Pretty Girl Gone (14 page)

I drifted through the room as Testen gave his speech, examining the memorabilia, studying the framed newspaper pages, each dominated by large photographs of jubilant teenagers hugging and dancing and raising their fingers in the air.
We’re number one!

“It wasn’t noticed that much by the rest of the nation,” Testen said. “Yet in Minnesota, I think the Victoria Seven was as huge as the Olympic hockey team that beat the Soviets and won the gold medal in 1980.”

“I remember,” I said.

“The funny thing is, we weren’t that good. Jack Barrett was the only one on the team who was given a Division I scholarship. Dave Peterson played Division III at Gustavus Adolphus, but he was a walk-on. Gene Hugoson played JuCo for two years. The rest never played again. It shows in our record, too. We finished the season one game above .500. We never won a game by more than six points. We lost once by thirty-six.”

“How did you manage to win the state championship?”

“People have asked me that question for over thirty years and I always tell them the same things—superior coaching.” Testen chuckled in a practiced manner. “The truth is, I don’t know. I only know that we won our last six regular season games, cruised into the sections, and kept right on going. It didn’t matter who we played. It didn’t matter how much size we gave up. It didn’t matter if we trailed at the half or by how many points. We couldn’t lose.”

I halted in front of a photograph of the Victoria cheerleaders taken in the school gym. Elizabeth Rogers was in the forefront.

“I think it was psychological,” Testen said. “Somewhere along the line the kids got it into their heads that they couldn’t be beaten and so they didn’t allow it to happen. Anyone who plays or knows sports will tell you that that’s a goofy theory. What’s the line? The race isn’t always to the swift or the battle to the strong, but that’s the way to bet? Still, after all these years, it’s the only explanation I have. That and divine intervention. One sports writer compared us to the Amazing Mets of ’69 that won the World Series.”

“Still, it’s getting to be a long time ago,” I said. “Over thirty years.”

“That’s a long time only when you’re looking forward. You look back and you wonder how the years passed so quickly.”

“What about Elizabeth Rogers?” I asked abruptly to see how he would react. Testen continued without pause.

“Nothing is ever perfect, is it? The boys were very upset by Beth’s death as you can imagine . . .” I flashed on the photographs I had seen in the
Herald
and decided they had done an awfully good job of hiding it. “It was such a small school back then; everyone lived in everyone’s pocket. But what were we going to do? Forfeit? People died the day the
Eagle
landed on the moon, yet that didn’t stop Neil Armstrong from taking his giant leap for mankind. Do you think it should have?”

“No.”

“No, no, of course not. Life goes on, just like it did after 9/11. Anyway, it’s like you said, it was a long time ago.”

So why does Elizabeth’s murder trouble you so,
my inner voice asked.

Because her killer is still out there.

What do you care?

It could be Jack Barrett.

What do you care?

I care.

Why?

I just do.

“You were at the party the night Elizabeth was killed,” I said.

“I was the guest of honor. Me and the Seven.”

“When did you leave?”

“It was late. Monte—Grace Monteleone—she was this hippy chick should have been running a flower store somewhere instead of teaching—she complained to the principal that the kids were drinking beer. Not my kids, I wouldn’t have allowed that, but some of the other kids. She wanted the principal to put a stop to it. He refused. It was a celebration, after all. Instead, he suggested the teachers leave a few at a time, you know, pretend it didn’t happen: out of sight, out of mind. Monte—she was the first one out the door, probably went home to burn incense or something. I stayed late because, well . . .”

“You were the guest of honor.”

“Yes.”

“Did you see Elizabeth at the party?”

“I’m sure I did, but honestly, I don’t remember what I had for dinner last Monday much less who I saw at a party over three decades ago. Why do you ask?”

“I’m trying to learn who killed Elizabeth.”

“After all these years?” Testen began to massage his temples and I knew he was regretting that he had opened his door to me. “I don’t think I can help you with that. Why don’t you talk to Chief Bohlig? Ask him about it. He’ll tell you.”

“Tell me what?”

“Tell you what happened. I have no idea. At the time, I was trying to win three consecutive basketball games.”

“Did Elizabeth’s murder help or hurt you in the tournament?”

“Help or hurt? That’s actually a good question. Most people would be appalled to ask it, but—You look like you used to play some ball.”

