I met a new guy. Kent and Sandra brought along a friend, another Stowall from up in the mountains near where we live. His name is Mark, and I think he’s the one I’ve been waiting for. After lunch the four of us went ashore in Kent’s dingy. We walked along the coast for a while and he held my hand. It was warm and somehow reassuring. His hand felt as if I’d been waiting to hold it all my life.
By the time we went back to the boats the adults had started in already. Jolene was cooking us dinner in the small galley but she kept falling against the counters and spilling stuff, so Gordon ordered me to finish the meal. He dragged her angrily up the stairs and forced her to sit on the bench at the stern.”
I stopped reading. I skimmed down looking for the violence I knew would be there. It went on for three pages and at the end of it Gordon—she now seemed to be calling her parents by their first names—buried an oar in Jolene’s head, supposedly while trying to rescue her after she’d fallen overboard. I couldn’t stand it, so I shut the little volume and turned off the light. It was a long while before I slept. And a short while before I was awoken again.
Chapter 36: Andrea’s Alpha Bet
Sunday, October 12
The phone rang. I pondered whether it was one of the three Bee Women I’d called earlier or our new mystery caller.
Matt had tried returning the call, with no response. He said he would research the number then left on another errand. I stood looking down at the phone, almost frightened.
But it was Matt.
His warm voice said, “Sorry I left so abruptly. I had a follow-up on the Henry case. Are you in the office?”
“Yes.”
“I left my notes on this guy next to my computer. Could you check and see what the house number is? I’m driving around in circles down here getting nowhere by checking mail boxes.” He was in La Jolla again. I gave him the number.
I said, “Will you be heading back after you serve him?”
“No. but you’ll be safe. I think I’ll check out some details on the Miller investigation while I’m down near the cop shop. Their lab here has the best records on priors. What are you up to today?”
The Miller case was a white collar investigation of a financial fraud on the order of a Ponzi scheme, only San Diego-sized. Miller had given himself away by buying an expensive new car. Two hundred K expensive.
I said, “Nothing much, just making some phone calls. So how good does the new Audi RS4 Cabriolet look?”
“I’m getting one next week.” He chuckled, reminding me of a more normal Matt.
I sighed. Then his comment hit me. What did he mean, you’ll be safe?
Matt said, “That unidentified caller turned out to be from a public phone at the airport. Probably just a wrong number.”
“Was it the same as the ones last night?”
His silence screamed which calls last night? I looked around his desk and spotted the note I’d left for him, shoved under some other papers. I thought how unusual it was for him to be so disorganized. And remembered that was my job. Keeping him organized.
I told him about the series of phone calls last night. That they’d come in on all three of our phones. Gave him the number.
Matt said, “It’s a different number.” Then he slipped into some void, stayed there for several moments.
I said, “Will I be able to reach you later today, if I need to?” As soon as I asked him I knew I shouldn’t have. I could almost feel his brainwaves change through the phone. Or maybe I heard his breathing change.
“What are you planning?”
“Nothing.” Too quick.
“I thought you said you were through with that Stowall mess.”
“No, I didn’t. I said, I wished I was through with it. Anyway, I am, for now.”
“Rachel.”
“Matt.”
His turn to sigh.
He finished with, “Stay out of trouble.”
He was being a Marine, worrying about my security. It was lovely, until it got annoying.
I sat staring at the phone willing callbacks for the next half hour while playing bridge on my computer. Finally I remembered how to make someone call. Take a shower.
Sure enough, ten minutes later while I was all lathered up and enjoying the decadent western pleasure of a daily hot rinse, the phone chirped. Hair full of soap, I wrapped myself in an oversized, cotton towel and raced for the office.
Bingo! It was Andrea. We spent several moments trading brief but useless remarks, as I wiped some tickling soap off my forehead. I cut to the chase.
“Andrea, I need one of you folks from the bee to tell me what this snake-thing is with the Stowalls.”
“They had a small business milking them. Jake supplied the local medical clinics with rattlesnake venom for a hefty fee. He was really just a handyman constantly looking for ways to make money. With seven kids you can see how it would be.”
Coaxing, I said, “That’s a dangerous job. Where did he keep them?”
“Out back of their house, there’s a little shed. Could still be some squirming around out there now, if you want to go take a little look-see. Although they haven’t sold the venom for ages, so they’d probably be loose. They use something called CroFab as antivenom, now.”
“Right.” I knew this, of course. I ventured on.
“Okay, but can you tell me…I mean, can you describe Luke? What he looked like? Did he favor his mother or his father?”
“Weird. Your questions get weirder and weirder. You guys were just at his autopsy.”
I said, “Yes. But people don’t look the same after death. And what I want to know is who he resembled when he was younger and healthier.”
He was Jake’s knock-off. At least, he was the last time I saw him. He looked almost as old as Jake was, too. Wasted.”
Like the guy at the Mexican restaurant.
My good luck with her answers encouraged me, a bit too much.
“What about Eddie. Does he favor Luke?”
Andrea said, “What? Oh, no. He looks like Ada, slightly African, a little Chinese.”
