Not a Sound

by Heather Gudenkauf

  Instead of making Evan lemon squares I find a package of preportioned chocolate chip cookie dough in the back of the freezer behind some frozen peas and a bottle of vodka I had forgotten about. I pop the cookies into the oven and pour the vodka down the drain.

  Twenty minutes later, carrying a plastic container of still-warm cookies with a thank-you note taped to the lid, Stitch and I step out into the November sunshine. The sky is a gauzy blue behind trees that are stripped bare, their discarded foliage spongy beneath my feet. I’m dressed in a medium-weight parka that I can tell, even though my breath comes out in white puffs, will be too warm to wear by noon.

  Actually, this would be a beautiful morning to take the kayak out on Five Mines. I’ve found that as long as I’m dressed for it, the river is my perfect playground in all kinds of weather. If Jake can prove it, and Gwen’s husband is the culprit, then I’ll have my river back. I know that sounds callous, but after losing so much, mostly due to my own stupid choices, sometimes I feel like Five Mines is the only sure thing I have anymore.

  “I’m trusting you not to run off,” I say to Stitch who, for the moment, is obediently at my side. As we approach, I can see that Evan’s storage building is shut up tight. Either he doesn’t have any appointments scheduled for this Sunday morning or everyone has canceled. Based on the brisk business that Evan has done up until now, I figure that all his clients, spooked by the discovery of Gwen’s body, have canceled.

  Stitch and I climb the stone steps to Evan’s house. By the time we reach the top of the bluff I’m out of breath and sweating. No wonder Evan transports his customers up and down by four-wheeler. It’s a workout all on its own by foot. The house is beautiful. Two stories tall and made from hewn logs the color of honey, stone and glass, the home is at once obnoxiously large and oddly homey-looking.

  I knock on the double door, painted a deep mallard green. There’s no answer. I move back and look up at the second-story windows. Evan steps into view and stares down at us. The remnants of his scuffle with Bennett and Cole are evident on his face. There’s an ugly gash above his eyebrow, his cheek scraped and one eye is swollen and discolored. I grimace and wave. He moves away from the windows and I wait a few more minutes for him to come to the door. He doesn’t. I can’t really blame him. I wouldn’t want to talk to me, either. I leave the container of cookies by his front door and Stitch and I walk down the bluff back to the house.

  Just as I predicted the day has warmed considerably and I decide that I’m not letting anything keep me away from Five Mines. It is a beautiful day for a ride in the kayak and I’m going. I’ve wasted too much time hiding away from the world, from myself. Well, no more. I have Stitch and he’ll look out for me.

  After lunch I put on my waterproof paddling pants and jacket and pull my two-person kayak out of the shed. With Stitch right beside me, I haul it down to the river’s edge. I strap a life jacket expressly made for dogs on Stitch since we’ll be going into much deeper water today. I have no intention of going back to the crime scene. Instead, we’ll take a different back channel and work our way north.

  The current is moving swiftly and I really only have to use my paddle to keep the kayak facing forward. Stitch, oddly enough, is content just sitting in the front seat of the kayak. He must still be worn-out from his midnight run. Silver flashes appear just below the surface of the water. Carp or bluegill. I think about all the other critters that swim below my kayak. Otter, channel catfish and gizzard shad. Another world, and I wonder if it is as silent as my own.

  It doesn’t take long and we’re approaching Bishop’s Island, an expanse of wooded land about two miles long and three-quarters of a mile wide. If I go left I’ll end up in the spot where I found Gwen; if I go right I won’t. I go right. This is a more well-traveled circuit of the river than I usually take and I see several fishing boats and a few other kayakers. After twenty minutes of paddling I pull off onto a sandy beach and let Stitch stretch his legs and run.

  I’m almost afraid at what he’ll find, but all he brings back to me is an algae-covered stick that I toss a dozen times or so for him to retrieve. I wonder how Jake did with questioning Marty Locke last night and wonder if an arrest was made.

