Alpine Gamble (21 page)

“I doubt there's a plan to systematically wipe out all California emigres.” I smiled back, hoping to lighten the mood.

Beverly ran a nervous hand through her long blonde hair. “Maybe not. Still, it's uncomfortable. Look at what a disaster our party was!” Her blue eyes strayed to the new windowpane.

There was no denying that the evening had turned out badly. I decided this was the moment to introduce my excuse for calling on Beverly Melville.

“How would you like to get better acquainted with some of the local women? Do you play bridge?”

Beverly looked at me as if I'd asked her to join in a game of piquet or pin-the-tail-on-the-donkey.
“Bridge?
Hey, I'm no cardplayer.”

“Oh.” I was mildly embarrassed. I'd hoped to get
Beverly to fill in for me at Edna Mae Dalrymple's get-together in the evening. Janet Driggers would be there, and I didn't want to face questions about my trip to San Francisco. The invitation had also seemed like a good pretext for leading up to other, more serious queries. “There'll be other opportunities. Have you been able to get involved with any groups or organizations yet?” I had the feeling that Beverly would find most of Alpine's activities as quaint as playing bridge.

“No, I haven't,” she replied. “I keep busy here. This isn't just a hobby.” Her fingers flicked at the nearest catalogue. “I'm an interior decorator by trade. I still consult with clients in L.A. When I finish figuring out our own decor, I intend to market myself on a regional basis. Alpine itself probably wouldn't keep me going.”

“You're right,” I agreed, taking in the present eclectic furnishings, which spanned three centuries and five times as many countries. “Do you go into Seattle often?”

“At least once a week. I was there Monday.” Beverly gazed at me steadily over the rim of her glass. “All day.”

I pretended she hadn't said anything important. “Lucky you. I don't get into the city more than once every three months. When you remodel, will Scott have his office here or keep the rented space in the Clemans Building?”

“He'll keep it,” Beverly said, pretending I wasn't pretending. “He believes in separating work from home. I feel differently. I can integrate both without one taking away from the other.”

“It's easier for women,” I said.

“We're more flexible.”

“We've had to be.”

“Yes.” Beverly put her glass down on a small rosewood table that probably dated from early nineteenth-century
England. “I liked Stan. If Blake was the heart of their partnership, Stan was the soul. He had substance, integrity, compassion. I wouldn't dream of harming him. Neither would Scott. And Blake is going to be lost without him.”

I avoided Beverly's level gaze. “I'm not very subtle.”

Beverly shrugged. “One of the deputies—a young Asian-American, very sweet, very earnest—already called on Scott and me. Monday morning Scott was here. He had to come home unexpectedly because the glazier was arriving at ten-thirty, and I'd already left for Seattle. Why don't people around here work on Sundays?”

I didn't try to justify small-town philosophies. It was time for me to leave. “Do you expect Blake to come back?” I asked at the door.

Beverly stared up at the mountains with their lingering pockets of snow. “I'm not sure. He'll have to find a new partner, no matter what he does next. Blake could never operate alone.”

I thought about Ed, waiting in the wings. There were worse things than working alone. I also considered mentioning Beverly's relationship to Blake. But the visit had gone better than I'd hoped. I decided not to push my luck.

I just wished that Beverly played bridge.

“Why,” Vida asked in exasperation, “didn't you tell me where you were going? Secrecy gets my goat. I'd have gone with you.”

“That's why,” I said reasonably. “The two of us would have overwhelmed Beverly Melville.” More accurately, Vida would have overwhelmed her.

“She never told me she was an interior decorator when I interviewed her this winter. More secrecy. I'm putting that item in 'Scene.' ”

That sounded harmless enough. “Use Harvey Adcock's new sign for the hardware store. He's a good advertiser.”

Vida nodded abruptly, still smarting from being left out. “ 'Scene' has been too dull lately. Names make news, and everyday occurrences catch people's attention in a small town, but there has to be
something
that piques interest. This week is worse than last week.” She waved the newly arrived edition of
The Advocate
, “Darla Puckett dropping a dozen eggs at Safeway. lone Erdahl having her car washed by the Rainbow Girls and the De Molays. Guests at the ski lodge getting the wrong shoes back from Boots. The Thordahl twins eating fresh strawberries at John Engstrom Park. Whistling Marmot patrons complaining about low fat popcorn. Dull, dull, dull! We need sprightly items. Is no one paying attention to Alpine's human foibles?”

