Blood Country (9 page)

The roof of the barn swam above her, nests of swallows tucked into the beams. If she closed her eyes, she knew she would sleep. She kept them open and stared about her. Forms moved in and out of her vision.

She knew what was wrong with her. An alien had invaded her body. It wasn’t making any major changes yet, but it would soon be apparent The world she existed in was not her own anymore. Every little detail was skewed. Nothing looked like itself or tasted right or smelled good. Slowly, this new life would begin to devour her from within. It would feed off her until she was hardly able to move. And then, when she was wasted to nothing, it would come shooting out of her body, demanding even more from her.

Bridget knew there was only one thing to do. She knew she had to take a test. But she was afraid of the results, afraid the piece of paper would turn blue or pink or a stripe would appear, and her fear would be confirmed. She was afraid she was pregnant.

10

A
fter the school bus dropped her off at the corner, Meg walked up the hill to Ramah’s house. Ramah watched her until her mom came home from work. The hill changed from day to day. Some days it was very steep, and some days it wasn’t hard to climb at all. Or else her legs were stronger and then weaker again. Today, it was medium. Climbing the hill felt like work, but she did it confidently.

It had been fun having Bridget at their house the other night. Nice to have someone for Mom to talk to. Meg liked sitting upstairs in her room and hearing the two women laugh downstairs. Their laughter sounded like birds’ wings to her, rising in the air. She remembered when her mom and dad would laugh downstairs when she was already tucked into bed. It made her feel so comfortable, like nothing could go wrong.

She reached the top of the hill and looked into the woods to see if any of the flowers were peeking up from the dead leaves yet. She didn’t see any, and she knew she shouldn’t dillydally. Ramah was a nice old lady, but she was a fussbudget. She worried about Meg if she was even a minute or two late.

Often she’d been standing outside her door, watching for her. Meg had to walk by Landers’ house, and she kept herself from looking at the place where she had found him. Never again would she cut through his yard. When a bad thing like that happens in a spot, you never go there again.

That’s what she had learned when her dad died.

It had been a completely normal day. Her mom was in the kitchen, cooking beef stew. She was watching TV in the living room. She heard her dad’s car door slam. She ran to the window to see him come up the walk, but when she looked out, he wasn’t there. He was walking out into the street. He looked mad. He was waving his arm at a truck. It was coming toward him. Meg thought he wanted to talk to the man in the truck, so he was trying to get him to stop. But instead of stopping, he went faster. The truck—it was black, she remembered, or maybe she had turned it black in her mind—came right at him. Meg grabbed the curtain in front of the window. The truck hit him, and he went flying over the top of the cab. He slid right up on it and then over and through the air until he hit the ground.

Then Meg ran outside. She shouldn’t have done that. It was wrong. Her mother would be mad. She ran back into the house and hid in the curtains.

M
EG WAS CLOSE
to Ramah’s house now. Ramah was standing outside, shaking out a rug. Ramah was old, twice as old as her mom. She had white, fluffy hair, and her hands shook when she tried to pour a glass of milk, but she was pretty strong. They played cards together; Ramah had taught her Five Hundred. She waved at Meg, and Meg waved back. Ramah would have a treat ready for her, often fresh-baked oatmeal cookies. But Meg’s favorite treat was graham crackers with butter spread on them. She loved the way they tasted with a big glass of cold milk. They just went together.

Once Ramah had asked her about her father’s death, what had happened to him. But Meg told her what her mom told her to tell anyone who asked. That she didn’t know anything. She hadn’t seen anything. She really didn’t remember what had happened. She was so glad that she had finally told her mother. The secret had been tearing a hole inside of her, and now that was over.

After the ambulance came and took her dad, she and her mom had left the house and had never gone back.

But Meg had never forgotten. She remembered what the man who drove the car looked like. He would be hard to forget. He had red hair, and he wore it down to his shoulders. He looked a little bit like Jesus Christ did in the Bible, except he had red hair.

