Knitting Bones (2 page)

T
HE
door to Betsy’s hospital room opened, and Jill appeared in the doorway. “Hi, are you ready to go?” she asked.

“I guess,” said Betsy. It had been five days since the horse had rolled over and broken not just both her fibula and tibia—the two long bones between her knee and ankle—but also torn the ligaments that held her ankle bone in place. The tendons were not torn completely loose, and they had a decent chance to heal if supported by a cast or brace. A surgeon had removed the marrow from the shattered larger leg bone and strung the pieces on a metal rod as if they were beads. The tibia was held in place by a plate with screws. The pieces of bone would grow back together, but the hardware was permanent. For the rest of her life Betsy would carry a card, signed by her doctor, explaining why she set off metal detectors in airports.

And meanwhile, she was unable to get around at all. This was not the kind of broken leg that allows for a walking cast, at least not for several weeks. She was instructed to go home and stay there, mostly sitting down or lying in bed, hobbling around on flat surfaces with crutches. No stairs, no prolonged moving around, and certainly no driving.

“Does it hurt much?” asked Jill.

“Not too much. So long as I lie still, there’s only a kind of ache,” she said. “Of course, they keep insisting I get up and move around—and now that you’re here, there’s going to be some serious movement, isn’t there?” Jill had come to bring her home. Betsy’s surgery had been four days ago. Her medical insurance mandated, and her doctor agreed, that she could finish healing at home. “And by the way, have you given any thought to how I’ll get up to my apartment?” she asked Jill. Betsy lived on the second floor of a two-story building, which normally was great, because her needlework shop was on the ground floor. But there was no elevator.

“Lars will carry you,” said Jill.

Betsy chuckled uncertainly. Lars was Jill’s husband, a very large cop who could probably climb the stairs with her thrown over his shoulder, without even lightening his load by first taking off his gunbelt.

“Isn’t he on patrol today?”

“Certainly. But our motto is ‘To Protect and Serve,’ and carrying you up to your apartment is service.” Jill used to be a cop, too, but she had quit to raise her daughter, the adorable Emma Elizabeth.

“Jill, are you seriously proposing that Lars carry me up the stairs to my apartment?”

Jill’s light blue eyes widened with sincerity. “Sure. Otherwise we’ll have to get two or three men trying to carry you in a wheelchair, and maybe stumbling and letting go with you hanging on for dear life, and the wheelchair going over and over and you winding up at the foot of the stairs with your other leg broken, if not your skull.”

Betsy wasn’t sure if Jill was joking. She looked serious, but then, she was at her most serious when pulling Betsy’s leg the hardest.

Jill was of Norwegian stock, and not the least inclined to let her feelings show—whether she was joking, angry, or penitent. She had apologized in her direct way—once—for instigating the horseback ride that led to the mishap, but she had not mentioned it again. Betsy was fine with that; it was nice to have a friend who didn’t find it necessary to make endless demonstrations of sorrow or repentance. On the other hand, doubtless Jill felt responsible for getting Betsy home safely.

Betsy decided just to trust Jill. She would wind up safe in her apartment one way or another, because another thing Jill was, was reliable.

Betsy said, “Thank you for helping me.”

Jill smiled, pulled her cell phone from her purse, punched in a fast-dial digit, and said, when the call was answered, “It’s go for the transfer. We’ll be leaving here within half an hour. Right.” Her tone grew tender. “Bye, sweet-ums.”

Betsy rang for the nurse, who helped her pack up her belongings: two bed jackets (knit by loyal customers of Crewel World), five pairs of bed socks (ditto), a potted plant, a half-eaten box of chocolates, a toothbrush and other bathroom items, a pair of crutches, a carrier bag of medicines, and several printouts of instructions for home care. These were put in a cardboard box, which was balanced on the arms of the wheelchair after Betsy was helped into it. She managed not to groan.

