An Educated Death (15 page)

Explaining my family is a long and complicated story. Before my sister Carrie died, I thought I had the world's greatest family. Since then, I've come to see all of us in a new light, and not a particularly favorable one. Last spring, my mother pressured me into helping out a friend of hers accused of murdering her husband. No matter what I did, my efforts didn't satisfy my mother. We ended up having a fight so major neither of us has gotten over it, though she pretends she has. The fight was at my brother Michael's engagement party—which I walked out of—and that made Michael and Sonia's wedding, in September, even more tense and difficult than their awful personalities had already ensured it would be.

I wish I were a more forgiving person. I wish that with respect to my family I had a more generous and tolerant nature, but I don't. I've always been the fixer in my family, the one everyone has always turned to to make it right and to work things out. But somewhere along the line, even though I still find myself rescuing strays of the human variety and taking on lost causes, I've lost my charity toward my family. Yes, it's stubborn and perhaps wrongheaded. My second favorite cop in the world, after Andre, Dom Florio, calls me headstrong. But whatever you call it, I believe I'm the wronged party and it's up to my family, especially my mother, to make the first move. Something more substantial and personal than Christmas dinner, which can be conducted on the level of a family ritual.

Then, too, there was something else. I wanted to spend Christmas with my own family, that is, with Andre. I wanted to sit with him in our living room, looking at the lights on our own Christmas tree and holding hands in the peaceful darkness. But we hadn't even discussed Christmas yet. Maybe he was expecting to spend it with his own family, with or without me. The whole business depressed me. My idea of a great present would be a year without holidays.

Sarah cleared her throat to remind me that she was still standing there. "I don't know what to tell her," I said, knowing Sarah understood about my mother.

She grinned conspiratorially. "Next time she calls, I'll apologize for failing to give you the message. She thinks we're all bozos anyway. I can go on being forgetful as long as you want." She hesitated, not being one to intrude. "Look, Bobby told me about the condo. If there's anything I can do..."

"I think things are under control. The guys who cleaned up after the fire were coming today, and they're great."

She nodded. "Yeah. You told me about them. They sound fabulous. Wish I could get them to come to my house. Maybe I'll set a fire...." She turned to go and then turned back. "I'm thinking of asking him to leave." I didn't need to ask who she meant. Sarah's husband has been like a blister on her heel for years, his criticism rubbing away her self-esteem until she is always spiritually sore and limping. "I'll wait until after Christmas, of course. But I'm afraid of how he'll take it, no matter when I do it. Oops, that damned phone..." She reached across the desk and picked it up. "Yanita Emery." She passed the phone to me and went out.

"Sorry to do this to you," Yanita said, "but how about tonight?" In for a penny, in for a pound, I thought, and agreed to set aside an hour at six-thirty for a phone conference. She was an hour away, and a face-to-face wasn't necessary until we'd done preliminaries. Suzanne and the baby stopped to say good night, followed by Lisa, Magda, and Sarah. Bobby left without saying good-bye, which hurt my feelings. I spread out my papers and the phone rang.

Dorrie's voice was leaden with fatigue. "How's it going?" she asked.

"Slowly."

"Everyone cooperating?"

"After a fashion. Drucker wasn't very forthcoming."

"Any idea who was out there with Laney?"

"Not yet. You?"

"Not a clue," she said grimly. "I can't get it off my mind, the idea that someone knows something and won't tell us. I think I'm going to mention it at school meeting tomorrow."

"You run the risk of upsetting them."

"Upsetting them more. They're already upset. But I'd appreciate it if you could be there."

"What time?" I asked, feeling as though someone had just added another brick to my load.

"Eight. Look, I know you like to check in at the office, but can't that stuff wait, Thea? This is important."

I hoped my sigh was inaudible. I knew it was important. "Don't worry. I'll be there."

I did a few things that couldn't wait and then, realizing I could talk on the phone just as easily in the car as at the office, I called Andre to tell him I was coming, and headed north to Maine. I hoped he'd check his messages. I figured it was worth four hours of driving to spend the time with him. It wasn't worth it to spend the time alone. I was on the phone with Yanita for almost an hour, and ended up setting up a meeting, with the King administration and their lawyer, for the following evening.