C
LAIRE FOUND LEO
Stromboli settled into a big, upholstered chair in his living room, a remote control in one hand, a cigarette in the other. A tall man with hooded dark eyes, silver hair greased back and a white shirt on, he sat in a lift chair, he explained to her—a chair that would mechanically lift him up when he wanted to get out of it. He was still living on his own, but his daughter lived just down the street and checked on him all the time. He wasn’t a well man, she could tell by looking at him. He sounded like he had emphysema, and he moved like he had arthritis.

Word of Landers’ death had already reached him, so she didn’t see his reaction to the news. But he told her he would miss him. They had been like brothers, only better, because there was no blood between them.

Leo Stromboli and Landers Anderson had owned a clothing store in Wabasha from 1945 to 1985. Forty years they worked together. “Never a mean word between us,” Stromboli told Claire.

“Now, I’m not saying he was an angel. Don’t get me wrong. He was a man like all of us.” Stromboli took a gasp of a puff on his cigarette. A shaky hand guided it back to the ashtray. “But he was a straight-ahead guy. No one would want to kill him.”

“How did you two meet?” Claire asked.

“We go back to the war. Met over in Italy. With a name like Stromboli, and I could hardly order a pizza.” His chuckle went deep and then exploded into a cough. After a moment, he regained his breath and took another puff on his cigarette. “Landers was in my squad. We were both of us from Minnesota. Landers lived in Lake City, and I came from Wabasha. So that kind of made us stick together. When the war was over and we had both made it home, we went into business together. Landers ordered the clothes and paid the bills. He was the brains. I was out on the floor, selling, selling, selling. I was a hell of a salesman in my time. Nobody better. We carried good stuff too. Easy to tell the women how good they looked in our hats. See, women used to wear hats back in the old days.”

“I vaguely remember that.” Claire laughed. “My mom had some great hats. My sister and I would dress up in them.”

“Yeah, women had style back then.” Leo closed his eyes for a moment as if remembering.

“What, you don’t like my outfit?” Claire teased him.

He waved his hands at what she was wearing. “You got a job to do. I understand. But I hope you wear a dress once in a while. A woman with a figure like yours gotta wear a dress.”

“So did you know Landers’ wife very well?”

“I guess you could say that.”

“Oh?” Claire wanted to follow up on his ambivalence.

“Ah, you know how it is. I saw her a lot. She would come and work the sales. But Landers didn’t like her to work. What’s the matter with a little work? I’d ask him. But no, for his wife, she needs to stay at home. I don’t know what she did with herself. They had no kids. She was delicate, Landers would say. ‘Cuz she didn’t get out enough. That’s what I think. I think she suffered from depression. Maybe she had a hard time when she couldn’t have any kids, who’s to say? But she wasn’t a happy person.”

“Did they get along?”

“I always thought so. Right toward the end, she got a bit touchy, but hey, wait until you get this age, and see if you can be a Little Miss Pollyana all the time.” He looked at the short stub of a cigarette he held in his hand, then decided it was done. He stubbed it out in a well-littered ashtray.

“Someone else told me that too. That the last five years of her life, they didn’t get along so well.”

Leo shrugged his shoulders. “My wife and I could go at it. Scream at each other. Cuss and have a real row, then it’d be over and she’d ask me what I wanted for dinner. God, I miss that broad. So who’s to say what goes on between people?”

“What about Landers’ brother? Did you ever know him?”

“Yeah, I met him all right. Knew him better than I wanted to. When he moved back to this area, he wanted a job at the store. Landers said he could have a go at it. Working the floor. Have you met the guy?”

“Yes, I’ve known him for a while.”

“It didn’t work out. I had to tell Landers. At first, he didn’t want to hear it. But when we caught Fred looking in the ladies’ changing room, that was it. Amscray.”

“He was peeping?”

“Yeah, we didn’t do anything but fire him. I’m not even sure Landers said anything to him. I wanted to belt the guy, but he was such a wuss, I didn’t. Peepers are like that. Real quiet. Often kind of goofy. They’re pretty harmless. Butyuck, what’s the matter with them? Made me wonder about the wife, that Darla. Wasn’t she giving him any?” “Hard to tell.”

