Jack Pine, page 17
“Have you seen my other sock?”
She rolled her eyes.
“It’s over there behind the door.”
Reuger put on his sock then his boot and walked back and fingered his hat like a man in a lawyer’s office. He was leaving, and at this moment he didn’t think he was coming back. She saw this and looked down quickly.
“You only said what you think, Patricia.”
“I’d appreciate it if you leave now.”
He snugged his hat and walked out of the room. She heard the cabin door close then his footsteps by the window. Patricia rubbed the bridge of her nose. She heard him pass the window again and the door open. She watched him walk in the room and take off his hat and finger the brim. She handed him the wallet from the side table.
“Thanks,” he said and walked out for good.
33
THE BELL CHATTERED the cold thin air and he woke from the dream lost and cold. Reuger lay with the quilt pulled up to his nose. With the third ring he looked at the alarm clock, but it wasn’t the clock that rang but the phone next to the bed. He picked up the black receiver.
“Reuger, Sheriff here.” Static. “Bad trouble at Pine Lodge last night…at the Ely hospital with the Reynolds girl from Pine Lodge and her family.”
White noise filled his ear again.
“Ya…seems…raped last night…woodshed.”
He was wide awake and out of the bed.
“On my way.”
“Family doesn’t want to deal with you…had some trouble before… father…rude to him…covering things here and have already conducted an interview with the girl… apparently told you… of the earlier incident…So there…want you…pick up that Indian…Tobin.”
He stood with the phone pressed against his cheek.
“She identified … mug shot… bet we… match…DNA… complicate other investigation…” Static washed him away again. “Jorde anyway…”
“Sheriff, let me talk to her—”
“Don’t want to talk… Reynolds …moving into town…investigation… an attorney and give a nickel…future of… Lodge… Jim Carpenter…lucky… can keep shirt … back.”
Clicking on the line.
“Go pick up the Indian and bring him… me.”
* * * *
Reuger stepped off the boat onto Center Island with the shotgun, and Gus carried the Winchester. They passed through the dead sour scent of fish guts. His boots sunk in the sand as he trudged like a man with a heavy pack before he got to the rocky granite. Sun glazed the stagnant water around the granite slabs where turkey buzzards flocked up on the flat rocks. The lodge was small across the lake.
“Don’t see his canoe,” Gus muttered with the Winchester clenched tightly, his face pale and old in the harsh light.
“Go look at his camp then,” Reuger nodded, ducking into the trees with flotsam in the branches.
They passed scraggly jack pines with foam green mold running the branches like an infection and dead branches curled in like a witch’s hand. Gus dropped down to a chipmunk raising fireweed. Reuger kept the shotgun close to his body with his finger snugged. He spied the clearing and bulled ahead with the branches shishing leaves like canastas.
Reuger reached down to the burned sticks and walked the flattened grass.
“Just pulled out here by the looks of that there grass, Reuger.”
He hunched down and thumbed up his brim.
“If he raped the girl, then he took off last night.”
Gus raised a bushy brow.
“Yer don’t sound convinced there.”
“Nope,” he said pulling up the radio. “Hector!”
“Ya, go ahead, Reuger.”
“Get hold of Irene Peters, tell her I’m going to need her plane soon as she can work me in.”
“Ya, 10-4.”
He turned among the wiry ghosts of dead trees. Reuger stared toward Canada and knew he had gone into hiding. He looked down at the flattened grass and the crusted black logs. Reuger picked up a burned stick. He turned it over slowly then looked up at Gus.
“Let’s go see that lawyer’s daughter.”
34
THE INN HAD been a Victorian mansion built by a lumber baron to bring grace to the Northwoods. The trees ran out, John Stafford died, and the mansion became a boarding home, then a restaurant, then a bed and breakfast. Gus and Reuger sat in the jeep across the street.
“They in there?”
“Oh, ya,” Reuger nodded.
“We goin’ to jest wait?”
