Below the Tree Line

by Susan Oleksiw

“I never even knew they existed.” Sasha leaned back, still admiring. “If I had some of those in my yard, I’d bring them in and keep them on the windowsill.”

  Felicity laughed. “Where they would die.”

  “They don’t like sun?” Sasha looked up at the thick canopy.

  “They don’t like leaving their natural home. They’re very hard to clone. The real ones usually die if they’re dug up. They need a particular kind of fungus to grow, and they take forever to grow from seed to something like this. Fifteen years or so.” She reached out to run her index finger along the curve of the flower. “They used to be scattered through the woods, but over the years they’ve been crushed and their environment pretty much ruined. This is probably one of the last few around here. There might be others, but no one cares as much anymore.”

  “And you come out here every spring to see them?”

  “I keep quiet about it because they’d be trampled if too many people came by. But you’re welcome to come any time.”

  Sasha studied her, a warmth of affection spreading across her face.

  “I’m sorry about Clarissa,” Felicity said. “From what you’ve told me, she would have enjoyed something like this.”

  “She would have loved it.” Sasha touched her index finger to the flower’s tip. “And she would have understood it the same way you do.”

  Later that morning, soon after Sasha drove away, Felicity stopped into the West Woodbury Police Department. Even though West Woodbury was a very small town, with a population under five thousand souls, there were usually three officers on duty throughout the day. To her surprise, Felicity didn’t see even Padma Mantell, the department administrative assistant, when she walked in.

  The department was located on the first floor, which was really the basement level, of Town Hall. Built into the side of a hill at the end of the nineteenth century, Town Hall creaked and occasionally shifted an infinitesimal amount but was never less than the sturdy remnant of times gone by, an imposing Victorian building reminding the residents of their duty. The police department enjoyed the advantage of being the only cool spot in the building during the summer heat, and the least pleasant place in the winter. In the spring, every person’s temperature fluctuated, perhaps in accordance with the weather or the upcoming town meeting.

  “Hey there,” Padma said a few minutes later. She dropped a paper sack on her desk and slid into her chair, letting it roll back to the wall, where it bumped gently before she walked it forward to the desk.

  “No one was here when I came in,” Felicity said.

  “So did you steal anything?” Padma grinned. “Sneak into any files?” With her varied-colored hair—today it was green—Padma was a reminder of the larger world and its trends. She sported a spiked hairstyle, nose rings, tattoos, and rows of tiny silver bracelets, all in contrast to the conservative clothes Chief Kevin Algren insisted on. She could wear colored tights to match her hair, but she was otherwise to be covered in such a way that his grandmother would feel comfortable walking into the office. But Kevin had learned to spell her new name, which she’d adopted after her first yoga class.

  “I wanted to know if Kevin had come across any reason why Clarissa Jenkins might have been on her way to see me,” Felicity said.

  “Was she?” Padma asked, her heavily made-up eyes widening.

  “Jeremy and I were out walking, and we saw her coming down the road. It looked like she was about to turn into my driveway but then changed her mind.” Felicity glanced around. “She was driving very erratically.”

  “That’s what Jeremy said when he came in yesterday. But I haven’t heard anything.”

  “Where is the chief?”

  Padma turned toward an inside door. “Coming down the stairs. With the head selectman, it sounds like.” And, of course, she was right. Kevin came through the door first, nodded to Felicity, and headed into his office. The head selectman followed. When the two men finished their conversation, Dingel Mantell, Padma’s dad, came over to his daughter’s desk.

  In addition to his role as head selectman, Dingel ran a small sawmill a few miles down an old side road. He was one of the few people not entirely unhappy at the sight of new homes sprouting in old pastures. More than halfway through his fifties and the survivor of numerous industrial accidents, Dingel was still the first one to be called when fine work was needed. Felicity inhaled the comforting aroma of fresh sawdust emanating from his denim overalls, which he wore belted at the waist. The sleeves of his plaid flannel shirt were rolled up to his elbows, and shavings stuck out of the cuff-made pocket.

