned in and I didn’t budge. And then he fell back.
“Okay. Sorry. I’m just upset. I mean, I thought a lot of Lindy. Shit, I loved her for a while. I still can’t wrap my head around this thing. It’s nuts. And she didn’t deserve that. We had our problems at the end but she was a good person.”
I waited.
“Anyway, there’s just a lot going on in my life even before this craziness.”
I nodded.
“How ’bout this? I should get word on this deal in, like, six weeks. How ’bout you wait on this story until after the deal’s done?”
I shook my head. “The news is the murder. This is the follow. No way can I wait six weeks. Or six days. Or six hours.”
He started to boil over again, fought it back.
“Okay. How much they pay you to write this? You on salary?”
I hesitated.
“Freelance.”
“So, what? A couple of thousand bucks?”
“Something like that.”
“I’ll pay you twenty grand, cash. Go sit on your hands for a couple of months. Go on vacation. You married?”
I didn’t answer.
“Take the wife to Barbados. Sit on the beach and drink rum. Fuckin’ A. I got friends here with hardware. As in private jets. I will have you flown down in a friggin’ Citation.”
I took out my notebook.
“What was she like? I’m told she was a hard worker with a great head for numbers.”
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