Past Tense

by William G. Tapply

  I picked up the phone, got information for Gorham, and learned that the town didn’t have a newspaper. I thought of asking the operator to connect me with the oldest living resident of the town, but she didn’t seem to have much patience. So I asked for the local police.

  A male voice answered. “Gorham Police.”

  “I’m an attorney in Boston,” I said, “and I hope you’ll bear with me, because I have an unusual request.”

  “Fire away.”

  “Who’s got the most seniority on your force?”

  “Seniority?”

  “Who’s been there the longest?”

  “I know what seniority means, sir,” said the officer. “I was just agreeing that this is an unusual request. It would be Chief Proctor. He’s been on the force for … I guess he’s coming up on twenty-five years.”

  “So he was there in 1980.”

  “Unless my math is worse than I thought.”

  “I wonder if I could speak to him.”

  “You probably ought to tell me what you want to speak to him about,” he said. “Then I can ask him if he wants to speak to you.”

  “I just want to know if he remembers a man who used to practice pediatric medicine in Gorham. His name was Winston St. Croix.”

  “St. Croix?”

  “That’s right.”

  “Hang on.”

  I waited nearly five minutes before a different male voice, this one older and raspier, said, “This is Chief Proctor.”

  “Chief,” I said, “my name is Brady Coyne, and I—”

  “You’re asking about Winston St. Croix.”

  “That’s right. Did you know him?”

  “Yes, I did. Why?”

  “He died today, and—”

  “You’re calling to tell me he died? He hasn’t been near this town for over twenty years.”

  “I’m wondering why he left Gorham in the first place.”

  Chief Proctor cleared his throat. “Far as I know, he went looking for greener pastures. It happened kind of sudden, as I recall. Folks weren’t happy about it. Fact is, we don’t keep good doctors around here for very long. Good lawyers, either, come to think of it. Not that you run into many of them.”

  “What do you mean, ‘sudden’?”

  “Well,” he said, “it was a long time ago, but I do remember Dr. St. Croix didn’t give any notice. Just up and left, practically overnight. The town was without a pediatrician for a couple years. That didn’t set well with people.”

  “But he was a good doctor?”

  “I guess he was. Never heard anything to the contrary.”

  “Does the name Ransom ring any bells with you?”

  “Ransom?” He paused. “You want to give me a hint?”

  “High-school teacher and his wife. They had two boys. Edgar and Owen. They moved away in 1984.”

  “You know more about it than I do, I guess. People come and go. I don’t recall any Ransoms. Why?”

  “I was wondering if the Ransom boys were Dr. St. Croix’s patients.”

  “These were young boys?”

  “Yes. They would’ve both been under ten at the time.”

  “No doubt they were his patients, then. He was the only pediatrician in town.”

  “How well did you know the doctor?”

  “Look,” he said. “I don’t know what you’re after here, but you’re talking about ancient history, and my memory of those days is pretty fuzzy. I knew Dr. St. Croix. Gorham was a small town back then. It’s still small, but it was quite a bit smaller then. Dr. St. Croix practiced medicine here for a while, then he moved on. People liked him. Far as I know, he was a good doctor. Beyond that …”

  “Owen Ransom was murdered two days ago,” I said. “He’d come to a town here in Massachusetts posing as a doctor. He sought out Dr. St. Croix, pretending he wanted to buy his practice. Then he got his throat cut.”

  “You think St. Croix did it?”

  “No. Dr. St. Croix had multiple sclerosis. He was in a wheelchair.”

  “Well,” he said, “if you’re suggesting there was bad blood between the Ransom boy and Dr. St. Croix, you’re asking the wrong man.”

  “Who should I ask?”

  “You could’ve asked my predecessor, but he died six years ago.”

  “The previous chief?”

  “That’s right. He and St. Croix were close friends. When the doctor left town, the chief refused talk about it. Wouldn’t even allow St. Croix’s name to be mentioned around him. Mad as hell about it.”

