Boar Island (11 page)

Peter was humming “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star” as he fed the child from a bottle.

He looked up and saw Anna watching. “Formula’s not the best, I know, but sometimes, well, the magic doesn’t work. Lily has no milk,” he said as if Anna had asked, as if she cared, which she hadn’t and didn’t.

“You’re the most beautiful girl in the world, yes you are, yes you are,” Pete crooned, bobbing his big square head back and forth.

“You do know you look like an idiot,” Anna said kindly.

“I
feel
like an idiot! I’m a prisoner of love,” he said with an exaggerated sigh and a hand to his heart. “Who knew? Your own kid is different.”

Anna would have to take his word on that. She’d never wanted kids, never had kids, and never regretted the choice. Kids were great; watching them was fun, talking to them edifying, and working with them occasionally revelatory. Anna liked kids. Then, too, she liked Irish wolfhounds. She just never much wanted one in the house.

The first few notes of Alice Cooper’s “School’s Out” sounded from the other room. Peter groaned. “Here, you hold her.”

“I can,” Anna said defensively as she took Olivia into her arms. Peter went to answer his phone.

“Hello, little citizen,” Anna said. Round blue-gray eyes stared unblinkingly into hers. The infant interrogation technique. Anna always felt she was being asked, “Are you worthy? Can you keep me safe?”

“No,” she said, and, “I’ll give it my best shot.”

Olivia stared at her in the unfathomable way of infants. Then her eyes squeezed shut. Her pretty little mouth formed an ugly square. She started to cry. Anna sighed. Babies almost always cried when she held them. It hurt her feelings. Was it that she smelled funny? Or was it that she was so paranoid about dropping the squirmy little beggars that her muscles tensed up until the creatures felt more as if they’d been nailed into a peach crate than enfolded in loving arms?

Peter appeared in the kitchen doorway, cell phone in hand. “That was Artie, the district ranger for Mount Desert. Courtesy call. They got an e-mail tip that your pal on Boar is receiving contraband.” The look he gave her reminded Anna of how long it had been since they’d spent any time together, as if he was thinking that if he could turn into Father of the Year, maybe she could have turned into a person who consorted with underworld types.

“I told him we’d meet them at the jetty on Boar,” Peter said. “Lily!” he roared, sounding like the old Peter. “We’ve got to go.”

Anna’s cell phone buzzed. She pulled it from its case. A text from Heath:
Weird shit getting weirder. Come when you can.

“Ready when you are,” she said to Peter. He led the way to the white Crown Vic, an older model. The NPS was a frugal organization. Anna slid into the passenger side, buckled her seat belt, and prepared to enjoy the view.

Visitors often asked her which park was her favorite. She’d never come up with a satisfactory answer. Today, a body of water encompassing a universe of light and life, a thousand blues in waves that rose and broke in sun-silver celebrations, the surf whispering secrets just out of hearing, it was Acadia.

The fancy houses infesting the multitude of islands scattered in the ocean should have made the coast feel cozier, more inviting of human habitation. Instead, on the rugged coast of the Atlantic, the grandest homes man could devise seemed mere shacks. They hugged the rocky shore as if afraid to venture from sight of land. Those on the tiny islands were like orphans lost at sea.

Anna loved it when nature made humanity seemed trivial. It was a comfort to pretend that she was of a relatively harmless race; she felt safer when she could delude herself that in the battle of Man against Nature, Nature had a chance. For the short duration of the boat ride out of Somes Sound to Boar Island, she could almost believe Internet bullies and weird shit getting weirder did not matter.

The ride up the lift, accompanied by the towering form of Peter Barnes and the hulky muscle-bound district ranger, Artie Lange, was a tad more exhilarating than Anna liked. Not for the first time, she wished more of her compadres were small-boned women, less inclined to strain machinery. Still, she appreciated the view.

The bedrooms in the lighthouse, accessed one through the other by the original circular iron stairs, and the rooms around the lighthouse’s base had been renovated. The rest of the place, two wings, blew northeast and west like a tattered cape in a gale. Damp, winds, and harsh winters had had their way. The remains were more ruin than mansion.

“That was quick,” Heath said as the lift creaked the last few inches to its mooring fifty feet above the rocks. “And with reinforcements,” she said, not sounding particularly pleased. Heath, in Robo-butt, was sitting in the shade, an iPad on her lap. Wily lounged beside her, his chin on his paws. With a deep groan he forced himself to his feet and ambled over to greet Anna. Anna and Wily were old friends; they were pack. She was glad of the sun on his old bones, and the new interesting scents for his nose.

