The Alpine Obituary

by Mary Daheim

  Outside, where the rain had almost stopped, Milo paused in front of the drugstore. “I’ll have one of the deputies check out Safeway.” He glanced at his watch. “Jeez, it’s almost two-thirty! No wonder I’m hungry. You want to go get some lunch?”

  I hedged as guilt tugged at my conscience. “I really should go to the office and work on those features for the Wednesday special edition. Besides,” I added, “I’m going out to dinner tonight. I don’t want to spoil my appetite.”

  “Oh? Who’s your date?” Milo’s voice was a little too casual.

  “Max Froland,” I replied. “He’s going to fill me in on some of the family background for the story.”

  “Oh.” The sheriff seemed to relax. “Max is a good guy. I’ve always felt sorry for him. That family’s had more trouble than they deserve.”

  “Dare I let Max know you told me his father had been poisoned?”

  Milo shrugged, his gaze going over my head in the direction of Old Mill Park. “It’s official. If you hadn’t found out today, you would have known about it tomorrow. Don’t mention the meth lab yet, though.”

  “Okay.” I stared at Milo who was still staring down the street. He seemed wistful. “What are you thinking about?”

  “Huh?” He gave himself a shake and focussed his hazel eyes on me for a moment, then looked away again. “I was thinking of Lynn.”

  “Lynn Froland?”

  Milo nodded once. “Yeah. I had kind of a crush on her in high school. I was three years ahead of her, but even when she was fifteen, sixteen, she was really something. Out of my league, though. All the athletes and the popular guys wanted to date her.”

  I couldn’t help but smile. There was something endearing about Milo discussing his high school days. He almost seemed to have reverted into a lanky, klutzy teenager. I half-expected him to stumble over his own feet and fall down on the sidewalk.

  “I saw some photos of Lynn in one of the family albums,” I said. “In fact, one of them may have been taken up at the ski area.”

  Milo nodded. “Lynn loved to ski. Water-ski, too, swim, rock climb. She did all the outdoor sports.”

  “Did she also play the field?” I asked with a mischievous smile.

  Milo’s expression remained serious. “Not really. While I was studying law enforcement in college, I heard she had a steady boyfriend from Monroe. Or maybe Everett. He may have been one of the kids she went skiing with the day she was killed.”

  “Were you around when the accident happened?”

  “No, I was taking classes at Everett Junior College and living off campus. I didn’t want to commute from here during the winter. . . .” Milo’s head swiveled around. “Goddammit, that guy in the red Mazda just ran the arterial at Fourth. He damned near clipped the O’Tooles in their new Chrysler. Nice car, that.” He waved to Jake and Betsy as they drove by, shaking their heads but waving back.

  “I didn’t recognize the Mazda,” I said. “I think they’re cute. Sporty, too.”

  “That’s why jerks like him think they can do the Indy 400 in the middle of town,” Milo grumbled. “I should have gone after him, but he had too much of a head start. If he’s local, I’ll nail him next time.” The sheriff paused, removing his baseball cap, running his hand through his graying sandy hair and replacing the cap. “That’s funny—talking about Lynn, the O’Tooles driving by after seeing that red Mazda. It reminded me of her car, the one she got killed in. She’d just bought it with money she’d saved working at the Grocery Basket. Of course Jake and Betsy didn’t own the store then, but I can still see Lynn behind the checkout counter wearing her hair in a ponytail. Anyway, it was a secondhand red Valiant, one of the original 1960 models. Grace Grundle bought that car new, but she didn’t like the color. She thought it was too flashy for a schoolteacher, so after awhile, she traded it in on a black Chevy Nova. God, it’s weird how certain things trigger your memory, stuff you haven’t thought of in over thirty years.”

  “Like what else?”

  “Oh—like seeing Lynn whipping around town with her boyfriend.” Milo smiled at the memory. “He was a good-looking guy, tall, blonde, athletic—sort of a mirror image of Lynn. They could have been brother and sister.” He stopped and frowned. “Wait a minute—I’m getting mixed up. There was another guy, tall, but dark, good-looking, too, but in a different way. She always let him drive the car. Hunh. She must have had two steadies. At different times, I mean.”

