The Alpine Scandal

by Mary Daheim

  “Oh.” Polly sipped her tea.

  Vida leaned forward, causing her black Gaucho hat to slip back on her head. “Have you had many callers?”

  “A few,” Polly said.

  “It’s nice to have neighbors so close,” Vida went on, tightening the string under her chin to secure the hat, “like the Della Croces. Very nice people, I’ve heard.”

  “They seem to be,” Polly said in a noncommittal tone. “How do you like the cookies?”

  Vida, who had taken a bite out of one, nodded. “Tasty,” she said after she’d swallowed.

  “Who’re the neighbors to the west?” I inquired.

  “The Tollefsons, I think,” Polly replied. “They’ve only lived there a year or so. We don’t see much of them. Their house is quite a ways from here, and the view’s cut off by the trees.”

  “Oh, yes,” Vida said. “Pamela and Russ Tollefson. I believe they both work for—”

  She was interrupted by the doorbell. “Excuse me,” Polly said in a surprised voice. “I wonder who that can be.”

  As Polly went to the door, Vida shot me a questioning look. “Why is she surprised to have a caller?”

  I knew what Vida meant. After a death in the family, visitors flocked to the bereaved. Unlike the city, Alpine’s smallness in population and geography encouraged people to visit, which also gave the locals something to do.

  We couldn’t see who had rung the bell from our angle on the sofa, but I heard someone—a male, I thought—speak, followed by Polly voicing surprise—and pleasure. Then the door was closed, and she returned to the living room carrying what looked like a floral display.

  “My goodness,” she exclaimed softly. “This is certainly a lot of flowers.” She put the delivery up on the fireplace mantel and unwrapped it. “Oh, how pretty! Why, I’ve never seen some of these before!”

  Vida was on her feet. “Let me look. Is it from Posies Unlimited?”

  “Yes,” Polly said excitedly. “Yes, it is. There’s a card.”

  It dawned on me that I hadn’t seen any other bouquets or plants that I’d expect to find in a house of mourning. Maybe all of the floral arrangements had been sent to Driggers Funeral Home.

  Vida was studying the lavish bouquet in its wicker basket. “Alstroemeria, liatrus, along with the more common snapdragons, carnations, and roses. My, my. Very lavish.”

  Polly was beaming. “It’s from Carter. How dear of him!” She slipped the card under the wicker basket. “He certainly knows how to treat his mama when she’s feeling blue.”

  “Very thoughtful.” Vida moved away from the fireplace. “Emma, we really must go. I have some work to finish this afternoon.” She turned to Polly, who was still admiring the flowers. “Thank you for the tea. Enjoy your meal.”

  “What?” Polly looked startled. “Oh—the food you brought. Yes, thanks again.”

  I traipsed along after Vida like a pet pooch. “Honestly!” she cried after Polly had closed the door behind us. “That woman is mental! It’s all Carter, Carter, Carter! What about poor Elmer? I’ve never known such a peculiar woman in my life.”

  “She’s not the first one we’ve run into who’s more obsessed with her child than with her spouse,” I reminded Vida, thinking back to a recent Alpine tragedy. “I doubt that Polly has ever done anything except be a wife and mother.”

  “That’s sufficient for many women,” Vida said, getting into the car, “and they do it very well. But they also extend themselves in other ways and don’t dwell constantly on their offspring.”

  “Polly’s world does seem very narrow,” I remarked, turning the key in the ignition. I paused. Vida was searching rather frantically around her person, as well as the floor and the seat. “What’s wrong?”

  “I can’t find my gloves. I had them when we got here, didn’t I?”

  “I think so.” I turned the engine off. “Did you drop them on the way from the house?”

  She stared out through the windshield. “Yes, I may have. I remember taking them off right after we arrived. I’ll go look.”

  Vida got out of the car and retraced her steps. In her long brown tweed coat she made me think of a giant sparrow searching for food. Except, of course, that sparrows don’t wear Gaucho hats. She finally reached the porch. I saw her bend down and pick something up. The gloves. She started back down the walk but suddenly stopped and cut across the front lawn to the side of the house, peering around the corner. I couldn’t see what she was looking at, but knowing Vida, it was something interesting. After a moment, she turned back and headed my way.