Scratching behind Wily’s ears, Anna introduced Heath to Peter and Artie. The young district ranger was looking at Heath keenly, undoubtedly hungering for a perp worth his ambitions. Anna had never worked with Artie, never met him before coming to Acadia, but she suspected he would have been happier on a SWAT team than a bucolic island getaway. She also suspected he thought—hoped—Heath might be a major drug dealer and Anna a co-conspirator.

Suppressing a sigh, she asked, “Where are Elizabeth and Gwen?”

If Artie was going to get all Long Strong Arm of the Law, she didn’t want Heath accused of drug crimes—or, gods forbid, arrested—in front of her daughter.

“John took E and Gwen into Bar Harbor for mail and groceries,” Heath said.

Peter shot Anna a look. Clearly he knew his district ranger and wanted Anna to take the lead. Anna folded down with her legs crossed Indian-style, the better to commune with Wily. Peter and Artie remained standing.

“You’re looming,” Anna said.

Peter sat down on the waist-high stone wall separating the patio from the drop to the sea.

Artie, continuing to loom, said, “I’ve never been on Boar. I’m not classy enough for Ms. Hammond and Ms. Zuckerberg. Mind if I poke around a bit?”

“Poke to your heart’s content,” Heath said easily.

Anna wished she hadn’t. It was always a bad idea to let law enforcement—especially guys like Artie—“poke around.” But then, Heath thought they were here to help her with weird shit, not investigate an anonymous tip. Before Artie could go more than a step or two, Anna said, “Artie got a tip. An e-mail that said you were receiving contraband goods. Drugs. That you and Elizabeth were dealing to the kids in Boulder.”

“You’re kidding,” Heath said, obviously—at least to Anna—stunned. Heath laughed. “You are kidding?”

“Nope,” Anna said.

“You’ve stolen my thunder for weird shit today. This is what I got.” Seeming completely unconcerned with the accusation, Heath rolled over to where Anna and Wily sat shoulder to shoulder and handed her the iPad. “Hit
REFRESH
,” she said.

Anna did as she was told. Reading the screen was almost impossible in the direct light of the sun. Shielding it as best as she could, she squinted at the line of comments scrolling down the right-hand side.

“That’s usually where the comments of people Elizabeth follows on Twitter show up,” Heath said. “This guy—or girl—has been tweeting like a damned canary since last night.”

The expected obscenities were in evidence, but the thrust of the argument had changed. Anna read aloud, “‘Kill yourself. The world will be better off when you’re dead. Slit your wrists. Your Mother tried to abort you. When that didn’t work, she dumped you. Put a bullet in your brain. You alive will make Heath kill herself. Die, bitch, die.’”

Peter rose to his feet. Artie decided this was more interesting than poking around.

“I kind of like that last one,” Heath said. “It has a certain simplicity the others lack.”

“Has E seen these?” Anna asked.

“All but the last few. They came in after John took them in the boat. She may have seen them by now. She has her phone with her.”

“I thought you were keeping her away from electronics,” Anna said, her voice flat to keep the censure from leaking through. Anna had not rushed headlong into the twenty-first century. People scarcely noticed as life was remade by cell phones, GPS, Amazon, YouTube, Google, and Facebook. Big Brother was a mere piker compared to Amazon and its fellows. Clicking “accept, accept, accept” to unread contracts, whole countries and their children became citizens of this sudden and stunning world of bread and fabulous circuses without a thought or a backward look.

Anna knew there would be a reckoning. Even in the twenty-first century she doubted there was anything like a free lunch.

“Aunt Gwen made a good argument against it,” Heath replied a bit defensively.

“Like E needs to see this stuff?” Anna growled.

“Like E needs to have a sense of control. That and addiction,” Heath said with the exaggerated patience Anna knew she’d inherited from her aunt.

“Addiction?” Artie asked. Had he been a dog, his ears would have been pricked.

“Evidently,” Heath said. “Aunt Gwen said it’s common, almost epidemic.”

“Gwen Littleton is a pediatrician,” Anna explained to Artie and Peter. To Heath, she said, “Elizabeth is not an addict,” and then, “Addicted to what?”

“Electronic media,” Heath said.

