“Right. Thanks for the coffee. See you.” He almost ran out of the cabin, his face crimson. He left his pen behind. It was a nice pen, a Shaeffer. It was still warm.
Seventeen
Edge of the forest you lose your breath
trip over a sliver of bone
flat-nosed to the cinnamon loam
you laugh at death.
—Shepherd’s Pie
Mark Becker and I are wading hand in hand through a spring meadow on soft-focus. We are looking for a secluded spot to spread out a blanket and have thumping, roaring, unprotected sex. I am so hot I am holding my crotch. Suddenly we are surrounded by a herd of large, ferocious white poodles, all snarling. Their teeth are long and yellow. Mark reaches for his gun…
I sat upright, totally bewildered, interrupted by a nightmare in the middle of a wet-dream. Lug-nut was hysterical, throwing himself against the door of the cabin and I was frozen solid in bed, one hand still glued to my privates, the other stubbornly refusing to respond to my command to grab the matches and light my bedside candle.
Becker had been right. I should have gone down to George’s for a couple of nights. Now I was about to be raped and murdered and Becker would find me first. Or George.
I stayed in that horror-movie mode for what seemed like hours, but was probably only a couple of minutes. Lug-nut was making too much noise for me to be able to hear what was outside, but I felt it—a presence, and I just sat there, hoping it would go away. I said “please” a couple of times, but I don’t know who I was addressing or if I said it aloud. When the presence went away I was too frightened to say thank you.
The dog finally moved away from the door, still whining, and I lit my candle, slipped out of bed and tiptoed into the kitchen area, lighting every candle and oil lamp I could find. No phone, eh? No electricity. No gun. “I can take care of myself,” I’d said. Well, that only applied for as long as I was certain that nobody was out to get me. I looked around the cabin. The only weapon I could find was my hatchet, a beautiful little Estwing with fine balance and a leather handle.
I picked it up and hefted it. Solid, yes, but with a reach of about eight inches. I supposed I could bonk an intruder on the head with it if he got close enough, but it would be a messy business. If I lived till morning, I resolved to ask George if I could borrow his shotgun—not that I know dick about guns, but a firearm would make me feel a hell of a lot braver than the hatchet made me feel.
I made a big fuss of Lug-nut, praising him for scaring off whoever it was—I had no illusions that it had been a raccoon.
Then I made coffee and settled in for the seige, propping myself up in the armchair next to the stove, cradling the hatchet.
When I woke up, I was stiff and sore. The hatchet had fallen to the floor and Lug-nut was guarding it with both paws, as if it might escape.
I groaned and stretched, discovering a nasty ging in my neck which prevented me from turning my head to the right. If somebody tried to sneak up on me from behind, I was dead.
I lit the burner under last night’s coffee and sat at the kitchen table, whimpering. I have never been good with pain. Aunt Susan once told me never to go into the spy business. She said that the enemy would be able to get secrets out of me just by threatening to cut my fingernails.
Lug-nut was padding around the cabin with a distressed look on his face. I finally realized that he had to go out to do the thing that dogs must do, and I hauled myself upright and opened the door, following him to get a bead on the morning.
While the dog peed against the porch steps, I examined the dead squirrel nailed to the front door.
It was a big one. It had been shot in the head with what I guessed was a pellet rifle, then its belly had been split open. The guts spilled out artistically in a nice cascade of yuck. I threw up over the railing before going back to read the note, which was stuffed into what was left of the squirrel’s mouth.
I handled the paper carefully, by the edges. “STICK TO YOUR GOATS,” was all it said. It was made with cut-out newspaper letters pasted onto a piece of lilac-motif notepaper, slick with squirrel bits. Becker, I hoped, would be able to find fingerprints and maybe even find a pack of lilac notepaper in someone’s desk.
I went back inside, poured coffee and was on my third consecutive cigarette before I noticed that my hands were shaking. It’s all right for some people, I suppose, finding a gruesome body on a Monday, meeting a bear on a Tuesday and getting a maimed squirrel tacked to your door on a Wednesday, but it was way too much for me. I went sort of crazy. First thing I did, even before breakfast, was to roll a really big joint and smoke the whole thing.
