The Alpine Traitor

by Mary Daheim

  “Maxim Volos,” I said. “Pretending to be Josh Roth. So who is Ginger?”

  Vida frowned. “Where is Ginger?”

  “She’s not around here.” I paced a bit. “It couldn’t be Kelsey, even if she is blond. I doubt very much that Kelsey could carry off an impersonation of somebody like Ginger. And Sophia’s very dark. Unless…”

  “Unless what?”

  “Unless,” I said, leaning against the filing cabinet, “Sophia was disguised. Come to think of it, Ginger had green eyes. So does Sophia. She strikes me as far more aggressive than Kelsey. You saw the so-called Ginger when she was here. What did you think?”

  “Hussy. California. Not a genuine human being.”

  “In what way?”

  “In…” Vida paused. “Oh. I see what you mean. Physical attributes as opposed to personal. Both. The hair, the makeup, the very large sunglasses, the skimpy clothes—rather theatrical, I thought. I didn’t speak to her but would assume she was…acting. Is that not a California type?”

  “Often a cliché,” I allowed. “But you’re right about Ginger. It seems obvious now that she wasn’t real.”

  “You’re certain Kelsey couldn’t have played the part?”

  I nodded. “Very certain. She couldn’t have done it unless she’s the greatest actress to not yet win an Oscar, and because she’d also have to be pretending now that she’s a very passive and probably troubled young woman.”

  Vida stuck a stray hairpin into her unruly gray curls. “Yes…and I really should meet her. How do you think she’d respond to my request for an interview about moving here?”

  “I don’t know,” I admitted. “First, they haven’t moved yet. We’ve no idea if they took one look at the Bronsky house up close and ran as fast as they could back to…San Francisco, I guess. I suppose Snorty or Ed could tell us.”

  “They’d lie,” Vida asserted. “Or at least hedge. What about Sophia? A visitor’s reaction to Alpine.”

  “That might work,” I said. “We don’t have room for it this week.”

  “Then next.”

  “Go ahead. Have you time to do that this afternoon?”

  “My, yes,” Vida said. “I’ve sent everything to Kip. I’ll call the ski lodge to set a time.” Sniffing the scent of new quarry to stalk, she went on her splayfooted way.

  Curtis returned a little before three. “Same guy,” he informed me, handing over the driver’s license photo. “Terri Burdette and Oren Rhodes both agreed this was who they saw at their restaurants.”

  “Bourgette,” I corrected. “Terri Bourgette.” I paused to let the name sink into Curtis’s skull. As usual, he seemed unfazed by the correction. Either he was used to being wrong or he chose to reject any criticism. “Okay, we’ve confirmed that much. Did you ask the sheriff if he’d done the same?”

  “Dodge wasn’t in,” Curtis replied. “He was out with the bears.”

  “The bears?”

  “Right. Those cubs. I guess they found them by some old mine shaft.”

  Taking a deep breath and staring at my bobble-head doll of Edgar Martinez in his Mariners uniform, I refrained from screaming at Curtis. Edgar wasn’t just a two-time American League batting champion but an icon of patience at the plate. And I needed patience, lots of it, in dealing with my exasperating reporter. Finally, I looked up at him. “Can you get a picture and some information so we can put the cubs in this week’s edition with its five o’clock deadline?”

  “I guess. Sure. Okay.” Curtis started to turn around but stopped. “Where is that mine shaft?”

  “If it’s the one by Disappointment Avenue,” I said, getting up, “it’s off of the Icicle Creek Road, otherwise known as Highway 187.” I pointed to the spot on my wall map. “If it’s a different old mine shaft, then it’s somewhere else around here,” I went on, biting off each word more sharply than the last, “but you can find that out by asking one of the deputies.”

  “Will do. I’m outta here.”

  Curtis rushed out of my office and straight to the newsroom door. “Hey!” I shouted after him. “Camera?”

  “Oh, snap!” He laughed lamely and went over to his desk to get his camera. I turned my back and looked again at Edgar. Patience, patience, patience. The young and the feckless were fraying my nerves.

  “Five o’clock,” Vida called to me. “Sophia wants me to join her for cocktails at the ski lodge.”