  “Why would he be mad?”

  “Damned if I know.”

  “Is there anybody in town who might know more about it than you?” I asked.

  “It was a long time ago,” he said. “Sorry. And I don’t mean to be rude, but …”

  “I appreciate your time,” I said.

  “Give me a number,” he said. “If I think of anything, I’ll get back to you.”

  After I hung up from talking with Police Chief Proctor in Gorham, Minnesota, I realized I was feeling hungry. So I splashed some water on my face, put on my shoes, and drove to the Cortland diner for what I hoped would be the last time in my entire life.

  This time I got there before they ran out of meatloaf. It was moist on the inside and crispy on the outside, just like I remembered my mother made it. They served it with two strips of bacon, a twice-baked potato, and candied carrots. It reinforced my faith in diner meatloaf.

  The hot apple pie and coffee afterwards left me feeling replete and happy.

  When I walked out of the diner, it was still light. So I drove north past the village green, turned down the road that led to the old Victorian where Evie had lived when she worked in Cortland, and continued past it to the lake. I kept glancing in my rearview mirror. As far as I could tell, Vanderweigh hadn’t attached a tail to me.

  I pulled into a dirt parking area beside the lake and walked down to a sand beach, where a few young women wearing bathing suits and wide-brimmed straw hats sat on blankets watching toddlers splash in the shallows.

  If I had my topography right, the stream that the old farmer had dammed to make the pond behind Mary Scott’s house emptied into this lake across the way from where I was standing.

  At the left end of the beach, there was a jumble of furnituresized boulders. I went over and sat on one of them, lit a cigarette, and gazed upon the water.

  A freshwater pond around sunset at the end of a summer’s day offers endlessly fascinating entertainment. Swallows and purple martins swooped and darted barely inches over the surface, chasing insects. Here and there their wingtips ticked the glassy water, leaving rings like feeding fish do. Bats and nighthawks had emerged from the shadowy woods along the shore to snag mosquitoes, and a string of half-grown mallards paddled single-file behind their mother among the reeds. A blue heron stood knee-deep in the water, still as a stump with its neck arched like a half-drawn bow, poised to strike a hapless bluegill. Bullfrogs grumped and grumbled in the lily pads, and now and then a bass or a pickerel swirled in the shallows trying to catch one.

  While I sat there, I thought about Winston St. Croix and Owen Ransom and Larry Scott, and I thought about Evie, and I thought about the people I’d met in Cortland, and I pondered scenarios that might link them all together. I had no flashes of insight.

  Still, sitting on a rock watching the water around dusk on a summer evening never fails to soothe my soul and restore my perspective.

  By the time I stood up and headed back to the car, the stars were popping out overhead and mist was rising from the surface of the lake and the young mothers had taken their children home for bed.

  Back at the motel I watched a seventies movie in which Robert Mitchum played a small-time Boston hood who was ratting out his friends to the feds in hope of saving himself from prison. In the end, Mitchum’s friends killed him.

  The credits were scrolling when somebody knocked on my door.

  My heart thumped. Evie?

  More likely it wa
s Vanderweigh, coming to grill me.

  I got off the bed and pulled the door open.

  I hadn’t expected anybody to knock on my motel-room door, but if I had thought about it, the last person to come to mind would have been Claudia Wells.

  She stood there rubbing her hands up and down on the tops of her thighs and looking at me with big solemn eyes. She smiled quickly. “I’m sorry,” she said. “This was stupid.”

  “It’s nice to see you, Claudia,” I said. “Do you want to come in?”

  She shrugged. “I guess so. Sure. Thank you.”

  I held the door for her. She brushed past me and stood uncertainly in the middle of my little motel room. She was wearing a dark blue Providence College sweatshirt, snugfitting white jeans, and white canvas sneakers. A little purse hung on a strap over her shoulder. Her blond hair was tied back with a scarf that matched the sweatshirt. She wore pink lipstick.

