The Alpine Traitor (2 page)

Spence had the grace to look faintly sheepish. “Hey,” he said, “I know what you’re thinking. But it won’t affect you that much. Maybe some of the Snohomish and Monroe businesses will agree to run ads in the
Advocate
.”

“Let me go outside and see if pigs are flying over Alpine.”

“Look,” Spence said with apparent sincerity, “I’m not doing this to hurt your business. I’ve got a living to make, too, and this is my chance to add a little more black ink to the bottom line. Can you honestly blame me for that?”

“No.” I shook my head. “Of course not. This just isn’t turning out to be a very good day.” I tried to smile but knew the attempt wasn’t convincing. “You have to do what’s in your best interests. I appreciate the heads-up.”

“Thanks.” Spence relaxed visibly, took a puff on his cigarette, and smiled. His effort came off as genuine. “How about me treating you to dinner tomorrow night at Le Gourmand?”

As usual, my social calendar was anything but crowded. “Okay,” I agreed, trying to be a good sport and not wanting to miss an opportunity to eat free of charge at the best restaurant in SkyCo.

“I’ll pick you up at six,” he said, walking over to put out his cigarette in Leo’s ashtray. “Maybe the food tomorrow will make today seem not quite so bad.”

“Let’s hope,” I murmured.

Spence left. Three minutes later, after I’d scribbled a note to Leo about KSKY’s venture into new advertising turf, my day got even worse. My former ad manager, Ed Bronsky, waddled into the newsroom, out of breath but full of excitement.

“Hey, hey, hey!” Ed exclaimed. “Guess what? We’ve sold the house!”

“The house,” better known around Alpine as Casa de Bronska, was Ed’s monument to his inherited wealth. Unfortunately, he’d overspent and made some bad investments in the past year. Ed had been reduced to working the counter at the Burger Barn until he’d acquired a new and resourceful CPA, who’d at least managed to keep the Bronsky family in chips and dips.

“Who’s the buyer?” I asked, wondering what kind of sap would pay almost a million bucks to live in an ersatz Mediterranean villa above the railroad tracks in Alpine.

“The name’s Platte,” Ed replied, checking the coffeemaker area to see if we had any goodies left from the morning bakery run. We didn’t, but Ed’s mood remained buoyant. “California types. They could never get a house like ours down there for a quarter of the price.”

That much was probably true. “A married couple?” I inquired.

Ed nodded. “Young, virtual newlyweds. You’ll want to put a story in the paper.”

I ignored the suggestion. “Where will you and Shirley and the kids live?”

“We’ve got our eye on a place,” Ed said vaguely. “Not as big as Casa de Bronska, of course, but…cozy. The Plattes are arriving next week to finalize the deal and sign the papers. Snorty’s already drawing them up.”

Snorty Wenzel was Ed’s real estate agent, whose office—as far as I could tell—was a ’98 Lincoln Continental. I’d met him only once, about six months ago, when he came in to place a one-column-by-three-inch ad in our classified section. I didn’t know his real name, but it wasn’t hard to figure out why he was called Snorty. He snuffled, sniffled, and snorted constantly, apparently a victim of sinus problems. The sound was annoying, but I suppose clients got used to it as long as he did his job. “I assume the Plattes have seen the house?” I remarked.

“Our house?” Ed saw me nod patiently. “Oh, sure. On the Internet. You know—a virtual tour, as good as walking through in person. Snorty uses every marketing ploy available. He’s tops.”

“I’m glad for you,” I said. “Did you get your asking price?”

“Almost.” Ed coughed a couple of times. “You know those Californians. They’re slick, and they like to haggle.”

I didn’t press Ed further. For all I knew, he’d given the place away. “Let me know when the Plattes get here. Vida will want to do a feature on them for her House & Home page.”

Ed looked disappointed. “She’ll want to interview me, too, won’t she?”

No,
I thought,
she won’t. She does not have fond memories of you avoiding real work while you were an employee of this newspaper, which barely survived your slothful habits.
“Of course,” I fibbed. “You’ll have to excuse me, Ed. I was just on my way to Stella’s Styling Salon.”