  I walked to the newsroom doorway. “Are you going to order a drink with actual alcohol?”

  Vida looked uncertain. “I have upon rare occasion done such a thing, as you know,” she mused. “Perhaps I should, if only to demonstrate that I’m not utterly opposed to liquor. That might get us off on the wrong footing. A Tom Collins—I always remember that cocktail. Years ago, there was a bucker by that name at the Alpine Mill. But I can’t linger. I should be at KSKY by six-thirty for my program.”

  “Frankly,” I said, “I’m surprised Sophia agreed to the interview. Did she mention if Dylan and Kelsey are really going to buy the Bronskys’ atrocity?”

  “She told me they were in negotiations.” Vida grimaced. “I hope that involves demolition.”

  “We’ll see,” I murmured, heading into the back shop to see if Kip had enough room for a front-page picture of the bear cubs. If Curtis managed to take it.

  My production manager was uncertain. “If the shot’s any good,” he explained, “we should run it three columns by six inches. That means the photos of Fuzzy Baugh’s carving have to be cut way down, and probably the head shot of the dead guy, too.”

  “We need the head shot to run large enough so that anyone who’s seen this guy can recognize him,” I said after a moment’s consideration. “Can we eliminate the pix Curtis took at the carver’s studio and put Fuzzy and his porcupine on the back page?”

  Kip stroked his goatee and shook his head. “The mayor won’t like that.”

  “The mayor isn’t in charge of the Advocate,” I retorted. “If he bitches, we’ll tell him our only other choice was to hold the picture off until next week.”

  Having made that decision, I returned to my office and called the sheriff. He might still be with the cubs, but I wanted to make absolutely certain that we weren’t overlooking anything involving the homicide investigation.

  Milo was in. “Just got back,” he said. “The Dithers sisters found the cubs. They ride their horses on a trail that follows Carroll Creek. One of them stayed with the cubs while the other went back to notify us.”

  I wasn’t surprised that Judy and Connie Dithers had managed to corral the cubs and keep them from running off. The sisters led lives that were all about animals, especially the half-dozen horses they owned. One of their few diversions was playing in our bridge group, but even then, they spoke only if necessary, and I always expected them to whinny or neigh when it was their turn to bid.

  “Curtis is taking a picture,” I said. “He probably didn’t get there until after you left.”

  “Didn’t see him,” the sheriff remarked. “Doe Jameson told me he’d been in a while ago to see if there was anything new on our murder. There isn’t.”

  “I figured as much,” I said, “but I’m trying to train Curtis in very small doses. Anything new on this Maxim Volos?”

  “I’d have told you if there was,” Milo shot back. “Don’t nag.”

  “Okay,” I agreed. “But there must be a connection between him and the Cavanaughs. How else would he have known about me and the paper and Tom?”

  “I checked with Graham earlier,” Milo replied. “He claims they never heard of him.”

  “Do you believe that?”

  “How can I prove they don’t?”

  Even as I talked to Milo, I went online and looked up Volos. It was a town in Greece, although I got hits on a couple of Americans with that last name. “From New York, huh?”

  “Yeah. So what?”

  “I’m trying to think of a connection.”

  “To what?” Milo was beginning to sound i
rked. “Wes Amundson just came into my office to tell me what the forest service is going to do with the cubs. Put your jigsaw puzzle together on somebody else’s time.” The sheriff hung up.

  I made a quick note to call Wes, one of our local forest rangers, before deadline. It would be too much to expect that Curtis might find out about the cubs’ future on his own.

  I went to talk to Vida, who was flipping through her large file of recipes. She didn’t look up when I approached her desk but beckoned for me to sit. “Kip informs me,” she said in a vexed tone, “that Nucoa isn’t around anymore, at least not under that name, and that even if it is, you no longer have to add the yellow color packet to make the margarine look like butter.”

  “How old is that recipe?” I asked.

  Vida finally looked at me. “I’m not sure. Right after World War Two? It was left to me by my predecessor, Mrs. Debee.”

  “Isn’t that a bit dated?”

  Vida shrugged her broad shoulders. “A tasty dish is still tasty despite the passage of time. Now I must find a substitute.” She pulled a three-by-five card out of the file. “Pottsfield pickles. That sounds interesting. Or this one,” she went on, extracting another card. “‘How to Can a Tuna Fish.’”