Reuger slumped down and pulled his hat forward.
“I take it that’s a yes, then,” Gus said leaning back in the seat.
At four o’clock, Reuger woke and saw a man and a woman step into a black Mercedes. They drove slowly past. The lawyer had on a light cream sports jacket and dark glasses. Reuger wondered how long Jim had before he had to close his doors.
“Ya, Reuger.”
He swung up the radio.
“Go ahead, Hector.”
“I have the medical examiner on the line, I’m going to patch him through…Hello! Hello!”
“Go ahead, Floyd.”
“Ya, Reuger, I’ve been working on the skeletal remains here you brought in, and I found something I think you should know about. You were right, that hole in the back of the skull is a bullet hole, I would think maybe a .44. Now I couldn’t find an exit wound so it either lodged somewhere in the brain and then was lost in the lake or it went out his mouth or eye socket there.”
“Anything else, Floyd?”
“Oh, ya. I was examining the bones for any other contusions or breaks or any other sign of trauma, you know, and I found along the vertebrae in the neck these strange chippings here and I examined it close, you know, and there is definite signs of trauma here.”
“Think so?”
“Looks to me like it was struck here with something very sharp and very fast—almost strafed, you know. Maybe with an ax.”
“How about a chain saw?”
“That could well be, but for a chain or something to strike those vertebrae it would have to have nearly cut the man’s head off you know, but it could leave these type of marks here on the bone.”
“Thanks, Floyd.”
“Sure, come on by the house sometime.”
He clipped the radio and paused. Floyd Habershaw was a transplant from the Twin Cities. He wore a buckskin coat in the winter and sported a Teddy Roosevelt hat from the Rough Rider days. He was as blustery as TR and had built himself a magnificent log cabin just below the Boundary Waters. Floyd was a loud man and he tended to brag a bit about his wilderness adventures, but he was thorough and a crack medical examiner.
“Gus.”
“Yep,” he said, sitting up from a dead sleep.
“When you talk to these hardware stores, look for someone who bought a lot of these spikes.”
“Fer sure,” he yawned, spatting to the hot pavement. “Now, yer sure yer want to do this?”
Reuger climbed out of the jeep and squinted across the parking lot.
“I know you’re going to do what you’re going to do, but that Mr. Reynolds could cause a lot of trouble and if Riechardt…all right, all right.”
“Be back directly,” he nodded.
Gus slumped down in the seat and closed his eyes.
“I’ll be here.”
* * * *
Reuger walked across the lawn passing lounge chairs under a willow that Stafford managed to baby through the winters, an angel gurgling into a birdbath, and a sprinkler that whipped around then chattered back. Flowerpots bright with red impatiens lined the porch steps. He climbed to a door of leaded glass and entered the parlor. A man with wired lenses stood behind the hotel desk. The Inn still carried the moldy scent of a Victorian home.
“What rooms are the Reynoldses staying in?”
The man pushed up his glasses and clicked his tongue then drew a book open and lined it with his finger. He turned to a row of keys.
“I’m sorry, the key is not here.”
“I just need the room number.”
“Oh, I see, police business. “He drew his hand across his mouth. “Mum’s the word.”
“I still need the number.”
“Ah,” he said leaning forward and lowering his voice. “The Reynoldses are in 211 and Dana Reynolds is in room 212.”
“Thanks.”
Reuger climbed the carpeted stairs to a landing settled by a love seat and a crystal lamp. He walked the hall with the Colt slapping his thigh. The plush carpet was wobbly under his boots as he passed dignified numbers on brass plates. He came to a lacquered door with 212. The brim of his hat touched the wood.
“Dana.” He knuckled the door. “It’s Deputy Sheriff Reuger.”
He heard the sound of a suitcase falling to the floor. Reuger knocked harder and tried the door handle. He smelled something like a napkin burning and saw smoke misting from beneath the door.
“Dana!”