I wasn’t getting what I needed. I wanted to hear about which of the oldest Stowall boys Eddie favored.
I said, “I noticed at Victoria’s, how different Mark and Luke looked. Mark was so handsome.”
I just put the thought out there, hoping she’d connect my questions and tell me if Eddie looked more like Luke or more like Mark.
Andrea said, “I don’t know.”
I tried another approach. “Andrea, I need to know more about Eddie’s life. The last twenty years. What happened?”
Andrea said, “I don’t know.”
She was pleading the fifth. I tried lobbing a bomb.
“Was Eddie locked up in the basement by his parents because of his sexual…tendencies?” Okay, not an ordinary bomb. More like a nuclear bomb.
“WHAT!” She didn’t sound pleased. She started dropping alphabet bombs.
I said, “Why else fill him with Depo-Provera?” I offered innocently, between her swear words.
“Because they didn’t want him chasing women! How dull are you?”
“This isn’t personal, Andrea. I need to understand what’s happening here. He’s on the loose and the cops have been looking for him. Think, Andrea,” I said gently.
It really isn’t easy to remain calm when someone else is raving at you.
“He isn’t on the loose, he’s right where he should be.”
“Where?”
“None of your effing, backbiting business! He’s run away again…maybe to the same place his mother took him years ago. You do know that the sixth square is Ada and Eddie on an island because she fled Luke, don’t you? And you know why, right?”
I didn’t answer her. Hoping she’d elaborate. But all I heard was heavy breathing.
Finally, I said, “I need your help to solve the mystery…”
“How much of it have you solved?”
I recounted what we were sure of. Then I a
dded a little of what we were almost sure of, so I could sound more productive…or so she could tell me I had something wrong.
“That’s it? That’s all you know? Are you telling me you haven’t solved the middle three squares yet? Like square four is Jake and Victoria with their freaking snakes? Like square five holds their children, and square six is Ada and her son Eddie. What kind of effing researcher are you?”
Fighting my rising reaction, I said, “But there are only four children in square five. And why…” are their genitals crossed out, I finished to myself. She was off stream-swearing again, dropping “A” bombs, “B” bombs, and a couple more “F” bombs.
“Eddie is a victim. They put him in that basement prison when he was barely sixteen! Not because of child molestation, but because he had a girlfriend, who, by the way was almost fifteen. So whoever’s floating this crap about pedophilia is a liar! And you better stay away from him. He’s the victim--of the freaky Stowall legacy. Not the bad guy. The sooner you get that…”
“What legacy? Do you mean the infighting?” Controlled calm, I reminded myself. But since when is fourteen the legal age for kids to have sex?
Of course, they might not have been having sex. That had been twenty years ago. Not everyone fell into bed with everyone else at the drop of a hat in that decade.
“Not infighting, dumb-o, inbreeding! Do your homework. Visit the Carlsbad library and read up. Get John Stowall’s book on the family, like Gerry told you to. Or at the very least, ask old Ruth. She’s our local, loco historian.”
Inbreeding? Was Eddie dating a first cousin?
One more “F” bomb and she was gone.
Lovely. My ears were burning and ringing. I wanted to call her right back and remind her that the people with the knowledge of what was happening--the youngest ones who’d ‘hired’ me--were the ones stonewalling, not the old people.
Breathing, breathing…slowing down. Okay, I was back. Calm. Almost normal.
I began to wonder how strained our relationship would be next month when we met for the bee. Victoria certainly didn’t put up with her talking like that. But, I needed to concentrate on what she’d said. I also needed to wash the soap off my hair before it crusted.
The phone stopped me in my tracks. Good grief!
I returned to the office, feeling a little shy about taking anymore of Andrea’s verbal abuse. Or maybe it was the mystery caller. Then again it might be Matt. I leaned forward to read the ID on the phone. It was a number I didn’t recognize. A new one.
The phone continued to chirp as I nervously pondered what to do and the call eventually went to our message machine. But whoever this was he/she wasn’t leaving a message behind. I wrote down the number for Matt on a much bigger piece of paper and taped it to the front of his monitor. He’d be thrilled.
It was time for a visit to Carlsbad City Library branch, the Georgina Cole Genealogy Library. I finished my shower, and after putting on my makeup, selected my new slacks and matching shirt. Then I began to plot my visit.
Sipping a glass of noonday tea, I stood staring vaguely out at our yard. Wisdom was watering it. I was achieving zen. Until some movement in the bushes and trees on my neighbor’s side caught my eye. I glanced away, not wanting to be peeping, and not wanting to be peeped at.
Then I remembered Matt’s comment about someone hanging around and quickly looked back. But whatever it was, man or horse—or next door neighbor--it was gone.
I pushed the worry away. Surely Wisdom would have barked if it had been some intruder. But he was now faithfully hugging my left leg, having come in through the dog door, in hopes of a walk. “Sorry pal, not now. Maybe later,” I lied. The almost constant rain was cutting into our quality time. A pang of guilt twanged in my heart.
I went into Ada’s Bedroom, Wisdom followed with lowered head. Her quilt was still on the bed, a spiral notebook with my thoughts on the meaning of the quilt lay opened upon it. I needed the reminder of where this investigation had begun and what I knew and didn’t know.
