Spider Web (18 page)

“Where’s she from . . . or rather, where does she
say
she’s from?”

“Seattle area. Her dad was career military, died when she was in college. Her mom died when she was five. No siblings. On the co-op application, she put her “in case of emergency” person as Amanda. But she barely knows her.”

“That
is
odd. Like maybe she’s hiding something?”

I stopped my rocker with one foot and scooted forward. “Exactly. I do have her license plate number. It is from Washington, so she wasn’t lying there. It’s in my purse. I’ll call you when I get home.”

He nodded. “I’ll sic my investigator on her. Never hurts to do a little background check.”

“Thanks, Emory. If nothing else, it’ll just relieve my mind.” I stood up to leave.

He stood up too and pulled me into a hug. “By the way, your clever little diversionary tactic didn’t work. I’m still watching what’s going on with you and Gabe. I’ll step in if I have to.”

I hugged him back and didn’t answer.

“I’ll call you as soon as I hear anything,” he said, walking Scout and me down the steps.

Back at home, I dug out my checkbook and called the license plate number over to Emory. Then I contemplated my day. Everything was so organized with the Memory Festival that I didn’t have much to do. Once I went to the folk art museum and gathered up what we’d need for the booth at the farmers’ market tonight, my day was free. On the drive over to the museum, I wondered what precautions the police department was taking for the farmers’ market. I couldn’t be the only person worrying the sniper would strike again.

San Celina’s Thursday night farmers’ market had become one of the most famous farmers’ markets in the state. It was actually a combination of street fair/farmers’ market and became an eagerly anticipated event for tourists, locals and Cal-Poly students. Besides providing a seasonal variety of local fruits and vegetables, the weekly event offered grilled tri-tip, giant turkey legs, smoked chicken, ribs, barbecued Portuguese luinguiça sausage as well as homemade pizza, spicy carne asada tacos or Hatch green chile–cheese tamales. Then there was the deadly rich, home-style ice cream made by Cal Poly’s Food Service department. Besides the food, there were craft booths, political booths, henna tattoos and face painting. And there was always some band playing—blues, zydeco, country, oldies rock, Cajun, or mariachi. Every Thursday night downtown San Celina was off limits to cars so people could wander the market on foot.

It was busy at the folk art museum with three school tours and dozens of artists working on last-minute projects to sell at the Memory Festival. I spent the next hour packing up the flyers, posters and raffle tickets for the booth tonight. We would be displaying the Coffin Star Quilt Guild’s Coffin quilt and making another big push to sell raffle tickets. When I was finished, I called the ranch to see how things were going. Uncle WW answered.

“Hey, Uncle Dubya, Dubya,” I said. “What’s cookin’?”

“Not too much,” he said, his gravelly Arkansas drawl reminding me of what Emory was likely to sound like when he was older. “The sisters are drivin’ your daddy plumb crazy.” Uncle WW gave a tiny chuckle. “He says he’s got a plan.”

That did not sound good. “What does that mean?”

I could picture Uncle WW’s grinning face, the deep wrinkles pulled slightly up, one thumb hooked in the pocket of his denim overalls. “Not my place to tell you.”

“I was just calling to check on everyone.”

“We’re all fine, now that the construction is over. The sisters are off gallivanting somewhere, and Isaac left early this morning, said something about the Bennett brothers?”

“They’re the five-generation fishing family in Morro Bay. He’s taking their photos for his book. I’m scheduled to interview them next week.”

“Guess I’ll be seeing you at the farmers’ market tonight. I’m resting up. This dang ole Parker’s Son disease just throws me somethin’ awful, sometimes. Someone oughta smack that Parker fella and his ornery son.”

I smiled at his nickname for the disease that was slowly taking away his freedom. That was Uncle WW, though. He could make a joke about anything, even his own disability.

“Are you going to be okay tonight?” The farmers’ market could be a stressful place, but especially this week.

“That’s why I’m home restin’ up. The girls and me will be at the historical society booth tryin’ to convince folks to come to the Memory Festival.”