“Huh? Oh, sure. I’ll walk you out.”

We went past Ginny Erlandson’s desk in the front office. Ginny looked up from her computer when I told her where I was going. She nodded in her usual no-nonsense manner, murmured “Bye,” and returned to the monitor. Ginny, whose husband, Rick, worked at the Bank of Alpine, was expecting a baby in October. The couple had two boys, and Ginny was hoping for a girl. She was also hoping for a raise. I couldn’t promise either at the moment.

Ed and I parted company at the corner. Stella Magruder’s hair salon was in the Clemans Building across Front between Second and Third streets. Luckily for me, she had an opening.

“June slows down after graduation,” she explained, beckoning me to follow her to her station after I’d put on the required purple smock. “When it comes to hair, regulars and weddings are what keep me going in the summer. I’d have gone broke if I hadn’t started offering facials and waxing and all the other services a few years back.”

I noticed that only one other stylist was busy, a young woman named Naomi, who was wrapping permanent rods in an older woman’s gray hair. “We’ve got a new blonde in town,” I said as Stella studied my shaggy brown mane in the mirror. “Ginger Roth. Has she been in yet?”

“No,” Stella replied. “Natural blond or product?”

“I couldn’t tell,” I said, “but her skin is fair, despite having moved recently from Arizona. I guess her tan’s faded already.”

“Sun!” Stella exclaimed. “We know how overrated sun is around here. Every so often I get some idiot who wants me to install a tanning booth. You can’t convince tanning freaks that sun, real or artificial, is downright dangerous to the skin.” She stopped fiddling with my hair and put her fists on her hips. “Okay. I give up. What can I do for you that you just might be able to maintain on your own if you’d only take the time and trouble?”

“Um…much shorter and layered?” I suggested.

“We’ve tried that. It lasted less than a week before you turned it into a shrub.” Stella looked away as a young man entered the salon. “May I help you?” she asked, moving toward the front of the shop.

The dark-haired and rather handsome newcomer was holding what looked like a map. I couldn’t catch most of what he said, but Stella was pointing to her right and then straight ahead and again to her right. Map Man nodded and left.

“Lost,” she said.

Naomi, a perky and plump gold-foiled girl, giggled. “He’s cute. I could’ve shown him the way to my place.”

Stella smirked. “Forget it. He’s from out of state. He was trying to find the golf course. I told him it wasn’t exactly Pebble Beach and warned him to watch out for bears crossing the fifth fairway to go fishing in Icicle Creek.”

We returned to my coiffure dilemma. Stella suggested a shorter cut and a tube of so-called threads that she insisted even I could manage. “Just put the stuff on your palms, rub it around, clap your hands over your head to distribute the product, and then fluff up your hair. We call it styling. God knows what you’ll call it.”

“Uh-huh,” I said, looking at my mirror image, which showed my expression as only slightly more intelligent than your average turnip. Since the directions involved dexterity and coordination, I might as well have taken the twenty bucks Stella charged me for the so-called threads and tossed Andrew Jackson into the Skykomish River.

The rest of the workday petered out in my vain attempt to find editorial inspiration. Vida had managed to track down Ginger and Josh Roth. According to Ginny’s husband, the banker Rick, they’d moved into a condo at Pines Villa. In fact, it was the one that Scott and Tamara Chamoud had vacated when they left for Seattle. Josh worked for a high-tech company based in one of the Seattle suburbs and apparently was able to handle his job from just about anywhere. As far as Rick knew, Ginger was currently unemployed. They hadn’t opened an account yet, but Josh had cashed a traveler’s check.

“There might be a story in that,” I remarked to Vida. “The ability of people to live in some remote yet cheaper area and work for an outfit that’s headquartered somewhere else. It sounds like a growing trend.”

“And how wise of them to choose Alpine,” Vida pointed out proudly. “No commuting miles and miles, finding the smaller towns less nerve-racking, enjoying the outdoors, and getting to know everyone.”

