Dead Drift: three small town murder mysteries (Frank Bennett Adirondack Mountain Mystery Series Book 4)

by S. W. Hubbard

  Frank held up a hand and trudged toward the golden lights of the house. At her back door, he pulled off his snowshoes and followed Barb into her kitchen.

  “Put on a pot of coffee, Vonn. Frank’s about frozen.”

  Vonn, a tall man in his seventies, shambled over to the counter and contemplated the coffee pot as if it were an electron microscope. A small TV flashed muted scenes of a snowbound Manhattan, and his gaze drifted to the screen. Barb, slightly younger and much livelier, nudged him out of the way. “I’ll make the coffee, honey. You get out the mugs. And offer Frank some muffins.”

  Frank’s antennae went up at the mention of food. He never had managed to get any lunch, and the McGrath’s house was suffused with the lovely smell of recent baking. But he felt a jarring disconnect between the cozy kitchen with it’s blue and yellow-checked curtains and gap-toothed grandkids’ class pictures stuck to the fridge and the stark black, white, and red scene out back. Renee Moran had gone out for a hike and ended up dead. Her husband and kids were waiting for a woman who would never arrive. The high spirits of the snowy holiday weekend had melted in the heat of violence.

  Nevertheless, when the promised muffin appeared, Frank ate. Between bites and swallows of strong, hot coffee, he drew information from the McGraths.

  “How well do you know your neighbors?”

  “Jade and Anna?” Barb bustled around the kitchen, wiping the already spotless counters. “Oh, they’re lovely girls. Always giving me tomatoes and beans and squash in the summer. I try to pay them, but they won’t take a cent.”

  “Hard workers,” Vonn added.

  “How about the family up the hill?”

  “Oh, them. They’re not from around here. Where did he say they’re from, Vonn?”

  “Jersey. They show up occasionally. Haven’t talked to them since the summer.”

  “Sometimes they come by helicopter. Land right in the field beside the house.” Barb shook her head and walked over to the kitchen’s large bay window. “I see lights on up there now. They must be up for the weekend.” She turned toward Frank. “Is it one of their kids lost out there? Oh, lord!”

  As Frank’s gaze followed Barb, he noticed something that had been covered by the open back door when he walked in.

  A .30-30 Winchester rifle propped in the corner.

  “You always keep your gun out like that?” he asked Vonn.

  “I do until I kill that damn coyote that took our Spanky.” Vonn scowled into his mug.

  The coffee and muffin churned in Frank’s stomach.

  “Spanky was your dog?”

  Barb’s lip trembled. “The best little dog. A terrier mix—only twenty pounds. We let him out in the yard to pee before bedtime—” Barb began to sob.

  Vonn continued the tale. “That damn coyote darted out from the woods and carried the little guy off right in front of our eyes. In October he took some chickens from the farm; in November he killed Mira and Tom Paulson’s cat. When he took Spanky, that was the final straw. I called Rusty over at the DEC office. He said a coyote that preys on domestic animals is considered nuisance wildlife. I could shoot him anytime if I saw him on my land.”

  “And you saw him today?”

  “Yeah, twice. Once he ran real quick, and then he come back­—”

  Barb gripped the edge of the counter. “Hush up, Vonn.”

  “Huh? Frank asked me about the coyote. I saw him—”

  She whacked her husband sharply on the upper arm. “We got nothin’ more to say. Vonn’s just getting over a stroke. He can’t be upset like this.”

  “Upset? I’m not upset. You’re the one who was just crying over Spanky.”

  Barb jerked her head toward the dining room and Frank followed her while Vonn sat at the kitchen table and returned to watching the news.

  “You tell me what happened out back.” Barb’s voice was fierce and low.

  “Renee Moran was snowshoeing alone. We found her with a bullet through her chest.”

  Barb’s lips shaped the word no.

  For a solid week the shooting of Renee Moran was all anyone in Trout Run could talk about. On Sunday, everyone offered prayers for that poor woman. She was young, had kids who needed her. By Tuesday, underneath the stream of sympathy for the victim ran a stronger current of compassion for Vonn. First a hip replacement, then a stroke, now this. The accident just might be the end of him. Sometime Wednesday afternoon the blame game began. What was she doing back there all alone anyway? And who went into the woods in winter dressed all in white? She was from the city—she didn’t know better. Well, stay in the city, then, if you’re going to be that dumb.