  “Well, I never!” she huffed, getting into the car and pulling on her gloves with a fierce motion. “I heard a noise outside and decided to see what it was. How aggravating!”

  “What’s aggravating?” I asked, turning the engine on again.

  “Polly. She was outside at the garbage can, throwing away the meal you brought her. Why would she do such a thing?”

  Chapter Thirteen

  “MAYBE,” I SUGGESTED as we drove down the Burl Creek Road, “Polly thought we were trying to poison her.”

  “Nonsense,” Vida retorted. “She’s one of those strange people who can’t accept charity. Too high and mighty, I suspect.”

  “Ben would say that it’s a lack of humility.”

  “Isn’t that the same thing?” Vida demanded.

  “Yes, I guess it is.” I swerved slightly to avoid a big bump in the county road. “Or maybe it tells us something about Polly’s level of trust in other people.”

  Vida shot me a sharp glance. “Meaning what?”

  “I’m not sure.” I slowed for a chipmunk that was racing to safety among the maidenhair and sword ferns that flanked the creek side of the road. “My problem is that I keep trying to tie everything that happens with the Nystroms into Elmer’s murder. That’s futile, really.”

  “Y-e-s,” Vida said slowly, “but personalities and habits—even one’s daily routine—often offer clues to how individuals meet an untimely demise.”

  A moment of silence followed, perhaps in memory of Elmer. “Why aren’t you inviting Ben for dinner tonight?” Vida suddenly asked.

  “He’s been asked out to the senior Bourgettes’ home,” I replied. “Do you think Milo and I need a chaperone? Want to join us?”

  “I can’t,” Vida said. “Buck is taking me to visit some old friends of his who just moved to Sultan from east of the mountains.”

  Buck Bardeen was Vida’s longtime companion. He was a retired air force colonel and the older brother of Henry Bardeen, who ran the ski lodge. Buck and Vida didn’t seem inclined to get married. They maintained their own homes, hers in Alpine, his down the highway in Startup. I was never quite sure of their arrangement, and I didn’t pry, because Vida guarded her private life as assiduously as she ferreted out the secrets of others.

  I tied up a few loose ends at the office before I headed home at five. Early January was always a time to take stock of the newspaper, and not just in a financial sense. I looked through the last quarter of the year’s editions, paying special attention to the features we’d done. They were heavily slanted toward middle-aged and older women. Like everybody else in the print media, we needed younger readers—of both sexes. I made a note. Scott was going to be busy finding interesting eighteen-to thirty-five-year-olds.

  One of whom, I realized, was Carter Nystrom. What kind of guy, I wondered, rushed out to collect his new Corvette the day before his father’s funeral? Or was the car a symbol? My parents helped me become successful so I could buy this expensive automobile from the dealership where my father toiled so long and so hard on my behalf. That was what I wanted to think about Carter. But I had reservations.

  On my way out through the newsroom, Scott told me that he was meeting Coach Ridley for a beer at Mugs Ahoy around five-thirty. I congratulated my reporter on his enterprise and wished him well. Maybe he could inveigle some information about the amoral Nordby son and the Methodist minister’s daughter.

 
; I didn’t bother to change when I got home. My usual winter work attire of sweater and slacks was casual enough for cooking. It was also devoid of any come-hither appeal that might make the sheriff think about hitting the sheets after dinner.

  Milo arrived at two minutes before six. Frankly, I thought he still looked drawn and tired. He insisted on making our drinks—Scotch for him, bourbon for me—but went out into the living room before I left the kitchen. Usually, he stayed around to visit while I finished the cooking preparations. I joined him as soon as I’d turned on the burner to start his steak, which he preferred cooked as tough as a logger’s tin pants.

  Milo was sitting in his favorite easy chair, smoking and staring up at my Sky Autumn painting.

  “That’s not bad,” he remarked as I plopped down on the sofa. “At least it looks like a real river. You ever hear anything of the nut job who painted it?”

  I shook my head. “Craig Laurentis? Not really. He keeps himself to himself, as they say. Donna Wickstrom thought he might be working on a picture of Mount Baldy. If he is, she wants it for her art gallery.”

