Copper River (25 page)

C
ork recognized the man who accompanied Ren into the cabin. He’d been at the old resort the previous day looking for the boy and for Charlie. The newspaperman. Johnson—was that his name?

“I apologize for barging in like this, Sheriff O’Connor,” the man said. Despite the barging in, he’d stopped a discreet distance from Cork’s bunk. “I explained to Ren the necessity.”

“Is it okay?” Ren asked, looking concerned.

“It’s okay,” Cork said. Then he addressed the man, who once again reminded him of some bulky kitchen appliance with powerful legs attached. “You called me Sheriff. What exactly do you know?”

“Mind if I pull up a chair?”

“Might as well,” Cork said. “This feels like it could take a while.”

Johnson—Cork remembered his first name now: it was Gary—took a chair from the table, swung it close to the bunk, and sat down. Despite his size, his movements had the fluid grace of an athlete. Ren hovered in the background, still looking as if he were afraid he’d done something wrong.

“I apologize for prying, but it’s pretty much the nature of my job, eh.” Johnson smiled.

“Just tell me what you know.”

“First of all, let me explain that all this is mostly by accident. On the other hand, what I know about reporting is that if you’re good, you somehow end up in the right place at the right time. See, I thought Charlie might show up here, so I hiked over early this morning to keep an eye out for her.”

“Hiked?” Cork shifted his hurting body and winced. “You came in on the Killbelly Marsh Trail?” He was thinking of the boot tracks.

“That’s right.” The newspaperman rubbed his hands together, fingers thick as brats. “I set up my stakeout behind the shed. As it got light, I noticed the bullet holes in the car parked back there. I took a good look and discovered blood all over the front seat. Believe me, that struck every reporting nerve in me. I didn’t have the patience to wait around hoping for a glimpse of Charlie. I hoofed it back to my office and began making phone calls.

“Sheriff Corcoran O’Connor of Tamarack County, Minnesota, currently suspended from duty for failing to comply with a regulation requiring psychological counseling following involvement in an officer-related shooting.”

He paused for a breath.

“Also very recently implicated in the murder in Winnetka, Illinois, of one Benjamin Jacoby, although according to my sources the police don’t really consider you a suspect. At the moment, however, they’re quite concerned that you’ve disappeared during the course of their investigation. The car with the bullet holes came from a lot in Kenosha, Wisconsin. Honest John’s Quality Used Cars, to be exact, purchased with cash by a man who signed as Liam O’Connell. Three nights ago, police in Kenosha investigated a report of shots fired at the Lake Inn and the disappearance of the man who’d checked into Room 111, a man registered as Liam O’Connell and whose description—medium height, medium weight, thinning red-brown hair—would certainly fit you.” He paused, opened his big hands as if expecting something to be delivered into them, and said, “So who tried to kill you in Kenosha, Sheriff?”

“You’re a pretty smart guy. Why don’t you tell me?”

“Could have been a random act of violence, I suppose. But that would be a pretty big coincidence, eh.” Johnson sat back and the joints of the chair creaked. “From what I understand, this man murdered in Winnetka was from a connected family. The father’s a real hard-ass, blames you for his son’s death. Nobody would confirm this but I suspect, given the man and his connections, that he’s put out a contract on your life.”

“Suppose that were true, think all your poking around has helped my situation any?

Johnson nodded seriously. “I did my best to be discreet, Sheriff.”

“You haven’t done me any favors, Mr. Johnson.”

“Gary. Call me Gary, eh.” He leaned toward Cork again, and again the chair complained. “Look at it from my perspective. I see you here yesterday, limping, with a bulge near your crotch that’s got nothing to do with anatomy. Then I stumble across that shot-up car of yours. Charlie’s missing, her old man’s dead. So I’m trying to put together a lot of disparate pieces of information, thinking that the more I know, the clearer the whole picture will become.”

“What’s going on has nothing to do with that girl’s situation.”

“I know that now.” Johnson nodded toward the bloodied jeans Cork had dropped in a heap on a chair near the table. “You were hit in the Kenosha shootout. You came up here hoping Jewell could fix you. How bad is it?”

“I’ll live. These sources you mentioned, who are they?”

“Colleagues.”

“Chicago reporters?”

The man only stared at him, but Cork sensed that he’d hit the nail on the head.

“Great,” he said. “Now they’re down there asking all the wrong questions of all the wrong people.”

Cork wanted to get up out of the bunk and slug the man, but he didn’t have the strength, and what good would it do now? He heard a vehicle drive up outside. Ren opened the door.

“Mom!” he called.

A minute later the others walked in. Gary Johnson stood up politely in their presence and said, “Hello, Jewell. Ms. Willner. Hey there, Charlie. Come on in and join the party, eh.”

R
en stood back, feeling bad, as if he’d failed because he hadn’t protected Cork from the newspaperman. Mr. Johnson had surprised him with the things he already knew, and he’d talked in a convincing way about how he needed to see Cork in person so he could help straighten everything out. Ren liked Mr. Johnson but he couldn’t help thinking now that the newspaperman had tricked him. Ren didn’t believe that he’d been stupid, said anything he shouldn’t. Still, he felt lousy.