I tried to humor Vida. “What about Crazy Eights Neffel in the buff?”

Vida shuddered. “You know my policy on Crazy Eights items. Unless he's doing something extremely unusual—for him—I refuse to write it up. Besides, the police log story included Grace's complaint about an intruder. It was just as well to name no names or mention his lack of attire. Otherwise, he might be encouraged to do it again.”

Vida's guidelines for Crazy Eights Neffel were shared by the rest of the staff, especially Carla, who found the old nut utterly unamusing. She dismissed his antics as silly, but I sensed that deep down she felt sorry for him. Carla's brain might be suspect, but she had a good heart.

The paper looked pleasing, from a journalistic standpoint. A page one murder is definitely subjective. I, too, had liked Stan, and wished to heaven he hadn't been killed. But death always makes bigger headlines than
birth or whatever happens in between. Feeling callous, I skipped to the sports page, which almost always centered on the Alpine High Buckers. The stories were submitted by Coach Ridley and edited by me. Occasionally, Carla would write a feature, but as she had absolutely no interest in sports, the stories tended to take on a nonathletic slant. This week's coverage was exceptionally thin, due to the end of the school year. Some twenty column inches were devoted to the annual sports banquet, which had been held the previous Friday night, and an accompanying photo showing Rip Ridley presenting a lanky lad named Grant Aadland with the Alpine Athlete of the Year award. Grant had distinguished himself in basketball, baseball, and track.

Such stories are generally innocuous, so I hadn't read Carla's account closely. I knew Vida had proofed it, because she'd made some biting remark about Grant's parents, neither of whom had finished high school, let alone excelled at much of anything except warming bar stools at Mugs Ahoy.

“It's too bad Grant didn't continue with football,” Rip Ridley had said in Carla's direct quote. “With his sure hands, he would have made a great receiver. With the graduation of our starting quarterback and most of the offensive line, the Buckers may be in for a rough season this fall. I'm beginning to think we should start recruiting some of those big, fast kids out of southern California. If all those people from Los Angeles want to move someplace else, why not bring in somebody who can actually help Alpine instead of hurt it?”

I blanched. The awards banquet story wasn't the place for Coach Ridley's comments. I should have read the article before it was published, but there are times when I feel I have to trust Carla's judgment. And, of course, Vida's.

I stormed out into the newsroom. Vida was still
alone, studying wedding pictures. “Whatever is Candace Daley wearing on her head? It looks like a pineapple.”

Since Vida had been wearing orange rinds earlier, I felt she had no right to criticize. “How come you let this quote from Rip Ridley pass?” I asked, pointing to the sports page.

Vida frowned at the article. “I didn't. Not the quote. After Carla laid out the page, she was an inch short so she added that later. I never saw it.”

At that moment Carla came into the office. I confronted her at once. She gazed at me with wide, innocent eyes. “What's wrong with it? I spelled everything right. I didn't even have to use the dictionary.” Over my shoulder she shot Vida an impertinent look.

“It isn't that,” I said, now fairly calm. “Maybe I'm reading something into it that isn't there. But the next night Rip and Cal got into it with Scott Melville. And now that Stan Levine is dead, Rip's going to want to eat his words. But first he'll chew us out for printing them in the first place.”

Carla seemed unconcerned. “Well, he said it. I've got notes.” With a toss of her long hair she sauntered over to her desk.

“I know that,” I said with a sigh. “But all the same, Ridley's going to be mad. People often say things they'd rather not see in black and white. You have to use some discretion.”

“Oh, pooh!” Carla snatched up a bottle of mineral water. “It was a
banquet
There were sixty people on hand. Rip didn't exactly whisper the quote to me in a dark alley.”

Carla had a point, but so did I. It was a judgment call, and as the more experienced journalist, I felt I was right. I was also the boss. Neither factor seemed to impress my reporter.

Two minutes later Rip Ridley was on the phone, barking in my ear. I could picture him wedged into the swivel chair in his small, chaotic office at the high school. Rip's burly body had been honed on a wheat ranch in the Palouse, and the former Washington State University linebacker now carried an extra thirty pounds. But his crew cut was still cropped close, if beginning to gray.