  “Hunh.” Milo swallowed some Scotch. “I guess geniuses are all pretty crazy.”

  “I don’t think Laurentis is crazy,” I said. “He’s antisocial. I still think it’s strange that nobody has ever found out where he lives.”

  Milo waved a hand. “There’s plenty of forest out there. Second growth, anyway. Some of it still hasn’t been explored since the Alpine Lumber Company clear-cut this neck of the woods eighty years ago. One thing, though—I’ll bet this painter guy has his cabin or whatever near a creek. He’d have to have water.” The sheriff paused and eyed me over his glass. “What’d you do with that other picture of the pond?”

  “The Monet? I put it in my bedroom.”

  “Any chance I could see it after dinner?”

  “Not a prayer,” I said firmly. “You just got out of the hospital.”

  “I feel fine.”

  “Don’t push it, Milo,” I said. “Wait until your test results come back.”

  “Bullshit,” he growled. “Ten to one they won’t show a damned thing. All those tests are just a way to rake in money. It’s a good thing I’ve got SkyCo medical coverage. Otherwise, I’d probably have to sell the house.”

  I stood up. “I’m going to check your steak and put mine on.”

  He held out his glass. “How about a refill?”

  There was still some liquid covering what was left of the ice cubes. I frowned. “Well…okay. But you shouldn’t overdo the booze, either.”

  “When did I ever?” he retorted.

  That much was true. The sheriff wasn’t a heavy drinker. “Fine.” I took the glass and went into the kitchen. So far, I’d refrained from asking him about the homicide investigation, but I couldn’t keep quiet forever. Ten minutes later, after we’d sat down to our meal in the dining alcove off the living room, I tendered a query.

  “Any progress concerning Elmer?”

  “Those garden tools are being checked out at the Everett lab,” Milo replied. “We should hear back tomorrow.”

  “That’s taking them quite a while,” I noted. “Should Ben and I rush over to Everett so we can lay some Catholic guilt on Brian McDonough?”

  Milo gulped down a bite of steak. “They’re shorthanded. Some of the crew scheduled vacation this week instead of between Christmas and New Year’s. At least three lab people and their wives or husbands or whatever took a package cruise. Not to mention that a ton of people always croak around the holidays.”

  “So they do,” I agreed. We’d already had five people die in Skykomish County just before and after Christmas. And that didn’t count Elmer, who wasn’t a typical holiday corpse. Homicide wasn’t the usual cause of deaths at Christmastime in Alpine. “What about interviews with people who know the family?”

  The sheriff didn’t answer until he’d gnawed all the meat off the bone. “Worthless,” he finally said, wiping his mouth with a paper napkin. “At least the church people are. They said all the right things—Elmer was devoted to his family, a hard worker, always willing to help out the other guy, honest, upright, blah, blah, blah.”

  “What did they say about Polly and Carter?”

  “More or less the same kind of bullshit,” Milo said, casting his eyes toward the kitchen. “That’s it for the steak?”

  “Lord, Milo, it was the biggest one I could find.”

  “Oh.” He looked disappointed. “Hospital food makes you hungry for the real thing.”

  “You had the real thing for lunch,” I pointed out. “I’ve got some leftover cheesecake for dessert. I froze it after Christmas.”

  “Sounds good,” Milo said, cheering up a bit. “How about some of that sweet after-dinner drink to go with it?”

  “Drambuie? Sure, I’ve still got half a bottle.” I rose from the table, cleared away our plates, and went into the kitchen. Milo stayed put at the dining room table.

  Upon my return with the dessert and liqueur, I tried to coax some more information out of the sheriff. “You can’t tell me,” I said, sitting down again, “that even the saintly ladies of the parish had only good words for Polly. I hear otherwise.”

  Milo threw me a snide glance. “You women. You just love to dig the dirt.”

  “You find the truth under the dirt,” I retorted. “Like finding gold in the mountainside. All those bitchy little nuggets reveal far more than the hoo-hah you’re getting from the mealymouths.”

  Milo downed some Drambuie. “Okay, so what have you heard that’s so damned important?”

  “Polly’s a vicious gossip,” I said. “She spreads false rumors.”

  “Who doesn’t in this town?” Milo responded. “It’s one of Alpine’s biggest hobbies.”

