Pride v. Prejudice (20 page)

I pulled a box out of the corner and sat down. Tuck had saved—or hoarded—every utility bill, credit card bill, tax receipt, and income tax form over a four-decade span. I put aside the credit card statements for additional scrutiny and tackled another box. It proved to be more of the same, so I moved along to the next. After I'd sneezed my way through the dust of the remaining boxes, I dragged a duffel bag to the middle of the room and unzipped it. Tuck's dedication to organic farming was profound, based on the number of manuals and brochures regarding the use of pesticides and fertilizers. A thick folder of correspondence indicated he'd communicated often with government agencies. A chemist might have found the information worthy of mild interest, but I'd eked my way through freshman chemistry without grasping the essence of multisyllabic compounds.

I rezipped the bag and dragged it out of the way. What was curious, I thought as I sat on the edge of the bed and gazed morosely around the room, was that Tuck had left no personal papers of any kind. There was no shredder in the house. He wouldn't have sent anything to the landfill or recycling center, where it might fall into the wrong hands and in some obscure way expose his identity. I went back to the hall and looked up for both inspiration and access to the attic. The latter was directly overhead. I grabbed a gray cord and pulled it until the panel came down and I could reach the folded ladder.

I was not enthusiastic about encountering any creature that scuttled or flapped its wings. As I ascended, I called out several warnings to the probable inhabitants so that none of us would be surprised. My hands were damp when I reached the middle step and poked my head through the opening. The attic was partially floored with plywood, the rafters draped with cobwebs. The dust was abysmally thick, and the temperature so high that my skin seemed to shrink. I continued up until I could stand, and then waited until my eyes adjusted to the musky darkness.

I was pleased to see a lightbulb dangling from the ceiling, but distinctly less pleased when I flipped a switch and nothing happened. A blanket had been hung over a window. I moved cautiously toward it, positioning each foot before transferring my weight. I reached it without putting my leg through the floor, and yanked at the blanket until it relented and fell in a heap. Dust enveloped me, setting off a paroxysm of sneezes and wheezes. This did not happen to amateur sleuths in mystery novels, I told myself as I gasped for breath. They were much too genteel for a primitive display of bodily dysfunction. Lord Peter never excused himself to go to the loo.

Once I'd blotted my eyes, I surveyed the attic. There were battered suitcases, lampshades, a pile of drapes and blankets, discarded furniture, a box marked
X-mas ornaments,
a sewing machine that might have been used by Betsy Ross's great-granddaughter, and a large trunk with a padlock. I focused on the trunk. Tuck hadn't trusted Sarah, so it seemed credible that he would stash his treasures in a safe container.

I yanked at the padlock until I accepted that it wasn't going to cooperate with the likes of me. I considered dragging the trunk to the opening and giving it a shove. It would damage the hall floor, but Sarah wasn't coming home anytime soon, and Tuck was in no position to complain. After a series of huffs and puffs, I realized that I couldn't budge the trunk. However, where there was a lock, there was a key. I crawled down the ladder and returned to Tuck's bedroom. I'd already rifled the bedside table drawers, but I'd been looking for letters and photographs. This time I needed a key. My determination began to wane after I'd yanked out the drawers and made sure the key was not taped on a back slat.

The third bedroom had only a bed and a rocking chair. I felt along the top shelf in the closet but encountered nothing except dust and a few yellowed scraps of newsprint. Tuck would not have hidden the key in Sarah's room. I went down to the kitchen and dug through a junk drawer. All the keys were labeled, including one for the basement. I was not in the mood for subterranean exploration, so I took a hammer from the drawer and returned to the attic.

I was pounding on the padlock and muttering under my breath when I heard a male voice shout, “Who's there?”

It was too hot to swoon, so I went to the opening and looked down at Will Lund, who seemed a tad perplexed. “It's Claire,” I said. “I'm just checking on the house.”

“In the attic?”

“Basements can be clammy.”

“Uh, need any help?”

I made a decision based on my aversion to sweat. “Yes, I do. Will you please come up here and help me with this pesky padlock? I've already wasted a lot of time on it, and although I've made a dent in it, it's stubborn.” I stepped back as he climbed up the ladder and stood up, nearly bumping his head. I handed him the hammer. “I couldn't find the key, and I am not an expert lock picker.”

