“Oh, my God. Does Grace know?”
He shook his head. “I don’t think so.”
I took the emotion and shoved it down deep. I needed a clear head, but it was hard. Then it hit me. “You knew,” I said. “As soon as I told you that he’d confessed, you knew why he was doing it.”
“No, son. I knew only what you knew; that Dolf Shepherd could never kill anyone. I have no idea who he’s protecting; but I do know this. Whoever it is, it’s someone he loves.” He paused, and I prompted him.
“So?”
He stepped closer. “So, maybe you should do what he asks. Maybe you should let it go.”
“Dying in jail is not death with dignity,” I said.
“It could be. Depends on why he’s doing it.”
“I can’t leave him there.”
“It’s not your place to tell a man how to spend his final days—”
“I won’t let him die in that hole!”
He looked torn.
“It’s not just Dolf,” I said. “There’s more.”
“More what?”
“Danny called me.”
He was vague in the gloom, dark hands at the end of long, pale sleeves. “I don’t understand,” he said.
“Danny tracked me down in New York. He called three weeks ago.”
“He died three weeks ago.”
“It was a strange thing, okay. The call came out of nowhere, middle of the night. He was hopped-up, excited about something. He said that he’d figured out how to fix his life. He said that it was something big, but that he needed my help. He wanted me to come home. We argued.”
“Needed your help with what?”
“He refused to say, said he wanted to ask me face-to-face.”
“But—”
“I told him that I would never come home. I told him that this place was lost to me.”
“That’s not true,” my father said.
“Isn’t it?”
He hung his head.
“He asked for my help and I refused him.”
“Don’t go there, son.”
“I refused him and he died.”
“Things are not always that simple,” my father said, but I would not be swayed.
“If I’d done what he wanted, if I’d come home to help him, then he might not have been murdered. I owe him.” I paused. “I owe Dolf.”
“What are you going to do?”
I looked at the rain, reached out my hand as if I could pull truth from the void.
“I’m going to turn over some fucking rocks.”
CHAPTER 21
We rode back to the farm, and I listened to the hard slap of wipers on the old truck. He killed the engine and we sat in the drive. Rain beat itself to mist on the roof. “Are you sure about this, son?”
I didn’t answer the question; I was thinking of Danny. Not only had I refused his request, but I’d doubted him, too. It was the ring found with Grace. It made everything so clear. He’d changed, gone dark for the money. His father wanted mine to sell and Danny had played along. Damn! I was so ready to believe it. I forgot the times that he’d stood up for me, forgot the man I knew him to be. In all of the ways that mattered, that was the greatest injustice I had done to him. But he was dead. I had to think of the living.
“This is going to kill Grace,” I said.
“She’s strong.”
“Nobody’s that strong. You should call the hospital. It’ll hit the papers. Maybe they can keep it from her, at least for a day or two. She should hear about this from us.”
He seemed uncertain. “Maybe until she’s better.” He nodded. “A day or two.”
“I’ve got to go,” I said, but my father stopped me with a hand on my arm. My door was open and water cascaded into the cab of the truck. He didn’t care.
“Dolf is my best friend, Adam. He’s been that for longer than you’ve been alive; since before I met your mother, since we were kids. Don’t think that this is easy for me.”
“Then you should feel like I do. We need to get him out.”
“Friendship is also about trust.”
I waited for a long second. “So is family,” I finally said.
“Adam . . .”
I climbed out, leaned in as water thrummed on my back. “Do you think I killed Gray Wilson? Right here, right now . . . do you think I did it?”
He leaned forward and the dome light struck his face. “No, son. I don’t think you did it.”
Something snapped in my chest, a strap loosened. “Saying that doesn’t mean that I forgive you. We have a long way to go, you and me.”
“Yes, we do.”
