The Alpine Traitor

by Mary Daheim

  Henry grimaced. “If you didn’t tell her you talked to me, I suppose I could turn a blind eye. But,” he quickly added, “she’ll know somebody gave her your room number.”

  “No.” I spoke emphatically, causing Henry to give me a curious look. “You have three suites here, and it’s June, so chances are all of them aren’t taken, but Kelsey’s rich—she’d want a suite. Let’s see if I can guess. If I’m right, don’t say a word and don’t watch me go to the elevator.”

  He considered my idea for several seconds. “All right. Go ahead. In fact, don’t even tell me what you’re guessing.”

  “Fair enough.” I smiled at Henry and went to the two elevators in the lobby, one for guests, the other for service. I pressed the button for the third floor, which was the highest in the lodge and where all three suites were located. There was the King Magnus Suite, the Queen Margrethe Suite, and the Prince Haakon Suite. I went straight to the Margrethe and rapped the brass knocker three times.

  I waited, wondering how long it would take for Kelsey to peer through the peephole and decide if I looked like a crook. A full minute passed—I’d checked my watch. A few seconds later, I heard a tentative voice say, “Yes?”

  “Ms. Lord,” I announced. My voice seemed to echo along the empty corridor, with its Norwegian hooked rugs and framed photos of skiers tackling the slopes around Stevens Pass.

  I was about to give up when the door opened a couple of inches, the chain still in the guard. A familiar pair of blue eyes stared out at me from a pale face framed by long fair hair.

  “Yes?” Kelsey repeated, more softly this time.

  “You know who I am?” I asked, also very quietly.

  “Yes.” She bit her lip. “You’re the newspaperwoman.”

  The newspaperwoman. Not her father’s fiancée, not his bride to be, not even a friend of the family. I felt something very like a brick sink in my stomach. But what was I expecting? That Kelsey would throw herself into my arms and sob her heart out for missing out on having me as a stepmother? No. Still, her response was so impersonal that I felt as if I’d played no part in her father’s life.

  “May I come in?” I asked stiltedly.

  Kelsey looked uncertain. From what I could see of her, she seemed to exude a waiflike air, a slim, fine-boned young woman devoid of makeup and, except for her blue eyes, bearing no resemblance to Tom. Sandra’s child, I thought and wondered if she had also inherited her mother’s unstable mental condition.

  Thin fingers with very short nails coped awkwardly with the chain. “Please.” Kelsey stepped aside to let me enter. “It’d be better if you waited until Graham was here,” she said, sinking gracelessly into an armchair.

  “When is your brother arriving?” I asked, sitting down un-bidden on the sofa. As I recalled, the suite had a sitting room, two bedrooms, and two baths. I could see an open suitcase on the floor in the nearest bedroom. Kelsey was barefoot. A pair of Juicy Couture brown suede and gold snake sandals lay not far from the sofa. A pale yellow cashmere cardigan was draped over the back of the chair where Kelsey had sat down. She wore what I assumed were designer jeans, a honey-colored tee, and a diamond ring with a marquis-cut stone as big as a cat’s eye.

  “Graham will be here tomorrow,” she said, picking up a bottle of water from the side table by her chair. “He’s coming from New York.”

  “He lives there?”

  “No. He’s boating with some friends at Glen Cove.” She drew farther back in the armchair and tucked her feet under her bottom. I sensed that she was wary of me. I didn’t blame her.

  “I see.” I hoped I looked sympathetic. “I’m terribly sorry for what’s happened to your husband. I never got to meet him.”

  Her gaze was off into space. “No?”

  “We were trying to set up a meeting,” I said.

  “Yes.”

  There was an uncomfortable pause. At least it was uncomfortable for me. Kelsey was staring up into the exposed pine beams of the cathedral ceiling. There was no sign of recent tears, but probably she was beyond that by now.

  “It’s very brave of you to come to Alpine,” I finally said.

  Kelsey shrugged.

  “I’m sorry we have to meet in these circumstances.”

  Kelsey nodded.

  I was running out of platitudes—even if they were true—and I wondered how I could get her to talk. “Would you like to see a doctor?”

  She blinked several times. “A doctor? Why? I’m not sick.”