“I can say this stuff to you, can’t I?” Leo leaned forward, watching her face. “I mean, I’m talking to you like you’re a cop, not a lady. Is that okay?”

“It’s fine. This is very helpful.”

“So who gets all his estate? The brother?”

“I’d assume so.”

“No will?”

“Not that I know of.”

“So in Wisconsin that means it’ll all go to the closest of kin. Since he has no children, it’ll go to his brother.” Leo shook his head. “That surprises me. I just don’t think Landers would have liked that.”

R
ED WOKE UP.
The phone was drilling a hole in his head. He thought of throwing it at the TV that was droning away in the corner. Stop both of them from making all the fucking noise. He struggled up out of the couch and stood in the middle of the room, feeling it rock around him like a giant ship. He grabbed the phone and grunted into it, “What?” “This is Hawk.” “Yeah. I figured.” “We got a problem.” ‘What’s new?”

“I just heard from my police sources that the little girl saw you.”

“Yeah, so?”

“Yeah, not good.”

“Why’d it take so long to find this out?”

“The mother was keeping it a secret But guess she felt like the cops had dropped the case, so she brought it up. It could mean trouble. I want you to disappear.”

“Don’t worry about it. I’ve been keeping my eye on her.”

There was silence on the other end of the line, then Hawk said, “You have? You know where she is?”

“Sure. I tracked them down there one day, followed Claire from work. They’re in Wisconsin.”

“This is bad timing. We got that big deal coming down. I don’t want you around here. I want you to leave town.”

Red thought for a few moments. The woman on the TV, Martha Something, was showing a man how to make your own doilies out of paper napkins. God, how some people wasted their lives. “I’ve got a better idea. Let’s do something about the little girl.”

“Not a good idea. Like sticking your hand in a hornet’s nest.”

“Hornets don’t sting me. I’m magic.”

11

T
he woman Claire saw in the mirror had dark blue eyes, black hair pulled back in a clip, no makeup. She didn’t like this image of herself particularly. Too severe, too somber. Claire wiped her hand across the mirror as if to change what she was seeing in the glass. Other than growing her hair out, Claire had done nothing to change or improve her looks in years. She had always been serious, but now she looked worse than that—she looked set in her ways, as if she wouldn’t even try anything new.

Wearing her hair pulled back probably didn’t help. When she was a kid, she saw movies where the secretary would transform herself by taking off her glasses and letting down her hair and—voilà!—she was the hottest number around. Claire reached back and took the clip out of her hair. She smiled. It did help. Her hair was getting long; it probably needed a trim. It hung down below her shoulders.

What about lipstick? This wasn’t a date or anything, but she was going out in public. Her mother wouldn’t have been caught dead in public without lipstick. Her mother had always worn a deep red, even to go to the grocery store. Claire pulled a tube out of her top drawer and put on a light film of red, a rosier red than her mother’s color, then blotted it. Nice. Color, she needed color, otherwise she could look sallow.

Because of Leo Stromboli’s slight criticism of her clothes, she was wearing a dress. One of those flowered dresses with a hip waist. She was even wearing shoes with a slight heel; they were a dark burgundy color. She had bought them for someone’s wedding, maybe Bridget’s.

One more glance in the mirror. Better and better. One thing was for sure—she didn’t look like a cop. Maybe people would forget she was one and talk more easily around her. It was for the same reason that she had asked Rich to drive; she didn’t want to pull up to this meeting in the squad car. Rich should be here soon. He had called her this morning and told her about a meeting of the Landowners of America. He said he was going to check it out and asked if she wanted to go with him and she had said yes immediately. She ran down the stairs to see how Meg and Sissie were doing.

The two girls sat in front of the TV, each with a bowl of popcorn in her lap. Sissie was fourteen, and she and Meg sometimes acted like friends. Claire was glad they got along so well together. She didn’t ask Sissie to baby-sit when she was going to be out late, but since the meeting would only be a few hours, she should be fine.

“Bed at what time?” Claire asked.

