Body Language

by Michael Craft

  “Sure!” Even though it wouldn’t be a very long ride, I looked forward to another trip in his big imported sedan. “Thanks.”

  He glanced back at the newspaper. “Nothing much happening in the world today. Johnson’s escalating troop strength in Asia again. Hippies are still on the march. Same old same-old,” he said, whatever that meant.

  In the kitchen, Hazel made my breakfast and told me that she’d miss me. When Aunt Peggy came downstairs, she looked sick. “I just wanted to tell you good-bye, dear.” Her voice was croaky. “Have a safe trip, and give your mother my love.” Then she went back to bed. My older cousin Mark never even got up (he must have gone to a party of his own), so I didn’t get to see him—I was hoping he’d muss my hair again, and I just liked the way he looked. Suzanne and Joey came down to eat, and Joey seemed really sorry that I was leaving. Then Uncle Edwin appeared in his topcoat, jangling his keys, saying, “Time to get going, Mark. Let’s catch a bus.”

  In the car, I noticed that my uncle was in much better shape than my aunt. The party, or something, must have agreed with him. He talked about enjoying the cold morning. He even whistled now and then as he drove. Then he reached into a pocket behind the car seat and pulled out my folder—the little stories that he’d asked to read the night before. “You wouldn’t want to forget this,” he told me. “You’re a fine writer, Mark. Keep working at it.”

  There weren’t many people waiting for the bus, not on New Year’s morning. Uncle Edwin carried my suitcase, setting it next to me on the pavement. Scrunching down so we could talk eye-to-eye, we said all the good-bye stuff, and we hugged. With his arms still around me, he said, “You’re a very special young man, Mark. You’re not at all like the others.” Then he kissed me—right on the mouth.

  Some dozen years later, he would repeat himself, almost word for word, when he kissed me at the grave of my mother, Edie Quatrain Manning. That was the last time I saw my uncle Edwin.

  But now I sat in his chair, at his desk, in his den, under the roof of the stately Prairie School house he once built with his partner, the man with whom he cofounded the Quatro Press. In an ironic twist of history, if not quite fate, his home was now my home—his desk, my desk. These thoughts led me to the letter he had written to me before he died, stowed safely in the credenza near the desk. Responding to the urge to read it again, I fished a little brass key from a pile of paper clips in an ashtray on the desk, then unlocked the cabinet door. The letter was propped where I left it, next to the box of Suzanne’s dossiers delivered by Elliot Coop the previous afternoon.

  I immediately lost interest in the letter, which I had read dozens of times, and focused on the files, which I had not yet read, but meant to. Pulling the heavy box from the cabinet, I nudged the door closed with my knee and carried the files to the low table in front of the fireplace.

  Settling on the sofa there, I lifted the folders from the box and discovered that they were already arranged into three bundles, which I placed on the seat cushion next to me. The two smaller bundles were labeled SUSPICIOUS and ABOVE SUSPICION. The other bundle, largest by far, was labeled INCONCLUSIVE. Intrigued, I went directly to the “suspicious” files, pulled the first, and opened it.

  Parker’s theory was correct. It was, in fact, a dossier on a Vietnam veteran, a survivor of the ambush that supposedly killed Mark Quatrain. It included a sketchy biography of the man’s upbringing before being drafted, then a detailed account of his activities and whereabouts during the thirty years that had passed since his honorable discharge. The thick file took some twenty minutes to read in its entirety. The report concluded that this subject was “suspicious” because he had family ties to central Wisconsin, but, otherwise, there was nothing in his background to suggest that he was really Mark Quatrain, back from the grave.

  Perusal of the next dossier, equally detailed, revealed only that the veteran was “suspicious” because, like Mark Quatrain, he had been an accomplished athlete who also held an honors degree in English. They had graduated from different colleges, however, and there was nothing to suggest that the subject’s academic records had been falsified.

  The files seemed less interesting now, so I ceased reading them in full. Skimming the next several, still from the “suspicious” bundle, I found nothing to convince me that Mark Quatrain was still alive and had assumed another identity. Immersed in this fruitless research for an hour or so—it was nearly noon—I was interrupted by a commotion in the front hall.

