The Mortal Groove (17 page)

Randy watched his daughter go through a silent reassessment. “That makes sense.”

“I was so angry all the time. People were living their normal lives and it just made me furious.”

“Mavbe it still does.”

Randy lowered his head. “Yeah, maybe you're right.”

“What else?”

She had no idea how hard this was for him. “Well, when Larry and Delavon came to Waldo to visit me, my mother told us to sleep in the basement. You remember the house, right? It was small, only two bedrooms. I'd always bunked with Ethan, but it didn't seem fair for us to take over his room. The first night we were all there, Larry kept getting up. He was driving Del and me crazy. The next night, after dinner, we found him out back. He was digging himself a foxhole. He'd set up a perimeter, like we'd been taught to do. He had a bunch of gear—night vision binoculars, rifle, extra ammo, poncho, field jacket, a couple knives, a boonie hat. He wore that boonie hat for years, until it rotted right off his head. Anyway, he was all set to crawl in for the night. Neither Del nor I even asked him why. We knew. He just didn't feel safe in the basement.”

“But you didn't do that, right?”

“No, honey. Everybody reacted differently. We just knew enough to leave him alone, let him take care of his own business.” Randy laughed, remembering his mother's reaction. “My mom thought he was nuts. And, of course, since Waldo is a pretty small community, word got around. When the three of
us would go into town for some reason, or stop at a bar for a beer, Larry would get some strange looks.”

“So, did you just kind of hang out? Do nothing?”

“For a while, yeah. I had a year of college behind me before I was sent over. I was an English major. I'd always thought I'd be a writer.”

“Why didn't you?”

“I guess my priorities changed somewhere along the line. Larry had worked as a mechanic for a while out of high school. He's from southern Ohio. Had no interest in college. Del, well, he was on his way to gang oblivion before Nam. For him, the war was a real turning point. When he came home, he was determined to make something of himself. He never thought he was very smart, but he'd learned otherwise. Eventually, he got his GED—he'd quit school when he was fifteen. And then he earned his undergrad degree in political science at the University of Minnesota. He could have gone on for a master's, but he wanted to get out into the real world and see what he could do to change things.”

The doorbell chimed.

“That's probably Mom,” said Katie. She seemed crestfallen.

Randy glanced at his watch. It was almost six. “Seems kind of early.”

“Can we talk about this again?”

“Sure, honey. Anytime you want.”

“Promise?”

“I promise.” He stood and walked over to the window. Instead of his wife's car in the drive, he saw a police cruiser. “Honey, I want you to stay here while I go down and talk to the police.”

“What are they doing here? Why can't I come?”

“I'm not sure what this is about. Please, Katie. Just stay here, okay?”

He rushed down the steps, his mind racing in a million different directions. When he pulled back the door, he found the same two cops who'd come by the house yesterday.

“Hi. Can I help you?”

“We need to talk to your houseguest, Larry Wilton.”

“He's, ah, not here at the moment.”

“When do you expect him back?”

“To be honest, I don't know.”

“But he's still staying with you?”

Randy nodded.

The shorter one, Sergeant Williams, pulled some papers out of his shirt pocket, handed them to Randy. “We've got a search warrant here—”

Randy instantly began to sweat. He took a desperate stab, hoping this wasn't about the bribe Larry had offered Gunderson last night. “Is this about the car you found in the ditch?”

“We need you to show us Mr. Wilton's room.”

“Well, sure. Of course.”

They followed him up the stairs to the third level.

Ethan came out of his room, stood in the doorway in his Skivvies and a gray sweatshirt. “What's going on, Randy? Hey, they shouldn't be in here. You guys go away.”

“Ethan's my brother,” said Randy, nodding to the cops. “He lives with me.”

The officers eyed Ethan warily as they walked past.

Randy opened the door to Larry's room and flipped on the overhead light. Inside, the bed was a mass of tangled sheets and blankets, the ashtray on the nightstand overflowing with cigarette butts. An empty bottle of vodka poked out from under a pillow. The room stank of unwashed flesh and just a hint of weed.

