Entombed

by Linda Fairstein

  Trebek told us the final category was Famous Names.

  "Level playing field," Mike said. "Twenty each?"

  Mercer agreed.

  "I'm not interested," I said. Then I thought of my handbag. "Did they get my pocketbook?"

  "You left it locked in the car when we went into the cottage. Don't you remember?"

  "Not really. I feel a little disoriented."

  "It's still there. How do you think I paid for dinner?" Mike asked.

  "Great cartographer, born Gerhard Kremer in 1512, who coined the word 'atlas'-after the mythical Titan he idolized-for his collection of world maps, renamed himself this," Trebek said.

  "Help yourself to another twenty. I'm out," I said.

  The three contestants drew the same blank I did.

  "I guess Rand and McNally weren't born in 1512," Mike said.

  "Baby needs new shoes," Mercer said, holding out his hand to Mike. "Who was Mercator? Gerardus Mercator."

  "Sometimes you surprise me," Mike said. "The old man?"

  Mercer's father had been a mechanic for Delta Airlines. "He used to bring home maps all the time, so I could study the pilot's routes. Don't you guys remember Mercator's projections, with those rectilinear rhumb lines?"

  "Sorry, Mercer. I'm fading on you."

  "I have one little present I've been saving," Mercer said. "Transit's got the MetroCard decoded-the one from the pocket of the Silk Stocking Rapist. They faxed it up to the office this afternoon. You'll have it tomorrow."

  "Any surprises?"

  "Lexington Avenue subway. Seventy-seventh Street mostly. Just where we figured he was living or working. You can grid it out yourself when you get home. See if it tells you anything."

  By nine o'clock, I could barely hold my eyes open. The guys were playing gin at my bedside.

  "Give in to it, Coop. You're whipped," Mike said. He put down his hand and walked out to ask the nurse for my medications.

  I was fighting sleep because I was terrified of my dreams. The pain had subsided but the feeling of being entombed infused every one of my senses. I ached to shut down my body and brain, but dreaded the nightmares to come.

  The nurse came in with the white paper cup and dumped some pills into my hand. I didn't even ask what they were before I swallowed them.

  Mercer stood up to pull the chain that turned off the light over my pillow.

  "Leave it on, please," I said.

  He kissed the tip of my nose. "I'll keep the one next to my chair on all night. I'm not going anywhere, Alex."

  I turned on my side and tried to get comfortable. Think wonderful thoughts, happy thoughts, my mother used to tell me as a child, when I awakened during the night. Then I would close my eyes and imagine myself walking on the beach with my father, holding his hand while he told me stories about his youth and his romance with my mother, or think of my last trip to my grand-mother's farm, and how she indulged me whenever I visited there. Now I called up memories of the happiest events I could conjure, but they were interrupted by dark visions of the day barely over.

  I remember opening my eyes, seeing Mike and Mercer engrossed in their card game, and closing them again. I felt the pills start to do their magic. I fell asleep.

  It must have been seven o'clock when I awakened. The morning routine in a hospital never allows sleeping in. Nurses and aides changing shifts, meal trolleys carting forty trays down the hall, and janitors mopping floors overcame the strongest sleeping potions.

  I stirred and looked up. Mercer and Mike were gone, but the deck of cards was on the table next to my water pitcher.

  I sat up and outside the door of my room saw the back of a cop's uniform. The officer seemed to be dozing in his chair, his head hanging forward. I pushed down the bed railing and started toward him. He must have heard the noise and stood up immediately, walking into the room.

  "Miss Cooper? Morning. I'm Gerry McCallion, from the Thirteenth-"

  "Where's Wallace? Where's Chapman?"

  "They were gone when I got here, about oneA.M. Don't worry, ma'am. You were never alone. There was an interim shift-"

  "I'm not worried about that. It's not like them to leave once they told me they'd be here."

  "It's the one from Homicide, Miss Cooper. Around midnight, he got a call with some bad news."

  "What-?"

