Where Echoes Live

by Marcia Muller

  He shook his head. “I never touch the stuff, or tea, either. Caffeine’s a killer.”

  I ignored the implied criticism. “So what is it you want to talk about?”

  “The murdered man. I think I know him.”

  “How?”

  “Well … I don’t know that he’s the same Michael Erickson. The name’s a common one, but the address at Barbary Park … Can you describe him?”

  I told him what I’d observed of the dead man’s appearance. As I spoke, Sanderman’s already pale skin went pasty and his eyes—red from lack of sleep—clouded.

  After a moment he said, “That’s the man. And Michael Erickson is his real name. Mick, for short.”

  “How do you know him?”

  “From my former firm in Silicon Valley. Techworks, it’s called. I was a computer engineer developing … well, that’s irrelevant. Mick was on the marketing side, mainly servicing our Pacific Rim accounts, but he had a technical background, too—a degree from Colorado School of Mines.”

  “Did you know him well?”

  “Not really. The technical and marketing staffs didn’t mix all that much, although it was a small company, friendly. After I left, I didn’t see him for a few years, never even thought of him. But two years ago I ran into him at Union Square in San Francisco, it was Christmastime. We were both trying to finish our shopping and pretty tired, so we went and had a couple of drinks.”

  Sanderman seemed to have run out of steam, so I prodded him. “What did you talk about?”

  “The old company, people we knew there, what they were doing. Mick had left a couple of years after I did and formed his own consulting firm. But he didn’t talk much about that; what he was interested in was my work with the Coalition. I told him about how we’d cooperated with the Friends in their efforts to stop the water diversions from Tufa Lake, and of our concern about the gold-mining potential in the Tufa area. He seemed fascinated.”

  “Did you see him after that?”

  “Twice. A few months later he turned up in Sacramento at the Coalition headquarters. Said he’d had business in the area and just dropped in on impulse. He invited me to have drinks again after work, asked me to bring along some of the Coalition literature and position papers on the situation here in Mono County. I was happy to; we’re always short on funds, and Mick seemed well off. I was hoping for a donation.”

  “Did you get one?”

  “Yes. Two or three weeks later he showed up again. This time he took me to dinner. He asked a lot of questions about Tufa Lake and Stone Valley. Before he left he gave me a thousand dollars for the Coalition.”

  “And then?”

  “That’s the last I saw of him.”

  I thought for a moment about what he’d told me. “Tell me more about Mick Erickson. What was he like?”

  “Like?” Sanderman stared off at the lake, where the tufa islands were taking on sharper definition as the rising sun gilded them. “An attractive guy. Well dressed, drove a Jaguar. Not handsome in the classical sense, but there was something about him that made women sit up and take notice. Very smooth, with a good sense of humor. He wasn’t the sort to tell jokes, though; they were more like amusing stories, anecdotes. Not your stereotypical marketing type—much more sophisticated.”

  “You know anything about his personal life?”

  “I think he was married. At least, when I ran into him that Christmastime, he complained about how difficult it was to choose perfume for his wife.”

  “Anything else?”

  He shook his head.

  “What about the consulting firm he’d set up?”

  “I can’t even recall its name.”

  “Okay, now let me ask you this: You must have suspected the dead man and Mick Erickson were the same person when we all talked last night. Why didn’t you mention it then?”

  He wet his lips, compressed them.

  “Ned?”

  “I just …I didn’t want to say anything in front of Ripinsky, not until I’d thought it over.”

  “Why not?”

  “Well, the way it looks to me—and I’m sure it will to him—is that I inadvertently gave Mick an idea that he later exploited.”

  “About the gold-mining potential here.”

  “Yes.”

  “Hy could scarcely blame you for that. As far as you knew, Erickson was interested in the Coalition’s work. He did give you a sizable donation.”

  “You and I see it that way, but Ripinsky will manage to turn it around. He’s like a lot of the old-style environmentalists—a zealot who resents the new breed.”

  “I’m not sure I understand.”

