Timber City Masks

by Kieran York

  “I’ll have more concern for the plan of life. There must be tranquility. My affair with the professor was a crisis-a-minute love. It became encumbering.”

  “My grandmother says it needs to be a compromising exchange of love. My mother thinks it’s respect.”

  “What does love feel like to you?”

  “Sometimes love blesses and sometimes it batters. Gwen says my affair with Valeria is either an 'oh’ or an 'ouch’ kind of thing. Gwen also claims that she’s never experienced an 'ouch’ with Nadine. What do you believe love is all about?”

  “I don’t know that I believe in a classic definition. The Ute have a ceremony where the souls of lovers are placed into the center of one another. It’s a very sacred chant. Sort of a Ute lullaby of love.”

  Consumed by the moment, Royce studied Hertha’s face. Then her lips began to move slightly, finally sealing, “I’m sorry you were hurt by the professor.”

  “Molly says that things always turn out for the best.”

  “You’re getting to know my mother’s sayings. And what does your mother have to say about life and love?”

  “Some sayings can’t transcend culture,” Hertha joked.

  ***

  “That woman is a warm little heater,” Nick bragged with an accompanying whistle.

  “Curio shop?” Royce quizzed, as she watched him strut toward the department Blazer. He tossed the keys to her, and with one hand she grabbed them midair. Scowling, Royce shook her head. “And they say chivalry is dead.”

  “We can’t all marry cheerleaders. The woman is boiling over with desire for me.”

  “Have you ever made love with a woman rather than to a woman?”

  “I don’t see a difference.”

  “Made my point.” Royce leaned against the Blazer. “Let’s fight about something else.”

  As Yancy approached, Nick waved. “Hey Yanc, Royce here is about to tell me how to love women.”

  “Oh no,” Royce bantered back. “A gorilla charge. Two of them.”

  “Got your daily quota of murders solved?” Yancy teased her.

  “Just a little behind on a couple of them.”

  “Me and Nicky are goin’ over to the Bell Ringer and have us a few brews. Too bad you’re on duty.”

  “Yanc, I do appreciate your covering for me on my birthday.”

  “Faye tells me you were happy as a hornet,” Yancy said with a snicker. “Or was it a honey bee?”

  “Or a wasp,” Nick jabbed.

  “I just hope this hive is in hibernation tonight. I’m not ready to battle with cowboys,” Royce declared.

  “I seen your Gran. She tells me you’re working on her porch. Says she wants to have a little get-together when it’s done. Now Mrs. Madison invited me, but I’m not sure Nicky here is bein’ invited.”

  “Trust me, he’ll be invited,” Royce assured Yancy. “I like to have him where I can keep an eye on him.”

  “Have yourself a good evening,” Yancy said. “See you over there after you’ve changed,” he called to Nick.

  “I’ll be in my civvies in ten.” Nick began to walk toward the courthouse and then stopped. Slowly, he turned and faced Royce.

  “Aren’t you in a hurry?”

  “Royce, I want to talk with you a minute.”

  “Talk.”

  “I’m beginning to think you might have something about Luther Sumner being involved.”

  With a start she pushed away from the fender. “What?”

  “Listen, don’t mention this to Yancy ... What I’m going to tell you. I had lunch with Luther over at the hotel today. I just dropped in for the special and he was sitting there. Told me to join him. The guy starts telling me how nobody gives him credit for anything. Then he boasts that if he had killed anyone, he was smart enough not to get caught. He says that if he wanted to murder his wife, even his own brother couldn’t catch him.” Nick’s brow furrowed and his eyes narrowed. “It was the way he said it. Scoffing. I couldn’t tell Yancy about it. But I swear he gave me the impression he was saying he did it. He even used the term. 'Get by with murder.’ Shocked the hell out of me.”

  “Nick, if you’re handing me some elaborate shit. A practical joke . . .”

  “This isn’t a joke. Don’t be so damned paranoid. I’m trying to help.”

  Royce eyed Nick suspiciously. “It could be a plot to find out what I’m on to. Cozy up to me with this story.”

