Witch Cradle (8 page)

Something besides the death of the intrepid Rosie Makinen might have been contributing to Guibard's bleak demeanor. “Palmerson figures he'll be drafted,” he said. “I'm going to have to take over part of his practice for a while.”

“But he just got here.”

“And now he's going to Korea.”

“He must be past forty years old.”

“Forty-six, and with a wife and four kids. Uncle Sam ain't planning to run short this time. Palmerson got his medical training compliments of the U.S. government in the last war. They don't figure they got their money's worth out of him.”

What would it be like to be conscripted into the military at about the age McIntire had left it? McIntire could imagine all too well.

He buttoned his coat and made for the door. Guibard looked up from pulling a sheet over the two skeletons. “You're gonna have to come up with a better story than that for Pete Koski.”

Chapter Sixteen

McIntire let the earpiece dangle and walked upstairs to knock on the bathroom door.

“It's a Mr. Patrick Humphrey's secretary, returning your call. What do you want me to tell her?”

The only response was a gurgle of water.

“Leonie? You still with us?”

“I was just trying to think. It must be a mistake. I've never heard of any Patrick Humphrey.”

McIntire relayed the information to Mr. Humphrey's secretary and went back to the problem at hand. The visit to the Thorsens couldn't be put off any longer. Besides hashing over what to do about the money, it wasn't very neighborly to make no show of sympathy for Mia's broken leg. McIntire couldn't expect Leonie to be his surrogate forever. Leonie, for that matter, hadn't been spending as much time tending to Mia as McIntire had envisioned. Not surprising now that he thought of it. Mia wasn't one to accept help with any more grace than did her husband. Well, McIntire wouldn't embarrass her by offering to spruce up her cupboards. He'd cluck over her leg, try to get his hands on the seven hundred, and be gone.

But first he intended to drop a short line to Special Agent Melvin Fratelli. If J. Theodore Falk had been a card-carrying communist, and if he was still alive and living in the USA, the FBI might be just the folks to know his whereabouts. They might for damn sure have an idea where he'd gone when he left St. Adele.

Agent Fratelli, after his successful stint undercover in Flambeau County, instead of riding off into the sunset or back to the bureau's field office in Detroit, had been hanging around Marquette, the better to periodically badger McIntire about what kind of subversive activities might be going on in St. Adele Township. McIntire wasn't keen to be in Fratelli's debt, but desperate times called for desperate measures. He went to the dining room for paper and pen.

“Who you writing to?”

For someone so secretive about her own correspondence, Leonie was being pretty nosy.

“I thought I'd see if G-man Fratelli can find out anything about Teddy Falk.” He added, “I'll go over to Thorsens' this morning to let them know that it wasn't Teddy in the well, if they haven't heard. That should come as a relief. But the state police, and maybe even our very own Cecil Newman, will be questioning them regardless. They'll have to fess up to finding that money.”

“Good luck.” Leonie adjusted the towel on her head. “Mia hasn't been eager for company. You might do better to wait until Nick is at home.”

The excuse for further procrastination was tempting. “No,” McIntire said. “Nick will hear all the gossip when he's on his route today. I don't want it to look like I'm not bothering to let them know what's going on, or worse yet, holding out.” Leonie looked small in her thick dressing gown. “Want to come with?”

“I don't think so. As I said, it seems as if Mia would rather muddle along on her own.” She opened the cupboard. “I'll send along some of the fairy cakes.”

When he again picked up his pen, McIntire's apprehensions about consulting Melvin Fratelli returned, especially if it might end up involving his neighbors. Fratelli was tenacious in his pursuit of wrongdoers, and no doubt the Michigan winter was having the same effect on him as it was on McIntire. Looking for someone who might, or might not, have skipped out to the Soviet Union twenty years ago would give the agent great amusement. It probably couldn't lead to much trouble for the current residents of St. Adele. With Falk transformed from expatriate to fugitive from justice, the FBI would get into it anyway. Still, McIntire worded the letter judiciously, only asking for advice on locating an old acquaintance, J. Theodore, no mention of why and certainly none of double murder.