Meg craned her head back and then turned completely around when she saw her mom. “Wow, like, you look gorgeous!”

“What is this, like,
Baywatch
talk?” Claire tweaked Meg’s nose.

“You look nice, Claire,” Sissie said. “Cool dress.”

“I helped her pick it out at—guess where,” Meg explained proudly.

Sissie looked puzzled.

“Mall of America!”

Claire and Meg had gone up to the mall for a treat in the middle of the winter, when no end to snow seemed in sight. Claire bought a few things for herself, and even though she hadn’t been in favor of the mall when they had built it, she had enjoyed the shopping trip. The air in the mall was humid and warm, thanks to all the trees they had planted. The shrieks of children zooming around on the roller coaster had filled the atrium. Meg had thrown all Claire’s pennies into the fountain and made lots of wishes. A good day for both of them.

“Nine at the very latest. Even if you’re watching something on TV that’s fantastic. Sissie, I shouldn’t be home any later than ten. Is that okay?” Weird to be asking your baby-sitter if you could stay out late, but that was the way it was handled these days.

“Yeah. My mom said it was okay.”

C
LAIRE WALKED OUT
of the house as soon as she saw Rich’s pickup pull up into the driveway. She didn’t want him to come in. The only man Meg had seen her with since her husband’s death had been Bruce. Meg knew where she was going and who she was going with, but Claire wanted it to seem very casual. Which it was.

The dress complicated climbing up into the pickup truck. Reaching up for the door frame, she suddenly felt her wrist gripped firmly. The next thing she knew, she was sitting in the cab next to Rich.

“Hi. Thanks.”

“Howdy,” Rich said. “You look nice.”

“Thanks. Don’t get much chance to dress up around here.” She glanced over at him. He looked all cleaned up. He was wearing a cotton plaid shirt with the sleeves rolled up, jeans, and black cowboy boots. He was clean shaven and his face scrubbed. He even smelled good—a woodsy smell, dark with a hint of spice.

He nodded and backed out of her driveway.

Claire looked around the truck and was surprised by how neat it was. Just like the house. Nothing out of place. An old, worn copy of Twain’s
Life on the Mississippi
stuck out of the side pocket.

“I haven’t read that” She pointed at the book.

“Oh, the Twain. Yeah, I just picked that up. I read it when I was a kid and was sure that the life of the captain of a riverboat was for me. Closest I’ve come to it is living on the lake.”

“That’s pretty close.” Claire looked out at the lake as they drove up alongside of it on 35. “You know, I’ve never been out on the lake. Funny to live so close to it and not have taken a boat out on it.”

“Oh, I’ve got an old canoe. If you want to go canoeing sometime—”

“Is that safe out there with all the motorboats and sailboats and barges?”

“I stick close to the shoreline. I watch out for the other boats, because I know they’re not going to be looking for me.”

“That’d be fun.”

They were silent in the car until Maiden Rock. As they drove through the town, Claire tried to think of something to say. She felt uncomfortable not talking; she didn’t know Rich well enough to be silent with him with ease. “Where’d you find it?”

“What? The canoe?”

“No.” She laughed. “The book.”

“In one of the antique shops.”

“You go into the antique shops?”

“Why is that surprising? I find a lot of great old stuff there.

Old tools, saw blades. I’ve bought a lot of my furniture there. After I fixed up all the pieces that were worth saving of my uncle’s.”

“Most men don’t like them. My husband wouldn’t set foot in an antique store.”

“So you did have a husband? What happened to him?”

Claire said what she always said to that question.
“He
died.”

Rich reacted the way most people did. They shut up. They figured if she wanted to tell them more, she would. She never said anything more.

A
FTER HE HAD
asked about her husband, silence hung in the cab of the truck for a few moments. Rich watched the familiar scenery slide by—glistening lake, points of land sticking out into it, bluffs rolling up near to the road and then pulling back. He loved this place.

He heard Claire clear her throat. “So tell me about this Landowners group. How did they get started? What’s their purpose? Are they peculiar to Wisconsin?”

