“When did you meet Enrique?” I asked.
“I couldn’t even tell you, except to say that he was always there, always a part of the group that returned every year. I spent November through July like a hermit, creeping around my big old house, going to school in town but living inside my own little shell. No one could get inside, not that anyone ever tried. By the time summer came, I was crossing the days off on my calendar, wishing them away, living for the moment when those first few trucks and cars full of migrants would come rattling up the hill.”
She chuckled as she described how she spent the first half of every summer reading on a blanket in the yard, toasting her skin in the sun, trying to get herself as dark as they were.
“It never worked, of course, so by the time they got there I was always a red, splotchy, peeling mess. They didn’t care. They didn’t care that my hair was always in tangles or that I had no mother or that my clothes were stained and torn. They were outcasts too, and they pulled me into their world and made me one of them as quickly and simply as if I were a part of it year-round. We always had the fall together, the glorious harvest, when the parents would head into the fields and the children were left to their own devices back at the camp. All year long I worked on my handwriting so that in the fall I could write intelligent, grown-up sounding excuse letters to my teachers so I wouldn’t have to go to school. ‘Karen cannot come to school next week, for she has developed a ventricular aberration of the patella.’ The stupid teachers never knew the difference. I doubt I made it to my classes even half the time during harvest.”
“That’s so sad.”
“What’s sad was when slowly the migrants would start to leave. That’s when Enrique and I grew close, because his family was one of the ones that stayed through to the end. By October there were maybe half a dozen kids left, and Enrique was always my favorite. He was funny and adventurous and between the two of us we were forever building bridges out of twigs or damming the creek with stones or creating playhouses in the kudzu. For several years there, he was my very best friend in the world, and when the end came and his family would load their car and drive away until the next time, I was utterly inconsolable. Those were the times when the housekeeper would write my excuse notes for school for me, real notes that couldn’t begin to touch on what was wrong: ‘Karen could not come to school last week because she was ill,’ when in fact I was locked in my dark bedroom, moaning and crying like the mad wife out of Jane Eyre. Sooner or later I would emerge and everyone would pretend that there was nothing wrong, and I would go back to school, dead inside, until the following summer when my friends would return and I could come back to life again.”
My heart was heavy for her as I continued to work, and I felt a surge of anger toward Lowell Tinsdale for allowing his daughter to suffer so.
“The year I was thirteen,” Karen said softly, not looking at me, “wasn’t nearly as much fun for me as previous years, since the migrant kids my age weren’t free to play anymore. They were working the fields now with their parents, and only the younger ones stayed back at camp. I still hung out with them, but it wasn’t the same, and half the time I felt like a mother or a babysitter rather than a friend. I actually made it to school a lot that year, because fun time with my buddies didn’t really begin until the end of the workday, when they came in from the fields. The nights were still great fun, of course, because then everyone was around and busy and noisy, cooking over their fires and laughing and talking and fighting. But for the first time I started feeling that there was a difference there. My skin wasn’t brown. My hair wasn’t black. Most importantly, I didn’t work hard all day in the sun until my hands bled. I was just the rich white kid who lived in the big house. Suddenly, I didn’t blend in so well anymore.”
Karen got down on her hands and knees and starting scrubbing the floor of the closet.
“Maybe that’s why the relationship between me and Enrique changed. Because I was trying to hold on to something? Because I wanted to keep him close to me, one way or another? All I know is that we went for a walk through the camp late one night and accidentally happened upon a couple making out under the stars. We left right away, of course, but it changed something between us. It put something there that hadn’t been there before.”
“I can imagine.”
“A few days later, we finally got up the nerve to talk about it. Enrique told me he’d never kissed a girl before, but he had thought about it a lot. Of course, I had been thinking about kissing boys. So we met in the barn and agreed to try kissing each other.”
“I think that’s sweet.”
“We were so innocent, Callie. I didn’t love him or even really like him that way, but he was thirteen and he was a boy and he was my friend. So we did it. We kissed.”
“And?”
“And it was scary and fun and tingly and exciting and all those things that a first kiss is. We were trying it again a second time when my father walked into the barn and caught us.”
“Oh, Karen.”
Though I had already known what she was going to say, I could still feel her surprise. I could still feel her pain.
“I can’t even describe for you what happened after that,” she said, and I could see tears filling her eyes as she talked. “My father kicked me out, basically. He sent me to an exclusive all-girls school in Santa Barbara, California—about as far away from North Carolina as you can go and still be in the continental United States. I felt like my world had ended and I had been banished to some far-off kingdom made up of nuns and rules and little girls in plaid uniforms. I came home every Christmas, of course, but in the summers my father always had to find some way to get me out of here before the migrants came. I was usually sent away to summer camp for the month of August, and then it would be time for school to start again in September.”
She rinsed the sponge in the bucket, the water dripping noisily.
