Alpine Icon

by Mary Daheim

  “Yes.” Vida was thoughtful. “Faith is very personal. I despise talking about it. To be frank, we have a few members in our congregation who are not unlike Monica Vancich. They're younger, like her. But Pastor Purebeck watches them like a hawk. Talking in tongues indeed!”

  Vida's remark about Pastor Purebeck reminded me of Father Den—and the visit from Marisa Foxx. “I wonder why Marisa went to see Den,” I mused. “I'll bet it had nothing to do with a spiritual crisis.”

  “You and Marisa should be friends,” Vida asserted. “I've often wondered why you haven't become better acquainted.”

  I'd occasionally wondered that myself. Marisa had moved to Alpine a couple of years earlier and joined the Doukas law firm. Her brisk manner and lack of overt femininity had given rise to rumors that she was a lesbian. But I neither knew nor cared about her sexual orientation. The truth was that we both seemed too caught up in our busy lives to extend a hand in friendship.

  “Maybe I'll invite Marisa over for dinner this coming week,” I said. “I can use one of the menus I planned for Ben.”

  Vida's gray eyes slid in my direction. “Good. Very good.”

  “Do you want to come?”

  “No, no. Not this time. You two Catholics need to be alone. Girl talk. Catholic talk. Talk, talk, talk. It may prove interesting.” Vida looked pleased with herself—or with me—as she eased the Buick into a diagonal parking space in front of the sheriffs office. We were lucky to find such a convenient place. Front Street was busy, mostly with out-of-towners enjoying the Labor Day weekend.

  Milo had the big fan going, which was good, because his ashtray was overflowing and Vida detested the smell of cigarette smoke. Still, the air was stale and oppressive. The sheriffs offer of hot coffee was refused by both of us.

  “I was wondering when you two would come by,” Milo said, settling into his swivel chair and putting his feet up on the desk. He looked a bit smug.

  “We're here now,” Vida responded, adjusting her glasses and smoothing the wrinkles in her striped culottes. “Have you some news?”

  The sheriff ruffled his graying sandy hair. “Could be. What do you want to know? Traffic accidents? Attempted break-ins? Bad checks? Crazy Eights Neffel swiping Grace Grundle's underpants off the clothesline and wearing them on his head in the public library?” Milo seemed uncharacteristically playful.

  It clearly strained Vida to humor the sheriff. “Actually we had some questions about Ursula Randall. For example, was there any indication that she might have suffered an injury that caused her to fall down? Doc Dewey thought not, according to Emma, but his examination was admittedly cursory.”

  “Cursory, but on target.” Milo reached for his cigarettes, caught Vida's warning glance, and toyed with a ballpoint pen instead. “We heard from Everett about a half hour ago. It seems that some high muck-a-muck in Seattle at the Catholic church headquarters called my SnoCo colleagues and put on the pressure. The preliminary report is in.” Milo put down the pen and reached into his shirt pocket for a roll of mints. “Ursula Randall had an accident, all right. She passed out and fell on her face in the Sky because she was drunk. The lady was loaded with alcohol. Hell, the lady was loaded. What more can I say?”

  Milo popped a mint into his mouth, held out both hands, and gave us a triumphant grin.

  Vida told him he was an idiot.

  Chapter Eight

  THE SHERIFF EXPLODED in anger. What was so strange about a willful woman who had swigged down a fifth of vodka, wandered away from her fancy house, and collapsed at the edge of the river while she was contemplating her navel or her future or her next drink? People walked in front of railroad trains, meandered across major highways, stepped off curbs in front of buses. Accident or deliberate, the result was the same—they ended up dead.

  “Hell, what were you expecting?” Milo demanded, his tone finally becoming less harsh.

  Vida leaned forward in her chair, one arm planted firmly on the sheriffs desk. “Foul play. Which, I believe, is what you told Emma in the first place. Do you really intend to dismiss this as an accidental death?”

