The Alpine Kindred

by Mary Daheim

  I realized Jack had been watching through the double doors. “Yeah, right, I got dodged by Dodge. Your boss is being difficult these days. Can you bail me out on this Rasmussen case? I want to finish my story for tomorrow's edition.”

  Jack shrugged. “What's to bail? We haven't heard from the ME in Everett yet.”

  “But you've been conducting interviews, haven't you?”

  “Sure.” He shuffled some papers behind the curving counter. “No leads, though. Honest, Emma, there's nothing to report.”

  My shoulders slumped. “That's discouraging.” After a pause I narrowed my eyes at Jack. “So now I have to write that the Sheriff has made absolutely no progress investigating Einar Rasmussen Jr.'s violent murder on the campus of Skykomish Community College?”

  Jack's skin darkened. “Hey, you don't have to get nasty about it! Hell, the guy hasn't been dead for twenty-four hours yet!”

  “I didn't know there was a time line for a homicide investigation,” I shot back. “Surely Milo has been going through Einar's business dealings, his financial status, his private life. Are you trying to tell me he's come up empty?”

  Jack didn't respond for several seconds. Finally, he spoke again, his tone subdued. “We really don't have much to go on. And frankly, there hasn't been time to dig into every dark hole in Einar's life. Give us a break, Emma. You know how short-staffed we are.”

  I did know. “Okay.” I sighed. “But my readership won't be pleased.”

  “Luckily, you don't have a readership in Snohomish or Monroe, where Einar had most of his clout,” Jack said, all but jeering.

  “Actually,” I replied with a lift of my short, unimpressive chin, “I do. You'd be surprised how many people over in Snohomish County have ties to Alpine and subscribe to The Advocate.”

  Jack made a disgruntled noise low in his throat and shook his head like an angry pup. “Okay, okay, I know you're pissed off. It's not our fault your paper comes out tomorrow. By then, we may have something. Right now it's really slow going. Hell, I couldn't even get hold of your reporter today just to find out what kind of lipstick she wears. That stick-up-his-butt boyfriend of hers said she was too weak to come to the phone.”

  I was lost. “Carla? Lipstick? What are you talking about?”

  Jack gazed at me with curiosity. “You were there last night. Don't you remember? Or had you already gone when Doc Dewey spotted the lipstick on Einar's shirt?”

  “I'd gone,” I said faintly. Timing, they say, is everything. As usual, mine stunk. “What about this lipstick?”

  Though Toni Andreas was the only other person in the office at the moment, Jack lowered his voice. “Dodge noticed lipstick on the front of Einar's shirt, just below the shoulder. Sure, it could be Mrs. Rasmussen's, but we haven't been able to check her out either. She's not talking to anybody, which, I guess, figures. The son, Beau, said that his sister, Deirdre, has taken over the funeral arrangements.”

  “It wasn't Carla's lipstick,” I asserted. “She never saw Einar that night. Besides, Einar was close to six feet tall, and Carla's barely five feet. Her mouth wouldn't reach Einar's shoulder.”

  Jack's eyes danced. “It might. Who said they were standing up?”

  I made a face. “You don't really think it was Carla's, do you?”

  “Hey, you know Dodge—he never rules out anything or anybody.” Jack's eyes were still twinkling.

  “Very funny. Have they set a date and time for the funeral?”

  “Saturday, ten A.M., Christ the King Lutheran Church, Snohomish.” He looked beyond me as an older man I vaguely recognized entered through the double doors. “Hi, Elmer. What's up?”

  It was my signal to depart. Back at The Advocate, I told Vida and Leo about the lipstick-smeared shirt. “I can't use it in the story,” I said, “but it's pretty interesting.”

  “Five-six,” Vida said. “Shorter, with heels.”

  Leo rubbed his upper lip. “Einar's mystery date?”

  “Yes. That's my calculation.” Vida adjusted her glasses, which, like her previous pair, had a tendency to slip down her nose. “Which might include Marlys. She's at least average height.”

  Leo was shaking his head. “Forget Marlys. I've met Einar Jr. a few times, and he's not the type to go out of the door, especially for a picture shoot, with a dirty shirt.”

  Vida sniffed. “You just want it to be something sensational.”

