Cloudland

by Joseph Olshan

  “Another factoid that you might find interesting. The literature left in the pockets of some of these women was Seventh-Day Adventist.”

  Matthew groaned. “Oh God. Not one of us. Well, in that case he may be purposely leaving his victims by trees with lots of homilies hoping in his own perverted mind to convert them in the afterlife.” Soon his gaze grew concerned. “This whole thing has really taken a toll on you, hasn’t it?”

  “Especially since I believe that my copy of The Widower’s Branch is probably the only one in the Upper Valley.”

  Matthew shook his head. “Not necessarily,” he said. “Even if somebody were patterning killings after an obscure novel, this particular book is well over a hundred years old. So surely there’s a digitized version of it available on the Internet.”

  “There isn’t,” I informed him. “I searched with several different engines. There is just a brief synopsis. And nothing about bodies found near fallen trees or the religious material. Just a citation that The Widower’s Branch was Collins’s last, unfinished text, his most obscure and unknown work.”

  Matthew asked, “Do you still have passwords for JSTOR and Project Muse?”

  “Nope. They were inactivated as soon as Saint Mike’s gave me the boot.”

  However, I’d been able to use Theresa’s Wesleyan sign-on for these two sites and had checked them all, including Boolean searches on Yahoo and Google. Then I explained how I thought my copy of the unfinished novel had disappeared, and forgotten I’d loaned it to Breck.

  He looked startled to hear this. “You know, Catherine, that is really weird.”

  “What is?”

  “That the book disappeared. I just remembered something—and obviously I was afraid to tell you this at the time—but when I borrowed your copy I put it in a very specific place on the edge of my desk. And then one day it just vanished. I looked everywhere for it. I tore apart the whole apartment. I was frantic. But then, even weirder, it just reappeared one night wedged in the bookshelf, as though it had always been there. And I just couldn’t understand how that could be because I checked through every single book on my bookshelf at least a half dozen times.”

  “That kind of stuff with missing books happens to me all the time,” I reassured him.

  “Yeah, but I almost had this feeling that somebody actually took it away and then brought it back.”

  “Like who?”

  Matthew shook his head. “Anyone who visited me, I suppose.”

  I decided to make light of this. “Literary elves burrow into the pages of books you never crack. They come out at night and do all kinds of mischief.”

  “For the purpose of a mind fuck,” Matthew said, and we both laughed. “So how is Breck?” he asked after a few moments of silence.

  I told him she was fine and had become involved with an older woman. “She won’t be happy when she knows I’ve seen you.”

  “Who can blame her?” Matthew said with admirable equanimity.

  “None of my friends are happy that I’m seeing you,” I felt I had to point out.

  “But that doesn’t apply to you, hopefully,” he said.

  I endured his steady gaze for a moment or two. “I can’t say that I feel completely comfortable … with you here.”

  Matthew looked disconsolate. I was inadvertently touching my scar again, this time in full view of him, and I could see it register. He took a step forward, as though wanting to touch it himself, but then held back, momentarily at odds with himself. At last he said, “Honestly, Catherine, do you think that I’m really capable of doing something like that again?”

  I panicked for a moment, unable to even speak.

  “If you really thought so, then would you have invited me to visit you?” He glanced around the house and turned his palms up. “Alone?”

  I had to respond even though I felt I couldn’t. “It’s not so simple, Matthew.” I managed to control my voice. “Went … against my better judgment.”

  “I’m glad you took the risk. And I’m happy to leave right now just to prove a point.”

  Feeling a bit more composed, I said, “So you think if you left right now the next time I’d feel safer?”

  “I’d hope so, Catherine. Certainly with time.”

  I knew I wouldn’t.

