“We can get some counseling for him if that’s the case.” I held out a box of tissue. She took several and nodded. “So, you drove to Glacier?”
“Yes, up the Inside Road, to the trailhead to McGee Meadow.”
“And was Victor still out cold?”
“He was starting to come to, but still pretty out of it. I knew I needed to move fast, plus I wanted to get back to take Brady to the vet. On the way up, I had decided that I would teach him a lesson, that I would leave him alone in the woods to scare him while I took Brady in, and then I’d go back and get him and make it clear that if he ever went near any of my family members again, including Leslie, I would hunt him down, knock him out, and do it all over again.”
“You thought of all this on the drive?”
“I did, it was the only thing I thought of. I didn’t think about killing him, honestly, it didn’t even cross my mind. I just knew the police weren’t going to help and I had to take care of this guy myself—for Lewis’s sake, for my entire family’s sake.”
“Did you have a gun then?”
“Yes. I’d run in and grabbed it. He had come to, so I made him go in front of me at gunpoint. He was still sort of out of it, but able to walk and I—” She was sitting up taller now, her shoulders straight and nearly proud as she spoke. Although she appeared almost frail when I came in, hunched into a ball on her chair, she seemed transformed—tall and strong with defined shoulders and biceps. In a strange way, she was opening like a flower as she told me her story—gaining strength from the relief of getting it off her chest. I could see that she would be more than capable of lifting a scrawny guy like Victor.
“You made him walk all the way out there?”
“I did. But he was stumbling a lot, so I ended up not going all the way to McGee as I initially planned and he was calling me a crazy bitch, which I guess I pretty much was, and a, a . . . cunt and every other name imaginable, and saying that I was going to pay for this, that Lewis would pay. My anger started to boil even more and I told him, ‘No.’” She said firmly but in a whisper, “‘It’s you who’s going to pay.’”
I felt a shiver go down my spine.
“And I was still thinking about Brady,” she added. “But when I stopped by a tree and took off my pack, he lunged for a rock with both hands and tried to hit me in the head. I kicked him hard in his chest straight outward”—she pushed her heel firmly out showing me the Tai Kwon Do kick from her chair—“and he went backward and banged the back of his head hard against the tree. And with him being so unsteady, he went down easily and was out again. I propped him against the tree and taped him under his arms and around his hips while he was just limp. I was afraid if he got loose, he’d come for me, so I wrapped it layer after layer. I taped his mouth and then I ran back to the truck.”
“On the trail?”
“No, through the brush, there and back.”
“Were you thinking of footprints?”
“No, nothing like that. Honestly, I was crazed. I didn’t have time to look for the trail, that’s all. I just went. You have to understand—I was a mess. I thought my plan was good under the circumstances, but I was half-crazed. Out of my mind.” Her tears had stopped and she had a faraway, dazed look in her eyes, her pupils large and pale.
“Where did you go?”
“I went home. I took Brady to the vet.”
“Dr. Pritchard?”
She nodded, looked at me, confused that I knew that, but didn’t ask how, just continued. “He was hurt worse than I thought. He was moving really badly by the time I got back, and then I was angry with myself for taking Victor into Glacier and wasting precious time. They took X-rays. The goddamned jerk fractured my dog’s spine. And I’d heard rumors about what he and some other guy had done to that other dog earlier in the year. Fuck him, I thought.” She crossed her arms stubbornly before her. “He could wait while I took care of this. I was thinking that I should just leave the piece of shit out there to rot anyway, but by the time I got home from the vet’s, it’s was already midnight. I checked the thermometer and it was surprisingly warm out, like fifty-six degrees. I was just so mad about Brady and so crazed about him threatening Lewis and I knew what I had done, tying him up like that, was beyond crazier than anything I’d ever done in my life and would now come with a load of consequences I couldn’t even fathom. So the only thing I could figure to do was to stick with the insanity I’d begun, leave him out there to really show him I was serious.”
“So in the morning?”
