“I want to know,” said Eris, and he started the engine of the truck.
“Where were you last night?” Russell asked loudly.
“Out.” Eris shifted into reverse and backed up. The look on Russell's face was the first hint ever given of how he felt about his fellow officer.
Eris's mouth twitched as he drove away. It's mutual.
He drove to Diamond Bay and got out to look around. Blood still stained the location where Shelly's body was found, and he went back up the road on foot to see if he could find any skid marks or other evidence left by someone trying to come to a stop.
The road was clear.
It was possible the driver hadn't even seen her, he told himself. Maybe whoever it was thought it was a deer that had been struck and just kept going.
Or the driver, too, was drunk and swerved when he or she should have braked.
Eris regretted that he had forgotten his beeper, but there was nothing he could have done any differently than Russell. There was little to do but coordinate facts with the police. The conservation officers were there mostly as a courtesy, to lend a hand where they could. They knew the area and were familiar with the residents, and if such knowledge was useful it would be passed on in whatever way was helpful.
While Eris was standing in the road, Bill Bigelow came to talk to him. The man was obviously shaken by what had happened to his daughter, his skin was gray, his eyes sunken. He shook his head a half-dozen times while looking at the pontoon boat and finally announced that he intended to sell the thing and get her away from the lake once and for all.
“The boat?” said Eris.
“Shelly,” said Bigelow. “She wasn't nearly so wild and crazy until we started coming out here. It was the crowd she fell in with, those wild kids who party every night and drink beer all day long. They don't even ski, or fish, they just come out here to get drunk and pass the hours.”
Bruce Beckworth, thought Eris. But Bigelow couldn't blame the kids entirely. He did a fair share of partying on the pontoon boat, pouring martinis and playing host to all sorts, many of them girls only a few years older than his daughter, and most of them fond of swimming nude at night.
“Have you contacted the hospital this morning?” asked Eris.
Bigelow nodded. “I just spoke to her mother. She's still critical, but the doctors are optimistic. Many bones broken, hip, leg, arm, collarbone, ribs, severe lacerations and abrasions, and the loss of a kidney, but thank God the internal bleeding has stopped.”
Eris nodded uncomfortably. He didn't like Shelly Bigelow, but he hated to see anyone suffer such a fate.
“She'll hang in there, I'm sure,” he said to her father. Then he excused himself and returned to his truck.
He stopped on the dam bridge to look and see who was down below, and while he was out walking around he saw Madeleine coming toward him in the old truck from her garage. He walked out to the road and she slowed to a halt beside him.
“I'm going shopping in Fayville,” she told him. “Any requests for dinner?”
“Shrimp?” said Eris.
She made a face and reached out as if to cuff him. He leaned away from her arm and gave her a smile that made her sigh. She looked at his mouth and said, “I love it when you do that.”
Eris leaned into the cab of the truck and kissed her. When he lifted his head he said, “I can cook tonight if you want.”
“No,” she said. “I like to cook for you.”
“Let me give you some money.”
“Only if you want steak. I was thinking more along the lines of meatloaf.”
“Meatloaf is fine, but I still want to give you some money.” He reached in his pocket and took out his wallet. When he opened the wallet, the folded letter from the adoption agency fell out. He bent to pick it up and saw her eyes following his hands. She blinked, but her lips went firmly shut. She would not allow herself to ask him, he saw. He handed her fifty dollars, and her eyes searched his as he replaced his wallet. He smiled again.
“Buy some ketchup for that meatloaf?”
”Oui, Monsieur Renard. Au revoir.”
He tipped his hat. “Mademoiselle.”
At any other time Eris Renard would have felt utterly stupid carrying on in such fashion while standing on the dam bridge in plain view of half a dozen fishermen and various others. He didn't feel stupid with Madeleine. He felt good. His chest expanded as he watched her drive away from him.
It was incredible how she made him feel about himself. He would never get over the way she carried on about his smile. Or his eyes. She nearly had Eris believing he was handsome.
He felt handsome when she looked at him, when her eyes lingered and her hands couldn't stay away from his face.
He was beginning to see what she saw in the mirror, instead of what countless others had seen and shied away from. The scars were somehow less noticeable and his eyes looked different to him, warmer, browner, less hard. He saw his teeth more often, and he paid more attention to his hair because of her. He thought he would probably gain a few pounds, but a regular meal or two wouldn't hurt him. He found he actually preferred sitting down to eat.
After driving down below the dam to check licenses and chat with the fishermen, Eris went home and took out his wallet. Before he could lose momentum he punched in the number and held his breath. He listened to four rings, and then a woman's voice answered. “Hello?”
Eris opened his mouth and nothing came out. He cleared his throat and struggled, finally pushing a weak hello past his lips.
“Who is this?” asked the woman.
“My name is Eris Renard,” he managed. “I'm calling to speak with Sara Bent Horn.”
“My God,” she said softly. “Your voice is so deep.”
“Is this Sara Bent Horn?”
“It is. Is this my son Eris?”
“According to the adoption agency I am.”
“Where are you?”