  “You’re in shock, I think.”

  “I don’t believe in medical doctors,” she said. “Natural remedies are best.”

  If that was what she was using, Mother Nature had struck out. Or perhaps Kelsey preferred cocaine or some other illegal substances for medicating. Yet her eyes seemed as clear as they were dry. I tried another query. “Do you have any…plans?”

  “Plans?” She finally looked at me again. “You mean for the funeral?”

  “That, of course, and with regard to your move.”

  She shook her head. “Dylan did all the planning. I’m not very organized.”

  Getting two entire sentences out of Kelsey felt like a small victory. “Do you and Dylan have children?”

  She shook her head again. “We talked about it, but…” Her voice trailed off.

  I recalled Tom telling me, some years earlier, that Kelsey had gotten pregnant by the boyfriend she was living with. Maybe she’d miscarried. Maybe she’d had an abortion. Maybe she’d given the baby up for adoption. Maybe she’d forgotten that she’d ever had a baby. Of course I realized that she was probably still in a state of shock. Her husband had been dead for only a little more than twenty-four hours. “You live in San Francisco?”

  Kelsey nodded yet again.

  Another long silence hovered over us. Did I dare mention Tom? Not yet. Kelsey seemed very fragile. Perhaps she’d inherited her mother’s emotional instability after all. Still, I reminded myself, she was Tom’s daughter. Although I could make little physical connection between the two, I wanted to help her. So many what-ifs raced through my mind.

  “Is there anything I can do?”

  Kelsey looked at me curiously. “In what way?”

  “Have you eaten since you arrived in Alpine?”

  She took another swig from her water bottle. “No. I couldn’t.”

  “You can’t starve yourself,” I pointed out. “You need to keep up your strength.” More platitudes. I was a walking compendium of clichés.

  She shook her head. Again.

  “Do you know anyone in town? That is, have you had personal contact with anybody here?”

  Another head shake. “Dylan did all that.”

  I felt like asking her why she’d bothered to make the trip. Was she planning to sit in the ski lodge suite until the county released Dylan’s body? “Who notified you about Dylan?”

  “A man,” she replied. “I think he was from the sheriff’s office.”

  “That was Deputy Fong,” I said. “Would you like to talk to him?”

  “Why?”

  “To learn the details,” I said. “To find out how to…make arrangements.”

  “Graham can do that when he gets here.” She swallowed more water before standing up and crossing the room to open the doors of a rustic armoire that held the television and the bar setup. “Do you want to watch TV?”

  “Ah…no, thanks.” I also stood up. “I should be going.”

  With the remote control in one hand, Kelsey studied the TV program guide. “Saturdays are bad nights for good shows. You don’t get HBO here?”

  “Not at the lodge,” I said, moving to the end table. I picked up a pad and pen that were next to the phone and wrote down my name and numbers. “If you need me for anything, call. I mean it, Kelsey.”

  She accepted the slip of paper and shoved it into the pocket of her jeans. “Thanks.”

  I left. Kelsey hadn’t bothered to move from the spot where she was standing by the TV.

  I d
idn’t know what to make of her. She didn’t seem to be plugged into the rest of the world. Heredity, grief, shock—I supposed there were explanations. But I definitely found her odd. Maybe her brother would be an improvement.

  After ten o’clock Mass the next morning, I cruised by Vida’s house. She attended the Presbyterian church, where the services usually ran almost two hours. There was a fellowship gathering afterward, which provided Vida with ample opportunity to catch up on any gossip she’d missed during the week. It was probably wishful thinking that she’d come home before one o’clock.

  I waited in front of her house for over ten minutes with no luck. I was about to drive away when a horn honked behind me. My rearview mirror showed Ed Bronsky’s Mercedes pulling up alongside my parked car. I’d avoided the Bronsky bunch at church, an un-Christian thing to do, but I wasn’t in the mood to face him about his hard luck with the house sale.

  All eight of his bulky family members were jammed into the sedan because they’d sold Shirley’s matching Mercedes. Ed had rolled down the window on the passenger side and leaned across the youngest of the brood, Christina, and his wife to call out to me.

  “Is that lawyer woman at church any good?” he shouted.

