Russian River Rat

by Abramson, Mark

  Ruth wiped her fingers on a bar towel and extended her hand, but at that moment the front door burst open and Jake flew in. He had a dozen rings in each ear and a new gold stud through his left eyebrow. Ruth hoped the old lady didn’t think this was Tim.

  “Hi, Ruth, how are you? I hope I’m not late.” Jake stopped cold and turned to the old lady. “Oh, my God. You’re Amanda Musgrove, aren’t you? I’m a huge fan. I’ve just started re-reading Three French Coins. It’s here in my backpack, somewhere. Would you autograph it for me, please?”

  Ruth piped up, “This is Jake. He’s one of the other waiters.”

  “How do you do, Jake,” the old lady said. “I thought perhaps you were a salesman from the Sarah Coventry Jewelry company. I certainly hope your family owns stock.”

  Jake was oblivious to her remark as he searched his bag for the tattered paperback. “Here’s the book,” Jake said, handing it to her with a pen.

  “Hmmm.” Mrs. Musgrove took the book and frowned. “If you’d had a hardcover copy I might have looked for a fountain pen from my purse, but I guess this old Bic will do for a paperback. How did you recognize me, young man? My photograph never appears on the covers of my books.”

  “I saw that interview you did on TV last year when Esmeralda’s Dilemma came out. I bought that one in hardcover, but I don’t have it with me.”

  “What a dreadful interview that was. They might have assigned it to someone who had read the book. I wondered if that imbecile had ever read any book. I have never been subjected to such insipid questions.” She signed the paperback with a flourish and handed it back to Jake. “I’m glad to hear you bought the hardcover of that one, by the way. I’d be happy to autograph it for you another time.”

  “Thanks, Mrs. Musgrove. I thought that interviewer was awful, too,” Jake said. “But you were great! I kept hoping you’d tell him off. That would have been funny.”

  Mrs. Musgrove responded with a sniff.

  “I wanted to go back and re-read this one because it was where you introduced Detective Blake. It’s out of print now, so I was lucky to find a paperback copy.” Jake glanced at his watch. “Excuse me, please. I have to get to work.”

  Jake started toward the kitchen and turned back. “Oh, Ruth, Tim called to say he’s running late. He asked me to set up both our tables. It was an honor to meet you, Mrs. Musgrove.”

  …

  So this was Nick’s grandmother. Ruth finally had a chance to shake hands with the old woman. It was bad enough that Ruth didn’t recognize her and Jake did, but even worse that Tim was late to work today, of all days. Ruth served her other customers and returned to the lady. “I was sorry to hear about your loss, Mrs. Musgrove. Did you go to New Orleans for the funeral of…?”

  “Nathan, the deceased—he was a distant relation, the grandson of my late husband’s brother. I barely remember him, but I understand that he and Nicholas were friendly when they were boys. My husband and I traveled so much then.” She looked down and fussed with her purse, but Ruth didn’t interrupt. She hardly knew what else to say if that nephew of hers didn’t get his butt in here to work yesterday.

  “Yes, I went along with the rest of the family. The Musgroves are a huge clan in the South. I am merely related by marriage, but after having lived a long life and achieving some small fame as a writer, they’ve adopted this old Yankee girl as if I were their matriarch.”

  “I’m sure they admire you, Mrs. Musgrove,” Ruth said with a cheery smile.

  “I’d prefer that you call me Amanda, and I’ll call you Ruth, if you don’t mind. Why, even the former Governor of Mississippi likes to call me ‘Cousin Amanda.’ I won’t have this bejeweled Jake on a first-name basis, but you and I are adults, and we have a great deal in common, I believe. By the way, I’m not wearing mourning clothes, if that’s what you thought. I always dress in black.”

  “Oh,” Ruth was taken aback by the old lady’s frankness. “Was there a particular reason you wanted to see Tim?”

  “Because of my grandson, of course. Nicholas is very dear to me, and I was happy to spend some time with him in New Orleans, but he seemed overly distraught over his cousin’s death. I heard that Nathan was on his way to pay Nick a visit, but it still didn’t make sense. They hadn’t seen each other in years. Nicholas was suffering, but it had nothing to do with mourning Nathan. He was upset about something else entirely, and I finally got it out of him. Nick is quite smitten with your nephew. He may be stubborn and headstrong, but aside from all that, my grandson is an extremely sensitive man.”