According to my herbal remedies guide, dope is an analgesic, anti-asthmatic, antibiotic, anti-epileptic, anti-spasmodic and anti-depressant. It’s a tranquillizer, an appetite stimulant, oxytocic, preventative and anodyne for neuralgia (including migraine), aid to psychotherapy and agent to ease withdrawal from alcohol and opiates. It’s also great stuff in a crisis.
When I smoke dope, the clarity is wonderful. I see the veins in the leaves, the roughness of tree bark, I smell the earth and ideas flow like blood. The negative side of dope is that whatever is uppermost in your mind assumes a paramount importance. So, when Lug-nut and I went down to the barn a little later to do the chores, I carried the image of a dead squirrel on my back like a throbbing emotional hump.
I’d removed the corpse from the door. It had been jammed onto the nail which lives there holding up a scrap of paper and a pencil on a string. When I go out, I usually scrawl a note telling where I’ve gone and when I’ll be back, just in case someone drops by. In the boonies, this is not interpreted as an invitation to burglary, but rather as a pleasant and neighbourly practice. It had been, in this case, abused.
After I pulled the squirrel off the nail, (it made a faint sucking noise which almost made me throw up again), I dumped it into a big plastic baggie and put it into the top compartment of the icebox, next to the block of ice. I put the note into another baggie and slipped it into my desk. Exhibits A and B.
In the barn I did the chores quickly, feeding the kids a bottle of warm milk stripped from Erma Bombeck's teat, in case they weren’t getting enough the regular way. I doled out hay and grain with more than half my mind on who the hell had sent me the squirrel. I was so distracted I forgot to sing while I was milking, and production was down by several ounces, which made me feel guilty.
After the barn chores, I went up to George’s place and slipped in to use the phone. George was up, bustling around the kitchen.
“Are you all right, Polly?” he said. “You look terrible.”
I told him about my night-visitor and the squirrel, then asked him if I could borrow his gun.
“You are joking, yes?” he said.
“Nope. I don’t want it loaded or anything, George. I just, you know, thought it would be a good thing to have. To wave around if I needed to. Sort of a talisman.”
“Huh. A talisman for trouble, maybe,” he said. “You don’t have a firearms certificate, for one thing. It is registered to me, and if you were caught with it, I’d get the blame. Considering that you are spending all your time with that policeman, I think you are better off without it.”
“Okay, okay, I was just asking.” It was a stupid idea anyway.
“Maybe you had better stay here for a few days,” George said, “until this mess is all settled.” It was daylight now. I wasn’t scared any more. I was angry.
“The cabin is my home, George. I’m not going to be harassed out of my home by some nutbar who likes to dismember squirrels. Besides, I’ve got Lug-nut and he did a pretty good job of scaring the guy away.”
“Well, just keep him with you all the time, then.”
“I was planning to.”
I called the police station and after I sat on hold for five minutes, Becker picked it up.
“What is it, Polly? I’m in the middle of a meeting.”
“Someone came up to the cabin last night.”
“Who?”
“They weren’t invited, Mark. I don’t know. It was the middle of the night.”
“Are you okay?”
“I’m fine. The dog went nuts and whoever it was went away, but he left a message behind that I think you should see.”
“He left a note?”
“In a way. It said stick to your goats’.”
“It said what?”
“And the piece of paper it was written on was shoved into the mouth of a dismembered squirrel nailed to my front door.”
“Jeez. We’ll be over. Don’t go anywhere.”
I said I wasn’t planning to, and Becker hung up.
I accepted a cup of strong, black coffee from George, who had looked hard at my face as I was dialling, concluded that I was stoned and turned on the coffee-maker. George knew I smoked, disapproved, but considered it my business. He didn’t lecture me, just asked me to acknowledge that this was no time to be on a different planet.
While we were waiting for the cops, Francy called.