  Leo grinned. “True. But I also want to be realistic. Has Dodge figured out where Einar was before he came to the campus?”

  “Dodge,” I replied with acrimony, “hasn't figured out what year it is.”

  Leo wiggled his eyebrows. “Ah. So that's how it's going to be on this one. Adversarial stances between the press and law enforcement. Go get 'em, editor-publisher babe.”

  “I intend to.” With a thumbs-up gesture, I returned to my office and finished up the Rasmussen story. The copy wasn't quite as harsh as my recital to Jack Mullins, but I did write that “According to the Sheriff's office, no one has come forward yet with any information that might lead to apprehension of a suspect” and that “Sheriff Dodge has no substantial leads so far.” It was accurate, it was news, and it wasn't as unkind as I wanted to be. Dunderhead is a term more suitable to editorials than the front page.

  The last thing I did before telling Kip MacDuff we were ready to roll was to read through Vida's long cutline, which accompanied the pictures she'd taken at the warehouse site:

  “Trespassers had to be ejected by Sheriff's deputies today when they refused to cooperate and stop digging for alleged buried treasure at the site of last October's warehouse fire where John and Dan Bourgette plan to build a restaurant. The Bourgette brothers are the sons of Dick and Mary Jane Bourgette, who recently moved to Alpine, and are enjoying semiretirement in their home near the golf course.”

  As usual, Vida had written the caption in her House & Home style. I deleted the last sentence, broke up the first one, and added a couple of minor touches. It was exactly five o'clock when I told Kip the paper was ready. It was one minute after five when I began collecting my things in preparation for ending my day at work. I was heading out when Ed Bronsky literally stumbled into the newsroom.

  “What was thatV he asked in a surprised voice, glancing all around.

  “Your feet, Ed,” I responded. “There's nothing on the floor.”

  “Oh.” He shook himself. “Darn. It must be these new shoes. They're Gookies.”

  “Guccis, Ed,” I said patiently, eyeing Ed's expensive footgear that would have been more suited to a bandleader in the Catskills than an ex-ad manager in Alpine.

  “Right, gotcha.” He beamed at me. “Am I too late?”

  “For what?” Ed had often been late when working for me. Shirley was sick, the plumbing was broken, his brakes had failed, their dog, Carhop, was having a liver transplant. Ed had a million excuses, some of them true.

  “For this week's Advocate” Ed replied, still beaming. “I've got some really, really hot news.”

  Rats, I thought. “What is it, Ed?” I tried to look curious.

  “My book. Mr. Ed is going into a second printing. Can you believe it? What's more, even bigger, is that Hollywood is showing some interest.”

  I gaped. “Hollywood? Hollywood, as in California?”

  Ed gave me an odd look. “Well, sure, where else? You know, movies, TV. I mean, somebody down there called Mr. Ed Si project.”

  A reclamation project, I thought in my uncharitable way. But I tried to smile with some enthusiasm.

  Ed, however, needed no encouragement. “Down there, in Hollywood—California—when they talk about a project, it's practically a done deal. The book's sold almost ten thousand copies in hardcover, and Vane Press goes back for a run of five thousand more next week. Since the book's only been out two months, it's considered a runaway best-seller in the industry.”

  I didn't know enough about book publishing to comment. Maybe ten thousand copies in hardcover was a substantial number. Bu
t I did know that Vane Press, located in Redmond on Seattle's Eastside, was a vanity publishing house, and that Ed had assumed all the expenses of getting his autobiography on the market.

  “Do you have a name of the Hollywood type who's interested?” I asked, reluctantly thinking that maybe we could squeeze four or five lines into this week's edition.

  Ed shook his head. “The guys at Vane are the contact. They're handling the subrights and all that other stuff for me. They don't want to say anything until the project is further along. But Skip O'Shea and Irving Blomberg both tell me is that what sells Mr. Ed is it's so fresh. Oh, there've been a zillion autobiographies lately that have done well, like Walter Cronkite's and Cal Ripken Jr.'s and a bunch of others, but none of them have a story like mine. I mean, rags-to-riches isn't new, but as Skip and Irv point out, I got that way by doing absolutely nothing.”

  I looked puzzled while Ed seemed very proud of himself. “Yes,” I said slowly. “You did. Get that way. By doing nothing.” I nodded a couple of times. “That's your style, Ed.”

