by Mary Logue
“How tired are you tonight?” she asked.
“Medium.”
She kissed him back. “I’m medium too.”
“That doesn’t sound encouraging,” he said.
She laid her head on his chest. “Margaret thinks Patty Jo had something to do with her father’s stroke.”
“How could that be?”
“Left him out there to die.”
Rich put his arms around Claire and pulled her close to him under the covers so that their bodies touched all the length of them, down to their toes. “I think I’m glad you like me and that you don’t think I killed anyone.”
“No. I like you a lot.”
“Prove it.”
CHAPTER 12
Boxes lined the walls in every room. The couch was where Bridget wanted it to be—right in front of the fireplace. Last night she had hung two of her favorite paintings—horses coming out of mist—in the living room before she fell into bed. But the house was a disaster.
Bridget watched her big sister look around. She knew seeing all of someone else’s stuff in her house would be hard on her. Claire always liked to be in control.
“I can’t believe you’re all moved in.” Claire turned and stared at the big ficus tree in the front window where her old rocking chair had been. “You even moved that big old tree.”
“Hired three big strapping college guys, and they did just what I told them to do.” Bridget wondered if she should have asked Claire and Rich to help. She hadn’t wanted to. She’d felt as though they were doing enough, that she should do this on her own. Now she wasn’t sure. “Everything is in the right room even though it’s not unpacked.”
“It’s going to look good.”
“Really? You think so?”
“I like what you’ve done with it already. It looks like you.”
“I didn’t take much from our old place. I like a spare house. Not so cluttery. I’ve never been much of a housekeeper.”
“It’ll be easier without a guy to mess it all up.”
Bridget had set Rachel on the floor, and the little girl was busy tearing up the cardboard tube from a roll of toilet paper. Bridget felt she had to explain her daughter’s behavior to Claire. “I haven’t found her toys yet.”
“Poor baby.”
Claire swooped her niece up. Bridget watched her kiss her daughter on the top of her head, right in the middle of her frothy dark hair.
“I have a question for you . . .” Claire started.
Bridget hoped it wouldn’t be about Chuck. She didn’t think she could talk about what was happening without breaking down, and she didn’t feel like doing that in front of Claire. Not today. Not when she had so much to do.
Chuck had been gone most of the day that Bridget had moved. Then, right at the end, he walked in when she had just about emptied it of all she had wanted to take. The guys were busy tucking the smaller boxes in around the big pieces of furniture. Chuck sat down in his old lounger and didn’t even look at her. He stared out the window. He didn’t say anything. He acted like she was already gone. Bridget was afraid for him.
Claire said, “Let’s say someone had some small strokes. . . .”
“Oh, this is for work.” Bridget shifted into her pharmacist mode.
“Yeah, nothing that did any damage.”
“Sounds like TIAs.”
“What?”
“Transient ischemic attacks—otherwise known as light strokes. They don’t tend to leave the brain damaged, but they are certainly precursors of what the patient has to look forward to.”
“A major stroke?” Claire sat down on the couch with Rachel on her lap.
Bridget sat at the other end of the couch. “As you well know, that’s impossible to say for sure. But yes, probably.”
“Anything anyone can take to prevent it?”
It had always bugged Bridget how people wanted to know what exactly would happen if they took a certain medication or if they didn’t take it. It wasn’t like that. Everyone reacted differently to medicine. That’s the only thing she could say for sure. Claire knew that, but she would still ask the questions and expect a concrete answer.
“Well, this person probably has high blood pressure, and certainly taking medication for that would be vitally important. Then the usual: quit smoking, ease up on the alcohol, and do steady exercise.”
“Blood pressure medication? I’ll check into that. Do the Tildes come to your pharmacy for their prescriptions?”
“Claire.”
“I’m asking for their daughter.”
“Have the daughter call me.” Bridget watched Claire. “Why?”