  If there were a few tree huggers who felt the coyote didn’t deserve to be shot, they kept silent in public forums like Malones and the Store. People quoted Section 11-0523 of the Environmental Conservation Law with great authority: coyotes that are injuring private property may be taken by the owner at any time in any manner. That city guy better not try to start trouble because he didn’t have a leg to stand on.

  Some said Jade and Anna should’ve taken care of the coyote when he first stole their chickens and spared unsteady old Vonn the task, but that met with eye rolls because those girls didn’t even own a gun. Others said Renee had been trespassing but they got shouted down. Since when did anyone in the Adirondacks care if a neighbor crossed his land? Ah, but the Morans weren’t real neighbors, were they? No one knew them; no one even knew when they were occupying their house. True neighbors would’ve been aware of the coyote, and would not have stumbled into the path of a bullet meant for that marauder. By Friday, public opinion and legal precedent were united: Vonn couldn’t be faulted for the death of Renee Moran.

  Saturday morning, people began talking about the weather again.

  On a non-holiday weekend, Sunday nights were quiet in Trout Run. Frank sent Earl home in time for the weekly Davis family dinner, declining, as he always did, Earl’s invitation to join them. The rowdy Sunday evening camaraderie of Earl’s scrum of cousins and in-laws plunged Frank into a loneliness he kept at bay during the work-week. In the quiet of the deserted office, Frank revisited the moment in the diner last week when Penny had invited him to drink beer with her and Edwin and Lucy at the Inn. He felt a sharp twist of disappointment that the shooting behind the McGrath’s house had kept him from going, followed by the quick burn of shame. He was alive. Penny was alive. There would be another day. Not so for Renee Moran.

  His phone chirped the arrival of a text message. Speak of the devil—Edwin. LEGO crisis. Olivia needs you. Dinner included.

  Be right there.

  Frank whistled as he locked the office door. With any luck, Edwin wouldn’t expect him to handle his daughter’s LEGO crisis single-handedly.

  “Frank’s here!” Olivia shouted.

  “I hear you have problems.” Frank basked in the iron grip of her skinny arms. It was nice to be greeted so passionately. No sign of Penny. Only Edwin waving with his chin as he furiously whipped something in a bowl.

  Olivia dragged him to a corner of the big kitchen where a small table held her latest creation. “This Hogwarts Castle model is messed up. The package doesn’t have the right number of pieces.”

  Frank looked at the box. “5,500 pieces. Age 12 and up. Have you turned 12 since the last time I was here?”

  Olivia poked him with her pink bunny-slippered foot. “You know I’m only nine. But I’m good enough to do the big ones, if I just had the right pieces.” Her brow furrowed. “I need more of these kind of bricks to make the towers connect up. LEGO cheated me!”

  “Hmmm. When all else fails, read the directions.” Paging through the complex diagrams, Frank discovered where she had gone wrong. “Look honey, you used three-pronged gray bricks here when you should’ve used two-prong. That’s why you’re short of the bricks you need on this side.”

  Olivia’s scowl deepened and she stamped her foot, making her bunny ears shake. “I should have been able to figure that out. I hate it when I do dumb
things.” She smacked the tower and sent bricks ricocheting through the kitchen.

  “Hey! None of that,” Edwin warned.

  Frank pulled the little girl into a hug and murmured in her ear. “We all make mistakes, Olivia. And sometimes it can be hard to see them when we’re too close. Or if we’re sure that we’re right.”

  She pulled back so she could study his face. “You ever make mistakes like that?”

  Frank sighed. “All the time. You know what I try to do when something’s not going the way it should?”

  “What?”

  “Take a little break, then come back and look at it with a fresh eye.”

  “Good idea,” Edwin said. “Let’s break for dinner and you can fix that tower afterwards.”

  Olivia cast a longing look at her castle. Frank could tell she wanted to jump right back into the fray. He took her hot little hand in his. “C’mon, let’s eat.”

