Dead Dogs and Englishmen (13 page)

“How on earth could you be reading my material ‘in a way'? Either you're reading it or you're not.”

“Yes, that's true, but …”

“My God, Emily! Spit it out. Do you find my writing so bad you can't speak its name aloud?”

“That's not it at all.”

“Then, for heaven's sakes, my dear woman, would you please say whatever you've called to say.”

“Lila gave me the wrong book. This isn't about Noel Coward. Not even a biography … well … I'm just guessing …”

“Oh, that.” He covered the phone and had a conversation with someone nearby. I could hear laughter, a few more words, and then he was back. “But Emily. That was the point of our contract. You aren't to tell anyone, certainly not Jackson, what you're editing. Let him believe what he wants to believe. What I've really written is fiction, you see. That was one of the reasons I agreed to have you do the edit. Jack said you wrote fiction. For a biography I would have had someone who was at least slightly familiar with Noel Coward. I should have thought you'd figure that out by yourself.”

“This is fiction?”

“What on earth did you think you were reading? My life story?”

“No … but …”

“Oh, I see. You poor thing. It's because of my hand. You think I wrote about my own traumatic knuckle loss, don't you?” He laughed. Laughter came from behind him. “But let me tell you the banal story of my knuckle debacle, dear.”

I settled back into my desk chair, feeling not stupid but angry, as if I'd been had by that pair—yet again
. Oh, let's shock the rube
… They'd been waiting for my call: expecting me to be upset, to feel sorry for Cecil. All a big joke.

“It happened when I was seven,” he went on, a touch of boredom in his voice. “My father bought a new car and I was eager to be taken for a ride. My mother was as excited as I. She pushed me into the car but closed the door too soon. The door took the end of my finger off, making it very difficult to impress people when I expose my middle digit.”

He laughed. I was supposed to but didn't.

“So, is this what you want me to edit?” I kept my voice cool and business-like. “Is it a mystery? If so, I'll edit it with an eye to the conventions of the genre. If not, and you intend it to be something else, I've got to know before I continue.”

“Oh, a horror novel, of course. And now that we've gotten all of that out of the way, what do you think of my effort so far?”

I hesitated. My first inclination was to tell him his writing stunk and his way of doing business stunk even worse.

“I haven't really read enough,” I said. “Since you weren't honest with me, I stopped in the first chapter. I thought I had the wrong manuscript and that I had no business going any farther.”

“Oh, no …” He chuckled again. “But that proves you're a person to be trusted. I don't want word of this novel getting out until it's ready to see the light of day. That's why the subterfuge. Now we'll be on solid ground. Please, continue to read my poor effort at fiction. Edit as you see fit. But you must not, under any circumstances, reveal the true nature of my work to anyone. Back in England, well, I do have a certain kind of reputation to protect. I have enemies who would love to get their hands on the manuscript, thinking it something they could use against me. A man as wealthy as I, Emily, doesn't get to where I've gotten without a few malcontents left along the road. Do you see what I'm saying? It's all part of a huge game, Emily. Certainly you know that by now. I play my game. You play yours. My enemies play theirs. And in the end, it comes to nothing but death. A game. You do see that, don't you?”

“I see fine,” I said, still seething.

“Then you'll edit my novel.”

I hesitated. The money was in my bank and I'd written a couple of checks on the account. I wasn't in a position to give him his fifteen hundred dollars back. And anyway—now that things were cleared up—what did it hurt me to finish the job? Maybe I'd have to tell a few lies to Jackson. Or I could simply say I couldn't discuss the project, he'd seen me sign the non-disclosure contract. What I was finding was that the poor didn't have room for a whole lot of moral reservations.

“Yes, I'll work with you. I should have these five done this afternoon. Could we meet tomorrow morning? You have more chapters for me?”

“Oh, my dear, not tomorrow morning. We have some very important guests here. I wouldn't be able to sit down for minute. How are you Sunday morning? About nine? I'll have another check ready.”

Nine was fine. I'd get it out of the way early.