“Walter Tilde died recently. He had a massive stroke after a series of TIAs. His daughter, Margaret, suspects his new wife of not getting him to the hospital fast enough.”
“It makes a big difference. There are new medicines that they can administer within the first three hours that can almost reverse the effects of a stroke.”
“That’s what they tried for Beatrice. She’s recovering, but never fast enough for her. One of the reasons I’m questioning what happened to this man is that his wife has inherited everything. She was a good twenty years younger than him, and they had only been married for a few months.”
“I can’t tell you anything more, Claire. I’ll check into it. Have the daughter call me.”
“So not taking the blood pressure medication could bring on a stroke.”
“Yes, but everyone’s different. Would it be murder if the wife kept him from taking his medication?”
“If it was done with malicious intent.”
“How else could it have been done?”
Claire shrugged as if to say, That’s the point. “The problem is it might be impossible to prove.”
Rachel grabbed a hank of Claire’s hair and pulled, causing Claire to yelp. Rachel started crying. Bridget took the child from Claire as they both laughed.
Claire stayed a while longer and helped Bridget unpack some boxes. They got most of the kitchen unpacked. They played music, Rachel danced for them, and they didn’t talk about anything important.
Just as Claire was leaving, she caught the front screen door with her knee as it was swinging shut. She turned and really looked at Bridget. Then she asked, “How are you doing with everything? With Chuck?”
The question took Bridget by suprise, even though she had been waiting for her sister to ask. She looked down at Rachel and then answered, “Claire, I’m afraid this is all my fault.”
“The doctor told me I shouldn’t drink so much coffee,” Sheriff Talbert told Claire, then took a sip from his ever-present coffee mug.
“How much does he want you to cut back?” Claire asked.
“It’s a she, and no cups a day.”
“That’s definitely cutting back. What have you been averaging?” Claire knew he was a heavy coffee drinker, as she ran into him many times a day going to the communal urn.
“I count pots, not cups.”
“How many pots?”
“I feel good on two to three.”
“Why’d you have to cut back?”
“Not sleeping so good.”
“I wouldn’t go cold turkey,” Claire advised him.
“I don’t plan on doing that.” Talbert drained his coffee mug. “Got a call from Patty Jo Tilde.”
“What about—the fire?”
“Yes, she called to say she wouldn’t be needing any help from the sheriff’s department. She assured me that it was an accident.”
Claire rolled her eyes. “Methinks the lady doth protest too much.”
“Whatever you said, I think I agree.”
“What’d she say about the fire?”
“She said the barn burned down.”
“She speculate on how it happened?”
Talbert raised his eyebrows. “Something about electrical wiring. Why?”
“I got a bad feeling. I happened to be up there when it burned down. A neighbor called and told me abo
ut it.”
“How so a bad feeling?”
Claire sat in a chair. “First, Patty Jo wasn’t there when it started. She happened to be in town. Second, nothing of particular value was in the barn. Third, she comes back just as the fire is put out. Fourth, without asking many questions, or even really wanting to see what had happened, she goes in to call her insurance guy. And fifth, I don’t trust her as far as I could throw her.”
Talbert folded his arms across his chest. It was his prove-it-to-me stance. Claire recognized it easily after working with him for years. “Was Chovsky there?”
“Yeah.”
“What’d he have to say?”
“He was the one who told her it was probably electrical. But he didn’t really look around much. It was more like an educated guess,” Claire explained. “I thought I’d give the insurance company a call. See if they’re going to check into it.”
“Well, I suppose you could do that. It’s kinda putting the cart before the horse.”
Claire stayed silent.
“We usually wait for the insurance companies to call us. Plus, many of them have their own investigators.”
Claire had called Margaret last night and asked who her father had used as an insurance company. “Fort St. Antoine Mutual?”
“I don’t know about them. I guess it can’t hurt to call.” The sheriff fussed for a moment, then said, “Claire, I trust you not to step over any lines here. I know you don’t like this woman much, but you’re not going vigilante on me?”
