Dead Floating Lovers (20 page)

It was a morning of confusion. And, I’d have to say, embarrassment, in the careful way Jackson and I smiled at each other. I dressing furtively, hurrying into jeans and shirt as if not wanting to be caught unclothed. I dashed on makeup: lipstick and blush, as I wouldn’t have on any other morning. I brushed my hair back and caught it on top of my head with a tortoiseshell clip.

Jackson sat in an easy chair in my living room, looking over his manuscript. Unlike me, he was at ease in his blue boxer shorts and no shirt. I made coffee for him—espresso—and tea for me. I brought the coffee to his chair, arranged a napkin beneath the cup, and asked if there was anything else I could get him. It felt like pandering, like I’d slipped a notch or two in my own estimation:
here, let me wait on you, my darling man …

The sex was like an old ritual we’d fallen into, a place where all other irritations between us disappeared. I would name it a safe place, but that wasn’t what I wanted to think about myself: that I ran to the safety of illusions.

The talk over breakfast stayed general, careful, and light. Jackson wondered when I could get this last bunch of pages into the computer and when he could see them. I talked about my garden and my plans, adding, “Unless I decide I’m going back to Ann Arbor. Then I guess I’ll have to let it all go.”

He murmured something unintelligible at me and stared out at the lake. The beaver was busy—swimming in circles with a log in his mouth. The trees swayed. The lake was a soft painting, with the light and shade of Monet’s garden. For just a moment I felt an ache inside me, as if I’d already given this away—sold it to someone who would rarely see it for what it was. The disconnect didn’t last long. There were practicalities to be considered here. This new burst of feeling for Jackson meant I would have to choose between my life up here and my life with him.

Dolly called as he was about to walk out the door. She launched into her plan to go back to the tribal council and ask about the Naquma family. She wanted me to get out to that oil pumping station and see if there was anyone who remembered the old Indian and his family squatting by Sandy Lake. Jackson came to kiss my cheek and whisper good-bye while she talked on. He left, but Dolly had heard his voice.

“He’s still there?” she demanded, as if she had a right.

“Dolly, watch the boundaries, OK? What I do or don’t do isn’t really any of your …”

“You’re nuts. You’re doing it for money and ‘money’s the root of all evil,’ you know.”

“‘The
love
of money is the root of all evil,’” I corrected, though she ignored me.

“You are not a city woman, Emily. I don’t care what lies you’re telling yourself or what airs you put on. You belong in the woods …”

“Well, thanks a lot but I think I’ll make my own de—”

“Yeah, dumb ones.”

I hung up on her.

___

I needed to be away from all of them for at least that day. I wasn’t up to facing Dolly or talking to oil men. After Jackson left with his completed sheets in his hands, I decided this was the perfect day to get out to the cemetery beyond Alba, get my photos, and write the story for
Northern Pines Magazine
.

I packed my bag with a sandwich, a Diet Coke, tape recorder, notebook, lots of pens, and my camera. The cemetery was only twenty-five miles out past Alba, on 131, but I hoped to make a day of it. Dark Forest first and then maybe a stop at Dead Man’s Hill to hike down the steep slope into the Jordan Valley, with Sorrow. He’d be great company on the hike. I stuck a couple of dog bones in my bag, along with my lunch, and got his leash. The moment the red leash came out he leaped in the air around me, careful not to knock me over, but yipping in his silly baby voice and ready to go.

Sorrow sat in the back. I lowered his window so he could ride happily along with his head hanging out, long red tongue dopily flapping from the side of his mouth, and button eyes half closed against the wind.

Another soft May day. I kept my window rolled down too, feeling as free as Sorrow. I drove through Leetsville, then through Mancelona, then out past the potato farms lining both sides of the road. When I drew near the sign to the Jordan Valley, I was half tempted to take the hike and save the cemetery for later but decided work came first. I had to get out to Dark Forest, which was supposed to be an isolated and meaningful place. Cemeteries weren’t high on my list of “meaningful” places, death not being one of my favorite pursuits, but it would be good to work on my own story and not something Dolly or Bill had decided I needed to follow.