“Hockey and baseball,” I told him.

Testen frowned, like I had failed an easy test.

“Not basketball?”

“Just pickup,” I told him.

“Well, you play sports you learn about motivation. Sometimes the worst thing that can happen is the best. Josie Bloom, not our best player by any means, he’s the one that carried us in the final. Seventeen points, eleven rebounds, four steals, including a big one at the end. He said before the opening tip he was dedicating the game to Elizabeth. Jack—I think Beth’s death hit him the hardest—he
was
our best player, and he said the same thing. Yet in the championship game he didn’t play well at all. ’Course, being double- and triple-teamed all night didn’t help. So, to answer your question, I don’t know. I just don’t know.

“I’ll tell you one thing, though,” Testen said. “Linking what those
kids achieved, linking their great triumph to something as sordid and tragic as Beth’s murder annoys me. It’s unfair to them.”

Now was a good time to change the subject, I decided.

“Tell me about the players,” I said. “Where are they now?”

Testen seemed relieved. He found a team photograph.

“Like I said earlier, they weren’t that special.” He was giving his practiced speech again. “It was only what they did that made them special. In many ways they were just typical kids who went on to lead typical lives.”

He pointed to the boy in the middle of the photograph holding a basketball.

“Jack Barrett went on to become governor—you know that. Before politics he was a millionaire entrepreneur, owning companies, making deals.”

His finger moved to another boy at the far end of the photo with long hair that must have been pulled into a ponytail in order for him to play.

“Gene Hugoson went to prison for robbing a convenience store, assaulting the cashier, and stealing her car. He’s now working on his family’s farm.”

Testen moved his finger along the line of basketball players, referring to each of them in turn.

“Dave Peterson, or I should say, Doctor David Peterson, is an optometrist working out of Mankato. Nick Axelrod owns and operates Nick’s, a family restaurant here in Victoria. Brian Reif works as an auto mechanic . . .”

Ah, my friend Brian,
my inner voice said.

Testen sighed again and I wondered if he always sighed at this part of the presentation.

“We lost Tony Porter just a while ago,” he said. “He was there for the thirtieth reunion of the team, but we all knew then that he was very sick.”

Testen sighed some more, and pointed at the last of the Seven.

“Josiah Bloom. Well, I guess he’s sick, too. He’s an alcoholic, although the last I heard he was clean and sober.”

Testen set the photograph carefully where he found it.

“Very much a microcosm of America.”

“Just one big happy family,” I said.

Testen laughed in reply.

“Lord, no. I said they were a microcosm of America. Sometimes they couldn’t stand to be around each other.”

“Why’s that?”

“People can always find a reason to irritate other people, can’t they?”

“What about Governor Barrett? How did he get along with the rest of the Seven?”

“Jack—he was the exception. Everyone loved Jack.”

Everyone loved Jack.
Well, not everyone, I reminded myself when I returned to my Audi and headed south. I was fumbling with my map, debating whom to annoy next when I encountered County Road 13. I hung a left and followed it to Milepost Three. I don’t know why, certainly there was nothing to see after all these years. Curiosity, I guess.

When I reached the milepost, I stopped the Audi along the shoulder, put it in neutral, and set the brake. I sat and listened to the radio. After a few bars of country anguish, I switched it off. There were no structures that I could see and no traffic. It was as good a spot to dump a body as any.

I slipped out of the car. Only the wind whistling through the power and telephone wires that lined the blacktop and the gentle hum of the car engine disrupted the silence. Gray, snow-covered farm land stretched into the distance, merging with the gray sky—the horizon could have been a mile away, or it could have been a thousand. There was no color, except . . .

I moved to the edge of the ditch. I gazed at a spot of red just below the milepost.

What is that?

I stepped into the ditch and immediately descended into knee-deep snow. I could feel it lodge between my boots and jeans as I plowed my way to the red.

It was a flower. A red rose partially drifted over by blowing snow. When I pulled at it, a second bud appeared, and a third. I kept digging until I had recovered a bouquet of fifteen long-stemmed roses, frozen but still bright with color. Whoever had thrown them there had done it recently—I say “thrown” because there were no footprints in the ditch save my own.

I carried the roses back to my car. Once on the blacktop, I stamped my boots, shaking the snow free. I brought the flowers to my nose, but, of course, there was no scent.