  It looked like she’d tried, but her makeup failed to hide the redness and swelling and sadness around her eyes. They looked like they’d seen too much.

  I closed the door and waved my hand around. “It’s not much,” I said. “But it’s what I’ve been calling home lately.” I gestured at the only chair in the room, in the corner beside the television set.

  She put her purse on top of the TV and sat down. “I should’ve called,” she said.

  “No problem.”

  “I was hoping to talk to you.”

  I sat on the foot of the bed facing her. “Why me?”

  “I’m sorry,” she said. “I really shouldn’t’ve—”

  “Please stop saying you’re sorry. I’m happy to have some company.”

  She looked at me for a moment. “Why you?” She shrugged. “I couldn’t think of anybody else, I guess.”

  “Well, that’s flattering.”

  She leaned toward me and put her hand on my knee. “I didn’t mean it that way. All I meant was, there’s nobody in this little town I feel like I can talk to. Sometimes it’s better to talk to somebody you don’t know so well. Know what I mean?”

  I nodded.

  “I mean, you seem like somebody you can talk to. Somebody you can trust. Who won’t judge a person or spread gossip all over town.”

  “Well,” I said, “I am a lawyer. Did you want to talk to a lawyer?”

  She shrugged. “Not necessarily. It’s not that you’re a lawyer. It’s that … you seem like a nice guy.”

  “Claudia,” I said, “are you in some kind of trouble?”

  “No. It’s nothing like that.”

  Her hand was still resting on my knee. I patted it, then picked it up, gave it a quick squeeze, and let her take it back.

  She slumped in her chair and folded her arms across her chest. “It’s about Win,” she said. “The doctor. I didn’t see it coming, and I feel like I should have. I didn’t have a clue. I can’t get my mind around it. It’s like somebody punched me in the stomach.” She shook her head. “Do you realize what it’s like, working side by side with the same man for twenty-one years, seeing him practically every day, taking care of him when he’s sick, scheduling his activities, thinking you know everything about him, and then something happens and you realize you didn’t know him at all?”

  I nodded but didn’t say anything. All I could think of were glib platitudes, and I didn’t think Claudia wanted platitudes from me.

  “I feel so alone,” she said softly. “It’s worse than when my parents died. I—I gave that man half of my life, and then he turns around and leaves me like that.”

  “Maybe he wanted to make it easier for you.”

  “He should have known me better than that. He should’ve known I’d want him to talk to me about it.”

  I shrugged. “He was sick and depressed. He probably thought you’d try to talk him out of it.”

  “Well, maybe I would have.” She tried to smile, then shook her head. “You know something, Brady?”

  “What, Claudia?”

  “This has been an awful day. The worst day of my life. There were people around all day. Friends of mine. Of ours. Me and Win. They knew how—how close we were. But not one of them even thought I might need a hug.” She gave a little shrug, then turned her head away. I realized she was crying.

  After a minute, she got up, went into the bathroom, and came back with a tissue. She wiped her eyes and blew her nose, then balled up the tissue and tossed it into the wastebasket.

  “You seemed to know a lot about him,” she said.

  “The doctor?”

  “Yes. Yesterday, when you came over, I had the feeling you knew something you weren’t saying.”

  “Not really.”

  “That Detective Vanderweigh,” she said. “The state policeman. After you left, he was asking strange questions.”

  “Like what?”

  “Oh, about Win’s work before he came to Cortland, about that Dr. Romano—Ransom, I guess his name was, who was murdered. About Larry Scott, and … I don’t know. It was like he thought there were secrets that I should know.”

  It occurred to me that Vanderweigh would have told Claudia and the others whatever he wanted them to know. It was likewise safe to assume that what he hadn’t told them, he didn’t want them to know. “I don’t know what Vanderweigh was after,” I said.

  “Yesterday when you were talking with Win,” said Claudia, “it seemed like you had something on your mind. He suddenly got all defensive and said he was too tired to talk. Didn’t you notice?”

  I nodded. “I guess I did.”

