by North, Will
“She likes to walk around the peninsula in the morning.”
“Walking shoes are by the back door.”
“Whoa, you’ve really been working on this mystery, haven’t you?”
He’d known Adam since the day he was born. A bit of an “old soul,” Adam was; he could be as noisily antic as any of the kids on the beach, but it wasn’t uncommon to find him wandering the tide line alone at dawn or simply sitting on a bleached driftwood stump staring across outer Quartermaster Harbor. He was perfectly happy in the company of adults and had been able to carry on thoughtful conversations with them from about the age of five. And he had a hunger to learn. When he noticed on a walk one day that a section of the beach at the tip of the Burton peninsula was composed of crushed white shells instead of the dark, gritty sand and smooth, tide-weathered stones all the other beaches were, it puzzled him. The fact that he noticed at all made him different from most kids his age, but what he did next was, to Colin’s mind, classic Adam. Instead of asking his mother or father about it, he got on his bike, pedaled the four miles to town, went to the island’s tiny history museum on Bank Road, and dug through any document he could find about the Burton peninsula until he discovered that the beach was what was left of an oyster shell midden left behind by the S’Homamish tribe, who’d used the site for nearly a thousand years before being driven out by settlers.
Then he pedaled over to Tramp Harbor to tell Colin all about it. When Colin said, “Wow, wait till the other kids hear about this,” Adam just shrugged. “They won’t care.” And he was right.
Adam was eight, but Colin had long teased Pete that her son was born at the age of forty. He often wondered whether the boy’s maturity had developed early because, at some perhaps molecular level, Adam understood he was born of despair. The boy with his mother’s seawater eyes came into the world on August 15, 2002, almost exactly a year after his ten year-old brother, Tyler II, was killed in a freak water-skiing accident.
Pete’s daughter Justine, then fourteen, was at the wheel of the family speedboat, Tyler beside her as spotter, and “Two,” as Tyler Junior had always been called, was cutting a wide and expert shoreward arc with his slalom ski through the choppy water perhaps twenty yards off Madrona Beach. With his father yelling, “Go for it, dude,” Two jumped the speedboat’s wake and grabbed big air, one hand holding the edge of the ski like a skateboard maneuver, to the wildly cheering kids watching from the swimming float nearer shore.
Between the roar of the Evinrude and the cheering, no one heard the distant screams of the old woman running toward them along the beach from the east.
Two landed perfectly, raised a hand in salute, then stopped abruptly, the tow line handle racing out ahead of him. There was debris in the water, something his father should have anticipated. Two’s ski had caught the angled branch of a partly submerged log. His lanky body—for he took after his father—catapulted skyward, flipped once, hit the water at high speed and an awkward angle, and never moved again. The impact snapped his neck. He was dead instantly. Edwinna Rutherford stopped running along the beach, dropped to her knees, and curled her body into a ball on the sand, howling. No one noticed her; there were too many other screams.
A month later, when al-Qaeda terrorists destroyed the twin towers of the World Trade Center in New York, killing thousands, the horror barely registered in Pete’s consciousness. She had not left their darkened Seattle home on Capitol Hill since the accident and had spoken to no one, except to try to console Justine, who was inconsolable.
Then, in November, in a moment of unexpected intimacy, the kind that occurs when a woman seeks comfort and reassurance from her husband and gets sex instead, a child was conceived. And though she was already thirty-five and hadn’t wanted more children, it soon became clear to everyone that the baby would be Pete’s salvation.
But Tyler didn’t share her joy. When they learned the child would be another boy, something in Tyler’s soul disconnected. What Pete saw as a miraculous second chance Tyler saw as a cosmic rebuke; a living reminder of his failure as a father to do the one thing men exist to do: protect their women and children. Two was gone because of Tyler’s characteristic carelessness, his willful ignorance of consequences, his chronic immaturity. Two was the recklessly confident athlete he himself once had been. Tyler saw himself reflected in his boy, felt reborn in that young body. Through Two, Tyler thought he could rewrite his own history. Two was his hope.
And hope had died.