“What in the hell are fifteen roses doing here?” I asked the deserted road. “Is it a tribute to Elizabeth?”

Maybe,
my inner voice replied.
Either that or a message.

T. S. Eliot called April “the cruelest month.” T. S. Eliot never spent a January in Minnesota. If he had, he would have known that to us April is the light at the end of the tunnel. It is the promise of warmth; it is the bright and shiny future (not to mention the beginning of the baseball season). It is also a long way off. Which is why I took great pleasure from stepping into Fleur de Lis on Main, the only florist shop in Victoria. It smelled warm and damp and made me think of spring.

The woman behind the counter had enormous eyes that seemed to be in mourning. She spoke softly and for a moment I wondered if she was conducting a wake in the back room.

“May I help you?”

“Do you sell long-stemmed red roses?”

“We certainly do.”

“How many in a bouquet?”

“Usually a dozen, but we can make up a bouquet of any size.”

“Have you recently sold a bouquet of fifteen roses? Long-stemmed roses?”

“Fifteen?”

“Yes.”

“I don’t think so—No, I’m sure I haven’t. Why do you ask?”

“I recently came across a bouquet of fifteen red roses, and I wondered if they came from here.”

“No. No, I’m sure they haven’t. I would have remembered an order of fifteen. It’s an odd number.”

“In what way is it odd?”

“There is a traditional meaning attached to the number of roses you give someone. For example, a single rose means ‘Love at first sight,’ or ‘I still love you.’ ”

“Still love you? I thought it meant simply, ‘I love you.’ ”

“No, that’s three roses. Nine roses means ‘We’ll be together forever.’ A dozen means ‘Please be mine?’ Two dozen means ‘I’m forever yours.’ Fifty roses professes ‘Unconditional love.’ Nine dozen means ‘Will you marry me?’ and nine hundred ninety-nine roses means ‘I will love you till the end of time.’ ”

“What does fifteen mean?

“ ‘Please forgive me.’ ”

A short time later I was again parked on the shoulder of County Road 13 opposite Milepost Three. I left the Audi, went to the edge of the road, and tossed the bouquet of fifteen red roses back where I found it.

“Who is it, Elizabeth?” I asked. “Who’s apologizing to you? Or are the roses meant for me?”

If the flowers hadn’t been purchased in Victoria, then they must have come from outside. As I had.

“I’m being played, sweetie,” I said aloud. “I can feel it. I don’t suppose you could tell me who’s plucking the strings?”

Elizabeth didn’t answer.

I stood alongside the ditch, not moving, not really thinking much, either. Someone driving by could have mistaken me for a cow in a pasture. After a few minutes I dropped a single white chrysanthemum next to the roses. The woman at the flower shop told me it meant “truth.”

“It would be nice, Elizabeth,” I said, “if we could find some.”

The huge, overstuffed chair had been upholstered in blue mohair and the large sofa against the wall was covered in the same material. Both had ornately carved woodwork on the arms and along the backs. The large rug was a faded Persian. A coffee table made of ancient wood stood on the rug in front of the sofa and a matching end table had been placed at the elbow of the chair. There was a lace doily in the center of the end table and a crystal lamp in the center of that. Mounted on the wall in front of the sofa was a series of photographs. Mrs. Rogers identified the subjects—Elizabeth, her daughter, murdered by assailant or assailants unknown, Michael, her son, killed in a car accident, Thomas, her husband, dead of a heart attack.

“It has been very difficult,” Mrs. Rogers said.

Her eyes had known anguish, yet suffering had not made them hard. Instead, they somehow had remained soft, even kindly and I wondered how Mrs. Rogers had managed it.

“After Beth was killed, my anger was powerful,” she explained. “I hated. Since the Lord didn’t show me whom to hate, I hated the world, I hated Him. I hid that anger, that hate, buried it deep inside because there were so many others who were hurting as I was, so many others who needed help. My husband, I needed to help him deal with our loss. My son—my son was so young at the time, only ten years old when his beloved sister was taken from him, and like the rest of us, he did not know why. So many others. Relatives. Friends. Neighbors who did not know Beth except as a cheerleader at the high school. They were all suffering, all desperate
for comfort. I needed to be strong for them. When they no longer needed my strength, I tried to regain my anger, my hate; I went searching for it in the lowest part of my heart and discovered that it was gone.”