And knowing everyone’s business,
I thought. But I kept my mouth shut. Vida didn’t take kindly to criticism of Alpine. “So
that
mystery is solved,” I said. “Do you want to write the story, or shall I give it to Curtis?”

“I’ll do it,” Vida said. “I’m always delighted to welcome newcomers.”

I knew she’d volunteer. The Roths were about to be interrogated with all the zeal—if not the pain—of the Spanish Inquisition.

An hour later I arrived home at my little log house nestled among the big second-growth evergreens that marched up Tonga Ridge. I was eating an unimaginative dinner of chicken breast, green beans, and rice when the current man in my life, Rolf Fisher, called from Seattle.

“Are you as bored as I am?” he asked—and yawned to prove his point.

“Kind of,” I admitted, putting my plate aside and wandering into the living room. “What’s wrong? No hot news coming over the AP wire?”

“Just the usual wars and terrorists and gang-related killings and African famines and big-time CEOs being hauled off to prison.” Rolf sighed dramatically. “I’m trying to get assigned to a Third World country—like Alabama. Look, I haven’t seen you for over a month. Isn’t it time you came to Seattle for a raucous romp?”

“Maybe,” I allowed, gazing up at
Sky Autumn,
an original painting by a reclusive local artist named Craig Laurentis. “Do you realize that in the two years we’ve known each other you’ve visited me in Alpine only three times?”

“Do you realize I just told you I was bored?” Rolf countered. “Face it, Emma, there’s not much to do in your little mountain aerie. I’ve actually seen toadstools and gophers before.”

I took umbrage. “I thought you enjoyed my company,” I snapped.

“I adore your company, I adore your conversation, your big brown eyes, your knowledge of the infield fly rule, your clumsy way of walking into walls and bouncing off of them without so much as a flicker of surprise. But,” Rolf went on while I drummed my fingernails on the end table by the sofa, “I do not adore only two choices when it comes to restaurants with palatable food, and the sole entertainment is watching the clouds come down over Mount Baldy.”

Rolf was right, of course. I turned away from my favorite painting, with its almost palpable sense of rushing river, velvet moss, and glistening boulders. “What did you have in mind if I drive to Seattle?”

“Well…” He cleared his throat. I couldn’t suppress a smile. “Besides that, of course, I thought we might go on a cocktail cruise around Elliott Bay Saturday night. I’ve been invited, and I’m allowed to bring a guest. Naturally, I thought of you.”

“Why,” I demanded, “didn’t you say that in the first place?”

He laughed the deep, dark chortle that I found so fascinating. “I’m bored, remember? I wanted to play a game, if only via the telephone.”

That was part of the problem with Rolf. I never knew when he was playing games and when he was serious. Maybe that was the main reason I kept trying not to fall in love with him. It had been so different with my late and much-lamented lover, Tom Cavanaugh. Tom could be frustrating and, as it turned out, so private that he bordered on secretive, but at least he never toyed with my mind—only my emotions.

“Okay,” I said, “I’ll come down Friday after work.”

“Excellent,” he said. “How was your day?”

“Oh—kind of stupid. Just one of those days with a lot of niggling little problems. I’ll tell you when I see you.”

“Nothing serious?” he inquired.

“Not really.” I sighed. “It was utterly uneventful.”

I had no way of knowing that several of those nonevents were going to turn my world upside down.

TWO

T
HE DINNER WITH
S
PENCER
F
LEETWOOD ON
T
HURSDAY
night had turned out to be a pleasant interlude. When Spence removed his radio personality mask, he was good company. He read books, mostly nonfiction, had traveled all over the world, and, though he was not a sports fanatic, at least had a passing interest in baseball. We never discussed politics, both having the same philosophy: As representatives of the media in an area of small population, we kept our views to ourselves, lest we start pandering to elected officials, overtly or covertly.

Friday morning, Vida had an eleven o’clock appointment with Ginger Roth at Pines Villa. At eleven-twenty, my House & Home editor stomped back into the newsroom with a furious expression under the brim of her floppy green hat.