  I didn’t offer any more advice. Vida couldn’t cook a decent meal to save her soul. I shuddered at the mere thought of her wrestling with a tuna fish—or even pickles.

  “Tell me,” I said, “what am I missing on this Cavanaugh thing? How could Maxim Volos of New York City know about the Advocate and Tom’s children?”

  She frowned. “Well now…I suppose there’s a social or a work connection somewhere. I assume Milo has asked the Cavanaughs.”

  “Yes. They claim ignorance.”

  “They would, wouldn’t they?” Vida drummed her fingers on the desk. “Dylan and Kelsey live in California, correct?”

  “San Francisco,” I said. “Graham and Sophia also live there.”

  “Are any of them living in Tommy’s former home?”

  Even after so many years, I could never get used to Vida referring to Tom as “Tommy.” It had never bothered him, but it always sounded incongruous to me. I tried to remember the address Graham and Sophia had given when they registered at the ski lodge. “No, not the house in Pacific Heights. Tom planned to sell it after Sandra died because it was too big—and maybe held too many memories. I’m not sure if he ever put it on the market, though. He’d already bought a condo on Nob Hill.” Pausing, I tried to remember the street name that the younger Cavanaughs had registered at the lodge. “Clay Street. I’m not sure, but I think Clay cuts across Nob Hill.”

  Vida stroked her chin. “So no New York residents.”

  “I’m trying to remember,” I said, certain that some vital fact was buried in my brain. “One of Tom’s kids moved to New York for a while. Yes, it was Kelsey. She was in love with a guy who got her pregnant.”

  “Dylan Platte?”

  “I don’t think so,” I admitted. “She told me they didn’t have any children together. I’m not sure Tom ever mentioned the father’s name. In fact, I don’t even know if Kelsey had the baby. She had a difficult pregnancy. You may recall that Tom had to cut one of his visits here short when Kelsey appeared to be having a miscarriage.” I tried to think, to remember, to bring back Tom’s voice in my head. “Maybe I never really wanted to hear about Tom’s kids. It was hard enough to listen to Sandra’s problems. And there was such a lapse of years before we got back…” My voice trailed off. I was close to tears. Clenching my fists, I cleared my throat. “For a couple of writers, we never wrote to each other. Everything was on the phone or in person.”

  “Of course,” Vida said. “Too risky for him, at least to receive anything at his home while Sandra was alive.” She waited for me to pull myself together. “Something may come back to you.”

  “Maybe.”

  “Birth records,” Vida said with a snap of her fingers. “If Kelsey didn’t marry that boyfriend, then her child’s birth would be recorded under her maiden name in San Francisco.”

  “True,” I agreed. “Although that really wouldn’t help much in figuring out who killed Maxim Volos.”

  “Probably not,” Vida responded, “but aren’t you curious? What about marriage certificates?” she went on, obviously gathering steam. “Dylan and Kelsey, Graham and Sophia. There could be a connection that Milo, with his limited imagination, would never search for.”

  “We could do that on the Internet, though I’m sure they’d charge us for a search.”

  “It’s a business expense,” Vida pointed out.

  “Yes,” I replied, “but we have other extra business expenses these days.” I pointed upward. “The roof, for example.”

  “Oh, for heaven’s sakes!” Vida cried, fists on hips. “You’re being evasive. I don’t think you want to know anything about these people, criminals or not! Where’s your curiosity? If need be, I’ll pay for a search myself.” She stopped speaking and frowned. “Though I must admit, I’m not sure how to go about it. You know I’m decidedly ignorant when it comes to anything with the computer that goes beyond typing. I’ve never seen any reason why I have to learn all those silly functions just to write my articles.”

  “Okay, okay, check it out. Here.” I leaned over her shoulder. “Go online…like this.” I clicked the mouse to get Vida on the Internet.

  “Now what?” she asked as I typed in “California birth records.”

  “We find a good site.” I chose the first of many listings. “There. Go ahead and type in the name Kelsey Cavanaugh.”

  “In that blank box?”

  “Yes.”

