by Kieran York
“I’m glad they got here. Another couple of days without my butterscotch fix, and I’d need to go on to the harder stuff. Maybe spearmint,” Royce joked. “Gran got any packages?”
“Got one that I know of.” Bonnie’s stout, large-boned frame stutter-stepped down the crowded aisle. She moved behind the boxed, caged window of the postal area. “Isn’t that little place of your Gran’s about filled up by now?” Her chocolate-colored eyes beamed from her circular face. Dove-gray hair was tightly curled and created a sphere around her head.
“When Gran gets tired of something, she gives it away. Last week she got some kitty grooming comb that you place on the corner of a wall. Elsa was supposed to rub up against it. Poor cat thought it was the most ridiculous thing she’d ever seen.” Royce grinned as she shook her head. “Gran put it up higher and uses it for her own back scratch.”
Bonnie simpered. “That’s your Gran. Well, Dora does get some useful things. Got herself that cordless card shuffler. It’s a dandy. Used it last week for our bridge game.”
“Where’s Orson today?”
“Sent that old man of mine to Denver for some supplies. Never can get those overalls offa him 'cept when he goes to the city. Havin’ our forty-eighth wedding anniversary this summer and I just bet that old back-number will wear those blasted overalls.”
“Naw. Denims maybe, but not overalls.”
“Aw, I shouldn’t complain. He’s filled the bill for most all of my life.” Digging through a bundle of packages, Bonnie retrieved a small one. “This is your Gran’s. Say, what do you think of this murder business? Guess that Ray fella done it.”
“They’re just holding him for questioning. I’m not convinced he’s the killer.” Royce controlled her statement.
“If he didn’t do it, then we got us a killer runnin’ loose.” Bonnie leaned across the counter and speculated, “I say it musta been the Indian. There was that donnybrook with the other deputy. So why’d Ray take a swing at Nick if there wasn’t somethin’ he was hiding?”
“Maybe he was provoked. Or maybe he doesn’t trust the legal system. I’m not discounting the fact that there may very well be a murderer at large.” Royce grasped the rolls of butterscotch. With a lift to her upper lip, she smiled. “I am glad I’ve got my butterscotch to get me through the investigation.”
***
Royce’s walk to the wall telephone at the corner had been jaunty. But after a brief conversation with Valeria, she plodded back to her Blazer. Valeria had listened to the report on Smoky. She had told Royce that she was picking up the Chandlers at the airport later that afternoon and wasn’t certain when she could see Royce. But she would keep in touch. In touch, Royce thought with an emptiness, was a hollow prize. She wanted to comfort Valeria. She had shivered as she slipped the receiver back into its plastic pocket. She recalled wiping the moist mask of tears from Valeria’s face. She remembered her heart aching.
Royce’s Blazer forged the narrow, rutted gravel road to the cabin. Royce felt a surge of warmth each time she saw Gran’s cabin coming into view. It was her respite. Those seasoned, weathered logs had been constructed with care and with love. The cabin was surrounded by pines and shrubs. Bird feeders hung from bare lower branches. Stacked cords of wood leaned against the cabin’s sturdy exterior wall.
The inside of the cabin was alive with planters of geraniums that filled window ledges. There were small potted violets on the mossrock fireplace that covered one living room wall. Antique bellows hung from its mantel. A sofa, oak glider rocker, a three-sided curio cabinet, gun rack, oak hassock with tapestry top, and an assortment of leaded-glass Victorian brass lamps filled the room. A paint-chipped wooden rocking horse stabled in a corner. It had belonged to Royce’s father, and then Royce.
One of the three tiny bedrooms belonged to Royce. A brass bed, cedar chest, and armoire crowded the room. Royce was comfortable with the earth colors of rust, forest green, and camel in the draperies and comforter.
The heart of the cabin was its kitchen. On one side was a Franklin stove. In the center was a round oak table with ball and claw base. Arrowback chairs surrounded it. Cheery floral wallpaper and hanging utensils decorated the walls.
Pots of herbs freshened the room and were responsible for the seasoning of meals. And those meals were shared with family problems, joys, and memories. Decisions were made, challenges met, laughter churned, and tears spilled around that table. There was no other warmth that felt the same as the crackling morning fire in that Franklin stove. There was no other sound like the yawn of the floorboards when Royce walked across them to pour her first cup of coffee each morning.