  I check my phone but don’t have a text from him. I’m a little disappointed. I’ve replayed our dinner over and over in my mind and as much as I’ve told myself that it wasn’t one, it kind of felt like a real date. Stupid, I know. We’re just friends. We’ve always been just friends. But it felt comfortable, it felt, I don’t know, easy. I hate this limbo that I’m in. Married but separated. Sometimes I just wish that David would make up his mind. That I’d make up my mind. That I’d just say fuck it, it’s over. But then I take the risk of not ever seeing Nora again.

  I shouldn’t be shocked that Jake hasn’t texted. Even though it’s Sunday, I know detectives don’t work Monday through Friday, nine to five. He’s in the middle of a murder investigation. He’s busy. He’s probably been up all night and is exhausted.

  I call to Stitch, who has been digging a hole in the sand. He bounds back to me and shakes himself, pelting me with the coarse grains of sand that his coat collected in his play. I corral him back into the kayak and push it off into the brackish water before climbing in myself. Heading upstream in the kayak is much more difficult than downstream, which is why I only traveled a short distance. That’s why outfitters like Evan’s do so well. He provides the kayaks and then meets his clients down river in a large vehicle, straps the kayaks to the roof and then hauls them back up to their cars.

  My muscles are straining against the push of the current, but the exertion feels good. By the time I reach the island my arms are burning and I still have a long way to go before I’m back at my dock. I may have underestimated the current and overestimated my kayaking abilities today. The last thing I want to do is travel to the same spot where we found Gwen, but at this rate it will take me twice as long if I take the alternate route.

  “I must be nuts,” I say to Stitch as I pull my paddle through the water and head up the back channel that I will forever, at least in my own mind, refer to as Gwen’s. I mean to get us home as quickly as possible but as we near the spot where Stitch first spotted Gwen I stop paddling. I’m not sure what I think I might find. Certainly the police and the forensics team have searched the entire area meticulously, have collected each scrap of paper, each tin can, each out-of-the-ordinary item as possible evidence.

  I’m no better than the horde of media that met Gwen’s remains at the marina, but I don’t come back here out of morbid curiosity, this I’m sure of. I don’t know why I’m drawn to this spot.

  The online obituary said that Gwen’s funeral service was going to be held on Tuesday morning. The photo accompanying the obit could be Gwen’s ID photo from Queen of Peace. It’s a head shot of a smiling Gwen wearing hospital scrubs. She looks healthy and happy.

  I haven’t decided if I’m going to attend the funeral or not. Part of me wants the opportunity to see that Gwen is laid to rest surrounded by her friends and family, not discarded like a piece of trash in Five Mines. Part of me doesn’t believe that I have the right to attend the funeral.

  I vaguely remember Gwen coming to see me in the hospital. David told me she had called several times to come see me when I was convalescing at home, but I refused. She sent a card begging me to call her, to talk to her. I remember reading it and tossing it in the trash with all the others. I didn’t want anyone’s sympathy, didn’t want people to pity me.

  The last remaining leaves on the trees quiver tremulously above me as if one good scare will send them tumbling down. Upriver, my old friend the great blue heron is wading, belly deep, her plumed black-and-white-striped crown regally scanning the water for fish. I look up and notice her bulky stick nest in the tree above me. She could be the only witness to what exactly transpired here a few days earlier. Did she see someone toss Gwen into the river, or per
haps she observed the actual murder?

  My breath quickens as the kayak draws closer to the jumble of fallen branches that tethered Gwen to the land rather than releasing her fully to the river. Stitch, sensing my anxiousness, stands. His body tenses, and I reach forward to rub his head to let him know that it’s okay but he ignores me. I follow Stitch’s line of vision and lock eyes with a man standing on the muddy bank near where Gwen’s body once lay. He’s nearly bald, slightly built and wearing a button-down shirt and khakis. He’s definitely not dressed for hiking.

  The expression on his face mirrors my own. First surprise, then fear. He’s just as shocked to find me there as I am to find him. Like a magnet, my kayak is drawn toward him on the current. His expression shifts once more. His eyes harden and narrow into an icy glare. With a gentle bump, my kayak strikes the copse of fallen tree limbs that separates me from the man on the bank by less than fifty feet. Obscured by tangled clusters of deep brown fox sedge, something glints in his right hand and he tosses it to the ground. A knife? A gun?