I didn’t plan to say what came next; it just welled out of me. “I want to come home,” I said. “That’s the real reason I’m back.” His eyes widened, but I wasn’t ready to talk further. I slammed the door, splashed through puddles, and slipped into my car. My father climbed onto his porch and turned to face me. His clothes hung wetly from his frame. Water ran down his face. He raised a hand above shadow-filled eyes, and kept it up until I pulled away.
I went to Dolf’s house; it was empty and dark. I stripped off wet clothes and flung myself down onto his couch. Thoughts churned through my mind; speculation, theories, despair. Fifteen miles away Dolf would be lying on a hard, narrow bunk. Probably awake. Probably afraid. The cancer would be chewing through him, looking for that last vital bit. How long until it took him? Six months? Two months? One? I had no idea. But when my mother died, and my father, for years, had been lost to me in mourning, it was Dolf Shepherd who made the difference. I could still feel the strength of that heavy hand on my shoulder. Long years. Hard years. And it was Dolf Shepherd who got me through.
If he was going to die, it should be with sunlight on his face.
I thought of the postcard in my glove compartment. If I was right, and Dolf had not killed Danny, then the card could possibly set him free. But who might it implicate? Someone with a reason to want Danny dead. Someone strong enough to conceal his body in the crack at the top of the knob. Maybe it was time to give it to Robin. But Dad was right about one thing: Dolf must have his reasons, and we had no idea what they might be. I closed my eyes and tried to not think of what Parks had said. Maybe he wanted the body found. And then Dolf’s voice, again: Sinners usually pay for their sins. Dark thoughts came with the sound of thunder. If Dolf killed Danny, he would have needed a damn good reason. But could he have? Was it even possible? I’d been gone for a long time. What things had changed in five years? What people?
I chewed on that thought until I fell asleep, and for once, I did not dream of my mother or of blood. Instead, I dreamt of teeth, of the cancer that was eating a good man down.
I woke before six, feeling as if I had not slept at all. Coffee was in the cupboard, so I set it to brew and walked outside to watery, gray light. It was thirty minutes before dawn, silent, still. Leaves drooped under dark beads and the grass was beaten flat. Puddles shone on the drive, as black and smooth as poured oil.
It was a perfect, quiet morning; and then I heard it, the multithroated wail of dogs on the hunt. The ululation of the pack. It was a primal sound that made my skin prickle. It rose above the hills and then faded. Rose and fell, like crazy men speaking in tongues. Then shots crashed out in quick succession, and I knew that my father, too, was restless.
I listened for a minute more but the dog sounds faded away, and no more shots were fired. So I went inside.
I stopped in Grace’s door on the way to take a shower. Nothing had changed and I pulled the door closed. Down the hall, I turned on the water. I washed in swift, economical movements and toweled dry. Steam followed me back to the living room, where I found Robin sitting where I had slept, her fingers splayed on the pillow. She stood, looking small and pale and more like my lover than a cop. “I always seem to find you in the shower,” she said.
“Next time, join me.” I smiled, but the day was too dark for levity. I opened my arms, felt the cool press of her face against my chest. “W
e need to talk,” she said.
“Let me get dressed.”
She had coffee poured by the time I returned. We sat at the kitchen table as mist moved out of the forest and the sun stretched sharp fingers between the trees. “I heard about Dolf’s confession,” she said.
“It’s bullshit.” The words came more strongly than I’d intended.
“How can you be certain?”
“I know the man.”
“That’s not enough, Adam—”
My control slipped. “I’ve known him my whole life! He all but raised me!”
Robin kept her calm. “You didn’t let me finish. That’s not enough if we’re going to help him. We need a crack in the story, some place to start chipping.”
I studied her face. There was no reticence in her. “I’m sorry,” I said.
“Let’s talk about what we can do.”
She wanted to help, but I was in possession of material evidence, a crime, maybe the first of many. “Not we, Robin. Just me.”
“What are you saying?”
