On that Friday evening, June, John and Elmer all dropped by, patted her hand, wished her well and embraced those who would mourn her. On Saturday a few people from Grace Valley stopped by, reminding Sam and the family that they were not really alone. And although the doctor would not have guessed it would happen so soon, she passed on Sunday, just a few days after being admitted to the hospital. Some would find it shockingly fast, others would give thanks that she did not suffer long.
Justine had requested that her ashes be scattered from the rocky coast out over the Pacific Ocean, something that could be done whenever the family could find a gathering place and put together their few words. Sam told the sisters to come and collect whatever of Justine’s they wanted. The door would be unlocked.
Sam had not done too much fishing since marrying Justine. In the first place, he had only been trying to help her get over a broken heart by being complimentary and friendly. And, oddly enough, she took to him. In the second place, he could see they were good together, so there was no point in knocking good fortune. He knew when they married that they were both on borrowed time—he was seventy and her cancer had been diagnosed before they were wed. He thought it more likely they could cure her cancer than his age, so this loss came hard. Harder still because he felt she’d been robbed more than he; she was just a girl.
He fetched his pail and pole from his gas station and drove his old truck out to his favorite stream. He’d rather fish at dawn than at dusk, but he could think of nothing better than fishing to help him deal with the ache in his heart. He was there less than an hour when he heard rustling behind him. Through the trees they came—Lincoln Toopeek, Elmer Hudson, Burt Crandall, Judge Forrest, George Fuller and Harry Shipton. Each one gave Sam a nod, put down his pail and baited a hook. They lined up along the river, three on each side of Sam, their lines in, and fished. In a little while there was more rustling, and Standard Roberts walked up behind them. There was some shifting at the edge of the river as they made room for Stan next to Sam. Stan clapped a hand on Sam’s shoulder, Sam clapped a hand on Stan’s back.
They fished a while, and in the way that men fish, they took great comfort in the fact that they were friends and they were never intended to bear any pain alone. When the sun was nearly down, Harry Shipton said, “May each fish thank God for the time he has given them to swim in the river.” And all the men said, “Amen.”
Jurea Mull was not an educated woman. In fact, her husband had taught her to read, a pastime that had become a passion for her. She lived for the used books, magazines and newspapers Clarence would scrounge and bring to their little shanty in the woods. And when they had moved to town and Jurea learned of the library in Rockport, not far from the hospital where she’d had her surgery, she was giddy with excitement. Imagine, a place where you could borrow the books for free and keep them for up to four weeks in your own home!
But she had gone back to the woods with Clarence after only two brief visits to that library in Rockport.
Jurea wasn’t educated, nor would she consider herself clever, but she did have good sense and sound instincts. It took her a little while, but she knew that what June had told her was true—as long as she coddled Clarence, he would stay back in the woods. And it would be better for their whole family, including Clarence, if they lived together in town and Clarence tried the medicine and therapy again.
Charlie MacNeil thought he was coming to the forest to pick up Jurea and take her for a visit with her children in town, but Jurea was packing up the few articles of clothing she owned, waiting for Clarence. If he didn’t come back, she would attempt to write him a note.
But he came. He walked in with his rifle balanced over his shoulder, a couple of rabbits strung together and dangling lifelessly from a rope. He had trapped them; he was an excellent trapper.
“I’m glad you’re back, Clarence,” she said. “I’m going back to town. Much as I want to stay and help you figure things out, I need to go back.”
He nodded curtly and tossed his rabbits on the ground in front of the woodstove. He pulled a crude bowl from the shelf to hold the innards, drew his hunting knife from his belt and got ready to clean them on a board on the dirt floor.
“Clarence, I think you should try and show a little courage and come back to town. For the sake of your kids, who need you.”
“They’ll get over that soon enough.”
“No, I don’t think so. Just like I still feel the need to see my family though I haven’t lived with ’em in twenty years, your kids will always feel the need to have you. They won’t be with us much longer, Clarence. They’re growing up. I just can’t have them spend their lives hiding in the forest.”
He turned around and looked her in the eye. “You go on, Jurea. You go on and have a better life. I don’t need you here.” He turned back to his rabbits and kneeling, began to gut and skin them.
His words had stung, but she knew he didn’t mean them the way they sounded. He needed her, but he could exist without her help.
“Well, I need you, Clarence. I hope you decide to come back to town. Come back and go to the VA clinic and get you some new medicine and have a good life with us again. If it’s easier for you, I’ll promise not to have no more operations on my face.”
Clarence, on his knees, slowly turned toward her, looked up at her and asked, “You would do that?”
“I would do just about anything to help, except keep our family apart. If I didn’t think it would hurt the kids real bad to live back here, I’d bring ’em back. But you should see ’em, Clarence. They’re so happy going to school. They’re learning real fast and making some friends. I mean, Clarence, you got to go to school when you was a boy. It wasn’t a town and family and friends that made you sick, it was a war. The kids deserve our best, not our worst, fears.”
Charlie MacNeil had arrived and gave the horn on his car a toot. Jurea opened the door, waved to him that she’d heard, then went to her husband. She bent at the waist so that she might kiss him on the cheek, but he turned away from her and she was left to kiss the top of his head. She picked up her bundle and made to leave.