“I’m back at home now,” she said. “The place is—Polly, they left it all like it was. The cop who brought me back last night just took down the tape and said it was okay to go inside. The kitchen is—oh, God. I went to sleep on the couch, just curled up in a little ball.”
I remembered the state of things when I’d been in to get the dog food. Not a pleasant welcome. “That sucks, Francy. They should have warned you. Could you use a hand cleaning up?”
“Oh, yeah. Would you? I know it’s a lot to ask, but I can’t stay here without some sort of, you know, exorcism. Maybe we could burn some sage or something. If I don’t stay here, I’ll have to go stay with my in-laws in North Bay, and we kinda don’t get along. I’d rather stay at home, but right now it’s like I’m living in a haunted house, you know?”
I told her I would try to get over there in a couple of hours, that I had an appointment first, though I didn’t explain what it was about. I figured she had a big enough case of the creeps as it was, and there was no reason to add to it. The cops had told her that Lug-nut was with me and she thanked me for taking him.
“That dog’s never liked me, and the feeling is mutual,” she said. “And now I’m scared he’d hurt Beth. You can keep him if you want.” I told her that I’d be glad to, and that I would see her soon.
I went out to the porch with my coffee, where George was sitting on the steps with Lug-nut. The dog was sort of leaning against him while George scratched him behind the ears. Lugnut turned his head as I came out and looked at me. Somehow, he knew he was mine, now. Or I was his. Whatever.
“How come Francy hated you so much?” I said.
“Huh?” George spun around.
“Lug-nut, not you.”
“Oh. Well, he was John’s dog,” George said.
When Becker and Morrison arrived, I told the whole story again, and then the three of us hiked up to the cabin to collect the evidence. I was surprised that Morrison wanted to go—maybe he was curious about where I lived, or maybe he was aware of something starting up between me and Becker, and just wanted to be in the way, like a little brother. Anyway, the hike cost him and he was wheezing by the time we got to my front door.
I was sure that there was still the faint smell of grass in the air, but the cops didn’t seem to notice it, or, if they did, they didn’t comment. I opened the icebox and brought out the baggie with its grisly contents. Becker peered at it for a moment, then handed it to Morrison, who took it delicately between thumb and forefinger.
“Ugly,” Becker said. I passed him the bag with the note and he shot me an approving glance. “You didn’t handle it, then?”
“Only by the edges. Maybe you can get some prints from it.”
“Maybe, maybe not, but it was good thinking, Polly.”
Morrison sneered at Becker’s tone and looked away. Then he laughed, a short, sharp bark. I followed his gaze and found he was looking directly at the puppet-head I had finished the night before, after Becker had left. It was a pretty accurate portrait, if I do say so myself. I had been proud of it up until then, but now I would have done anything to have it disappear off the face of the earth.
“What’s your problem, Morrison?” Becker said. He hadn’t noticed the head yet. When he did see it, I knew he would be uncomfortable—maybe flattered, but more likely just embarrassed. It would be like seeing your name scrawled in someone’s math notebook in high school. Your name ringed with hearts and flowers and mottoes. I cringed.
“No problem, Becker. None at all,” Morrison said, surprising me no end. He moved his bulky body between Becker and the work table, blocking his partner’s view. I could have kissed him. I owed him one and he knew it, too.
Becker brought his gaze back to the baggie with the note inside, and Morrison caught my eye. He winked.
On the way back down to George’s, Becker again tried to convince me to shack up with George for a while. I answered him the same way I had George. Both cops seemed to think I was just being stubborn for the sake of it.
“It’s not like you have to prove anything, Polly,” Becker said with some exasperation. “We all know what an independent, self-sufficient woman you are. But this…” he shook the squirrel-baggie, “is proof that someone wants to hurt you. Being up there in that place with no phone means you’re a sitting duck.”
“Maybe she’s holding out for some twenty-four-hour-a-day police protection,” Morrison said, an innocent smile on his face. I shot him a look, but he let it slide right over him.