  “I didn't tell Emma any such thing,” Milo retorted. “I said it might have been foul play. Look.” The sheriff wagged a long finger. “How often do you read—or in your case, write—an obituary where you say something like 'So-and-so died of apparent kidney failure' or 'Memorials in Blah-blah's name should be sent to the American Heart Association'? Sure, it sounds like natural causes. But you know damned well—especially you, Vida—that So-and-so and Blah-blah drank themselves to death. Or worse, they OD'ed on drugs. You never read that a person who died in a house fire caused by a smoldering cigarette had passed out first with an empty jug by his—or her—side. Ask Doc Dewey, ask Peyton Flake. They'll tell you that one hell of a lot of people right here in Skykomish County peg out on booze. You've got almost forty percent of the population living below the poverty level. What little money they've got goes into a bottle.” Milo paused, his eyes fixed on the map of Skykomish County. “It wasn't always like this. There used to be jobs, people had pride. A man could hold his head up and support his family—” He stopped altogether. I could have sworn there was a catch in his voice.

  “Pitiful,” Vida murmured. “But, alas, true. I'm older, I remember even more of the good times.” She sighed. “Well, I suppose we ought to be going. Thank you, Milo, for your help.”

  Milo had turned his attention back to us. “Damn it, you're going to have to trust me on this. It was the booze.”

  Vida had risen, a majestic figure in the striped culotte costume and sailor hat. With a stretch of the imagination, I could picture her as a figurehead on a New Bedford whaler. “Perhaps,” Vida said in a noncommittal tone. “Though I do have a quibble. The people you've been describing are unemployed, uneducated, living in despair. That doesn't really suit Ursula Randall, does it?”

  The sheriff's expression was ironic. “You think rich people don't drink? They just buy better brands.”

  “That's not the point,” Vida said with dignity. “1 don't think that rich people—such as Ursula—walk three miles from the elegant comfort of their own homes to pass out in the Skykomish River. It doesn't make sense.”

  “You'd be surprised what weird things people do,” Milo replied gruffly.

  “No, I wouldn't.” Vida's glance veered in my direction. “Ursula's clothes, her shoes, the time of day—none of it fits. But most of all, where was the bottle?”

  “The bottle?” For the first time Milo looked jarred.

  Vida leaned both hands on the desk. “Of course. Now, I'll confess I've never been inebriated. But my uncle Otto, whose family nickname was Uncle Blotto—well, never mind, let's say that I've had some experience with alcoholism. I do know that if a person walks a great distance in fresh air, they begin to grow sober. 'Walking it off—isn't that the expression? Now, if Ursula did indeed go on foot from The Pines almost to the end of River Road, she shouldn't have passed out when she got there. Unless, of course, she had brought a bottle or a flask or some such container with her. In which case, where was it? Did Richie find it? Did you? Emma and I certainly saw no sign when we were there this afternoon.”

  Milo was drumming his fingers on the desk. “She might have dropped it and it broke. If it was a flask, it could have been carried off by the current.”

  “Rot,” I put in. “The current next to the shore is relatively slow. It only picks up toward the middle of the river, where that underbrush is caught. You know that, Milo. You're a fisherman, for God's sake.”

  Milo had the grace to look sheepish: “It's still a plausible scenario.”

  “No, it's not,” I said, and then saw the disappointment in Milo's hazel eyes. Perhaps he'd taken my long silence for agreement. Trying not to flinch, I plunged ahead. “Look at this from another angle. Most of the local deaths caused by drinking don't benefit anybody. That may not be true with Ursula. She was rich. Who gets her money? She was jumping into what may be a really nasty situation at S
t. Mildred's. Who is sufficiently fanatical to want her out of the way? She had a history of making trouble. Who might have been seeking revenge? If ever there were motives to murder someone, it seems to me that Ursula Randall is pretty high on the list.”

  “That's right, Emma,” Vida chimed in. “And that's not the half of it.”

  I gave Vida a puzzled look. “Huh?”

  “The classic triangle.” Vida nodded sapiently. “Ursula, Warren, and Francine.”

  Milo and I both stared.

  “Bullshit,” the sheriff scoffed.

  “Rubbish,” I declared.

  Our disdain had no effect on Vida. “As you will,” she said, snatching up her straw purse. “Come, Emma, we must go. Doubtless Milo has criminals to catch.” She stalked out of the office.

