Dead Frenzy (10 page)

He had always assumed that these delightful scenes were similar to what happened between a man and his wife. When he first laid eyes on Mary Lee, he couldn’t help but imagine her as a willing player in the fantasies of his youth. Not long after their vows were taken, he realized that he’d said way too many Hail Marys—he had a good account in heaven that he’d never be able to use.

But today it all changed. What had always been so enticing in that little blue book wasn’t just the action—it was the reaction, the joyful enthusiasm of a willing partner. No indeed, he did not regret all those Hail Marys. He just had to use them up before it was too late. Not a bad night of nymphing. No sir-e-e.

And with that happy thought, he fell asleep.

“But,
Ray, the question is—how do I keep from hurting the woman’s feelings?” As he waited for an answer, Osborne wondered if he was crazy to be asking Ray for advice.

After all, Ray was the one who still harbored hope that he was the right guy for his old high school sweetheart, the New York fashion model who was now on her third divorce, ratcheting up from millionaires to billionaires. Ray seemed oblivious to the fact that life in a rusting trailer home with a lurid leaping fish painted across the front might hold minimal appeal for the lovely Elise.

On the other hand, while Ray might be disappointed in love, he was a free man. A free man with a great excuse for not committing, an excuse that kept other women on the hook for a long, long time. How long does it take to get over a broken heart? Yep, Ray knew how to drag
that
line all right.

For reasons that Osborne could not fathom, at least half a dozen (if you believed Ray) hardworking northwoods females had offered to support the guy’s fishing habit. One promised to build him his own bait shop! Even Mallory, when she drove up from Lake Forest, maintained such a high level of interest in Ray’s comings and goings—and laughed so delightedly at his dumb jokes—that Osborne still had occasion to worry his neighbor might graduate to son-in-law. An alarming thought.

If experience with females counted, Ray was definitely the man to ask. Success was another story, and Osborne’s question had nothing to do with success.

Mulling over Osborne’s dilemma from where he sat at the kitchen table, Ray sipped his coffee. It was his fifth cup. He was so excited about the job Lew had dropped in his lap that it had been hard to get him to focus. Not only a new client but a television star! He had spent the previous evening glued to the Fishing Channel, prepping for his first meeting.

When Osborne finally managed to work in news of the encounter with Bert and Harold, he’d had to settle for a trade: Ray would do his best to intercept the two at the Best Western in exchange for the use of Osborne’s new Subaru station wagon.

“My first impression will be critical, Doc.” Osborne agreed. They both knew the beat-up old pickup with the door frozen shut was not going to inspire confidence.

“But planning to wear that fish on your head?”

“Now that’s different,” said Ray, raising both hands, palms out, in protest. “That’s signature, Doc. That’s style.” Ray never hid the fact that one of his chief goals in life was to have his own fishing show on ESPN. This could be just the break he needed. He was going all out.

“Hey, it’s not the big time, it’s only the Fishing Channel, but it’s a foot in the boat, doncha know. You never know what they need on air, Doc. Gotta give ‘em something
different.
Like I said, something with style. You watch, they’ll be
begging
me.”

“Firing’s more like it.”

“C’mon. I’m a natural. You know that.”

Osborne waited as Ray continued to sip, deep in thought, eyes scanning the road beyond the driveway. The maple armchair could barely hold his lanky six feet five inches as he leaned back, feet thrust out in front and crossed at the ankles. A light drizzle had kept them from having their coffee on the deck, which was fine for a change. Together they could contemplate the view out the kitchen window: all the comings and goings on Loon Lake Road.

Finally, Ray set down his coffee cup. “I think the best thing is to let it run itself out, Doc. The one time I tried to tell a woman I didn’t want to see her anymore, she slugged me. So don’t do that.”

“But I haven’t been
seeing
her! Can’t I just say, ‘Thanks, but no thanks’?”

“You can. You can do that. But she lives right down the road, you use the same post office, you go to the same gas station, the same grocery store … how many times a week would you say you run into Mrs. Anderle?”

