Lightning Strike

by William Kent Krueger

  “Search wherever you need to.”

  In the cottage, he found another piece of important evidence, a vial of barbiturates.

  “They’re for Duncan’s mother,” Mary Margaret explained.

  “Why are they here?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe Duncan uses them to relax.”

  “Or maybe Duncan used them to drug Big John before he killed him,” Liam suggested. “May I take these?”

  “Take whatever you want,” Mary Margaret said in a voice cold as winter. “And then, for God’s sake, take away that man, that monster.”

  CHAPTER 35

  That evening, Grandma Dilsey and Sam Winter Moon showed up at the house on Gooseberry Lane. They came to have a serious talk with Liam about the unrest on the rez.

  Cork’s mother explained to them that he’d stopped by home shortly before supper and that he believed he’d found enough evidence to obtain a warrant for Duncan MacDermid’s arrest for the murder of Big John. He was on his way to see the county attorney.

  “What evidence?” Grandma Dilsey asked, looking first to her daughter, then to Cork.

  “We don’t know,” Cork’s mother said.

  “Did he say when he would be back?” Sam asked.

  “Only that he might be late.”

  “We’ll wait,” Grandma Dilsey said.

  As night overtook Aurora, they sat on the front porch, talking quietly. In the front yard, Cork threw a rubber ball for Jackson until his arm was tired and it was too dark for even Jackson to see the ball in flight. Fireflies had begun to wink on and off. Ten o’clock came and Liam O’Connor still hadn’t returned.

  Cork sat on the bottom porch step, stroking Jackson, who lay at his feet, and he listened to the others as they talked and speculated.

  “Maybe he’s already made the arrest,” Cork’s mother said.

  “Would he question Duncan right away?” Grandma Dilsey asked.

  “Why not?” Sam said. “I know how eager Liam is to get to the truth.”

  “If Duncan wasn’t drunk, he would have insisted on having an attorney present,” Cork’s mother said. “That would take a while.”

  “You could call the Sheriff’s Department and ask,” Grandma Dilsey suggested.

  Cork’s mother left the porch for a few minutes, and when she returned, she said, “He’s not there. They don’t know where he is.”

  “Has he arrested Duncan MacDermid?” Grandma Dilsey asked.

  “No,” Cork’s mother said. “At least not yet.”

  They were quiet for a bit, then Sam said, “I knew MacDermid’s father. A man as hard as the iron ore that came from his mine.”

  “I remember the mine strike back in 1916,” Grandma Dilsey said. “He brought in armored cars filled with sharpshooters, and the sheriff here then, a man named Wheaton, as I recall, a toady of MacDermid’s father, deputized hundreds of men as mine guards. Thugs with badges. Terrible violence from both sides. It was the only time I can remember when people on the reservation were glad MacDermid had a rule against hiring Indians.”

  “A rule?” Cork said from his place on the steps.

  “Nothing official,” Grandma Dilsey said. “But everyone knew it. And I suspect he passed that prejudice down to his son. Along with a lot of other unpleasant qualities.” She’d been sitting with Cork’s mother on the porch swing, but now she stood and said, “I brought blueberry cobbler. I believe I’ll have a bite of it. Would anyone like to join me?”

  They were in the kitchen, sitting around the table eating Grandma Dilsey’s cobbler, when Sheriff Liam O’Connor walked in the door from the mud porch. He stood just inside the threshold, taking them all in.

  “Did you get the arrest warrant?” Cork’s mother asked.

  Cork’s father didn’t answer immediately. He seemed to be gathering himself. “I presented our county attorney with everything, and then we went to the judge. He said it wasn’t substantial enough to justify an arrest warrant. He said it was all still too circumstantial. He said when it came to a man like Duncan MacDermid, I would need nothing less than an eyewitness or a signed confession. I said, fine. I told him I would bring the man in for questioning and I would get a confession out of him. In no uncertain terms, he said that I was not to harass Duncan MacDermid any further. And then he said, ‘Manydeeds was just an Indian. Let it go.’ ”

  Liam O’Connor reached up and unpinned the badge from the blouse of his khaki uniform. He took three long strides across the kitchen linoleum, set the badge on the table, and said, “In Tamarack County, justice is dead.”