The sergeant walked to the closet and opened the door.

Randy stood behind him, working on what he'd tell him if he asked about the marijuana. But as he looked over the cop's shoulder, his surprise disconnected his thought process. “His clothes,” he said, moving closer. “They're gone. And his duffel. What the—”

“You didn't know he'd taken all his stuff?”

“No. He's coming back, I'm sure of it.”

“When did he leave?”

“This morning. Early. I was still in bed.”

“So you didn't talk to him?”

“No.”

“And you haven't seen or heard from him since?”

He shook his head.

The cops proceeded to take the room apart.

“He told us the other day that he arrived by bus,” said the sergeant, flipping the mattress off the box springs.

“That's right,” said Randy.

“Did you pick him up at the bus station?”

“No, he walked here—or hitchhiked. I mean, he must have. He just showed up.”

“Then how did he leave this morning?”

“He bought a truck.”

“You have any of the paperwork? The license number?”

“Sorry.”

“Know who he bought it from?”

“No idea.”

“What kind of truck?”

“Brown and white ‘84 Silverado with a topper on the back.”

As the cops finished up, Williams gave Randy an appraising look. “Tell me the truth, Mr. Turk. How well do you really know this guy?”

“We were in Nam together.”

“But since then?”

“We get together every few years to catch up. What's going on?” He asked the question again about the burned-out car. “You think Larry had something to do with it?”

“He got a temper, this friend of yours?”

“Sometimes. Who doesn't in the right circumstance?”

“Likes bars, does he? Drugs?”

“I'm sure you've run a background check on him. You know he did time for assault.”

“You hear from him, you call us.”

“Of course.”

“You don't call us and we find out you've had contact with him, we pull your license.”

“You don't have to threaten me.”

“Just a word to the wise, Mr. Turk.”

Randy walked them back down to the front door.

Before they left, Williams turned to him one last time. “I know Wilton is your friend, but I suggest you be careful. And again, notify us if he contacts you.”

“I will,” said Randy.

“You take care now,” said Williams as he and his partner walked back out to their cruiser.

Randy had no sooner closed and locked the door than his cell phone rang. Pulling it out of his back pocket, he checked the caller ID. It was Del.

“I still haven't heard from him,” said Randy. “But I do have some news.”

“So do I. Go turn on the TV.”

“What?”

Do it now.

Randy dashed up the stairs and switched on the 13” in the kitchen.

“Turn to Channel 5.”

The local early evening news was just beginning.

“What am I supposed to see?” asked Randy.

“Just wait.”

Katie walked out of the family room, stood behind him. “Who's on the phone?” she asked.

“Del,” he whispered.

A moment later, he watched in stunned silence as the anchor moved to a story about an attempted murder that had taken place last night at the Unicorn bar in Uptown. Melanie Gunderson, forty, a reporter for
City Beat,
had been stabbed several times in the chest in the bar's parking lot. She'd been taken to HCMC, where she was now in a coma, fighting for her life.

Still holding the cell phone to his ear, Randy heard Del say, “We are fucked so many ways, man, we'll never see the light of day again.”

 

It was Monday morning. Standing on the Lyme House deck with the fog rolling in off the lake, Jane felt momentarily suspended. On mornings like these, when the world turned indistinct, when the outside blurred and forced her to look inward, she would often feel a quick, powerful rush, a sense that Christine, her partner now gone for so many years, was hovering just outside her vision. She couldn't explain it. She had no proof. But Christine was there, her angel, her guide. Jane felt certain that one day she would turn her head too fast and Christine would be there, the threshold separating them momentarily breached. Maybe it would be a cosmic mistake, or maybe it was allowed. Jane had no real idea about any of these things. She wasn't religious, but
she knew it would happen, she would see Christine again, look into her clear, smiling eyes.

Jane wondered why these visitations never left her feeling guilty. After all, she had a new love now and a life very different from the one she'd shared with Christine. But these moments were out of time, on a different plane.

