Cast in Stone (20 page)

"Handwritten?"

She
nodded, twisting a wadded up tissue in her big hands. "He took
eighty Valium."

"I'm
sorry." It sounded inane, but I said it anyway.

"It
was probably better that way," she said. "At least it was
over for him. He didn't have to be around when they auctioned off the
house, the cars, Mom's furniture, everything. I don't think he could
have stood that. It would have broken him. They even sold his and
Mom's clothes to a secondhand store in Wenatchee."

"And
Rachel Gandy?"

Rosalee
Weber sat up now, placing both hands flat on the desktop.

"That
was later. After the auction and the suits and the settlements, when
things started to slow down a little and I had time to think about
things, that's when I got back to wondering about Rachel Gandy. About
the timing of it all. How Dad had looked that day when he found she'd
gone. How he'd run right over to the bank. How happy he'd been up
until that morning. How terribly alone he'd been since my mother

passed
away. Then I started to think about how much time he and Rachel had
spent together out there at Vista in the models. Day and night for
months, just the two of them out there together. It started to add
up. That's when I started to wonder. She had him to herself. He was
so lonely. It would have been so easy for a woman like her. He was
country, just a small-time, small-town guy, you know, it would have
been no problem for her. So I started asking some questions."
"And?"

"Most
people around here wouldn't even talk to me. Lots of folks around
here had money in the project. Far as they were concerned, if I
wasn't going to have the decency to do what Dad did, I should have at
least left town. I kept at it though, and eventually I ran down a
couple of the original construction guys, electricians, who said that
on a couple of nights, back in late July, when they'd stayed late to
finish up projects, the model was lit up long after closing time,
that it sounded like there were people in there. Music, laughing.
Sounded like a party. The second time it happened, they knocked to
see what was going on. They thought maybe it was kids, you know.
According to them, my Dad answered the door, and she, Rachel,
was in there with him."

"Interesting,"
I offered.

"And
her file. She took it with her. After I talked to the electricians I
went back to see if, you know, maybe I couldn't get a line on her.
Gone. Her license. References. The whole thing. Gone."

"Did
you run your suspicions by the local authorities?"

"They
didn't want any part of the idea. Still don't. They've got their
villain. Twenty-odd years of doing business in this town, and now
they spit on him. Took his picture off the wall over at the Rotary.
You can still see the light spot on the wall where it hung for all
those years."

For
the first time, anger began to push sadness aside.

"I'm
still a hundred and seventy thousand in the hole, but I'm going to
pay off every last dime of it if it takes the rest of my life. And
when I do, I'm going right back in there and hang his picture up
where it was. Then I'm gonna put this town in my rearview mirror once
and for all."

"I
believe you will," I said earnestly.

"Do
you know where she is?" she demanded.

"No.
I don't even know who she is."

"Where
did you get that picture?"

I
gave her the abridged version. The missing aunt story. No sense
raising any false hopes in her. As she'd said, her plate was already
full. When I'd finished, she was quiet for a long time. Rebecca
shuffled uncomfortably behind me.

"Then
it's finished. Good. And I don't mean good she's dead. I won't allow
myself that sort of bitterness. I wasn't raised that way. Dad
wouldn't want that. I mean good, I can stop wondering, thinking that
maybe this is all just some sort of bad misunderstanding. Part
of me kept thinking that maybe she was going to walk back in the door
with the money or something. Isn't that stupid?"

"It's
not stupid. I'd say it was a pretty natural reaction to all you've
been through."

Self-conscious
now, she gazed down along the length of herself.

"What
a mess I am. I'd better change my clothes. I keep some clothes ..."
She gestured awkwardly toward the rear of the building.

I
put a business card on her desk.

"In
case you think of anything else. Or maybe just

She
nodded absently. "Thanks," I said.

She
started back. Rebecca and I found our way out.

"Why
didn't you tell her what's going on?"

"Because
I don't know what's going on."

"But
you've got a feeling, don't you? I can tell."

"What
I'm thinking is too ugly for words."

"She
lives back there, you know," Rebecca said, as I accelerated out
onto the two-lane highway. "There's a little Hide-a-Bed. Her
clothes are all in back there hanging on a rope. And all her shoes."

We
passed the forty miles back to the airport in silence.

I
remember next to nothing of the plane ride from Wenatchee to Seattle
and even less about the drive home from the airport. Later that
evening is mostly blank too, as if the proximity to the recorded
message had so tainted the memories and sensations as to make recall
impossible.

A
flat, professional voice I didn't recognize. No name, no number.

"Mr.
Waterman, I have been requested to inform you that Henry Sundstrom
died at nine seventeen last evening. Services for Mr. Sundstrom will
be held at eleven o'clock a.m. on Wednesday, November eighth, at
Gethsemane Lutheran Church, nine hundred eleven Stewart Street
in Seattle. In lieu of flowers, the family requests remembrances to
the American Cancer Society." Click. Hiss.

I
poked the play button hard. Listened again. Same message. Then again.
Tomorrow. Eleven in the morning. Oh, goddamn. I pounded the
offending phone with the flat of my hand, sending the receiver down
toward the floor, where it bounced twice, then danced just above the
surface, spinning on its spiral spring. Feeling foolish, I first bent
to retrieve it, then, as rising blood burned the tips of my ears,
instead used my forearm to sweep the rest of the phone from the
table; a muted tinkle announced its arrival on the carpet

where
it lay motionless, its tightly curled neck now arched like a fossil
bird.