He grinned. “Neither am I, but I'll try.” He bent down and began to beat on the padlock with admirable ferocity. After a dozen blows, the padlock fell to the floor. I moved closer as he opened the trunk. “Bunch of stuff,” he murmured. “Were you expecting to find jewels and gold doubloons?”

“Tuck's personal papers,” I said as I took out shirt boxes and a thick pile of manila folders. “I know he had secrets.”

Will sat down on the edge of a chair lacking a seat and studied me as if I might have been more at home in a belfry. “Like being a fugitive from the FBI? Like being accused of murder? Yeah, he had secrets. I assumed it was paranoia, but sometimes they really are out to get you. How's Sarah doing?”

“Sticking to her story that she didn't shoot Tuck. The trial starts Tuesday, and her lawyer is scrabbling to come up with a semicredible defense. Let's take all this downstairs.” I emphasized my request with another round of explosive sneezes.

When we arrived in the kitchen, I moved the plates and coffee cup to the sink and gulped a glass of water before sitting down at the table. From the way Will was looking at me, I was fairly sure I no longer resembled an efficient legal assistant. I plucked cobwebs from my blouse and brushed ineffectually at my skirt. “I know Tuck was your friend,” I began as I reached for a box, “but if you know anything that might help Sarah, this is the time to say so.”

“I wish I could. After Junie and I saw the news yesterday, she told me that Tuck had already confessed to her. I asked her why she didn't confide in me, but she got up and went outside.” He looked inside a cigar box, then set it aside. “Maybe it's better that she didn't.”

“Can you think of anyone else he may have taken into his confidence?”

He glanced up at me. “Like who?”

I took a stack of letters out of another cigar box and removed the rubber band that bound them. “I don't know. Someone he met at church?”

“Sarah and Tuck never went to church that I know. They were stuck in the hippie mentality, all that spiritual jargon about horoscopes and crystals. Tuck relied on an almanac for his weather forecasts. Wait a minute, are you talking about Tricia Yates?”

“She admitted that she knew him. Did he ever mention her?”

“No,” he said slowly, “but I thought I saw them together last summer, maybe June, outside a coffee shop near the campus. They were going in, and I didn't get a good luck. I said something to Tuck later. He blew me off, claimed he was in Oklahoma at a solar energy symposium.”

“You believed him?” I asked.

Will shrugged. “Didn't have a reason not to. He'd been talking about solar and wind power since the technology emerged. He devoted an entire notebook to the amount of money he'd save if he invested in a couple of windmills to generate electricity to run the irrigation system. Columns and columns of numbers and figures.”

“What can you tell me about Tricia Yates?”

He glanced at the clock on the wall. “I got to go in a minute, Claire. Junie's making a special Sunday dinner for Billy, and she can get testy if I don't show up on time. Afterwards, I'm going to take the kid fishing one last time. Our daughter and her husband are coming tomorrow at noon to take him home.”

“Tricia Yates?” I prompted him. “I'm desperate, Will.”

“She started working at the church about three years ago. I'm a deacon, so I was on the committee that interviewed her. She had experience in bookkeeping and office management, which is what we were looking for. Everybody likes her, and we've never had any complaints.” He stopped and frowned. I stayed mute and resisted any sudden urges to grab him by the shoulders and shake more information out of him. He finally looked at me and said, “Except for right after Tuck died. She missed church and didn't show up the next couple of days. One of the other deacons went to her apartment and pounded on the door. Then there she was at the Wednesday evening service, acting as if nothing was wrong. Dismissed her absence as a bout of stomach flu.”

“Or a reaction to Tuck's death.”

“I don't know,” Will said, “but I do know that I don't want to piss off Junie. Good luck with all this junk. Maybe you'll find a stack of death threats, signed and dated.” He gave me a crooked smile as he went out the back door.

I spread out the envelopes and studied them. “Oh, Tuck,” I murmured, “you were a sly dog, weren't you?”

 

11

As I'd anticipated, Tuck had been unable to destroy his correspondence, addressed to a variety of aliases at post office boxes in unfamiliar towns in Oklahoma and Missouri. I was vaguely put out when I had to walk down the long driveway to collect my mail; Tuck had driven hours for his. There were no return addresses, and the postal marks were difficult to decipher. The earliest letters had arrived five years ago; the most recent, fourteen months ago.