“And don't forget our party a week from tomorrow. Bring anyone you'd like to bring. Lila and I are so looking forward to it.”

I promised I'd be there and that I was—at that very moment—choosing between costumes, and hung up.

By four, I was dripping sweat from the still heat. Sorrow sat beside me as I read and marked the manuscript. He leaped up at every move I made, hoping it was time to get on to something more interesting. Hot, feeling tired and dirty, and suffering from eye strain, I agreed with him. A short walk. Move the hose in the garden. A swim before dinner. Later, I'd call Dolly. See what happened to her. She was supposed to let me know about the dead woman out on Old Farm Road. But first there was doggy business to attend to.

_____

The water was unruffled. Not a breeze. The willows along the shore hung unmoving, branches touching the surface of the lake. Mosquitoes didn't come to the middle of the lake where I floated, only a skating bug or two, and two curious crows overhead, looking down at me, commenting to each other. The beaver didn't bother to raise his head to see who disturbed his quiet. He swam in slow circles around his stick hut, ignoring me and ignoring Sorrow, who usually infuriated him.

I'd slipped on an old pink bikini, much washed out, maybe a little too small but Sorrow made no comment so I figured I was fine. I flipped over and out of the bra a few times, tucked myself back where I belonged, and took long slow strokes, stopping to drip cool water on my warm face. I put my tongue out and lapped at some of the drops. I asked myself, not for the first time, how had I ever lived anywhere but here? I was developing the contempt Henry David Thoreau had felt for civilization: for any occasion requiring new clothes. I could find my own food. I could live in solitude without ever feeling alone.

Maybe I wasn't like Thoreau. I had running water, an inside toilet, a writing studio, a fridge, a stove, a supermarket not too far away, and I wasn't planting acres of beans. Who cared? I rolled over, looked my wet and happy dog in the eye, and laughed.

“Hey!” A call came from the shore.

Dolly Wakowski, with a man beside her, stood on the end of my dock. She waved me in, an arm making frantic circles. I narrowed my eyes and wiped away the lake water so I could see. The guy was about my age. Taller than Dolly—but who wasn't? He stood with his hands in the pockets of his light summer slacks. Pretty good looking. Black hair. Trim, maybe even muscular. I turned around a time or two, paddling, then struck out for the dock. There was a towel there, at their feet; a raggedy old towel I used for swimming since I would never put it out for company. I felt around under the water, making sure the bikini covered all it was meant to cover, then relaxed, thinking, oh well, if it didn't, this guy was going to get a good look at what most men never got to see.

“Jeffrey Lo,” Dolly introduced
the man standing beside her. She kept her eyes down as she concentrated on not looking at me.

I scrambled up, as modestly as possible, onto the dock.

Jeffrey Lo stood against the sun, lowering in the western sky, getting lost among the treetops. He was Asian, a little taller than I, with warm skin, very dark eyes, and a nice smile. His blue summer suit didn't have a wrinkle. His tie was perfectly knotted. Maybe his white Nikes didn't go with the rest of him, but the guy might just be into comfort.

When I took the hand he held out to me, it was warm, the kind of hand that curves around yours and makes you feel enveloped. I grabbed the towel around my body as best I could, dripping lake water and feeling the blood rushing into my face. As he let go of my hand, I felt a sense of loss, as if I'd been tossed out into a lonely world again.

Jeffrey Lo was one of those guys who could make my knees go weak. A high school kind of thing I was never proud of, when a gangly boy would dip his head down to mine and kiss me ever so lightly on the cheek and I would look up and bat my eyelashes … even back then I kind of made myself sick.

“Emily,” he said, bowing slightly. “Nice to meet you.”

I gave a half shrug. It would have been lovely to meet him too, if I weren't having the sexual spasms of a sixteen-year-old and if I knew what the two of them were doing standing on my dock.

“Mr. Lo's with the INS, out of Detroit,” Dolly said.

I gave him a quizzical look. I didn't have a clue what INS was.