Then Jill wheeled her down the broad corridor to the bank of elevators, stepping back when a car arrived with a nurse, two attendants, and a patient on a gurney. “So, you want to go horseback riding again this weekend?” Jill asked Betsy while they waited for the patient to be wheeled out. An attendant was maneuvering a wheeled stand holding up two plastic bags each half full of a clear liquid, which was dribbling down a hose into a needle taped to the back of the patient’s hand. He was an unconscious man with dark hair showing under the edge of his bandages and a lot of facial cuts and bruises.

Betsy made a tsk sound of pity, as Jill pushed her into the car and punched the button for the ground floor. Then, “No,” said Betsy, chuckling, as Jill’s question suddenly registered, “not this weekend. Maybe next if the weather is nice.”

T
ONY
Milan was vaguely aware that he was moving. And not walking but riding. In a car? A very distant alarm went off at that thought. But no, he was lying down. Maybe…maybe he was on a horse. No, of course not. Silly idea. He was doped up, and by the familiar muffled feeling it was on some kind of downer, something stronger than pot. Prescription pills, maybe, the good kind.

Rolling, rolling, rolling—wasn’t there a song with those words? A cowboy song. Something about a horse? Whoops, the rolling had stopped. And there were voices, a woman and a couple of men. Maybe a couple of women. His clothing was being messed with, he seemed to be dressed in sheets. Toga party? And now they were moving him, rolling or pushing him, he was sliding. Was he being mugged? He opened his mouth to protest and suddenly what they were doing hurt and he let out a kind of soft yell. One of the women said, “Hush, take it easy, you’re all right,” and covered him with something, like another sheet. But damn, his whole left side hurt, and his head, and the back of his hand, and his knee, and his right ankle…before he could finish his inventory, he was drifting back into the comfortable haze that only OxyContin can bring.

And then someone was calling his name. “Tony? Tony Milan? Wake up, Tony!” He opened his eyes and a dark-haired lady with brown eyes and an Aztec face was bending over him. He had no idea who she was.

He tried to ask, but his throat hurt and all he managed was a croaked, “Ur? Oo-oo.”

“My name is Margaret, and I’m your nurse,” she replied, just as if she understood his question. “You are in Hennepin County Medical Center. You had an accident with your car. Do you understand that?” She was talking as if to an idiot. Of course he understood. “Wah,” he said, which was nearly a word. “Hah, how—” Better. Lick lips and try again. “Howah lon I behn heah?” He seemed to have developed a foreign accent.

“Three days,” she said.

That seriously surprised him. He’d never gone on a toot that lasted that long before. “Th-thu-reeeee?” The drawn-out vowel was because something started stabbing him in the chest. Only one arm seemed to work, he reached to touch the sore spot. Was she poking him?

“Lie still, don’t try to move,” she said. “You have some broken bones.”

“Ah?”

“Don’t you remember the accident?”

“Uh-uh.” He’d been in an accident—was that because he’d been on a toot? Tony didn’t want the police involved in this. He was scared, and began a struggle to remember. Somehow this started to involve his whole body, and a gentle hand came down on his chest.

“I said, lie still. You can’t remember because you fractured your skull in a car accident.”

“Amma gonna die?”

“No, though we were a little worried about you when you arrived.”

“Wha’ happen?” He sure hoped someone hit him, that he hadn’t hit someone.

“A drunk driver ran a light. He’s more badly injured than you, which is unusual.”

“Yeah.” Tony tried to nod—he had often joked about drunk drivers who walked away from accidents that killed other people—but the movement hurt his head.

“Amma hurt bad?”

“You have a broken leg, a broken arm, broken ribs, and a skull fracture.”

“Wow. Car totaled, huh?” He liked that car, and it was paid for.

“What was left of it had to be cut open with the Jaws of Life to get you out.”

“Wow. Wait, skull fracture?” His head was actually broken? No wonder it hurt!

“Yes, that’s why you can’t remember the accident.”

“What day is today?”

“Monday. You had the accident on Friday.”

“Wow.”