  “I don’t give a damn about being on your side. You don’t sign my checks, and you aren’t exactly my favorite person. I really think Luther has something to do with it. I’m telling you because I admire the way you keep punching. Even when you’re about to hear the ten count.”

  “For now I would keep it buttoned.” Royce could see the concern in Nick’s eyes. She knew him well enough to know that he was uncomfortable. When he was pulling a fast one, he was smooth as silk. “With them being brothers, it could be a volatile situation to report this to Yancy.”

  “You won’t mention this to him?”

  “No. I just can’t imagine Luther spouting off like that. After all, if he did kill Trish, Yancy gave him an alibi.”

  “And that makes Yancy an accomplice.”

  “And that’s where my stomach knots up,” Royce confessed. “What we know for sure is that two people are dead.” She stopped short of saying that Luther had threatened her. “Another wouldn’t matter.”

  Royce saw a flash of fear in Nick’s face. He had not been lying to her. She was convinced that it happened just like he said. Luther was getting careless, or bold, or both. And Royce was the one he had threatened most recently.

  “Nick, you’re meeting Yancy for a drink in a few minutes.” Royce cautioned, “You’d better not look like you just found out the sheriff’s brother killed someone.”

  “You’re right. Easier said than done. You haven’t got a joke, have you? Probably not,” he answered.

  “As a matter of fact, I do. And it’s sexist, so you’ll love it. Do you know why it’s better for a woman to have boobs than brains?”

  “No.”

  “Because most men see better than they think.”

  “That joke is supposed to make me lighten up?”

  Everyone’s a critic, Royce thought as she watched Nick walk away. She was glad Gwen had told her that joke. Nick grumbled all the way to the courthouse doors.

  She then climbed into the Blazer and vowed to be very careful on every call she took. It had always been a life and death job.

  Now it seemed even more ominous. Royce put on her sunglasses, checked in the rearview mirror, and then backed out onto the street. Even butterscotch would not improve her mood.

  ***

  Gran prattled on and on. She was putting Royce on edge. Royce usually welcomed Dora Madison’s news of the day. “Got a delightful letter from Blanche,” Gran reported.

  “So what did your favorite sister have to say?” Royce didn’t wait for a response. She tapped a finishing nail into the paneling.

  “Asks after you and your mother. Tells me she’s fine. Says a friend of hers just got back from Europe. Now that’s a place I always wanted to go. Blanche and I been talkin’ about it for years. Go over to see England. I’d love to set foot in Cornwall. My own gran was from there.”

  “Wish I had the money to send you both. Maybe we should have waited on the porch.”

  “We agreed on a new porch this year. And you send me off to California every summer. I can’t imagine how much this porch is costing.”

  “Don’t worry about it, Gran. I’ve budgeted for everything.”

  “I almost forgot. Your friend called.”

  “Hertha?”

  “No. The teacher. Veronica.”

  “Valeria.”

  “Well, aren’t you gonna dash off and phone her?”

  “After I finish the trim.” She was glad when her grandmother returned to her kitchen. She would comb her mind for clues. She put the hammer down and reached into her pocket. She lin
ed the three shell casings up on the newly installed window sill. As her index finger counted them off, her mind skirmished with clues. Along the edge of dishonesty, she surmised, there must be some automatic game of deception. She wondered if each crime committed had its own flavor and texture. If Laramie was to be believed, one person had killed three times. Fraudulence probably entered in. It was not some gracefully designed arsenic in tea executed by a disgruntled butler. Three shots were fired into a human being. A woman was strangled. A man was bludgeoned.

  Somehow these crimes were linked. Looped together by fate. Over a decade had elapsed. There were three victims with very little in common. There was no recognizable common denominator. A sheriff, a socialite, and a drifter. Where was the filament, that common strand, tying these killings together? The murders were as different as were the victims. But then, Luther had bragged about committing the perfect crime. He might know that mixing methods stymies investigators.

  When Royce heard her grandmother’s call, she quickly put the casings back into her pocket. Her grandmother covered the telephone mouthpiece and whispered that it was Valeria. Royce walked slowly toward the outstretched phone cord. She held the receiver to her midsection for several moments. Finally she lifted it to her head with great deliberation.