For the rest of the trip, Laney Taggert was my only companion. What was it her father had said? She wasn't very nice but it was just a stage she was going through. Now she'd never get past that stage. I pictured him sitting alone by his Christmas tree, weeping, Laney's wrapped presents by his feet, the only person I'd met so far who genuinely mourned her death. I could almost feel the wrench of those sobs in the emptiness of my car. Laugh and the world laughs with you, cry and you cry alone.

By the time I pulled into the driveway, I could barely keep my eyes open, and Andre's car wasn't there. All up and down the street, the houses gleamed with holiday cheer. Ours was just dark. I stumbled up the slippery steps, unlocked the door, and went in. It was cold and the air smelled of old fried eggs. I turned on a few lights, said hello to his breakfast dishes, turned up the thermostat, and called Andre. No one in the office knew where he was. I left word that I was home and dragged myself, my suitcase, and my ever-bulging briefcase up the stairs.

Half an hour later, I climbed out of a lukewarm bath into an icy room and decided that the heat wasn't working. I was prowling around the smelly, cobwebby basement with a flashlight, trying to find the gauge on the oil tank, when the phone rang. I stumbled upstairs, banging my shin, and squelched an armload of epithets as I grabbed the receiver. An unidentified voice that sounded a lot like Roland Proffit gave me a number where Andre could be found. I abandoned my heat-seeking mission and called, knowing, even before the phone was answered, what I was going to hear. I wasn't, and was, disappointed when it was blond, bubbly Amanda who answered the phone, the unmistakable sounds of a party behind her. "He's right here. I'll put him on."

With coplike precision he cut to the heart of things. "Where are you?"

"Home."

"Which home? Suzanne's?"

"Our home."

"Goddamn. Why didn't you tell me?"

"I tried. I called. I left messages. I thought they were always supposed to know where to find you. I think they're a hell of a lot better at knowing how not to find you." Damn. I didn't want to fight. Why was I doing this? "Are you coming back? There's no heat."

"I thought you were up to your ears in work and couldn't get away."

"I missed you." Idiot, I thought, just say you're on your way. I didn't add an extra four hours of driving to my life when I'm already dead tired so I could talk to you on the phone. I could have stayed in Massachusetts and done that.

He was talking, but not to me. To someone else. Explaining why he had to go. "Because the heat's not working." Not because he wanted to be with me, though it was silly of me to expect him to say that out loud.

I heard her reply, loud and clear. "Well, then I'd guess you'd better take that hot body home, handsome. Too bad. The party is just getting started."

"I'm on my way," he said. "Did you check the tank and see if we're out of oil?"

"Yes. No. Well, sort of."

"Well, check it," he said. "If it's empty, the fuel company number is on the wall by the phone." He hung up.

Now I was feeling distinctly snarly. I hate domestic crises. It's not that I'm helpless or timid. I live in a condo by choice so someone else can take care of such things because I'm busy. I'm busy and tired and now I was stone cold and the thought of going back to that nasty basement made my skin crawl. Boldly, I hefted my flashlight and set forth. The gauge, when I finally found it, was designed to be readable only to those under three feet tall who had long, narrow heads. When I finally managed to read it, it said empty. I called the emergency number, got someone who promised to come within the hour, washed the cobwebs off my face, combed them out of my hair, and went to bed, huddled beneath all the blankets I could find.

An hour later, I responded to feet on the steps with a joyous smile at my loved one's return, and received in return a delivery slip from the oil-blackened hand of a very surprised oil-truck driver. One good thing about the damned cold—I greeted him in a flannel gown and robe and not something skimpy and alluring. From an upstairs window, I watched the big truck lurch away down the street, a panorama of rear lights flashing. Watched a dusting of snow settle onto my car. Watched Christmas lights go off along the street. Watched with reddened nose and cold-stiffened hands as the rest of the world went to sleep.

