by M. K. Wren
“Something imaginary?”
“I’m afraid so. And that voice—well, she’s heard voices before.” Delia paused, studying him, then with a sigh, “I’ll take you to the grove, but after dinner; after Clare goes to bed. All right?”
He smiled. “All right.”
*
Dinner was a pleasant hour, with a beautifully prepared meal served at the round oak table in the dining room on white damask with Coleport china, Waterford crystal, and Sheffield silver. Clare had apparently forgotten the shots and the voice in the willows; she was vivacious and animated, assuming the role of gracious hostess and playing it well. A chandelier of Tiffany-shaded lamps cast a warm light on the sparkling table, multiplying itself in reflections in the bay window. Clare’s gray eyes caught the lights, and she was, briefly, the beauty she had been so many years, so many heartbreaks ago. She talked of the childhood and youth on the Becket family farm on Reynolds Creek, of parties and balls, of picnics and sleigh rides, and even—to Conan’s surprise—of Lee Langtry’s courtship, portraying him as a handsome, gallant knight in a white linen suit riding up Reynolds Creek to sweep her off her demure feet. But she didn’t touch on the aftermath of that courtship.
After dessert—blueberry cobbler, hot from the wood stove—Conan was sent to the parlor to enjoy a cup of coffee and a cigarette while the sisters washed the dishes. He started a small blaze in the fireplace against the chill of the mountain night, and was immersed in an old book on mining when Delia and Clare came in.
Clare said brightly, “I just popped in to say good night, Mr. Flagg. It’s been such a pleasure having you visit us.”
He had risen, and it seemed quite natural to make a little bow to her. “The pleasure was entirely mine. I hope you sleep well.”
“Thank you. Good night, Delia.” They exchanged light kisses and Clare departed. Delia listened for her footsteps on the stairs, then turned to Conan.
“I told her I had to see Dex about some business tonight, and you’d be going along. I didn’t want to say anything to remind her of what happened—or what she thinks happened—in the grove. My, that fire feels good. I’d better get a coat on before we go.” She stood before the fire, rubbing her hands in its heat, and she seemed abstracted, as if she were considering something she wanted to say.
But it was never said. The words were stopped by the sound of a shrill cry from upstairs.
Conan pounded up the stairs, saw the open door and the light in the north bedroom. Clare was standing just inside the door, one hand pressed to her mouth, the other clutching a kerosene lamp whose shuddering flame cast a glaring light on her face, and again there was terror in her eyes. Conan took the lamp from her shaking hand, just as Delia arrived and enfolded Clare in comforting arms, but Delia’s eyes were wide with alarm. “Good Lord, what happened here?”
For Conan it was at first difficult to make sense of the clutter around him. The room was large, crowded not only with furniture—the heavy, ornamented Victorian furniture that crowds the most spacious room—but also with pictures, souvenirs, mirrors, jewelry cases, music boxes, jars and vials of cosmetics and perfumes, mementos, ranging from withered nosegays to birds’ feathers, bric-a-brac ranging from fine heirlooms to gaudy, plastic contemporary. It was a moment before he realized that the disarray here was extreme and not simply the product of nearly forty years of occupation by a compulsive collector and saver. Drawers were pulled open, their contents littering the floor, bedclothes thrown back, the closet door was ajar, disclosing a tangle of clothing, shoes, and opened hatboxes with their flowered and feathered finery exposed.
Finally, Conan said, “This room has been searched, Delia.”
*
It was midnight when Delia and Conan left the house, armed with flashlights. It had taken nearly two hours for Delia to get Clare calmed, order restored to her room, and Clare in bed and asleep.
Clare had reported nothing missing, and none of the other rooms had apparently been touched. Delia could shed no light on who might have conducted the search, what its object could be, or why Clare’s room had been singled out. All she could be sure of was that the search must have occurred this afternoon while she and Conan were touring the town and Clare was out seeking wild greens.