Royce’s first memories were of that kitchen. It was a treasure trove adventure. It hinted at mystical culinary harvests. An alchemic transformation converted bushels of fruits and vegetables into rows of labeled glass jars. It was intrigue. Magic produced blackberry and plum jam; quince and spiced orange jelly. The large crock of briny cucumbers and vegetables became pickled treats.
Royce’s grandmother was the beating force in that heart-kitchen, and cabin. Dora Madison’s diminutive stick figure seemed far too energized to belong to a seventy-five-year-old woman. Her gray, biscuit-toned hair was pulled back into a bun and framed an ivory face. Opalescent blue eyes beamed from beneath pixy brows that lifted at their centers. Her nose, long and thin, was surrounded by gullies of laugh lines. Gran was jocular and witty. She could create joy. The flipside was that she could also create huge helpings of guilt when she pursed her lips and scowled.
Dora Madison was sensitive to Royce’s emotions. She knew when Royce entered that her granddaughter needed some time alone. Royce showered, put on her pajamas, and tucked her weary body into the flannel coziness of her bed.
Only then did Gran enter. She sat on the bed and ruffled her granddaughter’s tufts of spraying hair. Royce was glad for the opportunity to ventilate. “Gran, the one part of this job I can’t get used to is sleeping during the day.” She punched the pillow to emphasize her complaint. “Reminds me of napping and I was never very good at that,” she grumbled.
“Your mama is upset about this murder business. Knew she would be. Figured she’d light into you about bein’ a deputy. But she does love you, Roycie. She surely does.”
“I wish she had pride in me. I’m not on the streets hooking or dealing drugs.” Royce watched as the prowling Elsa pounced onto the bed beside her. “Elsa misses Smoky. No one for her to bully.”
“Elsa is the sheriff,” Gran chuckled. “All the reports I been getting tell that Smoky is doin’ better. When you took her in, she looked like she’d been dragged through a hedge backward.”
Elsa snuggled into the crook of Royce’s arm. Royce felt prickling whiskers against her face. “Elsa has the best of both worlds. Curls up with you nights, and days she snugs in with me.” Royce hesitated and then said, “Gran, make sure you lock the doors nights. Someone tried to poison Smoky. I worry about you being here on your own.”
“I worry about you bein’ out there. Your mother thinks that the murderer is still free. Molly and me, we have our differences, but we sure agree on one thing. We want you safe, Roycie. She lost her husband. The thought of losin’ her only daughter is more than flesh and blood can stand.”
“I don’t want you worried. Or Mom.”
“I worry about you bein’ happy. Finding someone and settling in.”
Royce felt her face flush and her eyes swayed from Gran’s gaze. “It isn’t easy. Finding love. Life is an internalized kind of thing. Love is the opposite. Maybe I’m stuck between. Finding the right person and their finding you at the same time seems impossible.” Royce buried the gender pronouns.
“Your grandpa had a saying about how life’s mostly a search. Like looking for gold, love is. You gotta know where you’re looking and not be fooled by pyrite. Fool’s gold folks, your grandpa would call 'em. Gold is harder to come by. Deeper in the mountains. But you just need to keep searching. When you find the true gold, you’ll know.
Don’t you be settlin’ for fool’s gold.” Gran reached over and kissed Royce’s temple. “Enough about prospecting. You get some shuteye.”
Royce squeezed under her covers into the dark textile cave. She heard Elsa’s accusing purr of abandonment. Royce’s arm looped the cat and pulled her near. She burrowed her face against the temporary safety of Elsa’s fur.
Royce considered the bliss of sleeping with Valeria and the emptiness of sleeping without her. Their conversation had been brief. Valeria was back in her forbidden zone. Royce could only await her call. Valeria would issue the invitation.
In the meantime, there was a murderer out there, Royce mulled. Scrambling clues belonged to an interlocking puzzle. Royce’s eyes refused to clamp shut. Shakily, she prowled the facts. Apocryphal facts haphazardly stacked. Until the murder was solved, everyone was in danger.
Royce wanted her family to be safe. She wanted Valeria safe. She wanted her friends to be safe. She wanted Smoky well. She wanted Timber City’s safety.
And how could that be, her mind questioned. Timber City was in the direct shade of a murder.