***

McIntire paused with his hand raised to knock. Maybe Mia would be in bed. Maybe he
should
have waited until Nick was there or insisted that Leonie come along. Leonie wouldn't hesitate to walk in without expecting Mia to hobble to the door and open it for her.

He entered the small porch, treading softly across the grey painted boards, feeling like a bandit, and rapped timidly on the kitchen door. If Mia had been forced to come from another room, she'd begun her hobbling at the sound of his car. She called out to him to come on in.

She sat on a wooden chair, her left leg, in a plaster cast nearly to the knee, resting on another. A pair of crutches, extended to their full length, leaned in the corner. On the table in front of her a ball of grey yarn, skewered with knitting needles, sat next to an open magazine. Her hair was damp and hung loose, something McIntire hadn't seen in thirty-five years. It rippled over her shoulders and past her elbows. A silver waterfall. For a moment neither of them spoke.

“I saw your car.” Mia sounded apologetic. “I thought it would be Leonie.”

“No,” McIntire said. “I'll be the one playing Clara Barton today.”

Mia pushed the damp tresses behind her ears. “It takes a long time to dry.”

McIntire wondered how she had managed to wash it. Could she stand up? Maybe Nick had done it for her. He deposited the plate of cupcakes on the table. “How're you doing?”

“Not so bad.” She didn't look good, her complexion barely a lighter shade of blue than her eyes, but then Mia had never had what might be called a robust appearance.

“I never did hear exactly how it happened.”

“And you never will.”

“Guibard said ass over teakettle on some ice.”

“It wasn't a teakettle.” She smiled a little but didn't say more.

“Anything I can do?”

“You can sit down, instead of looming over me like a buzzard.” She gave the yarn a shove. “I decided to put my time to use by doing some knitting. I didn't get far. I can't remember how you put the stitches on the needle.”

“Leonie can probably show you.”

“It'll come back to me.” She hitched herself up in the chair. “I don't suppose you came over to hold my hand. Are you here to tell me my father's body will be dug up so he can be hung?”

“Your father is probably off the hook. It looks as though Teddy Falk might still be alive.”

At the news that Rose Falk's partner in death was other than her husband Mia's eyes sprang to life. She leaned toward him. “You mean Rose was fooling around, and Teddy caught them?”

McIntire nodded. “Looks that way. Any idea who it might have been? Were rumors making the rounds? Maybe somebody showed up missing at the same time she did? Was there anybody else expected to emigrate?” It was hard to believe Rose could have gotten away with anything in this neighborhood.

Mia frowned and shook her head. “I can't think of anybody off-hand, but that was a long time ago. There wouldn't have been a shortage of men around, what with the mines and the logging. Rose got around to all the meetings, so she'd have had a chance to meet a few. If one of them paid some attention to her, who knows? I find it hard to believe she'd really have gone so far as to….But I'd be the last person to ask about what Rosie was up to. I never get off the farm, and I didn't even then. Which is fine with me. I'd as soon stay above the fray—or below it.”

He might as well get to the crux of his visit. “Being a homebody won't help you out this time.”

“Help me out of what?”

“The stuff you found under the tree. The sheriff will have to hear about it.”

“You didn't tell him?”

“Pete's thrown his back out. Cecil Newman is at the helm. But Koski and the state police are going to have to know about the documents
and
the money.”

“What for? You say Teddy's still alive. What has any of this got to do with my father now?”

“It's possible Falk's alive, but he's still missing.”

“Of course he's missing. He killed his wife! He'd hardly have hung around.”

“He'd have needed that money.”

“If he's got along without it this long, he doesn't need it now.”

“It's evidence in a murder case,” McIntire pointed out. But it wasn't his problem, and he knew that when Mia got into one of her stubborn moods, trying to argue with her was a waste of time. “I'll let you fight it out with Pete Koski. But he's going to ask me why I first suspected that the Falks hadn't gone to Karelia, and I'll have to tell him.”