She took his pulse, then tucked his good hand, his right one, under the sheet. “Are you in pain?” she asked.

Well, bless her, there was a question he loved to hear! He nodded and began trying to look pathetic. Actually, he was in pain, he could feel it moving around under the drugs they’d already given him. Oh, wonderful to be in a hospital, where the pain meds were legal, where the chance he’d get some was amazingly, happily high. Which he hoped to be, real soon.

And there it was, a syringe just dripping with eagerness to sink into a vein—only she didn’t put it in the vein, she stuck it in a thin, clear plastic hose—oh. That’s why the back of his hand hurt. Gosh, not even the pain of a needle stick and here was the sweet, warm fog coming back again. He sank happily into it, even though someone at the back of his head was yelling, “
Three days?
Three days?”

I
T
was Wednesday morning, around noon—Betsy had come home on Monday—when she looked up from her knitting. She was lying on the couch in her living room, her right leg supported on three needlepoint pillows. From the knee down it was encased in a hard, gray plastic foot-shaped case held shut with Velcro straps. The toes poking out the end of the case looked small and forlorn.

She was knitting an afghan made of squares of scrap yarn. She was bored with it, but being fuddled with pain meds meant she could knit only very simple patterns.

Her large and fluffy cat, Sophie, was asleep on her stomach. At twenty-two pounds, Sophie was a serious burden; but the animal had taken it upon herself to be a comfort to Betsy, a behavior so outside her normal selfishness that Betsy hadn’t the heart to discourage her.

It was so quiet up on the second floor that both sets of ears picked up even faint sounds. Sophie’s head came up only an instant before Betsy heard the footfalls of someone coming up the stairs. They were followed by a soft
tap-a-tap
on her door. “Come in!” Betsy called, because she knew who it was.

“Hello, hello, it’s me!” caroled Godwin. He was her store manager, though he preferred Vice President in Charge of Operations of Crewel World, Incorporated. He stopped just inside the door, which let into a short hallway, to ask anxiously, “Are you decent?”

“Yes, yes,” grumbled Betsy, who thought that an irrelevant question, considering her age, weight, injury, and the sexual orientation of the man asking. Nevertheless she pushed Sophie onto the floor so she could rearrange her old bathrobe, the thick one with the broad vertical stripes of gray and maroon, so it covered her down to her ankles. She lowered her needles and peered over her magnifying glasses.

He’d sounded all excited about something, but as he entered the living room he halted short. “What?” he said, surprised.

“What, what?” she asked.

“I don’t know, you were giving me a look, like you already know I did something wrong.”

“I was? I didn’t mean to.” She took off the magnifying glasses. “Did you do something wrong? Is there trouble down in the shop?”

He relaxed and came forward. “No, no, nothing like that. But have you seen the news today?” He was starting to get excited again.

“No,” she confessed. Though she was not taking so many of the most strenuous meds, she still found she lacked any desire to see what was happening in the real world, possibly because she lay helpless here at home so there was nothing she could do about anything. “Did I miss something?”

“Girl!” said Godwin. “Did you
miss
something? Only the biggest scandal ever to hit EGA!”

Betsy stared at him. She hadn’t been able to go to the convention, of course, being either doped into semiconsciousness or actually in surgery while it was going on. But Godwin had brought her all the details once she was awake and able to take notice. Others reported that he had done a superb job of running the Crewel World booth at the event. Neither he nor any other visitor had even hinted at a scandal. And, anyway, the Embroiderers Guild of America was hardly a place one would find a scandal of any size, large or small. She tried a smile, thinking he was jesting, or at least exaggerating, but he didn’t smile back. “You’re serious!” she said.

“You bet I am!”

“So tell me!”

“Well, you know how they were selling that heart canvas to raise money for women’s heart disease research,” he began.

She nodded. The local EGA group had begun selling a painted outline of a Valentine heart on canvas right after the last annual convention. The inside was divided into seven sections, each to be filled with a different stitch. There was a competition to find the best composed and executed set of stitches, entries to be displayed at the convention for members to vote for. Betsy and Godwin had both been consulted by several people putting together their designs—and been glad to sell them the materials needed to work them.

