Bury the Hatchet in Dead Mule Swamp (5 page)

“Hey, Ma! I thought I’d
surprise you.”

“Chad Allen Raven, you are
impossible! Get in here.” I swiped at his arm as he entered, but he
sidestepped and instead encircled me in a bear hug and swung me
around the room. When he put me down we were both laughing and a
little dizzy.

“So this is your ‘new’
place,” he said, looking around.

“What are you doing here
now?” I asked at the exact same time.

We laughed
again.

“My project finished a few
days early.”

“I’ve still got a lot of
work to do.” Once more our sentences collided.

“Me first, I’m the mom,” I
said, retrieving my shoulder length hair and tucking it behind my
ears. “I thought you’d call first. How’d you know how to get
here?”

Chad rolled his eyes. “Ever
hear of GPS? I just keyed in the address and followed the
directions.”

“Where’s your
car?”

“Out there around the
curve. I didn’t want you to see me drive in.”

“You scallywag. Have you
had breakfast? Did you drive all night? How long can you stay?” My
mind flooded with mother questions.

“Slow down, Ma!” Chad said.
“I camped with some friends last night in the National Forest, and
we split up early. It was only about two more hours to get here.”
He rubbed his stomach.

“OK, I get the hint,” I
said, leading him toward the kitchen. “I think I’ve got eggs, and
maybe some ham.”

While I fixed omelets and
divided up the rest of the blueberry pie—the smaller piece for
me—Chad pulled his battered Toyota up to the house and brought in
his backpack and guitar case.

As I beat the eggs and
poured them into a hot pan, I realized my headache had disappeared.
I was delighted to see Chad. He and I had always been close, but
one never knows what might happen when a son begins to discover his
adult self, especially when his parents have recently split up.
Chad looked a lot like a young Roger, with his blue eyes and wavy
hair. My mind drifted as I waited for the eggs to cook; I buried my
nose against a small warm head of blond curls while the other young
man squeezed my shoulders and smiled down at us. Wasn’t that just a
few months ago?

“Ma! This old place only
has one bathroom? Upstairs? Where should I sleep?”

Reality always cuts to the
immediate, rather than the important questions. “How about one of
the little rooms off the living room? I don’t have an extra bed
yet, but it would be more private for you.”

“That’s perfect. I’ll use
my camping pad and sleeping bag. No big deal.”

For the rest of the
morning, Chad and I brought each other up to date on the events of
the summer. We’d talked by phone a few times, but the connection
was never good enough to really visit. Of course, I wanted to hear
what he’d been doing on Isle Royale, but I was surprised and
pleased that he was interested in my summer, too. I gave him a tour
of the house, and he liked what I’d accomplished, but he mentioned
the lack of a television and an internet connection.

When I got to telling him
about the recent confusion over a body washing up at Jalmari, he
held up a hand. I stopped talking.

“I think you’ve found a new
hobby, solving mysteries,” he said.

“Oh, no, I don’t have
anything to do with this one,” I said, bugging out my eyes and
shaking my head. I changed the subject. “How long can you
stay?”

“’
Til Saturday, I think. I
need to go see Dad, too, before I have to be back on
campus.”

I knew this was the outline
for my future, having to share Chad with a man who made my stomach
contract into a hard knot. I wanted to protest that two days was
too little time, but I knew my desires couldn’t make Chad stop
caring about his dad. I didn’t want him to hate Roger. Well, maybe
just a little bit.

“How about if I help you
get those shutters for the screen porch started tomorrow?” Chad
said, pulling me back to the conversation.

“That would be great,” I
said, “But why not start today?”

“I have something I’d like
to do, if you don’t think it’s too stupid.” The impish grin I love
broke across his tanned face.

“What’s that?” I asked,
wondering what on earth he might have cooked up in just a few
hours.

“I drove in to Cherry Hill
pretty much along the river. This part of the state is beautiful.
Can we go look at cabins on the water? I’ll be in work-study this
fall, and maybe I could make payments on something
small.”

“But you don’t have any
idea where you’ll be working after college, or anything yet,” I
protested.

“Yeah, but you plan to stay
here, right?”

“I think that’s settled,” I
said. “But what difference does that make?”

“If I had a cottage, I
could have my own place and still see you without being a bother.
Even if I end up with a family some day, it would be a great
vacation place.”

“Chad, I don’t know.
Anything on the water will be expensive. Who will take care of it?”
I didn’t want to get saddled with the upkeep on another old
building.

“Oh, c’mon. Looking is
free. It’s probably just for fun. Are you worried about
high-pressure realtors bugging you after I leave?”

“Maybe a little bit,” I
admitted, picturing the lady in the tropical print with the husky
voice. She had seemed very forward, but I supposed realtors had to
be. “All right. It’s a good trade for help with all that plywood
tomorrow. Where shall we start?”

In about an hour, we were
driving into Cherry Hill, past the park beside the river where I’d
faced off with a really bad man in May, and over the Mill Street
bridge. Chad had talked me into letting him drive my Jeep, so I was
in the passenger seat. We turned west on Liberty Street. I’d never
seen this part of town, since it wasn't really on the way to
anywhere.

“Hey! There’s the old
school,” I said. I pointed at a large red brick structure on my
side of the street. “Stop a minute.”

“That’s a really cool
building, but not quite what I had in mind,” Chad said dryly as he
pulled to the curb.

I recognized this place
from pictures Cora had shown me. The two-story school had a central
bell tower, and a third-story dormer with small diamond-shaped
panes. Close behind the building was a chain-link fence, with the
Petite Sauble River just beyond. I hadn’t realized the building was
so near the river. I wondered where the schoolkids had played. The
structure obviously hadn’t been in use for a long time. Some
windows were broken out and covered with plywood. Nevertheless, it
was a handsome building.

