Stranded

by Lorena McCourtney

  Now that he’d told me this bad thing about Hiram, Norman seemed reluctant to commit himself on what it might mean.

  “Did he ever tell you this woman’s name?”

  “No. Never did. All he said was she had a real spitfire temper. It tickled him, I think. He was laughin’ about it ’cause she’d got mad and thrown a bowl of soup at him.”

  “For some particular reason? Or just because she liked to throw soup?”

  “He said she had a jealous streak.” Unlike two men of my acquaintance, I thought irrelevantly. “Lucinda could get a little hot too, of course. Though I don’t know as she ever threw things.”

  No, but she wasn’t above acting on her feelings when she got irked, as Kelli said she’d done when she’d once fed Hiram’s dinner to a couple of miner bums. And maybe she’d do a lot more than that if she really got angry. More than ever, those carousel horses in the bedroom, especially if only recently purchased, suggested that Hiram had planned to dump Lucinda and marry KaySue, with the horses a wedding surprise for her. Not a pleasant surprise for Lucinda.

  I jumped to the bottom line. “Do you think this could have something to do with Hiram’s death? Or the fire?”

  “You said the fire was from bad wiring. An accident.”

  “Hiram’s death wasn’t.”

  He nodded, his expression troubled. He started the engine. Pop. Bang. Burst of smoke. “Well, I’m just thinking, you should take care, Ms. Ivy. Funny things goin’ on. People ain’t always what you think they are.”

  So very true. “I’ll be careful.”

  He’d been so somber with what he had to say, but all of a sudden he brightened. “But I figure you’ll be okay, with Mac here lookin’ out for you now.” He gave me a little wave, not a heartbroken wave, I noted, and the Dorf roared backward out of the driveway. At the street he braked to yell, “Thanks for dinner, Ms. Ivy. You tell Mac he wants to come out to the mine any time and look around, he’s welcome.”

  “Thanks, Norman.”

  The Dorf drove off, with a rattle like a junkyard symphony, one taillight winking with a peculiar irregularity, as if it might be receiving messages from outer space. I went back inside. Mac was in the bathroom washing off grease and dirt from fixing the flat tire. He came out of the bathroom with his sleeves rolled up.

  “Who’s Ginger?” he asked.

  “One of Norman’s chickens. They’re all named for movie stars, past and present. He never kills them to eat, so when they die he buries them. He has a little cemetery.” I wondered if he had a funeral for them. I hadn’t thought of that before.

  Mac didn’t guffaw or say anything to make fun of Norman. I was, in fact, prepared to give a fiery defense of Norman’s ways, if he did. But all he did was say reflectively, “Ms. Ivy. You like that?”

  “It’s a Norman exclusive, if you don’t mind.” I paused, thinking. “Some people think he could be the one who murdered Hiram.”

  “Really? I thought he sounded rather fond of the guy. What do you think?”

  “I consider everyone a suspect.”

  Mac threw up his hands. “But I just got here!”

  “Okay, everyone but you is a suspect.”

  Mac laughed. “He’s an interesting guy. More to him than you might think at first glance.”

  That sounded more curious and thoughtful than jealous. Which might have been disappointing except that I’d lost interest in the jealousy angle. What interested me now was that Norman had seen the same possibilities in the Lucinda-Hiram-KaySue triangle that I had. Both women had tempers. Both women were capable of acting on those tempers. One of them could have done him in.

  And might not be shy about doing the same to me if I looked like a problem.

  24

  We all went to church together the next morning, all except Kelli. She and Chris, who were spending more time than ever together, were going to brunch at the Chuckwagon. She’d developed an I-have-a-secret glow about her, which made me suspect she and Chris would soon have an important announcement to make. I was glad for her, even though I hadn’t yet been able to warm up to Chris myself.

  Magnolia and Geoff, Mac, Abilene, and I all went, using the Margollins’ car for transportation. Dr. Sugarman joined us at the church, and we filled up a good share of a pew. I felt gratified by how raptly our whole lineup listened to the message about the dangers of false teachers, taken from Jude, a short book of the New Testament that is too often overlooked.