  SEVENTEEN

  THE MORNING FOLLOWING Matthew’s visit I got a phone call from Breck informing me that an article about the most recent body of “an illegal alien” being found had appeared in the Newark Star-Ledger. The paper reported that the forensics so far were not matching the latest victim with the previous one; however, the residents of Springfield, Vermont, and Claremont, New Hampshire, were once again fearful, locking their doors at night, while the purchase of guns kept skyrocketing at the local shops. In the Upper Valley of Vermont and New Hampshire, emergency town meetings were called to debate placing a temporary moratorium on women bicycling or jogging the roads alone. The paper even mentioned incidents of frightened homeowners shooting at suspicious shadows on their land.

  “So people really have shot out into the dark,” I commented. “I didn’t read that one in the Valley News. Thank you, New Jersey, for telling me what’s going on in Vermont.”

  “New Jersey has its virtues, Ma,” Breck said. “Lots of them. Just waiting for you to discover.”

  “Could you be any more obvious? If you’d only stop sounding like an infomercial and find me a pig sitter, I’ll throw my other two critters in the car.”

  There was a brief silence. “I was actually thinking of coming there for a short visit.”

  “I’d be absolutely thrilled.”

  “I’d have some time if I visit tomorrow. Would that work?”

  She’d have some time? As far as I knew, Violet was the only one employed. “I’m not going anywhere,” I told her.

  As soon as I finished my conversation with Breck, I tried calling Anthony and got his voice mail. I left him a short message. I wondered what specifically he wanted to discuss with me.

  The last time Breck visited me was in early January, just prior to Angela Parker’s disappearance. When she arrived this time it was on a dry, cloudless Saturday afternoon. I told her to meet me at the Norwich farmer’s market, one of her favorite venues, a once-a-week consortium of organic farmers and bakers and craftspeople that usually hired a nerve-grating fiddle band. Barely enduring the music, I was standing by a pyramid of mottled heirloom tomatoes when I saw Breck in a pair of pale yellow capri pants strolling across the trampled lawn holding a big straw shopping bag and wearing a matching sun hat. She’d gained some weight (much needed) and her face, though always augustly angular, wasn’t looking so haggard. Before noticing me, she paused at a stand selling huge bouquets of phlox and dahlia and mallow and immediately set to putting together an arrangement.

  “Those for me?” I said as I approached.

  She dropped all the stems, threw her arms around me, and squeezed me tightly. “You look so grown-up,” I said. “Like a young mother out shopping for her family.”

  “Not with this stomach,” Breck said, pulling up her form-fitting cotton shirt and showing me a rippling abdomen. “Young mothers don’t have this.”

  “Despite your six-pack you look like you’re eating,” I said.

  “Eating like a horse,” she said, reaching into her purse to pay the silver-haired, florid-faced lady who was wrapping the purchase.

  “But probably exercising yourself to death,” I said.

  Breck explained, “Keeps me sane. What can I tell you.… May I ask you something?” Breck said as we began wandering among the stalls of local honey vendors and bakery “artisans” who offered golden loaves and pies and homespun macramé handbags. “Why do you think so many women in Vermont dress in formless clothes … even ones who are slender?”

  “Rural people don’t get dolled up for daily activities. You know that. But, believe me, a lot of us know how to throw ourselves together when we have to.”

  “Well, but look at you,�
�� she said. “In your black leggings and your sleeveless linen shirt.”

  “If I wasn’t meeting you I’d be sporting tennis shoes and a muumuu.”

  “Baloney. You like to look good.”

  “I don’t give it nearly as much thought as I used to.” I reminded her of the wardrobe that I’d accumulated at deep discounts when I was on staff at several magazines. “Most of it just sits there. When we get home, you should go through it and see if you want anything.”

  “Okay, I will.” Breck considered something for a moment. “Ma,” she said, “I know you think fashions are heavily influenced by environment. But I never changed the way I dressed when I moved up here.”

  “That’s because you were making a statement.”

  “At school they called me ‘the dress-up freak.’ The ‘skinny minny.’”

  “Well, you were a displaced city girl.”

  “Still am. New Jersey isn’t exactly Manhattan. Even though we’re twenty minutes away by twain.”