“I suppose you will. It's just that…John.” She sounded conciliatory, almost pleading. “You know Papa wouldn't have stolen so much as a penny. If he had money, it had to be his own.”

And hence, would now be hers. Maybe she had more of a need for it than McIntire had considered. He nodded and looked out the window at the slowly growing mountain of pine branches. “How's Nick doing?”

Mia pulled a handful of hair through her fingers. “Not so good. He gets weak and stiff. Sometimes he can't so much as tie his shoes. It comes and goes for no reason. He's not going to be able to work much longer.”

“That'll be tough on him.” Possibly not nearly so tough as on his wife.

“He's been delivering mail on that same route since he was sixteen. He'll have to keep up with driving the car for a while longer, though, if we have to get to town. I'm in no shape to take over.”

“You know we'll do anything we can to help.”

“We'll get along.”

“Leonie is never happier than when she's fussing over somebody. She'd be glad to drive you anywhere you need to go.”

“I know that.”

“I think she might be a little hurt that she hasn't been able to help you more.”

“I know that, too.”

McIntire stood for another awkward leave-taking. His social graces seemed to be failing. He hoped it didn't have some connection to those urges to take up ice fishing.

Chapter Seventeen

A light wind sent an eddy of snow off the pumphouse roof, obscuring what appeared to be an arctic explorer waddling to the door. Only when the man pulled off his cap and looked up into the sun did McIntire recognize Melvin Fratelli. The former bogus detective's abundance of clothing impeded his progress up the path, giving McIntire sufficient time to speculate with horror on what he might have said in his letter to bring this rapid personal response. It also gave him time to consider if not being at home might be the best course of action.

Unfortunately, before McIntire could lock the door and draw the curtains, Nanook was in his porch, peeling off layers of wool and flannel.

“Heater ain't worth a shit,” was all he said until a few swallows of coffee with cream and a dollop of brandy reduced the frequency of his teeth chattering. Then he gave a monumental shiver. “Aren't you going to ask what brings me out on a day like this?'

In McIntire's estimation, this was one of the best days they'd been blessed with in weeks. The mercury might be low in the tube, and the breeze a little brisk, but the sky was blue as anyone could want, and he hadn't moved so much as a teaspoon of snow. “No,” he said. “My manners are too good. I'll just wait for you to tell me.”

The agent wasn't reluctant. “Why you looking for that Red?”

The Melvin Fratelli that McIntire had met a few months before had been the stereotypical bumbling detective, an act McIntire couldn't believe he'd fallen for. He knew better now and spoke cautiously. “Teddy Falk used to live around here. He left back in the thirties. A few days ago two skeletons were found in his well. You'd have heard about it.”

His nod was brisk. “You were the one found them. I heard that, too.”

It sounded like an accusation. McIntire went on, “One of those skeletons was that of Mrs. Theodore Falk. That makes Mr. Theodore suspect number one. It has nothing to do with his political persuasion.”

“Nothing that you know of.”

The flatness of Fratelli's voice gave McIntire to know that life was soon going to get a hell of a lot more complicated. It was too late to back out now. “I don't suppose you can tell me where he might be?”

Fratelli drained his cup and half-filled it from the bottle. “He's right here in the state. Been here since he came back from Russia in 1948.”

Had it really been so easy? He'd located that missing Red with nothing more than a two-cent stamp. Maybe he was getting the hang of this detective stuff. McIntire poured a celebratory drop into his own cup. “So he did go after all.”

“He was in the U.S.S.R. for thirteen years.”

“That long? I wonder how he managed to get out.”

The self-assured agent's cynical snort left a sparkling drip below his nose. “Don't we all?”

It was something McIntire did not want to be drawn into. “If you suspect Teddy Falk is an enemy agent, that's your problem. I only want to inform him of the death of his wife, in the highly unlikely event that he doesn't already know.”

Fratelli tipped up the cup, swallowed, and gave another convulsive shudder. “How'd you know Falk was back in this country?”

“I didn't think he'd left.”

“Then why the letter to me?”