After updating the notes with Andrea’s revelations, I stood looking at the beautiful creation. It was hard to believe it contained such evil.
Early yesterday morning I’d finally solved the mystery of the top stitching—the random snakes.
I ticked off the known: a random pattern of snakes sewed the three layers together—the top stitching; the top row of the three-by-three block of central squares held the earliest history of Mark, Luke and Ada, including Mark’s murder; now I’d had it confirmed that the central row of three were about Jake and Victoria, and their family. I still had questions here. Why were only four of the Stowall children depicted in the fifth square, the literal center of the quilt?
The bottom three squares remained unexplained. Perhaps I could find information at the library about the two squares containing squiggles that looked like chemical notations.
The last of the nine squares held a solitary human figure. It was intricately created from black, brown, white, tan, yellow and red materials, minute pieces of which had been painstakingly cut and sewn together. These were the colors of the human race. However, to make the character even more enigmatic, it appeared to have breasts of pale pink and a black phallus hanging between its legs.
I thought again of the estrogen bottles found in Eddie’s medicine cabinet, and wondered if this multi-colored human was meant to be him. It certainly would fit.
But before I could make my escape the house phone rang, yet again. This time it was Gloria. I switched to my Ukrainian translator ears.
“Hello, Gloria. Good of you to call back.” Being my kind of gal she came straight to the point.
“I vant you to understand, Rachel, dat I had no idea, none, dat Eddie vas alife. None of us did. He vas kept hidden. And Ada alvays spoke of him in the past tense.”
“Have you seen him?”
“No. No I hefen’t. I don’t know vere he iss. No von seems to know. But vat I need you to understand (at least that’s what I think she said) is dat dere vas nothing I could do for Ada. Nothing.” To make matters worse Gloria began to cry.
“I vas only a young nurse when I met her. I had no power, I vas…and she couldn’t leaf him. She vas in her forties by den. She had no….and couldn’t leaf him. He did things. Even worse things dan you know. John, his condition, she didn’t know if maybe Eddie vould maybe...be a…” The phone went dead.
Resolutely, I picked up my notes and packed them in a briefcase. I added sharpened pencils, a fresh note pad and my thin camera.
Chapter 37: Townsend Report 2
LIRI Log: Will Townsend:
10.12 / 12:22. Followed subject, Rachel Lyons, on drive to Carlsbad Public Library. During drive, she displayed distress attempting to use her cell phone.
10.12 / 13:13. Observed subject enter library after several more phone calls. No evidence of her being followed.
10.12 / 13:24. Confirmed subject’s whereabouts in Genealogy Room. No one was observed watching her.
10.12 / 14:38. Confirmed subject is still in Genealogy Room.
10.12 / 16:39. Subject left library for home after three hours and fifty-seven minutes.
Chapter 38: Bad Blood
The traffic was moving well as I approached I-15 via I-78, on my way to the library. And of course my phone rang. I checked it quickly, holding the phone down in my lap. Early this morning my freshly repaired station wagon had been returned to me and it was too old to have hands free phone devices.
It was a joy to drive in once again.
But the last thing I needed was a ticket. It was Ruth McMichaels. Mind-reading-Ruth. The one I’d been trying to reach for what seemed like eons.
Maybe she was calling to get me arrested. Maybe she had no idea I was in a car. Surreptitiously, I cupped the phone to my ear and said hello, after the fourth ring.
Silence. She’d probably given up.
Then, as if from some great distance, “It’s not Eddie’s fault. He’s an innocent.” Her voice was reed
thin.
Oh lord, how many times did I have to hear that?
“Ruth! I thought I’d missed your call. Thank you so much for getting back to me. Do you know where Eddie is?”
“With the sisters.” She paused again. “I’ve seen….”
She faded out. I prompted her.
“Seen what, Ruth?”
“They do things. You have to know, Rachel. People want you stopped. They want you terminated, like the girls—well, not all of them. No, like Hazel. I have to tell you...” Again the voice disappeared into some netherworld. Again it returned.
“It didn’t happen to all of them. Or there wouldn’t have been Eddie….”
What wouldn’t have happened?
I thought I heard a man’s urgency behind her. Then other voices.
“Ruth, is someone with you?”
“The boys were spared. Maybe….”
Ruth yelled something, but not into the phone. Was she talking to her husband? She was still married, right? What was his name? I started to support his needs, to tell her I could talk with her at a better time—when I wasn’t breaking the law--but then she was speaking again.
Now in a different time zone. Much earlier.
“Gordon said she was a witch. But that was just because she was pregnant.” She laughed faintly. “He was drunk. She drowned, like a witch.”
Gordon?
I said, “Do you mean Gordon Stowall killed Hazel?”
“It’s the bad blood. That blood was bad in more ways than one.…”
I wasn’t getting much information I could understand and again thought it might be best to push for a later conversation. But she forged onward.
“In front of half the family. On Lake Henshaw. They’re after me now.”
“Who’s after you? Do you mean the sisters?”
Ada Unraveled Page 23