  “That sounds right for a girl like Lynn at that age,” I remarked, starting to take a few steps in the direction of the sheriff’s office. “How about giving me a ride home so I can bring my car back down here and get a jump on the special edition?”

  “What?” Milo still seemed lost in reverie. “Your car? Oh, sure, let’s go. I’ll grab lunch at the Burger Barn. I need to do some work.”

  Twenty minutes later, I was in the newsroom, feeling stupid. I knew I had to do something for Marsha Foster-Klein, but I felt like I’d exhausted all possibilities. Maybe Vida would have some ideas, especially after she had her visit— and scouting expedition—at June Froland’s home that evening. On the off chance that Vida might be able to inspire me, I dialed her number. She didn’t pick up the phone, which meant she wasn’t there. It had taken a long time for her to get an answering machine, and when she did, the message on it was typically Vida: “So pleased you called me. Don’t leave your news as a message. I’ll need all the details.”

  Still at a loss, I decided to give in to Milo’s case of nostalgia and read more about Lynn Froland’s fatal accident. If nothing else, it would prep me for dinner conversation with Max, should the sorry subject come up.

  Earlier, I’d only skimmed the article that Marius Vandeventer had written over thirty years ago. Now I read the whole thing, along with a couple of sidebar stories on the front page, including a warning from the state patrol about highway driving in the mountain passes.

  It wasn’t until I got to the jump of the lead story on page three that I felt I might have struck gold. It was there that Marius took up the account of the accident:

  “The driver of the car owned by Lynn,” Marius wrote, “was eighteen-year-old Gabe Foster of Everett. He was taken to Alpine Community Hospital where he is being treated for a broken leg, facial lacerations, and multiple bruises.”

  Could Gabe Foster be Gabe Foster-Klein, Marsha’s brother? I finished the rest of the piece in a rush:

  “The other two passengers in the car, Clare Thorstensen, 18, of Alpine, and Terrence Woodson, 19, of Monroe, were treated for multiple cuts and bruises but released from the hospital Monday. Clare, like Lynn, is a 1966 graduate of Alpine High School, and the daughter of Don and Marcella Thorstensen who live on First Hill.”

  I was finishing the last sentence even as I dialed Judge Marsha’s number. She answered on the third ring.

  “Any chance you can drop by the Advocate office?” I inquired. “I want to show you something.”

  “Is it important?” she asked in vexed voice. “I’m busy right now.”

  “Yes, I think it is.”

  Marsha didn’t respond for a few moments. I thought I could hear a muffled voice in the background. A man. What could be more important than Marsha’s reputation? Sex? Dubious.

  “I’ll be there in twenty minutes,” she said, and hung up.

  March 1917

  Ruby Siegel gazed over the top of a two-day-old Seattle Times. “The czar abdicated,” she announced to her husband. “Did you hear about that while you were visiting your Wenzler relations in Seattle?”

  Louie Siegel glanced up from the small cardboard suitcase he was unpacking. “Yes. So what?”

  “It’s about time,” Ruby declared. “Those poor Russians— they’re starving. How can they fight the Germans when they’re too weak to walk?”

  “They spend more time fighting among themselves,” Louie retorted.

  “Now maybe they’ll settle down,” Ruby said, still scanning the newspaper with an avid eye. She devoured everyth
ing she could read about politics and social change. It annoyed her greatly when the train delivered the paper a day or two late. “I don’t think we should get into the war,” she went on, noting an article that suggested President Wilson was edging closer to sending troops to Europe. “It’s not our kind of conflict. The old order is dying, and it’s about time.”

  “That doesn’t have much to do with us,” Louie remarked in a disinterested manner. “I’m too old to be soldier.”

  “There are plenty of younger men here in Alpine,” Ruby replied with fervor. “I don’t want to see any of them sent to Europe to get slaughtered. Those Wobblies are right—we shouldn’t fight a war for the foreign upper classes.”

  Louie said nothing. He had closed the empty suitcase and put it under the bed. Ruby looked up from the newspaper. Her husband was still on his knees. At last he got to his feet, holding what looked like a train ticket stub.