***
ADAM HAD ALWAYS liked Colin and this summer he’d become a frequent visitor to Colin’s cottage on the bluff. He’d bicycle around inner Quartermaster Harbor and show up unannounced, like a dog seeking shelter. He’d sit on the edge of Colin’s deck, his legs swinging rhythmically, humming a bit to himself from time to time as if waiting, patient as a fly-fisherman, for something interesting to emerge from the water far below.
Colin was never sure why Adam had started visiting. Maybe for the quiet. The family compounds down at Madrona Beach tended to be boisterous, the recreational activities frantically competitive—so different from those of year-round islanders whose weekend ambitions ran to trolling slowly for salmon in the deep channel off Dalco Point, or pulling their crab pots and steaming the meaty Dungeness crabs they’d caught, or puttering in the garden, or, come winter, jigging for squid at night at the end of the Ellisport pier.
One thing Colin was sure of was that Adam didn’t visit for the fun. Or the conversation. They hardly talked. They didn’t play. Their relationship was affectionate but oddly formal.
“Hey, I’m thirsty after my bike ride and you must be, too. Want something to drink?”
A nod.
“I got juice and lemonade.”
“What kinda juice?”
“Cranberry, I think.”
“Lemonade.” Pause. “Please.”
“You got it. How’re things down at the beach?”
Shrug.
Colin often wished he’d had a natural aptitude for play. He didn’t. Every time the boy visited he felt he’d failed him in some way, by not thinking up games, by not talking in a high, excited, child-energizing happy voice. It wasn’t that Colin was depressive. He often thought the happy part of him existed in a state of dormancy, as if his store of joy was like a tight ball of tinder waiting for some external spark to set it alight. He envied those to whom playfulness seemed to come naturally and easily. He wondered what combination of brain chemicals it was, what package of neurotransmitters he’d missed getting at birth that made normal people happy. As for play, he was sure it was a learned skill. If you grew up in an environment that was safe, where there was a certain assured percentage of happiness like a minimum daily dietary requirement, then playfulness grew just like the rest of you. Like your bones and muscles. But if you had a chronic deficit in this nutritional category, you were stunted. Colin was stunted.
As a consequence, when Adam visited, Colin felt stiff and anxious despite his affection for the boy. But while this stiffness plagued him, it seemed of no matter to Adam. Adam was not interested in being entertained. Adam came, Colin guessed, simply for the companionship. Colin respected Adam, was in fact a bit in awe of him. He attended to the boy, took him seriously, talked to him like an adult, and listened. That’s why they were friends.
Adam was curled in the lap of one of Colin’s big easy chairs, studying the pulp at the bottom of his empty glass as if at tea leaves, as if a solution to this latest mystery lay there.
“Wherever she is, Adam,” Colin said, “I’m sure she’s safe.”
The boy turned to him with a flash of what was either anger or fear. Or both.
“How can you know that? You have no evidence. Things happen. Like accidents.”
Accidents. They were the family curse; the curse of both the Petersens and the Strongs, in fact.
“I can’t say why I’m sure about that, Adam. I just am. I don’t expect you to believe me, but I hope you will. Maybe I’m getting like M
iss Edwinna.”
“Nobody’s like Miss Edwinna; nobody else I know, anyway. She knows things. She sees them.”
“Yes. She does.”
Adam got up, went to the refrigerator, poured himself a second glass of lemonade, and returned to his chair.
“You make good lemonade.”
“Thank you, Adam. The secret is I use real lemons; those small ones that are four for a dollar at the Thriftway. They have thin skins and better juice.”
“Uh huh.”
Adam’s eyes rested on the watery distance and Colin let him brood while he changed clothes. When he returned the boy was asleep. Colin lifted the glass from his limp fingers. He wondered if Adam was exhausted, and if so why, or whether in sleep he sought refuge, and if so, from what?
eight
COLIN GRABBED THE PHONE halfway through the first ring. Adam stirred but slipped back into sleep effortlessly, the way children do.