“Ma? Hey, are you in
there?” Once again, I’d been lost in thought until Chad’s voice
brought me back. Maybe I had been spending too much time alone
lately.

Chapter 7

“Sorry. I’m still
discovering things around here too. A friend told me about this
building, but it’s even more beautiful in real life.”

“Beautiful?” Chad asked
with some disdain. “Looks pretty spooky to me. A great place to
scare some friends on Halloween. Maybe I’ll come back in October
and bring my buddies.”

He put the car in gear
again, and we continued straight for a couple of blocks till
Liberty ended where West South River Road veered off to the right,
close to the water. I pointed. “Take this. It’s even closer to the
river than US 10.”

“Now we’re getting
somewhere.”

We drove for a few minutes
past several large year-round homes, stately Victorian mansions,
until the road narrowed and the space between the pavement and the
river became filled with black willow trees, brushy sumac and
overgrown grape vines. Occasional clumps of deep purple asters
brightened the scene. The water wasn’t visible, and there appeared
to be no cottages along this stretch. “I don’t know which sections
have been built up by summer people,” I apologized. At least I’d
been in Cherry Hill long enough to know what cottage owners were
called.

“We’ll find them,” Chad
said with the confidence of the young. But, the landscape still
didn’t reveal any driveways on the water side. “I’ve been thinking
about your dead body.”

“What? It’s not my
body!”

“You know what I mean. It’s
just too weird, a name so much like the newspaper guy. Doesn’t seem
like a coincidence,” Chad said.

“I agree, but he’s much
younger than Jerry Caulfield. Shorter, too. Even if someone was
trying to hurt Jerry, they couldn’t have mistaken the two
men.”

“No, the similarity isn’t
their looks, but their names. It’s more like some kind of
threat.”

“Seems awfully
far-fetched.”

“Maybe. But it’s pretty
unlikely that a man who lives hours away, that no one seems to
know, would come up here and get himself murdered by accident in a
town with someone whose name is so similar.”

I grinned. “Murdered by
accident?”

“My point
exactly.”

“But what could it mean? It
doesn’t make much sense any way you look at it. And I don’t think
they know where he was killed.” I was sure the Sheriff hadn’t
mentioned it, but maybe he knew and wasn’t telling.

“I think it’s a warning. I
think someone wants to tell Jerry Cauliflower that he should be
careful.”

I clucked my tongue, and
tried not to smile. “Caulfield, Jerry Caulfield. But who would have
that big of a grudge against Jerry?”

“Don’t ask me. It’s your
town. Think about it. People with that much power always have
enemies. And he’s old. He’s had time to collect lots of
them.”

“Maybe, but I haven’t been
here long enough to hear much against him.” Jerry didn’t seem that
old to me, but he did have control of considerable property in
town. And I knew that four generations of Caulfields had lived on
the upper edge of Cherry Hill society. Poorer folks always resented
those with money. However, if this was a warning, a lot of planning
had gone into it. Luring Jared Canfield to Cherry Hill had taken
some cunning. Unless only his dead body had been brought
here.

“Look, Ma, there’s a road
with a whole bunch of house numbers on that board, and a couple of
‘For Sale’ signs.” He turned the wheel and we bounced into a
pot-hole-riddled sand track. The road broke into three forks almost
immediately, and names handpainted on slats nailed to trees
suggested how one might find certain owners. However, the placement
and angles of the boards didn’t convince me that one could be sure
of locating any particular cottage on one try. At the corner, some
small realtors’ signs on wire posts had been pushed into the
ground. One of them had a blue arrow and read “Holiday Realty.” I
thought that must be the new lady I’d met Wednesday night. Both
signs directed potential buyers to the left fork. Chad slowed down
and took that road.

We bumped along for another
half mile, until the road widened into a sandy clearing containing
three homes which seemed to have open space beyond. Chad parked the
Jeep away from any of the buildings, and practically leaped out his
door. I followed a little more slowly.

No one seemed to be at any
of the cottages, if they could be called that. All of them were
full-size homes; one was modern and the other two were older. We
were drawn immediately to one of the older ones that was for
sale.

“This is great, Ma!
Vintage, and in really good condition.”

A long set of dark green
steps climbed to the main level of the house. A carved sign above
the screen porch read “Chippewa Lodge.” The building was square
with an open porch, connected to the screen porch, and wrapped
around the river side of the building. White clapboards and more
green trim completed the classic look. A stone chimney rose from
the roof. We quickly discovered why there had been a void beyond
the houses. A high bank fell off steeply to a bend of the river.
The water seemed deeper and swifter here than it did at my
property.

I told Chad, “It’s
absolutely wonderful. But, this is probably worth two-hundred
thousand dollars. A little out of your range, don’t you
think?”

“Yeah, but who knew there
were awesome places like this in such a sleepy town? Most of it
looks like a dump compared to home.”

A stab of pain shot through
my chest. Of course, he would still think of home as the place he
grew up. But it no longer held fond memories for me. “This is my
home now, Chad,” I said in a quiet voice.

“Oh. Yeah. I didn’t think
about that. I’m sorry, OK? Let’s try to find something smaller.” He
headed for the Jeep.

We continued downstream on
West South River Road, driving slowly. We stopped a couple more
places, but everything we saw was either too large for Chad’s
potential budget or dilapidated almost beyond repair. I wasn’t
surprised. People didn't seem to want rustic cottages for
vacations, these days; they preferred secondary
mansions.

About three o’clock a small
road sign notified us that we were entering Jalmari.

“Jalmari!” I said. “I
didn’t know it was so close. This is where the body was
found.”