Delia locked the front door behind her, then flicked on her flashlight and led Conan down the steps into the chill, still, black night. Her pace was slow and careful—the only indication that her night vision and sense of balance were in any way diminished by her years—and there was staunch determination in her ramrod posture. Conan followed a few paces behind the shifting circle of light from her flashlight, walking in his own span of light. There was no moon, and the sky presented a spectacle that stopped his breath: the scintillant plumes of the Milky Way wafted across the fathomless black, and individual stars—myriad was the only word for them—seemed not dots on an even dome, but candescent, pulsing lights existing in depth. In this sky perception approached knowledge.
They walked north, footfalls a soft crunching in the fine gravel, and passed Adler’s house, but there was no light within it. At this late hour, there wasn’t a light in the entire town, and the darkness effectively obliterated it, as if it did not now, nor had ever existed.
Beyond Adler’s house, a rubble-choked gully, then another house, the one that had been Clare and Lee Langtry’s. Delia veered a little to the right, passing behind yet another house, then the cover of low scrub on the ground vanished, and she turned east up a rutted road. After she had followed it a short distance, she paused.
“I have to find Clare’s path. It should be right…yes, here it is. This is Slaughterhouse Gulch we’re coming to. There really was a slaughterhouse up there. You can still find cut bones here after a rain.”
She left the road and continued north down a gradual slope until at length willows loomed in her flashlight. She scouted along them, then stopped, playing her light on something lying on the ground.
It was a shovel, old and rusted, but caked with fresh dirt. Delia picked it up. “I wonder where this came from.”
“I wonder what it was used for,” Conan countered.
She didn’t answer, but carried the shovel with her as she pushed through the willows into a small open area entirely shielded by the dense foliage. Conan’s flashlight picked up a scattering of chaff and crumbs. It the spring, or when heavy rains fell, this glade would be filled with the sound of rushing water; the narrow stream bed, dry and silent now between rock walls, descended in steps of fallen boulders, and it seemed as artfully composed as something that might be found in a Japanese garden.
But the sanctity of this grove had been violated.
The purpose of the shovel was explained. It has been used to turn up the ground all around the grove, even to lever smaller stones back and probe beneath them.
“Oh, for the Lord’s sake…” The shovel fell from Delia’s hand with a thud. “Why would anybody do this?”
Conan didn’t answer, but began examining the area with his flashlight, privately cursing the darkness. He found nothing, not a clear track, cigarette stub, burnt match, not a human hair or thread of clothing. Finally, he brushed the dirt from his knees and asked Delia, “What about that shovel? Any idea where it might have come from?”
He couldn’t see her face, but her voice was tight and uncertain. “No. It might’ve come from one of the weekenders’ houses, or, Lord knows, it could’ve been lying in some pile of boards for fifty years. Do you…I suppose this might be the work of some of those crazy kids who come through here. Hippies, whatever you call them. Lot of them stay up at the campground south of town.”
Conan doubted that explanation very much. He didn’t read this as vandalism but as a deliberate search. Another one. Apparently Delia doubted it, too. She added with an audible sigh, “I’ll have to think of something to tell Clare. Bottle hunters. Maybe that’s more reasonable. They’ll dig up anything to find an antique.”
Conan didn’t comment. It was more reason
able than vandalizing hippies, to be sure, and far more reasonable than a voice in the willows that belonged to someone who wanted something Clare had; wanted it enough to frighten her with threats and gunshots, and enough to take the risk of entering the house to search Clare’s room.
What was it?
“It’s late, Delia. Let’s go back.” He picked up the shovel as they left the grove, wondering if he’d ever have an answer to his question, and wondering if Clare knew the answer.
Chapter 5
The clock on the kitchen wall chimed eight times.
“Good morning, Conan.” Delia, sporting a white, bibbed apron, was sitting at the kitchen table chopping rhubarb. Behind her the sink was piled with big-leaved stalks, and on the stove two kettles boiled steamily, one filled with empty mason jars, the other with rhubarb simmering down into a piquant-scented stew.
“Good morning, Delia. I suppose you and Clare have already breakfasted and finished half your day’s work.”