  Olivia bounded across the kitchen. “Guess what, Frank? You’re not the only company we’re having at dinner.”

  Frank worked to keep his voice bland. “Oh? Who else?”

  “Two big kids and their dad. Do you think they’re too old for LEGOs?”

  Disappointment shot through him so viscerally he thought he might actually have gasped.

  “Probably,” Edwin answered Olivia. “You can ask them, but if they say no, don’t beg.

  Edwin dispatched Olivia to set the table. “I hope you don’t mind. I invited Mike Moran and his kids for dinner. They could use a little company.”

  “You know them?”

  “He used to stay at the Inn while the house up here was being remodeled. He’d pop up alone for the weekend to check on the work. Really nice. Super smart. Invented some kind of financial software program and now he’s a gazillionaire. But a totally regular guy.”

  “I’m surprised they want to stay here after what happened. How come they’re not back in New Jersey?”

  “You didn’t know? They sold the house in Summit to live up here full time. The shooting happened at the end of their first week in Trout Run. How horrible is that?”

  “Mmm—awful.” Frank wondered if he could possibly escape. This guest list was making a frozen dinner in front of his TV look mighty good.

  Olivia popped back into the kitchen. “I need one more plate. I forgot that Penny’s upstairs with Mom.”

  “Can I have a beer?” Frank stood in front of the open fridge for a moment to cool down. If this roller coaster continued, he’d be the next person primed for a stroke.

  Frank had eaten at the Iron Eagle countless times, but he’d never been to a weirder dinner. First of all, the food was strange, even for Edwin. Once the guests were all settled around the crackling fire in the living room, Lucy passed the appetizers.

  “What are these, Edwin?”

  “Edamame, goat cheese, and baby beets.”

  Lucy looked apologetically at her teenage guests. “Would you guys like some chips and salsa?”

  Sophie smiled, revealing flawless teeth, and crossed her coltish legs at the ankles. “No thank you. I like beets.”

  Frank hoped her brother would opt for the normal food and rescue them all, but Drew Moran gamely popped one of the red, green, and white concoctions in his mouth. The kid chewed and swallowed, then turned to ask Penny if she’d lived in Trout Run all her life.

  As Frank recalled from the incident report filed on Renee Moran, Sophie was fourteen and Drew eighteen. Where were the black eye make-up and the slutty clothes? Where were the sullen slumps, and the muttering, and the refusal to meet an adult’s eye? Weird.

  The conversation lurched along in strained politeness. What can you say to a man whose wife died in a freak accident? What chit-chat can you make with kids who just lost their mom? Every possible avenue of discourse—skiing, home remodeling, Adirondack pastimes--seemed inevitably to lead back to the woman missing from the group.

  Finally, Olivia couldn’t take it any more. “Sophie, do you like Harry Potter?”

  “I love him.”

  Olivia grabbed the older girl’s hand. “Good. Then you’ll want to see the Hogwarts castle I’m building from LEGO.”

  Sophie rose. “Drew’s the one who’s really good with LEGO.”

  “He can come too.” Olivia led the older kids off.

  As soon as they were out of sight, Mike Moran threw his head back on the sofa. A tall, wiry man in his early forties, Moran looked more like a high school track coach than a software titan. “I can’t bear this. The kids are being so good. They’re holding themselves together for me. We should never have come.”

  Moran’s outburst cut the tension. At least they no longer had to avoid the forbidden topic.

  “Don’t feel that way, “ Lucy said. “You’re among friends here. Just go ahead and vent.”

  Moran offered a weak smile. “Thank you. I meant we should never have moved to Trout Run.”

  The rest of them exchanged glances. Penny forged ahead. “Why did you decide to move up here full time? It’s a big switch from Summit, New Jersey.”

  Mike Moran’s gaze traveled around the room. Frank couldn’t tell if Moran felt cornered by their interest, or baffled, as if he didn’t know himself why he’d come.

  Penny smiled and leaned forward, elbows on knees, head in hand. “All of us are transplants. We all came the Adirondacks looking for something. Some days, we even feel like we might have found it.”