  The irony was lost on my former ad manager. “Will you run any pix? I sent you that new one last month of Shirl and me in the trophy room.”

  The trophy room was where Ed kept his three bowling awards and the first putter he'd used to break a hundred. “I don't have room for a picture this time around,” I said truthfully. “We're pretty tight, with the Rasmussen murder.”

  “Oh, yeah, that. I played golf once with Einar.” Ed stroked his chins. “That was a real shame.”

  “Yes, it was,” I said, not sure if he referred to his game or the murder. “Einar was a staunch supporter of the community, at least of the new college.”

  “Huh?” Ed hadn't seemed to hear me. “Oh—yeah, right.” He pivoted on his Guccis. “I meant it was a shame because it really upset Birgitta. I guess she didn't think that a little place like Alpine would have violence like they do in the big city. She said none of the Advocates we sent to help her get acquainted with the area had any murders in them. 'Course those were issues from last fall and winter, when things were quiet around here. Now she feels like we duped her, and has been threatening all day to go back to Sweden.”

  “Will she?” I was starting to twitch a bit in my anxiety to get to Kip in the back shop.

  Ed screwed up his suetlike features. “I don't know. Probably not. I mean, we've got a contract and all. Shirl and I figure she'll get over it. By the way, if you use Shirley's name in the article on Mr. Ed, make sure it's spelled right. Last time Carla called her Swirley.”

  'Til watch it,” I said, edging for the door. “I'd better dash, Ed, or your story won't make it into tomorrow's edition.”

  Ed seemed to recall the exigencies of a deadline, at least when his own ego was involved. He meandered away in his Guccis while I went into the back shop. Kip and I decided we could squeeze Ed's item onto page four if we cut the last graf in Carla's feature about DeeDee and Amer Wasco's trip to Europe. The lines were expendable, since they dealt with the Wascos' cheese purchases in the Netherlands.

  “Too much of a Gouda thing?” Kip said, grinning.

  I was glad he still had a sense of humor. These days, I wasn't sure that I did.

  Carla kept to her bed the following day, so I decided to use the customary Wednesday lull to talk to the Bour-gettes. I was interested in finding out why anyone thought there might be more gold buried under the old warehouse.

  I found the brothers at the restaurant site, with Dan running some kind of digging apparatus. “You're really moving along,” I remarked to John, who'd been studying a bunch of blueprints. I had to shout to make myself heard over the sound of the tractor.

  John smiled, then wiped his brow with his sleeve. “We have to, since we'll be doing most of the work ourselves. Dad may pitch in, now that his job at the college has wound down.”

  I nodded. We were standing on Old Mill Street, with our backs to the railroad tracks. Now that virtually all remnants from the warehouse had been cleared away, I could see the Skykomish River less than a hundred yards away, and River Road winding through the trees on the far bank. On this overcast morning in May, the Sky flowed at an unruffled pace in this part of the river, but its color was off. The murky brown current might have been caused by the recent rain, or perhaps someone was actually logging farther up, near the source.

  I gestured at the old loading dock which stood between the future restaurant site and Alpine Way. “Is that part of the parcel?”

  “No.” John lowered his voice as Dan shut off the tractor. “Burlington Northern turned it over to the city along with the warehouse, but Mayor Baugh wanted to keep it in case they ever widen Alpine Way and need right-of-way.”

  I made a note on my steno pad. “So who's getting the gold? The nuggets in the steel chest, that is.”

  John grimaced. “Mayor Baugh is playing hardball. He says it belongs to the city. Maybe he's got a point. It was found last fall, before we bought the land.”

  “That's true.” I paused as Dan gave me a friendly wave, then started up the tractor again. “What,” I asked, raising my voice, “did those trespassers expect to find?”

  “More gold,” John replied. “We've gone over the surface pretty thoroughly, though, and haven't turned up anything more interesting than some old tools.”

  “It must have been a onetime stash,” I said, thinking that I should interview the assayer, Sandy Clay.

  “There were gold and silver mines here in the old days,” John said. “But you must know that.”

  “Yes. They attracted all kinds of people, including some of the Japanese and Korean railroad workers.”