“So inconsiderate!” she ranted. “This younger generation! Making appointments and not keeping them! I rang the buzzer on the intercom several times and got no response. I finally buzzed my addlepated sister-in-law Ella Hinshaw and she let me in. But Ginger didn’t respond to my knock on her door. How rude! If you want her life story, have Curtis get it. I’ve no time for bad manners.”

Curtis was sitting at his desk, only a few feet away from where Vida was standing. For some reason, she rarely spoke directly to him but behaved as if he weren’t present. Vida didn’t like change. Maybe she was pretending that Scott was still working for the
Advocate.

“Curtis?” I said.

He looked up, blue eyes wary. “Yeah?”

I took Ginger and Josh Roth’s address and phone number from Vida. “Ms. Roth was a no-show for—”

Curtis grinned, a rather engaging expression. “I heard. Ms. Roth is a boor, unworthy of calling herself a resident of Alpine.” His eyes flicked in Vida’s direction, where she was about to sit down at her desk. “Mrs. Runkel,” he said, a bit louder, “I’m not deaf, though it’s kind of you to be considerate of my handicap. If I had one.”

I stiffened, prepared for a burst of reproach from Vida. But after an awkward pause, she gave Curtis one of her cheesy smiles with plenty of teeth showing. “Ah. So you do have some spunk. Good. I’ve been concerned about that.” She stopped smiling, sat down, and immediately picked up the phone.

Curtis studied the scribbled information on the Roths. “Should I try again today?”

“Early afternoon,” I suggested. “She may be out shopping this morning. Thanks, Curtis.”

Shortly before noon, Dick Bourgette stopped by to give me an estimate on a new roof. I trusted Dick, who’d moved to Alpine several years earlier with his wife and almost-grown family. The Bourgettes had flourished in every way, with their six children marrying, multiplying, and getting involved in various business endeavors of their own. Dick’s wife, Mary Jane, was a friend of mine, and the entire clan were regulars at St. Mildred’s Catholic Church. Though the Bourgettes had come late to Alpine, it seemed as if they’d always belonged to the town, and in fact, one of their daughters had married a descendant of Carl Clemans, the mill owner and the town’s founding father.

“Okay,” Dick said, laying a spec sheet on my desk. “If you want only the section over your office replaced, it’s going to cost less than five hundred bucks, including labor and materials. But that old tin roof over the rest of the building is shot. The climate’s changed. We don’t have as much snow like we did in the old days. I suggest you go with slate. It’ll withstand anything and last forever.”

I blinked a couple of times. “How much?”

Dick scrunched up his round, faintly florid face and tapped his pen on the desk. “Oh—let’s say fourteen hundred. That’s a fair price, Emma.”

“Well…” I hesitated, though I knew Dick was scrupulously honest. “Okay. When can you start and how long will it take?”

“Mid-July,” Dick replied, putting his pen back in his shirt pocket. “A couple of days. I can do it myself. It’s not a big job.” He pointed to two of the buckets I kept in my office. “You better hang on to those. It usually rains just before or after the Fourth of July.”

I nodded. June in Alpine could be more like March; May was usually sunny and pleasant; February often brought a few days of what the old-timers called “false spring.” The venerable adage about the changeable climate was “If you don’t like the weather, wait twenty minutes.”

Dick gathered up his clipboard and laptop computer. “I hear the Bronskys finally sold their palace.”

“So Ed told me,” I said. “Thank your lucky stars you weren’t here when they built it. You can’t imagine what they put their architect and contractor through.”

“Oh yes, I can,” Dick responded and chuckled. “Mary Jane and I went to a couple of their soirees—or as Ed pronounced it, ‘
soy
-rees.’ We couldn’t believe how much money they wasted on things like those marble floors with inlays of the family’s pictures, including their dog, Carhop.”

“Ed started going broke before they could add their new dog, Barhop,” I remarked. “I hope the buyers have enough money to undo some of Ed and Shirley’s atrocious taste.”

“I’d like to meet with them as soon as they get settled,” Dick said. “I thought I might drop off one of my business cards at the Tall Timber Motel, but that’s probably pushing it.”

I gave Dick a curious look. “They’re here?”