Chapter 5
Frigid gusts swept across crystalline blue skies that morning. Small meadow firs bowed, and the American flag snapped. The crowd at the Timber City cemetery began to disperse. Royce lifted the tan, pile-trimmed collar of her uniform jacket in an effort to block the wind. Pressing her sunglasses back firmly, she stretched to see Valeria. Black clad, with reddened face veiled beneath dark netting, Valeria walked with the Chandlers.
Royce wondered whether it would have been easier if Trish had been in an accident, rather than victim of a homicide. There was so much suffering on the mourner’s faces. She wanted to reach out to Valeria, but she could not intrude on their sorrow. She was the hidden lover. Bitterly, Royce watched as Trish’s defunct body was eased into the ground. She rebuked herself for thinking only of her own pain. Emotionally charged events bring self-examination, she deliberated.
Watching her leggy, sophisticated lover move toward the midnight black limo, Royce felt a desire to make love with Valeria. She wanted to kiss her warm, wet mouth. To press their bodies together with their secret surrounding them. The sensual thought made Royce’s face flush. She crushed her daydream and closed her eyes in disgust for having such thoughts. Valeria was steadying Mrs. Chandler. Valeria was grieving. Royce wondered how she could have allowed herself those thoughts of exquisite intimacy. Certainly, Valeria was not thinking about Royce. Valeria was not thinking of their braided bodies and the scalding heat of their affair. Her somber eyes had only tapped Royce twice. Both times the glimpse quickly shifted.
“Good turnout,” Bonnie Laird blurted, interrupting Royce’s self-condemnation. Gwen was at her side and gave Royce’s arm a squeeze of camaraderie. Bonnie rattled, “But I ’spected there would be lotsa folks show up. Even if wind nearly knocks a person down to the ground. Us Cousin Jacks and Cousin Jennys stick together. Good to see the Chandlers. We’ve known 'em since Hector was a pup. Gives me the heebie-jeebies with all the killing business. Hope Trish’s killer roasts in hell. Why that sweet little angel, Trish. She looked so natural.” Pausing, Bonnie gushed, “Just natural as all getout. Why there’s Orson waiting on me.” Bonnie trudged toward her husband.
“Natural!” Gwen grumbled. “Hell, I think people lose their marbles when they near a graveyard. Natural. She was a corpse and she looked dead. That’s hardly the most natural way anyone can look.” Gwen muffled her chuckle. “Bodies always have that rubbery pallor. Natural! And angel? Trish was a party animal. Angel, no. Hell’s bells. People really lose it when they get out here.” Gwen inspected Royce’s brooding expression. “Yancy recruit you to escort the procession?”
“I volunteered. I have tonight off.”
“Thought it might be so you could see your luscious dragon lady. Be there in her hour of need.”
“She still hasn’t called. She’s been busy with the funeral arrangements.”
“She could have picked up a goddamn phone. Two years of being her puppet and your excuses on her behalf are even beginning to sound like her. Lap dog.”
“Dog. That reminds me. Smoky gets sprung from the clinic tomorrow.”
“You’ll be able to see that adorable vet,” Gwen said with a wink. “Well, I’d like to stand here and chat, but the wind is nearly blowing my tits off and my ass is getting frozen. I’d better get back to the Times. Nadine needs a lunch break. Need to get the funeral story typed. Another sweet little angel for heaven’s casting-call.”
***
Dresden blue afternoon skies were chilled and filled with warnings of an impending spring storm. Royce had changed into a heavy woolen sweater, old denims, and hiking boots. She had donned her leather worker’s gloves and gone to the stack of wood next to the cabin.
She tucked a log between two downed tree trunks and began splitting wood. She wanted to be remote and to burn energy. Chopping firewood was the answer. Puffing, she swung the sledgehammer and hit an iron wedge over and over. Pine scents filled the air. Each time the wood cracked as it split, chipmunks chattered with displeasure. Gloom was easing with each swing of Royce’s sledge. Her body seemed to be overheating, and she continued to pound with every bit of shoulder strength.
Wood chips flipped through the air and became patterns on the bare ground. Bald from the tromping of feet, a circle of mountain loom was edged by flattened tundra. An occasional spurt of shaggy grass lifted. Bordering the house were waves of snow. These snowbanks were lightly peppered with chimney ash. Royce knew that those crusts would be covered again by the predicted snow flurries.