The roadside sign for the cemetery was almost indecipherable. I drove past without seeing it and had to turn around at the next side road. The gravel lane was dusty, and little more than a two-track. If a car came from the opposite direction, I’d be hard pressed to find a spot to pull over. Trees met overhead, making the drive beneath dark and dappled with flashes of bright sunlight. The road went on for a little over a mile, then opened out into a field. I drove in, parked beneath an ancient oak, grabbed my bag with my gear, and got out to stretch in the sun like a happy cat. Sorrow had to stay in the car. His face, through the window, was long and astounded—that I would bring him this far and leave him behind. He had a finely tuned sense of doggie justice, and this wasn’t it.

There were no other cars. No people. To my right was the newer cemetery where I walked among rows of markers and white crosses. Vases of flowers stood in front of some of the graves. On others, rocks had been left, and circles of papier-mâché—some disintegrating. The saddest were the tiny graves with a toy boat or a small, weathered doll laid near the base of the white cross. Many colored ribbons fluttered. There were American flags on the graves of veterans. The feel of the cemetery, under wide trees, was of shade and love and care. Not an unhappy place. I made notes of grave decorations and names as I walked through. I took photos. When I’d finished, I hurried back over the road to where a sign pointed to “Old Cemetery.”

I followed the pointing arrows into a very different place, a quiet land of nameless white crosses meandering here and there as they disappeared down a hill, up another hill, and out of sight. Between the crosses, wild flowers grew, along with vines, mints—all things of nature. Even the plain crosses seemed to have grown in place, stitches holding the earth together. I’d never been anywhere like this before. Nothing eerie about it. I walked along checking the few graves with markers sinking into the earth, beneath their white crosses. I looked at the names, not expecting to see a Naquma. I didn’t. I took photograph after photograph—white, white crosses against the darkness of the surrounding forest; white, white crosses gleaming at the top of the far hill. I meandered from place to place—marveling at the equal care the simple crosses were given. No ostentation here.

The only sound around me was the wind sighing through the pines. I moved slowly down and then up the narrow path bordered with wild greenery. The path curved on around another hill. I followed, almost mesmerized by the soothing sound in the trees, the softness of tall vegetation bowing between graves, the hard places where rocks anchored graves. So much more appealing than
ashes to ashes, dust to dust …

“Emily Kincaid.” A deep voice came from nowhere.

I hadn’t heard anyone coming down the path behind me. I’d been too preoccupied with thoughts of death as not ugly, but inevitable.

“Emily Kincaid.” The voice rang out behind me.

Startled, I wasn’t certain my name was real. The voice had to be in my head. Maybe an ancestor. Maybe I had a connection here. I looked down at a crooked cross near my feet, above a large stratified rock where erratic quartz layers shone in rainbows as a sunbeam fell across them.

“Emily Kincaid!”

The deep voice was real. I looked up and around me, feeling my heart catch.

Two men stood on the hill I’d just walked. Two men, more silhouette than real against the bright sun. I held my breath. My heart beat furiously. One of the men had long black hair blowing softly about his head. The other was as dark, but older. I recognized Lewis George, the man who’d burst into my studio. He raised a slow hand to hail me. The other man simply stood, as I’d seen him standing out at Sandy Lake.

Think,
I told myself. One of these guys could be a killer. Maybe both. They had to have followed me out here. No other reason for them to be the only ones in the cemetery with me. What did they want? And why two of them? Too many questions to stand there and become a target.

I searched quickly around me. No place to run. Survival mode took only a moment to kick in. I hugged my gear bag close. There was nothing but trees, undergrowth, and crosses everywhere. The only real way out was back up the path, toward the men walking slowly toward me. Otherwise … I looked around, then took off running straight uphill. I dodged between crosses, feeling my feet pulled by vines covering the ground.

“No!” The deep voice shouted.

I glanced hurriedly over my shoulder. They stood where they’d been on the path, not coming after me. Yet. Or maybe they were waiting for me to get entangled in the undergrowth and thrown to the ground. I had to concentrate, stay on my feet, keep going—one foot after another, up the hill between crosses, through places where the graves were sunken, the ground uneven. I ran hard.

When I got to my car I pulled the door open and pushed Sorrow’s wet, inquisitive nose away as I dug my car keys out of my pocket, locked everything, and started my car.

I wheeled in a wild circle as the two men came loping up from the cemetery and into the road. There was a red pickup parked beyond where I’d parked my car, off to the side. They’d come in after me. That was certain. This was no coincidental meeting in a cemetery.