  McCallion spoke over me. "His ladyfriend was in some kind of accident up in Canada. Broke her neck in a fall is what I was told. The girl is dead."

  33

  "Where are you?" I asked Mercer. "Can you talk?"

  "Yeah. I just stepped out of the car when my phone rang. Mike's out cold. He fell asleep about fifteen minutes ago. What time is it?"

  "Almost eight o'clock. What happened? Where-"

  "Val's brother called Mike on his cell phone. I had gone to the other room to put my head down for an hour or so-must have come in around twelve. This ski business, you know about it?"

  "Val talked about it a bit. A helicopter flies them out somewhere in the wilderness, drops them on top of a mountain. Pure powder, that kind of thing. Experts only."

  "Yeah, well, one of the dangers is that those uncharted runs can be pretty unstable," Mercer said, pausing. "The group of them jumping, or something the chopper did letting them down, set off some kind of cataclysmic reaction."

  "She fell, is that what did it?"

  "Three of them, Alex, they went off into a crevasse. The snow shifted and exposed an enormous break in the surface. Val and two others just-just went over the edge. Her brother was in the pack behind them. He watched it happen."

  I thought of the courage with which Valerie Jacobsen had fought to conquer the cancer that had ravaged her body, only to lose her life to a treacherous sport.

  "This happened yesterday?"

  "The day before. It took them twenty-four hours to recover the bodies."

  "And Mike only got the call last night? What are those people thinking? Don't they have any idea how much he loves her?"

  "His fix on it? He's sure Val's parents didn't want him out there. I don't think they knew how serious the relationship was. He thinks they just didn't want to know."

  "The funeral?"

  "First thing this morning. Nine o'clock, in Palo Alto. Family only. He couldn't have gotten there in time if he wanted to. Maybe they planned it that way."

  I always thought it was one of the things the Jewish religion dealt with best. Don't sit with the body in a room for a week. Get the burial done before the next day's sundown and then get on with the grieving. It was so at odds with the practices Mike had grown up with in the Catholic Church, and so foreign to his personal experience.

  "There's going to be a memorial service in two weeks, according to the brother," Mercer said. "I'm telling you, Alex, Mike's in a blind rage. He doesn't know who to lash out at."

  "Where are you?"

  "That's a good question," Mercer said. "Ever hear of Jamestown, Rhode Island?"

  "Sure, right over the bridge from Newport. Why?"

  "We're parked behind a gas station here," Mercer answered softly. "We've been jackassing all over the place since we left Manhattan. It's like he's trying to find a piece of Val, something concrete to hang on to. I can't explain it any better than that."

  "But there?"

  "When his phone vibrated, he left your room so he wouldn't wake you up. Of course, he had no idea who was calling or why. He came in and woke me up-must have been just after he got the news."

  "What'd he do?"

  "He-he was just out of control. He was angry-he knew he had to get out of the hospital before he turned the place upside down. I'd say he was more furious than he was sad."

  "Mike will have all the time in the world to be sad."

  "Then he started calling the airlines. See what time he could get a flight. Val's brother called back to talk him out of that."

  "Have you stayed with him the whole time?"

  "Most of it. He needed to go to Val's place. That's the first thing he
wanted to do. And he wanted to go there alone. I thought he needed that."

  "I'm sure he did."

  "He was up there about an hour. When he came downstairs he told me he wanted to take a ride, to drive somewhere. He's got a pocketful of pictures of her and an armful of her favorite books. I told him he wasn't going anywhere without me."

  "Thank goodness."

  "Mike insisted on taking the wheel and I just let him do it. He went north up the Taconic Parkway for about an hour and a half, to some little inn where they'd spent the night once. Just parked in front, got out and walked around the grounds, without saying a word to me. Then he cut back across upstate New York to Connecticut, over to New Haven."

  Val's architectural firm had been working on Yale's master plan. He loved to look at the buildings, the physical structures she had envisioned and created. "Yeah, they'd been up to the campus together a number of times."