“I grabbed my gun again and my first-aid kit, thinking he’d be in tough shape. It was unusually warm out that week, but I grabbed a blanket in case, and I went out there.”
“Do you know what time that was?”
Her eyes became watery and she nervously brushed her hair behind an ear. “When it finally got to be morning, I was a wreck and I kept walking around the house, rechecking for things I might need to take with me: the first-aid kit, a blanket, Advil, scissors to cut the tape with. I know.” She looked at me. “I know how crazy I sound.”
I didn’t say anything at first, then went back to the time. “So you don’t quite remember the time?”
“I think I remember it being about eleven or eleven thirty by the time I was actually on my way. Of course, I never went to sleep and planned to go earlier, but Dr. Pritchard was supposed to call me when he got in, and I didn’t hear from him until around quarter to ten and I knew if I went to the park, I wouldn’t have cell coverage. Then”—she sighed heavily—“Lewis showed up out of the blue. It was such a nightmare. He said he didn’t want to go to school that day, and after Leslie dropped him off, he waited till she left, then rode his bike over. She had taken it with them so he could ride to my house after school, but I wasn’t expecting him until around three forty-five. I spent some time convincing him that he needed to go back and drove him there with his bike and checked him in at the front desk. Then I went back home and grabbed the stuff. I remember pulling out, then pulling back in to get more bottled water. I don’t know, I guess I had some kind of approach-avoidance seesaw going on in my head. I was afraid to go, afraid of what I’d find and how he’d be, that my plan wouldn’t work, and mostly, still afraid he’d hurt Lewis or maybe Leslie really badly once I brought him back to town and he rested up. I’m guessing I was parking beside the McGee trailhead by noon or so.”
I stayed quiet. I knew what was coming next was going to be the hard part, and I could hear her breathing quicken. I nodded to encourage her on.
“Then I walked out. I was so scared. When I got there, his head was hanging down, and I was afraid he had died. I checked his pulse and called his name, asked him if he was awake. I said his name several times, then decided to cut the tape, and in that split second, as I started to lower the gun so I could grab my pack and look for the scissors I’d brought, he grabbed for my wrist. I flinched, tried to back away, but he had ahold of my arm between his hands.”
“His wrists still bound?”
“Yes.” She nodded and mimed how his wrists were pressed together with the tape, but his hands free enough to grab her. “He, he”—she swallowed hard—“was stronger than I thought he’d be after being out there all night, and it freaked me out. I mean . . .” She cupped her palms around each side of her face. “A part of me really thought he’d be at my mercy, that he’d be thanking me for getting him out of there and giving him something to drink. I thought I’d have him right where I wanted him, scared and in my debt in a weird way. I twisted my arm”—she showed me the classic breakaway judo move—“and I broke free, and out of instinct again, I swung to his head, not that hard, but I had the gun in my hand still, although it had turned downward somehow in the struggle and I was holding it funny . . . I don’t remember exactly. I’ve gone over it in my head millions of times, but, well, it went off and . . .” She looked down, her shoulders sagging—all the life gone out o
f her, the blossoming of strength over with the full confession.
“And he was shot?”
“He was bleeding.” She placed her palm over the spot below her left rib. “It was an accident. It just went off.”
“What did you do then?” I leaned in.
“I freaked out. I grabbed my pack and ran back to my truck and drove. Just drove until I got to about Coram and stopped and tried to gather my wits. But once I calmed down, I realized I couldn’t leave him like that. All I could think was, oh my God, I’ve shot a man, I’ve shot someone. I could barely breathe.” She squeezed her eyes tightly together as if she could shut out the memory. “I was hyperventilating.” Her voice was dripping with the raw memory, dark and pained. “But I tried to calm myself down and eventually, eventually, I drove back. I knew I needed to get him to a hospital.”
“You still had the gun?”
