• • •
HAYLEY DECIDED THAT while Isis might be fine with keeping her grandmother in the dark, she herself could not keep silent about Aidan Martin’s disappearance, considering how much stress he was under with his parents on their way. Still, it felt horrible to name him directly to the undersheriff. So she looked for a halfway point between saying nothing and telling Dave Mathieson that Aidan was missing and trouble might well be on the horizon. When she reached the traffic light at Bayview Corner, she knew what to do. The main offices of the fire department were right on her route.
At the fire station, there was no receptionist, and the offices Hayley looked into were empty. She was about to give up on the whole idea of talking to Chief Levitt when she heard his voice. She found him at the end of a corridor, adding something to a bulletin board with photos of fire scenes on it.
Whoever he was talking to was on his cell phone, which he had balanced against his shoulder. He was saying, “Yeah . . . yeah . . . I got that on record . . .” and when he saw Hayley hanging back, he ended the call and said, “Help you, hon?”
Hayley nearly lost her courage, but she reminded herself that someone had died in the last of the fires. So she stammered, “It’s about . . . I have some information?”
Karl Levitt’s eyes narrowed. “Come on into my office. You are . . . ?”
Hayley gave him her name. She hated doing so but at the moment she didn’t think to withhold it. Still, she said quickly once she’d told him, “Only . . . can you not tell Sheriff Mathieson that what I’m gonna tell you came from me? It’s just that what I know was told to me in confidence. If it gets out that I told you and you told him and . . . Can you please keep my name out of it?”
He pointed to a seat in front of his desk. She looked around nervously. The room was functional and messy, with bulletin boards filled with pictures of every spot a fire had occurred from the summer till now.
Karl Levitt said kindly, “Why don’t you give me your information?”
“C’n you promise me . . . ?”
“Can’t do that. If this has something to do with the fires, and I figure it does since you showed up here, then this whole thing’ll come to a trial eventually. Somebody’s been killed, and that means we’ve got a different kettle of fish. But I can tell you I’ll hold back your name for a while.” When Hayley didn’t reply at first but rather twisted her hands in her lap, he added, “This is a serious business we’re looking at, Hayley. I bet you know that or you wouldn’t be here.”
“I just hate to—”
“Tell on someone. But here you are, so you must know what’s right.”
This was true. So Hayley screwed up her courage and told Karl Levitt everything about Aidan Martin that she knew, the entire story from the death of his baby brother to the fires he’d lit in Palo Alto to his incarceration at Wolf Canyon Academy to his present disappearance in advance of his parents’ arrival. At the end of it all, she said, “Isis says he’s freaked out. He figures they’re coming to take him back to the school in Utah and he doesn’t want to go. So he’s panicked and when he’s stressed . . . that’s when he sets fires.”
Karl Levitt nodded. He’d been taking notes. Hayley asked, “Do you . . . Will you tell the sheriff he’s disappeared?”
“Oh yeah,” he said. “Got to do that straight off.” He stood and ushered her to the door, a hand on her shoulder. He gave it a squeeze. “You did the right thing,” he told her kindly. “Even if it doesn’t feel so right at the moment.”
• • •
HAYLEY ONLY PRETENDED to leave. She had a feeling that the very next thing on the fire chief’s agenda was going to be a phone call to Dave Mathieson, and that was what happened. So she set off down the corridor, but then tiptoed back to his office.
“Got some information from one of the kids down here, Dave,” was what she heard him saying after the preliminary social niceties of hi, how’s the wife, and going hunting this year? After that, it was all about Aidan Martin. Isis was mentioned and so were Nancy Howard, the Martin kids’ parents, Wolf Canyon Academy, and Aidan’s history: the exact how and why of the fire setting. The sheriff seemed to know much of this already, from what Hayley could tell, but then Karl Levitt went on to Aidan’s disappearance, and to this Sheriff Mathieson seemed to respond at length.
Then the fire chief made an electrifying comment that rooted Hayley right to the spot. He said, “Since that ring at the scene was from Palo Alto and the Davenport kid handed it over to the girl—this Isis?—there’s too many coincidences at this point, Dave.”