  “I could do this for anyone I was curious about?”

  “Yes.”

  “Hmm. Perhaps I should learn some of these things after all.”

  “It can be very helpful,” I said, knowing that Vida was already hooked. I could imagine her brain firing up with endless possibilities. It wouldn’t have surprised me to see smoke coming out of her ears.

  “Ah!” Vida exclaimed as Kelsey’s name appeared along with her age as thirty-two. The city listing was San Francisco. “Now what?”

  “We have to agree to pay the forty bucks to check further,” I said. “We might as well. We’ll need to go through a bunch of hoo-ha to register and pay with a credit card. I’ll get my purse.”

  By the time I’d returned with my Visa card in hand, Vida had brought up Dylan, thirty-four, San Francisco, CA. She seemed quite proud of herself.

  “We can find out when they were married,” Vida said. “Shall we?”

  “Okay, but why don’t you move so I can type in all this other stuff?”

  Vida got up, and I sat down. “This is quite fascinating,” she declared, adjusting her navy blue skirt to cover the hem of her slip. “I had no idea there were so many ways to learn about people. I may try this to find out information about…say, former Alpine residents and where they’re living now. Strictly work-related, of course.”

  “Of course,” I agreed, deadpan. It took a few minutes to enter the required information. Vida stood by the small window next to her desk, watching the passing parade on Front Street.

  “Barney Amundson’s limping,” she murmured. “I wonder why. A mishap at Alpine Meats? Marisa Foxx…where is she going? The courthouse? That reminds me, Judi Hinshaw is her legal secretary. Perhaps she could stay with her aunt Ella for a while.”

  “How is Ella?” I asked, waiting for credit card approval.

  “Exactly as I’d expect,” Vida replied. “Feeble. Wan. Feeling sorry for herself. I prescribed a good dose of gumption.”

  “A stroke can be serious,” I pointed out, relinquishing the chair to Vida. “Ella is fairly old.”

  “Old,” Vida declared, “is a state of mind, not a number.” She waved a hand in apparent dismissal of Ella’s problems. “Exercise, that’s what she should have done. I walk all over town, I work in the garden, I keep up a house. Ella simply sits in her apartment and watches TV.
I’ve no time for that kind of laziness.” She slapped her hand down—unfortunately, on the keyboard. The search site disappeared.

  “Oh!” I blurted, then realized that I was overreacting.

  “What?” Vida asked.

  I pointed to the screen, which now showed the wedding cutline Vida had been writing. “No problem. We’ll just have to go on the Internet again.”

  “Oh, dear.” Vida sighed. “I’m so sorry. Maybe I’m hexed.”

  “No, no,” I assured her. “Go ahead and sign on—”

  Curtis’s arrival interrupted us. “Ta-da!” he cried in triumph. “Great cubs pix, ready to go on page one.”

  “Let’s see,” I said.

  Vida joined me at Curtis’s desk, where he transferred the photos to his computer. “See?” He grinned with pride. “Cute, huh?”

  Two fuzzy black bear cubs stared at me with wary eyes. Or maybe they were hungry eyes, sad eyes, lonely eyes, motherless eyes. “Very good.” I waited while he went through the other shots. “The third and seventh ones are best,” I decided. “You and Kip figure out which one. What are they going to do with the cubs?”

  “I dunno,” Curtis replied. “Let them loose? Give them to a zoo?”

  I pointed to his phone. “Call Wes Amundson or the sheriff now and find out. It’s going on four o’clock. We don’t have much time.”

  “Gotcha.” Curtis picked up the receiver and stopped. “Who’s Wes Amundson?”

  “One of the forest rangers,” I informed him and marched over to Vida’s desk. “Okay, let’s get back on the Internet. We’ll try for birth records first and see if Kelsey’s baby—” I stopped. “My God, it just came back to me! How could I have forgotten?”

  Vida regarded me curiously. “What?”

  I perched on the edge of her desk and pressed my fingers to my forehead. “Maybe it’s all this talk about abandoned baby bears, but I suddenly remember that Kelsey had her baby and was trying to raise him—it was a boy—on her own with Tom’s help. He was named Aidan, for Tom’s father. I think he’d be about six by now.”