Cutter's Run (8 page)

A kerosene lamp sat on an end table. I picked it up, held it beside my ear, and shook it. It was empty.

I sat on one of the rocking chairs. I didn’t know what I was looking for or, indeed, whether it made any sense to look at all. This was not my home, and I had no business being here.

There was no evidence of a break-in, no sign of a struggle, nothing to suggest what—if anything—had happened to Charlotte… except for that burned-down candle, the unfinished glass of sour milk,
My Antonia
marked at a place where one would not normally stop reading, and the empty kerosene lamp. It was as if she’d been sitting at the table in the evening, sipping her milk and reading by candlelight, with the lamp burning in the other room, when she was interrupted. As if she’d marked her place, gotten up, and never returned. As if someone had come for her and taken her away and done her harm.

Maybe the explanation was simpler and less malign. Maybe I just wanted to invent a story to explain why Charlotte wasn’t there. I sat there, rocking and thinking about it. But nothing else occurred to me.

After a few minutes, I went outside and took one more turn around the house. But I saw nothing new. So I headed back for my car. I had to talk to the sheriff.

Just as I came within sight of my Wrangler, I spotted a large animal standing in the roadway. A moose, was my first thought. Alex and I had seen moose several times while driving the back roads.

Then I saw that it wasn’t a moose. It was a horse. And then I saw Susannah Hollingsworth leaning against the side of my Wrangler. She was wearing jeans and sneakers without socks and a man’s blue cotton shirt with the sleeves rolled up past her elbows and the tails knotted over her belly. Her blond hair was pulled back into a tight ponytail, and big silver hoops hung from her ears.

She held up her hand, and I waved. When I was close enough to speak without shouting, I said, “I thought your horse was a moose.”

“His name is Arlo,” she said. “We do worry about Arlo during hunting season. A lot of out-of-staters carrying thirty-ought-sixes don’t know the difference between a horse and a moose. Some of them,” she added with a shrug, “don’t care.”

“I know the difference,” I said.

She smiled and patted the side of my car, inviting me to lean beside her.

I accepted and lit a cigarette.

“So what are you doing here?” she said.

“I was going to ask you the same question.”

“I came to see the swastika,” she said. “It’s hateful, isn’t it?”

I nodded. “There’s another one on her outhouse.”

She touched my arm. “No,” she whispered.

“Yes.” I told Susannah how I’d searched the outhouse and the cabin, looking for a dead body. I told her about the burned-out candle, the paperback book, and the glass of sour milk.

She peered into my eyes. “Do you think…?”

I nodded. “It feels bad.”

“What’re you going to do?”

“Call the sheriff. I talked to him this morning. He said he was interested in swastikas.”

Susannah pushed herself away from the car. “Let’s go for a ride.”

“Where?”

“I want you to show me that swastika. We’ll take Arlo. He can hold both of us.”

“I really want to get home and call the sheriff,” I said. “I’m very concerned about Charlotte.”

“Me, too,” she said. “Maybe I’ll notice something you missed. Come on. It’ll only take a couple minutes.”

I nodded. “Okay. Maybe you can tell me I’m crazy to be worried about her.”

Arlo had no saddle. Susannah slithered up on his back. I handed the reins up to her and then took her hand and managed to scramble awkwardly up behind her.

“Hold on,” she said over her shoulder.

There was nothing except Susannah Hollingsworth to hold on to. I placed my hands tentatively on her hips.

“If you don’t want to fall off and break your neck,” she said, “you’d better put your arms around me.”

I realized she was right. I was a long way from the ground up there on Arlo’s back. So I circled Susannah’s waist with my arms and hitched myself forward until I was pressing against her back. I could smell her hair in my face. Violets.

She laughed. “Don’t be afraid of me. I can’t bite from this position. Relax and hold tight. Arlo’s a good old horse, but it’s a bumpy ride.”

Arlo picked his way back up the sloping rutted road that I had just walked down. Every time he took a step, I bounced. I noticed that Susannah seemed to roll her butt in synchrony with Arlo. I couldn’t quite find Arlo’s rhythm. So I embraced Susannah from behind and concentrated on not getting bumped off.

“What did the sheriff say?” she said over her shoulder.

“Nothing, really. Just that he considers painting swastikas on other people’s property more than vandalism. I had the feeling that he wouldn’t blow it off.”