Dick nodded. “At least the husband is. Our daughter Terri talked to him at the diner yesterday. His first name is Dylan. Dylan Platte.”

Terri Bourgette was the hostess at the fifties-style diner owned by two of her brothers. “Interesting,” I noted. “We seem to be attracting some younger people to Alpine lately. I’m going to run a story about that after we’ve talked to the newcomers.”

“It’s a good little town,” Dick asserted. “I’m glad we made the move. That traffic in and around Seattle is really horrendous.”

On that note, Dick left. I decided to call the Tall Timber Motel and arrange an appointment with Dylan Platte. He wasn’t in, so I left my name and number.

Vida was still fuming. “I hope you have better luck than I did with the Roths,” she declared, taking a hard-boiled egg, a container of cottage cheese, and several carrot and celery sticks from a brown paper bag. It was obvious that she was on another one of her intermittent diets. I never understood why—she is a big woman with a big frame, and no matter how much or how little she eats, Vida never seems to lose or gain a pound. She sniffed with contempt. “Common courtesy was left behind in the last century.”

I couldn’t argue the point. I decided to go over to the Burger Barn and pick up fish and chips for lunch. If I ate in the office and finished the tasks I’d allotted myself for the week, I could leave for Seattle around four. As I walked through the front office, Ginny was on the phone, standing at her place behind the counter and wearing her coat.

“Just a moment,” she said into the phone and beckoned to me. “Ms. Lord is still here.” Ginny handed me the receiver. “It’s somebody named Platte,” she whispered.

“Hello, this is Emma Lord,” I said into the phone, waving Ginny good-bye. “Thanks for returning my call so promptly.”

“Your call?” The male voice sounded puzzled. “When did you call me?”

“About five minutes ago,” I said, equally puzzled. “I phoned the Tall Timber Motel after I heard you were in town.”

“Then you must know what I’m calling about,” he said.

“You’re buying the Bronsky house,” I replied, moving around the counter and sitting down in Ginny’s chair.

“Yes.” He paused. “When can we meet?” he finally inquired after at least thirty seconds had passed.

“I’m on my way to lunch,” I said. “Can you join me at the Burger Barn?”

“That doesn’t work for me,” he responded, sounding very formal. “I’d prefer meeting you somewhere less public, perhaps after work tonight. I see you live on Fir Street, off Fourth.”

I was beginning to get suspicious. “I’m afraid that’s not possible, Mr. Platte. I’m leaving town for the weekend later this afternoon. Can you wait until Monday?”

“No,” he replied. “I wouldn’t think that’d suit you, either. There’s quite a lot to talk and think about.”

“Like what?” I was growing impatient as well as wary.

“I thought you knew.”

“I haven’t a clue.”

Dylan made a sound at the other end that was either a snort or a laugh, I couldn’t tell which. “I suppose I’d better make the announcement right now, and then we can talk about it tonight.”

“I won’t be here,” I said, figuring he was one of those people who had some weird idea for a story that would make himself look like a hero, adventurer, entrepreneur, or some other kind of self-seeking opportunist. “I told you that.”

“I know what you said,” Dylan assured me. “But my time here is limited. I have to be back in San Francisco Sunday night. My wife and I won’t return to Alpine until the second week of July.”

“Your wife is with you?” I asked, wishing he’d get to the point.

“Kelsey couldn’t make it. I had to check out the house by myself.”

The name “Kelsey” rang a faint bell. I didn’t stop to figure out why. “So what’s your proposal?” I asked.

“My wife and her brother and I want to buy the
Advocate.
”

I was sure that I hadn’t heard correctly. “You want to buy
space
in the
Advocate
?”

This time the noise at the other end was definitely a chuckle—a rather snide chuckle, I thought. “Didn’t you get Kelsey’s e-mail last week?”

Kelsey.
I knew that name. It was unusual, but I knew—or knew of—someone named Kelsey. I thought back to the batches and batches of mostly worthless e-mails sent to me every day. “I don’t recall anything from someone named Kelsey,” I said.

“The subject was ‘Acquiring the
Advocate
,’” Dylan said.