“In the car, but this time, I knew better than to bring it, so I left it under the seat. I grabbed my pack again with the first aid and I went back down the trail and when I started to get closer, I knew something was wrong. I could smell bear,” she said, almost in a whisper. “And I could hear noises.” She put her hands over her ears like a child as if she were still hearing them. “I couldn’t hear Victor crying out; he must have already been gone.” She shook her head and slammed her eyes shut again. “I froze where I was and tried to see. Between the trees, and I could make out the brownish-silver fur. He was grunting and pulling at him, his head bobbing up and down. Not violently, just steadily.” She opened her eyes and added in a small voice, “I know this is going to sound messed up, but it . . . it looked almost, I don’t know . . . natural, as if he was just eating berries off a bush, as if it was meant to be.” She looked at me like I was a priest and would offer her absolution. Her eyes were large, searching, rimmed in pink from crying. In the span of the last two hours, she already looked five years older, and I was certain that the last two weeks had to have been utter hell, had to have shaved years from her life span. Her cheekbones were sharp and hollowed out and in spite of her strong build, her collarbones suddenly seemed to protrude. “I”—she shook her head slowly, tears flooding her eyes and streaming down her cheeks, down the line of her jaw—“I, I was too late. I had murdered a man.”
I watched her shoulders rise and fall as she tried to calm her breathing. The room was cold and she began to shake, a small persistent tremor. The small cinder-walled room felt bare, ragged and unforgiving. I thought of the Inside Road, of the path to McGee Meadow, and the lone tree that she bound Victor to. I pictured Two Medicine Lake and its haunting sacred peaks. I saw Oldman Lake with its green water and stunted trees, peering upon my father and my demon phantoms. My cabin in West Glacier—a meek shelter among the vast wild—flashed into my mind. I thought of the summer attraction Glacier is, drawing and enfolding millions of tourists in its embrace. Hordes of people coming to see its endless beauty draped in golden-and-rose glory, to hike its trails, to witness its silver-sparkling waterfalls and its pastel-colored river rocks. Coming to see its wildlife as if it was only a zoo and nothing could go wrong. Finally, I thought of how out in this wild, Heather’s mind had run feral, had reverberated around in untamed space with no boundaries, no anchor. I swallowed with effort, my throat dry. “What did you do with the motorcycle?”
“Oh, that.” She glanced at the ceiling, then back, almost relieved to be asked another question. But she looked dazed, as if on autopilot. “When I got back from Dr. Pritchard’s, I put it in my shed to hide. Then, when everything went from bad to totally inconceivable, I had to get rid of it, so I walked down to the river.”
“You hid it down there?”
“It’s in the water.”
“And the type of gun?” Of course I already knew, but it was important to get her full confession.
“A Ruger. A Ruger Blackhawk. You apparently already know I got rid of it. Threw it in the Middle Fork on my way home.” She stared at her tea, which she hadn’t touched and had gotten cold by now. “Is there,” she said hesitantly, “maybe some water?”
I got her some, then sat back down. “Our research indicates that you just recently acquired the gun from one of your students. Can you explain why?”
“Because”—she shook her head, her eyes watering—“after I had my suspicions about Lewis and with him harassing me, I thought I might need a little extra protection. I never figured I’d use it. One of my students, Martin Reilly, said another one of my students, Troy Hamlin, went to gun shows and collected them. I simply asked him if he’d like to trade out—Tai Kwon Do lessons for a gun. He offered me the Ruger.”
I nodded.
“Okay,” I sighed. “We’re almost done. I’ll need you to sign some forms before we get you somewhere where you can rest.”
“I don’t think there’s much in the way of rest for me for a long time to come.” She almost gave a timid smile but couldn’t fully get there. The side of her lips attempted to curl, then fell right back down. She continued to shiver.
“It seems,” I said, “that you’ve been wanting to get this off your chest. Why didn’t you come to me earlier?”
She looked at me, her skin very pale and her expression intensely sad. She gave a small shrug. “I guess a small part of me was trying to convince myself, for my parents’ sake, for Lewis’s sake, that I could live with what I’d done. That if I remembered how bad Victor Lance was as a human being, that what I had done wasn’t so horrible. But I know”—she held up her palm—“you don’t have to say it. I know, he was still a human being, no matter how . . .” She didn’t finish, just dropped her head.