  * * *

  Cork could hear the low timbre of his parents’ voices drifting through his window, and he left his bed. Quietly, he crawled out onto the porch roof and positioned himself near enough to the window of his parents’ bedroom that he could hear their words.

  “I understand, Liam,” his mother was saying. “But this isn’t the answer, and you know it.”

  “I’m tired, Colleen, tired of fighting.”

  “So, you’re just going to give up?”

  “Let someone else take the heat.”

  “And you’ll do what? Stand on the sidelines and watch? That’s not you, Liam. Come to bed.” Cork heard the old bed frame creak. “Lay your head here.”

  They were quiet for a while, then his mother said, “Now you know what it’s like for my people. We’ve been fighting for justice forever. If we’d given up when it was difficult, we’d be nothing but a memory now.”

  “There are many of you. I’m one man.”

  “But a good one, Liam. When I grew up here, the men who wore the badge you wear weren’t like you. You make a difference. Get some rest tonight. Things will look better in the morning.”

  “Nothing will have changed.”

  “Maybe your outlook. And that’s all you need.”

  The conversation ceased and the chirr of crickets filled the night. Cork returned to his bed and wondered if one night’s sleep would be enough for anyone.

  He’d just closed his eyes and begun to drift off when the front doorbell rang, followed by a desperate pounding on the door itself. Jackson leaped from where he’d been sprawled across the foot of Cork’s bed, bolted into the hallway, and set to barking furiously. Cork followed, entering the upstairs hallway just as his father and mother came from their bedroom, hastily throwing on their robes. He was right behind them as they hurried down the stairs.

  “Cork, hold Jackson,” his father ordered, switched on the light in the foyer, then the porch light, and opened the door.

  Jorge and his mother stood there, supporting Mary Margaret MacDermid, who was between them. The skin around the woman’s left eye was a deep purple and the eye itself was almost completely swollen shut. Her lower lip was split, and the dark, clotted blood looked like a leech had attached itself there.

  “Good God,” Liam O’Connor said. “Come in, come in. What’s happened?” He took Jorge’s place in supporting Mrs. MacDermid as she walked unsteadily into the living room. He and Jorge’s mother eased her down onto the sofa, and Jorge’s mother sat next to her and held her hand.

  Cork’s mother turned on the living room lights and said, “I’ll call Doctor Haines.”

  Cork stood beside Jorge, who looked scared, his face ashen. Like Cork, Jorge was in his pajamas, but he’d managed to put on his Keds.

  “Tell me what happened.” Liam O’Connor addressed this to Jorge’s mother.

  “Mr. MacDermid came home late tonight. Somehow he knew that Mary Margaret had let you search the cottage.”

  “Our county judge, no doubt,” Cork’s father said.

  “He was angry and drinking, and this is what he did to her.”

  “Is he still at the house?”

  Jorge’s mother opened her mouth to speak, but no sound came. It was as if instead of speaking, she’d dropped a stone into a deep well, and it felt to Cork like everyone in the room held their breath waiting for the sound of it to hit.

  “Yes.” It was Mrs. Mac
Dermid who finally spoke. She lifted her battered face to Cork’s father and said, “He’s still there. He’s there and he’s dead. I shot the son of a bitch.”

  PART II MURDER

  CHAPTER 36

  July melted into August in heat and humidity that left the North Country on edge. Mary Margaret MacDermid was not charged with murder. Her face and the bruises in other places were proof enough of the brutality of her husband’s attack, and the shooting was officially deemed self-defense. That she may have had an additional motive in killing her husband was never brought up, because Liam’s suspicions surrounding Duncan MacDermid’s part in the death of Big John Manydeeds were never officially made public. But people talked, as people do, especially in small towns, and rumors flew about like harpies.

  There was no wake for Duncan MacDermid, just a visitation and a funeral Mass, well attended but tearless. He was buried in the Catholic cemetery, his grave marked with a stone that was ordered by his wife and was undoubtedly much smaller and less elaborate than he might have arranged for himself had he known his fate ahead of time.