I
paced the apartment, breathing hard, the air in my lungs suddenly
cold. As I passed each window, I pushed back the curtains and raised
the blinds. Spears of sunlight herded the newly airborne dust into
illuminated schools of swimming crystals. After several complete
circuits, the apartment was awash with the kind of slanted
late-afternoon light so favored by Dutch painters, but Heck was still
dead.

These
days, every death sets me adrift. Even the smallest change in my
delicate web of connectedness is enough to loosen my slim purchase,
to set me bobbing about like airborne dust. The phone began to make
insistent noises. I blocked it out. Surrounded by a crystalline moat
of floating slurry, I stood in the single remaining shadow at the
center of the apartment and wept.

Much
later, when the receding light had allowed the dust to settle, I
resurrected the phone and dialed. Marge's home number got me the
maid. Mrs. Sundstrom was unavailable at this time. When charm,
reason, and guilt failed to elicit further data, I called the Sea
Sundstrom offices. Same deal. Mrs. Sundstrom was not available.
No, they did not know where she could be reached. No, they had no
idea when she would become available. Click.

I
tried McColl's office. Mr. McColl was away from his desk at this
time.

"That's
kinda vague, don't you think?"

"Excuse
me, sir?"

"That
phrase—'away from his desk,'" I said testily. "There's a
pretty wide range of possibilities in 'away from his desk.' People
serving lengthy prison terms could be said to be 'away from their
desks.' Technically speaking, the dead are 'away from their
desks.'"

"They
are indeed sir," she said evenly.

I
was suppose to go away now. I wasn't in the mood. A lengthy silence
ensued.

"Well?"
I said finally.

"Well
what, sir?"

"Well,
where is old Howie?"

Rather
than lightening the atmosphere as I'd hoped, my cavalier use of
McColl's first name had precisely the opposite effect.

"I'm
sorry, sir. I only know where Mr."—heavy emphasis on the
Mr.—"McColl is not."

"Which
is ..." I countered.

"At
his desk," we said in unison.

Another
silence.

"Howzabout
a hint, then?" I suggested. "A hint as to what, sir?"

"Well,
maybe a hint as to approximately which end

of
the 'away from his desk' spectrum Mr. McColl

might
be closest to. I mean like has he left the country

or
something, or is he just off takin' a leak?" Click.

Hummmmm

Gethsemane
Lutheran church was packed to the rafters. They had come, nearly
seven hundred strong, to pay their respects, packing both the
surrounding parking lots and the pews. Arriving a half hour early had
gotten me a seat in the third row of the balcony. I could make out
the families up front. Marge was hunched between her parents on the
inside and the ever-attentive H. R. McColl, who occupied the aisle
seat in the front row. Her extended family of aunts, uncles,
brothers, sisters, nieces, and nephews filled the better part of six
rows on the left-hand side of the church. On the right, about an
equal number of solid Sundstroms strained the seams on seldom-worn
suits. I recognized few others. Martin Henry and Artie Klugeman from
the old days at the marina sat together center left. A cadre of
minor political figures were hard up behind the Sundstrom contingent.
The rest were strangers.

I
absently crushed and twisted the small pink program that I'd been
handed on the way in. Thanks from the families. Address for
remembrances. According to the wishes of the deceased, no
funeral home viewing. No graveside service. Closed casket. Cremation.
Coffee reception to follow. Lutherans always had a coffee reception.

What
Lutherans were was not Catholic. Where the Catholics poked
presumptive spires toward heaven, the Lutherans built square brick
earthbound sanctuaries. No miracles, no saints, no gothic
arches. Instead, a rock-solid house of worship. A wine-red
carpet bisecting twenty-five double rows of light oak pews leading to
an unassuming altar covered today with black vestments. The light
poured in, not refracted through stained glass but rational and
clear, through high sets of twelve-panes fifty feet tall. I
reluctantly moved my gaze to the front, where the draped coffin
rested slightly to the right of the simple altar. A single blaring
note from the massive pipe organ signaled the start of the service,
"Excuse me." An elderly woman stood at my left shoulder.

I
stared dumbfounded at the rest of the people in my pew, who now
inexplicably wanted out. The church was filled with whispers and
moving bodies. I focused out over the church. The front rows had
emptied. A solid line of mourners shuffled toward the back of the
church. The service was over.

"I'm
sorry," I said, quickly stepping out into the aisle. They filed
past me.

Downstairs,
the crowd seemed to be evenly divided between those turning left for
the reception and those heading out onto Ninth Avenue. I waffled.

"That
you. Leo?"

He
was small, indigenous, and leathery, with thick gray hair and a wide,
expressive mouth that broke into a smile as I turned. He read my
confusion.

"It's
me, Rudy," he said. "Jesus," I stammered. "Naw,
just old Rudy." The grin got wider. I stuck out a hand. Rudy
filled it with a fist. His roughened fingers were contorted nearly
into a ball. I I held on.

f
"Hands are about gone. Arthur-itis, big time," he said.
"Too damn many years pullin' at them froze-over nets."

Struggling
to recover, I released his hand.