He leaned against the wall next to the door. Charlie stood beside him. The adults were all clustered near the bunk where Cork lay covered to his waist with a bedsheet.

“Look, Jewell,” the newspaper reporter was saying, “some terrible things have happened in Bodine over the last couple of days. I’m just trying to figure them out.”

“You have no idea of the trouble you could be causing, Gary.”

Ren could tell she was furious.

“I think I do. I also think I could help if you’d let me,” Johnson said.

While his mother and Mr. Johnson went back and forth, nobody else said anything. They were old friends, Ren knew, whose relationship went all the way back to when they were kids. He’d seen his mother tear into the man on many occasions when they disagreed over local issues. This was different. This was about family.

“I know the sheriff’s situation has nothing to do with Charlie and what happened to Max,” Johnson said. “I’d like to hear what she knows about her dad’s death.” He swiveled and eyed Charlie.

Ren eased closer to her so that their arms touched. Something in the way she looked at him sent a little electric jolt down his body, and he had to avert his eyes.

Mr. Johnson went on: “Three extraordinary events have occurred in town over the last two days. In a place like Bodine it’s hard to believe they’re not connected, eh. I’ll tell you what I see. One”—he held up his index finger—“Max is killed and Charlie runs away. Two: The next day a girl’s body is fished out of the lake. Not just any girl but someone with a connection to Providence House where we all know Charlie sometimes hangs out when her father’s on a tear. Three: That same evening, Stuart Gullickson is the victim of a hit-and-run that nearly kills him. Stuart is a friend of Charlie’s. You see what I see? Charlie’s linked to everything.”

“I didn’t do anything,” Charlie snapped at him.

“I didn’t say you did,” he said calmly. “But I believe you have a pretty good idea of what’s going on.”

“All we did was see her body, that’s all.”

“Where?”

Ren saw Cork raise his hand in an attempt to stop Charlie, but it was too late.

“In the Copper River,” she said.

Cork sat back, as if what happened now didn’t matter.

“In the river?” His large brow formed a puzzled overhang that shadowed his eyes.

“We didn’t really,” Ren said. “Stash did.”

“Stash?”

“Stuart,” Charlie clarified. “He saw it. Then Ren and me went looking for it that night and someone else was looking for it, too, on a boat. They saw us.”

He nodded slowly, and Ren figured he was putting things together.

“So they were afraid you might say something and went to your father’s place looking for you but found him instead. And he wouldn’t give you away.” He eyed Ren. “But nobody’s come after you?”

“They think it was Stash who was with Charlie. That’s why they tried to run him over.”

The man addressed Jewell. “Do the police know all this?”

“No,” she replied. “It sounded pretty far-fetched. We’ve been trying to get hold of something more solid we could offer them.”

“Have you?”

“Not yet. What are you going to do, Gary?”

He shook his head a moment, considering. “This is a lot just to sit on. I can’t believe the police haven’t put some of this together already.”

“The sheriff’s investigator probably doesn’t know Bodine. He may not realize the connection between Charlie and the dead girl. And there’s no way he’d connect Stuart with any of this.”

“What about Ned Hodder? He’d know.”

“I’m not sure what Ned’s told him,” Jewell said. “As I understand it, it’s not Ned’s jurisdiction. Gary, promise me you won’t talk to Ned. If anyone says anything to him, it should be us.”

“You’re asking a lot.”

“We could just tie you up and keep you in a closet until all this is finished,” Dina offered.

Ren laughed, but no one else did and he shut up quickly.

Mr. Johnson turned to her. “Dina Willner. Don’t think I don’t know about you.”

“Then you know not to mess with me.”

Mr. Johnson slowly stood. He towered over Dina. The way the two of them faced off reminded Ren of a sleek cougar confronting a grizzly bear.

“Wolverine two-time all-American defensive tackle,” Mr. Johnson said.

“Twenty years and thirty pounds ago,” she countered.

Cork laughed. “Gary, if she decides to wrestle you into a closet, believe me, you don’t stand a chance.”

Mr. Johnson said, “What I do or don’t do will be because of Jewell and Ren and Charlie, because they’re important to me.”

Dina stared at him in a way that, had it been Ren, he’d have melted in a puddle of terrorized flesh.

“Despite your vocation,” she finally said, “I believe you’re not a bad guy at heart. I suggest you listen to that heart.”

“He’s on our side, really,” Ren’s mother offered.

“I’ll have to take your word on that,” Dina said.

“Tell you what I’ll do.” Mr. Johnson turned himself so that he spoke, more or less, to all the adults. “No more calls that might jeopardize you, Sheriff.”

“I appreciate that.”

“And I won’t do anything that might expose Charlie or Ren to any more danger than they might be in already. But I want a promise.”

“What?” Ren’s mother said.

“That in the end this story is mine, Jewell. You don’t talk to the
Mining Journal
. You don’t talk to
60 Minutes
. You talk to me.”

“All right.”