  “Marisa Foxx?” I called back. “Yes, she’s very competent. I thought you had a lawyer from Everett.”

  “He’s unavailable,” Ed replied as Shirley tried to keep smiling despite being crushed by her husband’s weight. I couldn’t see Christina at all. Maybe she had been wedged between the seats. “I’ll give her a call today,” Ed added. “She didn’t stick around for coffee and doughnuts after Mass.”

  I was sure that the Bronskys had stayed on, stuffing themselves with as many free goodies as they could clutch in their pudgy hands. “Why,” I asked, knowing the answer was going to be something I didn’t want to hear, “do you need a lawyer?”

  “I want advice on how to handle this sale of the house,” Ed said. “A deal’s a deal.”

  Despite my vow to avoid his harebrained schemes, I asked another question: “Has money crossed hands?”

  Ed glowered at me. “Verbal agreements stand up in court, you know.”

  I mentally kicked myself for not keeping my mouth shut. “Since when?”

  He leaned even farther across his daughter and wife. I wondered if either of them could breathe. “Since I’ve got a witness who heard me talk to Dylan Plate,” Ed declared as Shirley uttered a little groan. At least she hadn’t been smothered to death.

  “His name is Platte,” I said, spelling it out, though I figured that Ed’s mistake indicated he still had food on his mind. “You met him?”

  “No,” he retorted, “but I talked to him on the phone this week. Snorty Wenzel was on the extension in the study. Plate—I mean Platte—told us he’d put the earnest money down as soon as he got to Alpine. He thought it’d be best to set up an account and deal with a local bank.”

  “Probably,” I allowed. “Did you talk to Platte after he got here?”

  “No,” Ed shot back. “I told you that. You think I offed the guy?”

  “Of course not,” I replied. “You’d be killing the goose that laid the golden egg.”

  “You got that right,” he muttered. “In fact,” he continued, “I’m going to drop off Shirley and the kids and go see Mrs. Platte. She’s at the ski lodge.”

  “That’s not a good idea,” I informed him. “She’s not receiving.”

  “Receiving what?” Ed demanded.

  “Never mind,” I said. It was useless to argue. “Good luck.”

  Ed finally sat up. I saw Shirley take a deep breath and try to offer me a smile before the Mercedes headed east on Tyee Street. There was still no sign of Vida, so I went home. I called Henry Bardeen at the ski lodge and asked if Graham Cavanaugh had checked in yet.

  “No,” Henry replied. “His sister wasn’t sure of his arrival time.”

  “That figures,” I murmured. “She struck me as rather vague.”

  “Understandable,” Henry said.

  “Yes. By the way,” I added, “Ed Bronsky is coming to see her. Brace yourself.”

  “Oh, my!” Henry exclaimed. “Why?”

  “The Plattes were buying Ed’s villa,” I replied. “Ed, of course, is hatching plots to unload the place.”

  “That puts me in a bind,” Henry said. “Very awkward, being caught in the middle.”

  “I don’t envy you. Maybe Kelsey won’t let Ed in.”

  “You know how he…Well,” Henry amended, “Ed can be very determined.”

  Not when he sold advertising for me, I thought. “Good luck. Say,” I said, “would you ask Kelsey if she has a picture of her husband? I just realized we don’t have any photos for the newspaper.”

  “Can that wait until tomorrow?” Henry inquired. “Heather will be here then. It’s my day off, you know. Maybe a woman’s touch would be better.”

  “Sure,” I said. “I’m sorry to bother you, but we should run a picture, even if it’s just one she carries in her wallet.”

  “I’ll make a note,” Henry promised. “Ah! Here comes Ed.”

  I thanked Henry and hung up. Feeling at loose ends, I opened my laptop and checked to see if Adam had sent me a new message. He hadn’t. I felt vaguely resentful about the way he’d responded Friday night. He certainly understood how upset I must be, given the painful memories that recent events had resurrected. After all, Kelsey and Graham were his blood siblings. The more I thought about it, the more annoyed I became.

  Of course I was also irked at Rolf, who should have been more sympathetic. He was in the news business, too, and ought to understand the demands of a breaking story. I’d expected—hoped, actually—he might call to apologize. But by four o’clock the phone had remained silent. I was beginning to get mad at the entire world, at least the half occupied by men.