• • •
IT WAS ALMOST dark when Hayley got home. The search for Aidan followed by the Karl Levitt talk had taken far longer than she had anticipated. She was feeling wretched about everything, especially since the fire chief’s remark about the ring pointed to horrors to come. Those horrors were what she was thinking about when she got home and found the house completely dark.
Where the hell was Brooke? was what she thought. She was supposed to be working on dinner. She had let Hayley down another time. It was as if she was determined to make everyone’s life a misery.
Hayley stormed out of the truck. She hurtled toward the back door. She only got as far as the steps, though, when she found her father. Bill Cartwright was lying unmoving at the bottom of them, a dark and crumpled form in the shadows.
Hayley cried, “Dad!”
He stirred and she thanked God silently that he wasn’t dead. She grabbed his arm to help him up, but dropped it quickly when he shrieked in agony. She jumped nearly a foot at the sound of such pain. She shouted, “Brooke! Cassie! Brooke! Brooke!” and she flew into the house and up the stairs for help.
On her bed, Brooke was wearing headphones and listening to music and in a fury, Hayley grabbed them off her head. She shrieked, “Dad’s outside! Do you even know that? You selfish little bitch! What in God’s name is the matter with you? Get off this bed and out of this room!”
Brooke started to cry. But Hayley’s words got her off the bed and out of the room. Hayley grabbed a blanket and followed her down the stairs. In the living room, she saw, Cassidy was watching a video of Cinderella. Nice try, she thought bitterly. As if.
Back outside, Bill Cartwright had managed to work himself onto his side. “Why’d you go out?” Brooke shouted at him. “Why won’t you just stay in the house? What’s wrong with you?”
“Shut up!” Hayley screamed at her. She used the blanket to cover her father’s body. She said to him, “We got to get you to . . . I’ll call 9-1-1.”
“No ambulance,” he said. “It’s my arm is all. Girls, it’s okay. Just a fall. If you c’n help me up . . .”
“Where’s your walker?” Brooke demanded. “What’ve you done with your walker? Why won’t you use your stupid walker?” She began sobbing, and Hayley wanted to swat her as hard as she could.
She said to Brooke, “Get Cassidy. Get in the truck.” And when Brooke looked confused, “Just do it, Brooke.”
“Why? What’re we—”
“We’re taking him to the hospital. Now get the hell going.”
FORTY-NINE
Seth and Prynne found themselves establishing a routine. Two times a week, they had been meeting. He would either go to Port Townsend, where she’d pick him up at the ferry, or she would come over to Whidbey, where he would do the same. When she came to Whidbey, often it was to rehearse with Triple Threat. She fit into the group seamlessly. But what Seth liked best about Prynne was that she got him. He’d never felt so completely able to be himself with anyone.
He was at that stage where he wanted to show her off to his entire world. This was one of the reasons he took her to Smugglers Cove Farm and Flowers. He wanted her to meet Hayley and Hayley to meet her. He wanted to share the joy of being what he knew at heart he was: in love with Hester Prynne Haring.
“Someone I want you to meet, if tha
t’s okay,” was how he told Prynne where they were heading when he turned west on Smugglers Cove Road after he met her at the ferry. This would take them through both forest and farmland, ultimately cutting a course through the old growth state park that lay midway between two arrowheads of land: Lagoon Point and Bush Point with their expansive views of Admiralty Inlet and the northern snow-topped Olympic Peninsula that rose beyond it.
Prynne cast him a curious look, but what she said was, “I like meeting your friends. You’ve got good friends. That says a lot about you.” She smiled and pointed to her eye patch. “You want I should go with Mr. Glass Eye? I got him with me.”
“Nope,” he told her.
They enjoyed the ride in companionable silence, which was something else Seth loved about Prynne. She was as happy quiet as she was talking. She didn’t say much else till they got to Smugglers Cove Farm and Flowers. Seth signaled for the turn into the rutted drive, and Prynne looked around. “Super nice farm,” she said.