“Immigration and Naturalization Service,” he explained.

I nodded, still very much in the dark.

“Could we go up to your house, Miss … eh … Kincaid … ?”

“Emily.”

“Emily. We need to talk about the murder you two have been investigating.”

I motioned for them to go ahead of me. Better that than to think of him watching me from the back as I made my way through the bracken to my deck. Wet bikinis from behind aren't pretty no matter what size the butt they're covering.

Inside the house I told them to sit. Time to get shorts and a tee shirt on though I was already sweating and wishing I could have stayed in the wet bikini. When I got back to the living room Dolly and Jeffrey Lo were deep in conversation, heads bent close. They stopped as soon as I entered the room. I offered iced tea, made some, served it—with the last of the ice in the trays—and sat, looking expectantly at Mr. Lo.

Dolly began. “We've ID'd the dead woman. I'll let Agent Lo, here, explain it to you. And nothing for the paper, Emily. I told him about our special arrangement that you only put in what I say …”

“I choose what I put in.” I snapped. I was no police flunky when I'd been a full-time journalist and wasn't about to become one now. I was smart enough not to blab things that could hurt a police case but that was all. Despite working with Dolly so closely, I was a good reporter and took pride in that. Every once in a while Dolly got the idea that withholding information from one of my stories was a good idea. So, every once in a while, I had to bring her back to earth.

“Yeah, well,” she shrugged and rolled her eyes at Agent Lo. “Anyway, he understands you've been a big help and says he's okay with it.”

Jeffrey Lo nodded, cleared his throat, and started:

“The woman's name is Maria Santos. She was an agent with the Secretaria de Gobernacion Instituto Nacional de Migracion.” Impeccable Spanish. The guy was truly smooth. “That's the Mexican form of what I do: immigration, emigration, naturalization. Mexico City got in touch with our office in Washington when Agent Santos disappeared. My office in Detroit sent me up to look around. The first thing I came across was your unidentified woman who could be Mexican and was dead up here in Leetsville. Got a photo and prints. Sent them to Mexico and got a positive ID. So I'm here for as long as it takes. This is now a government problem and an international crime.”

He waited as if I might have questions. I couldn't think of a thing or, rather, I had many questions but hadn't put them together.

“Agent Santos wasn't here on official business. A cousin of hers in Oaxaca called her about another of their cousins, Acalan Diaz. Acalan came to northwest Michigan with his wife and two children to work on a farm. The cousin told Maria Santos that Acalan was worried. He called and said there was bad trouble up here. What Maria learned from the Oaxacan cousin was that Diaz got threats after working on a particular farm. She was told the threats got so bad he was afraid for his life.” Lo sat back and cleared his throat.

“Did he know which farm this Acalan was talking about?” I asked.

“I don't think even Agent Santos knew. When she got here Acalan Diaz was gone, along with his family. She found where Acalan last worked and went out there. That's what the officer and I learned today.” He nodded toward Dolly. “We talked to the farmer this morning. I don't think the problem was with this particular farm, do you, Dolly?”

She shook her head at him. “Everybody knows Joe Swayze. Good man. Family's been up here a hundred years or more. Used to run the grange. I'd be very surprised if Joe was into anything bad.”

Lo went on. “This Joe Swayze said a woman came to talk to him last week. She wanted to know what was going on with Diaz, but all Swayze could tell her was that Diaz never said where he'd
worked before. Now he and his family are gone. He said the
workers are all getting nervous. Oh, and he'd just heard from one of the men that a dead dog was found on Diaz's doorstep one morning.”

I sat back, taking it all in: more dead dogs, threats. Drugs was the only thing I could come up with. Or that “coyote” revenge.

“Agent Santos wasn't here officially. We got that from her boss in Mexico City. They couldn't send her here for that kind of complaint. It would have been reported to us and we'd take it from there. What Agent Santos did was ask for time off to come on her own to investigate, and then she stayed in touch with her boss. I learned that while she was here she stayed in a motel in Kalkaska. We got the name and phone number from Mexico. I've been through her room and found nothing we didn't already know—except for a phone number, which I had traced, and that was this Swayze's farm.”