  “I stopped in to see Kevin,” Felicity began, “but I can do two things now. I’m getting ready to file the next cutting plan I’ve been working up with my logger, Lance Gauthier, so you should be hearing from him.”

  Dingel, always a man of few words, nodded and tipped two fingers to his temple in acknowledgment. “You tell your dad I said hello. Miss him when I see that rod and reel.”

  “I’ll tell him.” Felicity knew how much the two men had loved fishing together. Nothing was allowed to interfere with that sacred time. With another salute and a few words with his daughter, Dingel was gone. Felicity poked her head into Kevin’s office. “Got a minute?”

  Kevin waved her in. “Real sad business.” He swiveled in his chair and inspected the half pastry Padma had placed on his desk.

  “She was a friend of Loretta Colson’s,” Felicity said.

  “So Jeremy said. What’s this about her driving erratically down your road?”

  “It looked like she was turning into my driveway but then she changed her mind. I wondered if you’d found anything in the car to explain that. I didn’t know Clarissa, but she told a relative of hers she was coming to see me. It sounds like she had something to tell me.” Felicity briefly described Sasha’s visit.

  Kevin swiveled in his chair and pulled open a desk drawer. He opened a file and scanned the contents. “This is all on the computer, but our WiFi, or whatever it is, is down.”

  “I thought the town was fixing that.”

  He looked at her over the file with an expression that said, In your dreams. “The phone company told us we weren’t important enough for them to bother with, so we’ll have to put up with the service we have.”

  “They didn’t say that.”

  “In so many words, they did.” Kevin returned to the file. “So, as to your question, the answer is yes. She had an old envelope addressed to her that had your name and address scribbled on it, so maybe she was coming to see you.”

  “What was in the envelope?”

  “Electric bill.”

  “Anything else? A note, initials?”

  “You think she was interested in the CSA garden?”

  “You know about that?”

  “Everyone knows about that, Felicity.”

  “Sometimes I forget how small West Woodbury is.” Felicity gazed out the window at the steep side street and the small parking lot beyond. “May I ask a question here?”

  “Would it do me any good to say no?”

  Felicity laughed. “Was there any problem? I mean … ”

  “You mean was she drinking at seven o’clock in the morning or smoking something or on pills?”

  “Yes. I wondered if you’d noticed anything.” Felicity licked her lips and took a deep breath. “Her driving was pretty erratic.”

  Kevin shifted in his chair, trying to get comfortable. “The answer to that is no, I didn’t smell anything on her, and she didn’t show any outward signs of being impaired. But the ME will have to decide on that one.”

  “It’s frustrating.”

  “I know you talked to the young fellow on the bicycle.” Kevin didn’t wait for her to comment. “Saw her swerve, to miss an animal in the road, he thought. He’s pretty shook up.”

  “Nathan Holyoake? My dog calmed
him down while we waited for the ambulance.”

  “We found a repair bill in her purse.” Kevin eyed the pastry again. “She’d just picked up her car at the Flat Road Automotive.”

  “That’s where I go.” Felicity recalled Jeremy commenting about the loose steering wheel and the absence of skid marks. Before she could ask about the car, however, Kevin pulled an envelope out of the file and shook out a small plastic sleeve holding a photograph.

  “So I have a question for you.” He held it out to her. “Recognize this?”

  Felicity peered at the picture. A man and a woman stood together, with the woman smiling directly at the camera and the man looking over her shoulder, away from the camera, as though something behind them had caught his attention. “Is that the Grange building in Finerton?”

  “It is.”

  “Who are the people?”

  “That’s Clarissa Jenkins and a man we can’t identify.” Kevin put the photograph away. “The family doesn’t know who he is, but he could be the fiancé. We’ll find him.” He slid the envelope back into the file.

  “Sad for something to happen now, when she was on the verge of a new life.”