“You’re not so smart, either, mister,” Colin heard Miss Edwinna bark. “You didn’t think about how I was going to get her the hell out of the goddamned car…”
Colin smiled. “And did you?”
“Do you have any idea how old I am?”
“I would not presume to guess, Miss Edwinna.”
“Too old to haul inert bodies around, I can tell you that!”
“So she’s still in the car?”
“Don’t be an idiot; I carried her, fireman style, into the house. The girl weighs less than a bird. Then, by way of thanks, she vomited over my shoulder and all over the kitchen floor.”
“Better there than the bedroom, Edwinna.”
“Go to hell. When are you coming to sort this all out?”
“I still have Adam here.”
“Well, get rid of him.”
Colin’s phone beeped once: an incoming call, which he let go to voicemail.
“So she’s conscious now?”
“Enough to throw up.”
“Keep her on her side, Edwinna.”
“Why?”
“So when she throws up the next time she doesn’t choke.”
“I’ll choke you if you don’t get over here, pronto.”
The beeper in Colin’s pocket went off. He pulled it out.
“Shit!”
“I beg your pardon?”
“Look, Miss Edwinna, I’ve got an emergency at the clinic; you’ll have to attend to her a while longer. I’ll be there as soon I’ve taken care of this. Try to keep her comfortable in the meantime. Gotta go.”
He hung up before she could protest and then roused Adam.
“Sorry, pal, but I’ve got to get to the clinic. Time for you to head home anyway. Want a ride part way? I’ve got the van.”
“What about Mom?”
Colin sat on the arm of Adam’s chair and roughed up the kid’s sun-bleached hair. “Like I said, I’m sure she’s fine.”
The boy looked unconvinced, shrugged, and stood. “I’ll take a ride to the Highway, okay?”
“You got it. Bike in the van. Let’s roll. Eileen? In the car, sweet girl.”
The gangly dog plodded out the door Colin held open, looking more like an imperious camel than the graceful animal she truly was. That was part of her charm. She had no idea how lovely she was.
***
AT THE END of Quartermaster Drive, where he let Adam out just before turning north to town on the Highway, he pulled out his cell phone and retrieved the message he’d missed while talking with Edwinna. As he’d expected, it was Patsy, his British vet tech. Because it was Labor Day, she’d been on call, which meant anyone calling the office would automatically get bounced to her number. They were a small practice and he and Patsy alternated who’d be called on days the clinic was closed. On her days, Patsy screened the calls and let him know when there was a real emergency. It was an unusual arrangement, but Patsy had trained at London’s Royal Veterinary College just like Colin, though several years after he’d graduated. But when it came time to take a scalpel to an animal she had hit a wall and dropped out. Short of surgery, though, there wasn’t anything he wouldn’t trust her to do.
He slammed his fist on the steering wheel.
“You idiot, you should have taken Pete to Patsy’s.” Patsy, who knew him better than he knew himself, who was like an extension of himself at the clinic. She’d have known how to take care of Pete. And now there was an emergency. Or, rather, yet another.
***
AFTER SHE’D ABANDONED vet school, Patsy had fallen for, and stupidly gotten pregnant by, a charismatic Scottish drummer who’d subsequently immigrated to Seattle to be a part of the grunge music scene. She followed but realized after a couple of years that he’d never be anything but a marginal session player, while groups like Pearl Jam and Nirvana hit it big. Ian had talent, even a certain presence, but no ambition. More importantly, he had no long-term vision for himself, Patsy, or their four year-old daughter, Emma.
Patsy Ashton didn’t have a lot of patience for slackers, and what patience she’d had with Ian had finally passed its expiration date. She hadn’t clawed her way out of London’s East End only to be dragged down again by someone somewhere else.
She was at the Seattle Library branch on Capitol Hill with Emma one morning, scanning the Puget Sound Business Journal while her daughter enjoyed story hour—the cheapest babysitting service in Seattle—when she saw an article about a new vet taking over the clinic on Vashon Island from a husband and wife who were retiring. When she read that, like her, the new vet had trained in London, she made her move. On the day Colin was scheduled to take over the practice, she and Emma caught an early bus to West Seattle, boarded the ferry to Vashon, and were waiting at the front door of the island’s clinic when the new vet arrived.
