by R. R. Irvine
His head shook slowly from side to side. “I should have seen it coming. I should have realized that Penny would go off looking for her mother.”
“What do you know about Earl Jordan’s killing?”
“The police informed me about it, of course. Other than that, I don’t know the details. I didn’t ask for any.”
Traveler stared, wondering if that was the truth. “Penny tells me her mother stopped writing to her about six months ago.”
“More like a year. I’d held back some of her letters. When more stopped coming, I parceled out those I’d accumulated to Penny one at a time. Six months ago I ran out.” He chewed at his lower lip. “Whatever else Martha is, she was a good mother. It’s not like her to stop writing.”
“What do you think happened?”
“I wish I knew, Mr. Traveler.”
“I understand Penny called the sheriff in Lydel Springs.”
“That’s right. All Martha’s letters were postmarked from there.”
“Penny showed me some of those letters. Do you have any more?”
“There might be some in my daughter’s room.”
“May I take a look?”
“Of course. I’ll show you myself.” Varney led the way, The Book of Mormon clutched to his chest like an amulet against evil.
Penny’s room was done in white, white walls, white carpet, white curtains, white furniture. The lack of color made her collection of teddy bears look all the more cheerful. They lined three windowsills; they sat in a careful row atop a vanity table; they lounged on a writing desk; they marched across the pillows at the head of her bed.
“This is just the way my daughter left it,” Varney said.
“She must be a very tidy young lady.”
“My sister insists. She says you never know when we might have company.”
Traveler opened both closets. Clothes were displayed as precisely as the bears.
“Does she ever come home to change?”
“You’d have to ask my sister about that.”
Traveler checked the desk. Its middle drawer was divided into neat compartments, one filled with pencils, another paper clips, and still another with erasers. At the rear of the drawer he found a well-worn address book.
He thumbed through it quickly. Two names were on the flyleaf, Martha and Penny Varney. The rest of the book was filled with entries. “Do you mind if I take this along?”
“Just so I get it back when you’re finished.” There was a hint of despair in Varney’s tone, as though the book might eventually become a memento of the daughter he’d lost forever.
By the time they went back downstairs, Pearl Varney was waiting for them. She had set up a card table in her brother’s study. On it were cups of hot milk and a plate of cookies.
“I made them myself,” she said as if anything else were unthinkable.
“Aren’t you going to join us?” Traveler asked her.
She looked to her brother for guidance. When none came, she shook her head and left the room.
“Please,” Varney said, “help yourself.”
Traveler sampled a cookie. It was filled with raisins and spiced with nutmeg and cinnamon. His stomach was immediately grateful.
He went through another cookie before asking, “Would you take your wife back if she came home?”
“That’s none of your business, Traveler.”
Traveler smiled. For the first time in their conversation, the Mr. had been dropped from his name. It gave him a perverse satisfaction to say, “Maybe I ought to speak with your sister.”
“Does that mean you’re going to help us?”
He thought about the white room upstairs filled with teddy bears that looked as if they’d never been hugged. “I’ll do what I can.”
Varney insisted on shaking hands again. As he did so he drew a deep breath. His chest expanded. A smile came to his face. He had the look of a man who has suddenly been relieved of a great burden. “You’ll find Pearl in the kitchen.” With that, he turned his back and began studying his Book of Mormon.
The kitchen was old-fashioned enough to have walls of tile, once white but now yellowed with age. The tiles on the floor were the same color, only much larger squares. Everything else had been updated, including a stove and refrigerator that gleamed like polished brass.
Pearl Varney, who had her back turned, was mopping bloody footprints from the floor. Traveler froze in midstep until he saw the pair of knee-high rubber boots off to one side, their soles and sides matted with bright red mud.
When he cleared his throat, she swung around, obviously startled. Her complexion was as white as snow. One hand went to her chest. “I didn’t mean to frighten you.”
“Dear God, I thought you were a ghost.”
6
TRAVELER THOUGHT he was seeing a ghost, too, as he left the house. Or perhaps it was his imagination that there had been movement in the aspen grove.
He stared into the blowing snow until his eyes watered. After a moment he shrugged, put his head down, and trudged toward the car. But as he pulled open the door, he glanced back one more time. The figure gliding through the trees, even blurred as it was by falling snow, was definitely not an apparition.
As a distraction, Traveler snapped his fingers like a man who’d forgotten something and slowly began plodding back toward the house. Halfway there, at a point where the walkway took him nearest the aspens, he veered suddenly and charged into the trees.
The ghost ran. From behind he looked like a three-hundred-pound lineman rushing some unseen quarterback.
Traveler’s tackle knocked the man facedown in the snow. Air whooshed out of him. When Traveler rolled him over, the man’s mouth was working furiously, spitting out snow while trying desperately to pull oxygen into his lungs.
The man wasn’t really big. He was all clothes, bulky layers of them to protect against the cold.
Traveler straddled him, using his knees to pin the man’s arms at his sides. Almost gently, Traveler wiped snow from his victim’s face.