  Chapter 20

  Royce had entered Valeria’s bedroom hoping love would warm away the early evening’s chill. Soft music was a prelude, and her lover’s smile, she’d hoped, would be an encore.

  “Royce baby, are you headquartered in some primrose fantasy?” Valeria stepped out of her designer skirt. She swirled the billowy scarf that had dangled from her frosty white silk blouse in Royce’s direction. Underneath the blouse was an ivory-colored lace camisole. “Why don’t you be a love and pour me a drink? I have some of that special reserve cognac, and there’s some German beer for you.”

  Obediently Royce went to Valeria’s bar and poured the cognac and then flipped open a beer. From the bedroom, she heard Valeria’s instructions to make it a large glass. She’d had a hellish day with the brats, she expressed with a long sigh. Royce poured the cognac into a larger glass and added another inch. When she returned to the bedroom, she handed it to Valeria.

  “I don’t usually drink expensive beer.”

  “I see. Why don’t you use a glass? There are those adorable mugs. I hate it when you drink out of a bottle.” Her criticism stung. Then she asked, “Is that how your little vet pal drinks her beer?”

  “Hertha doesn’t drink.”

  “Well isn’t she just little miss perfect. What an exciting twosome you make.” Valeria had stopped undressing long enough to drain her glass. “Guess I’ll just have to have another in her honor. Bring the damned bottle with you this time, Royce. It really has been a hideously rotten day.”

  As commanded Royce brought back the bottle and placed it on the bed stand. “Your reserve.” There was an edge to her voice.

  “And you didn’t get yourself a mug.”

  “I’m drinking the damned beer. I’ll drink it the way I want.” Royce sat in the winged chair. There was a silence that struck them both. Royce peered into the bottom of her beer bottle. The beer distorted the design and the circle had become a floating halo-shaped image. “Maybe I do believe in a primrose fantasy. I’d hoped that love entered into it.”

  “Love? Life is an elaborate soiree. Love is the best hors d'oeuvre on the platter. I’m spending the weekend with Jane.”

  Valeria flung her blouse across the room and it landed in Royce’s lap. Royce felt the body heat, and when it cooled she tossed it over the chair’s arm. She watched as Valeria eased onto the bed, still in her camisole and stockings.

  “And you’re having a weekend feast?” Royce felt her stomach tumble. Her head sunk into the palms of her hands. “Does it all come down to some mechanical orgasm. Do you think I’ve got a punch-out heart?” There was indignation in her voice, but not in her slumped shoulders.

  “We have tonight.”

  “My grandmother would call it pyrite.”

  Valeria poured another drink and gulped half of it immediately. “Oh, don’t let’s get on your Granny jag. Dear old Granny and her tired witticisms. Even as a child I couldn’t stand nursery rhymes. And now I have to listen to that crap from you. Jesus. Just don’t do that to me now. Not when I’m ready to go over a damned ledge.”

  Royce went to the bed and sat. Her arms went around Valeria. “I want to be there for you. Val, I know you’re going through the loss of someone you loved. Please let me help.”

  “Save the tedious crap for your fishing buddy. You’ll be there to scoop me up when I fall. To lean on. The vet is probably impressed by all those 'love forever’ lines. Why don’t you bed her. If you haven’t already.”

  “I’ve never made love with Hertha.”

  “That’s your business. I take it she gave you that squaw bracelet? You can’t even see that she has the hots for you. Mind boggling.”

  “She isn’t the type of woman who gets the hots for someone.”

  “You may want to play sentry over your emotions, but don’t expect the same of me.”

  “I’ve never had expectations.” Her heart plunged.

  “No, Royce. Of course not. But you do want to make our flesh dalliance into some hot and heavy love affair. Now that’s deception. That’s fraudulence. You know you like my probing tongue and my nails raking your back. You know you love my warm and willing body.” Valeria finished her drink and extended the glass to Royce. “Top this up, will you baby?”

  Royce took the empty glass. It was covered with sticky smudges. She turned. “Do you honestly think that all you’ve ever meant to me is sexual pleasure?” Her face appeared to be on fire. Her eyes watered.

  “My drink?”