  Milo was leaning across his desk, hissing at me. “Are you home tonight?”

  “Sure. Want to come over?”

  His answer was a thumbs-up gesture. I was still smiling when I joined Vida outside of the main entrance.

  “You two,” she muttered in a tone of disapproval. “I just don't know.”

  “Know what?” My voice had an edge to it.

  Vida sighed, then marched to her car. “It's not a good match,” she declared after I had settled into the passenger seat. “It was inevitable, of course. But I simply don't understand how you and Milo … Oh, never mind. What I think isn't important.”

  It wasn't. Or it shouldn't have been. But it really was. In the past six months Vida had never commented directly on my romance with the sheriff. It hadn't occurred to me that she might not approve.

  “I don't get it,” I huffed. “You like me. You like Milo. What's wrong with liking us together?”

  Vida's lips compressed as she steered the Buick up Front Street. “You're not suited for each other. You have very little in common. You enjoy classical music, movies, theatre, books. Milo fishes and reads gun magazines. What on earth do the two of you watch together on television?”

  “Sports,” I answered promptly. “We both like sports. We've got tickets to a Mariner game with the A's.”

  Vida sighed again. “I keep forgetting—you actually enjoy watching all those overgrown boys romping around in silly suits with various types of balls or pucks or other such missiles. But that's not enough on which to build a future.”

  “It's enough for now.”

  “Oh, dear!” Vida actually sounded despondent.

  “Vida …” I paused, questioning the wisdom of having to defend my feelings. “Milo and I are very … comfortable with each other. We have more in common than you might think. Milo occasionally does enjoy a movie. I like some country-and-western music. We laugh at the same things. We can talk to each other. What's wrong with that?”

  Vida was driving up Fourth Street, apparently taking me home. She didn't reply for a long time, not until she turned right on Fir. “It's not Milo himself. It's you. I truly don't believe you've ever gotten over Tommy.”

  “Vida!” I was appalled. For reasons I'd never fathomed, Vida clung to a belief that Tom and I belonged together. A few years ago, when we had been reunited, I'd found her attitude touching. After I'd decided to cut Tom out of my life, her persistence was amusing. Now I was downright disgusted. “What would be the point? Tom is never going to leave Sandra, and even if he did, can you see him moving from San Francisco to Alpine?”

  “He could commute,” Vida said doggedly.

  I opened my mouth to argue that Tom owned a weekly-newspaper empire, all his family, business, and social ties were in the Bay Area, he was a city person through and through. But debate was pointless. Tom and I were finished; the only connection was our son. If Vida couldn't accept that, then I might as well shrug it off as one of her inexplicable blind spots.

  “You're really convinced that Ursula was murdered, aren't you?” I finally said, changing the subject.

  “Milo's divorced. He's a Protestant.” Vida pulled up in my driveway.

  “Milo and I have never discussed marriage,” I replied testily. “Why are you so sure about Ursula?”

  “Could Tommy get a—what do you call them?—an annulment?”

  “I agree with you about the bottle. In fact, I think you're right about foul play.” I was forcing myself to sound reasonable.

  “I've heard that if you have money, you can buy an annulment from the Vatican.”

  Briefly closing my eyes, I let out a loud sigh. “That's not true. And I don't want to discuss it. Really, I don't.”

  Vida stared through the windshield, which was now covered with a fair share of dead bugs. “That's very foolish. But I'll keep my own counsel. For now. Goodbye, Emma.”

  I despised quarreling with Vida. However, her present mood was impossible to dent. I got out of the car and headed for my front door. It was only after I'd heard the Buick drive off that I realized my Jag was at her house. Running down the driveway, I waved my arms and yelled her name. But she had already turned onto Fourth.

  It was too hot to walk all the way over to her house. There were more clouds moving in, which offered hope that the weather might cool off by late afternoon. Feeling tired and frustrated, I went inside. The phone was ringing.

  The voice on the other end identified itself as belonging to Alicia Lowell. “Francine's daughter,” she clarified. “Do you know where my mother is?”