“Of course,” she said, “if I hadn’t missed my migrant friends so much, I might even have given the school half a chance, for it really wasn’t such a bad place. At least there was structure there, and adults who inquired after my health and seemed to care that I was smart and mature for my age and a bit talented as well. They did the best they could with me, in any event. By the time I graduated from high school five and a half years later, I had made a home for myself there, of sorts.”
“What happened after graduation?”
She shrugged, dropping the sponge into the water and drying her hands on a nearby towel.
“At that point, there was no reason to come home. I wasn’t a little girl anymore, eager to play with the Mexicans down by the creek. I had no way of knowing what had happened to any of them, though I assumed they were still coming back, year after year, still working their way through harvest. But that part of my life was over. I went to UCLA and ended up falling for one of my professors, a man twenty years my senior.”
She gave me a sardonic smile.
“No psych degree required to figure out that one,” she said. “We were married the day after I graduated from college and stayed together until I finished graduate school. I’d like to say the divorce was painful, but the truth was that it was the best thing that ever happened to me, because it got me going back to church and into therapy. I was finally able to confront some of the truths of my past and make peace with myself.”
“You had a lot of strikes against you,” I said.
“Well, I suppose it’s true what they say, ‘that which doesn’t kill us makes us stronger.’”
She came over to the table and began going through a stack of construction paper, sorting it by color.
“So how’d you end up back here?” I asked.
She was quiet for a long moment, making piles of red, piles of blue, piles of green.
“I worked with the migrant population in Washington state for a couple of years, developing programs, working out solutions for education and health care and housing. But I missed home. I missed the mo
untains. I missed, believe it or not, my stupid father. He had remarried when I was in high school, but when I heard she passed away and then that he had such bad lung problems, it was almost like the Lord was telling me to come home and make my peace. So I came back and started Go the Distance.”
“But you haven’t made your peace.”
“Not yet,” she said evenly. “I’ll get to it.”
“I saw him the other day,” I told her. “And, frankly, Karen, he doesn’t look well.”
She bit her lip and nodded, not replying.
“What about Enrique?” I asked, changing the subject. “Did he remember you when you came back?”
She smiled, and this time it was a warm and genuine smile.
“The day I opened for enrollment here, one of the migrants—one of my old friends—recognized me. Word spread that Karen Tinsdale was back, and by that night about fifteen people showed up at my door. It was probably one of the most special nights of my life. We ate Mexican food and reminisced, and I got to know their spouses and children. I especially liked Enrique’s wife, Luisa, and of course his kids were adorable. Except for the fact that my father and I haven’t yet reconciled, coming back here was the single best decision I have ever made in my life.”
“Did you and Enrique ever acknowledge what had gone on between you?”
“The kiss?” she asked. “Oh, Callie, it was such an unimportant part of our past together. We had years of fun and friendship. The only important thing about the night we kissed was the impact it had on my father and on my life. Enrique and I were just friends. Now my friend is dead, and they’re saying it was murder.”
Karen began putting everything back in the closet. As she did, I couldn’t help picturing her as a sad and lost little girl, spending three-fourths of the year without a single friend. Her story seemed genuine, her relationship with Enrique aboveboard.
Once she had cleared the table, I decided to wipe it off for her. I picked up the bucket and carried it over. It wasn’t until I plunged the sponge into the water, however, that I realized what was there right in front of me: a bucket of cleanser, with tiny pieces of glitter floating on the surface.
Forty-Two
I was out of there by 12:30, confused and frustrated and wondering what to do next. Karen’s story seemed so genuine, so sincere, and yet the physical evidence threw a monkey wrench into the whole thing.
It wasn’t until I was several blocks away, however, that I realized I had never gotten around to asking her about the expensive car purchase that Go the Distance had made. I turned around and drove to the car dealer that had made the sale, figuring I could finesse the answer that way.
It didn’t take long. There were only three salesmen on the floor, and when I asked for the same person who usually dealt with Karen Weatherby at Go the Distance, one of them raised his hand and said, “Guilty as charged!”
For some reason, the three of them thought that was hilarious, so I laughed along with them, waiting until the other two disappeared back into their offices before launching into my tale.
“Karen’s a friend of mine,” I said, “and I know she’s happy with the vehicle that she purchased here. I thought I might see if you have any more like that.”
“On the lot?” he asked, blinking so excessively that I had a feeling it was either a nervous tic or this was his first day with contact lenses. “No, that was a special order.”
“It was,” I said. “Do you have the details on it? Because I may want to buy exactly the same thing.”
His eyes stopped blinking and instead lit up, and I could almost picture little cartoon cash registers going off inside his pupils. Reluctantly, I followed him into his office, where he went through a drawer until he found what he was looking for. Slapping some papers down on the desk in front of me, he asked if I would be wanting the 21-foot model, or if the 18-foot would do.
As we talked and I tried not to sound stupid, I slowly figured out what he was telling me. The $49,000 purchase hadn’t been a car at all, but a mobile unit for the education center. Custom-fitted with desks, computers, special wiring and phones, it was basically a second Go the Distance on wheels. I felt fairly ignorant that I hadn’t figured that out myself, especially since Karen had talked about her mobile branch. What did I think she was using—a bicycle?