  Roxanne Exner and Carl Creighton had just arrived from Chicago, and I was too absorbed in my reading to hear them when they pulled into the driveway. Neil and Parker were now greeting them at the door. So I packed all the dossiers back into their box—including those labeled inconclusive and above suspicion, which I had not yet opened—and returned them to the cabinet, locking them away for future study.

  Emerging from the den into the hall, I saw at once that I had not underestimated Roxanne’s attention to her travel wardrobe. Carl was hefting the last of the luggage in from the porch, and its quantity suggested a stay of a month, not a weekend. A disconcerting thought: Was this a sign not of vanity but of foresight on Roxanne’s part? Had she come prepared to stay awhile, assuming I’d need her at hand to defend me against the overzealous maneuvers of a hotdog DA?

  “Long time no see,” she told me, shrugging out of her fur as I stepped forward to give her a kiss.

  Eyeing the Christmas nutria she dragged on the floor, I asked her, “Wasn’t it a bit warm for that in the car?”

  Carl answered for her, “We had the air conditioner on. And it’s still ten below.”

  We all shared a laugh as Neil and Parker stacked luggage at the foot of the stairs. Neil turned to ask everyone, “Hungry? Hazel set up a makeshift buffet in the kitchen. After last night, we’re lucky to have lunch at all.”

  “I’m surprised she’s even up,” I told him. “How is she?”

  Parker answered, “Wobbly, but functioning. No signs of life from upstairs yet.”

  “Good God,” Roxanne wondered aloud, “what’d we miss?”

  “’Twas a night to remember,” Neil assured her. “Let’s talk about it in the kitchen.” And he led the way back through the hall.

  Hazel had set out makings for sandwiches, various sweets, and a potful of noodly soup, made ahead yesterday, simmering on the stove. Her door was closed, and I asked, “Won’t we bother her?”

  “She said not to worry about it,” Neil told me. “She’s just fixing herself up.” Under his breath, he added, “Frankly, she’s got her work cut out for her.”

  Roxanne repeated, “What’d we miss?”

  As Neil and Parker began constructing absurdly thick sandwiches for our new arrivals, I related events of the previous night, inching toward Hazel’s postprandial revelations.

  Roxanne sat at the kitchen counter on a stool, legs crossed, listening, experimenting with the sandwich Neil had given her. Unable to get it into her mouth, she pulled it apart and picked at it with a knife and fork. Splatting a puddle of mustard on her plate, she said, “All right, Mark—the meal sounds fabulous, and I’m glad the wine was perfect, but what ‘happened’?”

  Her impatience was justified. My narrative had given no hint of the evening’s climax. So, while preparing a sandwich of my own, I explained, “After midnight, after the toasts, we all settled into conversation in the living room.”

  Roxanne mumbled, “Meanwhile, back in the drawing room…”

  Without comment, I continued. “Both Joey and Hazel had been drinking far more than usual all night, and between the two of them, they managed to spill some extraordinary family secrets.”

  “How delicious,” said Roxanne, licking something from a finger. It wasn’t clear whether “delicious” applied to her finger or to the secrets. Carl shushed her, preferring to hear my story.

  “Ultimately”—I paused—“Hazel revealed that Suzanne had an out-of-state abortion during high school. We had already suspected as much. This wasn’
t just a typical unwanted pregnancy, however. Suzanne had been raped. On a Christmas morning. Upstairs in the great room of this house.” Roxanne’s jaw was already drooping. Was she ready for the corker? “The rapist was Suzanne’s own brother, Mark Quatrain.”

  Roxanne and Carl were of course stunned by this news, losing interest in their lunch. I was hungry, though, and took advantage of the lull to eat a few bites of my sandwich. Roxanne also lost interest, at least for the moment, in wisecracking. “Lord, how awful,” she said, slumping on the stool. Whirling her hand, she attempted to piece together the story: “So Suzanne had the abortion, but what happened to her brother? Didn’t you say he died in Vietnam?”

  “Right,” I told her, “but I didn’t know the details till this past week. The family never pressed charges against him. They were—what? Conflicted? They just wanted him out of here. A few months later, he graduated from college, got drafted, and, before long, he was off to Asia. There he raped another girl, a local girl, and—this gets worse—he murdered her. Then, while awaiting a military trial, he himself was killed in an ambush.”