  The rest of the day passed uneventfully. I couldn’t bother Ben. He’d be on his way back to his temporary parish in Cleveland, where he was filling in for a priest who’d gone on sabbatical. I didn’t want to pester Milo. I wasn’t the designated reporter on the murder investigation. I shouldn’t bother Curtis. If he’d been working on Sunday, which I doubted, he would’ve brought me up to speed on any new developments. Or would he? I’d wait to find out in the morning.

  Monday brought a drizzling rain to the mountain slopes of Alpine. I arrived at the office before anyone else except Kip, who was already finalizing his report on the new software we needed for the back shop.

  “It’s going to cost around four hundred dollars,” he informed me. “Is that okay?”

  “It has to be if we need it,” I said. “Go ahead.”

  The rest of the staff—Ginny, Vida, Leo, and Curtis—trickled in.

  “Where are the bakery goods?” Leo asked, looking a bit forlorn after pouring out a mug of coffee.

  Vida turned her gaze to Curtis. “I believe it’s your day to go to the Upper Crust,” she said in a reproachful tone. “Did you forget?”

  Curtis made a face. “Darned if I didn’t. Who wants what?”

  Vida wasn’t letting him off the hook easily. “You know how we do it,” she asserted. “This will be your third trip since you started here. It’s your responsibility to determine which products look best on any given day. And never get doughnuts on a Monday. It’s likely that they’re left over from Saturday. The Upper Crust is closed on Sunday.”

  “Wow,” Curtis said under his breath. “I never guessed I’d have to take a course in pastry before I went to work for a newspaper.” He sauntered out of the newsroom.

  “Much too cheeky,” Vida remarked. “What’s wrong with young people these days?”

  “Spoiled rotten,” Leo said, sitting down at his desk.

  “Definitely,” Vida agreed as Leo lighted a cigarette. “But at least Curtis doesn’t smoke.”

  “Oh, Duchess,” Leo lamented, “and just when I was beginning to think you liked me after all these years.”

  Vida snorted before taking a
sip of the hot water she drank at work instead of coffee.

  I leaned against Curtis’s desk and told Vida and Leo about my Saturday visit to Kelsey Cavanaugh Platte. Leo was intrigued; Vida was outraged.

  “You went without me?” she cried. “How could you?”

  Leo ignored her comment. “Kelsey was still a teenager the last time I saw her. It was summertime. She and Graham were on a tour with their dad to visit his newspapers in Southern California. I wonder if she’d remember me. It’s a wonder I remember her—I was semidrunk at the time.”

  “I assume she looks like her mother,” I said. “She does have her father’s blue eyes, but that’s it.”

  “Graham doesn’t look much like Tom, either,” Leo noted. “In fact, Adam bears a closer resemblance to his father than Kelsey and Graham do.”

  “Maybe,” I suggested, “you should be the one to talk to Graham. He was supposed to get here yesterday.”

  “Wouldn’t that be stepping on Curtis’s toes?” Leo asked.

  “I meant,” I said, trying to avoid Vida, who was now glaring at both Leo and me, “as an old friend of the family.”

  “I was never that,” Leo pointed out. “I was an employee. I probably only saw the Cavanaugh kids two or three times in all the years I worked for Tom.”

  “Still,” I began, “at least you have an entrée into—”

  “Oh, bosh!” Vida exclaimed. “Either Curtis is covering this story or he isn’t. Of course it’s none of my business, but it makes good sense to give him his head, Emma.”

  I looked at Vida. “Or enough rope to hang himself?”

  She bristled. “Certainly not. You seem to have confidence in him, or you wouldn’t have assigned him the story in the first place.” Vida turned away, studying some photos she’d received from one of the food syndicates she used on her page.

  Leo shot me a knowing glance. I shrugged and went into my cubbyhole. Half an hour later, when I went back into the newsroom to refill my coffee mug, I realized that Curtis hadn’t yet returned from his bakery run. Vida and Leo were both gone, off on their various rounds. I went into the front office to ask Ginny if she’d seen Curtis.