  “Ripinsky’s in love with Mother Nature. Every tree, every rock, every bird, must be preserved at whatever the cost.” Sanderman’s lips twisted scornfully. “He doesn’t see the realities of what we’re up against. Doesn’t see the need to compromise, make accommodation. And he doesn’t understand just how bad our need for money is. We can’t exist on the dribs and drabs that trickle in from our members and private foundations. We need big money, and we have to learn how to tap into the sources for it.”

  “Did you think you could do that through Mick Erickson?”

  “… Well, he certainly seemed like a man who could provide a good entree to the big-money interests. But try telling that to Ripinsky. He’d accuse me of selling out the entire Tufa Lake area. And the devil of it is that if anyone else—Anne-Marie or one of the Friends, for instance—had made the same error in judgment, he’d have understood how it could happen. But because it was me …Ripinsky’s out to get me.”

  “Why?”

  He shrugged and looked away.

  “I don’t think he’s out to get you, Ned. The two of you just don’t get along because of the difference in your personal styles.”

  Sanderman still did not meet my eyes. He seemed to want to tell me something, but was unable to broach the subject. Finally he said, “Maybe you’re right. This kind of conflict isn’t new to me. All my life …I don’t relate well, and people don’t relate to me.”

  I hadn’t suspected he possessed such self-knowledge. “In what way don’t you relate?”

  “Basically I find other people uninteresting. Compared to ideas, they seem pretty trivial. Their concerns, their lives— when you examine them, you’ve got to admit they’re frivolous. I’m happiest when I’m alone: working out theoretical problems, catching up on my technical reading, creating crossword puzzles or acrostics. But I’m socially aware enough that I realize I should relate, so I compensate by talking too much. People find me boring.” He fell silent, putting a hand to his lips as if trying to force back the pain that underlay his words. I sensed that this was the first real confidence he’d shared with anyone in a good long time.

  It struck me that I had the reverse of Sanderman’s problem: all my life I’ve related—perhaps too well. People tell me things, frequently things they’ve never told another living soul. Maybe it’s because I have an open manner; maybe it’s because I ask the right questions; maybe I simply behave like someone who will respect and guard a confidence. Often it’s gotten me into trouble when someone later regrets having been too frank, but occasionally it’s formed the basis for solid friendships—to say nothing of having been extremely useful in my work.

  I asked, “Do you care that people find you boring?”

  “Of course I do! I have feelings, you know. Just because I don’t spread them out for everyone to see … You remember the other night when I said I had my mid-life crisis at thirty-nine?”

  I nodded.

  “Well, what brought it on was my wife leaving me. I know that doesn’t sound particularly unusual. In Silicon Valley, people are always divorcing. Men leave their wives for their secretaries; women leave their husbands for their co-workers or bosses. Hell, two of my wife’s women friends left their husbands for each other. But you know one of the reasons why my wife claimed she left me?”

  “Why?”

  “Because I
was so boring that every morning she had to remind herself that I existed.” His pain was clearly apparent now. “How do you like that? To my own wife I was a nonentity!”

  Had I heard his story secondhand—had he, for instance, been one of Hank’s clients, who as a group have endured some of the most hilarious divorces on record—I would have been amused. But his outrage was such a transparent mask for hurt that I found no humor in the tale. I said, “Your wife doesn’t have much depth or compassion, does she?”

  It was the right response; Sanderman’s tense face relaxed. “No, she doesn’t. But she’s right about one thing—I am boring.”

  I smiled. “Boring and proud of it—that’s the spirit. But, Ned, to get back to Erickson, you should call the sheriff’s department and tell either Kristen Lark or Dwight Gifford what you know.”

  “I plan to. What about …”

  “Don’t worry about Anne-Marie and Hy. We’ll just say that you didn’t make the connection between the dead man and your Mick Erickson until we spoke this morning.”

  “Thanks.”

  I stood up. “No problem.”

  “And thanks for listening. I’ve talked at you a lot since you’ve been here, but it was better talking with you.”