  Stitch begins barking, his jaws snapping wildly. He clambers from his seat, his front paws on the spray deck. The kayak rocks and the motion spurs me into action. Using my oar, I push against the fallen limbs, sending my kayak propelling backward and into a spin. When I finally get the kayak under control and once again facing the bank, the man has disappeared.

  I sit there for a full five minutes, trying to catch my breath and scanning the shore for any sign of the man. How did he get there? Did he hike the trail or come by boat? I think of the near break-in at my house and can’t help but wonder if maybe it wasn’t a false alarm. If this man was involved. Stitch has returned to his usual docile self so I know the man is long gone. I know I should just paddle home but curiosity gets the better of me and I cautiously make my way to shore. Keeping Stitch close to my side, I pick my way toward the spot where I think the man dropped what he was holding.

  I smell it first. A heady, fragrant smell that reminds me of my grandmother’s perfume. There it lies, pale, white and delicate. Not a knife or gun. A spray of white flowers, long stemmed and wrapped in silver metallic tissue paper. Calla lilies.

  I text Jake to let him know that I saw a man and what I’ve found. He responds immediately asking me what the hell I’m doing at the crime scene.

  Kayaking with Stitch, I respond. I thought it would be okay. You said her husband probably did it.

  I can imagine Jake shaking his head in exasperation. I didn’t say that. I said we were questioning him. Besides, we had to let him go.

  I glance around nervously. Would the murderer really come back to the scene of the crime and leave flowers? Who do you think would leave flowers? How would they know exactly where to put them?

  My screen is still for a moment and then Jake’s response fills my screen. Could be anyone. A friend, a family member. Soon the place will probably be filled with flowers and stuffed animals and photos of Gwen.

  Aren’t you going to at least come look at them? They could mean something.

  It means someone cared about her. GO HOME!

  I expel a breath of frustration. Is it so odd that a man who isn’t Gwen’s husband would come all the way out here to lay flowers at the spot where a loved one died? Jake didn’t think so, but I’m a little more skeptical. Even though the media gave the approximate location where Gwen was found, it is no easy feat getting here. Whoever came here must have cared about Gwen very much. I snap a quick picture of the bouquet before shoving my phone back into my pocket and then summon Stitch to join me back at the kayak.

  I know Gwen has siblings who live out of state and I wonder if they have arrived in town yet. And if they have, would the first place they go be the spot where her body was found? I don’t think so, but maybe I’d feel differently if it had been Andrew or my dad who had been killed. I know that I bring flowers to my mother’s grave on Mother’s Day and her birthday each year. Maybe if a loved one of mine was murdered I’d be the first person there at the site of their death with a bouquet of snow-white lilies.

  By the time we reach my dock I’m sweating, my muscles are burning and I’m out of breath. So much for the impending snow I smelled in the air. Another false alarm. Typical Iowa weather.

  Stitch leaps to the wooden platform and tears off toward the house while I pull myself out of the kayak. With difficulty I lug the kayak from the water and as I was taught, so as not to strain my back, I bend my knees and grab the far side rim of the kayak with one hand and lift it to my shoulder. Placing my arm inside the cockpit, I support the kayak along my back without actually allowing the full weight to rest on my shoulder.

  The exodus of autumn makes me sad. For years I dreamed of one day taking a long-distance trek down the Mississippi with whatever I could pack into my kayak. David and I used to talk about it. He and Nora would be my travel crew, driving the support car, providing me with food and water and moral support. We even tossed around the idea of beginning at the headwaters in Minnesota and traveling the twenty-three hundred miles down to the Gulf of Mexico.

  Now it looks like it will be just me and Stitch making the trip. I’ve been training all summer and fall but I know I have a long way to go in order to be strong and skilled enough to make the journey. The impending winter will make it difficult for me to be prepared and I will have to train in other ways: on the rowing machine at the YMCA, lifting weights, cross-country skiing. Doable, but not quite the same.