“Did you know they raised over twenty-four thousand dollars?” asked Godwin.

“I knew it was going to be at least twenty thousand,” said Betsy. “They said as much at the last meeting I went to.”

“Well, the Heart Coalition was so impressed that they sent a man to the banquet to pick up the check—and he’s gone. So’s the check.”

“Gone?”

“Yes, gone. Gone, as in run off, vanished.
With the check.
The police are looking for him, but so far no luck. That’s what the news is saying. Mrs. Germaine is downstairs, and she’s really upset.”

Mrs. Germaine was president of the local EGA chapter. Betsy said, “She should be—everyone in the guild should be. Twenty-four thousand dollars was a lot of money to raise, and it’s a lot of money to lose!”

“No, no, sweetie, you don’t understand! The man who disappeared with the money is her
husband!”

Betsy had to try twice before she could exclaim, “No!”

“Yes! Mr. Bob Germaine came to the banquet, made a nice speech, gave me the eye, and walked out with the check.”

Betsy shook her head as if to clear it. “I don’t think I’m following you.”

“I went to the EGA banquet, remember? You told me to use your ticket, since you couldn’t go. That’s why I was actually there, an eyewitness who watched him take the check from Ms. Pickens, the EGA Treasurer, and make a small thank-you speech. Don’t you remember me telling you about that?”

“You told me about the banquet and the check presentation. But that’s not what I mean. Why did EGA give the check to Allie’s husband?”

“Because he was the honcho from the National Heart Coalition they sent to pick it up.”

“Bob works for the Heart Coalition?” Betsy held up a hand. “Wait a minute, I knew that. How could I forget that?”

“Possibly because Allie came up with the idea of the Women’s Heart Disease fund-raiser?” suggested Godwin.

“Yes, she did. So what? Oh, I see what you mean: She didn’t want to underline the fact that her husband’s employer would benefit from a heart disease fund-raiser.”

“That’s right. She talks a lot—a
lot
—about Bob, but ever since EGA started that Women’s Heart Disease fund-raiser, she never let the fact that her husband is an executive with the National Heart Coalition escape her pretty lips.”

“Do you suppose the idea was really his? That he used EGA as a fund-raiser?” asked Betsy. “That
would
be a scandal.”

“You know I love you,” said Godwin. “And that you are my very favorite boss in all the wide world.”

Betsy frowned at him. “Do I hear a
but
in there somewhere?”

“But,”
said Godwin, nodding. “The question is not whether or not he asked his wife to use EGA to raise money for the company he worked for. I mean it might be a scandal if it’s true, but not nearly as big a scandal as his taking the check and leaving town.”

“Oh,” said Betsy. She definitely had to cut back on the meds. “I suppose people are saying that if he really did run off with the check, then this whole thing might be a plot between the two of them to steal the money. That
would
be a scandal!”

Godwin raised a slim forefinger, indicating he had a thought about that. “Twelve thousand dollars apiece seems kind of small potatoes for people in their income range.”

Betsy nodded. “Well, yes, you’re right. Besides, if it was both of them, why is she still here?”

“She wants to talk to you.”

“No, I mean, why didn’t she leave town with him?”

“I don’t know. But right now this minute she is downstairs all agog to speak with you.” He frowned. “Is
agog
the word I want?”

“I don’t know. What does she want to talk to me about?”

“About helping her find out what really happened to him, of course!”

“Goddy, look at me! I can’t go sleuthing! I’m stuck inside this apartment for another ten days—and I can’t drive my car for six weeks after that! How on earth can I possibly investigate when I can’t go anywhere?”

The note of distress in her voice brought Sophie back up onto her stomach. “Uff! Easy, cat!” But when Godwin came to lift the animal down, she said, “No, leave her, she thinks she’s helping.”