  Parker interjected, while stirring the soup, “Or so the story goes.”

  Roxanne looked from face to face, confused. I told her, “Parker has a theory, based on the fact that Mark Quatrain’s body was mutilated beyond recognition in the ambush.”

  Parker crossed from the stove to us, explaining, “Mark Quatrain could have survived the ambush and switched identities with a badly mutilated victim in order to escape prosecution for killing the Vietnamese girl. Years later, when Edwin Quatrain died and the probate lawyers began nitpicking the estate, they may have concluded that Mark Quatrain’s death could not be absolutely verified. Even though the estate was settled without incident and Suzanne was its principal beneficiary, she’d gotten wind of the idea that her brother might still be alive. Now, in light of what we learned last night from Hazel, it’s perfectly obvious why Suzanne would be motivated to find him—revenge.”

  Roxanne and Carl, both of them lawyers, were by then fully engrossed in Parker’s theory, nodding to each other as he led them point by point through an intriguing legal thicket.

  I told them, “Parker’s theory took on even greater plausibility yesterday when Elliot Coop delivered to me a pile of private investigators’ dossiers that Suzanne had been collecting.” I turned to Parker and Neil, confirming, “I studied some of the files this morning, and, sure enough, they trace the whereabouts of veterans who had survived the ambush in which Mark Quatrain supposedly died. Unfortunately, the files I read pointed nowhere.”

  Parker pressed onward. “Still, consider: The plot comes full circle. Suzanne has had these guys under investigation for a couple of years now. Suppose Mark Quatrain is, in fact, one of them, and suppose he’s clever enough to figure out that Suzanne was on his trail. He would then have a strong, obvious motive to kill her.”

  “Jeez,” said Carl, shaking his head at the thought of it, “the brother from the grave.” He plucked a pickle from his plate and bit off its end.

  Neil asked, “But how would he do it? I mean, Suzanne was killed here in the house, on Christmas Day. We know who was here—at least we think we do. Did Mark Quatrain sneak in, kill Suzanne, and sneak out again?”

  “Not likely,” said Parker, “but he could have paid or otherwise convinced someone—anyone—to do it for him. He may be nowhere near Dumont. Or maybe he’s been here all along.”

  I reminded everyone, “This is all speculation, involving a bunch of ‘ifs’. At this point, I’d call the ‘brother from the grave’ a long-shot suspect at best. I think we need to concentrate on the short list of living, breathing known suspects we’ve already identified.”

  At that point we heard footfalls in the hall, and all of us turned to see Joey Quatrain step through the kitchen doorway. He stood there timidly, looking like hell, having slept in his clothes. His suit was wrinkled, tie askew, beard unshaven, hair unkempt. Seeing me, he immediately asked, “Was I bad, Mark?”

  “No, Joey, no”—I waved him into the room—“you just had a bit too much to drink. It was New Year’s, and no harm was done.” I reintroduced him to Roxanne and Carl, whom he remembered from Christmas, but he had little to say to them. I asked him, “Do you feel okay?”

  He wasn’t sure. He answered quietly, “I’m sort of hungry.”

  Neil offered, “How about some soup?”

  Joey nodded, licking his lips. Neil crossed to the stove with a bowl.

  I told Joey, “There’s coffee, too. That’ll help wake you up.”

  He hesitated. “Do you have any cocoa?”

  Parker laughed. “I’ll get it.” And he went to the refrigerator for milk.

  I asked Joey, “Is Thad up yet?”

  He shook his head. “I looked in his room. He’s still asleep.”

  Roxanne eyed me accusingly. “Did you get him smashed, too?”

  “No,” I assured her, “he’s just sleeping in. You know how kids are at that age.”

  “No,” she assured me, “I don’t.” Then she reconsidered. “Actually, I do recall reading something about their circadian rhythms.”

  “God, Rox,” said Neil, “you make him sound like a locust or something.” He carried the bowl of soup to the counter and pulled up another stool so Joey could join us and eat.

  In deference to Joey, we avoided the topic of Suzanne’s murder and dropped our discussion of Parker’s “brother from the grave” theory. We focused instead on Joey himself, and Roxanne got him to talk about his job at Quatro Press.