She laughed, while the knife clack-clacked on the cutting board. “Well, we’re usually up and about as soon as it gets light. Pour yourself some coffee. Pot’s on the stove.”
He found a mug in the cupboard and crossed to the stove where a big, graniteware pot was warming. The coffee was uncompromisingly black, even its aroma invigorating. While he savored a scalding sip, Delia carried the cutting board to the stove and deftly swept the rhubarb into the kettle. “It’s going to rain soon. Look at the way that water’s boiling off.”
Conan stepped back out of the way by the veranda door. “Do you grow the rhubarb?”
“Yes, but you can find it all over town. The Chinese brought it in.” She added more water to the kettle, then wiped her hands on her apron. “Well, I’d better fix you some breakfast.”
“There’s no hurry about that. I want to go over to Clare’s grove and have a look around in daylight. Where is she, by the way?”
“Out in the garden.”
He looked through the glass on the door. Beyond the veranda was a narrow, picket-fenced yard shaded with apple trees and lilac bushes, most of it given over to a vegetable garden, the sprouting rows marked with stakes and strings. In a gathered skirt of blue chambray and a muslin blouse, her hair confined by a white scarf tied at the back of her neck, Clare stood among the rows leaning on a hoe, and she seemed a figure out of a Millet painting.
“Delia, does Clare know about her grove?”
Delia nodded, glancing out toward the garden. “Yes. I made an excuse to walk over with her this morning. Usually, she doesn’t like anybody going with her; she says they scare the animals away. But she seemed happy to have me along this morning. I think she remembers that something happened there yesterday evening, but she wouldn’t talk about it. Anyway, when she saw how the place had been dug up, I told her it must’ve been bottle hunters.”
“Did she believe you?”
“Well, she seemed to, and she wasn’t too upset about it, thank the Lord.” Delia paused, then, “Conan, I…well, I’d sure feel better if I really understood what happened.”
“So would I, Delia. We will. Give it time.”
A few minutes later, as he left the house, he was wishing he could truthfully feel that optimistic about eventually understanding what had happened to Clare. He walked north past Adler’s house. There was no sign of Adler, but a plume of smoke rose from the chimney. The morning shadows were still long, a bracing chill in the air. There was something unique about morning air in the mountains, a quality derived perhaps from its clarity and from the scent of wild vegetation unsullied by urban effluvium. The slopes that seemed at first glance barren were in fact verdant with inconspicuous plants blithely thriving in this high, dry land. Wild geranium, fleabane, and buckwheat tended to blend into the subtle coloring of their background, but Indian paintbrush and scarlet gilia were beacons of red, and balsam flowers turned their golden heads sunward, looking themselves like miniature suns.
He had no trouble finding Clare’s grove, and the distance seemed much shorter than it had in the depths of night. As he approached the thicket of willows, a flock of bluebirds whirred into instant flight, and a pair of crows, augmented by a complement of scrub jays, circled overhead, complaining raucously at the interruption of their repast. Within the grove, chipmunks scurried away into the undergrowth, except for one fat and confident specimen who perched atop a rock to watch Conan, disappearing with an irritable squeak and a flip of its tail only when Conan’s examination of the area brought him within a few feet.
Conan worked out from the open center of the grove, eyes programmed for detail and anomaly, but he found nothing. That didn’t mean there was nothing to find, rather that the loose, gravelly soil and the thick leaf rubbish under the willows—which grew so densely he could barely get a hand between the slender trunks—made it extremely difficult to find anything. At length, he departed with an apology to the birds and beasts for interrupting their breakfast. He had hoped to find a cartridge case—Clare had spoken of the gunshots as if they were close to her, and Conan had judged the shots he had heard to be coming from the vicinity of the grove—but he’d have been happy with even a clear foot track; any evidence at all of the voice in the willows or the violator of the grove.
The beauties of the morning were lost on him as he tramped back to the Starbuck house, absently frowning at the happy little suns of balsam. When he reached the house he went directly to the kitchen, where Delia was clearing the table, all the rhubarb consigned to the kettle.
She asked, “Any luck?”
“No.”