He was about to drive on by the chicken barn when he saw that the doors were open. He knew that Hayley and her sisters were responsible for the chickens, so he pulled over.
Hayley, he saw when he entered with Prynne, was by herself. She was shoveling chicken droppings. She had on rubber boots, and a baggy sweatshirt overhung her jeans. Her glasses had slipped to the end of her nose, and her face was shiny with perspiration.
“Need some help?” he called.
She looked up. “Help from Brooke would be nice, but that’s not happening.”
“Got another shovel?”
“No way, Seth. It’s disgusting in here.” She came to join them. She said, “You’re Hester Prynne Haring,” to Prynne. “That’s a very cool name, except when people ask where the A is.”
“It’s why I go by Prynne. The joke only goes so far.”
“I hear you,” Hayley said.
“We c’n help do something,” Prynne told her. “Really.”
“Yuck. No. I’m surprised you can even stand the smell.”
“Well, it’s organic.”
“It definitely has that going.”
The two girls laughed and Seth beamed at them. Hayley asked what they were up to. It was a lovely day despite the growing crisp cold of mid-autumn, and she said she wouldn’t have minded spending some time outside herself. Seth said he didn’t know what the heck they were going to do. “Hang,” was how he put it. “See what’s up,” was Prynne’s response.
“Got your fiddle with you?” Hayley asked. “’Cause I’d—”
Parker Natalia strode into the barn. He had a stormy look about him that Seth didn’t much like, but he seemed to master it as he came in their direction. Seth and Prynne said hi. Hayley said nothing, but Seth could see that her face got stony.
“C’n I talk to you?” Parker said to Hayley. And he added with a glance at Seth, “Alone?”
Seth glanced between them. He felt Prynne take his hand. She said, “We’ll take off, I guess. Hayley, if you get into Langley today, we might be playing at the Commons. Right, Seth?”
“Uh . . . right.” Seth felt a gentle tug from Prynne, and she was leading him back the way they’d come. Behind him, he heard Parker say, “We’ve got some things to work out,” and Hayley’s reply of, “I don’t think so.”
Seth heard Parker swear and his antennae went up. Once they were outside, he said to Prynne, “You wait here, okay?” and he nodded at the barbed wire fence that ran along the field at the side of the chicken barn.
She said, “You sure? It looked sort of personal.”
“That’s what I’m afraid of.”
When Seth got back to the barn door, he could hear them arguing, Hayley saying to Parker, “Oh please. The cigarette was right there in the sleeping bag and you might want to check her Facebook page sometime.”
“That’s what this is all about? I do one stupid thing with that loopy blonde—who came on to me like you wouldn’t believe—and that’s it.”
“This isn’t about what you did with Isis. This is about the fact that you lied. I don’t care what you did with Isis, Parker. I don’t care about where or how many times or anything else. I don’t like liars and I don’t want liars in my life.”
“So you freaking called the sheriff on me? You had me dragged up to Coupeville and—”
“I didn’t call the sheriff!”
“Oh sure, Hayley. If not you, then—”
Seth entered the barn. “It was me,” he said. “And I didn’t call him. I went to see him.”
Parker swung around. His face was dark with anger. He said, “What the—”
“I told him he should look at you because of how long you’ve been on the island. From before the first fire, okay? Hayley didn’t do anything at all except maybe care about you when she shouldn’t have, from the sounds of it.”
Parker stared at Seth. Then he turned to Hayley. He shook his head at both of them. “Jesus, I am out of here.” He strode from the barn.
Hayley and Seth looked at each other. Hayley’s cheeks were bright. She was still holding the shovel she’d been using when he and Prynne had entered the barn, and now she leaned her head against the handle.
He knew what she was feeling. He just didn’t know what to do about it. So he said, “Man, I’m sorry, Hayl. I guess I blew it for you.”
She shook her head but she didn’t look up. “He blew it for himself.” And then in a much lower voice, “I am so totally tired.”
Seth went to her and put a hand on her shoulder. He said, “Lemme help you here.”