  Briefly I was speechless. “No. Isn't she at the shop?” Francine's Fine Apparel was open on Saturdays from eleven until five. It was now three-twenty.

  “The shop's closed,” Alicia said in a worried voice. “I'm at home—at Mother's, that is. I just got back from Snohomish.”

  Francine and I attend the same church, we belong to the same bridge club, we're both members of the Chamber of Commerce. I like her, and I think she likes me, but we aren't close friends. I'm a customer and she's an advertiser. There is more mutual dependency than intimacy in our relationship. Consequently I was puzzled by Alicia's call.

  “I tried Mrs. Runkel first,” Alicia said, as if she could read my mind. “But she didn't answer. Mother says Mrs. Runkel always knows everything about everybody. I thought she might be at your place.”

  “You mean Mrs. Runkel? She just dropped me off. But I don't think she knows where your mother is.” I had carried the phone to the kitchen, where I took a Pepsi out of the fridge. “Have you called your father? Maybe she's helping him with the funeral arrangements.” Only an emergency would make Francine close the shop. Her ex-husband's plight could qualify.

  “I don't speak to my father.” Alicia's voice had turned icy. “Who else would know where she might be?”

  The first name that popped into my head was Roseanna Bayard. Over the years I'd gathered that the two women were good friends. “Try Roseanna at home. She doesn't usually work at the photography studio on weekends.”

  Alicia thanked me and rang off. Sipping my Pepsi, I, too, began to worry about Francine. My thoughts were interrupted by Vida, calling to me through the screen door.

  “Goodness!” she exclaimed, bursting into the living room. “How addled can we be? It isn't as if I knew Ursula particularly well, certainly not in recent years. But her death must have unhinged my brain. Do you want to get your car now?”

  I stared at Vida. Apparently she had dismissed our discord over Tom and Milo. There was no trace of anger in her manner as she paced between the green sofa and the stone fireplace, her eyes darting into every nook and cranny.

  “That'd be fine,” I finally said, grateful to be on good terms again. “How about something to drink first?” I held out my can of Pepsi.

  Vida doesn't care for soft drinks, but she said that ice water would do nicely. A minute later we were seated in the living room and I was telling her about Alicia's phone call. To my surprise, she evinced no concern.

  “Maybe the power went out. You know how often that happens around here.” Vida calmly sipped her water.

  Power failures, both massive and individual, were definitely not rare in Skykomis
h County. Sometimes the cause was lightning; often it was the wind; in winter, it was snow.

  But the weather had been perfect, at least by some people's standards. “It just doesn't seem right,” I murmured.

  “Unexpected company, in for the Labor Day weekend,” Vida declared. “The register broke. A rat got loose. Crazy Eights Neffel barricaded himself in the dressing room. Don't fuss so, Emma. Francine is very capable. Warren couldn't lose two wives in one weekend.”

  “Ursula wasn't his wife—yet,” I reminded my House & Home editor. “Who was his second wife?”

  Vida gave a small shrug. “Someone from Monroe. Warren was working in the sporting-goods store there at the time. I never knew her, except by name. They moved to Seattle. I don't believe it lasted very long. They divorced.”

  The annulment issue popped into my head. How had Ursula and Warren gotten permission to marry in the Church when he had been divorced twice? But I didn't bring up the question for fear of having Vida start in again on my romantic situation. Instead I asked if Warren had left Francine for the other woman, or if they had already broken up by the time he met Wife Number Two.

  “I'm not entirely sure,” Vida admitted. “Warren had been working for Harvey Adcock, but they didn't get on well. Warren took a job with a fishing-tackle store in Monroe. It was a bit of a commute, but he didn't mind. The next thing we heard”—as Vida spoke I had visions of Alpine's residents, ears attuned for any news that was whispered along Highway 2—”he was staying over now and then. Now, whether he quit Harvey's Hardware partly because he wanted to get away from Francine, I don't know. It might have been a kind of trial separation. When he married this other woman, The Advocate didn't run the story because the ceremony took place either in Monroe or Everett. I hadn't yet gone to work for the paper, and Mrs. DeBee wasn't much for reporting news that didn't fall in her lap.”