“I don’t need protection,” I said. “I have the dog, okay? Just drop it, would you please?” Becker dropped it, but, while Morrison was stowing the baggies in the trunk of the cruiser he tried again, very quietly.
“Be extra careful, please. I don’t want to pick you up in a body bag tonight.”
“Charming image.”
“Charm is my strong suit, eh?” He smiled in a way that left my knees feeling funny. “I’ll see you at seven-thirty, with another statement for you to sign. You’re creating too much paperwork. Cut it out.”
“Okay. I’ll wait until you catch up,” I said. “See you later.”
I watched the cruiser bounce and swerve its way down the potholed sideroad and then went to ask George for the truck. Francy was waiting for me, and after visiting her, I planned to look in on Freddy at the dump. Not to do any detecting, mind you. Just to pass the time of day, that’s all.
Eighteen
I should have known
the shufflings of strangers
would unhinge me.
—Shepherd’s Pie
Blood sure stains, eh?” Francy said. She was on her knees scrubbing the kitchen floor. We had argued over who would actually do the dirty work. I thought it would be too much for her, emotionally speaking, if not physically, but she insisted. With both of us doing it, it wasn’t so bad, like we were spring-cleaning before a visit from relatives.
“Yup. It’s the protein,” I said, then wished I hadn’t. Protein meant meat and I suddenly saw John’s body again. I was collecting beer bottles and sweeping up the broken glass. The morning sun streamed through the window and Beth sat in her carrier in the sunlight, playing with the dust in the air, batting at it with her tiny fists.
“Of course, any woman with her period knows that blood stains, I guess,” Francy said. “Once something has blood on it and it dries, you can never get it out.” It felt like we were in a Pinter play.
Cleaning up the kitchen didn’t take us that long, once we got started. Francy poured bleach over the remaining dark patch on the floor-boards and I made tea while we waited for it to soak in, staring at it like it was a Polaroid we had just taken.
“How are you feeling, Francy? Were the police hard on your?”
“I’m okay. The police were very nice, actually. The big guy especially.”
“Really?”
“He was the one who did most of the questioning. I was a real mess the last time I saw you
, you know. Still in shock, I guess. But your aunt, she straightened me out.”
It still hurt that Francy had sneaked away from me to be with Aunt Susan instead, but I didn’t say so.
“Susan’s good at straight-talk,” I said. “Did you remember what happened?”
“Not really. At least, nothing more than what I already told you. I was drunk and pretty high when Eddie came over, and we had a couple more beers before John came home and started beating on me. Then we took off to the Schreier’s place after Eddie clobbered John over the head. God, Polly. You should’ve seen Eddie go for him. It was like a scene in one of those Kung-Fu movies where the nerdy guy goes nuts. When John went down—I said this to the cops too, so don’t worry—I did wonder if Eddie hit him too hard. Just wondered. Maybe that’s why my head went blank after that. That’s still all I remember.”
“And you told the police all this.”
“Yup. They didn’t push it. It was a relief to know that Eddie didn’t kill him with the wrench, though. The big cop said if he hadn’t been shot he would’ve needed a few stitches, but the head-wound didn’t kill him. I’m real glad about that.”
“Did the cops ask you any, you know, leading questions? Anything that might incriminate you?”
“I dont know. I don’t know what might do that. They asked about money. About how we were doing financially and if we owed money to anybody. Of course we did. We owed money all over the place, but not to anybody who would kill for it, I said.”
“Was there anything pressing, though? Like a gambling debt?”
“They asked that, too. I told them about John selling that stuff to Rico. John said he wanted to get some new piece of machinery for the shop.”
“You let him sell your table for a piece of machinery?”
“He said it was important. “
“Did you believe him?”
She looked at me and smiled a little. Her face was still swollen, the eye still half-closed. “It was never smart to show him you thought he was lying,” she said. “Best thing to do was take him at face value. I told you I was planning to leave him anyway. That table didn’t mean anything to me anymore. I was gonna be out of here.”
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