The Dearly Departed (21 page)

“She asked me to drop off a check.”

“I'll drop it off for you. Her place is hard to find, especially in the dark.”

“It won't be dark till eight or nine. It's one of the longest days of the year.”

“You can say that again,” said Joey.

“Thanks anyway, but I'd rather do it without the escort. She'd see the cruiser pulling up and she might think it's more bad news.”

“No,” said Joey. “Just the opposite. She's in a pretty isolated area. She'll look out the window, see a strange car . . .” He shook his head regretfully.

“I'll call first.”

Joey pointed to the telephone, but Fletcher hesitated.

“Are you thinking she might say ‘Don't come'?” asked Joey.

“I'm thinking I don't know her number. Which wouldn't be a major obstacle . . .” He squinted and tapped his forehead.

“If only you could remember her last name?”

“I know it: Sunny and Margaret . . . it's on the tip of my tongue. And it's probably on my father's speed dial.”

“Let's just go,” said Joey. “We can drop your check off on the way to the station.”

Fletcher said okay; what choice did he have? He wasn't going to cross the chief of police. Give him a sec to take a leak.

From the bathroom, raising his voice to be heard, Fletcher called pleasantly, “I'm sure Sunny told you that she's my half-sister.”

“Your
theory
that she's your half-sister, you mean?”

The toilet flushed, but Fletcher took another minute. When he appeared, his hair was newly leavened and the scent of Old Spice deodorant drifted toward Joey. “I'm going to ask Sunny to take a DNA test,” Fletcher said, tucking his shirttails into his jeans. “I think they can swab the inside of our mouths, and that's all there is to it.”

“I hope to God you're not going to propose that tonight.”

“We'll see. I'm playing it by ear.”

“Can I give you some advice? It's too much for her now. You're coming on way too strong with this brother thing.”

Fletcher smiled. “
Half
-brother. And you know this how?”

“She's my friend. I'm the one who broke the news about her mother to her.”

“Sorry, Chief.
I'm
the one who broke that news. You gave me her phone number.
I
called her.”

“You told her machine! Who tells someone her mother died on an answering machine?”

“Now I get it.” He nodded smartly. “You think I'm moving in on her. Well, you can relax. Where I come from, men don't date their sisters.”

Joey set his hat back on his head. “I'd watch the insults, pal. You're in enough trouble—”

Fletcher opened the front door, smiling confidently, waving the police chief through. “We both know I'm not,” he said.

 

F
rom the passenger seat, Fletcher complimented Joey on his Chevy Tahoe's digital scanner, asked if he could point the radar gun at a passing vehicle, then confided, “I was wondering how much a town this size puts together for a cop's salary package.”

Joey shook his head, smiling in disbelief.

“It's public record, correct?”

“Let's just say I'm paid in line with what surrounding communities pay their chiefs.”

“Decent benefits?”

Joey shrugged.

“Dental?”

“Why do you want to know?”

“Just trying to get an idea of what makes King George tick. For example, how do people make a living here? Farming?”

“Yeah, right. Farming. We all live off the land.”

“You have subsistence farming up here? I've seen some orchards, but I wouldn't have guessed—”

“What century do you think we're living in? People do the same things here that they do elsewhere: They pump gas and fix cars. They teach school. They commute to Concord and work for the state, or to Hanover and work for the college. They plow roads. They groom ski trails. Some are lawyers and doctors. My father was a fireman who hung wallpaper on the side.”

Fletcher popped a Tic Tac in his mouth and crunched it loudly. “Much high-tech?”

“Not in King George proper. Why?”

“Just trying to get an idea of what your tax base is.”

“We scrape by,” said Joey. “The summer homes on the lake help.”

“What's the year-round population?”

“A thousand-plus.”

“That's who employs you? A town of a thousand?” He whistled. “You're not getting rich in this job, my friend.”

“Which isn't why I chose this job.
My friend.
”

Undeterred, Fletcher asked if he was married or single, homeowner or renter. Joey didn't answer, but continued to nod in greeting at each passing motorist, each walker, each dog on a leash.

“Do you know
everyone
?” Fletcher asked.

“They know me.”

“What do you do for housing?” he tried again.

“Look: I pay my mother room and board to help her out, but I have a little setup in the office—bed, bureau, TV.”

“Full bath?”

“You think I live in a place that doesn't have a shower?”

Fletcher shrugged. “I wouldn't want to live above the store, so to speak.”

“It's not forever. I moonlight on weekends.”

“As what?”

“The family business. Word-of-mouth.” He smiled. “If you clean up after yourself and you match the seams and the grass cloth doesn't peel off in a year, you're a genius.” He depressed his left blinker as they passed a sign announcing
KING GEORGE LINKS, 200 YARDS AHEAD.

Fletcher straightened up from his slouch and complained, “I thought we were going to Sunny's.”

“We are. This road bisects the course.”

“That's not it?” Fletcher asked as they passed an imposing stone-and-timber house.

“That's the clubhouse. She lives farther back, tucked away.”

Fletcher tapped the box to dislodge a Tic Tac into his open mouth. “What's with this town?” he asked mid-crunch. “The chief of police lives in the station and the golfers live at the country club?”

“Just her. It's a little house her mother rented. It was here way before the club was built, and the historical commission wouldn't let them tear it down.”

“No wonder she plays,” said Fletcher.

“Sunny's good,” said Joey. “I mean
really
good. A scratch golfer. I don't know how much she told you.”

