Cold River

by Liz Adair

  “He has very fine eyes,” Mandy murmured.

  “Yes, he did.” Granny said softly.

  Mandy set the picture down. “I think you need to tell Vince.”

  “Tell him what, my dear?”

  “Tell him that he has fine eyes.”

  “When the time is right.”

  Mandy picked up her purse. “Actually, he already knows. I just think he needs to hear it from you.”

  “When the time is right,” Granny repeated. She put her arm around Mandy as she walked her to the door. “Here’s the umbrella. Drive carefully.”

  “I will,” Mandy promised. She was thankful for the protection as she hurried to her car. She got in, found the keys under the front seat as Stevie Joe had promised, and started the car. It was pitch dark, and the rain streamed down so hard the wipers had a hard time keeping up. She drove slowly, peering through the windshield to track the fog line on the side of the road. It seemed to take forever, but finally she saw the lights of Fran’s house ahead and looked for the turnoff to her gravel road. When she found it and veered gently to the right, she was conscious that now there was no white line to show her where the edge dropped steeply off into blackberry bushes.

  Carefully negotiating the curve, Mandy saw that her sister was home and had every light in the house on. Grateful for that beacon shining in the night and pointing the way, grateful for the soup and toasted cheese sandwiches that Leesie fixed for dinner, grateful for a good bed, Mandy retired at eight and didn’t wake until Leesie roused her just before leaving the next morning.

  Her eyes fluttered briefly when she heard Leesie call, but it wasn’t until the slamming of the door broke through her sleepy fog that she looked at the clock and realized she needed to be up. She threw back the covers, bolted out of bed, and headed for the shower. Dressing with an eye on the clock, she decided there was no time for breakfast. She stuffed two granola bars in her purse, ran to her car, threw it in reverse, and backed out of the drive.

  Halfway up the hill and still accelerating, she heard a sudden, sharp click click click click, and the front of the car began to shimmy violently. Before Mandy even had a chance to wonder what was happening, there was a loud whang, and the Miata lurched to the right. Mandy yanked the steering wheel to the left, but the car had already sailed off the road. The brambles cushioned the landing, but she slammed against the seat restraint so hard that it knocked the wind out of her. Try as she might, it seemed an eternity before she could loosen the invisible bands cinched tightly around her chest and draw in that first, blessed breath. She took another, less painful than the first, and then another. When her breathing returned to normal, Mandy took stock. Everything had happened so quickly, it was hard to go back and replay the experience.

  What she did know was that right now, the car stood on its nose with the motor running, and she hung in her harness like an unused puppet.

  Feeling ridiculous, she put the Miata in park and turned off the key. Looking around, she could see a tangle of wicked-looking blackberry canes pressing against the windows. She unlatched the door and pushed on it, but she was in an awkward position and couldn’t exert enough force to open it more than an inch. The passenger door didn’t look any more promising.

  Mandy twisted around and looked up through the back window. She could see gray sky beyond the vines that crisscrossed her field of vision. “It’s like a vertical prison,” she muttered.

  Her eye fell on the steel teeth of the zipper that encircled the window, and the idea of a jailbreak began to stir. Still hanging in her shoulder restraint and seat belt, she stretched her arm until it pulled painfully against the socket, but she couldn’t reach the zipper handle. She needed to get free of her seat belt. She drew up her knees and knelt on the steering wheel for support so she wouldn’t drop when she undid the latch. Even so, when she pressed the release, she fell sideways and had to catch hold of one of the struts that held up the top to keep from ending up down by the foot pedals. As she fell, her knee hit the horn button, and the sudden blast made her jump. She paused for a moment to get her balance and let her pulse quiet.

  After a deep breath, she held onto the passenger’s headrest, grabbed the zipper tab, and pulled. In two seconds she had the window down and tentatively poked her head between two lethal-looking blackberry canes, but there wasn’t enough room to get her shoulders through without lacerating her jugular. With a sinking heart, Mandy eyed the sheer embankment and wondered if a car driving by could even see her. She doubted it.