“I hope you get over hurting, Clarence. I hope you come back to town because that’s where I’ll be.”
Tears smarted in her eyes as she left the shack in the woods, knowing she would never return to it, hoping Clarence wouldn’t die there alone.
On Monday morning, Harry Shipton phoned both John Stone and Mike Dickson, one at a time, but had almost identical conversations with each of them. “I understand you’ve been in trouble with the missus for weeks now.”
“More like months,” John said.
“My wife and mother,” said Mike.
“With any hope of patching it up anytime soon?” Harry asked. He was told by each that, however hard they tried, however apologetic, the women had been offended enough to carry a grudge. “That’s a shame,” Harry said. “Well, how far are you willing to go to get back in the good graces of your wives…because I have an idea of something you can do, something we can all do together for the town and the women who have been insulted.”
Of course both John and Mike said they’d do anything. Harry was going to have some fun.
Every time Myrna Claypool looked out the window of her study into the yard around Hudson House, it irked her more. She was no longer the gardener she had once been and she was too old and frail—something she hated to admit—to put that mess to rights again. It was not as though she couldn’t afford to have a professional landscaping crew come in from one of the larger towns and make the grounds more beautiful than ever. It was the idea that this could be done to her without conscience, without substantial probable cause.
Someone was going to pay for this, but she wasn’t quite sure who it would be.
Her attorney, John Cutler, was positioned in the sunroom, using the coffee table as a desk. He used his cell phone while Myrna used her house phone. They were working on separate research projects, either of which could bring t
his mystery to a close. Myrna was trying to find out what Paul Faraday really had to do with the discovery of the bones, and Cutler was trying to get information on what had become of Morton Claypool.
Myrna peeked into the sunroom to steal a look at Cutler. His name was John, but she addressed him as Cutler because she liked the sound of it. He had corrected her a couple of times, then let her be. He was a rumpled mess, and June thought they should hire an older, more experienced lawyer, but after having a brief conversation with him on the phone, Myrna knew he was exactly what she wanted. He was a little socially inept but very bright. And most important, he was perfectly willing to do things her way. At her age, after all the years of independence—virtually from the age of fourteen—it wasn’t likely she was going to be ordered around by anyone.
Cutler scribbled something on a yellow pad and simultaneously looked up to see Myrna peeking in. He lifted his eyebrows and inclined his head in a gesture that meant she should enter. “Thank you, thank you very much,” he said into the phone. “Mrs. Claypool, we have something important. Your husband took retirement from Sandfield Office Supplier. He was sixty-two and his retirement income from them was very modest, but he continued to pay into his social security for five years after the last time you saw him.”
“Well, that old dog. I always suspected another woman. Where was the old coot?”
“That’s a problem. He had his check sent to a post office box.”
“So I wouldn’t find him, I suppose.” She tapped her pen idly on the rim of her glasses. “I should have thought of social security. He’s either dead or collecting it now.”
“There’s the problem. They don’t have records of either.” At her alarmed look, he said, “Now, that doesn’t mean anything, Mrs. Claypool. He could have stopped paying in because he had no further income. His pension with the office supplier dried up when they went bankrupt. The pension fund, like the rest of the company, was mismanaged.”
“Oh my! I wonder, did they let Morton run the place for a while?” she asked facetiously.
Cutler ignored her sarcasm. “He stopped paying into social security. He didn’t file for receipt of social security, which could have been because he didn’t need it. Not everyone collects, you know.”
“Now, why in the world would Morton stop paying in and fail to collect, unless he was dead?” she wanted to know.
Cutler shrugged. “He could have married a rich woman. He could have left the country. In fact, he could have died out of the country and been unidentified. There are a million possible explanations. I just want to be sure we can prove he wasn’t buried out there,” he said, giving his head a jerk toward the window.
“My dear Cutler, if he were out there, don’t you suppose he’d have been found by now?”
He grinned, then asked, “How are you doing on your detective work?”
“Not nearly as well, I’m afraid. Mr. Paul Faraday is a true-crime writer and stringer for the San Jose paper. I gather from some of his interviews that he fancies himself a screenwriter as well, but hasn’t had any success. Obviously he’s targeted me for a story, but I can’t understand why.”
“Your books, Mrs. Claypool. I’m afraid you might have set yourself up for this investigation.”
“Oh, so everyone says. But then answer me this, Cutler. The ADA, Ms. Glaser, she’s a bright woman, isn’t she?”
He nodded. “Some say she’s brilliant.”
“Why does she go along with this—this warrant, this collection of evidence, based on Mr. Faraday’s flimsy and concocted story?”
“She must believe he’s on to something. The bones were found to be those of a male, approximate age of sixty, dead twenty years. That fits a certain bill.”
“Then there’s only one explanation,” she said. “Mr. Faraday didn’t get them here.”