“I’ll do whatever it takes to get Dolf out of there. Do you understand what I’m saying? Anything. If you help me, your career might not survive. Other things might not survive. I’ll do what I have to do.” I paused so she could think about what I was saying. Obeying the law was not one of my priorities. “Do you understand?”
She swallowed. “I don’t care.”
“You chose me, not Dolf. I don’t want you getting hurt. You owe Dolf nothing.”
“Your problem is my problem.”
“How about this? You help me in ways that don’t put you at risk.”
She thought about it. “Like what?”
“Information.”
“I’m off the case, remember. I don’t have much.”
“How about motive? Grantham must have some theory on that. Have you heard anything?”
She lifted her shoulders. “Just chatter. Dolf didn’t give a motive in his interview. They tried to pin him down, but he was vague. There are two theories. The first is simple. Dolf and Danny worked together. They had a falling-out, an argument that went too far. Happens all the time. The second comes down to money.”
“What do you mean?”
“Maybe Dolf was the one killing cattle and torching outbuildings. Maybe Danny caught him doing it and got killed for his trouble. It’s thin, but a jury will listen.”
I shook my head. “Dolf has nothing to gain one way or another.”
Puzzlement twisted Robin’s features. “Of course he does. Same as your father. Same as Zebulon Faith.”
“My father owns this place. The house, the land. All of it.”
Robin leaned back, put her hands on the table’s edge. “I don’t think so, Adam.” She tilted her head, still confused. “Dolf owns two hundred acres, including the house we’re sitting in.”
I opened my mouth, but no words came. Robin spoke slowly, as if I were not quite right in the head. “That’s six million dollars, based on the latest offer. One hell of a motive to squeeze your father into selling.”
“That can’t be right.”
“Check it out,” she said.
I thought about it, shook my head. “First of all, there’s no way Dolf owns a piece of this farm. My father would never do that. Secondly”—I had to look away—“secondly, he’s dying. He wouldn’t care about money.”
Robin understood what that statement cost me, but she refused to back away. “Maybe he’s doing it for Grace.” She put her hand on mine. “Maybe he’d rather die on a beach some place far from here.”
I told Robin I needed to be alone. She put soft lips on my face and told me to call her later. What she had said made no sense. My father loved this land as he loved his own life. Guarding it was his special trust; keeping it for the family, the next generation. Over the past fifteen years, he’d given partial ownership to his children, but that was for estate planning purposes. And those interests were merely shares in a family partnership. He kept control; and I knew that he would never part with an acre, not even for Dolf.
At eight o’clock, I went to the house to ask my father if it were true, but his truck was gone. He was still out, I thought, still after the dogs. I looked for Jamie’s truck, but it was gone, too. I opened the door to a cathedral silence, and followed the hall to my father’s study. I wanted something to put context around what Robin had said. A deed, a title policy, anything. I pulled on the top drawer of the file cabinet, but it was locked. All of the drawers were locked.
I paused, considering, and was distracted by a flash of color through the window. I walked to the glass and saw Miriam in the garden. She wore a solid black dress with long sleeves and a high collar, and was clipping flowers with her mother’s shears. She knelt in the wet grass, and I saw that her dress was damp from having done so many times. The shears closed around a stem, and a rose the color of sunrise fell to the grass. She picked it up, added it to the bouquet; and when she stood I saw a small but satisfied smile.
She’d piled her hair upon her head; it floated above a dress that might have come from another age. Her movements were so fluid that in the silence, through the glass, I felt as if I were watching a ghost.
She crossed to a different bush, knelt again, and clipped a rose as pale and translucent as falling snow.
As I turned from the window, I heard a noise from upstairs, a sound like something being dropped. It would be Janice. Had to be.