“Not much.”

“She was the only girl on the varsity in high school, and she got plenty of shit for it. People didn't like it. And the coach was a jerk.”

“Were you her boyfriend?” Fletcher asked.

“I don't think she had a boyfriend in high school.”

“But you thought about it, am I right?”

Joey said, “I'm interviewing
you,
remember? About sheltering criminals and molesting underage boys. I'm the one asking the personal questions.”

Fletcher smiled. “I can't help it. A generation ago I'd be one of those reporters in a brown suit and a fedora, licking my pencil point. In today's world, I'm a consultant.”

“Unemployed, you said.”

“On purpose. I took the job solely for the money, but she had no business running, and I hated every minute of it.”

“Who's ‘she'?”

“Emily Ann Grandjean, Esquire. Hopeless.”

“So you quit?”

“In a manner of speaking.” He smiled. “I wasn't allowed to quit. I could only be fired for cause, so”—he tapped Joey's forearm—“you might appreciate this: Her old man paid me an exorbitant retainer up front, so my only out was doing something egregious that would get me fired on the spot.”

Joey turned onto an auxiliary road lined with mathematically spaced overhanging trees. “I'd just as soon not hear this,” he said.

Fletcher said, “Off the record, then: I copped a feel. No sexual content, of course—just a means to an end.”

Joey stepped on the brake and smacked the gearshift into park. “You sexually assaulted a woman on purpose so she'd fire you?”

“Look, I reached over and tweaked her nipple—”

“And this nipple belonged to a
lawyer
? Running for public office?”

“Believe me, the whole thing was staged. She knew I had to do something to be terminated, and this was the most attractive option.” His tone changed. “I certainly wasn't going to embezzle from the war chest or party hearty before driving the campaign bus off the road.”

“And you think that's the end of it?”

Fletcher patted his shirt pocket, then removed a pink message slip. “ ‘Emily Ann called. Try her cell phone,' ” he read.

Joey checked his rearview mirror, put the car back into drive, and proceeded slowly toward the little box of a house ahead. “I don't know why I'm giving you advice,” he said, “but it's so obvious I can't help myself: Be nice to this Emily woman, even if you're faking it. Best-case scenario: She knows it was a kamikaze act, and she's willing to play along with you as long as you don't ignore her. I'm a cop. I know how things work. I see what makes people sue their doctors or shoot their foremen, and it happens when they get mad. And they
get
mad when they're ignored or insulted or stepped on. I'm not kidding—I've known people who died in bungled operations, then the surgeon goes to the funeral and hugs the widow, and she never calls the malpractice lawyer.”

“I see your point,” said Fletcher. He studied the pink message, lips pursed. “Good advice,” he said. “Good to have you on my team.”

“The hell I am,” said Joey.

“Sunny?” she heard from downstairs—a male voice, startling and silencing her. She waited, didn't answer.

“It's Joe Loach. Sunny?”

“Stay down there,” she called. She pulled the bathtub's white rubber plug and reached for a towel.

“You okay?”

“I'm just getting out of the bath. Give me a sec. I'll throw some clothes on.”

She wrapped the towel around herself and ducked across the hall to the bedroom. The contents of her mother's closet instantly deflated her: What had felt consecrated at first glance now looked crammed and rummage-ready. She closed the door quickly. A red swatch of something stuck out, caught. She opened the door again, followed the silky hem to its skirt, then up to its padded hanger.

No, she thought. I couldn't.

But the red slip-like thing had a robe and the robe had a belt. Opaque, she reasoned, and there was no time to find a more suitable garment. She slipped the nightgown over her head, then closed the matching kimono with a firm cinch of its belt. “You still there?” she called from the top step.

“Yup,” Joey answered. “Didn't meant to—”

“Me too,” said an only slightly familiar male voice. Halfway down, she saw them both, two soldiers posted at her door.

“Hey,” said Fletcher. “How goes it?”

“Sorry for barging in,” said Joey. “I knocked a couple of times, and when you didn't answer—”

“Visions of carbon monoxide danced in his head,” Fletcher supplied.

“I was in the tub,” said Sunny. “I just grabbed the first thing I could find.”

“Nice outfit,” said Fletcher. “Are you going out?”

“I can't go out,” said Sunny. “I have no car. I was just going to get started on the thank-you notes.”

“He said he had to drop off a check,” said Joey, “so I thought I'd better help him find your place.”

“Got a pen?” asked Fletcher. “I'll take care of it right now.”

“Dickie hasn't sent me a bill yet.”

Fletcher said, “No problem! Just let me know when you've done the math, and I'll hop over in my—get this—new car.” He walked to the black velvet love seat and sat down.

Joey cocked his head toward Fletcher. “The terrible loss of his father has been somewhat cushioned by his new Beetle and his refurbished waterfront property.”

“The cabin?” asked Sunny.

“I would
not
have recognized it if the undertaker hadn't dropped me off there,” said Fletcher. “I would have thought I had the wrong address. Have you seen it lately?”

“No,” Sunny said.

“I'm guessing,” said Joey, “that Miles was fixing up the place so that it would be their principal domicile after they married.”

“I hadn't thought of that,” said Fletcher.

“Because you can't believe your father was going to marry someone you hadn't met, who lived in a place you wouldn't have deigned to visit,” said Sunny.

“This is charming!” Fletcher protested with a wave of an arm. “And I heard it has historical significance.”

“I meant the town—a place like King George. Population practically nothing.”