“No. You take care of Prynne.” She looked up. “Thanks for bringing her by, Seth. Things are right with you guys. Don’t mess it up.”
He nodded, but still he felt the tug of an old loyalty to her that he would always feel. He vowed to himself that he would do something somehow to make things better for Hayley.
Outside, Prynne was at the fence, hands on top of one of the posts and looking out into a field that rose on a slight but steady incline toward the great forest at the back of the property beyond the pond. When Seth joined her, she said, “Dude, this is one fine place. How come they’re not doing something with it? Horses, sheep, cows, goats. Crops. It’d be great for crops.”
Seth wasn’t sure how to put things, so he settled on saying, “Hayley’s dad’s in a bad way. So the rest of ’em—Hayley, her mom, and her little sisters—they’re trying to keep things going, but it’s hard. Everything went to hell in the last couple years.” He sighed. “I wish I knew how to help ’em.”
Prynne looked thoughtfully out at the field once again. Seth could tell she was considering something. But she didn’t say what was on her mind. Instead, she shot him a look from beneath her eyebrows and said, “She’s your ex, isn’t she?”
Seth didn’t say anything for a moment, but he felt the sour stomach of dread. He hadn’t meant wrong in bringing Prynne to meet Hayley, but all of a sudden he could see how this side trip to Smugglers Cove Farm and Flowers might be interpreted. Still, remembering what was at the core of Hayley’s dispute with Parker, he wasn’t about to say anything less than the truth. He said, “She hasn’t been for a while. My girlfriend. I mean she hasn’t been my girlfriend for a while.”
Prynne smiled. “Not a problem. I guess it’s okay for you to want me to meet her. But you got to tell me these things in advance, okay? I don’t like to be blindsided.” And she added with a grin, “Especially since I’m already blind-sided.”
She pointed to her eye patch and then she laughed. Seth grabbed her by the shoulders and kissed her soundly.
• • •
THEY WERE ON their way to Langley when they saw Brooke Cartwright, just outside of the town of Freeland. She was sitting at the side of the highway atop a large sack. Not far away was the biggest farmers’ supply store on the island, so it was clear where she’d been if not what she
was doing on the side of the road.
Seth said, “What the heck?” and pulled over. He stopped the car just beyond her.
Prynne said, “Who’s that?” and he said, “Hayley’s sister,” as he got out and called, “Brooke! What’re you doing here?”
Brooke slowly turned her head in his direction. Seth approached her. Behind him, he heard Prynne getting out of the car as well. He said to Brooke, “Whatcha doing? You waiting for your mom?”
Brooke shook her head. She seemed even more down-in-the-dumps than she’d been at any time in the past month. She said, “Waiting for the bus. I got chicken feed.”
“How come Hayley didn’t bring you? She was working in the barn. We were just there.”
“Hayley’s mad at me. She said no way was she driving me anywheres. And anyway, I didn’t know. It’s not like I do things on purpose.”
Seth glanced at Prynne for some kind of girl translation. Prynne shrugged. Seth said, “Well, get up off that bag. Me and Prynne c’n take you home.”
“Hayley’ll only get madder at me.”
The poor kid sounded so disconsolate, that Seth extended his hand to her, said, “I ain’t taking no for an answer,” and when she took his hand and allowed herself to be drawn to her feet, he gave her an around-the-shoulders hug. To his surprise she started to cry.
“Hey, hey, hey!” Seth said. “What’s going on?”
“D . . . d . . . dad,” she sobbed. “He broke his arm. Hayley says it was ’cause I didn’t pay attention when I was supposed to. We had to take him to the hospital and there’s no insurance and I didn’t . . .” She sobbed till she hiccupped.
Prynne touched the girl’s shoulder, saying, “’Course you didn’t and I bet she knows that. She was probably just ticked off and she said the first thing that came into her head.”
“N . . . n . . . no. She hates me and it was my fault and everyone’s mad and I try to be good. But she says I only think about myself and it’s not true but when I eat stuff that I’m not s’posed to eat it’s only only ’cause—”