“Dr. Ryan?”
“Yes?”
Patsy extended a slender hand and shook his with a strong, confident grip. “Patricia Ashton. Your new assistant.”
“I don’t have an assistant.”
“You do now.”
Her smile was so bright it was like looking directly into the sun.
“We just had a ferry ride!” the little girl beside her said, hopping on one foot.
Colin looked down at the child with the bouncing red curls and freckles, looked back at her handsome mother, laughed, and invited them both in. Patsy had her state veterinary technician license in no time and they had worked together ever since.
Patsy was a natural. She had a warm and genuine word for everyone who came into the clinic and an uncanny way of putting animals at ease…and owners as well. Though the practice was kept busy principally by the ailments and injuries of pets, the mostly rural island also supported a wide and occasionally strange array of farm animals needing assistance: horses, cows, goats, sheep, chickens, geese, pigs, llamas and alpacas, ostriches, and peacocks, among others—not to mention an organization that rescued abandoned or abused farm animals, and another that cared for injured or ill wild animals. On any given day, it was just as likely for Colin and Patsy to be treating an injured North American bald eagle or a sick wolf as someone’s overfed cat.
Patsy was happiest on farm calls. Her urban upbringing notwithstanding, she was the kind of woman who thought there was nothing more delightful in the world than standing in the pouring Northwest winter rain with her arms up some cow’s uterus, the water pouring off her nose while she waited patiently for the doctor to fetch the right suture thread. That was exactly the condition in which Rebecca Johns found her one February afternoon. Rebecca, a stocky, graying, non-nonsense woman, ran “Nibbling Nubians,” a herd of goats she hired out like green mowers to chew through land choked with wild blackberry and other noxious shrubbery. She’d been driving by a farm in her pickup when she caught sight of Patsy kneeling in a field in the rain, next to a prostrate cow. She hit the brakes, pulled to the roadside, and jogged back along the fence.
“You okay there, Patsy?” The rain was strong and stubborn, not the usual island winter “mist.”
�
��Never better!” Patsy shouted.
“What the hell are you doin’, girl? You’ll catch your death!”
“Waiting on Dr. Colin.”
“Where the hell is he?”
“Needed umbilical tape, he did; went back to the clinic for it!”
“And left you holding the bag?”
Patsy laughed. “Literally! Cow just calved and I’m protecting the uterus!”
Rebecca shook her head.
“You sure you’re all right?”
“Oh yeah; at least I’m not on my feet at the clinic!”
This was true. Patsy was kneeling in bloody mud the consistency and color of catsup.
“He’ll be back in a few minutes; I’m fine, really…”
Rebecca threw her hands up, trudged back to her truck and yanked open the door just as Colin rounded the bend in the van. She slammed her door shut again, stood directly in the van’s path, and, when Colin stopped and rolled down the window, said,
“I was wrong about you, Colin Ryan; I thought you were a gent, but you’re a beast like all the other men.”
Colin laughed. “Hey, I offered to send her but she said she wanted to stay!”
Rebecca looked back at the woman kneeling in the mud and chuckled.
“Doesn’t surprise me in the least. Take care of that girl, Colin, you hear? One in a million, that one.”
“Promise. On my honor as a beast.”
***
“WHAT HAVE WE got, Pats?” Colin said to his tech as he came through the back door of the clinic.
“And good morning to you, too, Doctor Ryan,” she said, looking up from a whimpering Jack Russell terrier.
He stopped, let his shoulders relax, and smiled.
“Good morning, Patsy. I’m sorry your holiday has been interrupted.”
“Yours, too…”
“It’s my job.”
“And mine.”
Colin shrugged. “Fair enough.”
“Where’s Eileen?”
“In the van. She likes to pretend I’m her chauffeur. It’s like ‘“Driving Miss Daisy,’” except I’m not as sanguine about it as Morgan Freeman. The window’s open; she’ll be fine. What’s happened to ruin our day?”