  “Any time you want to talk some more, I’m here. And, Ned, if I ever take up needlepoint, my first project will be a pillow for you saying—”

  “I know: ‘Boring and Proud of It.’ ”

  Two hours later, just as I returned from a long walk along the shoreline, Nickles tottered down the hill looking like death warmed over. She cringed at my offer of breakfast, but agreed to help me locate the other prospectors in the valley. On the way into town to retrieve her Jeep, I asked her how it had gone with Rose Wittington, but she didn’t want to talk about that. All she would say was, “The woman’s fuckin’ crazy.”

  Because of the early hour, Stone Valley still held the chill of night, but by the time Nickles, with the unerring sense of a born tracker, ferreted out the two prospectors I hadn’t been able to find, the temperature was on the rise. Neither man was able to tell me anything about Michael Erickson, under either his own or the Tarbeaux name; neither had seen Earl Hopwood in at least two weeks. As we approached the hillside encampment of the man with the shotgun, I began to wonder if all this running around in the heat was really worth it.

  The man’s abode was merely a shack of wood, tar paper, and sheet metal, with a battered and faded psychedelically painted VW van parked next to it. Nickles stopped several yards away and called out. He emerged, shotgun cradled in his arms. He was big but running to flab, clad only in shabby jeans and an open leather vest; his full beard hung nearly to his belt, and his matted curls were restrained by a blue bandanna. A cross between a desert rat and one of the area’s leftover hippies, I thought. When he saw us, he planted his feet wide but didn’t raise the gun.

  “Hey, Bayard,” Nickles said, “I got a friend here, needs to ask you some questions.”

  Bayard just stood there.

  Nickles motioned to me, and we went closer. Now I saw that his eyes were dull and burned out. I also could smell him, the shock waves of body odor almost palpable in the hot, still air. Definitely leftover hippie.

  “My friend tells me you were kind of inhospitable yesterday,” Nickles said. “You better watch what you do with that shotgun, Bayard. Could get you in a lot of trouble.”

  The man shrugged and spat to one side. “Thought she might be from the welfare, wondering why the kids ain’t in school.”

  Kids? I glanced at the shack and caught sight of a pale, rabbity little face peering around the doorjamb. It withdrew as soon as its washed-out eyes met mine.

  Nickles laughed. “Nobody’s gonna bother about those kids goin’ to school—they’re too damn dumb.”

  Her remark didn’t faze Bayard; he merely nodded. “Dumb as posts, so why bother? What’s your friend want to know?”

  I started to speak, but Nickles answered for me. “Same kind of stuff those tree huggers came asking about. You ever hear of a Franklin Tarbeaux?”

  “I told them no.”

  “What about Michael Erickson—Mick, for short?”

  “… Him neither.”

  “When’s the last time you saw Earl Hopwood?”

  Bayard scratched his head. “Hopwood?”

  “Yeah, you know—the old guy from up the stream.” She looked at me and without lowering her voice said, “You gotta be patient with Bay. He did too many drugs back in the sixties.”

  That remark seemed to slide right by him, too. I was beginning to feel as if we were speaking two languages here, with Nickles as interpreter. After a moment some rusty mental mechanism seemed to kick in, because Bayard said, “Old Earl. Saw him just last week driving by on his way to his claim. Driving too damn fast for that van of his—must be older’n mine.”

  Nickles glanced at me and frowned. “You sure it was last week, Bay?”

  The man looked mildly irritated. “Sure I’m sure. This past Wednesday it was. I know because my check just come.”

  “You talk with Earl?”

  “Yelled at him to slow down.”

  “See him after that?”

  “Nope.”

  “Well, thanks, Bay. Say hello to the missus for me.”

  Without a word he turned and went back into the shack.

  “He’s got an entire family living in there?” I asked in amazement.

  Nickles grinned slyly. “Well, sure. Kind of ruffles your middle-class sensibilities, don’t it?”

  I ignored the comment—probably because it hit too close to home. “Listen, is it likely what he says is true?”

  “Pretty likely. The check he’s talking about is from state disability. It’s the big moment in Bay’s life; everything dates from before or after that check comes.”

  “He could have seen Hopwood some other week, though.’

  “No, Bay’s memory ain’t that good. If he says it was last week, that’s when it was. Now how about you and me going to my place so we can get out of this sun?”