I stood up. “Heather,” I said, and she looked up, her face strained and ghostly. “He”—I looked into her haunted eyes and nodded once—“he really was despicable.”
She stared at me for a moment, then bowed her head, her blond hair draping on each side of her face.
I stood still, watching her. I wanted to offer her some comforting gesture, to touch her shoulder or her cheek, but I resisted. All I had to offer her was what I’d already said: He really was despicable. “I’ll be back with the paperwork,” I said.
• • •
That night I didn’t leave the county jail until about two in the morning. I got the tape and the capsaicin muscle spray from Monty and completed as much paperwork as I could. Monty had watched most of the confession through the two-way and didn’t have much to say. When I walked in he let out a big sigh.
“The gun,” I said. “You mentioned a Kevin Fuller?”
“Yeah, that gun’s been traded more than . . . ” He paused and looked down as if he realized it wasn’t worth it to try for a metaphor. “Kevin Fuller,” he began again, “traded the gun to a Troy Hamlin from Columbia Falls at the Fairgrounds one year ago for a riding lawn mower. At first he didn’t remember who he traded it to, but when I mentioned that a riding mover would be somewhat more than the cost of the Ruger, he remembered that Hamlin had to write a check for the difference. And it turns out that Fuller’s wife keeps check records for years. Mrs. Fuller had Troy Hamlin’s name dug out of a file cabinet within twenty minutes for me.”
“Good work,” I managed.
“Ted,” Monty said. “Joe isn’t handling this so well.”
I nodded.
“He’s in the waiting area.”
I walked out to it to see Joe sitting slumped in a chair, his head in his hands. When he heard me walk in, he looked up, his eyes bloodshot and his skin rough and red. “Joe,” I whispered. He stared at me for a split second, then his face contorted and utterly unexpectedly, he lunged for me, grabbing my collar and pushing me against the wall. I wasn’t expecting it and fell easily back with his strong shove, the back of my head slamming the cinder-brick wall.
“How could you?” His face was full of rage, his jaw set hard. “How could you do this to her?”
I didn’t put up a fi
ght. I’m quite a bit taller, not to mention younger, so it wouldn’t have been hard to push him off, but I didn’t. I stayed put, just held my hands up like I was surrendering, my back against the wall. I felt Joe’s knuckles dig into the bottom of my neck. “I’m sorry,” is all I said.
The anger stayed in his face, but I could feel that he started to release his grip just as Sheriff Walsh came in and grabbed Joe by the arms and pulled him away from me. Joe’s shoulders stayed tense, and he ripped his arm away from Walsh, turned, and gave me a piercing look, then glared at Walsh as if to say, Don’t mess with me now.
Walsh ended up asking Joe to go home for the night. “Joe,” I heard him say after I’d gathered my things from one of the back offices and came back out to leave. He had put his hand on his shoulder. “There’s nothing you can do. Go home to Elena.”
“How am I going to tell Elena this?” he asked, his voice suddenly small.
That moment cut me to the bone. I knew I had to get out. I drove east of Kalispell to the Flathead River and parked in a lot on the west bank. I sat in my car and watched the ink-black water slide silently by. The cloud cover was dense, blocking any sign of the half-moon, and I was completely alone. No parked teens, no squatters camped in the trees by the shore as they sometimes did by this part of the river. Only two cars passed by on the road to my back as I sat and thought, their lights briefly skimming the water.
I thought about Shelly and how we came to this exact spot to make out a few times when we were dating. I thought of how she was still just a child, a girl really, when we got married, her full and rosy cheeks, her tea-length white dress, her hair up in a bun with baby’s breath. But then, my own mother had married my father at an even younger age.
I thought of what it would have done to Ma or even my dad if Natalie or Kathryn had taken Leslie’s messed-up road or done what Heather had done. It would have crushed them. But then again, although transformed forever, people move on. They strengthen their shells and forge ahead because there is no other good alternative. Just as the four of us did without my father.
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