  “You could just as well be describing Tim,” Ruth said.

  “Nicholas is also quite practical,” she added, as if that made all the difference in the world. ”I like to think he might have inherited that virtuous trait from me.”

  “That’s one way in which Tim is very different.” Ruth sighed. “Sometimes I doubt he knows the meaning of the word. Oh, good. Here he comes, now.”

  Tim rushed in the door and leaned across the bar to give his aunt a peck on the cheek. “Hi, Aunt Ruth… I’m sorry I’m late. I finished painting the ceiling in the guest room. Is Jake here? He said he’d cover for me.” Tim looked down at his hands and scraped a chip of green paint off his right thumbnail.

  “Yes, Jake is here,” Ruth said. “There’s someone else here, too. This lady came to meet you, Tim. Amanda, I’d like to introduce my nephew, Timothy Snow. Tim, this is Nick’s grandmother, Mrs. Amanda Musgrove.”

  “Oh,” Tim said, startled. He wasn’t sure how he’d pictured his first meeting with any of Nick’s family, but this wasn’t it. Maybe he’d never pictured meeting them at all, as if he and Nick could exist in a vacuum, just the two of them in one big bed with a crackling fire in the woodstove and a bottle of wine.

  Well, Nick had met Tim’s Aunt Ruth, so this was bound to happen, too. If he and Nick got back together, Tim would eventually have to meet his mother and father as well. Thank goodness Nick was an only child, like Tim. Were he and Nick going to stay together? They’d never seemed farther apart than they were right now.

  “How do you do, Mrs. Musgrove? I’m very happy to meet you.” Hadn’t Nick said she was a writer? Yes, a mystery writer. And Tim hadn’t bothered to read any of her books. What did he know about mysteries? The only books he’d read lately were in that box Arturo gave him. They were by gay writers from the last couple of decades, not some old woman who looked like she belonged in a sepia print in an oval frame. Tim hoped he could get through this without insulting her or embarrassing himself.

  “How do you do, young man? Late to work, I see.”

  “I’m never late… not usually, I mean. And I called ahead. Jake owed me one, anyway. It’s not as if I…” Tim had a terrible thought. “Mrs. Musgrove, is Nick all right? Nothing’s happened to him, has it?”

  She looked Tim up and down without a word. When she broke the tense silence, she still didn’t answer his question. “Your aunt makes an excellent Manhattan. I think I’ll have another, if I may. Nick’s mother, my daughter-in-law, is doing some early Christmas shopping, and she’ll be picking me up here soon, but I think I should have time for one more.”

  “Of course,” Ruth said.

  Tim smiled, yet inside he cringed at the thought that he might have to meet Nick’s mother and grandmother on the same day, with Nick not even there to introduce them. And he was late to work. Tim looked down and noticed a spot on his shirt.

  “My grandson has told me a great deal about you, young man.” Mrs. Musgrove turned back to face Tim again. Nick never sounded like he was scared of her; Tim wondered why he was so shaky.

  “I-I don’t know what to say,” Tim stammered. “I’m hoping to see him as soon as I can. We have to get some things straightened out. Do you know when he’s coming home?”

  “I happen to know that he has a flight on United Airlines arriving tomorrow morning at about 10.a.m. If I were you, I should meet him at the airport with a smile and a box of chocolates. Don’t bring him flowers. He g
rows them, you know. That would be a bit ‘coals to Newcastle,’ wouldn’t it?”

  “Thanks a lot for the advice,” Tim said.

  “You’re welcome, Timothy. Now, you had better get to work, hadn’t you? Your aunt and I have matters to discuss.” Tim couldn’t hear their conversation, but all he cared to know was that Nick would be home tomorrow. He might have protested if he’d overheard his Aunt Ruth call him impractical, even though it was true.

  It was one of those nights at work where the hours dragged by. But no matter how difficult the customers were, Tim thought about tomorrow and kept telling himself that everything would be okay soon.