  Afterward, with sudden inspiration, I asked Dr. Sugarman if he had a cowboy rope Mac could use for the Will Rogers monologue.

  “Sure. I’ve got several old ropes out in the barn. I used to do some calf roping in college rodeos back when I was in vet school. Come on over after church, and I’ll find one for you.”

  I looked at Mac.

  “Sounds good to me,” he said. “Although I have to admit I don’t know one end of a rope from the other.”

  My own thought was, How much can there be to know? Although that was to prove overly optimistic.

  We arranged that Dr. Sugarman would take Abilene and me back to the house to change clothes, and Abilene would go on with him to his place. They were going out to treat the sick horse again that afternoon. Mac would go back to the RV park with the Margollins, get his motorcycle, and come by for me. At the cabin, I fixed a quick sandwich lunch for Dr. Sugarman, Abilene, and me. Dr. Sugarman, ever the vet, gave both cats a quick going-over while he waited for us.

  Today, when Mac picked me up, I was better prepared for a motorcycle ride. I’d put on thick socks, long underwear under my jeans, a heavy sweatshirt over my sweater, plus a wool scarf wrapped around my neck, and gloves lined with fake fur for my hands. And I recklessly dabbed on a few drops of that perfume grandniece Sandy had sent me a while back, the Catch Your Man stuff. I was pretty sure I smelled good, although I was afraid I looked like a short, overstuffed teddy bear. For whatever reason, Mac nodded approvingly.

  Dr. Sugarman had given me directions on how to get to his house, which was about a mile out of town, and I yelled them to Mac as we rode. You don’t talk in normal tones on a moving motorcycle, I discovered. I also discovered I didn’t really have to wrap my arms around Mac. Bracing myself against the sturdy backrest and just grabbing his jacket lightly made me feel quite stable and secure.

  Hmmm. I decided I’d pretend I’d never discovered that. Wrapping my arms around him felt too good to discard. I actually managed to enjoy riding the motorcycle this day. It puts you right out there with the fresh scent of snow and trees, the shrieks and laughter of children sledding on a hill, plus the discovery that there were odd pockets of warmer air even on this cold day that you never noticed in a car.

  Dr. Sugarman’s house was bigger than I expected, two stories with a covered deck and cozy-looking dormers on the second floor. There were no flowers at this time of year, and the lawn showed brown and flattened between patches of snow, but rototilled spaces that were surely flowerbeds in spring edged the walkway to the front door. Did flowerbeds signify a woman’s presence recently? I wondered if Abilene had asked Dr. Sugarman if he’d ever been married. Knowing Abilene, I guessed not.

  Dr. Sugarman and Abilene were headed out to the barn when we zoomed into the yard on the motorcycle. A couple of big chestnut horses trotted along a corral fence, tails flagged high. Abilene had mentioned Dr. Sugarman had taken in two other horses to care for in their old age, and they were out in a larger pasture area. One had a decided limp, but it snorted and kicked like a colt when the motorcycle pulled into the yard. Cats perched on the corral fence, peeked out of the barn, and played tag on the deck. An Australian shepherd with white eyes and a three-legged poodle came over to check us out.

  “Glad you found the place okay,” Dr. Sugarman called.

  Inside the roomy barn, he led us to a tack room, neat but not fanatically clean. He examined several ropes, chose one, and tossed a loop at an upright bale of hay in the alleyway. The coils of rope in his left hand unfurled smoothly, and
he jerked the loop taut around the bale. He coiled the rope again before handing it to Mac. “Need a roping lesson?”

  “I don’t have to rope anything. I just need to know how to keep from accidentally hanging myself with the thing. I practically choked myself hanging up a clothesline one time.”

  Dr. Sugarman laughed. “It’s not like a gun. It isn’t going to go off accidentally. Say, why don’t you two ride out to the Everlys’ ranch with us? Even if a sick horse doesn’t interest you, it’s a nice drive out to their valley.”

  I made up my mind I was going even if Mac decided to go back to town, but without a moment’s hesitation he said, “Sure. Interesting country around here.”

