Bitch Creek

by Tapply, William

  Calhoun fed Ralph and put on a fresh pot of coffee. Then he went into the bedroom and changed into jeans, a dark blue sweatshirt, and sneakers. He found a bottle of Ben’s insect repellent in his fishing vest in the living room and stuck it into his pocket, too.

  He had a couple hours to kill, so he found the classical music station on his stereo. They were playing Mozart’s clarinet concerto.

  He sat at his fly-tying bench. Humming tunelessly along with the clarinet, and without thinking much about it, he found himself tying a red-and-white wet fly, a Parmacheene Belle, which had been named after Lake Parmacheene in the northwestern corner of Maine. When he recognized what he had done, Calhoun smiled. Lyle had loved history and had a special fondness for old-fashioned flies, especially those that originated in Maine like the Grey Ghost, the Warden’s Worry, and the Nine-Twelve.

  Calhoun figured that even when he wasn’t aware of thinking about Lyle, part of his mind was doing just that.

  Tying flies, like fishing with them, served a double purpose. Both fishing and fly tying gave him something to focus on at one level, while at the same time clearing his mind and allowing it to roam freely, to ponder problems on a different level.

  So the front part of Calhoun’s brain arranged feathers and bucktail and tinsel, while some darker, deeper part considered why Fred Green had murdered Lyle and now wanted to murder Calhoun himself.

  The next time he looked at his watch, it was eleven-thirty. He’d tied nine flies, all of them different. But he had solved no problems.

  He pushed back his chair, went to the kitchen, filled a thermos with coffee, and turned off the stereo. He took a heavy army blanket from the bedroom closet, screwed a black baseball cap onto his head, picked up the shotgun, snapped his fingers at Ralph, turned off all the lights, and went outside.

  He stood on the porch for a minute, holding the Remington at port arms, waiting for his eyes to adjust. It was a cloudy, moonless night, but after a while he was able to see shapes and textures.

  He went over to the truck, took the box of shotgun shells from the glove compartment, and dumped a handful of spares into his pocket. Then he slipped into the bushes along the driveway beside the house. Ralph followed.

  He found a big old oak tree to lean his back against. “Lie down here,” Calhoun said to Ralph. “This is my watch, so you might as well snooze.”

  Ralph obediently dropped his chin onto his paws.

  Calhoun spread the army blanket over his legs and laid the shotgun across his knees. Then he poured himself a mug of coffee and prepared to wait.

  CHAPTER

  TWENTY-FIVE

  THE TRICK TO STAYING AWAKE ALL NIGHT is to have something on your mind, preferably something to worry about, to mull over, to conduct mental dialogues about. Calhoun had Lyle’s murder, and he had Kate, and he had the Man in the Suit—not to mention Fred Green with his twenty-two who wanted to kill him—and they kept him going. He bounced from Lyle to Kate to the man in the suit to Fred Green and back again, and sometimes all four of them managed to get tangled up in each other and he’d find his mind free-wheeling, creating bizarre, nightmarish scenarios. When that happened, he’d stand up and stretch and pour himself some more coffee from his thermos.

  The coffee helped, and so did the possibility that Fred Green might show up.

  He couldn’t see his watch in the darkness, but he had faith in his internal clock. He guessed it was close to four when Ralph, who was lying beside him, snapped up his head and gave a low growl.

  Calhoun reached over and tapped Ralph’s shoulder by way of telling him to shut up.

  The sun wasn’t scheduled to rise for another hour, but already the black sky had begun to fade into a pewtery purple. Calhoun leaned forward so he could see through the bushes. He caught a shadowy movement on the far side of the parking area, then made out a dark shape easing along the edge of the opening, just inside the woods.

  No. Two shapes.

  Without taking his eyes off them, he slowly reached down and picked up his shotgun. Ralph growled again, and Calhoun gave him a gentle slap on the shoulder.

  The two shapes slid out of the bushes and into the opening in front of the house.

  Deer. A doe and her fawn, moving like ghosts in the semidarkness, not ten yards from where Calhoun and Ralph were hiding. The doe carried her head high and alert, and the fawn—which wasn’t much bigger than a long-legged jackrabbit—mimicked her. She’d probably gotten a whiff of the man and the dog and found the mingled scent confusing.