I gave myself a moment to bask in my success, however minor, and then removed the letter from the oldest envelope. It began with a cheerful salutation and a mention that the writer had come across an allusion to him on something called Facebook and, through mutual acquaintances, had tracked down his PO address. It was a curiously guarded message: If he were indeed the person who had worked in a taco food truck on Venice Beach in 1968 and remembered the name of his co-worker, he could refer to it on Facebook and the writer would send another letter. The letter ended with a peace sign drawn in purple ink

Apparently, Tuck had obliged. The writer had imparted leftist opinions about the political climate, news of a career in handmade textiles (macram
é
and tie-dye), and inquiries about Tuck's health and well-being. Purple peace sign. The next letter offered advice about herbal supplements. Purple peace sign. I skimmed several more with the same gist. I was about to admit defeat when I came across a letter that referred to the incident at the campus. Did he regret his decision to flee? Did he feel remorse about the slain undercover officer? Why hadn't he stayed to help the other members of the group? Purple peace sign.

I felt as if I were eavesdropping on a private conversation. I put down the letter and went to the refrigerator to find something to eat. It all looked suspiciously vegan. I settled on a box of gluten-free crackers and a jar of organic almond butter, refilled my glass with water, and sat back down. I would have scrutinized the handwriting with laser eyes had it been handwritten. It wasn't, although the FBI could have nailed the brand of the printer and, with all its stealth capacity unleashed, the day of the week it was sold. I tried to imagine Peter, Jorgeson, or even my late husband selecting a purple marker to sign his letters. The writer was female—and she knew what had taken place during the fateful demonstration. Whether her knowledge was firsthand or based on something as innocuous as a newspaper article was difficult to discern.

I dived back into Tuck's clandestine correspondence. The writer had bombarded him with questions about both the past and his current situation. As I continued to read, I began to feel that a level of intimacy had intensified. A reference to a night on the beach in San Diego. Warm memories of a camping trip in the desert. Nothing overt, mind you, but a middle school kid would have no problem spotting the implicit sexual references. Luanne would have taken to her bed with a cool compress. I opted for a damp paper towel.

The last dozen letters made it clear that the author was residing in Farberville and was no longer reticent about her desires. The prose was more purple than the peace signs. She and Tuck had found places to meet and do more than greet. My eyes widened at the increasingly graphic reminiscences of afternoons spent in lascivious behavior. Tuck's wife and best friends had seriously underestimated his capacity for physical intimacy. My face was warm when I opened the last letter, dated a week before his death. I paid little attention to the description of their last tryst, which had taken place on a picnic blanket. I blushed at the improbability of what had occurred, scolded myself for being a prude, and arrived at the last line. “Same place and time, my lustful lover. Wait for me.” Purple peace sign.

Tricia Yates was the obvious suspect. From what Will had said, she'd disappeared immediately after his death and stayed out of sight for most of a week. Was she mourning, or was she overcome with guilt? I spread almond butter on a cracker and nibbled pensively. If she was one of the members of the Student Antiwar Coalition, she'd gone to prison or gone underground. I peered more closely at the postal marks, and finally detected postal abbreviations from the Midwest. Before coming to Farberville, the writer had lived in states laden with vowels. I took out the cell phone to call Peter, but then reluctantly put it down. The darling man would want to know where I was and what I was doing. These were topics best left alone until I concocted a truthful if carefully edited response that would not cause him undue distress. He had so much on his plate, what with his mother coming for a visit and his wife going bonkers.

A dusty shirt box caught my attention. I moved the folders to a chair and opened the box. It was crammed with newspaper and magazine clippings, more than enough to wallpaper the kitchen. Most of the newspaper articles were yellowed and brittle. Tuck had written the dates in the margins in print the size of ant tracks. I shuffled through them until I found a photo that depicted police tape across a pair of double doors.
FBI AGENT KILLED BY STUDENT DEMONSTRATORS.
It was dated March 1, 1970, and contained little hard information. A second article, dated the following day, had a photo of the demonstrators lounging against the same doors. A heavy chain prevented the doors from opening. The demonstrators were dressed in jeans and sandals, and all of them had long hair and defiant grins. I looked for Sarah, but the photo was grainy and faded and it took me several minutes before I recognized her. She'd been a beautiful young woman.