Looking out at the water, she saw that the sun was beginning to burn its way through the fog. The mist was rising, gathering itself at the tops of the trees. The corners of Jane's eyes finally relaxed. She stood on the deck in that rare in-between state, her mind drifting, until a door behind her opened and then closed and she felt the familiar squeeze to her insides that told her the world was back in place. She turned to find her brother smiling at her.

“Am I interrupting something?” he asked. “You look so peaceful.”

“I love it out here,” she said. She had a busy life, too busy most of the time. That's why she craved quiet. The Lyme House deck, early, before the restaurant opened, or late, after the restaurant had closed for the night, was one of her favorite places to just sit and think. “You're back from New Jersey. How did the job interview go?”

Peter moved up next to her, leaned his arms on the wooden rail, and looked out at the dark, choppy water. “Actually, that's what I came to talk to you about.”

“Don't tell me you're moving to New Jersey.”

He shook his head. “No, I'm taking the job Dad offered.”

“That's great news.”

“I talked to him last night. We're leaving this afternoon, flying down to Worthington. It's the kickoff for another southern Minnesota swing. I've gotta run by his campaign office this morning, sign some papers. I'm already packed.”

“Sigrid okay with all this?”

“Yeah. Fine.” His lips parted in a grimace.

“Peter? What's wrong?”

He looked up through the shifting mist, leaned farther out over the railing. “If I tell you, do you promise to keep it to yourself?”

She slipped her arm across his back. “Sure, kiddo. You know you can trust me.”

“You can tell Cordelia if you want, but nobody else.”

“Okay.”

“I didn't have a job interview in New Jersey. You know about Sigrid and me . . . the problems we've been having?”

“I know you'd like to start a family and that she doesn't want to have children.”

He hesitated. “Last year she confided something to me—something she's never told another living soul. She got pregnant towards the end of her senior year in high school. She'd saved up some money, so she went to New York to live for a while, had the baby, but then gave it up for adoption.” He went on to explain all the struggles he'd had with her over Margaret, how he'd tried to get her to see that just because she'd given one child up didn't mean she couldn't have another. It took him nearly an hour to unload the frustration and accumulated bile in his stomach. By the time he was done, they were sitting at one of the tables, the sun burning hot over their heads.

“So that's why you went to New Jersey on Friday, to talk to her adoption lawyer.”

He nodded, then launched into the conversation he'd had with the woman at Child Protective Services in Newark. “She basically told me it was hopeless, that I could never find Margaret. All the records are private.”

“What about this PI you hired?”

“That's one of my problems, Janey. He's expensive and I'm running out of cash. I refuse to believe that she can't be found, but I'm not so out of touch with reality that I don't realize it could take years. I just don't see how I can afford it.”

“You haven't told Sigrid any of this?”

“How can I? She'll be angry, for sure, but then maybe she'll get into it. If I raise her hopes only to dash them when Margaret can't be found—I couldn't live with that. No, I can't tell her about any of this until I find the little girl. All this time I felt in my gut that she's not in a good situation. And now more than ever, I think I'm right.”

“Have you thought about the kind of effort it takes to raise a special-needs child?”

“Of course I have.” Now he was indignant. “But it doesn't change anything. I've never set eyes on that kid, but I already love her. Can you understand that?”

“To be honest, I'm not sure I do, but I believe you mean it.”

He leaned forward, spread his arms on the table. “While I was waiting for my plane to leave, I stopped at a bookstore, found a book on foster care. I read it coming home on the plane. I mean, did you know that over half a million children are part of that vile system? Less than half of them will finish high school. Two-thirds of the girls will get pregnant in their teens. Without a stable childhood, these kids don't have a prayer, they just repeat the cycle. If they stay with their biological parents, the problems are poverty, neglect. Bad enough, but the problems in foster homes are even worse—sexual and physical abuse. One study found that abuse of all kinds was, like, seven times greater in a foster home than in a biological home—and the person doing the abusing was generally one of the foster parents. I know it's
not everybody. I'm sure there are good foster homes, but what if Margaret ended up in a bad one? And then there are ‘children's homes'—the PC word for orphanages. They can even be worse.”