  A moment later they melted into the woods and were gone.

  Calhoun let out a deep breath and slumped back against the oak tree. He realized that his palms were sweaty and his heart was drumming in his chest.

  He reached over and scratched Ralph’s muzzle. “Good work,” he whispered. “You got the ears and the nose. I got the eyes and the gun. Between us, we’re one whole, lethal animal.”

  He waited another hour or so, and when the birds started chorusing and the daylight began to creep in under the trees, he stood up, yawned and stretched, picked up his gun and his blanket and his thermos, and lugged them into the house.

  Ralph trotted to his water dish and lapped it dry.

  Calhoun put on a fresh pot of coffee and set the timer for eleven. Then he went into the bedroom, stripped, and flopped down on the bed.

  Ralph came in and curled up on the floor. “Your watch,” Calhoun told him. “And don’t bother waking me up for some damn deer.”

  He checked his watch. It was ten after five. He instructed his mental alarm to start ringing at eleven, rolled onto his belly, and fell asleep.

  He slept badly, with a night’s worth of caffeine and adrenaline blasting through his bloodstream, and when he awoke—it was 10:35 by his wristwatch—he felt less rested than before he’d slept. There had been dreams, but they were gone the instant he opened his eyes, leaving him feeling vaguely anxious and disoriented and depressed.

  He stumbled naked into the bathroom and started the water running. The cool shower washed some of the cotton out of his head, and he stood under it for a long time, thinking about what he had to do today.

  He toweled himself dry, slipped into jeans and a T-shirt, poured a mug of coffee, and went out on the deck. He listened to Bitch Creek sing while he replenished his system with caffeine and resolve.

  Then he fetched his shotgun, whistled up Ralph, got into his truck, and headed for Jacob Barnes’s store.

  Calhoun filled his tank from the pump in front, then pulled off to the side next to a Pepsi delivery truck. Ralph seemed to have resigned himself to spending his days cooped up in the cab of the truck, and he didn’t even lift his head when Calhoun got out.

  It was musty and dim inside, and Calhoun paused in the doorway and blinked a couple of times. Old Jacob was leaning on his cane talking to the Pepsi guy, who was loading up the glass-fronted cooler against the back wall. Marcus, Jacob’s grandson, was behind the counter thumbing through a magazine.

  Calhoun went over to him. “Good morning, Marcus.”

  Marcus looked up. “Mornin’.” He was wearing his customary overalls and T-shirt and Mets baseball cap.

  Calhoun pulled out his wallet and put two tens on the counter. “It came to fifteen even.”

  Marcus made change, and Calhoun slipped the five into his wallet. He jerked his head in Jacob’s direction. “Your grandpa likely to be tied up for long?”

  Jacob looked over at Calhoun. “Be right with you, Stoney.”

  Marcus returned to his magazine. Calhoun looked idly at the collection of rental videos.

  Finally the Pepsi man wheeled his dolly out the front door and Jacob hobbled over and held out his hand. “How’s it goin’, Stoney?”

  Calhoun shook hands with him. “Can’t complain, Jacob,” he said. “Wondering if I might pick your brain for a minute?”

  “What there is left of it—I don’t mind. Let’s go sit.”

  Jacob’s store did not have the traditional potb
ellied stove, but there were three rocking chairs in the back corner by the coffee urn where locals sometimes assembled to drink coffee and chew the fat. Calhoun remembered what Millie had said about there being no secrets in Maine. He suspected that a good many local secrets got aired in the back of Jacob’s store.

  Jacob sat with a soft groan. “This damn arthur-itis,” he grumbled. “It don’t get no better. Back when I had Ingrid, she used to rub me down. She hit all the places I can’t reach myself.” He shook his head. “Hell, Stoney. You didn’t come here to listen to my complaints.” He gave Calhoun a quick grin. “Did you?”

  “Nope,” said Calhoun.

  “Well, that’s okay. Personally, I think it’s fascinating.”

  Calhoun smiled. “You remember about me finding Lyle McMahan’s dead body over in Keatsboro last week.”

  Jacob nodded. “Up to Potter’s old place. You and the sheriff showed me the picture of the guy who done it.”