  Old Mrs. MacDermid died, too, just a week later. Although she’d been in ill health for years, everyone said she’d died of grief. She was laid to rest between her husband and her son.

  Billy Downwind and his mother didn’t return to California, at least not immediately. Billy told Cork that neither of them was eager to leave the rez again, but what exactly they would do was still up in the air. There were also lingering concerns regarding the truth about Big John’s death, which the killing of Duncan MacDermid had done nothing to resolve.

  On the second day of August, when Cork was out on his newspaper route with Jackson, the dog tangled with a raccoon and was bitten. As soon as the North Star Veterinary Clinic was open, Cork and his mother took Jackson in.

  “Morning, Colleen. Morning, Cork,” the veterinarian greeted them in the waiting area, which was otherwise empty. “Sorry to hear about Jackson. Raccoons can be nasty critters.”

  “We’re worried about rabies.”

  “As well you should be. Follow me and we’ll check him out.”

  As he set about his work, Doctor Dave shook his head and said, “So hard to believe all that business with Duncan MacDermid.”

  Cork knew this was a subject his mother hated discussing, and she didn’t respond.

  “We both knew him well growing up, didn’t we, Colleen? He wasn’t a bad sort when he was a kid.”

  “He was always a bully.”

  “I suppose. Although I think that was mostly the influence of his father, who was, if you’ll excuse my language, a real bastard. But we were Boy Scouts together, and you got Duncan into the Boundary Waters and away from his old man, he wasn’t a bad sort. I remember one time my brother and Duncan and I went skinny-dipping off a point in Moose Lake. Pretty much only us Boy Scouts and the occasional Indian from the rez entered the Boundary Waters through Moose Lake, so we figured we were safe. We were out there having a great time when ten canoes full of Girl Scouts came around that point. Instead of just staying in the water, Duncan climbed bare-assed out of the lake straight up a big face of rock. Got himself great applause from all those Girl Scouts.” The vet laughed at the memory. He ruffed Jackson’s fur and said, “The bite wound is pretty much superficial. I’ll clean it and give you some antibiotic. Just put it in his food. But let me know if it begins looking any worse. No worries about rabies. We gave him a booster just last month. He should be fine.” As he saw them out, Doctor Dave said, “And Big John Manydeeds? Liam’s closed the book on his death, too?”

  Cork’s mother said, “Thanks for your help with Jackson.”

  Cork thought that his father had, indeed, closed the book on the case. He spoke no more about it at home, and neither Cork’s mother nor Grandma Dilsey raised the subject.

  Then two things happened that changed everything: The Bureau of Criminal Apprehension finally sent the full toxicology report on Big John. And the body of the missing Ojibwe girl was found.

  * * *

  The first Saturday in August, Cork headed out to collect from his customers, those who were home, anyway, and who had both ready cash and the inclination to pay him. Sometimes when he collected, people pulled out wallets and shook their heads and said something like “All I have is a fifty.” Cork carried a change bag, but there was never enough in it to cover a fifty. Even if he could see other bills in a wallet, what could he say that wouldn’t sound as if he were calling the customer a liar?

  He’d had little luck that day when he knocked on a door with a leprous look to it, paint peeling from top to bottom. It was a house on Sycamore Street, with an unkempt yard and a crabapple tree under which fruit, fallen and rotting, attracted a constant buzz of yellow jackets. The customer, Argus Friar, was three months behind on his bill. Cork intended to tell him that there wouldn’t be a paper on his porch again until he’d paid what he owed. After Cork had knocked twice, the man opened his door. He wore an undershirt and undershorts, and his hair was all wild wisps of gray, as if the top of his head was smoldering. His angry glare scared out of Cork any determination to demand payment.

  “Collecting for the News-Tribune, Mr. Friar,” Cork said.

  “Don’t have my wallet, boy. Come back later.”

  “You haven’t paid for three months, sir,” Cork ventured.

  “I’ll pay when I have my wallet.”

  “I could wait here.”

  “Later, boy.”

  “I’ll have to…” Cork began his threat.

  “Have to what?”