  We headed for Dr. Sugarman’s big pickup then, and, with the prerogative of LOLs, I came right out and asked, “Have you ever been married—” I started to call him Dr. Sugarman, because Abilene always did, but I remembered he’d once said to call him Mike. Which seemed like a good idea, since I was getting into nitty-gritty nosiness here. Unable to think of more tactful phrasing, I repeated the question. “Have you ever been married, Mike?”

  He looked a little surprised, since there had been nothing leading up to the subject, but he said, “No, never have. I came close once when I was in vet school, but we both backed off when I realized she was thinking city vet clinic for lapdogs, and she realized I was thinking country clinic for anything four-legged. And since then …” He didn’t finish the sentence, but he gave Abilene a sideways glance that I thought was meaningful. She, of course, was busy petting one of the cats.

  Dr. Sugarman and Abilene sat up front, Mac and I in the backseat of the king cab. Up front, they talked about the sick horse’s problem, something called impaction colic. Abilene was fascinated, of course, asking questions about various medications she’d been reading about. I knew that’s what she did in her spare time at the office: read Dr. Sugarman’s old vet books. But I had to admit, when it finally registered to me what impaction colic was, that I had only limited interest in what boiled down to a severe case of horse constipation. Though I was glad for the horse’s sake that Dr.

  Sugarman seemed so knowledgeable and competent, since I don’t like to see any creature suffer and this could be life-threatening. The gravel road out to the ranch passed several other ranches, some with prosperous-looking red barns and expansive houses, some with rickety sheds and a single-wide trailer. A trio of high-spirited horses raced around one snowy pasture, and a black bull regarded us with kingly superiority from atop a small rise in another field. Dr. Sugarman pointed out some long-abandoned mining shacks clinging to a steep hillside, and a pair of snowmobiles whizzed across an open field.

  In spite of the interesting sights, I was glad when we reached the Everlys’ ranch. I’d dressed for motorcycle riding, not the warm interior of a pickup, and I was beginning to feel like a hot dog steaming in a bun. I was also afraid an overheated-LOL scent might be canceling out the Catch Your Man.

  Dr. Sugarman and Abilene went off to run a tube into the horse’s stomach where they would let off gas and administer mineral oil, not a process I particularly wanted to watch. Mac had brought his newly acquired rope, and we strolled over to the fence where a half dozen cud-chewing steers didn’t bother to stand up when we approached.

  Mac made a loop with the rope as Dr. Sugarman had done and tossed it at a fence post, but he neglected to let loose of the coil, and the loop flopped around his feet. Where he immediately got a foot entangled in it, then a leg, and finally nearly managed to hog-tie himself before he got out. I could see how the clothesline had given him problems.

  “What did ol’ Will do with the rope onstage anyway?” Mac grumbled as his second toss went no better than the first.

  “I’m not sure. Didn’t he kind of spin the loop back and forth or something?”

  Mac tried that, only to find the rope wound around shoulders and knees like a web trying to strangle him. The rope had appeared cooperatively limber and manageable in Dr. Sugarman’s hands, but now it seemed to have gone stiff and contrary, with a stubborn will of its own.

  “Perhaps this rope didn’t come with the spinning feature,” I suggested, trying to be tactful. Mac’s look suggested I knew even less about ropes than he did. True. I tried again. “You know the old saying, practice makes perfect.”

  “At least I do have most of the monologue learned.”

  “Already?”

  He launched into a handful of Will Rogers’s folksy sayings, and again I marveled at how smoothly he slipped into the persona. Although somehow I doubted the real Will whopped himself on the head with the rope hard enough to make him blink, as Mac did.

  “Good thing I never wanted to be a cowboy,” he muttered.

  Altogether, in spite of the unruly rope, it was a most enjoyable day. With a most satisfactory good-night kiss at the end of it.

  Monday afternoon was another rehearsal, and it was a hectic time because Lucinda wanted it done with a full setup of props. So I lugged props onstage for each skit, offstage after the skit was over, plus dashed up to the third floor numerous times because some little thing always seemed to be missing. Then someone bumped into the lamp in the parlor scene skit and smashed the shade. A loose board popped up and ripped one of the spangled costumes. Doris prompted one of the Stooges with the wrong lines. Tempers flared several times.