This was getting into treacherous territory. “All I knew,” McIntire responded, “was that Teddy Falk was once involved in the Communist Party, that he was scheduled to go to the Soviet Union, but that he hadn't shown up for the trip. Apparently I was wrong on that last point.”

Fratelli pasted on his
I don't get it
face. All the more effective with that drip trembling on his upper lip. McIntire, knowing what a sucker he was, relented and gave a sketchy version of Nick Thorsen's discovery under the pine tree—sans money—and his subsequent conversation with the schoolteacher's father. “I only want to locate J. Theodore Falk. I expect you'll be hearing from the sheriff or the state police before long. I can have the satisfaction of letting them know where he is myself, soon as you tell me.”

“He's working as a taxi driver down south.” Fratelli fished a small notebook from his shirt pocket, tore out a page, and handed it to McIntire. “Mr. Falk's most recent address.”

Detroit. Detroit was “down south”? Well, all things are relative. “Many thanks. Do I need to memorize it and eat it?”

Another, even less agreeable, idea as to what the constable might do with the paper lurked behind the gleam in Fratelli's eyes. Apparently his training won out; he sat back with an indulgent smile.

“Melvin,” McIntire said, and saw the agent flush. “Melvin, you didn't come all the way from Marquette, in a car with no heater, to give me Teddy Falk's address or to chat about why I wanted to get in touch with him. What's on your mind?”

Melvin rubbed the bridge of his nose in a meditative pose, frowned, and dug a handkerchief from his pocket. “These are dangerous times.” He dabbed fastidiously at his nostrils.

“For who—whom?”

“For you and me and every other citizen of this country.”

While McIntire couldn't claim to feeling any sense of personal peril, he didn't argue with the overall sentiment. “True. There've been better than six thousand kids killed in Korea just in the past six months.”

“Beats fighting the Reds right here.”

“Are you expecting an invasion?”

“We are smack-dab in the middle of the worst kind of invasion, one from the inside.”

The agent sounded seriously concerned, and McIntire was seriously afraid that the invasion was going to involve him. Whether as defender or perpetrator, he wasn't sure. “What is it you're leading up to?”

“We have to keep our eyes and ears open. This is a strategically touchy area. You got iron mines and uranium.”

There'd been no big uranium strikes so far as McIntire had heard, in spite of Fratelli's relentless prospecting efforts of the previous fall.

“And you got railroads and docks to load it onto ships.”

“Melvin, spit it out.”

The spiral-bound notebook was never far from Fratelli's hand. He flipped its cover with a flourish and passed it to McIntire. “Do you know any of these people?”

There were about a dozen names. McIntire knew them all, some better than others. He handed the notebook back. “I find it hard to believe this bunch is plotting a coup, even from the inside. Although,” he added, “Grandma Jarvinen always did seem a little shifty.”

“Who's that?”

“Helmi Jarvinen. Number three on your list of subversives.”

“Helmi is female?”

“Female, and old enough to have gotten some practical experience in the original revolution, I'd reckon, and she's the spring chicken of this bunch.” He slapped the book on the table. “What is this supposed to be?”

Fratelli reclaimed his notebook and penciled in a question mark after Mrs. Jarvinen's name. “These are people the United States Government has good reason to want information about. Information that you are in a perfect position to get.”

“Such as?”

“What sort of organizations they belong to, donate money to, where they go, what they read….”

McIntire looked again at the list and at Fratelli's unsmiling countenance. It was his turn to not get it. “I can answer those questions right now,” he said. “They have no money to donate, they don't go much of anywhere, and they read anything they can get their hands on to keep from going stir crazy.”

The rectangle of light on the linoleum blinked out. Kelpie gave a disappointed whimper. Clouds once more obscured the sun. It had been nice while it lasted.

Fratelli leaned forward. “We need an agent here. Somebody who speaks the language.”

“The language in question being Finn?”

“I understand that the nationality of most of these people is Finnish.” His tone became conspiratorial. “There is an organization that these people all belong to.”

“I'm sure you'll tell me what it is.”