  Cork summoned all his courage. “Unless you pay me, I’ll have to stop delivering your paper.”

  “Do that and I’ll report you,” the man threatened.

  “And I’ll report you,” Cork shot back. Though to whom, he couldn’t have said. But he was angry, too, and returned the man’s glare.

  When Cork didn’t leave his doorstep, Friar finally said, “What do I owe you?” After Cork told him, he said, “Wait here,” and closed the door.

  Cork stood on the porch for five minutes, his anger growing as he decided that Argus Friar had stiffed him again. In his head, he was going over the things he would do in response—end the paper delivery, of course, but other possibilities as well, all of them pranks he’d heard about but never tried himself, things involving flaming paper bags full of dog crap or toilet paper wrapped around the crabapple trees or windows on which insults were written in soap.

  He was just turning away when the door swung open again and Argus Friar appeared with an old wallet in his hands. He plucked out the bills, handed them over, and demanded his change, which Cork gave him, along with a slip from his receipt book.

  The man eyed the receipt, then eyed Cork. “O’Connor? Any relation to our squaw man sheriff?”

  It was the first time Cork had ever heard his father referred to in that way, and it was like a rock had been thrown at him.

  “He’s my father,” Cork said, standing as tall as he could.

  “Killed MacDermid, you ask me.”

  Which caught Cork completely by surprise. “What?”

  “Hounded the man near to death, is what I heard. That Indian killed hisself a while back? Heard he was screwing MacDermid’s wife, and your old man convinced her it wasn’t no suicide. Had her believing MacDermid did it. Ask me, she didn’t shoot MacDermid cuz he beat her. Men beat their wives all the time and don’t get shot for it. Your old man, though, he looks the other way, cuz he’s a Indian lover, too. But hell, what can you expect from a squaw man?”

  Lava boiled up in Cork, anger so hot he couldn’t contain it. “Go to hell, Mr. Friar,” he said. “You just go straight to hell.” And he turned and stomped across the yard, raising up a flurry of yellow jackets in his wake.

  “Yeah and the same to you, you Redskin brat.”

  After that, there was no more collecting for the newspaper; Cork could barely collect his thoughts. He didn’t want to go home and try to explain to his mother in som
e stammering way why he was so angry. He just walked until his feet, as if with a mind of their own, took him to Glengarrow.

  Jorge opened up at his knock and the two boys sat among the monsters in Jorge’s bedroom.

  “I get it, too,” Jorge said. “Beaner. Or Spic.”

  Cork had heard other boys call Jorge that, though never to his face. “Have you heard me called a Redskin?”

  “Oh, yeah. And worse.”

  “Why didn’t you ever tell me?”

  “What for?”

  “Just to know.”

  “I thought you knew.”

  White people and the Ojibwe had been living in the North Country together for so many generations that the intermingling of blood was not uncommon. But Cork knew that, more often than not, people who didn’t look Ojibwe didn’t broadcast their Native heritage. Indians were dirty, untrustworthy, lazy, drunks. That’s what white people thought. A long list of cliché Westerns had drilled into the general public’s thinking that Indians were for spur-wearing heroes to kill. Cork realized he wasn’t innocent. He’d never made a big point of his own Native heritage. But he’d never heard his mother called a squaw before, or his father a squaw man. He wondered if now, whenever he looked into a neighbor’s eyes, he would see some unspoken insult there.

  “She’s going to sell Glengarrow,” Jorge said.

  “Mrs. MacDermid? Why?”

  “People are saying pretty bad things about her because she was, you know, doing it with Big John. And besides, she told Mom she’s always hated it here.”

  “Funny,” Cork said without laughing. “Big John was a good man and Mr. MacDermid was a real bastard. But people thought it was just fine for Mrs. MacDermid to be married to him and get beat up.” He stared out the window at the big house, a fortress of gray stone set against the sparkling blue jewel that was Iron Lake. “If she sells, what’ll you and your mom do?”

  Jorge shook his head. “Maybe she’ll marry Nick Skinner.”

  “That wouldn’t be so bad, would it? Especially if he builds that new hotel. You’d be rich.”