“I’ve seen you before,” Traveler said, unable to attach a name for the moment.
By now the man had recovered enough strength to struggle. But he didn’t have the mobility to free himself.
“Let me up,” he said breathlessly.
“I remember now. You’re Reuben Dixon.”
Traveler eased back on his heels before slowly rising to his feet.
Immediately Dixon began feeling around in the snow. “I’ve lost my glasses.”
“That’s what you get for spying on people.”
“Here they are, you bastard.” Dixon clamped a glove between his teeth and pulled it off. His bare fingers trembled as he wiped snow from the lenses. Then he slipped on the glasses, blinked, and said, “I ought to sue you for assault.”
Traveler bent over and helped the man to his feet. “I haven’t assaulted you . . . yet.”
Wide-eyed, Dixon backed away until he found himself pinned against an aspen. Snow tumbled onto his head from the overburdened spring leaves.
“You aren’t going anywhere until I get some answers,” Traveler said, moving in so close they were almost touching.
Dixon’s head swung from side to side as if seeking a route of escape. He had a narrow skeletal face and eyes that were always on the move. His cheekbones jutted out sharply, adding to his death’s-head appearance, while his bulky clothing made him look like a robot that was being operated from the inside by a much smaller man.
Traveler knew him to be a professional documents dealer who specialized in Mormon memorabilia. In the past he’d unearthed pioneer manuscripts purported to be signed by the likes of Joseph Smith and Brigham Young. Many of these contradicted present-day church policy. Such contentious documents brought a handsome price on the open market, despite those who claimed that Dixon was nothing but a forger out to make money off the church. Still others called him the anti-Christ. Nothing illegal had ever been proved against him.
Tr
aveler grabbed a handful of clothing and shook Dixon until his head flopped back and forth. “I want answers from you,” he said before releasing his grip.
Dixon’s head continued to bob on its own.
“Why are you watching me?”
Dixon’s head came to a sudden halt. He looked Traveler in the eye. “My clients, like yours, are entitled to privacy.”
“What is that supposed to mean?”
“That I know a lot of important people. Their names might surprise you.”
“Try telling that to the police when I have you arrested for trespassing.”
The man suddenly looked smug. “Charges like that would be up to the Varneys. This is their property we’re standing on.”
Traveler thought that over. It was impossible to imagine a man like John Varney dealing with the likes of Reuben Dixon. Unless, of course, it was a matter of protecting the church.
“Who’s to say I didn’t lose my way in the storm?” Dixon went on. “I could have wandered in here by mistake.”
Again, Traveler seized the man, this time with both hands, twisting the outer layer of material around Dixon’s neck until he went up on tiptoe to avoid being choked.
“You don’t have to prove how tough you are,” Dixon panted. “Word about you is already out.”
“It’s all true,” Traveler said, lifting Dixon off his feet and slamming him against the tree trunk so hard chunks of snow rained down on them from the quivering branches overhead.
The force of the impact caused Dixon’s teeth to snap. “I bit my tongue,” he yelped, spitting bright blood into the white snow.
Traveler pulled back for another try at dislodging the aspen.
Dixon’s face puckered in anticipation. Then all at once his head sagged to one side and words began spilling out. “Okay. I came here to do a deal with Varney. We’ve worked together before.”
“You’ll have to be more explicit than that.” Traveler again raised Dixon partially off his feet.
“Give me a chance,” the man whined. “I’ve done a lot of favors for the church, goddammit.”
Traveler allowed Dixon’s feet to settle firmly on the ground. “And you’re here to do another favor, is that it?”
“Exactly,” Dixon said, missing Traveler’s sarcasm. “You remember the Salamander letter?”
Traveler nodded.
“Well, what I’ve got now makes that look like”— his hands flapped to indicate a lack of words—“like child’s play.”
The Salamander letter was purportedly written by a contemporary of Joseph Smith in Palmyra, New York. In it, the church founder is said to have been a treasure hunter and a man who conversed with spirits that turned into salamanders. Such an image was a far cry from the present-day depiction of Smith receiving the golden tablets of Mormonism from the Angel Moroni.
“You can’t sell anything out here hiding in the trees,” Traveler said. “Or were you waiting for the ink to dry?”
“Don’t blame me for being careful, not when I see a guy with your reputation drive up. One look at you and I told myself, „Reuben, don’t you make a move until you know just what the hell is going on around here.’ So I decided to lay low, especially since I was holding a hot potato like this one. For all I know, Varney got wind of my find and brought you in to take it away from me, thereby saving the church a lot of money.”
Traveler didn’t know what to think. One thing was certain. He wanted nothing to do with church politics. Still, he was curious. He also figured there was a good possibility that Dixon was lying.
With a scowl Traveler drew back a fist and muttered, “Maybe it’s time I added to my reputation. Unless, of course, you want to tell exactly what it is you’re selling.”
“Go ahead. Hit me. But nobody gets a look at this without paying first.”
Traveler pulled his stomach punch. Even so, Dixon crumpled in the snow, curling into a ball and gasping for breath. “Bastard,” he managed after a moment.