  “That’s not accurate,” I asserted. “People gossip, they get things twisted, they end up exaggerating or even inventing. But usually it’s not malicious, just stupid. I don’t think that’s the case with Polly. She’s a mean-minded woman.”

  “Give me some evidence.”

  I hesitated. I couldn’t tell Milo about the phone call from Anna Maria Della Croce to the rectory. But I could relate what Janet Driggers had said about the Della Croce daughter.

  “Polly spread stories about her next-door neighbor’s daughter, Gloria. According to Polly’s rumor mill, Gloria is a tramp.”

  The sheriff paused with a forkful of cheesecake halfway to his mouth. “And you know that’s a lie?”

  “I’ve heard no other such tales,” I declared. “Furthermore, she’s an excellent student.”

  “So she’s a smart tramp. So what?”

  “Milo—” I shut up. The sheriff despised hearsay. “Never mind.”

  “Some goofball,” he said. “Maybe a bum who holed up in the henhouse to keep warm. That’s the theory we’re working on. But don’t go broadcasting it.”

  “We don’t broadcast,” I snapped. “That’s Fleetwood’s job. We print.”

  Milo shrugged. “Whatever. Got any more cheesecake?”

  “Yes. No!” I glared at the sheriff. “Do you want to end up looking like Ed Bronsky?”

  “I told you I was hungry,” he said, annoyed. “I’m in a weakened condition.”

  “How about some fruit? Or cheese?”

  “Cheesecake,” Milo said emphatically.

  I surrendered. “A sliver, that’s all.”

  I went back to the kitchen. This time Milo followed me. “Skip it,” he said, standing behind me and slipping his arms around my waist. “I’ll settle for another kind of dessert. It’ll work off the food.”

  I resisted the urge to lean against him. Milo was tall and big and strong as an oak. I’d sought shelter in his arms many times. But not now. Frankly, I was afraid for him. Even oaks can wither and die.

  “Please,” I said in a plaintive voice. “Let’s wait.”

  He let go. “It’s that AP guy, right?”

  With a sigh, I turned around to look up at him. “No. I’m not in love wi
th Rolf.” Not exactly, I thought. Not yet. Maybe some day… “Honestly. I like him very much. But I’m not in love.”

  The sheriff was skeptical. “You’re doing a damned good imitation.”

  I almost told him the truth. But I stopped. I knew he didn’t want to hear that I was worried about his health. Milo, even more than most men, didn’t want to hear his strength questioned. I also knew he wanted to prove that he was perfectly healthy.

  But instead of giving in, I put a hand on his arm and shook my head. “The year’s young yet.” Even if we’re not. “Next time I’ll buy you two steaks—and you can name your own dessert.”

  I’d like to think he suddenly looked a bit more cheerful. But that was wishful thinking. Milo, in fact, looked pained.

  I patted his arm. “I’m not putting you off,” I asserted with my kindest smile. “I’d really like to—”

  I stopped. Milo didn’t look pained, I realized, but was in pain. One hand was clutching his chest. “I’d better sit down,” he mumbled. “I don’t feel so good.”

  I started to steer him toward the living room, but he fumbled with a kitchen chair and sat down heavily. “Shit,” he murmured, still with a hand on his chest. “What now?”

  “I’m calling 911,” I said, hoping I sounded calm. My eye flitted around the kitchen. I couldn’t find the phone. Maybe it was in the living room. When had I used it last? Not since I had gotten home. Fighting panic, I espied my purse on the counter and dug out my cell phone.

  I recognized the voice at the other end of the line. It was Evan Singer, who often manned the emergency calls after Beth Rafferty went home at five.

  “Emma?” he said after I’d managed to mangle my message. “Did you say the sheriff? Or do you want the sheriff?”

  I glanced at Milo, who was doubled over in the chair. “I want medics. And an ambulance. Dodge isn’t well. Hurry.”

  “Got it.” Evan rang off. Unlike his big-city counterparts who often kept callers on the line until help arrived, SkyCo’s 911 service was a one-person gang. The line couldn’t be tied up any longer than necessary.

  The sheriff was groaning and cussing. It was hard to tell which was which. I moved closer. “Where does it hurt?” I asked.