Specs in hand, I thanked the salesman and cut the conversation short, saying I would get back to him once a decision had been made.
“It takes a long time to get those in from the company,” he called after me. “And then the custom work takes a while as well. So don’t delay!”
“I’ve got time,” I told him, giving a wave and then getting into my car. As I drove away, I set the papers on the empty seat, planning to add them to the case file at MORE.
I headed there now, wanting to touch base with Harriet—not to mention Dean and Natalie—and then use the phone to call the medical examiner. I wanted to find out if the sparkles in Enrique’s lungs were ordinary glitter and if the chemical that had eaten away his insides had yet been determined.
On the way, I called in to see if anyone wanted me to pick up some lunch. I reached Harriet, who sounded as if she were flying.
“I did it, Callie!” she whispered excitedly into the phone. “I detected.”
“You detected what?”
“I did something a detective would do. My heart’s still fluttering like a hummingbird’s wings in a sugar factory.”
“What happened, Harriet?”
“Well, it all sort of came together by accident. I got a hankering for a barbecue sandwich for lunch, see, and Dean told me the best barbecue in town was at a little place called the Pig Stop on Chester Lane.”
“The Pig Stop?”
“I know. It sounds disgusting, but he was right. It was the best barbecue I’ve had since Podner’s, and it came with really good cole slaw too. Anyway, while I was there waiting for my sandwich, who should walk in but Butch Hooper.”
Why didn’t I like the sound of where this was going?
“What’d you do, Harriet?”
“After he ordered his sandwich, he came over and said hello, and I invited him to share my table while he waited for his food.”
“Okay.”
“Once he sat down, he asked me if I had thought any more about the vacation house I wanted to build here—”
“What vacation house?”
“The one I told him about at the bowling alley last night, when I was trying to distract him from you and Snake.”
“All right, go ahead.”
“Okay, so anyway, he asked me if I had thought any more about my vacation house, and all of a sudden I got an idea from a detective show I saw once. Maybe it was a TV movie. Anyway, I remember them saying that the best way to see if someone is honest is to give them an opportunity to be dishonest.”
“Oh, Harriet—”
“No, Callie, it went perfectly! I’ve been wondering if all this sneaky stuff at Su Casa with Zeb Hooper involved Butch Hooper as well. But now I feel sure that Butch is an honest man. He turned my proposition down flat.”
“And what, exactly, did you propose?” I asked, a part of me not wanting to know.
“I threw a deal on the table. For my vacation house. I had already told him last night that I wanted to do the floors in this incredibly expensive Italian marble. Today, I simple elaborated on that. I said that I have a friend who drives a delivery truck for the marble company. I said we place the order, the guy delivers it, but then we say it never showed up. The company’s insurance covers the lost load, and we get a second shipment for free. I said he and I could split the difference.”
“Harriet!” I said. “That’s crazy.”
“I don’t know, Callie. I got exactly the reaction I was hoping to get: I made him an offer he couldn’t refuse—and then he refused it!”
“What did he say?”
“He got kind of mad and disgusted. He said he really didn’t think we could do business together, and
that he would appreciate it if I would look elsewhere for a construction company.”
“How do you know he wasn’t onto you?” I asked. “I mean, he knows you’re here with me. Don’t you think he’s smart enough to have figured out you might be testing him?”
“Oh, I’m positive he didn’t suspect a thing. I saw his gut reaction, Callie, and it confirmed for me that he is a man of character.”
Pulling up next to a small roadside fruit stand, I wrapped up the phone call. I would have to have a serious talk with Harriet later about “detecting.” By taking her along to the bowling alley last night, I realized now that I had created a monster. I only hoped I could nip this new proclivity of hers in the bud. Just as you wouldn’t operate on someone unless you’d been to medical school, I would tell her, you shouldn’t go out detecting unless you have the training and a license.
Forty-Three
My lunch ended up being a wonderful assortment of vegetables and fruits. I bought a tomato, a cucumber, and two plums, and when I got to the office I washed them, sliced them, and ate each one in turn.
Though I was eager to touch base with Dean and Natalie, they were currently out of the office. It was just as well, because the thing I wanted most to do was to get on the phone with the medical examiner and find out what new information had been uncovered about the body of Enrique Morales.
When I reached Dr. Grant, he remembered who I was and pulled the file on Enrique so he could give me the information without error. Fortunately, he still assumed I was somehow entitled to this information, so I didn’t disabuse him of that notion.
“Let’s see… All right, the chemical that ate him up was a combination of sodium hydrosulfite and sodium bisulfite.”
“What is that?”
“They’re both reducing agents, and they’re used in a variety of ways, primarily in manufacturing.”
“Manufacturing? Are you telling me he was drowned in a vat at some production plant?”
“It’s possible. Though it’s just as likely that he drowned in a water treatment facility or in a bucket of stain remover. These chemicals are very versatile.”
A Dime a Dozen Page 27