  We breezed by all the prepared food stands and found only one that Breck would consider; she bought us curried tuna salad sandwiches on baguettes and beet salad with chunks of chèvre. Just outside the perimeter of the market we grabbed an empty picnic table. Breck, who had run to put the fresh flowers in her car, returned with a thermos of herbal iced tea and a manuscript-page-sized Handi Wipe with which she scoured the table. “You certainly come prepared,” I said. “A little anal retentive?”

  She gave me a withering look. “Somebody in this family has got to be.”

  We unwrapped our sandwiches and Breck poured tea into clear plastic cups. After watching her take a few enviable bites, I remarked, “You’re eating like a wolf!”

  “Lunch,” Breck said, jutting her prominent chin forward and waving her sandwich at me. “That’s what happens at one o’clock in the afternoon.” A stiff, sultry breeze came up and blew fine, shoulder-length hair into her face. She quickly reached into her straw grab bag and pulled out a tortoiseshell clasp to pin it back. She took another bite of her sandwich, chewed carefully, and then said, “So … Elena Mayaguez. Is she the first non-Caucasian?”

  I nodded.

  “Nice to know that he doesn’t discriminate.”

  “I guess that’s a point in his favor,” I managed to say, sipping my iced tea. “If, indeed, it’s the same guy, who has just changed his strategy.”

  Breck thought for a moment and then said, “You’ve been following this closely, Ma. Do you really think they’re doing all they can? Rather than just investigating, are they trying to create a profile of this person, what he’s all about and what he’s after?”

  “Why do you suppose they’re using Anthony?”

  Breck reminded me that with all the murders nobody had been able to get DNA samples.

  I glanced at the scattering of people sitting at picnic tables around us and said quietly, “Just between us they do have a sample now. Though it’s not public knowledge. So keep it to yourself. They found it in Elena Mayaguez’s car. If it is the same guy, and it might not be, this is his first misstep, DNA-wise. Not on her, but they did find identical synthetic fibers on some of the women that would indicate he used gloves. He was wearing gloves when he attacked Angela Parker. Then again, it was the middle of winter.”

  “The middle of winter,” Breck repeated dismally as she wiped her mouth. “So glad to be away from that endless Vermont dreariness.”

  “New Jersey ain’t exactly the tropics.”

  “Well, we don’t get walls of snow in Jersey.… Anyway, so this detective is down with the idea that the murderer is lifting his method from your book?”

  “Just one of the theories being floated. There may be another copy around. We don’t know.”

  Breck put her sandwich down. “Okay, so who else has read your book?”

  Obviously, I would avoid mentioning Matthew’s having read it. “I had several students who borrowed it. I promised Anthony I’d get him their names, but I haven’t been able to find the right rosters of the classes they were in. Of course I have all the class rosters that I don’t need. I could have sworn I lent it to Wade; though he claims not, I don’t find myself quite believing him.”

  Breck’s eyes sparked and she drew in a sharp breath. “Him again?”

  “He always acts so innocent and open with me but I can’t help being a little wary.”

  Breck added, “Violence toward objects can forewarn violence toward people.”

  “The thing is that he knows that, too, and admits it freely.”

  We both fell speculatively silent, and then I noticed her eyeing the half-sandwich I’d left on my plate. Pointing to it, she said, “Don’t you like it?”

  “I’ve lost my appetite.” It was hardly the thought of Wade possibly being the killer, but rather the idea of broaching Matthew’s visit to Breck, which I knew I had to do. She wrapped the leftover food in my napkin and carefully placed it inside her bag.

  When we got home, Breck received a riotous greeting from the animals, particularly Henrietta, who’d always adored her. After slobbering all over her, Virgil and Mrs. Billy eventually went back to their favorite sleeping spots in my office; Henrietta shadowed us to the kitchen.