“So Acalan Diaz went back to Mexico? Why?” I asked. “Didn't he know his cousin was coming?”

“The family's not in Mexico as far as anyone there knows. No one in Oaxaca has seen any of them. But he could have gone to another state to find work. He hasn't been heard from. They're all worried about him and his family, and sick about what's happened to Agent Santos.”

I looked at Dolly, who made a weird face and shrugged her shoulders. International crime wasn't exactly her forte nor was it mine. We were in way over our heads.

“How can I help?” I asked, looking to Dolly to make sure I wasn't treading on any toes here. She nodded at me.
‘In this together.'
I could hear her now. There were times the woman's Three Musketeers spirit was amazing.

“We're breaking the story and want you to contact your editor, get it in fast. Got her photo.” He leaned over and handed me a picture of the woman I'd only seen dead on the littered floor of the Old Farm Road house.

“Actually INS protocol dictates that I conduct my own investigation, separate from yours. But, to tell you the truth, I need you and the deputy here because you know the people, the farmers. If I did this on my own I'd be starting so far back it would take me months to catch up. I need to talk to anybody who might have seen or heard something that could help. What I've learned so far is that the Mexican workers have been leaving the farms, and just a month before harvest starts. I've got to find where they're going and what's scared everybody so bad.”

“Do you think the Diazes are dead?” I asked.

“No idea.”

I looked over at Dolly. “Okay, let me get the story in first. I'll call Bill, give him a heads up.” I sat down at the laptop on my living room desk and made quick notes of everything Lo could give me. Lots of huge, unanswered questions. What brought the agent here? What did she discover that led to her death? Where was her cousin and his family? Most of all: what was going on? I ended the article with a plea to anyone who could help and gave the phone number of the Leetsville police station and the INS office in Detroit.

I e-mailed the story to Bill, with the photograph, then called him, explaining what was happening. I said I was staying close to Dolly and the INS agent, and would be in touch.

My part was finished.

I thought.

Lo leaned forward, hands clasped together. “What I need from both of you now is your help. You guys could save me weeks of interviews. You know, cut right to the chase. Dolly here's been looking into Agent Santos's death already. You've both been interviewing farmers. I've got all that, but what I need are the names of other farmers who might know something, who might still have workers on their places. I don't want to step on any toes here …” He looked meaningfully at Dolly, who dipped her head, agreeing. “I think we'll move along a lot faster if we work together. I guess that's all I'm saying. I'd like you to be a part of it, Emily.”

This guy knew how to smile. He melted me right into line. It was to my benefit anyway, I told myself as I smiled back at him—a big, simple-minded grin like I sometimes caught on Sorrow's face when he was thrilled to pieces with the idea of a new toy.

Outside, in the driveway, standing next to Dolly's battered police car, we agreed to meet in the morning. EATS was decided on despite Dolly's objections and the drawbacks of everybody listening to our conversation.

“Hey, Dolly.” I brought her up short. “You'll have to get over your snit sooner or later. The one thing I've learned about a place like EATS is how much help we can get there. You know as well as I do that if we need a farmer's name or ideas for places to contact migrant workers, EATS'll have somebody sitting in a booth right next to us who can help. And what nobody else knows, Eugenia will.”

She agreed after a couple of grudging remarks about people who should mind their own business.

“If you didn't give people things to worry about they wouldn't be in your face,” I said, then smiled at a puzzled Agent Lo.

“Dolly's got this thing …” I started.

“Watch it!” she warned me.

“She's got this thing about the people in Leetsville. Seems they try to take care of each other and worry about each other and help each other. Dolly doesn't like that.”

Lo gave me an odd look, then turned it on Dolly.

“Let's just keep this to police business,” Dolly growled at both of us.

I spread my hands, letting them know that was fine with me—business only.

I stood under the arbor waving as they backed up my driveway, through the birch trees, and out to Willow Lake Road.