That was also the reason she had left the cemetery and driven back to Timber Gulch. She wanted to give the murder scene one final scouring. Tomorrow a snow coverlet would bury any clues. She had prowled the area. It was squeaky clean. No sign of a struggle. That might indicate the killer was someone Trish trusted.
Royce put down the sledgehammer. Carefully, she stacked the wood. Her mind continued speculating. Raw-material clues yield finished-product resolutions. That was what one of her criminology professors had repeated. So why was her sagacity on leave? Nothing was fitting. Priori, posteriori, cause, effect. . . chicken, egg . . . her mind skirmished. It was preposterous that the list of suspects seemed to intertwine and yet conceal one another.
There was Ray. He could be a psychopath. Certainly he had exhibited aggressive behavior. Was he asocial? Unable to form bonds of affection? But there was his love for his sister. Was there a pattern of feeling little or no guilt? Not really. The characteristic didn’t fit. Even his songs, those tender lyrics, didn’t fit the profile. But then, Royce argued, psychopaths have the ability to take in a victim, a psychologist, or a cop.
There was the drifter, Royce continued the list. Had he entered the picture by chance after Trish and Luther met? When their meeting concluded, had the drifter murdered Trish? Then had he spotted Ray and had an immediate fall guy to blame? Did he then decide to report the crime and play out his role as a witness?
By Trish’s own admission, she was a wild party doll. Could she have met someone for a quick affair, been killed, and then her body dumped there? An unknown quantity, Mr. X, was a suspect.
Then there was Luther, but he had an alibi. Royce hated to think that Yancy would implicate himself in anything as important as a murder. He had shielded Luther in the past, however. Yancy would not want his baby brother on death row. Certainly, the sheriff’s living standards improved when his brother married into the Chandler family. Luther was generous, everyone assumed. Yancy had built an expensive mountain home and lived well beyond his means. County sheriff’s salaries were not large. Yancy could be beholden to Luther and providing an alibi for that reason.
Luther had gone through his paces at the funeral muzzling any emotion. The tall, good-looking man, with wild, golden hair, would have concealed his emotions regardless of whether he had killed Trish, Royce reflected.
Finally, there was a long shot. The people
affiliated with Peakview Investments. They could have had a hit man murder Trish. But those types of killings usually utilize weapons. Strangulation is not big with the mob, Royce argued.
“That sledgehammer must feel as heavy as a concrete mixer by now,” Dora Madison said as she approached Royce. “You’re really gettin’ after it.”
Panting, Royce realized that she had been mentally battering the murderer. “Lowering the boom on the bad guys, Gran.”
“And it looks like someone forgot to wind up your heart today.”
“I’ll be fine,” Royce promised. She could share a part of her anguish, but not all. She couldn’t tell Gran about Valeria.
As proclaimed by the beautiful teacher, Royce was an outsider. Valeria determined the rules of their affair.
“Birds are doing their afternoon vespers. Sure are singin’ sweet! You’d think they don’t know about the storm on its way. They know. Birds know. Why, my daddy told me they took canaries into mines with them. Warn the miners of poisonous gases. If those little canaries passed out or died, those miners hightailed it outta the mines. My grandpa always got attached to the birds. Think that might be why I love 'em so.” Gran heard the telephone’s blunt ring. “I’ll get that, and you take yourself a rest, girl. You’re red as a raspberry in the face.”
Royce sagged against the cabin logs. She hoped the call wasn’t an emergency. She wanted to finish exhausting herself and then collapse into bed. She wasn’t in the mood to be part of a rescue team tonight. Royce harbored resentment about people straying in the woods, or climbing walls of rock, or being careless. The Rockies deserved respect. And so did the rescue unit, Royce thought. She’d seen rescuers lose their lives because of someone’s hobby. Shooting the rapids, scaling the cliffs, and even wandering in the woods took skill. Each time a team was dispatched, the excuses would be there. Once found and rescued, the claims remained. How experienced a climber, hiker, or boater they are. They would brag about knowing the backcountry. Nobody ever mentioned to the frightened tinhorn that the lives of three dozen volunteers had been in jeopardy. Somehow it wasn’t appropriate. The tenderfoot’s eyes were always too filled with terror.