  Mac’s performance went off great as far as his lines went, not so great with his rope performance. It tangled around his feet. It snagged on his belt buckle. It wrapped around his body and knocked his hat off. Everyone was tittering rather than laughing outright, because this wasn’t the part that was supposed to be funny, and Mac looked thoroughly frustrated.

  The chorus line had a few glitches too, with the revolving wagon wheel looking more like the flat tire on Norman’s Dorf. One woman seemed to have forgotten the difference between left and right, and soon the whole lineup was more like a traffic jam than a chorus line. Stella had a cold, and her song in the street scene sounded as if she was gargling the words underwater.

  Lucinda dropped her head on her director’s stand at the end of the rehearsal. “I keep telling myself that it’s always like this, and there’s nothing to worry about. Always, just a few days before performance, it seems like everything is falling apart. But then it all works out okay.”

  I wanted to say that I was sure it would all work out okay this year too, but my tongue tangled in doubt because the chorus line was beginning to look more like a choreographed riot and the skits as if a traitor had sabotaged the scripts. But I put the best spin I could on it and said hopefully, “Everyone’s working very hard. Mac says he can fix the lamp shade.”

  Which he did, with duct tape that he ran out to the hardware store and bought. Though I have to admit I half-–expected Charlotte to produce a roll of it from her purse.

  A full dress rehearsal was scheduled for Wednesday, but Tuesday everyone got a day off to recuperate from Monday’s near fiasco. Mac and I spent the morning wandering through Hello’s antique and gift shops. Posters about the coming Revue were up everywhere, prints made from a photo of a previous year’s chorus line in an organized moment. In the afternoon Magnolia decided she wanted to drive down to Hayward because someone in the RV park had told her about a yarn shop there and she needed some special yarn for a project at the house in Phoenix. She and Geoff invited Mac and me to ride along.

  When we reached Hayward, Mac and Geoff headed for a car parts store. Something about needing windshield wipers and spark plugs, although I suspected they were just avoiding yarn. Posters about the Revue were in windows everywhere here too. I went with Magnolia to the yarn shop, but I’m about as good with yarn as Mac is with rope, and I slipped away for a quick side trip to the Nugget. I’d been wondering if KaySue had come up with any ideas about who’d murdered Hiram, and I also wanted to see if she was doing okay. And, though she wasn’t high on my list of suspects, she hadn’t slipped off it.

  In midafternoon, business was light in the Nug
get, and I found KaySue drinking a soda and leafing through a People magazine at the far end of the counter. She was still wearing the carousel earrings. I walked up behind her and tugged her long blond braid lightly.

  “Hi, KaySue. Remember me?”

  She swiveled on the counter stool. “Hey, I sure do.” I was surprised at how pleased she seemed to see me.

  “I just happened to be down this way with some friends, so I thought I’d drop in and see you.”

  “Want a cup of coffee?”

  “No, thanks anyway. Is everything going okay?”

  “I guess.” She shrugged in a so-so way. “I’ve been out with a guy who works at the Ford dealership a couple times.” She wrinkled her nose. “But he’s no Hiram. They haven’t caught Hiram’s killer yet?”

  “Not yet. There was also a fire at the house the other night. It destroyed the back side of the house. Abilene and I had to move out.”

  “Why would someone want to burn the house down?”

  The first question most people asked was about how the fire got started. But KaySue’s first thought was that the fire had been set on purpose. Hmmm. Interesting.

  “The fire department says it was probably caused by the old wiring. But I keep thinking maybe there’s something in the house that the killer doesn’t want found, and the fire wasn’t an accident.”

  “Like what?”

  My turn to shrug.

  “I think Lucinda knew about me,” she said slowly. She twisted her feet childlike around the stool’s center pedestal and fingered the thick braid hanging over her shoulder.

  “What makes you think that?”

  “I hadn’t thought about it before you were here last time, but then I got to thinking about something Hiram said once, not long before he was killed. That he’d bought something special for me, something I was really going to like, and he thought maybe she’d found out about it.”

  Carousel horses. Lucinda had said she hadn’t known anything about them until after Hiram’s death, but was that true?

  “And so you think … ?”