  “It’s sad whenever it happens.” Kevin gave the pastry one last look and pushed it away. “Okay, Felicity. Let’s talk about something else.” He shifted in his chair, as though gearing up for a difficult task. “You didn’t come in to talk about Clarissa Jenkins. Enough stalling. What’s this about an intruder? And why didn’t you come in yesterday about it?” He returned to the pastry, tugging at the corner of the napkin it sat on. Every time he turned his head, he seemed to catch a glimpse of it and the pastry moved another two inches to the left. Felicity watched it heading toward the edge of the desk. “Well?”

  “I think I handled it okay.”

  He wiggled his fingers at her. “Come on. Details. Let’s hear it.”

  “I thought I heard something.”

  “That’s what you said at five thirty in the morning when you called me.” Kevin struggled to get comfortable in his chair. “The town paid god knows how much for this damn ergonomic chair.” Felicity gathered up the pastry and took it out to Padma.

  “Okay, about the intruder,” she said when she came back. “I thought I heard something for a couple of nights, and on the third night I was sure of it. So I went out with a shotgun but whoever or whatever it was bolted before I could get to it. Really, Kevin, why do you always do that when I tell you something?”

  “Do what?” Kevin rested his elbow on the chair arm and his forehead in his hand, and then rubbed his hand over his face.

  “Do that. Cover your whole face with your hand.”

  “You went outside with a shotgun.”

  “I told you that.”

  “And it was loaded.”

  “The third time, yes. I told you that.”

  “And you took a shot at someone, or maybe two someones.”

  Felicity pressed her lips together. “Three nights in a row, Kevin.” She looked away. “I shot over their head.”

  “Felicity, the trouble with that is the shot has to come down somewhere.”

  “Three nights, Kevin.”

  “Jeremy told me he looked over the area with you and he can’t tell if it was a person or an animal, but it looked like the ground was torn up.” He clasped his hands in front of his stomach, his fingers looking for the belt buckle that used to be right there whenever he folded his hands over his middle, but in the last few years it had gone missing. He stopped searching.

  “So?”

  “Did your family ever bury scraps?”

  “Kevin!” She tried to glare at him. “You’ve heard about composting?”

  “You never know what could be enticing animals.” He sighed and swung around to glance out the window at the street and parking lot beyond. “Anything last night?”

  “Nothing.”

  “Taking precautions?”

  “Cleaning up the area, tightening windows and locks, patching the foundation. And I have the dog now, too.”

  “That should do it.” He bounced forward in his chair. “I’ll make a note, so if something happens again we can compare it.”

  “You’re not worried?”

  “Not unless you are.”

  Felicity stood up. “I’m more worried about what happened to Clarissa Jenkins. I want to know why she was coming to see me.”

  Four

  By the middle of the week, Felicity had taken Shadow twice to the Pasquanata Community Home for visits with her dad. Six months ago she had accepted the inevitable and moved her dad to the home, but it had taken her almost two years after finding him gasping for breath on the barn floor or falling silent on the phone when she asked him where he was calling from. Not dementia, his doctor told her, heart disease—heart attacks, strokes, heart failure. He kept bouncing back, but each time the bounce wasn’t quite as high as before.

  Shadow considered the visits a treat. When she snapped on the leash and headed for the home’s front entrance, the dog perked up and trotted smartly to the door, where he was greeted by a row of elderly men and women enjoying the sunshine. Her first few minutes were given over to answering questions about how Shadow was faring, what he ate, and where he slept. The nurses tried to persuade the residents to stay on the concrete apron while one of the women headed into the great unknown of the straw-covered garden before quickly being redirected. Today, as usual, Felicity’s father pushed his way to the front of the pack.

  “You tell Loretta not to take those big ones,” Walter O’Brien said, looking around the yard as though he might see other dogs. “They eat more than people.” Today he wore a blue-and-white-striped cotton shirt, chinos, and a bright green sweater. He insisted on dressing properly, as he called it, if he was going to be around other people all day. It was a change after wearing only barn clothes and boots for almost eighty years, and Felicity wasn’t quite sure what to make of this new version of her dad.