  “They call us ‘human resources’ now,” said Joey. “We used to be just the personnel department. It sounds more important, I guess, but we don’t do anything different.”

  Carl said, “I assume Quatro is Dumont’s largest employer.”

  “Oh, yes,” said Joey, pausing to slurp a noodle, “we’re biggest by far.”

  Parker stepped into the conversation with Joey’s cocoa. “I just had a thought,” he said. “Joey, I know you find the topic of your sister’s murder upsetting, but you know how important it is that we find the killer, don’t you?”

  “Yes,” he answered skeptically. I myself wondered where Parker was heading.

  Parker told him, “Before you came downstairs, we were talking about an idea that your older brother, Mark, might still be alive.”

  Joey dropped his spoon in his soup. “He died a long time ago, Parker. He was killed in Vietnam.”

  “Yes, we know that,” Parker explained patiently, “but there’s a slight chance that somebody made a mistake. It’s possible that Mark didn’t die, and if that’s true, he might be able to help us discover who killed Suzanne. But first, we’d have to find Mark. Would you be willing to help us?”

  Joey tried his cocoa, thinking over the question. “Sure,” he answered, “but I don’t know how to help you. Where would we look?”

  Good question. I was wondering about that myself. Parker told him, and the rest of us, “Quatro Press is the area’s largest employer. If Mark Quatrain were still alive, and moved back to town and needed employment but wanted to get lost in the crowd, chances are he’d apply for work at Quatro. He could quietly keep an eye on things at close range; then, when the time was right, he could act.”

  “Act on what?” Joey asked. But the rest of us now understood what Parker was driving at, and I had to admit that he had raised an interesting possibility.

  Parker said, “The point is, Joey, that since you work in personnel at Quatro, you probably know everyone who works there, at least in passing, right?” Joey nodded, and Parker continued. “So I’m wondering if you could check your files and find out if there are any Vietnam veterans who started working at Quatro anytime within the last three years. We need someone about fifty years old, with an honorable discharge, who may have asked questions about the Quatrain family.”

  “Allan Addams,” Joey said at once, looking suddenly alert. “I don’t need to check the files, Parker. The person you’re talkin
g about is Allan Addams. I hired him about three years ago—it was shortly after Dad died. Allan was hurt in Vietnam, so he walks funny. He works in the credit department, just down the hall from me, so I see him all the time. He’s always asking me about the family.”

  The rest of us all looked at each other, astonished. Had Parker hit pay dirt?

  He told Joey, “I know this may come as something of a shock to you, but Allan Addams could possibly be your brother, Mark Quatrain.”

  Joey screwed his face in thought for a moment, then laughed. “No, I’m sure Allan isn’t Mark.”

  Excited by the prospects raised by Parker, I jumped in, noting, “You haven’t seen your brother in over thirty years, Joey. People change a lot in thirty years. If Mark is still alive, he wouldn’t look anything like the way you remember him.”

  Joey considered this. “Nahhh,” he told me, as if he’d caught me in a fib, “they couldn’t be the same person.”

  Dingdong. We all looked toward the hall. “I’ll get it,” I said, then left the kitchen to answer the front door, leaving the others to gab about Allan Addams with Joey.

  Even before opening the door, through the narrow sidelight I recognized the figure of Sheriff Douglas Pierce. “Good afternoon, Doug. Happy New Year,” I told him as I let him in.

  He returned the greeting and removed his gloves to shake my hand. “Mark, I felt awful about declining your invitation for last night. I’ve got a lot going on right now”—he amplified—“personally, I mean. Maybe we can talk about it sometime.”

  “How about now?” I offered.

  “No.” He smiled. “That’s not why I’m here. I’m afraid this is business.”

  With a wave of my hand, I led him into the den. Closing the door, I explained, “There’s a houseful of people, mostly in the kitchen.”

  He hung his coat and told me, “In spite of the holiday, I’ve been getting a lot of pressure from the DA this morning on two fronts. Harley’s still pushing me to make an arrest, and now he’s started meddling in Miriam’s custody battle for Thad. I can’t hold him at bay much longer. We need a new lead, or at least a new wrinkle.”