  For a moment, Penny looked wistful. The interest and intensity she’d focused on Moran wavered and she slipped inside herself. Then her customary cheer returned.

  “We’re the NFAH support group, right Frank?”

  “Not From Around Here,” Frank explained. “It takes a few generations to become native North Country.”

  Moran eased back into his chair. “We came here for our kids. Funny how when you have kids, you want to make sure you don’t make any of the mistakes your own parents made. So you lean so far in the other direction that you wind up in a place you don’t even recognize. That’s what Summit had become to us.”

  “Did you grow up there?” Edwin asked.

  “No, Summit is a place where everyone is NFAH. You move there to erase the tiny little split level of your childhood.”

  Moran found his voice. His casual lankiness morphed into a wiry intensity. Frank could sense the fierce intellect that had launched a company and earned him millions.

  “My dad was a teacher and my mom a social worker. They were very serious people, not at all frivolous. We weren’t poor, but they were very thrifty. As kids, my sisters and I never had the trendy stuff the other kids had. And if we did succeed in wheedling a pair of Nikes or some new CDs out of our parents, they’d manage to make us feel like we were taking the food from the mouths of starving orphans. My older sister even had to get her prom dress at the resale shop. I still remember her crying that there was no way to get the Goodwill smell out of it.”

  “They wanted you to not be materialistic, but they went overboard,” Lucy said.

  “Exactly, but you can understand that when Renee and I had kids, I wanted them to have nothing but the best—the biggest house, the most prestigious school, the nicest clothes, every toy, every opportunity—they wouldn’t want for a thing.”

  He looked at the group. “Have you ever been to Summit?”

  Lucy nodded. “When Edwin and I lived in the city, I worked with a woman who lived there. Fabulous homes.”

  “All that loveliness comes with a cost: the competition, the status, the one-upmanship. Exhausting. A few years of that, and my parents’ values didn’t seem so bad after all. We needed a break, so we bought our place up here. We loved it, so we started spending more time in Trout Run. Finally we decided to make the move, and then….” He swallowed hard and gazed into the fire. “It’s my fault. It’s all my fault.”

  When Michael Moran choked up, Lucy and Penny began fluttering, two beautiful butterflies circling a drooping flower. While the women fussed, Frank observed the
ir target. The get-away-from- the–rat- race scenario seemed off. Would teenagers sophisticated enough to eat goat cheese and edamame embrace the 4H Club culture at High Peaks High School? It was hard to transplant kids at that age. Their roots were too tenacious to easily release the soil in which they had first sprouted, and too fragile to readily take hold in new dirt.

  And why was Moran blaming himself for his wife’s death? Surely a liberal suburbanite would be tempted to pin this tragedy on rural gun culture.

  Frank tried to catch Edwin’s eye for some sign that he agreed Moran’s performance was over-the-top. But Edwin looked just as concerned as the ladies, and Frank had to ask himself why he was so suspicious. Occupational hazard? Or maybe watching Penny murmuring reassurances to a handsome, wealthy, smart younger man brought out the worst in him.

  Once the party moved to the dining room, the mood lightened and the food improved. Edwin served butternut squash soup, which, despite a suspicious orange hue, was quite tasty. Olivia regaled them with tales of her plans to design and build her own medieval castle.

  “I’m going to work it out myself and order the exact bricks I need direct from LEGO. Then I don’t have to follow their dumb old rules.”

  Mike Moran high-fived Olivia. “Awesome! Do you know that’s what Drew is going to do for next few months? He’s designed his own engineering project and he’s going to work on that instead of going to school. He’s already been admitted early decision to MIT.”

  Frank observed the faces at the table. Moran beamed with paternal pride. Lucy and Edwin were clearly impressed. Penny leaned forward, eyes gleaming. “How exciting! Tell me all about your project.”

  Drew studied his plate, nudging the salmon away from the peas. “It’s a software thing. Some guy from my dad’s office is going to help me.”

  “My lead software engineer has agreed to mentor Drew,” Moran jumped in to explain.

  Frank watched the father-son dynamic. Drew’s social skills had dissipated like dew on a sunny lawn once his father started boasting about this special project. The kid who’d been chatting quite easily with the adults now fell mute.