  I agreed and we walked back there in silence. Nickles asked me if I wanted to come in for a glass of water. “I’d offer you a beer,” she added, “but I’m fresh out. Couldn’t stomach looking at one today, anyway.”

  I was anxious to get away, but her wistful expression made it so plain she didn’t want me to leave that I said, “Water sounds great.”

  “Come on in, then.”

  The interior of the house was surprisingly cool. I followed Nickles along a narrow hallway with peeling floral wallpaper and past a parlor full of mining gear; the hydraulic concentrator occupied the place of honor on a rag rug in the center of the floor. Another room had a mattress and box springs with a sleeping bag spread on top and clothing hanging from pegs on the wall. All the others were empty except for what little the original owners had abandoned. The kitchen was at the rear: iron cookstove, chipped enamel-topped table, dry sink, shelves of dishes and utensils. Several big bottles of water stood in the sink.

  “Stream water,” Nickles explained, taking down a pair of plastic glasses and inspecting them for cleanliness. “I collect it, let the sediment filter out. Pure as any bottled stuff I could buy.” She poured and added, “Sorry I can’t give you ice. What was in the chest over there is bound to be melted—I was after more when I got sidetracked to Zelda’s last night by that little weasel. Let’s go out on the porch.”

  In the midday sun the valley looked as washed out as an old color photo; heat waves danced off the iron roofs of the ruins below. Nickles and I sat on the steps, looking out.

  I said, “You’ve really got to be tough to survive here.”

  “Yeah, you do. Summers you roast, winters you freeze, all year long you don’t see another living soul for days—hell, weeks—at a stretch. You know, McCone, last night after Rose tucked me in—God, she scared me; hinted she might’ve poisoned my hot milk—I got to thinking. I’m gonna give it another season here, but if I don’t score
pretty damn good, I’m going back to Nevada.”

  “And do what?”

  “Get myself into a decent house, if I can. Make some real money.”

  I raised my eyebrows inquiringly.

  “Yeah, that’s what I mean. A cathouse. That bother you?”

  I shrugged.

  “In this world you use what skill you got. Except for looking for gold, that’s all I know. Besides, it pays a damn sight better than the casinos. At least I won’t die poor, like my mama did.”

  I thought about that for a moment. “What you said before about my middle-class sensibilities—it’s good for me to have them ruffled now and then.”

  “Oh, McCone!” She punched me on the shoulder. “Any time those sensibilities need ruffling, you just come see me.”

  I stopped by Ripinsky’s place half an hour later to see if he’d unearthed any pictures of Earl Hop wood. When he came to the door he was barefoot, in cutoffs and a tank top, dark-framed reading glasses pushed up on top of his curly head. A silver-and-gold holiday gift box full of photographs sat on the coffee table, and beside it lay several snapshots. One showed a smiling woman in a wheelchair and an unsmiling older man standing behind her; it had been taken in this room in front of the stone fireplace.

  “Earl Hopwood and Julie,” Ripinsky said, handing it to me.

  Hy’s late wife had been gaunt, with long gray-brown hair combed back from a widow’s peak. Her smile lit up her face; her eyes, sunk in a web of lines that betrayed chronic weariness and pain, contradicted her physical debilitation, spoke of an iron will and mental vigor.

  I said, “From what people tell me, Julie was a pretty amazing woman.”

  “She was. Went all out in everything she did. Tufa Lake would have been doomed without her, and she damned near saved me from hell.”

  I glanced up at him, hoping he’d elaborate, but he merely took the reading glasses off his head and went to put them on a table.

  I turned my attention back to the photograph, studying Hopwood. The old man was lean and sinewy, with sharp features, thin colorless lips, and weathered skin whose grayish cast matched his hair. But as with Julie Spaulding, what struck me was the eyes. Black and burning, even in this faded photo, they dominated his otherwise passive face. Zealot’s eyes, I thought, maybe even a little mad. Perhaps that was what living alone in the desert had done to him; perhaps what others described as laziness was a sapping of outward energy by his internal fires—whatever might fuel them. I looked at the photo a bit longer, then asked, “May I take this?”