  By the time I reach the shed, a brusque breeze has cooled the salty layer of perspiration on my skin and I’m eager to go inside and take a hot shower. But first I grab a boar bristle brush that I keep in an old milk crate along with grubby, tooth-marked tennis balls, a nearly bald squeaky toy disguised as a squirrel and a cracked Frisbee. I sit with Stitch on the front steps and slide the brush through his coat and comb away the remaining sand that clings to his fur.

  The image of the flowers lying starkly white against the muddy riverbank keeps invading my thoughts. Unlike the lilies that I’ve seen in funeral arrangements, the calla lilies left behind were more appropriate for a wedding bouquet. I’m sure there is significance to this flower choice. It wasn’t her husband, so it had to be someone else. Was Gwen seeing another man? Had Marty found out that she had been cheating on him and in a rage killed her?

  I rub a hand over Stitch’s back, now smooth and free of the gritty sand and prickly burrs. He looks up at me with his assessing gray eyes, the color of a gathering storm, as if he knows that I’m just about to stick my nose where it doesn’t belong.

  “I’m just curious,” I say. Stitch yawns, revealing his pearl-colored teeth, a gesture I know that in dog speak doesn’t mean he’s sleepy but that he’s a bit stressed. “Don’t worry,” I assure him and rub the soft fold behind his ear. “It’s no big deal.”

  I return the brush to the milk crate, lock the shed, and Stitch and I head into the house. I make a point to secure the door behind me, broomstick and all, refill Stitch’s water bowl, grab my own water glass and fill it to the rim. I take a seat at the kitchen counter, my hot shower forgotten for the moment, and bring up my long-neglected Facebook page.

  After the hit-and-run I was in no shape to keep up with social media. I had lost my hearing, had a severe concussion that made any kind of screen time migraine inducing. Plus, I wasn’t feeling particularly social. The happy, carefree images that my friends posted of themselves with their families made me sad and more than a little jealous. Later, it just pissed me off and I would leave alcohol-fueled, snarky, mean-spirited comments on posts. One by one I was unfriended.

  I enter Gwen’s name in the search bar and immediately her profile picture pops up. It’s the same picture that was used in her obituary. I spend a few minutes scrolling through her page. Hundreds of friends have posted condolences to Marty and Lane on the page. There are several pictures of Gwen with Lane, gap-toothed and smiling, but there
are only a handful of photographs of Marty. In each he appears to be distracted, as if his mind is somewhere else or he wants to be someplace else. I think of Jake’s early prediction that Marty is the one who killed Gwen. Maybe he’s right.

  But then who was the man by the river? A relative? A family friend? And if his being at the crime scene was only to lay down flowers in memoriam why did he look so scared and then so angry when he saw me? Why did he run away?

  I click on Gwen’s friends list and about two dozen friends’ names that we have in common appear. I don’t think I know or have ever seen the man who dropped the flowers at the river before, but I quickly look through the profile pics just in case. Not there.

  Next I start clicking on the comments left behind by those who posted on her wall. One by one I go through each. None of the accompanying pictures looks like the man I saw. I sigh. This could take hours. I click on comment after comment until the room begins to darken. I stand, stretch my arms over my head and consider logging off. Instead, I turn on the kitchen light and sit back down.

  A flash of irritation at Jake goes through me. I can’t believe he dismissed me so easily. I’m not sure if stalking Gwen’s Facebook page is going to help me find the man, but I’m sure going to keep trying.

  I go back to the top of Gwen’s page and begin clicking on the comments again. This time I go deeper. I read a comment and then read each reply listed beneath and one name and profile picture consistently appears. He gives his name as P. McNaughton.

  McNaughton is a common last name in Mathias. Just about everyone I know is related to a McNaughton in some way. By birth, by marriage, or three-times removed.

  The person’s name is accompanied by a picture of a man, half his face hidden by a professional grade camera held up to his eye. All of his comments are a refrain on the same theme: Gwen will be missed, such a tragedy, she was an angel on earth. What is most remarkable about his comments is the sheer number of them. I make a quick count and come up with thirty-six. All in response to another’s comment.