“That was a
joke''
he asserted. “Why didn't that dim-witted broad of yours put in the one I told about the rabbi, the priest, and the mailman? It brought down the house. Now everybody in town is going to think I'm some kind of bigot!”

“Bigot?” It wasn't the word I would have chosen. “Look, Rip, Carla quoted what you said, right? It was supposed to be funny, so most readers will take it that way. How did the audience react?”

There was a short pause. “They clapped.”

They would, of course. Rip's listeners had agreed with him. And with his tone, which wasn't jocular, but sarcastic. “You weren't misquoted,” I went on, “you knew Carla was covering the banquet, and it was a public event. I think you're getting worked up for nothing.”

“The hell I am,” Rip muttered. “It's one thing to be talking in front of a crowd that's having a good time, but it's something else to see what you said in print. It makes everything look so …
serious''

Rip Ridley was right, but I wouldn't admit it out loud. There are occasions when the power of the press is an embarrassment. Especially when you hold it in your hands and can't quite see through your fingers.

“Do you want to write a letter?” I asked. “You know I'll print anything that's signed.”

Rip hesitated again. “I'll talk to Dixie when I get home. She already called as soon as the paper hit the box. She was mad as hell.”

Great
, I thought, mouthing more soothing words before putting the phone down. Dixie Ridley would be at bridge club. So would Cal Vickers's wife, Charlene, and his sister, Vivian Phipps. As the clock ticked on I was growing more apprehensive. Even if Vida hadn't despised playing bridge, I couldn't have asked her to sub for me—one of the other regular members was her sister-in-law, Mary Lou Blatt. The two women weren't on speaking terms, for reasons that were as old as they were obscure.

Edna Mae Dalrymple is the head librarian, and though she wasn't born in Alpine, she has lived in town for almost twenty years. Edna Mae is small and jittery, but conscientious in her personal as well as her professional life. Her house is only two blocks from mine, so Ichose to walk. Like most of the recent evenings, the clouds had finally lifted to provide a glimmer of late springtime. As I headed downhill on Fifth Street to Spruce, I could smell the fragrant evergreens and the sweet hint of sawdust from Alpine's last remaining shingle mill. Beverly Melville was wrong—gray skies and endless rain were trifles compared to noxious gas fumes and pervasive smog.

The atmosphere inside Edna Mae's trim little bungalow was equivocal, however. I wasn't quite the last to arrive, but I sensed that the others had been talking about me before I came in. Despite Edna Mae's nervous aura, she sought to put me at ease by offering a glass of wine. It was a standard ritual at our get-togethers, and always involved the tight pulling of drapes, lest pass-ersby glimpse Alpine womanhood engaging in such vices as playing cards and drinking spirits.

As usual, there were three tables. I began the evening with Mary Lou Blatt and the Dithers sisters. Connie and Judy owned a horse ranch on First Hill. They somehow
looked ageless, though I knew them to be in their late forties. Both were pudgy and had long horse faces. After that, describing them became difficult, because they were so painfully plain. I doubted that they'd ever used cosmetics or seen the inside of a beauty parlor. They smelled of horse, or maybe hay, and except when they grew excited, the sisters spoke in abbreviated fragments that were hard to translate. Naturally, they wore jeans and shirts and ponytails. I had heard that at funerals they wore black jeans. At weddings they wore new jeans. I couldn't imagine either of them in a dress.

But their taciturn manner prevented any volatile comments. As for Mary Lou, she was always reserved in my company, no doubt because she thought I'd carry tales back to her dreaded sister-in-law, Vida.

Thus, the first hour passed without incident. The second started tranquilly, too. My partner was Vivian Vick-ers Phipps, whose daughter, Chaz, worked at the ski lodge. Our opponents were Edna Mae and Janet Driggers. Vivian enjoys chatting between hands, and Edna Mae is always anxious to please. Janet, of course, prefers to shock. For the most part we were all accustomed to her outrageous remarks.

Vivian had just made a successful three no-trump bid when Janet dropped her first bombshell. “You hear all the rumors, Emma,” she said, shuffling the cards like a Las Vegas pro. “You must know the buzz around town regarding Stan Levine.” She wriggled her overplucked eyebrows. “Outraged husband. Guess who?”