He banged the wood with his fist and jammed his shoulder against the door. A woman in pink curlers thrust her head into the hallway. Reuger drew back and kicked the door. He kicked it again with his booted heel marking the door like a horseshoe.
“Help! Somebody! This man is breaking into a room!”
He stepped back and drew the Colt and fired. Blue smoke roiled the space and he banged four shots until the metal perforated the hasp. He kicked the door open breathing burnt powder and stepping on lathe and plaster. Curtains waved over the four post Victorian bed and mahogany tables.
Reuger saw a trashcan by the bed flaming up toward the ceiling and dumped the burning paper in the tub and saw a cigarette still smoldering. He turned to an old man in the hall doorway.
“Get back!”
“Yes, sir! Something wrong?”
Reuger walked into the room and turned the television off.
Painted toenails peeked out from the far side of the bed. He kneeled down to Dana Reynolds in lacy panties and a bra. He put the gun on the carpet and gently turned her over. Blood smeared her stomach and breasts. She moaned like a child and then he saw the weak trickle pulsing from her wrists. He clamped the wounds and felt warm blood flowing between his fingers.
“Hang in there Dana, you’re going to be all right,” he murmured, pulling up the radio. “Hector!”
“Ya, Reuger.”
“Get me an ambulance to the Stafford Inn. Female with slashed wrists.”
“10-4.”
He pulled the pillows from the bed and wrapped pillowcases into tourniquets. He bound one arm just above her wrist then the other. She groaned again as he tied each cloth off tightly and saw her hands turn white. Reuger hoisted her like a baby and she moaned against his chest. He could smell a scented shampoo when her hair brushed his lips, then he ran down the hall like she was his child.
35
“SO THEY DIDN’T even thank you?”
Reuger looked up from his biography of Scott and Amundsen.
“Who?”
“Them Reynoldses!” Gus stared through the smoky light. “They just up and come to the hospital and don’t say nothin’ to you about savin’ their daughter from bleeding to death?”
Reuger sipped his beer and snugged his toes in the thick wool socks. He remembered Joel Reynolds whisking by him in the emergency room. He remembered standing there with his blood-soaked shirt, then Riechardt barging into the room. He had returned to his cabin, and it felt very cold and alone.
“Nope, they didn’t,” he said, setting his beer down.
“Don’t beat all.” Gus shook his head with pipe in hand. “What’s wrong with them people? They so sick with all their nastiness, can’t take the time to thank a man for saving their own namesake!”
The fire crackled in the room. The polka music had ended, and a nasal whine filled the room. Reuger glanced up to the radio on the mantle.
“Ain’t that…”
“My opinion here that the recent spate of murdered loggers turning up in the Boundary Waters is the doings of a single madman, better known as a serial murderer, who the deputy sheriff and his lackeys are trying to cover up for their own design. It is through the tireless ongoing investigation of this reporter that I have uncovered the discovery of another dead logger just yesterday that was also murdered in the gruesome style as Foster Jones and Carter Grisom. And the End of the Road show has learned that this logger’s head was chopped clear off and was found floating in the lake.”
Gus shook his head.
“Where does he get that kind of crap?”
“This reporter has always maintained that a clear and open discourse between law enforcement and the press is the best policy, but this is not the case and instead we have an elaborate cover-up along the lines of the John F. Kennedy assassination. And now the arrest of a leading environmentalist, Tom Jorde, who was just on this show last week, has told this reporter that he is being set up for much bigger forces at work. After much investigation, this reporter must agree. For End of the Road this is John Mcfee…”
Gus snapped off the radio with eyes burning.
“Where in the hell does he get off with that?”
“Free country.”
“But he talks out of both sides of his mouth here!”
“Good for his show.”
Gus sat down and shook his head.
“That dang Charles Kroning has left us with a curse, and his name is John Mcfee!”
Reuger drank from the beer again, feeling the cold rush. The windows rattled again, and he set down the book then walked to the glass panes. The storm was pricked out in the heavy coal sky. The Boundary Waters had performed one of those abrupt shifts from a pastoral day to a blustery cruel night.