I sped out the two track, up the gravel road, and onto 131, heading south in a matter of seconds. As I drove, I kept my eyes on the rearview mirror. Could I outrun them if they came after me? So little traffic. Nobody anywhere. Nowhere to run for help.

I headed toward the police station in Leetsville. If those men were truly after me I couldn’t think of a single truly safe place left to go. I had to get ahold of myself. I had to plan. Most of all, I knew I had to go after them fast now, before they came after me again.

Dolly was out on a domestic violence call when I got to the station. Lucky Barnard was in Gaylord. I didn’t know the girl at the front desk so I left a message for Dolly to call me at home later and went back outside to my Jeep.

I sat there, in one of the police station’s diagonal parking spaces, and tried to calm my brain. Sorrow was no help, leaping over the seat at me, dripping dog spit down my back. He probably had to pee. So did I, but there were only the choices of EATS (and I wasn’t up to being questioned there) or the BP station in town. I chose the BP for me and a field behind The Church of the Contented Flock for Sorrow. As he circled, hunting for the perfect spot, I figured what I had to do next.

I had to keep going—and even faster than we had been working. I would get right out to a pumping station and see if anyone remembered the man and his family. Then back to Peshawbestown and some real answers.

After sitting awhile, I found I wasn’t as scared, or mad, as I had been. The older man frightened me, that time he came to my studio. The other man—I’d only seen him those two times, neither had been really threatening, nor very friendly either. Probably it was the cemetery, I decided. They belonged there. I didn’t. I’d felt that all too keenly. I figured I was my own worst enemy, and if I ran into the men again I’d go right up to them and ask what they wanted …

But not in an Indian cemetery. Not in the dark. Not when there were no other people around …

___

The pumping station was down a grassy track, up a dusty back road, off a pot-holed county road. A large green-armed pump chug-a-chugged in a wide, weedy clearing. The place wasn’t easy to find, but I was lucky enough to catch two men checking gauges, hard hats on their heads, tool belts dipping around their waists, and big brown boots on their feet. Both in their mid-thirties, I figured they might be too young to help, but perhaps they knew someone who could. I let Sorrow run, since we had never made it to Dead Man’s Hill. He took off at one of his gallops, straight for the two men, leaping in the air around them, and woofing a hello.

“Emily Kincaid.” I stuck my hand out to first one of the disconcerted men and then the other before grabbing Sorrow’s collar and settling him down until I could let him go quietly sniff the earth and trees and any hole in the ground he could find. They had been surprised to find a woman driving in, the older man said. One who didn’t work for the company.

“I’m a reporter with the
Northern Statesman
…” I fudged my position a little and squinted up at the men in unrelenting sunlight. “Following up on a recent story. Maybe you heard about the bones found over in Sandy Lake?”

They nodded. One, with black hair sticking out from under his hard hat, deeply tanned skin, and sharp blue eyes said, “Awful thing. I used to go out there swimming. Gave me the creeps to think those dead folks might have been down there and me floating over them.”

“Yeah,” I agreed, “not a pleasant thought. What I’m looking for is anyone who was with the company about thirteen years ago. Somebody who might remember a family—Native Americans, I think—who lived out by the lake. Guess they would’ve been squatters—since the property belongs to the oil company.”

The men exchanged looks. I wiped perspiration from my upper lip. For May, the day was getting abysmally warm.

“Not me,” the blue-eyed one said, shaking his head. “Just got hired on a month ago.”

I turned to the other man with a bad complexion and a tiny mouth. He nodded. “Think Willy Shimmers would’ve been around back then. I’ll give him a call for you, see if he can help.”

I wrote my name and number on a paper I found jammed in my jeans pocket and handed it to the man, thanking him for any help he could give. I called Sorrow and left with a wave to the two men’s backs. They had already returned to checking gauges.

The one thing I didn’t want to do was go directly home. What I did was park up on Willow Lake Road, in behind some tall bushes. I made my way down the hill obliquely, moving from tree to tree, sneaking up on my own house, as if I could sneak up on anything with my exuberant dog running on ahead. I got to the door, got inside, with Sorrow bashing the back of my legs to get ahead of me, and locked the door behind us. I locked every window, and when the phone rang I waited until the answering machine picked up and I heard Dolly’s voice before I grabbed the receiver.

“What’s going on?” Dolly demanded. “I heard you was in here looking for me.”