  She turned around and considered. Even if she could get the door open far enough to get out, she would be flayed alive by the time she made it out of the thicket.

  Her legs began to cramp, and as she held onto one of the crossbars supporting the soft top in order to shift her weight, she suddenly realized she was hanging on to her escape route. It took ten seconds to undo the latches at the top of the windshield, another ten to get the top halfway folded down. She met resistance from the two canes that crossed over the back window, but they finally gave way, and she sat in the open air.

  “Hallelujah,” she said aloud. “It’s even stopped raining.”

  Just then she heard a car going by on the gravel road above. She called out, but it kept on going, rounded the bend, and the sound died away. Moments later, it returned, and Mandy heard Fran calling her name.

  “I’m down here,” Mandy hollered. “I ran off the road.”

  “Where?”

  “Down here.”

  Fran stood at the top of the embankment with her hands on her hips. “What happened? I was washing dishes and saw you go by at the bottom of the hill, and then you never came out on top. It was like the Bermuda Triangle.”

  Mandy crouched on the folded-up top and looked up. “I don’t know what happened. There was a sound like a machine gun and then a sound like a shotgun— or maybe a cannon. And then I was sailing off the road.”

  Fran looked around. “First thing to do is get you out of there. Wait and I’ll run back to the house and get a ladder. I think we can get you up without too much blood. While I’m there, I’ll call Stevie Joe to send the tow truck.”

  “Don’t be long.” Mandy thought that the sound of Fran’s truck driving away was the lonesomest thing she had ever heard. She pulled the keys out of the ignition and then fished her purse off the floor. After that, she crawled up to where she could sit on the upended trunk and bumper and folded her arms to try to stay warm. The minutes crawled by. Eventually she heard the sound of Fran’s approaching truck, and soon her friend was standing at the top with a ladder in one hand and a rope in the other.

  “I hope the ladder is long enough,” Fran said. She tied the rope to one end. “I’m going to throw this to you, so you can keep the end up out of the blackberries. Set it on the bumper, and I think it’ll bridge the worst of it.”

  She threw the rope, but it went wide and fell in the thicket. She tried again, and Mandy almost tumbled off her perch trying to catch it.

  The third time, the rope landed in Mandy’s lap. “I’ve got it,” she called. “Send down the ladder.”

  As Fran obliged, Mandy stood on her little green island and used the rope to keep the long extension ladder out of the blackberries. When she finally set it on the back bumper of the Miata, it made a bridge to the top of the embankment.

  “Wow!” Mandy breathed.

  “Okay,” Fran said. “This is a fiberglass ladder, so it’s going to be springy. Don’t get scared if it bounces a bit. You’ll be fine.”

  Mandy slung her purse over her head and one shoulder, crouched down, and grabbed the fourth rung. Tentatively, she placed a foot on the bottom rung and then started climbing.

  “Look at me,” Fran urged. “Look up here. You’re doing fine.”

  The ladder flexed with every movement.

  “It’s a bit scary,” Mandy admitted. “It doesn’t feel secure.”

  “You’re doing fine. Keep coming. That’s right. Now, give me your hand.”

>   Mandy stepped off the ladder onto the road. The first thing she did was hug Fran and tell her thanks. Then she turned around and looked at her car. “What could have happened?”

  “Maybe something in the steering went out. Wait. What is that?” Fran trotted down the road, calling over her shoulder, “Pull up the ladder, will you?”

  Mandy wrestled the ladder up, casting frequent looks at Fran, who was scrambling down the slope at a place where there were no blackberries and gingerly retrieving something from the prickly bushes at the bottom. She came back up on all fours and returned, out of breath, with her prize.

  “What is it?” Mandy asked, dropping the ladder on the road.

  “Wheel cover,” Fran said, panting. “You lost a wheel.” She handed the aluminum disc to Mandy. “Wait, what’s this?” Taking it back, she examined the inside surface. “There’s something written on it.”

  “Something written on it? What do you mean?”

  “Here. See for yourself.”

  Frowning, Mandy looked at the even block letters painted there. GET OUT OF TOWN. She looked up at Fran. “Did you call the tow truck?”