  When Ruth had a lull behind the bar, Amanda Musgrove caught her attention. “I know you’re awfully busy dear, but my grandson told me while we were in New Orleans about your involvement with catching a serial killer here in the neighborhood.”

  “Why, yes.” The whole sordid affair had only happened a few months ago while Ruth was here on a summer vacation to visit Tim. Now that it was fall, those days felt like ancient history.”

  “You know I’m a mystery writer, Ruth, so I’m always curious to hear about real-life stories from people who were there at the time. Eyewitness accounts can be so much richer than anything you read in the papers.”

  “I suppose that’s true.” Ruth was very fond of Nick, and she knew that Tim was desperate to patch things up with him again. If getting to know Nick’s grandmother would help, the least she could do was try. So between serving drinks to other customers, Ruth told the old lady the whole story from the day she arrived in San Francisco when Tim found Jason’s bloodied body through all the other murders until the day that Ruth buried the fireplace poker in the killer cowboy’s back. Ruth made a drink for herself before she got to that part and then she had to back up her story because she forgot to tell about finding the knife.

  When Amanda Musgrove pulled a small notebook out of her big black purse and scribbled some notes, Ruth felt almost like a celebrity. Then Nick’s mother arrived in a great hurry. She and Ruth got a brief introduction, Amanda bid her thanks and adieu, and the two Mrs. Musgroves were off.

  Tim came up to the bar with a tray of empty glasses and a large drink order just after they left. Artie was on a break, so his Aunt Ruth made his drinks. “Is Nick’s grandmother gone already?”

  “Yes, Nick’s mother came to get her.”

  “I’m sorry I didn’t get to meet her.” That was a lie. Tim was sorry he didn’t see her, but after the grilling Nick’s grandmother gave him, meeting the mother could wait.

  “I barely met her either. She said she was double-parked and had trouble finding the place, so she was in a big hurry. She was tiny. Slight and fair. It’s apparent where Nick got his blonde hair and beautiful eyes. He must have gotten his height from his father’s side.”

  “I hope you had a nice visit with the older Mrs. Musgrove, anyway.” Tim was glad his Aunt Ruth was there to make small talk with the old lady. She was always so much better at those things than he was.

  “Well, yes, when I had time. She wanted to know about the murders this summer, and we’d just begun to discuss Nick’s cousin’s death when we ran out of time.”

  “She didn’t like me very much, but maybe you should invite her to tea or something. You can catch each other up on all the grisly details.”

  “She’s a stern woman, Tim, but she has nothing against you,” Ruth insisted. “And I don’t know about tea, but I’ll be seeing her again very soon. We’ve already planned on it.”

  A dark car waited in the shadows on the main street of Guerneville, California that night. The driver turned the engine on every half-hour or so for heat and to keep the battery charged. He fiddled with the radio knobs and waited. There was no hurry. He’d waited so long already that he’d grown used to waiting.

  Men stumbled in and out of the Rainbow Cattle Company on Main Street, mostly locals this time of year. Rain fell hard through the redwood trees for miles around. This storm had come in from the northwest, lashed the beaches up and down the coast from Mendocino to Jenner-by-the-Sea. Rain poured down like nails through redwood needles and every now and then the wind picked up. That was the dangerous time. Even a light breeze could knock loose one of the dead hanging branches caught up high in the old-growth trees. Widow-makers, the old timers called them when they pummeled down like cannon balls. They could crash through a skylight easily or put a big dent in the hood of a car. They could break a man’s neck if he was unlucky or foolish enough to be out for a walk in the woods on a night like this.

  The driver flipped on the windshield wipers whenever headlights showed a car pull up and park on Main Street. He was waiting for someone in particular, but he hadn’t had any luck so far. He’d made mistakes, and he would no doubt make more. Some were a while ago and some were recent. None of that mattered to him. People got hurt. He didn’t feel guilty. People should look out for themselves. He did.

  Chapter 21

  Tim sat down at his computer before he went to bed and did some research on New Orleans, so it was no wonder he dreamed about it that night. His Aunt Ruth would have called it “research” but to Tim he was just poking around, trying to keep himself from exploring the old gay sites like dudesurfer.com, the only one he still had a membership for.