“No way. I’ll watch it. I’ll keep a tight rein on my feelings about Patty Jo. But that’s not why I’m pursuing this. There’s something there.”
It was the end of the day, so Claire decided to swing by the insurance office on the way home. When she called the number she got a recording telling her they were open only two days a week. One of those days was tomorrow. Soon enough.
She packed her stuff and decided this was the day she would stop and check on Beatrice. She had gone over to the nursing home with Rich, but she had promised herself she would stop by on her own once or twice a week. Beatrice was the only parent she and Rich had left. Claire didn’t always know what to say around Beatrice and she didn’t always feel she pleased the older woman very much, but she would keep on trying.
Claire drove down along the Chippewa and then cut up through the backwaters to Pepin. Once a great blue heron had lifted off from the slough and flown right across the road. She had barely avoided hitting it. The size of the bird had stunned her. For a moment, it had completely filled her windshield. Since then, she always slowed down and kept a careful eye out for animals.
Another perfect fall day. In the high sixties. Not even cold yet. How long would it last? The end of September had been known to produce snow if it turned blustery. Claire rolled down the window to smell the leaves in the air.
It took her a few minutes to locate Beatrice at Lakeside Manor. She wasn’t in her room, so Claire went to the activity room, thinking she might be involved in some bingo game. But Beatrice was not there either. Claire tried the lounge and found a small sea of white heads facing a TV set where a group of women were talking about how their boyfriends had impregnated other women. Beatrice was sitting at the back, slumped over in her wheelchair, sleeping.
Claire walked up behind her and gently roused her.
“Help,” Beatrice yelped.
Claire got in close so that the older woman could see her face and said, “It’s me, Beatrice. Let’s go back to your room.”
“Have you come to take me home?”
“Not yet.” Claire felt sorry for Beatrice. She knew the older woman hated being in the nursing home. “Do you want to go to your room?”
“Better than here.”
Claire pushed Beatrice back toward her room, but as she approached the door, she had a better idea. “Let’s go outside.”
“Oh, do you think so?” Beatrice said querulously.
“Why not?” Claire pushed her out the front door. The sun felt good on her face. A soft wind blew.
“How about down to the lake?” Claire suggested.
“That would be too hard.”
Ignoring Beatrice’s concern, Claire started down the slight hill. They were a block away from the road that ran along the lake. She carefully held on to the wheelchair as it gathered speed going down the hill.
When they reached the bottom, Claire parked the wheelchair next to a rock that offered a flat surface where she could sit. The water on the other side of the road danced with sun on its slight waves. She loved the way the low angle of the sun lit up the bluff line across the lake, showing the coulees as deep-green shadows cut into the hills.
“How about that?” Claire said.
“First time I’ve been out of prison.”
“Prison, huh?”
“That’s what it feels like.”
“How’s therapy going?”
“Look at me,” Beatrice said. She held up her bad hand as if it were a dead bird. “I’m no good.”
“It won’t happen overnight. It’s a slow process.”
“I don’t have much more time.”
Claire asked, “Is there anything I can do?”
Beatrice acted as if she hadn’t heard the question. Claire watched the old woman survey the scene in front of her.
Finally Beatrice said, “This is better. The fresh air is good.”
“Beatrice, this isn’t the end of your life. We won’t let you rot away in there. How about coming to dinner at our house this weekend? Would you like that?”
Beatrice stared at Claire as if checking to see if the offer was a trick. “Can we eat something that isn’t baby food?”
“Yes, I promise.”
“That was a good barn,” Carl Wahlund said as he whittled a spoon he was making from a piece of an old pear tree he had chopped down last spring.
Rich watched the five other men sitting in Ole Lindstrom’s house all nod. They had formed a half circle around the fireplace: Edwin, Ole, Carl, Ted, and Pader. Carl was fairly new to the carving group.