“Oh. Well, maybe you’re ready for breakfast now. Eggs and bacon all right? I’ve got some biscuits up in the warming oven. How do you like your eggs?”
The mere words seemed to awake a ravening appetite; the mountain air, no doubt. “Over easy, if possible.”
“Oh, almost anything’s possible,” she assured him as she delved into the refrigerator.
Conan went to the back door, attracted by the sound of voices. Clare was standing near the veranda now talking to a man Conan recognized, even if he didn’t know his name. It was the man he’d seen on Dex Adler’s porch yesterday. He was not by any means a young man, but his age was hard to judge. The initial color impression was of dusty khaki—clothing, skin, even his hair, which had once been blond but had faded to a streaked pewter. He towered over Clare, whose head just reached his wide, angular shoulders, and he still carried his rifle, but it was cradled on one elbow, his head was respectfully bare, his hat clutched in a big, brown hand. Clare was holding a bouquet of wild flowers, and Conan had no doubt her visitor had brought them.
“Delia, who’s that man?”
She looked up from the stove briefly. “Oh, that’s Reub Sickle. The prospector I told you about.”
Clare laughed coquettishly at something the man had said, and he seemed to grin—Conan had only an oblique view of his face—and looked down at the ground, shifting his booted feet self-consciously.
Conan said, “Tell me more about him.”
“Reub?” Delia shrugged as she slapped a piece of bacon into a frying pan. “Well, Reub first came to Silver as a young man about nineteen twenty-five, and he’s been here ever since, living out in the mountains prospecting for gold. They say he’s done real well for himself over the years, but you’d never know it to look at him. I think he’s just a born prospector; it’s the finding that’s important.”
“Where did he come from?”
“Oh, somewhere back east. I think he grew up in an orphanage, but he ran away before he ever graduated from high school and ended up in Nevada. Learned prospecting from an old man he met there, and I guess the life suited him. Poor Reub was always so shy it hurt. May have been because of his limp. Don’t know what’s wrong with his foot, whether he broke it as a kid or was just born that way.”
“He seems to get along well with Clare.” Conan was still watching them through the door panes.
Delia smiled as she crossed to the refrige
rator. “Would you like some orange juice? Well, Reub’s been in love with Clare since the day he first saw her back in twenty-seven. Of course, she married Lee that year, and there never was room for anybody else in her heart, but that didn’t seem to make any difference to Reub. He knew he didn’t really stand a chance with Clare, but she was always kind to him. He never seemed to ask for anything more. In fact, I think it would’ve scared him silly if she’d started taking him seriously.”
Conan smiled at that. “It sounds like a very accommodating relationship. I guess I’d better talk to him. You said he was here at the time of the murder.”
Delia sighed. “Yes, I almost forgot. Well, you go ahead. It’ll be a few minutes before your breakfast is ready. Clare will introduce you.”
When Conan stepped out onto the veranda, both Clare and Reub turned, and Conan had a good look at Reub’s face for the first time. It was weathered into a network of lines and burned brown with sun, and against that background his eyes were startling—a clear, bright blue as fresh as the morning sky. For a moment those eyes distracted Conan from another feature of Reub’s face that was equally startling: the ugly, white scar that slashed a raw line from the left side of his forehead across the flattened, misaligned bridge of his nose to his right cheek.
As if he were aware of exactly what Conan was seeing, Reub put on his hat and pulled the brim forward so that it shadowed his face. Clare said brightly, “Oh, Mr. Flagg, look what Reub brought me. Forget-me-nots and lupine and globe mallow and this”—she plucked out a flower with a delicate green blossom like a tiny Japanese lantern—“here’s meadow rue.” And Conan almost expected her to add, O, you must wear your rue with a difference…
Conan said, “They’re beautiful, Clare.”
“Aren’t they? Oh—you haven’t met Reub. Reuben Sickle, this is Mr. Flagg. He’s visiting with Delia.”
Conan offered a hand, which Reub took reluctantly, his sun-browned features set in tense, suspicious lines.
“Mr. Sickle, I’m glad to meet you. Did Clare tell you why I’m here?”