  “I’ll be sure to let her know. Only the little ones.”

  Walter insisted he wasn’t cold and didn’t want to go inside, so Felicity held on to the leash while her dad checked over the animal. He was remarkably supple and strong for his age and health conditions. He knelt down while he examined Shadow. “Hmm. Seems okay.”

  “He’s been to the vet and I have his papers.”

  Walter got to his feet. “And the sheep?” He gazed at her.

  “The sheep are fine, Dad. I have them in the paddock today and I move them every day.” The little dog nuzzled her leg and stared up at Walter, perhaps unsure why he was no longer the center of attention. “They love the wildflowers. Those are three very happy sheep. They’ll be even happier when the dandelions come up. Which is probably next week.”

  “They’re stupid sometimes.”

  Felicity laughed. “But they’re not mine, so I don’t have to worry about that.”

  “Don’t let him bother them.” Her dad looked at Shadow. He pulled a chair out into the sun and sat down, keeping a watch on the dog. Most of the other residents had gone back into the building; two men sat along a brick wall, soaking up the sun. Felicity caught the smell of a smoldering cigarette and saw the man cupping his hand behind the chair. “Gotta watch new dogs all the time.”

  “Shadow’s well trained,” Felicity said. “Loretta Colson got him from Clarissa Jenkins. I think I told you that. Did you know her? She was from around here but I didn’t know her. She was a Bodrun on her mother’s side, according to Loretta.”

  “Oh, no, Lissie, you mustn’t go visiting that family,” Walter said. His breath quickened and he reached out his gnarled fingers to grasp her wrist. He could squeeze tight enough to hurt. “Now, you mustn’t. Promise me. No, you mustn’t go visit that family. Mustn’t do that.”

  Confused by the sudden change in her father, Felicity took the easy rout
e and agreed with him. “Don’t worry, Dad. I won’t.” Surprised at his distrust of the family, she tried to recall anything she’d heard about them to justify her dad’s feelings. “I thought you liked the Bodruns. Weren’t you friends with Ezekial Bodrun?”

  Her father reared back, his eyes widening, and then bolted to his feet. “Come on. I’ll put a stop to this. I’m not dead yet.”

  Shoulders hunched and fists clenched, his bright green sweater almost glowing in the bright sun, Walter O’Brien headed down the cement walk to the parking lot. Felicity untied Shadow’s leash and ran after her dad, dragging the dog, who seemed to think this was a waste of energy.

  “Dad! Dad!” Felicity was startled at how fast her father could move even now. He hadn’t shown such energy and determination in months, but he was halfway across the parking lot before she caught up with him.

  “Not that way.” He bolted away from her and headed across the narrow road into an old field, an abandoned pasture turning into a meadow.

  Unable to stop him as he stumbled forward, Felicity ran back to the home and banged on the emergency exit, keeping her dad in view. An orderly opened the door, took one look at her and then Walter crossing the field, and raced after him.

  “Dad!” Felicity and Shadow and the orderly caught up with her father and walked with him until he slowed down.

  Walter scanned the horizon, then turned and looked back the way he had come. “There’s a way in here.” He stumbled back toward the road, and Felicity followed him. “I’ll tell them,” Walter said. “They’ll have to listen to me.”

  Felicity and the orderly led him back to the front entrance, but there he balked. He looked around, confused but steady on his feet, and turned back to the view of the woods.

  “It’s okay, Dad. You don’t have to worry.” Felicity wasn’t sure what he was worried about but figured reassurance was always good. “I have a guard dog now, so you don’t have to worry.”

  Walter looked down at the dog and then bent over to look more closely. He pulled up a chair and sat down, then rested his hand on the animal’s head. “He’s a good guard dog. That’s what they say about Labs. Good guard dogs.”