  "When we hit I-95 at five this morning, I assumed we'd be headed south, back to the city. But he came up this way. They spent a weekend together here, at the wedding of one of Val's friends, last fall."

  "Mercer, I've got an idea. Jamestown isn't much more than an hour from the ferry. Take him to the Vineyard. I'll call my caretaker and he can run over and open the house by the time you get there," I said, calculating the driving time plus the forty-five-minute boat ride from Woods Hole.

  "I don't know, Alex. He's kind of flailing about. He doesn't know what-"

  "Mike loves it there. And Val liked being there, too. There's a wonderful photograph of her in one of the guest rooms, from a day we spent at the beach. It's deserted this time of year. It's the most peaceful place on the face of the earth-and, well, there's something so spiritual about it. Besides, he can grieve any way he needs to without anybody getting in his way."

  "He doesn't know what he wants. He's just paralyzed with pain."

  I didn't speak for almost a minute. "I know exactly how he feels, Mercer. You tell him I said that this is one thing I can help him with."

  Mercer and Mike knew all about Adam Nyman, my fiancé who had died the day before our Vineyard wedding, driving to reach the island.

  "Yeah, but-"

  "I can fly up through Boston and be there by early afternoon. I'm not supposed to be working today anyway, am I? It would be the perfect medicine for me, too."

  "He may fight me on this, Alex. All I can do is try."

  My suit was dirty and musty, but dry. I was dressed by the time Dr. Schrem arrived and approved my release. "Give it a few days before you go back to work," he said. "Bed rest, plenty of fluids, don't use the painkillers unless you absolutely need to. Going directly home?"

  "Right now," I said. He didn't know I meant Martha's Vineyard when I said "home."

  Officer McCallion had orders to get an RMP to take me uptown to my apartment. On the way there, Mercer called to tell me that Mike agreed that some time on my secluded hilltop in Chilmark might help him deal with the tragedy that had taken Val's life and so violently disrupted his own.

  I changed into jeans and a sweatshirt. I scrounged around in my dresser drawer for some cash, ID, and a credit card and called a car service to take me to La Guardia to catch the shuttle. I made the ten-thrty, landed at Logan within the hour, and was on a nine-seater Cape Air at noon. There were only two other passengers on the twin-engine prop plane, and the February headwinds tossed us around above the low clouds, slowing our speed so the trip across to the islands took almost fifty minutes.

  Unlike the line of minivans that greeted planeloads of summer commuters, there was only one taxi awaiting incoming flights from Boston, New Bedford, and Hyannis. The driver agreed to make a stop while I ran into the up-island supermarket for some staples, then took me to my home, ten miles farther west to the most glorious part of the tranquil island.

  Mercer heard the van pull in and came out to meet me.

  "Where's Mike?"

  "He can't be still. Got back in the car and drove up to the cliffs, I think. All he's had in the way of sleep was a twenty-minute nap after we gassed up this morning."

  The red cliffs of Aquinnah formed the most dramatic vista, high above the western tip of the island, overlooking the point where the Atlantic Ocean crashed against the Vineyard Sound. The ancient tribal home of the Wampanoag Indians, the open land and seemingly endless dunes stretched out to where the sea met the sky. I knew Mike would find his way up there, probably trespassing out onto the heights of the fragile clay, to sit and talk to Val.

  "Let's go inside. The wind is vicious," I said. "Is Vickee okay with this?"

  "You have to ask? Whatever Mike needs-those are my orders."

  "I'll just put my stuff away. Give me five."

  I closed the door behind me in the master bedroom and walked across the room to stare out at the view. The French doors look out over several acres of gently rolling hills, bordered by the handsome stone walls that ringed the entire property. Thick trunks of the sturdy bare trees dotted the horizon, all the way down to the bright blue choppy waters of Quitsa Pond and the sandy outline of the Elizabeth Islands' shore.

  I had been standing here when my best friend and my mother broke the news of Adam's death to me, more than a decade ago. That moment had changed the island for me forever, and at the very same time made it even more important for me to savor its unique beauty and restorative power.