Godwin stopped and looked at Sophie, who was “kneading dough” on Betsy’s abdomen. “Are you sure?”

“Yes. And actually, it’s kind of nice having her within reach all the time.”

“Okay, if you say so. Where were we? Oh, Allie wants you to help her—and yes, I told her all about how you can’t go anywhere. But she says she just wants to talk to someone who might believe her when she says someone kidnapped her darling Bob. Someone who can give her some ideas about what to do, where to look.”

“Oh, for heaven’s sake! Don’t the police—?”

Godwin interrupted, “The police have put out an all points bulletin asking for help capturing one Robert Henry Germaine, wanted for grand theft, theft by fraud, and—something else, I can’t remember what. They have a photograph of him.” Godwin frowned. “It’s not a very good photograph, which is pretty clever of Mrs. Germaine.”

“What do you mean?”

“Remember when Mary Kuhfeld lost a lot of weight and had a Glamour Shot taken of herself all made-up to look like a model?”

“Yes.”

“Well, her husband said that if she ever ran away from home and he didn’t want her back, that’s the photo he’d give the police.”

Betsy laughed, and the jiggle made Sophie jump down and stalk off. Betsy said, “I see what you mean. Allie’s helping her husband hide by giving the police a photo that doesn’t look much like him.”

“That’s right.”

She nodded. “Well, that’s understandable. And clever, certainly.” She thought briefly, then suddenly flashed on something he’d said earlier. “What did you mean, he gave you the eye?”

“I mean, during his speech, my good old reliable gaydar went
ping!
So I smiled at him as he went out and he smiled back. I actually think he would have stopped, but he was surrounded by about half a dozen women who were escorting him out, talking sixteen to the dozen to him.”

Betsy laughed. “His wife might not have liked that, Goddy,” she said.

“His wife wasn’t at the banquet. She was at a meeting of chapter presidents.”

“During the
banquet
?”

“I know. It was supposed to end before the banquet started, but they got caught up in something—no one knows what—and had their meal sent up.”

“Still, I can’t believe he’d actually give you the eye with people who know Allie watching.”

“Unless he knew he would never be seeing any of them again,” Godwin pointed out. “One of the women told me they walked him out to his light blue Lexus in the parking garage, and he drove off, never to be seen again.”

“You really think he’s gay?”

“Well, my gaydar is generally reliable, but I’d never met him, and never even seen him, until the banquet last Friday evening. Have you?”

Betsy thought. “Now I think about it, no.”

Goddy shrugged. “Maybe his gate swings both ways. You can feel her out about it, if you like. May I send her up?”

“Oh, I don’t know—” Betsy didn’t mind so much that Godwin saw her in dishabille, but Allie Germaine was a different story. Betsy looked around at the mess in the room, at her ratty bathrobe, and recalled that she hadn’t had a tub bath since the accident. “My hair, this place—” she said.

“I’ll get you a comb. And this place isn’t so awful, really. Here, let me put some things out of sight.” He picked up the cat and a trashy novel and headed for the bedroom with them.

Betsy called after him, “But what if she expects more than I can do?”

The door closed and Godwin came back. “Oh, please don’t say no! She’s sitting right in the shop, ruining the ambience.” He rummaged in her purse, coming up with a comb, mirror, and lipstick. “Please, please?” He handed her the comb and said, “She’s so upset and sad, and she says you’re her last hope.”

Betsy looked despairingly at her face in the little mirror, then over it at Godwin’s pleading expression. “Oh, all right. Send her up.”

Godwin waited until Betsy finished with the comb and began applying lipstick, then hurried out. Betsy put away her knitting and tried to smooth some of the wrinkles out of the robe with her fingers. It was too big on her so it covered the even more wrinkled nightgown under it, and the ugly plastic casing under that. She had barely gotten past the wince of pain any movement of her leg brought when there was a light tap on her door, which Godwin had left ajar.

“Come in, Mrs. Germaine!” she called, and braced herself. She was sadly certain she would not be able to help this woman.