We came to the clearing and circled behind the house. Susannah reined in Arlo by the outhouse, gazed at the swastika on the door for a moment, muttered, “Jesus,” then turned Arlo back toward the meadow, where we stopped. I let my hands slip down so they rested lightly on her hips, and we sat there that way up on Arlo’s back, looking across the meadow toward the hillside beyond.

“You went into the house?” she said.

“Yes.” I summarized what I’d seen.

“I don’t think I want to go in there,” she said. She breathed out a long sigh. “What a world.” She pointed across the meadow. “That’s our orchard, over there.”

Even from that distance I could see that the trees were heavy with red fruit. They had been planted in perfect lines, so that the orchard made a patchwork-quilt pattern on the hillside.

“The river’s down there,” she said, indicating the valley between the meadow where we sat on Arlo’s back and the orchard on the hillside beyond. “It’s the boundary between this property and ours.”

“That must be the same stream that passes under some of the back roads around here,” I said. “I’ve often wondered if it held trout. I’m interested in moving water.”

“When I was growing up,” she said, “the boys used to catch trout from it. I don’t know about now. I’m not much for fishing. Let’s take a look.”

Before I could tell her that I just wanted to go home and call the sheriff, she clucked to Arlo, who began to canter down the sloping meadow toward the stream. I had no choice but to hold tight. As we approached the line of alders and poplar trees that marked the streambed, I could see that it looked more like a pond. It had flooded the valley, so that some of the poplars stood knee-deep in water. They still held their leaves, which had begun to turn into their autumn yellow. A forest of gnawed-off stumps rimmed the flooded area.

“Beavers,” I said.

Susannah nodded. “A hundred years ago it was dammed. There was a tannery over there, on our side of the river, and the water turned some machinery for them. A family named Cutter ran the tannery. My great-grandfather bought the property from Cutter after the tannery went out of business. He planted the orchard. Around here they call the stream Cutter’s Run. The dam blew out a long time ago. This is definitely beavers.”

New beaver ponds, I knew, made prime trout water. I made a note to explore it sometime.

We gazed at the water for a few minutes. Then Susannah leaned back against me. “Want to head back?” she said.

“Yes. I’m anxious to get hold of the sheriff. Anyway, Alex is expecting me for lunch.”

“Will you tell her about me?”

“What about you?”

She chuckled. “That I followed you here, took you for a ride, made you hug me?”

“Did you?”

“What?”

“Did you follow me?”

“Of course not. I was just kidding.”

“I’ll tell Alex, yes. Any reason I shouldn’t?”

She patted my hand where it held her hip. “None whatsoever.”

When we got back to my Wrangler, I slid off Arlo’s back and held my hand up to Susannah. “Thanks for the ride.”

She gave my hand a quick squeeze. “Let’s do it again. There’s a lot of country around here you can see best from horseback.”

“Sure. I’d like that.” I scratched Arlo’s muzzle and told him he was a fine animal. I started to get into my Jeep, then stopped. “How can I find Mr. Hood, do you know?”

“I know how you can find him,” she said. “Getting him to talk to you might be another story.”

“He’s not friendly?”

She smiled. “Hoodie don’t take kindly to strangers askin’ questions.” Susannah’s Down East twang sounded perfect. “If you want,” she said, “I could introduce you. He likes me.”

“I bet he does.”

She laughed. “I’ve known him since I was a baby.” She shrugged. “I’ll let you draw your own conclusions. How about if I drop by this afternoon, take you over there?”

“That’d be great. Thank you.”

“Bring Alex.”

“I’d intended to,” I said.

I
T WAS A FEW
minutes before one in the afternoon when I got back. The muffled click of typing from Alex’s office told me she was still working.

I took the cordless phone onto the deck and called Sheriff Dickman’s office. He was off-duty. I asked to have him call me. “Please tell him it’s important,” I said. Then I tried his home number. His answering machine picked up. “It’s Brady Coyne,” I told the machine. “I really think something has happened to Charlotte Gillespie. Please give me a call.”

A few minutes later Alex came into the kitchen, where I was bent over peering into the refrigerator. She patted my butt. “Hungry?”

“Yep.” I found a big plastic bag that held the remnants from the salad we’d served to Susannah and Noah. I turned and held it up. “How’s this?”