I told her about my trip to Dark Forest Cemetery and who’d been there, calling my name and chasing me.

She was quiet for a time. “Maybe you better get out of this, Emily. I don’t get why they’re after you, but that’s what it looks like.”

“Yeah, well you tell me how to get the word around that I’m not involved. What we need to do is move faster. I went out to the pumping station. There were two guys there but they weren’t with the company back when the family lived at the lake. They know someone who was and are calling him for me. I should hear soon.”

“I didn’t go back to Peshawbestown yet either. I still want to see if I can flush out those guys—or get more information on the Naquma family. Maybe we’d better …” She hesitated. “You want me to come out there? Are you scared they’ll come after you?”

“I was. But now … I’d just like to finish this. I don’t like being intimidated. That’s not who I am … I don’t think.”

She made a noise. “Last thing you are is a coward. Don’t let ’em get to you.”

“Let’s give it an hour,” I said. “If I don’t hear I’ll call the oil company offices and see if I can get ahold of this Willy Shimmers the men told me about, OK?”

“Then what?”

“If he can tell us, for sure, who the people were out there we’ll have something to go to the tribe with.”

“What about getting back out to Sandy Lake? We didn’t go through much of that burned-out house. Maybe there’s something …”

“Didn’t Brent send investigators?”

“I didn’t tell him yet. There wasn’t anything to connect the ruin to the Naqumas.”

We agreed to meet in an hour and a half, back at Sandy Lake. If she wasn’t there, she didn’t want me parking anywhere nearby, in case the men were out there too.

“Why don’t you just drive in and out until I get there? Don’t make a sitting duck out of yourself. Think I’ll bring Lucky with me. Wouldn’t hurt.”

___

After an hour without hearing from Willy Shimmers, I called the main office. The woman who answered said Willy wasn’t in but she would page him and give him the message. I gave her my name and number and made myself a pot of tea to pass the time while I waited. The water hadn’t even boiled when the phone rang. I let it ring, the way I had when Dolly called, then picked up immediately when a deep, male voice said he was Willy Shimmers, returning my call.

“Mr. Shimmers. This is Emily Kincaid. I’m with the newspaper and am following the story of the bones found at the edge of Sandy Lake.”

“Yeah,” he said, his voice deep and slow. “Read about that.”

“Were you with the company thirteen years ago?”

“Been with ’em almost twenty years now.”

“Were you ever out around Sandy Lake back about thirteen years?”

He took his time answering.

“You don’t mean this has something to do with that Indian guide who built himself a shack out there, do you?”

I caught my breath. Here was a connection at last. “Was his name Naquma?”

“Never called him anything but Orly. Could’ve been Naquma. Lived out there for maybe ten years. The company never bothered him. Figured he kept other trespassers away, and there’s a lot of territory to police. We’re not into policing unless there’s reason.”

“Did he have a family?”

The man’s voice hesitated. He coughed. “Well now,” he started in that way of northern men who don’t want to pass along gossip, “I never saw a woman there, if that’s what you mean.”

“How about children?”

“Saw a few. Older ones.”

“Two?”

“Maybe three.”

“Girls? Boys?” This was another case of pulling teeth to get the story.

“A couple girls. One boy, that I remember.”

“Do you know what happened to them?”

I could almost feel him shaking his head. “Never did hear. One day I went out there and the shack Orly’d built was burned to the ground. The family was gone. I figured they moved on someplace else where he could get work taking out hunters and fishermen.”

“That’s what he did? A hunting and fishing guide?”

“Well now, that’s what he called himself. I talked to a couple of guys who hired him, and they said they’d never hire him again. Guess the guy drank a lot. Not very dependable, I heard.” He stopped talking and took a deep breath. “To tell you the truth, I felt sorry for those kids. That wasn’t a way for anybody to grow up. Couldn’t imagine how they got out to school—maybe hiking back to the road, but that wouldn’t have been easy in winter. The boy seemed smart and real quiet. Both girls were pretty. But they were like most Indians are. You know, kept to themselves. And probably old Orly was afraid of getting run off the property, so he never was too friendly. At least not with me.”

I thanked Willy Shimmers, got off the phone, put Sorrow out on the porch where we both pretended he wouldn’t be sailing through the taped-up screen and down to the lake in five minutes, and left to meet Dolly at Sandy Lake.