  Tim had never been to New Orleans and hoped that someday Nick might take him and show him around. He read that a recent poll of major US cities ranked New Orleans, the city of Tennessee Williams and William Faulkner, second only to San Francisco in terms of gay friendliness, food and dining. That made sense to Tim, especially the gay friendliness, not so much the dining, but he didn’t often “dine” outside of the Castro.

  He read on…

  In the same poll New Orleans was voted last in safety and cleanliness and near the bottom as a family vacation destination. New Orleans lies geographically just beneath the Bible belt, in the moist, fragrant crotch of the country. The fundamentalist form of Christianity that pervades so much of middle-America takes a distant backseat in New Orleans to Voodoo and the Catholic Church, which are not mutually exclusive. Maybe that fact—and racism—were some of the reasons that the only things more shocking than the devastation of Hurricane Katrina in 2005 were the governmental blunders that followed. “At least 1,500 people died in Louisiana and some are still unaccounted for, but the dead won’t stay buried in the soft sand, damp silt and organic soils, called ‘marsh’ in New Orleans.”

  That line gave him a chill, but the next part was even creepier:

  Large parts of St. Bernard, Jefferson and Orleans parishes are below sea level and sinking. Since the earliest of times, cemeteries were built aboveground, and New Orleans is one of the oldest cities in America. To save space, tombs are used again and again in these ‘cities of the dead.’ Loved ones place the deceased’s remains in a family tomb where the hot climate makes them decompose quickly. In a year or two, the bones can be swept into a communal pit to make way for the next occupant.”

  Nate Musgrove’s body had been cremated, so only his ashes were placed in the Musgrove tomb. Tim figured that must have saved one major step.

  One of the web-sites showed pictures of ferns growing from the cracks and chinks even high up the sides of the old mausoleums where bones turned to dust lie in growing piles from one generation to the next. Tim read how some of the newer cemeteries out Metarie way had separate buildings just for cremains and looked at pictures of the above-ground graves with small metal vents in their sides to… let the fresh air in, or to let the spirits out? Who knew?

  Here the birthdates and death dates were mostly twentieth century. It was hard to find any before the 1940s. This was where Nick stopped again on his last day in New Orleans to wander among the marble slabs and little death houses to say one last goodbye to his cousin, whose death was still a mystery, and to say goodbye to New Orleans, too. Nick hadn’t been here in years, and would have had no idea how many more years it might be before he returned.

 
It had rained hard that morning, but the sun shone down in golden rays through the breaking black clouds. It lit the garish plastic flowers people had left against the gray tombs of their loved ones. The air seemed even thicker in the cities of the dead than it did outside their stone walls. Rainwater formed pools and puddles between the rows of death where plaster angels kept watch.

  Nick was about to turn and leave when a stranger stepped out from between the crypts. Even though the rain had stopped, he wore a large hat and carried an umbrella that shaded his face. “You’re Nick Musgrove, right? From San Francisco?”

  Nick jumped. “That’s my name, but I don’t actually live in the city. I have a place up north… Monte Rio on the Russian River.”

  “San Francisco is where your heart is, though… am I right?”

  “Who are you? Tony Bennett?” Nick tried to make a joke, but the man didn’t smile or extend his hand.

  “The name is Oliver. Jason Oliver.”

  “I feel like I ought to know that name. You seem familiar, but I can’t place you. Have we met before?”

  “Only in passing, but that doesn’t matter now. These cemeteries can be dangerous, even in the daytime. You shouldn’t be here alone. Besides, you need to go home.”

  “My flight leaves early tomorrow morning.”

  “Good.” The man tipped his hat and disappeared between the tombs.

  Tim’s dreams were wild all night long. He tossed and turned, got up for a drink of water and went to the bathroom again. He remembered he’d been dreaming about Nick in a cemetery in New Orleans and then Jason showed up. Tim’s sleep patterns might have changed because he hadn’t had a drink all week, but tonight he thought it had more to do with knowing Nick was coming home tomorrow.

  When Tim had asked him, Nick had denied knowing Jason back then. They might have “crossed paths,” but nothing more, no sexual encounters. Tim always wondered, but maybe Nick was telling the truth. Maybe this was more than just a dream.