All told, there were ten men who came to the group when they could. It was always at Ole’s house. He had the biggest living room, and his wife made great black-walnut bars. She said she had to do something with all the walnuts that Ole brought home. The men each worked on their own project, sometimes sharing tools, less frequently giving a piece of advice. Minutes could go by without anyone talking.
Rich sat as far away from the fire as he could. The idea was nice, but he didn’t think the weather called for it yet. They often had a fire going to get rid of the detritus of their work. He was carving a large bowl from the heartwood of a black-walnut tree he had cleared off his land. He was making it for Claire, his housewarming present for her.
“You talking about the Tilde barn? What happened there? I just saw it tonight as I drove by,” Pader said. He came the farthest, all the way from Plum City, which was about a twenty-minute drive. If the weather was bad, he sometimes didn’t make it.
“Nothing wrong with that barn,” Edwin joined in. “I was the one who saw it start. I was driving by, and flames came out of the backside of the barn.”
“Jeezus. That must have been something.” Ole picked up the poker and stirred at the fire.
“You’re not a-kiddin’. I got right on the horn and called the fire department. Listen, it was lucky they got there in time to stop it from jumpin’ to the house.”
“If Walter was alive, that fire woulda never started.”
“You don’t know, you don’t know. These things happen.”
“Walter was real careful. I think he rewired that barn not so long ago.”
Rich sat and listened to the older men talk around him, the sound almost like waves lapping along a shore.
“Wasn’t much of anything in that barn.”
“Nope, there wasn’t.”
“Those dang soybeans are still rotting in that field. That woman beats all.”
; “What’s the matter with her? She don’t have the sense that God gave geese.”
“You got that right.”
Ole joined in. “My wife knows her sister, and the sister don’t have much good to say about her.”
Rich perked up when he heard that. Time to step in and get some information for Claire. “Sister? She has a sister around these parts?”
“Not that close. Over toward Madison. I think they’re half sisters. Don’t stay in touch.”
“Do you know her name?”
“You know, it’s her married name. Let me think on it. It’ll come to me. I can almost hear my wife saying it. Give me a second.”
The room went quiet except for the sound of knife blade against wood.
“You know, I think it’s Parsons. First name of Debby. That’s it. Debby Parsons. She and my wife keep in touch. They’ve been friends since way back.”
“Claire might call your wife tomorrow to get the information.”
At the mention of Claire’s name, everybody looked up.
“What’s up?”
“She’s just checking on Patty Jo. The barn and the will that Walter left.”
“Damn shame, I say, that his daughter didn’t get that place,” Edwin said. “What was he thinking, leaving the farm to that fool woman? Now look what has happened. The barn burned down.”
“That was a good barn. Nothing wrong with that barn.”
CHAPTER 13
The hand-painted sign on the old church door read FORT ST. ANTOINE INSURANCE ASSOCIATION in bright-yellow letters against a deep-blue background. Claire knocked on the door and then stepped in. The building smelled of old cigars and wet wool.
An older woman with a halo of white hair was sitting at a typewriter, punching away at a good clip, and an older gentleman was seated in an inner office, reading over some papers.
Claire stood in the doorway for a moment, looking in at the scene, the sun pouring in from the east, the two people bent over their work in separate rooms. It looked like an Edward Hopper painting.
“Can I help you?” the woman said, holding her hands above the keyboard as if she were going to levitate it.
When Claire had moved to Fort St. Antoine, her banker had told her that she could get her insurance from this small company. He explained that it was an association of farmers from the area, a private insurance company. She liked the sound of it, so she had bought her insurance from them. A representative had come out and helped her determine the worth of her house. He introduced himself and told her that he had known the family that had built her house. Once a year she got a mailing from the company, telling her how much money they had in the group and how much they’d had to pay out over the year. Twice a year she received a typed notice for a bill. She didn’t want the woman to think she was there because of her insurance policy.