Traveler knelt beside him. “I don’t like violence.”
“Sure,” Dixon croaked.
“Now, tell me how much you’re asking.”
Dixon grinned. “More than you can afford.”
7
TRAVELER REMEMBERED the old police station on First South and State. It had been a landmark, three stories of red sandstone, granite steps and cornices, a kind of Victorian hand-me-down that had died beneath the wrecker’s ball. Its concrete and brick replacement on Fourth Street and Third East possessed all the charm of a parking garage.
Lieutenant Anson Horne went with the building. He was solidly built, the same muscled width from shoulders to waist, with hostile blue eyes and unruly blond hair on the verge of turning gray.
He pinned a visitor’s badge to Traveler’s damp coat and said, “I was hoping I’d never hear from you.” Without waiting for a response he led the way to a half-walled, six by six cubicle at one end of a forlorn squad room painted a dingy white. Smiling unhappily, he slid behind a desk that was too large for such cramped quarters, leaving Traveler to settle his bulk onto an undersize metal chair that was bolted to the floor.
“Not quite the luxury private eyes expect,” Horne said, leaning back and hooking his thumbs behind bright red suspenders. The gesture exposed a chrome-plated .357 magnum.
When he saw Traveler eyeing the weapon he asked, “Are you carrying?”
Jesus, Traveler thought, spreading his coat. Was this the red-carpet treatment that Will Tanner had promised?
“For once,” Horne said, “our metal detectors seem to be working. I understand you collect guns.”
“World War Two rifles mostly.”
“They aren’t much good at close quarters.”
“I have a permit to carry a gun, if that’s what you’re asking.”
“I’m not asking anything. I was just wondering about you. Like how long you’ve been in town?” His tone said he didn’t expect an answer. “Five months, isn’t it? Maybe six. It usually takes nine months for a concealed weapons permit to go through. But then I’m forgetting about your friends, aren’t I? It’s not everyone who has a Willis Tanner to vouch for him. But what the hell. We in the police department love you anyway.”
“Come on, Horne. A man’s got to be able to protect himself in our business.”
“But it never hurts to have important connections, does it? Take me, now.” He snapped his suspenders. “Influence got me where I am today. That and fifteen years’ hard work. What you see before you is a second-generation cop. Some say that makes me a dummy, because I should have known better. The plain fact is, my father told me to be a plumber. There at least, he said, you can recognize real shit when you see it. Around here you never know when you’re going to land in something worse.”
“I’m just an enlisted man, Horne. You’re the lieutenant.”
“Un-hunh,” the cop said, forcing a smile. “Now tell me just what the fuck I can do for one of Utah’s great football heroes?”
“That’s ancient history.”
“They still show you on highlight films.”
“That’s why I stopped watching television,” Traveler said, hoping that Horne would drop the subject.
“If I remember correctly you got a full scholarship to USC, didn’t you?” Horne winked to show there was no envy, but his eyes said otherwise.
“If it makes you any happier, I never graduated. I spent four years taking two years’ worth of classes.”
“That didn’t stop you from signing a big bonus with the pros.”
Here it comes, Traveler thought. People just wouldn’t let the past die. They had to keep reminding him, though God knows why. His nightmares already took care of that.
But the cop surprised him. He didn’t talk football. Instead, he stretched his suspenders almost to the breaking point and said, “Willis Tanner ought to have known better than to call in a private ticket on something like this.”
Traveler shrugged. “Just what did my old pal Willis have to
say?”
“To keep you informed about the dead guy.” He snapped his suspenders. “Like letting you know he was humping the Varney broad before he left Arizona for Bountiful.”
“I hope you can do better than that.”
“You’re not one of us.”
“One of who?” Traveler was being deliberately obtuse.
“LDS, goddammit.”
“Good Mormons don’t swear.”
Horne flushed. A vein stood out on his forehead. “My father warned me about you and your family. He had the misfortune to work with your father a long time ago.”
My God, Traveler thought. Salt Lake may have grown big enough to look like a cosmopolitan city, but it was still a small town at heart.
“I’ve been asked to help you,” Horne went on. “Well, asked isn’t exactly the right word. So I’ll do my duty.”
“Is there anything I ought to know about the Bountiful killing?”
“Private detectives don’t work murder cases.”
“I’m not exactly thrilled by the situation, either.”
Home stared. “You know something, I don’t think you are at that.” He shrugged and began massaging his temple. “I gave a copy of the report to Tanner. What else do you want?”
“That was the prelim, filed by the first cops on the scene. I want to know what follow-ups have been made.”
For a moment the cop looked as if he were about to object. Then he got on the phone and started making calls.
A few minutes later he hung up and said, “We’ve come up with a half-assed witness who says he saw a blond woman go into the dead man’s house. He’d probably ID you in a wig.”
“What kind of gun was used?”
“A forty-five. Your kind of gun, right out of World War Two.”
Traveler smiled dutifully. “I ran into a man named Reuben Dixon on the way here. He was hiding in the trees outside the Varney place.”
The policeman stiffened.