  “Nobody answered. I left a message.”

  “Well, before we get the tow truck, we need Doc MacDonald here. Someone sabotaged my car, and I know just who it was.”

  Fran asked who, but Mandy wouldn’t say anything more. Grimly, she helped stow the ladder in the back of Fran’s pickup. Then she asked to be taken home so she could call the deputy sheriff and the district office. Fran drove her down the hill and wanted to stay with her, but Mandy wouldn’t even let her get out of the pickup, insisting that she go on to work.

  “If you’re sure, I will,” Fran said. “I just got word I’ve got auditors coming. It’s no problem. Vince’s accountants like to do spot audits, but I’ve got some prep work to do in the office.”

  She rolled down her window as Mandy got out and walked around the pickup. “You’re sure you’re all right?”

  Mandy approached the window. “I’m fine. Not to add to your worries, but I’m giving notice. I’ll take you up on the offer to break the lease. I’m not going to stay where I keep having to look over my shoulder. Life is too short.” She laughed nervously. “Or it may become too short.”

  “When are you leaving?”

  “As soon as I can.”

  “I hate to think of you going, but I don’t blame you.” Fran waved, turned around, and drove off with the ladder rattling in the back.

  Mandy watched her for a moment then unlocked the door and headed for the phone. She found the deputy’s number, dialed it, and held her breath as she counted the rings. He answered on the fourth, and after hearing her story promised to be there in twenty minutes. He made it in fifteen.

  “How do?” he said when Mandy answered the door. “You sure ’nuff put that little car in the briar patch. Now, what’s this story about sabotage?”

  Mandy invited him in and had him sit. “This will take a while.” She told the story, beginning with the chocolate éclair and ending with the fire.

  “So, why’nt you call about the far?”

  “I really couldn’t believe that someone would set my house on fire while I was sleeping. I could have been killed.”

  “So, who do you think did it?”

  “Stevie Joe.”

  “Stevie Joe! If that isn’t a pea-brained idea! Where’d you come across that ’un?”

  “Okay, here’s the thing. Stevie Joe is married to Vonda Hawes, one of the schoolteachers that I’ve had to let go. He’s been driving down here back and forth in front of my house, looking at me.”

  Doc MacDonald shook his head.

  “No, wait,” Mandy said. “Listen. I had my car in to him last night to rotate the tires. It was a perfect time to sabotage my car— to make it so I could drive a ways, but for sure I’d have an accident somewhere. What if it had been on the way home last night in the rain? No one would have found me. I’d have been out in the rain all night. Or worse, in the river.”

  “Let me see that wheel cover,” Doc said. “You said there was some writing in it?”

  “Yes. It was a warning to leave town.”

  Doc took the aluminum disk from her and examined it. “There’s no way Stevie Joe did this.”

  “What makes you so sure?”

  “Stevie Joe never learnt to read and write. He can’t hardly even write his name.”

  MANDY SPENT ALMOST two hours with Doc MacDonald. He listened intently to her recital and then asked her to tell it again, but this time, to include the part about the stinkbugs. At her surprised look, he assured her the whole county knew about it. She insisted it wasn’t connected with the fire and the car accident— that the parcel on her doorstep and the decoration of her car were teenage pranks. Doc said, “Maybe so, but I want to hear it all.” He took a small spiral notebook and a pen out of his shirt pocket and took notes in block letters as she spoke. Afterward, he prowled around the back deck and got down on his knees to examine the area around the charred siding. He crawled under the deck and even shimmied his girth through the hole into the crawl space under the house.

  Mandy paced back and forth as she waited for him to reappear. When he finally crawled out from under the deck, she peppered him with questions, but he only shook his head as he dusted himself off. “It wasn’t wiring,” he said, though it sounded more like warring. “You can sleep sound and not worry ’bout that.”

  Yeah, sure, she thought. That’s real comforting to know.