Anna snorted. Peter wore a neutral ranger mask, the kind put on when taking reports of flying saucers and sightings of Kokopelli.

“Be that way,” Heath said to no one in particular. Shaking a cigarette from a pack kept in Robo-butt’s saddlebag, she went on. “For all the reasons we had talked about, I did take E’s iPhone, iPad, laptop, everything but her Kindle.” Cigarette in her teeth, Heath cupped her hands to protect the lighter’s flame from the onshore wind and lit it. “E grew sullen, irritable, had trouble sleeping, had little appetite, trouble focusing, exhibited obsessive behaviors, paranoia, hypersensitivity—all the things she would have if she’d been a cocaine addict and I’d cut her off cold turkey.”

“Or heroin,” Artie said.

Heath glanced at him, mild confusion in her eyes, then went on. “The only thing missing was hallucinations.” Taking a deep drag of the smoke, she glared around at the three of them.

Wily, Anna noted, was not included in the malevolence.

“She’s been under a lot of stress,” Anna said.

“That, too. But after Gwen convinced me, I Googled it.”

“That’s asking the dealer about the junkie,” Anna said.

“As Ripley said, believe it or not,” Heath retorted.

“So you just handed her back everything? Fornicating threesomes, goats, pederasts, and donkeys—the whole filthy business?” Anna asked.

“We talked. I told her she had to show me everything. If it was so shaming she just couldn’t bring herself to let me see it, she had to forward it to you.”

“Thanks a heap,” Anna said, but was honored.

“I gave her electronics back and the symptoms cleared up almost immediately,” Heath said.

“Freaky,” Anna said, shaking her head. To her, social media was about as entertaining as mosquitoes whining around her ears.

“Yup. Strange but true,” Heath said, the wind whipping the cigarette smoke from her lips.

The bell on the pole by the lift clanged; then, with a piteous groan, the machinery began paying out steel cable.

“That will be my little addict now,” Heath said.

The love in her voice made Anna smile.

Minutes later the platform appeared filled with bags, Gwen, Elizabeth, and John. When the retired lobsterman saw the field of green and gray, his eyes narrowed and his teeth clamped harder on his pipestem. Acadia was one of many parks that had frequent interface with previous residents, inholdings, shared or debated boundaries, and clashing cultures. Locals often eyed park rangers askance, figuring they were only around to make up rules about things that were traditionally none of their damn business. Conserving resources for the next generation was of little interest to those of the present generation who were just trying to get by.

Anna didn’t blame them, but it was of greater importance that the native plants and animals survive and thrive. Humans had much in common with kudzu, Russian thistle, and other invasive species. They needn’t be wiped out entirely, only uprooted where they threatened the natural balance.

Gwen, her hair made wild with salt wind, looked fifteen years younger than she had in Boulder. The sea air? The change of scenery? No, Anna decided; it was John. Gwen was enamored. The boat pilot had the same sort of sex appeal as Spencer Tracy, Humphrey Bogart, and Robert Mitchum. The kind that doesn’t depend on youth or good looks.

Even E appeared happy enough. When she saw Anna studying Gwen, she rolled her eyes and made a face. At sixteen, geriatric romance was grossing her out. A wonderful problem, given the other things that had been grossing all of them out for the last weeks.

“John, get the cart so we can get the perishables in the fridge,” Gwen bossed him happily. From the look on the man’s face, he was teetering between enchanted and terrified.

“Got a present,” Gwen said as she dumped envelopes and a shoe-box-sized package on Heath’s lap.

“Do you want me to come help put groceries away?” E asked, batting her eyes innocently.

“That won’t be necessary,” Gwen said.

E flopped down beside Wily and Anna. “I just offered to annoy her. For a while there in Bar Harbor I thought she was going to ask him to carry her books or give her a ride home on his bicycle. That or get a motel room. Yuck.”

“Amore,”
Anna said, and sighed deeply.

“Somebody to sit next to at the old age home more like,” Elizabeth said. Then, “Sorry, Mom. I know she’ll want to park her wheelchair next to yours.”

“Not if I take my medicine,” Heath said, waving her unfiltered Camel. “The cure for old age.”

E was not amused.

Nor was Anna.

“What’s in the box, Ms. Jarrod?” Artie, the district ranger, cut in. Anna had totally forgotten why they’d been called to Boar, the anonymous tip that Heath and E were drug dealers come to the East Coast to corrupt the youth.