  “Madame, where have you been all my life?” Breck said, scratching our darling behind the ears. Henrietta flopped down on the floor sideways, soliciting more. “You’re shameless,” Breck said, then combing through her purse, brought out my remaining half sandwich. “She knows where her bread is buttered,” she added, leveraging a hunk of tuna and holding her palm out. Henrietta rolled the morsel off with her snout and snorted in momentary pleasure.

  “Okay, now go under the table!” Breck ordered her. Henrietta listened, dutifully righted herself, and then muscled her way under. We heard the thudding sound of her collapse.

  “You’re the only person she really listens to,” I marveled as Breck began rubbing the pig’s belly with her toes.

  “That’s because she wuvs me,” Breck said in a baby voice.

  * * *

  Over the next twenty-four hours I found it impossible to bring up the subject of Matthew’s visit. On the second night of Breck’s stay, I awoke at around three A.M., thinking I heard rustling sounds; the bedroom Breck had lived in throughout her teenaged years, and where she’d gone through her first serious bout with anorexia, was right across the hall from mine. Anticipating her arrival, I’d purposely exhumed her scrapbooks, stuffed animals, board games, and ribbons and costume jewelry. I got up, fully expecting to find her sitting in bed, sifting through her old trinkets and belongings as she had a habit of doing when she visited. Instead, I saw her standing in an expensive blue silk bathrobe (that Violet obviously bought her), scouring the upstairs bookshelves as Matthew had done downstairs two days before. I asked what she was doing.

  Breck remained turned away. “Just browsing.”

  “At this time of night? What are you looking for?”

  “Nothing in particular.” She deliberately picked Armadale by Wilkie Collins out of the shelf and showed it to me.

  “I just reread it,” I told her. “I need to bring it back downstairs.”

  “To your Wilkie Collins shelf?” Breck sounded a bit sarcastic. “Is it any good?”

  “Yes, quite.” I told her many people put Armadale up there with The Woman in White, No Name, and The Moonstone. It portrays a very evil, powerful female character who was considered to be quite controversial when the novel first appeared. Armadale was also one of the author’s more socially advanced novels.

  “For one thing, the protagonist is half black.”

  “Oh, like Anthony’s wife.”

  “Precisely.”

  “How is she doing?”

  “Did I tell you she was having an affair for a year and a half before he found out?”

  “Nope, kept that little tidbit to yourself.”

  “She didn’t want me to find out about it for some reason.”

  “Maybe because the same thing ha
ppened to you. With Dad.” Breck flipped the book over and scanned the back cover and said, “I might borrow this one if that’s okay.”

  “You can, but only if you read it this time.”

  “I will.” I could see a thought influencing her expression. “Mom,” she said, suddenly plaintive, “I’ve been here nearly two days.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Isn’t there something rather important that you need to tell me?”

  I waited for a moment. “First I’d like to know whether or not it was the reason behind your … impromptu visit.”

  “Obviously.”

  “How’s that supposed to make me feel? You come here not to visit me but to check up on me.”

  “How do you think I feel when you never ask me how my partner is and refuse to come to New Jersey?”

  I started getting irritated. “Okay, pig notwithstanding, I hate traveling.”

  “What do you mean, you hate traveling? You and I have gone all over the world.”

  “That was then. I wish you wouldn’t take it so personally that I don’t like going too far from home anymore.”

  Breck shook her head, exasperated. “Look, I’m really worried about you. God knows you used to worry about me.”

  “The mother is supposed to worry.”

  “It also happens the other way round!”

  “Those jokers down the road!” I exclaimed. “I can’t believe they’d have the balls to call you up.”

  “Believe it.… Look, Mom, we all want to protect you. You can’t fault us for that. I mean, were you at least going to tell me?”

  “Of course. I was working up to it … before you left. I’ve just been afraid of your reaction.”

  “So when did he get back from Asia?”

  “April.”

  “How many times have you seen him, honestly?”

  “Once.”

  “You know you should not have been alone with him.”

  “Bad move, I admit it. But Wade and Paul knew he was here and called during his visit. And it went fine. He behaved like a gentleman.”