  “That’s right. Fred Green’s his name. You know Lyle was a friend of mine, and the truth is, it should’ve been me who took Mr. Green up there that day, not him. It was Lyle’s bad luck. Wrong place at the wrong time.” Calhoun cocked his head, inviting Jacob to offer a thought.

  But all he said was: “Don’t know how I’m gonna help you, Stoney. Haven’t laid eyes on that Mr. Green. I make sure everybody who comes in takes a look at that sketch. But I ain’t heard any useful rumors, if that’s what you’re askin’ for, and I ain’t been up to Potter’s in a coon’s age.”

  “Actually,” said Calhoun, “that property’s changed hands a few times since the Potters owned it.”

  “Oh, sure,” said Jacob. “But hereabouts, we still think of it as Potter’s. Nobody’s lived up there since the fire.”

  “The name Raczwenc mean anything to you?”

  Jacob blinked a couple of times. “Hell, I ain’t heard that name in years,” he said. “They’re the ones who sold that piece to Sam Potter.” He leaned toward Calhoun. “You know, Stoney, I can remember what happened fifty years ago as clear as if it was this mornin’. But ask me what I ate for dinner yesterday and I draw a blank. Sure I remember Raczwenc. Come over from Poland or someplace back before the war. There was Saul and his wife—damned if I can remember her name. Anyways, they bought themselves a big parcel up there in Keatsboro and settled right down to farmin’. Saul, he come down here for supplies every couple weeks. We was a feed-and-grain place back then. That’s when my daddy was still alive, but I was runnin’ the place. That Saul was a funny old duck. Nice fella, though. Worked hard, took care of his property.”

  “The Potters,” Calhoun said, “whose house burned in the fire? I was wondering what you might remember about them.”

  “They was from down south somewhere. Sam Potter bought that property from Saul Raczwenc, and damned if he didn’t built himself a house way the hell back in the woods. Didn’t know squat about farming, though he tried.” Jacob shook his head. “Sam died in the fire. He was the only one around here, though a lot of houses and barns got burned to the ground. Sam Potter just didn’t belong out there in the woods. Didn’t understand about fire.”

  “What happened to the rest of the Potter family?” said Calhoun.

  “I heard Mrs. Potter—Emily was her name—I heard she took their kids down to Florida. Can’t say I knew the Potters very well. They always pretty much kept to themselves. Sam was kind of a surly fella, actually. Sometimes had one of his kids with him. Girl and a boy. They was surly, too. Folks said that when Sam Potter was in the army, he was one of the first ones to go into the concentration camps, and he wasn’t the same afterwards. Always acted like a man who’d seen the devil, I can tell you that.”

  “After the fire,” said Calhoun. “Potter was buried there on their property?”

  “Hell, no. Why you askin’ that?”

  Calhoun shrugged. “I went up there the other day, thought I might’ve noticed an old gravesite.”

  “Last I heard,” said Jacob, “Sam Potter was resting out behind the Congregational church up to Keatsboro. Unless he got up and moved, I imagine he still is.” He narrowed his eyes. “You know, Stoney, some folks think the Potter place is haunted. Dying in a fire ain’t a peaceful way to go. They say that burned souls hang around even when their bodies get buried somewheres else. Maybe you ought not to nose around there too much.”

  “It is kind of spooky, all right,” said Calhoun, remembering that phantom foot. “What happened to the Raczwencs?”

  Jacob gazed off into space. “Sad story, Stoney. Old Saul, he hung himself. His son found him in the barn, danglin’ from a rafter where he jumped out of the hayloft. The missus, she died of the cancer a few years after the fire.”

  “And what happened to their property?”

  “Hell, Stoney. I thought you understood that. You know David Ross, don’t you?”

  “Well, sure.”

  “That’s David Raczwenc,” said Jacob. “The son.”

  “He changed his name,” said Calhoun, feeling stupid.

  Jacob nodded.

  “David Ross found his father hangin’ in the barn.” Calhoun shook his head. “That’s a tough one.”

  “I guess to hell it is, Stoney.”

  Calhoun nodded. “So after the fire, Ross bought back the Potter property, which had originally been in his family. Then—”

  “’Scuse me, Grampa.”

  Jacob glanced up, looking past Calhoun’s shoulder, and said, “What’s up, son?”

  Calhoun turned. Marcus was standing behind him wearing his usual empty smile. “I gotta go,” he said.