He had gone out to Center Island several times, but Tommy hadn’t returned. “One thing’s for sure.” Reuger turned around and walked back to his chair. “I’d say there is something that girl is trying to get away from.”
“Take a razor to her own wrists like that.” Gus crossed his legs like a professor in the wing chair. “Mighty young to be throwing all that life away.”
Headlights shone in the door. Gus craned around.
“Expecting guests?” He stood up. “It’s the sheriff.”
Reuger picked up the eagle feather from the table for a marker.
“Know what this is going to be about.”
The steps on the porch were loud and officious.
“Ya, door’s open there,” Gus hollered over.
The sheriff opened the door. He carried a Campbell’s soup can in his right hand. He peppered it with a sunflower seed. Phsit pop! His jaw turned and he spit into the can again.
“Come warm yer bones, Sheriff,” Gus called without turning around.
The sheriff stood in his wool coat with the star emblazoned on the left side. The overhead light flicked on and blinded the men.
“Reuger, I’d like a word with you here,” he said moving out from the wall switch.
Gus leaned forward and tapped his pipe on the hearth.
“Well, yer don’t have to beat me over the head,” he said standing up.
“Talk to you in the morning, Gus.”
He nodded to the sheriff by the door.
“And it’s been nice talking to yer too, Sheriff!”
The door slammed behind him with his boots fading into the forest. Riechardt tipped the can slightly. Phsit-pop! His mouth moved in fast rotation. Reuger gestured to the other chair in front of the fire.
“Have a seat, Sheriff. Mind turning off that light?”
Riechardt switched off the light then walked stiffly and sat down in two-time fashion like a man in an electric chair. He lifted the can up. Phsit pop!
“Coffee, Sheriff?”
He shook his head and rested the soup can on the arm and fired from the corner. Phsit pop! The patent leather holster next to the old upholstery and the stripe down his pants gave him the air of a retired general. The sheriff lifted the can.
“So, I’ll get right to the point here, Reuger. You’re not to go near the Reynolds girl again. If you do, I’ll take your badge.”
“Let the girl bleed to death next time?”
Riechardt leaned to the can again.
“Ya, going in like Custer and shooting up the Stafford Inn didn’t help matters,” he said, sitting back up. “You scared the guests half to death there, and Mr. Reynolds feels it was your fault his daughter tried to commit suicide by barging in on her. Said you scared her into doing it.”
Fire snapped between the two men. A green spark landed on the rug and Reuger reached forward and pressed it cold. The sheriff inventoried the books, fire, and the mantle with the hat next to the brown-holstered pistol.
“What do you think, Sheriff?”
He lifted the can like a staff. Phsit pop!
“Doesn’t matter what I think here. I had the mayor in my office today. Mr. Reynolds might well sue us anyway, but you’re to stay away from this girl!”
“I need to talk to her and find out what’s she’s sitting on.” Reuger said quietly.
The sheriff leaned forward with his legs wide.
“I don’t need any heroes up here. I know what happened down there in Minneapolis, Reuger.” He paused. “I’ve always known.” He sat back with the can planted. “Seems you were on the wrong side of things there too.”
“Funny way to look at stealing, Sheriff.”
Riechardt took off his glasses and looked at the lenses.
“Look Reuger, I’ve heard some strange things out there. Rumor is you know where Tobin is but won’t bring him in. I’m not going to listen to that shit, but you better get on the stick and get this Indian into custody.”
Reuger leaned back in the chair.
“I don’t think he did it.”
“Oh, ya, then who did?”
“I don’t know that yet.
“Listen, Reuger.” Riechardt touched the part in his hair, drawing the tip of his finger along the line. “We have a way things work up here. It may not be to our liking, but it’s our reality.”
“Why do I feel like I’m being offered a bribe?”
“Watch yourself there.”