Eighteen
Though the people in the clinic had every reason to feel the weight of grief after what had happened to Justine, June was ready to move forward with optimism. She had a quiet and serene acceptance of her life, her future. She watched from the café as Rob Gilmore used a rented cherry picker to string colored lights up Valley Drive, and saw with some melancholy Sam and Standard Roberts erecting Justine’s booth in front of her flower shop. The dried wreaths and arrangements she had spent late summer making would be sold after all.
There was something about the fall that seemed to wash the land clean; the sunlight filtered through colored leaves was like a kaleidoscope on the ground and streets. The air was snappy and made one think of soups and hot bread. The chopping of wood for winter fireplaces had commenced. It made one want to nest.
“I need to see you after your last patient, if you have some time,” June said to John.
“I’ve had my last,” he said. “I’m leaving in about a half hour.”
“My office,” she said, leading the way. She sat behind her desk, feeling awkward.
“What’s up?” he asked, entering behind her.
“Close the door, please.”
He hesitated, then did so.
“This is a medical matter, John,” June said, folding her hands on top of her desk.
By the solemn look on her face, John was made more than a little uncomfortable. “Am I sick?” he wanted to know.
She rolled her eyes. “John, I’ve been fighting a case of the flu for about two months now,” she said.
“Hmm,” he answered. “Fatigue, nausea, aching…? We should start with some blood work. It could be a simple case of iron deficiency. With your diet, I’m frankly surprised you haven’t been anemic before—”
“I don’t know when my last period was,” she said. “But I’ve been alternately crying and biting people’s heads off for a good six weeks.”
“Oh,” he said, then had the good sense to shut up.
“I’m thirty-seven…almost thirty-eight, I didn’t think I’d ever have a child, and now I find myself a geriatric pregnancy. I need a good OB-GYN and you’re the best I know.”
“Well, then,” he said. “I’d be honored. Go ahead to exam one and I’ll get Susan.”
“I’m not ready to share this with Jessie,” June said.
“You can have your chart, lock it in your file cabinet if you like. But before we make any diagnosis, we examine. Besides, we’re done for the day. I’ll go ahead and send Jessie home.”
A short time later, June assumed the position. She wasn’t sure what she was feeling, excitement or dread. It certainly wouldn’t be dread at having a pregnancy, but at having one accidentally and being left to hope the gentleman wouldn’t be too upset. In her entire experience with Jim, she’d never seen him upset about anything. Of course, she had to wonder when he’d return, and what she’d tell people if she began to show before she had a partner.
“It’s not Chris Forrest,” she said suddenly, forcefully.
Susan, who’d been at the counter compiling her chart information, looked over with a curious frown. John peeked over the sheet that covered June’s knees. He lifted his eyebrows; he had not been about to ask. “Obviously,” he said.
“It’s not,” she said more sanely.
John pulled out the speculum and stood over her. He palpated her uterus. He did this thoughtfully, she decided, his eyes rolling to the ceiling. Then he looked at her. “That last period, whenever it was, could it have been a lighter than usual one?”
She shook her head. “Can’t even remember. I pay no attention.”
“You don’t keep track? At all?”
“Periods have never been a problem,” she said.
“So uneventful that you don’t even know you’re having them?”
“Well, I…”
He snapped off his gloves and said, “Congratulations. You’re definitely pregnant.”
“Whew. I thought so. Damn. Talk about a surprise.”
“Oh, your surprises are just beginning. We’ll need an ultrasound, but it looks a little more advanced than you’re prepared for. I don’t think you?
??re going to be able to keep this quiet for long, June.”
She sat up, bracing on her elbows. “Well, how long?”
“You might be able to keep it to yourself till the harvest festival this weekend. You’re about four months. Haven’t you felt anything?”
“Like…?”
“Fluttering?”
“Oh Jesus! I can’t be that far along!”
“Can’t you figure it out? By when you had… contact.” He didn’t want to say relations because, for all John knew, this could be a donor baby.
“Maybe…but… Oh, I don’t know!” June fell back onto the exam table and felt the emotion begin to well up inside her. As often as it had happened lately, she was beginning to recognize the phenomenon very well. Tears spilled over and splashed down her cheeks. She pulled a trembling hand to a nose that was beginning to redden. John reached out to help her sit up and Susan aided from behind, pushing gently on her back. She sat on the edge of the examining table with a bare bottom and a paper sheet covering her and wept. “I’m not too old, am I?”
“Certainly not! You’re in excellent health, despite your crappy diet, and you’re as fit as a racehorse.”
“Racehorse?” she choked. “That’s nice, John.”
“Just be glad he didn’t say broodmare,” Susan interjected, getting herself a glare from John. “Well…” She shrugged.
“By the way, I don’t mean to make so many assumptions,” John said. “Of course you have options.”
“Don’t be ridiculous! I’m thrilled,” she said, but tears ran down her cheeks. She wished she could tell them that she cried because there was no one to share her excitement with, and she didn’t know when there would be. In fact, though she didn’t think it likely, it was possible she could get all the way to the delivery alone.
And there was also the chance that when she told Jim, he’d be less than pleased and would leave her to have a family on her own. Would he? He could. But would he?
Susan was hugging her, telling her she’d be a wonderful mother. John was asking if there was anything he could do for her. She said yes—prenatal vitamins and a night off.