  Doc told her he would supervise the rescue of her car and then gave her a ride to the district office. “I wouldn’t spread around any accusations about who did that to your car, if I was you,” he warned as he drove. “Now, I’ve got some revenue agents comin’ up, want to crash around in the woods a bit lookin’ for a still they think is operatin’ upriver.” He chuckled as he looked at his watch. “But they won’t be here ’til five. I’ll have time to talk to Stevie Joe. Shucks, I’ll sit with him as he fixes it and find out what he has to say. Don’t worry, if it was him as did it, I’ll know, and I’ll be all over him like a rat on a Cheeto.”

  He pulled up in front of the district office. “Next time somethin’ happens, call me. You shouldn’t ought to have taken off that burnt siding without me seein’ it.”

  Mandy sighed. “No, I know. But don’t worry. There isn’t going to be a next time.” She opened the door and got out.

  “You got a ride home, if your car ain’t done in time?”

  “I’ll manage.”

  “Well, give me your keys. Stevie Joe’ll leave them under the seat.”

  She took the Miata key off her ring and gave it to the deputy. “Thanks again,” she said and closed the door. She walked in front of the deputy’s cruiser to the porch steps, and as she mounted them, she saw the whole staff standing at the window. She forced a smile as Grange solemnly held the door open.

  “Hello, all,” she greeted. “Don’t look so concerned. I had a small accident— I took a curve too fast and tangled with a blackberry bush. No harm, no foul. Have I missed anything exciting here?”

  Mo wanted details, but she assured him there weren’t any except for her own stupidity. She asked Mrs. Berman to come to her office and led the way upstairs. As Mandy crossed the mezzanine, she looked down and caught Grange staring at her. He was frowning, and he looked so fierce that she dropped her eyes to the carpet and kept them there all the way to her office. Once there, she threw herself into her chair and clenched her hands in her lap to stop them from trembling.

  Mrs. Berman closed the door and stood in front of it. “What happened?” Her voice was kindly and held a note of concern.

  Mandy cleared her throat. “I hope I’m not going to act like a baby now,” she said, conscious that her eyes were welling. “It’s all over, and though it could have been bad, I wasn’t hurt at all, except—”

  “Except what?”

  Mandy rubbed her chest. “I’m a bit sore where the seat belt was. I wondered if
you had anything that would help. I don’t want it to be worse tomorrow.”

  “I’ll fix you some comfrey. But tell me, what happened?”

  “I ran off the road at a place where it was pretty steep. My landlady rescued me. I reported the accident, and Doc MacDonald gave me a ride. He’s going to see that my car is fixed, too.”

  “That’s it?”

  “That’s it.”

  “All right, then.” Mrs. Berman opened the door. “While I fix that comfrey, you need to look at that note on your desk. Nettie Maypole has your whole afternoon planned. Remember, I warned you she was a bulldozer.”

  Mandy smiled at that moment, but throughout the afternoon, as she watched Nettie lay the groundwork for a successful election, she reflected that the description was apt. Mandy sat as figurehead through meetings with Mrs. Foley and Wesley Gallant and nodded in support as Nettie primed a reporter from the Hiesel Valley Herald with facts and figures. In another meeting with committees from each of the towns in the district, Mandy endorsed Nettie’s plans and realized that, as hard as it had been to swallow her pride, she could not have asked for a more capable person to head up the levy campaign.

  At the end of the day, as Mandy sat at her desk examining her list of assignments from Nettie for the next week, Mrs. Berman tapped at her door.

  “I’m going now. Doc McDonald called while you were with Nettie. He said don’t worry about your car. Everything’s fine. I see it’s in the parking lot. Do you need anything else?”

  “No, thank you, Mrs.— Edith. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

  Mandy cleared off her desk, gathered her things, and went down to check out her car. The front bumper had a small dimple, and the right front fender had an ugly bulge on the top. Mandy ran her hand over it.

  “You didn’t tell us you lost a wheel.”

  She whirled. Grange stood just behind her. “How did you know?” she asked.

  “It’s pretty obvious. The lug nuts get sheared off, the wheel comes off, and when the car drops on the wheel, it bends the fender.” He stepped closer and traced the misshapen place. “I lost one once. It’s a pretty scary thing. I didn’t run off the road, but the wheel chased me and ran over me.”