  John's broad forehead creased in a frown. “I thought the railroad workers were mostly Chinese.”

  “They were at first,” I explained. “But some kind of legislation was in force for a while which prevented them from working on the railroads. That's when they brought in other Asians, mostly Japanese. Alpine was known as Nippon back then before the turn of the century, and there was a whistle-stop up the line called Corea. With a C, the old-fashioned way.”

  “Interesting,” John said, and looked as if he really thought it was.

  Dan stopped the tractor again and jumped down from the operator's seat. I thought he was coming over to join us, but instead, he knelt down to scramble around in the dirt.

  John had his back to his brother. “We're bringing a trailer in here as an office, so we thought maybe one of us could spend the night and keep watch,” he said. “Maybe we won't have to. Those signs might do the job.” He pointed to the half-dozen NO TRESPASSING—PRIVATE PROPERTY—KEEP OUT signs that ringed the site.

  “John?” Dan's voice sounded uncertain. “Take a look, will you?”

  I hesitated, then followed John to the spot where Dan was kneeling in the overturned dirt. It had a damp smell, the scent of age and the nearby river.

  “What the … ?” John bent down. I could see four charred bones, one larger than a turkey leg.

  “Dogs?” Dan said, taking off his glasses and rubbing at one eye. “Burying bones, somehow. What do you think?”

  Dan stood up and grabbed a shovel. “Could be. But this one looks like a rib.” He jabbed at a curving fragment with his steel-toed boot. “I'm not talking beef or pork ribs, either. I took anatomy in college, remember?”

  “What are you saying?” Dan asked, sounding breathless.

  “I'm not sure.” John plied the shovel. He unearthed several small bones that looked suspiciously like vertebrae. “Holy Mother,” he whispered. “What's this?”

  I thought he already knew. But I said it anyway: “I think you and Dan have found a human being.”

  Chapter Seven

  I WAS PAINFULLY reminded of finding similar remains in the basement of an old house in Port Angeles a few years earlier. The house had belonged to the daughter and son-in-law of my old friend Mavis Marley Fulkerston, and the bones had belonged to a woman who had met an untimely end. Though Jackie and Paul Melcher had helped sol
ve the eighty-year-old murder, that gruesome discovery still haunted me. Now, at the old warehouse site, I felt a sense of deja vu and wandered off several yards before the Bour-gettes noticed that I had been affected by their discovery.

  “Are you okay, Ms. Lord?” John asked, his manner full of concern.

  I gave him a weak smile. “I'm fine. I think. Are you?”

  He mopped his brow again. “I don't know. This is pretty damned creepy.” John put a hand on his brother's shoulder. “Danny?”

  Dan Bourgette was still staring at the bones. “Maybe this was an Indian burial ground at some point,” he finally said after a long, thoughtful pause.

  That was a possibility, but only marginally comforting, given the alternatives. “If it is, would you have to stop digging?”

  John and Dan gazed at each other, their faces showing bewilderment. “I'm not sure how that works,” John finally said. “We'd have to get hold of somebody from whichever tribe it would be, and as far as I know, there aren't many Native Americans left in Skykomish County.”

  I knew about the Wenatchis, but they had lived on the other side of the pass. Regrettably, I could name only a few of the other tribes who might have laid a claim to the area around Alpine.

  “What should we do?” Dan asked his brother. “Keep digging to find more bones, or call the Sheriff?”

  The brothers agreed that alerting Milo was the best solution. I felt I should stay, but wasn't keen on confronting the Sheriff again. Maybe he'd send a deputy.

  But five minutes after John had called the Sheriff's headquarters, Milo drove up in his Cherokee Chief. He looked about as happy to see me as I was to see him.

  The Sheriff dealt with my presence by pretending that I wasn't there. “John? Dan? More nuggets?”

  “Afraid not, Sheriff,” John replied. “Take a look.”

  Milo looked, bending down in silence, almost as if he were at prayer. I knew better; Milo's religion is fishing, and the only time I've known him to pray is when he's trying to catch a steelhead.

  “They look like human remains, all right, “ he said, straightening up. “I'll bag what you've got and send it to the lab. I'm no expert, but I'd guess these bones have been here a while. Keep digging. If you collect any more fragments, put them in a bag for us.”