  “It was like you had some kind of suspicion.”

  “I didn’t really. I just wondered if there was some old connection between him and Ransom.”

  “Like what?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Well,” she said, “whatever it was, you hit a nerve. He suddenly got all upset. Maybe you didn’t notice it, but I did. And then that same night he kills himself? That doesn’t seem like a coincidence.”

  “Are you blaming me for his suicide?” I said.

  “Not at all. I’m just trying to understand it.” She sighed. “Well, I guess I should probably get going?” She made it a question.

  I answered it with a nod. “I’m afraid I haven’t helped you much.”

  “No, I feel better. I like talking to you.” She cleared her throat and looked down at her lap. “I could stay for a while,” she said softly.

  “That probably wouldn’t be a good idea,” I said.

  She looked up at me and laughed softly. “Not many men would turn down an invitation like that.” She stood up and smiled. “Oh, well.” She went over to the single window, parted the curtain, and gazed outside for a moment. Then she turned to face me. “Sometimes I hate this crappy little town, you know?”

  I nodded.

  “I think I gotta get away from here,” she said, “start over again. Get myself a life.”

  “That’s probably a good idea. Maybe—”

  At that moment, a beeping noise came from the direction of the television.

  “Oh, shit,” said Claudia. “My cell phone.” She glanced at her watch. “I better get it.”

  She reached into her purse and pulled out her phone. She flipped it open, held it to her ear, and said, “Yes?”

  I didn’t try to listen, but it was hard not to hear Claudia’s end of the conversation. It consisted of a series of monosyllables: “Yes … No, it doesn’t look like it … I don’t know … Nothing … I doubt it … Okay, right.”

  She snapped the phone shut and shoved it back into her purse. “Sorry. I really hate those things, but nowadays …”

  “I refuse to get one,” I said. “Drives my secretary nuts. She likes to be able to keep in touch with me, and she doesn’t understand that sometimes I don’t want her to be in touch with me. Julie Is—”

  There was a loud knock on the door.

  “Now what?” I said. I looked at Claudia and raised my eyebrows.

  She shrugged.

  �
�Whoever it is,” I said, “I’ll get rid of him. You want to go in the bathroom or something?”

  The knocking became more insistent.

  Claudia nodded. “That’s a good idea.” She went over to the TV, picked up her purse, and took it into the bathroom. She pushed the door shut but didn’t latch it.

  I went to the door and cracked it open.

  Sergeant John Dwyer of the Cortland PD stood there scowling at me. He was out of uniform. He wore blue jeans and a dark windbreaker over a white T-shirt. “May I come in?” he said.

  I pulled the door all the way open. “I guess so.”

  He came in, looked around, and wrinkled his nose. “You got company? Am I interrupting something?”

  “If I did,” I said, “that would be my business. Is that why you came here? To see if I had company?”

  “Vanderweigh sent me,” he said. He looked around the room, then went to the bathroom and put his hand on the door.

  I grabbed his shoulder. “This is my room,” I said, “and unless you’ve got a warrant—”

  I didn’t see it coming. In one sudden motion, he pivoted and clubbed me on the side of my head with his elbow. It sent me sprawling backwards onto the bed.

  “Don’t you ever touch a police officer,” said Dwyer.

  “Get out of my room,” I mumbled. My vision was blurry. I wondered if he’d broken my jaw.

  “You invited me in. I don’t need a warrant. You’re a lawyer. You should know that.” He pushed the bathroom door open. “Okay,” he said. “You can come out now.”

  Claudia came out. She looked at me. “Are you all right?”

  I shrugged.

  She turned to Dwyer. “Did you have to hit him?”

  “Didn’t have to. I wanted to.”

  She touched his cheek. “You’re a bad boy.”

  Dwyer was smiling at me.

  “Better cuff him,” she said.

  He nodded and came over to the bed. “On your belly,” he said.

  “There’s no need for that,” I said. “I’m happy to talk to Vanderweigh. You can—”