“Perfect.” She tiptoed up and kissed my chin. “Did you see Charlotte?”

I shook my head. “Let’s dump this into bowls. I’ll tell you about it.”

Which I did while we ate at the kitchen table. When I told Alex about the swastika on the outhouse door, she put down her fork, dabbed at her mouth with her napkin, and muttered, “God!” And she sat there, her eyes peering intently into mine, as I recounted my search of the house.

Then I remembered the business card she’d been using as a bookmark. I took it out of my shirt pocket and showed it to her.

She shrugged. “You think this means something?”

“I don’t know.”

When I told her about meeting Susannah and our ride on Arlo the horse, she smiled. “And you’re the one who’s jealous when I go to a party without you.”

“She’s coming by later on to take us to meet Arnold Hood,” I said. “He’s Charlotte Gillespie’s landlord. I’m hoping he might shed some light on the situation.”

“Us?”

“If you’d like to come.”

“Sure,” said Alex. “I’ve heard Arnold Hood is quite the character. I’d like to meet him.”

We took coffee out onto the deck and lit cigarettes. “Oh,” said Alex. “I forgot to tell you. Noah called. He wants you to call him.”

“What’s he want?”

She shrugged. “He didn’t choose to confide in me. He sounded a bit anxious, though.”

I stubbed out my cigarette and picked up my coffee mug. “I’ll do it right now, lest I forget.”

Alex remained on the deck while I went inside. I found Noah’s number in the skinny local directory and dialed it.

Susannah answered.

“It’s Brady,” I said.

“Oh, hi. How are you?”

“Aside from a sore backside, I’m fine.”

She chuckled. “Did you talk to the sheriff?”

“Left a message,” I said. “Your father wanted me to call him. Is he around?”

“Sure. Sorry about your butt. Hang on. I’ll get him for you.”

I heard her call. “Hey, Daddy. It’s Brady Coyne,” and a moment later Noah said, “Brady?”

“What’s up, Noah?”

“Something I’d like to run by you.”

“Shoot.”

He dropped his voice. “I’d rather not on the phone. Why don’t you and your pretty Alexandria let us return the favor? Come on over, have dinner with us tonight. We’ll find a time to talk then.”

I opened my mouth to tell him I couldn’t do that, that I had a law office back in Boston that was open on Mondays, that this was Sunday, and that on Sundays Alex and I ate an early supper so I could drive back to Boston in the daylight, which, in late August, expired a little after seven o’clock. Alex and I treasured our quiet time alone on Sundays before I had to leave. Saying good-bye for a week was something we liked to do privately.

But then I thought of Charlotte Gillespie and her poisoned puppy and the swastikas. I had to tell Sheriff Dickman about the new one on the outhouse, and about my conviction that something had happened to her. I wanted to see if I could locate a local spray-paint artist, and I was curious to hear what Arnold Hood might tell me and to learn if he could suggest other people to talk to and other places to snoop around.

In the five seconds it took for these thoughts to zing through my brain, I decided I’d call Julie and tell her to cancel my Monday appointments. Julie, of course, wouldn’t like it, and she’d try very hard to make me feel guilty. She was very skilled at making me feel guilty, which was one of the reasons I treasured her. Without Julie, I’d probably go broke.

But, I reminded myself, it was my law practice, and if I chose to accrue zero billable hours once in a while, I could do that. That’s precisely why I worked in a one-man office.

So I told Noah we’d be there at six.

I hung up and went back onto the deck. “We’re having dinner with Noah tonight,” I told Alex.

She hunched her shoulders. “Oh, Brady…”

I knew what she was thinking. She was thinking that I intended to leave for Boston right after we ate with Noah, and we’d lose our little oasis of quiet time before I left. She was thinking that I didn’t care about that time the way she did, or maybe that I’d completely forgotten about it. I put my hand on her shoulder. “I’m not going back tonight, if that’s okay with you.”

She turned and smiled up at me. “Really?”

I nodded.

“Why?”

“I’m worried about Charlotte,” I said. “She wanted to see me. I feel I’ve got to stick around, see what I can find out.”

Alex pulled away from my hand. “Oh. Right.”

“I thought you’d be pleased.”

“Sure. That’s great.”

I leaned back against the railing, folded my arms, and looked at her. “Okay. What’d I do now?”