  “Fix your own drink.”

  “What?” Valeria stood, facing Royce.

  “When you drink, you become someone I don’t know.”

  “You aren’t my keeper. Jesus. I’m around a bunch of brats all day, I’m not putting up with your bullshit too.” Valeria stormed around to the other side of the bed and picked up the telephone. She dialed by memory. “Jane, darling,” the smoothly sexy rasp had returned to her voice. “Change in plans. Why don’t you come over tonight? I cleared the agenda for you.”

  When she put the phone down, Valeria glowered at Royce. Royce’s head had lowered. “Val, you didn’t need to do that to me.” With a humiliation she’d never experience before, Royce reached and touched the chain that held the diamond pendant. She didn’t feel the sting when she tore it from her neck. Nor did she feel the cut. She tossed the necklace onto the armoire. “I’ll leave. And you have my word, unless you’re speeding in my county, you won’t see me again.”

  “Unless I crave you.”

  “I doubt that you’ll crave me,” Royce lamented.

  “Welcome to reality, baby,” Valeria shouted as Royce opened the door.

  The words echoed. A chill that transcended reality remained with Royce as she left. She didn’t want to go to the cabin. She drove to Timber City. She hoped Gwen was working late. Gwen would chastise her for puerile actions. But Gwen would also offer comfort when Royce’s eyes exploded with tears. Royce knew that Gwen had sojourned to that place where a heart is alone. She would tell Royce to give up beauty queens. She would toss a box of tissue to wipe Royce’s moist eyes. She would try to make Royce laugh.

  Gwen would ask how warm Hertha’s kiss was.

  ***

  “Tell me about the lip lock with our vet?” Gwen asked without looking up from her time-scarred desktop. When there was silence, her whimsical tone changed. She glanced up. “What the hell happened to you?”

  “I lost my temper. Valeria put an end to what she referred to as our flesh dalliance.”

  “At least she was on point with that description. Royce, your eyes look like soggy creampuffs.”

  Royce’s thin frame crashed down into the rocking chair’s pillowed lap. “It feels final this time.”
>
  “It was bound to happen one day. You knew that.”

  “I hoped that the relationship would become stronger. She’s just getting into deeper trouble with booze.”

  “Royce, you really held out hope that she wouldn’t blow out love’s candle?” Gwen’s rhetorical question pinched. When Royce looked away, Gwen answered, “Sure you knew. She needs sidebar lovers to subjugate themselves. She treats people as if they’re from some hearts-to-go service. She’s a charmer and a stunner. She acts like she’s the rightful owner to any heart she wants.”

  “She no longer wants mine.”

  “There’s a word that I made up. Coined myself. A major contribution to the language, if I do say so myself. La session. It means that a person gives up his or her personality to another person. The word has the sound of its meaning. Yes. Well, you’ve been suffering with the damnedest case of la session I’ve ever witnessed.”

  “My punishment for this la session is hell.” Royce dabbed her eyes.

  “Royce, allow me to preach a minute. She left you rumpled and crumpled. But we all knew she would eventually give you the old heave-ho. The affair was based on sex and convenience. You allowed la session because you wanted to cherish her. And, face it, the affair was safe. It was clandestine. No need to make explanations, excuses, or apologies. It was hidden away. Away from your family and away from your badge. I may not know everything, but I know women. She doesn’t take prisoners. She landed you, hook, line, and sinker. With methodical precision. She’s the grand champion of la session, and now you’re a veteran.”

  “It hurts so much.”

  “A week from now you’ll be sending her a thank-you note for cutting you loose,” Gwen bantered. “Hell’s bells, the pain won’t last forever.”

  Royce shifted her legs. She had a numb feeling inside. “I’m glad I have you to confide in. The investigation is stalled and now my relationship has ended.”

  “What you need is a couple days away. You and Hertha have been talking about a fishing trip. Make it a two-day camping trip. Give your mind and heart a chance to heal. That’s what’s needed. Pitch a tent; sleep out under the stars; fish morning to night. There’s no reason for you and Hertha to be apart.” Gwen’s eyes twinkled and she playfully added, “And maybe every reason for you to be together.”