“No, they are not only indigenous to Wisconsin. They’re sprouting up all over the States. I’ve been reading up on them. I think they’re part of this new right-wing movement we see taking over politics. People afraid of losing their freedom. They’re not even sure what they mean by that, but they’re going to hang on to it, goddamn it, no matter what it takes. After their own personal freedoms, their property means the most to many of them. After all, land was what brought their ancestors to America. The Landowners of America group formed about five years ago in reaction to some land-use ordinances that were being passed along the St. Croix River to preserve the riverbank. A lot of farmers and old-timers are in the group.” He paused. She nodded at him, and he continued.

“They see many of the new people who are moving into this area from the Twin Cities and Rochester and Madison as the problem. These rich folk come in, buy up the land at cheap prices, then lay down a bunch of laws so farmers can’t make money on their land, and then the property taxes go sky-high. Many of the old-timers can’t afford to pay those taxes, so they can’t afford to keep their land. And because of the new laws, they can’t sell it for what they think it’s worth. They’re plenty mad.” He needed to stop. He could feel himself getting riled up. He wanted to be levelheaded going into this meeting, and he didn’t need to bore Claire to death.

She touched him on the shoulder, a slight touch, letting him know she was still listening. Then she asked, “What do you think of it all? Are you considered an old-timer?”

“My family is from here, so I’m grandfathered in, so to speak. I believe in moderation. I think some of the new laws—the bluff ordinances, the wetland things—sometimes go too far in trying to preserve an unknown. But I believe we need the laws. I think we need to look at the land in a new way. That it is a gift we have for a while, and then we should be willing to pass it on in better shape than we got it.”

“Better shape?”

“Means different things to different people. Many farmers believe nothing like a couple silos and a pole barn to spruce up a place. Mow everything in sight. No hedgerows for these folks. Myself, I’m partial to trees. First thing I did when I took over my uncle’s farm, I planted five thousand pine trees. I won’t live to see them in their prime, but I’ve been enjoying them every year I’ve been there.” He remembered the weekend they were delivered to his house. It was in early April, frost lifting out of the ground, slightly drizzly day, not a great day to be outside, but excellent tree-planting weather. He had dug holes for hours and then would go back over a row and lay the trees gently on their side. The next pass-through, he would firm the soil around their roots. The rows lined up, and after two days he had his forest planted.

Next to him, he was aware of Claire sighing. Then she said, “I’d like to have a pine tree on my property. I love the way snow sits on their branches in winter.”

T
HEY PULLED UP
to the VFW and got out of the car. The hall was an old barn, still painted red but with
^“
VFW” in huge yellow letters over the door. The front of it was lit up with a floodlight, and twenty cars were lined up in front of the building, half of them pickups. Rich remembered his mom and dad bringing him to square dances here in the late sixties. He had hated coming, thought it was sissy, but when his mom got him out on the floor, he had fun. The whirling and twirling of all the intricate steps made him laugh until his sides ached.

When they stepped through the front door and into the hall, they could hear the noise of chairs being pushed back, people talking. Rich recognized Mr. Brown from the village board meeting. He sat on a stool at the front door and welcomed people. Mrs. Langston was talking to Fred and Darla Anderson up near the podium, but when Claire and Rich walked in, she came right over to the door.

“I am sorry,” she said insincerely to Rich and Claire, “but this is not a public meeting. Members only.” She tilted her head. “I’m sure you understand.”

Rich waited a beat, then reached into his pocket and took out his wallet “I certainly do, Mrs. Langston.” He extracted a membership card. “That’s why I joined. Claire is my guest. I’m sure that’s fine, isn’t it?”

Mrs. Langston shriveled. Her chin pulled in, her eyes sunk, her mouth tightened. “Oh, you are a member. When did that happen?”

“When I heard you were coming to the town board meeting. I wanted to get to know your organization a little better.” A glance at Claire told him she was trying to keep a straight face through this exchange.

Mrs. Langston turned away without a word.

Rich took Claire’s arm and walked her to a folding chair toward the back.