For no reason that I could articulate, I still wanted to speak with her. I guess we had unfinished business. I climbed the stairs, and my feet were quiet on the thick runner. The upstairs hall was bathed in cold light through tall windows. I saw the farm below, the brown drive that cut through it. Oil paintings hung on the walls; a wine-dark carpet ran away from me; and the door to Miriam’s room stood ajar. I stood at the crack and saw Janice within. Drawers were pulled open and she stood with hands on her hips, studying the room. When she moved, it was for the bed. She lifted the mattress and apparently found what she was looking for. A small sound escaped her lips as she held the mattress with one hand and scooped something out from underneath. She dropped the mattress and studied what lay in her palm; it glittered like a shard of mirror.
I spoke as I stepped through the door. “Hello, Janice.”
She spun to face me, and her hand closed in a spasm; she whipped it behind her back, even as she bit down in obvious pain.
“What are you doing?” I asked.
“Nothing.” A guilty lie.
“What’s in your hand?”
“That’s none of your business, Adam.” Her features calcified as she drew herself up. “I think you should leave.”
I looked from her face to the floor. Blood was dripping on the hardwood behind her feet. “You’re bleeding,” I said.
Something in her seemed to collapse. She slumped and brought her hand from behind her back. It was still clenched shut, white at the knuckles in spite of the pain; and blood had, indeed, channeled through her fingers.
“How badly are you hurt?” I asked.
“Why do you care?”
“How badly?”
Her head moved fractionally. “I don’t know.”
“Let me see.”
Her eyes settled on my face, and there was strength in them. “Don’t tell her that you know,” she said, and opened her hand. On the palm of it lay a double-edged razor blade. Her blood put a sheen on it. It had cut her deeply, and blood welled from perfectly matched wounds on each side of the blade. I lifted the blade and placed it on the bedside table. I took her hand, cupped mine beneath to catch the blood.
“I’m going to take you to the bathroom,” I said. “We’ll wash this off and take a look.”
I ran cold water on the cuts, then wrapped her hand in a clean towel. She stood rigidly throughout the entire process, eyes closed. “Squeeze tight,” I said. She did, and her face paled further. “You may need stitches.”
When her eyes opened, I saw how close she was
to breaking. “Don’t tell your father. He can’t possibly understand, and she doesn’t need that burden, too. He’ll only make it worse.”
“Can’t understand what? That his daughter is suicidal?”
“She’s not suicidal. That’s not what this is about.”
“What, then?”
She shook her head. “It’s not your place to hear about it, no more than it’s mine to tell. She’s getting help. That’s all you really need to know.”
“Somehow, I don’t think that’s true. Come on. Let’s get you downstairs. We’ll talk about it there.” She agreed reluctantly. As we passed the tall windows, I saw Miriam driving away. “Where is she going?” I asked.
She pulled up. “You don’t really care, do you?”
I studied her face: the set jaw, the new lines, and the loose skin. She would never trust me. “She’s still my sister,” I said.
She laughed, a bitter sound. “You want to know; fine, I’ll tell you. She’s taking flowers to Gray Wilson’s grave. She does it every month.” Another tight sound escaped her. “How’s that for irony?” I had no answer, so I kept my mouth shut as I helped Janice down the steps. “Take me to the parlor,” she said. I led her into the parlor, where she sat on the edge of the fainting couch. “Do me one last favor,” she said. “Go to the kitchen and bring ice and another towel.”
I was halfway to the kitchen when the parlor door slammed shut. I was still standing there when I heard the heavy lock engage.
I knocked twice, but she declined to answer.
I heard a high sound that may have been keening.
Miriam was where her mother had said she would be. She knelt, folded into herself, and from a distance it looked as if a giant crow had settled upon the grave. Wind moved between the weathered stones and shifted her dress; all that she lacked was the sheen of feathers, the mournful call. She moved as I watched. Deft fingers sought out weeds and plucked them from the earth; the bouquet was positioned just so. She looked up when she heard me, and tears moved on her skin.
“Hello, Miriam.”
“How did you find me?”
“Your mother.”
She pulled out another weed and tossed it to the wind. “She told you I was here?”