He cleared his throat again. “I work for the Kansas Department of Wildlife and Parks at Green Lake Reservoir.”
“You're a game warden?”
”A conservation officer.”
“Are you married? Do you have any children?”
“No.” He couldn't believe he was having this conversation. Talking with his mother. It was unreal.
“When I turned forty last year I knew I had to find you,” she said, and he was stunned into silence.
Forty last year? She was only forty-one now?
”I…how old were you when…?” he asked.
“When I had you? I was fourteen. I don't want to talk about any of this over the phone to you. I have to see you. Please don't say no, I've been waiting for this moment for so long.”
No longer than I have, thought Eris.
“I can't get away,” he told her. “I'm responsible for—”
“I'll come to you,” she interrupted. “Just tell me the nearest major airport and I'll book a flight.”
“Where are you?” asked Eris, picking up the phone number to look at the area code.
“Santa Fe, New Mexico,” she said. “I'm an artist. I have my own studio and gallery here. Are you anywhere near Wichita?”
”A little over an hour away,” he told her. “There's nowhere to stay around here. No motels or—”
“Would it be all right if I stayed with you?” she asked. “Do you have room?”
He did, but she was suddenly going too fast for him. He wanted to see her, yes, but he didn't know if he wanted to have her in his house. She was, after all, a stranger.
“You can stay with me,” he heard himself say.
“Wonderful,” she said, and he heard a break in her voice. “You don't know how happy you've made me. I can't wait to see you. I'm going to take the first available flight out, is that all right?”
“Fine,” he said.
“Give me your number, so I can call you back with the flight details,” she asked.
“It would be better for me to call you back later today,” he sai
d. “I'm never home to hear the phone ring and the cell service out here is not good.”
“Yes, of course. Can you call me around three, your time?”
“I'll try.”
“All right. I'll speak to you again soon. And Eris? This might sound like a stupid question, but are you angry? Have you been angry with me? I have to know.”
“Yes,” he said.
“Okay. We'll talk when we see each other. I have a lot to tell you.”
When Eris hung up he felt numb. He looked around his house and suddenly realized he was going to need some furniture. A couch. A table, maybe, and something for her to sleep on.
His mother was coming. As quickly as she could.
He put his hands to his eyes and rubbed. Then he walked out onto the porch to feed the baby hawk and wait for Madeleine to come home.
She frowned when she saw him come up the hill. She got out of the truck with a sack of groceries and handed them to him while she opened the door.
“What's wrong?”
“Nothing.”
“Why are you still here?”
“I was waiting for you.”
They went inside and Madeleine moved to put the groceries away. She was still frowning, waiting for him to go on.
“I contacted my mother this morning,” Eris said. “She wants to come here. She's booking the first flight out.”
Madeleine stopped what she was doing and stared at him. “You found your mother? Eris, that's wonderful. You've already spoken to her and everything?”
“She's coming here,” he said. “She wants to stay at my house.”
Madeleine moved to grip his hands. “I can't imagine what you must be feeling right now. What you must be thinking.”
Eris gave her fingers a squeeze and said, “I won't be able to be with you while she's here.”
“No, I suppose not,” Madeleine said with a brief smile. “I was wondering myself how we would handle the weekend, with Manuel and Jacqueline here to guard my virtue. How long will she be staying?”
“She didn't say.”
“Will I be able to meet her?”
“I don't know.”
She fell silent and slowly removed her hands from his to go back to putting away groceries.
“I'm glad you found her,” she said, not looking at him. “I'm sure it was important to you.”
“Yes,” he said.
“Where does your mother live?”
“Santa Fe, New Mexico. She has an art gallery and a studio there.”
Madeleine stopped what she was doing again and turned to look at him. “My parents live in Santa Fe, your adoptive parents—”
“No,” said Eris. “It wasn't Santa Fe.”
”Oh.”
They stood looking uncomfortably at one another, until Eris said he had to go.
Madeleine nodded and turned to finish putting away her things. Eris exhaled and moved past the counter to put his arms around her and pull her against his chest. She stiffened, and for a moment he thought he should let her go, but finally she relaxed against him and placed her arms around his waist.
“I'll bring her to meet you when I can,” he said. “I want her to see you.”
She lifted her head to look at him. “For a minute there I thought you were ashamed of me.”
“Never.” His mouth worked, but he couldn't begin to impart what she was to him. Instead he kissed her, then tore himself away and left the cabin.
He had to go and find a bed for Sara Bent Horn.
CHAPTER TWENTY
Madeleine cooked her meatloaf that evening and watched in curiosity as a delivery truck unloaded furniture at Eris's house. After thinking about it she knew he would need another bed. And maybe another chair, or something to sit on in the living room. Perhaps a small dinette.
When the meatloaf was finished and Eris showed no signs of coming, she picked up the phone and called the Birdy’s. Earl Lee and Gloria were delighted to be asked to dinner and hurried right up the hill, bringing a six-pack and a can of tomato juice with them.