Dina said, “You’re used to reporting church suppers and town council meetings. What makes you think you can handle a story like this?”

Johnson glanced at Jewell. “You want to tell them?”

“Gary’s got a Pulitzer,” she said.

Dina looked at him skeptically. “For publishing the
Marquette County Courier
?”

“I returned to Bodine five years ago to take over the paper when my father died. For ten years before that I was a correspondent for the
New York Times
. Covered Desert Storm, then Africa. I’ve been in more firefights than most combat soldiers, Ms. Willner. Wounded twice. Care to see the scars?”

“I’ll pass,” she said.

“One more thing.”

They all waited. Mr. Johnson swung his eyes toward Ren and Charlie.

“Don’t do anything stupid,” he said seriously. “I’m pretty fond of you all.” He nodded in parting and started toward the door. “If I hear anything I think you ought to know, I’ll tell you, okay?”

“Thanks, Gary.”

“All this in Bodine.” He shook his head.

“Know what this reminds me of?” Ren’s mother said as he opened the door. “Tom Messinger.”

He stood a moment looking out at the afternoon. “Another sad chapter in the history of Bodine.” He closed the door behind him.

Cork watched until Mr. Johnson drove away, then he turned to Jewell. “A Pulitzer prize? Jesus, did I underestimate him. And who’s this Tom Messinger?”

“The boogeyman,” Ren said.

“Don’t, Ren,” Jewell said. “Tom was no monster. He was just a kid who did something…incomprehensible.”

“What?” Cork asked.

“It was more than twenty years ago,” Jewell said. “Ancient history.”

“I’d like to hear it.”

“A girl was found in Lake Superior just south of town. She turned out to be a runaway. Murdered. For a while it didn’t appear that it would be solved. Then Tom Messinger hung himself in his mother’s basement. There was a note in his pocket confessing to the murder. It was tough on everybody in Bodine. Tom was a decent kid. We all liked him. He quarter-backed the football team, was looking at a full scholarship to his choice of schools. It was so bizarre.”

“How’d it happen? Any idea?”

“It was right after the Bobcats won the championship that year.”

“According to the sign at the edge of town, the only year,” Dina said.

“So you can imagine it was a big deal around here,” Jewell went on. “The Lion’s Club threw a team banquet at the Ramada in Marquette. I was supposed to go. I’d been dating Ned, but we broke up. Anyway, after the banquet a bunch of the guys went to a cabin one of the parents owned and they had a party of their own, with alcohol, grass, whatever. As nearly as anyone can figure, when Tom was driving home from the party, he picked up the girl, who was probably hitchhiking. Exactly what happened after that only Tom knew for sure. He killed himself over it. Devastated his mother. The whole town, actually. It was a terrible shock.”

Ren said, “If you go to the football field at midnight on Halloween and say his name three times his ghost is supposed to appear.”

“Ren,” his mother said, casting a cold eye his way.

“That’s what everybody says.” He suddenly remembered something. “Hey, we know where Sara Wolf’s body came from.”

Dina looked at Cork. “Is that true?”

He smoothed the sheet over his legs. “I think we have an interesting speculation. Go ahead, Ren. You tell them.”

Ren waited, savoring their anticipation. “The Copper River Club.” He saw the consternation in their faces. “We figured it’s the only place upriver where someone could drop the body easily.”

“The Copper River Club?”

It was clear to Ren that Dina had no idea what he was talking about. He explained, “It’s a big private area in the Huron Mountains where only really rich people can go. We tried to get up there to have a look but Mr. Stokely stopped us.”

“Stokely?” his mother said, scowling. “Isaac or Calvin?”

“Calvin.”

“I don’t know what the connection might be between the girl and the folks up there,” Cork put in, “but I think it’s worth checking.”

Ren saw a dark dawning on his mother’s face.

“I think I know what the connection might be. Delmar Bell.”

“Delmar Bell?” Cork asked.

Dina said, “The handyman at Providence House.”

“He and Calvin Stokely have been best friends since they were kids,” Jewell said. “And for a long time they partnered driving semis cross-country. I’ve never seen Calvin’s place, but I understand he has a cabin on Copper River Club property, right on the river itself.”

“I’ve seen it,” Ren said. “It’s spooky.”

Cork said, “You know these men, Jewell. Think they’re capable of doing this kind of thing?”

From the expression on her face, Ren could easily believe his mother was in real pain. “I’ve never dealt with this kind of thing,” she replied. “I would’ve thought it took a monster, somebody whose face you could look at and see the horror they’re capable of. I don’t know. I honestly don’t know.”

Cork turned his attention to Charlie. “You’ve got to talk to the police now. They need to know.”

“No way.” She stiffened against the wall. “I’m not talking to anybody.”

“What about Constable Hodder?” Ren said. “You know him. He’s all right.”

She didn’t reply.

Ren’s mother said, “You won’t be alone, Charlie. We’ll be there with you the whole way, promise.”

Charlie folded her arms across her chest. “They’ll put me in juvenile detention. I’ve been there and I hate it. I hate cops.”