After we talked, I sat back in my chair, contemplating the second free day ahead of me. Setup for the farmers’ market didn’t start until five p.m., and I was caught up on all my paperwork. Though I certainly could clean house or do laundry, I wasn’t in the mood for chores. Since Isaac was working on our book, I decided I should too. That seemed a better use of my time than mopping a kitchen floor that would just get dirty again.

I pulled out the green canvas L.L. Bean briefcase I bought specifically for this project and pulled out my list of interviewees. Isaac and I didn’t start out with a particular agenda regarding whom we’d interview or photograph. We’d agreed that keeping it open this early in the process would allow the book to form itself. We’d let it unfold as we worked, getting inspiration from one person to seek out another. I glanced over my list. Who could I call on the spur of the moment? People were so busy, most interviews took some finagling to arrange.

I leaned back in my chair, staring at the pen-and-ink drawing of Scout romping through a field of sunflowers that Stewart Allison, one of the co-op’s longtime artists, gave me last week for an early fortieth birthday present. Stewart caught the wisdom in Scout’s eyes perfectly. After the Memory Festival was over, Scout definitely deserved a day out at the ranch, chasing squirrels and running through mud puddles.

Wisdom made me think of the Coffin Star ladies, specifically Miss Winnie. After finding out she had been a nurse in World War II and a prisoner of war, I thought again about how people were so often judged by their outside appearances.

Miss Winnie.
Of course! Why didn’t I think of it last night? She’d be a perfect person to interview for the book. Home had to really mean something special to someone who’d gone through an experience where they weren’t sure if they’d ever see home again. But would she agree to it?

I flipped through my old school Rolodex and found her number. It was eleven thirty, so maybe she was already at lunch, but I took a chance and dialed her number. Miss Winnie answered on the second ring.

“Hey, Miss Winnie, it’s Benni Ortiz.”

“Hello, dear! You just caught me on my way to lunch. It’s fried chicken day, and I want to get there while it’s still crispy.”

“I don’t blame you. I won’t keep you but a second. I have a huge favor to ask.”

“Certainly. What do you need?”

I bit at a rough spot on my thumb. “I’d love to interview you for this book Isaac Lyons and I are doing. Then he’ll take your photo. I . . . I want to ask about your experiences in the war and your feelings about what home means.”

She didn’t even hesitate. “Absolutely. When?”

“I know this is short notice, but I have this afternoon free.”

“How about one thirty? We can meet in my room, and then we’ll go out to the garden. It’s been so rainy, and I want to take advantage of the brief sunshine.”

“Thanks, Miss Winnie. I’ll be there.”

I hung up and gathered up my tape recorder, notebook and a couple of pens. A kernel of excitement tickled my stomach. It was the way I always felt when I was able to do what I loved the most, historical research. I loved my job as museum curator and I loved being a cattle rancher. I didn’t even mind being a police chief’s wife. But my passion was history, specifically oral history. It was the one thing that I felt was truly mine. I had a good feeling about this interview with Winnie Dalton. Depending on the photograph, I could imagine her being the cover of the book, though that was ultimately Isaac’s decision, not mine.

Outside, the sky was a brilliant shade of blue that could only be called California blue, a blue so clear and clean with the palest shade of aquamarine hovering around the edges. Scattered across that sky were clouds so perfect they could be applying for a job modeling for a Hollywood talent agency—fluffy on top, flat on the bottom. They seemed to hang by thin piano strings moving just enough to imagine an unseen hand somewhere making them sway.

I was staring up at the performing clouds when my cell phone rang.

“Hello?”

“Have some info for my nosy cousin,” Emory said.

I opened my truck’s door and tossed my briefcase on the seat. “That was unbelievably fast.”

“It’s the computer age, my little backwoods cousin. It took my investigator about fifteen minutes. It’s a short report, purely stuff she acquired from Internet sources. She could follow up, check it out in more detail by talking to folks, but I wanted to run what we have by you first. Unfortunately, I don’t think you’re going to like what I have to say.”

I felt my stomach roil and the clouds that had looked so innocent moments ago now had tinges of gray in them. Dark gray. Like the sedan parked in front of the Harper ranch house. “What is it?”