Both went on and on about the cabin, and after dinner Earl Lee attached himself without hesitation to a sports channel on the television, leaving Gloria and Madeleine to walk outside and sit on the porch to enjoy the evening air. The black kitten played at their feet, gnawing on toes and chasing imaginary insects.
“Seen the digger man?” asked Gloria.
“We call him the Earthworm,” Madeleine told her, and was gratified to hear Gloria snort with laughter.
“That's it. I'd heard it before but forgot it.”
“Gudrun is Mole Woman,” Madeleine added, and Gloria slapped her knee and laughed even harder.
Her short brown hair appeared red in the light from the porch.
The glass of tomato juice was right beside her, this time diluted with beer.
“I saw him last night as a matter of fact,” Madeleine told her. “And he was on his way up to the cemetery.”
“Why the hell didn't you call me?”
“I started to, but something else came up. How often does he do this disgusting thing?”
“No one knows for sure. Damn, I wish you'd called me last night.”
“Maybe I should have,” Madeleine said thoughtfully, staring down the darkened lawn at Eris's house.
Gloria flicked a pill bug at the kitten. “What did you say you do?”
“Do?”
“Profession.”
“Oh. I'm a teacher—well, I'm not a teacher anymore. I'm back to being an anthropologist begging for a grant.”
Gloria was impressed. “Any specific area?”
“Native-American languages.”
“Huh. How does that grant stuff work exactly?”
“The begging part? I tell a university what I've done and what I want to do, and they discuss the merits of my application. If they approve, voilà, I get money and time to study and write.”
“What do you write?”
“Papers, generally published in scholastic journals. A few years ago I wrote a book on variations in the Sioux language. It was published by a university press.”
“Did it do very well?”
“It wasn't a bestseller, if that's what you're asking.”
Gloria grunted. “Must've not had any humping in it.”
Madeleine rolled her eyes and Gloria gave her a light pinch on the arm.
“Glad to know what you're made of. I can see you as an academic type, with the right clothes and that tight little bun you wear. You ever talk with Renard about his people?”
“Only briefly.”
“He's a quiet one, Renard is. Earl Lee thinks the world of him. He once saw Renard cut his hands to shreds trying to loose a deer whose leg was caught in a barbed-wire fence. Renard had tranquilized the deer and he didn't know anybody was watching him. Earl Lee said he was as gentle with that deer's leg as if it were a human. That said a lot about him to Earl Lee.”
Madeleine nodded, but she said nothing. She wanted to change the subject so the sudden thickness in her throat would go away.
“Earl's thinking about teaching next year,” Gloria went on. “The folks over at the county community college want him to come and work with a criminologist on a course about the future of penal institutions.”
“Sounds interesting,” said Madeleine.
“I thought so.” Gloria swirled her glass and then took a drink. “I bet the community college would be more than interested in you.”
“How so?”
“You said you were a teacher.”
“Not anymore. I'm finished teaching.”
“Too many kids with shit for brains?”
Madeleine smiled. ‘‘You got it.”
“Things are different in the country,” Gloria said. “Kids aren't the same as they are in the city. They still know how to say please and thank you and they're grateful just to get off the farm or out of that small town and go to school.”
“I don't know about that,” said Madeleine. �
�I had kids from small towns in my classes. They fit right in with the rest.”
“So they wouldn't stick out. Out here being courteous is the norm, not the exception.”
“Have you told that to the jerk in the baseball cap?”
“He's a punk. Don't even consider him.”
“You sound like you're trying to convince me.”
“I am. I'd love to have a smart woman like you around all the time. I don't know that many smart women.”
Madeleine chuckled. “I'm flattered, but I'm afraid my circumstances won't permit me to remain here beyond the summer.”
“Out of money?”
“For starters. Second on the list is the fact that the cabin belongs to my sister and her husband, who only tolerates me because I'm family and because my sister loves me.”
“It's a shame,” said Gloria. “I can see us becoming cohorts in crime, nailing up pictures of the Earthworm wiggling his worm.”
Madeleine burst out laughing, and she found herself laughing continuously over the next hour, because Gloria had just gotten started.
When the Birdys finally took their leave Madeleine was sorry to see them go. She enjoyed Gloria immensely and wanted to call her sister Jacqueline and say, See? I have a friend.
They made plans to see each other again soon, and Madeleine finally closed the door behind them. It was ten o'clock and Eris wasn't home. She refused to allow herself to stay up and wait for a glimpse of his mother, but there was no chance of sleeping once she was in bed.
The ringing of the phone startled her and she leapt out of bed to answer it, hoping it was Eris but figuring it to be Jacqueline.
“Hello?”
“I can't believe you're fucking Renard. A piece like you spreading your legs for that ugly bastard. Makes me sick just to think about—”
She slammed the phone down and hurried through the cabin, locking all the doors and windows.
Someone really was watching her.
Her heart pounded in her chest as she glanced all around herself, wondering what she could use as a weapon.
Manuel and Jacqueline were going to love this. They would probably kick her out rather than wait for her to leave and take her troubles with her.
She had meant to tell Eris about the first call. She meant to tell him about the man in the baseball cap, too.
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