Half an hour after that, as I lay there sleepless and abandoned, feeling homeless and wretched and wondering if Andre was in a ditch somewhere, he finally turned up, smelling ripely of smoke and alcohol. By then, on a scale of one to ten, my mood was well into the minus numbers. He came to bed warm and loving and said and did all the right things but I went to sleep feeling unsettled, unhappy, and unconnected. Lonely, even with company in the bed, and uncharacteristically pessimistic about the future.

My dreams were a rehash of all my Bucksport interviews, a confused mélange of comments from which Laney Taggert emerged innocent, young, confused, sly, wily, manipulative, and ambitious. Not an easy read. Experience has taught me that when I dream about things I'm working on, I don't get restful sleep. I stumbled forth into the predawn darkness of another snowy morning feeling old and tired and not at all ready to face the day, not even fortified by the bowl of oatmeal my unusually attentive beau had produced without making eye contact. I think he was afraid, in the cold light of day—warmer, actually, than the dead of night, inside at least—that I would raise the subject of Amanda and her remark about his body.

The snowy drive didn't help. I arrived, neck stiff with tension, just as Dorrie was calling the all-school meeting to order.

"Good morning," she greeted them, to a chorus of moans and groans. Adolescents don't like to get up in the morning any more than I do. "I know. I know. You're all tired. But soon you'll all be going home for eighteen days, and with luck, you'll be able to sleep late on many of them. You need the rest. I know it. We're all tired after the last few days. I know they've been very hard on all of you, just as I'm sure you realize that they've been very hard on us." There was a murmur of agreement.

"One of the reasons that Laney Taggert's loss has been so hard for all of us is that here at Bucksport we have a community, rather like our own small town of which we are all the residents. When a close community loses one of its members, the whole community suffers. The whole community grieves. When the death is unexplained, as Laney's is, there is also fear and uncertainty in the community. The other members worry about what happened, and it makes them uncertain about themselves. I know that some of you are worried that Laney's death was not an accident, that she was worried and unhappy and deliberately put herself in the way of danger."

Oh, no, Dorrie
, I thought.
You shouldn't do this. Why didn't
you talk to me before you plunged ahead with this speech
?
It's only going to upset them more.
If I could have plucked her out from behind her podium without making a scene, I would have done it.

"We have no reason to believe that that is what happened," she said. "We have no reason to believe that her death was anything other than an unfortunate accident. Now, I know how news travels around here. Just like in a small town, it's very hard to keep a secret. So I expect you all know about the woman some people are calling 'Dorrie's detective.' " She motioned for me to come up and join her. I went forward with leaden feet and a plastic smile, trying to keep my irritation off my face as I forcibly unclenched my teeth. "This is Thea Kozak," she said. "I've asked her to come in and look over our shoulders—us meaning all the adults, the dreaded grownups whose job it is to keep you all safe and cared for—to be sure we're doing for you what you have a right to expect from us. Ms. Kozak's job is to see if we're doing things right or tell us where we need to change. I'm introducing her to you because in a small community like this, it is better to know than conjecture and guess. If there's anything you think she should know, you should feel free to drop in and tell her. She's in the office right next to Mrs. Drucker's."

Dorrie cleared her throat and looked out at the rows of upturned faces. "One last thing. Part of being a member of a community like ours is taking responsibility for the well-being of the community. For its peace of mind."
Shut up, Dorrie,
I thought.
Quit while you're ahead. Don't say it.
"Now we have been told that there were two sets of footprints going down to the pond...."

She paused for effect as a ripple of realization ran through the students. "Which means that someone else was there, someone who has information about what happened. Maybe you're scared, or maybe you're feeling guilty because you couldn't help her, or maybe you had a fight and walked away, and now you're too shocked by the terrible thing that happened to come forward. But we need you to come forward. We need you to talk to us. We need to know. Not just me. Not just the faculty and the administration, but everyone here. So please..."

She gripped the podium and leaned toward them. "Please, if you were there, if you know something about what happened... for Laney's sake, for her parents' sakes, for all of our sakes, please come forward and tell us about it. I'm available. Thea's available. Your counselors and advisors are available. Get it off your chest. Come talk to us."