He flashed a new page in his notebook. “Star of Hope. Meets every other Wednesday.”

“The Star is a subversive group?”

“Any organization that receives funding from the Communist Party is required to register with the federal government.”

“What funding?”

“Where do you think they get money to run this club?”

“I expect they each kick in two bits for coffee and cardamom cake.”

“The Temperance Society.”

“Is that a fact? Well, I can't say I share their philosophies, but—”

“The Temperance Society is a communist front organization. That's the only philosophy I give a shit about.”

“You're asking me to start going to Temperance meetings so I can inform on my neighbors?” It was perversively tempting—John McIntire, St. Adele's own Herb Philbrick.

“Inform on, hell! It ain't informing if they ain't done nothing. I only want to know things that no innocent person would bother to hide.”

“So what's keeping you from asking them yourself?”

Sadness invaded the detective's face as he peered into his cup, perhaps the result of McIntire's recalcitrance, more probably disappointment at the level of remaining liquid. “There could be those who would question your patriotism.”

“My patriotism! I spent thirty years working for Uncle Sam. Still do, now and again. How patriotic do you want?”

“Thirty years, was it?” His pensive gaze moved from the cup to the ceiling. “Except for a slight gap.”

McIntire felt his heart speed up, and he struggled to keep his expression bland. “What now?”

“A little matter of February 1948 until—when was it?—May? June? Oddly enough, about the same time your old buddy turned up here.”

“I never met Teddy Falk in my life.”

“That's not what your letter said.”

“I figured if I said anything else, you'd be sticking your oar in where it doesn't belong. Looks like I was right about that.”

“Why didn't you just leave finding Falk to the sheriff? Why stick
your
oar in?”

McIntire had no reply that wouldn't serve to remind the G-man that he was the one who found those bodies, which could lead to those awkward questions about why he had gone looking.

“Where were you?” Fratelli persisted, “in the spring of 1948?”

“I was in Moscow, in the service of the United States Army.”

“You might have been behind the Iron Curtain once. You weren't there in forty-eight, not in February.”

McIntire couldn't believe what he was hearing. “You've obviously taken the trouble to check up on me. So you know that my service record is white as that snow out there.”

“And I'm pretty damned sure you'd like it to stay that way.”

“Are you trying to blackmail me into spying on a bunch of old Finns, just because they get together to drink coffee instead of booze once or twice a month?”

“Did I hear the word blackmail?” Leonie came in, suppressing a yawn. “Good day, Mr. Fratelli. How lovely to see you. What brings you our way?”

“Just in the neighborhood.” Fratelli pushed back his chair. “And I'm afraid I need to be going. It's a long drive to Marquette.”

“Surely you can stay for tea.”

Fratelli wasn't to be persuaded. “It's starting to snow again. I'd better be on my way. Thanks anyway.” He turned to McIntire. “Think about it. I'll be getting back to you.”

McIntire allowed Leonie to take care of the parting chit-chat, listening with half an ear while Fratelli packed himself back into his woolens. It was a lengthy process. Their mutual acquaintance, McIntire's pseudo-youthful Aunt Siobhan, was still in San Francisco. Fratelli spoke to her now and then. Yes, working out of a hotel room was not pleasant, but a special agent got used to it. He'd get a new heater for his car tomorrow.

When he heard Fratelli's Buick pull away, McIntire found himself shaking like Nick Thorsen on his worst days. What could that moron possibly know about where he'd spent that wretched winter of 1948? He hadn't told anyone, not even Leonie. Especially not Leonie. It wasn't part of his service record.

“Oh, dear, you're freezing.” Leonie lit a burner under the teakettle and sat down. She took one of his hands between her own and rubbed it briskly.

“What brought on this call?” she asked. “It
is
a long drive to Marquette.”

“He's trying to recruit me.”

“Really? How exciting! But won't that put you in a sticky position?”

“I didn't say yes.”

“Did you say no?”

“I didn't figure the proposition was worthy of reply.”

The kettle whistled, and she dropped his hand. “What was the blackmail about?”

“Just a joke.”