  “You got some pretty girl waitin’ for you, boy?”

  Marcus shook his head. “Ollie Sorenson wants me to help him truck some firewood.”

  “Go ahead, then,” Jacob said to Marcus. “Say hello to Ollie for me.”

  Marcus nodded to Jacob, then to Calhoun. Then he turned and left.

  Jacob sighed, leaned on his cane, and pushed himself to his feet. “Guess I better get back to work,” he said. He began to limp across the floor. “Was there anything else you wanted to know?”

  Calhoun followed him, resisting the temptation to hold his elbow and steer him along. “I guess that’s about it,” he said. “Mainly, just trying to figure out what happened up there, why Lyle got killed.”

  “Guess when they catch up with that Fred Green you’ll have your answers,” said Jacob. “Meantime, if I hear anything, I’ll give you a holler.”

  The Congregational church, along with several lovely old Federal Period homes, an antiques shop, and an art gallery, overlooked the Keatsboro village green. The green was a perfect square. It was rimmed with elegant maple trees, and a miniature Washington Monument stood in the exact center, a memorial to the boys who gave their lives in the wars. Four paved pathways led to it from each of the four corners, and a few old artillery pieces—artifacts from the Great War—were scattered around. Bordering the walkways were neatly tended flower gardens, which bloomed with petunias, marigolds, phlox, and impatiens.

  Calhoun pulled into the circular driveway in front of the white-clapboard church. He got out and snapped his fingers at Ralph, who looked up, yawned, and climbed down from the truck.

  Behind the church, gravestones stood in rows on a west-facing hillside that sloped gently down to a pasture, where a herd of milk cows grazed. In the distance, the hills of New Hampshire bumped against the horizon. The cemetery covered an area about a hundred yards square and was surrounded by a tall black iron fence. The gate was ajar, and Calhoun went in.

  There were hundreds of gravestones—some tall and fancy and some modest and plain. Calhoun began walking the rows. Many of the markers dated back to the 1700s and 1800s. A number of them were family plots that told stories of tough old Yankee farmers with a succession of wives, each of whom had given their husbands several children before dying. Many of the children had failed to survive infancy.

  Calhoun thought of Lyle. Lyle had probably prowled this cemetery,
gathering stories, embellishing them, reading between the lines.

  Here and there, a faded little American flag was stuck into the ground, and there were a few pots holding brown sticks that had once been flowers. Memorial Day, Calhoun remembered, was about a month ago.

  He found Sam Potter halfway down the slope. A rectangular granite marker read SAMUEL EMERSON POTTER; MARCH 12, 1909–OCTOBER 22, 1947. A VETERAN OF THE SECOND WORLD WAR. LOVING HUSBAND OF EMILY GRAYSON POTTER AND FATHER OF LAWRENCE AND MARTHA. GOD REST HIS SOUL.

  A little American flag had been stuck in the ground in front of Samuel’s stone, and a cheap plastic flowerpot holding a droopy geranium leaned against the side of the gravestone. Unlike most of the other flowers in the cemetery, these were still alive, although it looked like they hadn’t been watered for about a week.

  After more than half a century, somebody still remembered Sam Potter, and for some reason, that made Calhoun feel ineffably sad.

  He whistled for Ralph, then sat down at the foot of the grave marker. Ralph lay beside him with his chin on Calhoun’s instep. He scratched Ralph’s ears for a moment. Then he lay back on the ground with his hands laced under his head and waited for Sam Potter to whisper his secrets to him.

  CHAPTER

  TWENTY-SIX

  HE ALLOWED HIS EYES TO CLOSE, drifting on his thoughts, ready to receive any messages that Sam Potter might choose to pass along, hints or clues that might help him understand what had happened on his property almost sixty years after he died.

  He remembered what Jacob Barnes had said about how the ghosts of fire victims remained behind to haunt the place where they had been burned even when their corporal remains were carted away and buried someplace else. When it came to ghosts, Calhoun was certainly not a disbeliever. He’d seen bodies in trout streams and feet sticking up out of the earth. Visions visited him at night. He wasn’t sure where the line between ghosts and imagination was drawn.

  He would welcome a visit from Sam Potter—even if it was the product of his own lightning-zapped brain—and he’d be willing to call it a ghost.