I vaguely recalled a heading like that, but all sorts of syndicates and news services and heaven knew what else were sent to me all the time and usually involved some sort of product for sale, including websites and even porn. I deleted them immediately, fearing that there were viruses attached.

“I never read it,” I admitted. “I’m not sure what you’re talking about. What do you mean by ‘acquiring’?”

“I’ll explain.” Dylan Platte sounded condescending, as if he were talking to the Alpine Idiot. “My wife, Kelsey, and her brother, Graham, inherited their father’s newspaper chain when he was killed a few years ago. For a time, they both left the business up to…”

I lost track of what Dylan was saying. Kelsey. Graham. Tom Cavanaugh’s daughter and son. The stepchildren I’d almost acquired—there was that word again—by marrying Tom. My son, Adam’s half brother and half sister. I’d met them only once at Tom’s funeral Mass in San Francisco. Adam and my brother, Ben, had gone with me, but we’d skipped the reception that followed because I simply couldn’t handle mingling with so many people I didn’t know—including Graham and Kelsey. I worried that they might blame me in part for what had happened to their father. I’d been so numb with grief that I’d barely been able to say more than a mumbled hello. They were only a blur in my mind’s eye.

In trying to recall what they looked like, I conjured up only the vaguest of impressions—in their twenties, muddling through mismatched mates and equally incompatible careers. I suddenly realized that the Cavanaugh offspring must be thirty-something by now, and apparently had settled down to take life seriously. The searing wound I’d felt when Tom died had never quite healed, and now I felt as if it had been reopened and was bleeding all over again.

I couldn’t speak.

“…Graham has inherited his father’s business skills,” Dylan was saying. “He understands the predicament of newspapers in general these days, but also knows that some of the solutions lie in mergers and acquisitions. My background is in advertising, Kelsey is the creative type, and Graham’s wife, Sophia, is a very fine writer. It’s an ideal situation for all of us, not to mention that living in the Bay Area isn’t what it used to be. We assume you’re getting close to retirement, and we’re prepared to make a very tempting offer. So what would be a good time this evening or tomorrow?”

I marshaled my strength to reply. “I’m not interested, and I won’t be in town past four o’clock. I’ve already made plans with a friend who lives in Seattle.”

“Oh?” Dylan paused, but only for a moment. “You enjoy the city, I take it?”

“Of course,” I said. “I was raised there.”

Here came that chuckle again. “So I imagine you’ll move back after you sell the paper. Especially,” he added a trifle slyly, “if your friend lives there.”

I tried to picture Rolf in my mind’s eye. I couldn’t. All I saw was Tom—smiling, talking, thinking, sleeping, looking into my eyes. I pressed my free hand against my forehead, willing myself to behave like a mature middle-aged human being.

“I’m sorry,” I finally said. “I’m not contemplating a sale of the
Advocate
in the near future. I have to go now. Good luck on your move to Alpine.”

“Hardball,” Dylan murmured. “I understand. You realize, of course, that Kelsey’s father intended to buy the
Advocate
before he died.”

“What?”
I was so startled that I shrieked the word.

“He left a letter—a memo, I should say—about his intentions,” Dylan explained, as though he was talking about a request Tom might have made to purchase a filing cabinet. “According to Kelsey, he made that fatal trip to Alpine to negotiate with you in person. My father-in-law was interested in getting a foothold for his newspaper chain in western Washington. Since he knew you, he felt that the
Advocate
would make a good starting point. Kelsey and Graham are simply carrying out what Tom Cavanaugh wanted to do.”

I glanced up as the front door opened. Mayor Fuzzy Baugh entered and offered me his best election-year smile. I tried to smile back, but my effort was puny. I spoke quietly into the receiver: “I have to hang up. Someone’s here to see me. I’ll call you back in an hour. What’s your number, or should I contact the motel?”

“I’m not at the motel,” Dylan replied. “I’ll call you.” He broke the connection.

I must have looked stricken. For once, the town’s longtime leader dropped his hail-voter-well-met expression and stopped smiling. “What’s wrong, Emma?” he asked with a trace of his native New Orleans. “Has something…happened?”