  I freshened up, put the groceries away, and helped Mercer stack the logs to start a fire. It was three in the afternoon when Mike came back to the house.

  I waited for him at the front door and held it open for him.

  Mike walked past me, his jaw clenched and his face drained of all emotion. He touched my forearm as he whispered the word "Thanks." He had a terrible pallor, with patches of color only where the wind had whipped his cheeks and bitten at the surface of his hands for the last couple of hours. His thick, straight black hair was blown all over his head, and even when he ran his fingers to smooth it down, it remained out of place.

  I followed him into the kitchen, where he helped himself to a can of soda from the refrigerator and held one out to me.

  "Do you want to talk?"

  "Not really," he said. "There isn't very much anybody can say that I want to hear."

  "You know that I adored-"

  "I know."

  He walked into the living room, leaving me leaning against the counter. I went to my bedroom and made some calls-first to one of Mike's sisters to make sure the family knew what had happened, then to my friends-in the office and out-who had come to treasure his friendship.

  I grabbed a pair of gloves for myself and a couple of Yankees caps that were in my closet and went into the living room, where the guys were sitting.

  "Keep the fire burning, will you, please, Mercer? I'm going to Black Point, Mike. I'd like you to come with me."

  He looked up at the solid wooden beams in the tall ceiling. Anything to avoid me.

  "C'mon. Let's take a walk." I tossed one of the hats in Mike's lap.

  He played with its brim without saying a word, then lifted it to his head and pulled it down, dipping it so that he didn't have to make eye contact with me.

  "I'll drive," he said.

  "Can't do it except in my old Jeep." He had been with me before to the private beach, more than a mile off the paved roadway, down a rutted dirt path that was inaccessible by sedans or sports cars. "My wheels this time."

  We drove along South Road for miles-past sheep farms, a cemetery, and horse pastures-until we came to the turnoff to Black Point. Mike's head rested against the window, oblivious to the landscape around him.

  There was nothing to mark the entrance, but I could have found the well-hidden access in my sleep. I had come here for solace whenever I needed some kind of comfort. I drove down the quiet road, kicking up dust all the way, finally reaching the old gate and stepping out to unlock it. I rounded the bend, scrubby brush giving way to the great expanse of wetlands. Tall brown grasses waved on the edges of the ice blu
e pond, backing up against the dunes, which dropped away to the fierce surf of the Atlantic.

  I got out of the car and hiked the path alone, climbing the cut to the highest peak and sitting there, surveying the miles of clean white sand that reached out in both directions, as far as I could see. The whitecaps on the waves reminded me how rough the ocean could be, how its angry pounding against the shoreline seemed almost a reflection of Mike's mood.

  The late-afternoon sun cast my shadow far out onto the sand. When Mike came up behind me minutes later, it threw his tall outline even farther toward the water than mine-two long black figures alone in their mourning on an isolated piece of one of the most beautiful beaches in the world.

  I had come here with Nina the day that Adam died-to rage against his loss and to be in a place where we had always found serenity. With his family, soon after, I had scattered his ashes offshore at this very spot.

  Mike stepped out of his loafers, took off his socks, and rolled up the legs of his jeans. The water was colder than I dared think, but I knew he wasn't feeling very much. For half an hour, he walked the shoreline until he was out of my sight and when he returned, his eyes were rimmed with red and swollen with tears.

  He stood at the edge of the tide as it ran out and spoke to me for the first time since we left the house.

  "She never caught a break. You know how it is? How certain people just carry some kind of curse with them from the moment they're born? They've got everything to live for but there's some relentless black cloud hanging right overhead? That was Val."

  "Think what she had with you this last year. Think what happiness you gave her." I kicked off my moccasins and walked down to be next to him.

  "Happiness? You know what a struggle it was for her to smile sometimes? You know what a triumph it was for her to be healthy again? You're sounding like her father-like all I was to her was the court jester, making sure she had a reason to laugh every single day she was alive."

  "Don't put me in his category. She told me what you meant to her on every level, and I know how very much she wanted to marry you."