  “When did you go to Wenatchee?” he asked.

  “Wenatchee?” Ruby’s green eyes widened. “Why, I haven’t been there in over a year.”

  Louie turned the stub over in his hands. “This is dated last week.”

  “Well,” Ruby said dryly, “you were here last week. Did you wave me off to Wenatchee?”

  “No.” He scrunched up the ticket and tossed it at the wood box. “How do you think it got under the bed, Ruby?”

  She shrugged. “How would I know? I suppose one of the boys picked it up some place and dropped it in here. Are you going to nag me about my housekeeping again?”

  Louie stood in silence, his eyes darting from his wife to the window where he could see two of their sons pelting each other with snowballs. Their father recognized that they were lively, headstrong boys, and sometimes careless, even disobedient. But, he thought, boys would be boys.

  And Ruby would be Ruby. Louie gazed at his wife with an ironic expression.

  She put the newspaper aside and stood up, her arms spread wide. “Quit looking as ornery as a bear with a crosscut saw,” she said, embracing her husband. “The boys won’t come inside for a while. Why don’t I welcome you home in a wifely fashion?”

  Louie took Ruby into his arms. With her plump little figure and those dancing green eyes and that mass of red hair, Louie couldn’t resist his wife.

  The problem was, as he knew too well, other men couldn’t resist her, either.

  Chapter Twelve

  MARSHA FOSTER-KLEIN LOOKED as if she’d thrown her clothes on in great haste. Which, I figured, was exactly what she’d done. The seams in her navy slacks were crooked and the sweatshirt with Mount McKinley on the front was bunched up in the back. Her hair was disheveled and she wore no makeup.

  “Well?” she demanded, without so much as a howdy do, “what have you got? It better be good.”

  “That depends,” I replied, determined not to let her rattle me. “Have a seat.”

  Marsha sat. “What’s all this stuff?” she asked, waving a hand at the photo albums piled on the table.

  “Never mind those for now,” I said. “It’s this issue of the Advocate I want to show you. The year is 1967.” I turned the bound volume around so it faced her. “Read the lead article about Lynn Froland. Skip the sidebars, and go to page three.”

  Marsha was a quick reader. When she got to the jump, her head jerked up. “Gabe Foster? Jesus.”

  “Is that your brother?” I asked.

  Marsha’s face lost some of its usual color. “It could be.” She touched her fingers to her lips, as if to keep from blurting out. “Let me think—1967. I was eight, nine years old. Gabe would have been . . . Yes, he would’ve been the right age.” She paused again, apparently still assembling her thoughts in an orderly fashion.

  “Did he drop the hyphenate?” I asked after a suitable pause.

  “That’s what I’m trying to remember.” Marsha no longer looked hostile or upset. “Gabe played basketball in high school. The coach thought hyphenated names were pretentious. Gabe had to drop the Klein part, which made my mother so mad she threatened to sue the school system. But Gabe got an athletic scholarship offer from Washington State, and he decided to stick with just the Foster half of his name because he didn’t want to cause problems over in the Palouse. They’ve always been more conservative, as you know. Besides,” she added with a faint smile, “he thought a shorter name would help the announcers when they broadcast the games. Basketball’s so fast.”

  I held up a hand, needing a moment to collect my own thoughts. “So you’re saying that the Gabe Foster driving Lynn Froland’s car could be your brother?” I was incredulous. “When I asked you about the Frolands, you didn’t think of this connection?”

  Marsha gazed at me with a blank expression. “No. Good God, Emma, that was when? Over thirty years ago? I was nine. My brothers considered me a nuisance; they’d always shoo me away when I tried to tag along. I learned to keep in my place. Do you think I had much interest in what they were up to?”

  “You’d know if one of them got into a wreck and landed in the hospital,” I noted.

  Marsha waved a dismissive hand. “They were always getting into wrecks and banging themselves up. Especially Zeke. He had his license suspended for a year. Besides, Gabe would’ve been in college in 1967, up at Western Washington in Bellingham. He tore his Achilles tendon when he was a high school senior. He never made it to WSU. The only thing I remember clearly was my parents, shrieking about their car insurance rates.”