“It is exactly nothing. She is who she says she is. Linda Snider. Born in Chicago, Illinois, in 1946. That would make her fifty-two. Divorced with no children. Both parents have passed away. No siblings. Started school in Berkeley, finished at Washington State. Major was accounting. Worked in the accounts payable department for twenty-three years for Humboldt Manufacturing. They make replacement parts for big assembly lines. You know, for companies like Nabisco and Coca-Cola. She took early retirement and still owns a condo up in Seattle. She is who she appears to be. A nice middle-aged accountant looking for a place to put down roots. Looks like your mystery balloon just lost all its helium.”

I knew I should be happy that she wasn’t some ex-girlfriend of Gabe’s or someone else with a nefarious motive. It should have relieved my mind knowing that she was just who she said she was. So why was my gut still thick with something that felt like a huge knot?

“Thanks for humoring me,” I said, not wanting to sound ungrateful. “I guess I was barking up the wrong tree.”

“You sound disappointed. Seriously, you can trust this investigator. But if you want, we can dig deeper, maybe contact an investigator up in Seattle.”

“No, no, that would be overkill. I guess my instincts were just off this time. It doesn’t explain why she was checking out the Harper ranch . . .”

“
If
it was her.”

“Touché. Maybe I’m searching for fleas when it’s just that the dog has an innocent itch.”

“You sound more and more like Dove every day,” Emory said with a laugh. “Let me know if there’s anything else I can do. I have a copy of her driver’s license if you want to pick it up here at the office. Betsy sent it as an attachment. I’ll print it off for you.”

“A private investigator named Betsy. Somehow that doesn’t sound right.”

“She has a master’s degree in criminal justice and was a Detroit homicide detective for ten years. She didn’t feel like she needed a macho name.”

“Touché
numero dos
, cuz. See you tonight?”

“I’ll be the one munching on a disgustingly delicious giant turkey leg.”

On the fifteen-minute drive to Oak Terrace, I told myself to let this suspicion about Lin Snider go. If I’d had a therapist, I suspected what she or he would likely point out was that I was attempting to avoid the real problem in my life, a husband who was teetering on an emotional breakdown. What I really needed to concentrate on was figuring out a way to convince him he needed . . . we needed . . . professional help. The thought of sleeping in separate rooms for the rest of our lives was simply unacceptable. But being hit by my husband, even accidentally, was unacceptable too.

I found Miss Winnie in her room sitting in a green and yellow calico easy chair. She cradled a bulky green leather photo album in her lap. The walls of her south-facing room were covered with a soft yellow wallpaper dotted with tiny white daisies. Photos of her family hung on all four walls—her late husband, Frank; her son, Billy; and her three granddaughters. The youngest granddaughter reigned as last year’s Miss San Celina County at Mid-State Fair. Frank, who I remembered as a practical joker with a penchant for silly humor items like hand buzzers and whoopee cushions, died of a heart attack a few months after Jack’s death.

“Hi,” I said, setting my briefcase on the floor. “What have you got there?”

“I kept a few photographs and some articles about the nurses who served with me. A while back, some nice lady from back East visited me. She was writing a book about the nurses captured by the Japanese in the Philippines. We exchanged copies of pictures, so I have more now. Some of them were taken by Japanese photographers while we were in the camp, some after we were released.” She patted the top of the album. “I don’t think about it much anymore. Some days it seems so hazy, like it happened to someone else. But the proof is all here.”

I reached for the album. “May I?”

“Certainly.”

I took the album, lumpy with photographs and articles, and sat down on the straight chair next to Miss Winnie, turning each bulky page slowly, trying to absorb the enormity of her history. She had divided her Philippines album in three sections—before, during and after her capture. Before photographs showed glamorous, classy-looking whitewashed buildings surrounded by palm trees. Inside they appeared airy and resplendent with tiled floors, sweeping staircases and tropical wicker furniture. The nurses wore spotless white uniforms and starched hats, smiling like movie stars. But in the smaller second section the photographs abruptly changed and showed blurred images of shanty-like buildings and tents, rows of people lying on the ground under a tangle of jungle trees, the nurses staring at the camera, their eyes sad and distant, their lips stoic. My expression must have given away my feelings.

“That’s before we were captured, right after the war began,” Miss Winnie said softly. “We had a full hospital out in the jungle to take care of our injured boys. It was hard and frightening, but at that point we were still free.”