  I thought back to my own youth. I vividly recalled Ben’s first three accidents, all of which occurred within a month after he got his license on his sixteenth birthday. Ben wasn’t allowed to drive for six months. In retrospect, I wondered if that wasn’t what had driven him—metaphorically, of course—into the seminary. But I’d only been two years younger at the time. That would make a big difference. I was already anticipating my own driver’s license. Marsha would still have been playing Barbies—maybe her own version— Judge Barbie, Prosecutor Ken, Bailiff Skipper.

  “So you never heard of Lynn or these other two who were in the car?” I asked.

  Marsha glanced back at the article. “Clare Thorstensen and Terrence Woodson?” She shook her head. “There’s some Thorstensens in town, though. I suppose they’re related.”

  “Probably. Look, Marsha,” I said turning the bound volume back around to face me, “even if you don’t recall the accident or Lynn Froland, isn’t it possible that somebody else does and is threatening you with the fact that your brother drove the car in which Lynn was killed?”

  “It’s irrelevant,” Marsha said in her most judicial tone.

  “To you,” I said. “Not to the letter writer.”

  “Then it’s also stupid.”

  “Where’s Gabe now?” I asked.

  Marsha waved a dismissive hand. “California—Santa Barbara, raising two kids and working for some air-conditioning company.”

  “And Zeke?”

  Marsha scowled at me. “What’s Zeke got to do with it?” “I’m curious, that’s all. Isn’t that what you want me to be on your behalf?”

  Marsha affected indifference. “I suppose.”

  Her attitude forced me to pry further. “So where’s Zeke now?”

  She gazed off in the direction of Leo’s desk. “I’m not sure. Zeke’s always been the family free spirit. The last I heard of him, he was involved in some environmental protest in Texas. My mother would be damned proud of him.”

  “Has he been arrested?”

  “You mean for protesting?” Marsha shrugged again. “Occasionally. He got busted for the first time over at Bangor during an antinuclear submarine protest. I defended him.”

  I wasn’t giving up easily on the Lynn Froland–Gabe Foster–Judge Marsha connection. “I’m sorry, I find it hard to believe that there weren’t more problems stemming from the accident at the summit. Are you sure no criminal charges were filed against Gabe?”

  “If there were, I never heard about them,” Marsha declared.

  I fel
t frustrated, but thought I understood. “If there had been, your parents probably wouldn’t have discussed them in front of a nine-year-old.”

  “Ha!” Marsha looked at me as if I were very dim. “Not in our house. Both my parents, especially my mother, didn’t hide anything from the children. In fact, my mother was very vocal about everything, from the mail arriving late to equal pay for women.”

  I drummed my nails on the tabletop. “I guess I disturbed you for nothing.”

  Marsha stood up. “I’m afraid you did. Does this mean you’ve run out of ideas?”

  Not wanting to feel like a witness on the stand, I got to my feet, too. “No. There are still some avenues to explore. But I must caution you,” I went on, hoping to sound at least semi-legal, “that after today, I won’t be able to devote much time to your . . . project until after the Wednesday edition is put to bed Tuesday afternoon.”

  “Great,” Marsha said sarcastically. “Then again, I don’t see that you’ve made much progress with time to spare.”

  “I seldom have time to spare,” I snapped. “You might remember that I’m doing this as a favor.”

  Marsha uttered a laugh that was more of a bark. “And I thought journalists were guardians of truth.”

  “And I thought judges didn’t rush to judgment.” Marsha glared at me, then banged the door as she exited the office.

  We had not parted on cordial terms. If we’d been the leaders of two foreign nations, political analysts might have described the meeting as “productive.” Which, I had long ago learned to interpret, meant the two parties hadn’t killed each other.

  I bailed out of the office at precisely four o’clock. When I got home, there were two messages awaiting me. The first was from Ben.

  “Out cavorting on the Sabbath,” he said, adding a “tsk, tsk.” “Call me if you get back by four your time. Which, come to think of it, is ours, too, since we don’t go on Daylight Saving Time in Arizona. The sun is always shining here. Dammit.”