Osborne thought hard. “Half a dozen at least but—”

“Doc, do you want to have this hurt puppy look ev-v-ery time you see her? No-o. My advice is to let it fade away. Let her be the one to lose interest. The way you do that is very simple:
stay busy.
If she invites you to dinner, you’ve already made plans. You of all people—you’ve got excuses up the wazoo. Ask Mallory up for a visit. Use this trouble with Erin—say you need to baby-sit. The secret is to be specific so they don’t hear it as an excuse.”

Osborne perked up. “Lew asked me just last night to look at the file on the Schultz murder and suicide. That could turn into a full-blown investigation. I might have to go down to Wausau, maybe Madison…. ”

“There you go. Perfect excuse and no one gets her feelings hurt. Uh-oh,” said Ray, looking past Osborne and out the window. He unlocked his legs and straightened up. “He-e-re’s Brenda.”

“You’re kidding.”

“No siree—it’s Mrs. Anderle with the hourglass figure …” Ray winked at Osborne. “But the fair lady’s sands of time have shifted.”

Up and out of his chair, Osborne was too late to the back door. His visitor had entered.

“Paul, you dickens.” Brenda Anderle’s flushed, cheery face hung in the kitchen doorway like a morning moon. “I tried surprising you two times yesterday. Honest to Pete, you leave early and get home late, don’t you.”

She bustled into the kitchen, clearing the way with a plate of something held out in front like a leaf blower. It was covered with a blue-and-white-checked cloth, which she whipped off with a Houdini flourish to expose a chocolate bunt cake drizzled with white icing.

“Cup of coffee, Mrs. Anderle?” said Ray, gazing hungrily at the cake.

Osborne could have killed him.

“I’d love one—got any cream?” Without waiting for her host, who was reaching for a mug on the rack beside the coffeepot, Brenda bustled her way into his refrigerator, turning her back to them as she scanned the shelves. Ray gave Osborne a big wink.

“Okay, Doc, I’ll be by at eleven. See ya.”

Osborne was speechless. Ray was leaving him alone with Brenda Anderle?

“No, wait, Ray—” Osborne followed him out the back door.

“Sorry, I gotta shower.” Ray dropped his voice. “Hey, you’re a big boy, you can handle this.”

“Okay, okay, but one more thing—did that woman you know at the law firm say anything about Mark?”

“Oh, right. Nothing unusual that she’s aware of except he’s been getting a lot of calls from someone named Cheryl.”

“Cheryl?” Osborne didn’t like the sound of that. “A client maybe?”

“Umm, she didn’t seem to think so.” Ray squinted slightly and turned away. It was a look he had when he knew he was delivering unwelcome news.

“What’s that all about?” said Brenda as Osborne walked back into the kitchen. She had parked herself at the kitchen table, where she took up a little too much space.

As a young wife and mother, Brenda had been quite striking with porcelain skin that looked all the more delicate framed in vermilion curls. And her body in those days was as generous as her laughing mouth. Married to Harvey Anderle, a veterinarian, the family had built their home on Loon Lake Road about the same time as the Osbornes, using the same builder, and they had daughters the same ages as Mallory and Erin.

But while Brenda was invited to substitute in Mary Lee’s bridge game, she never achieved the status of full-time membership. Nor was she ever invited to join the Garden Club. Whatever the reasons Mary Lee and her friends had excluded Brenda, Osborne had always found her to be pleasant and appreciated that she had always been good to his girls even if she did wear too much lipstick.

As far as Harvey went, he was a fly-fisherman in the days when Osborne was devoted to muskies and spinning rods, so the two men had never fished together. When Harvey succumbed to cancer in his mid-fifties, Brenda was left with enough that she could keep their home, which was four mailboxes down the road. The family had been patients of his, of course, and he had, in turn, always used Harvey as a vet.

The problem was that since Harvey’s death, Brenda had continued to cook for two—and eat accordingly. Where once her height carried her full figure well, she now resembled a side-by-side, freezer included. The effect was heightened by her habit of wearing what appeared to be chenille bedspreads festooned with either fruits or animals. Today, she was draped in strawberries.

Osborne reminded himself that she meant well. Still, he could not help noticing that age and weight and lack of exercise were causing her face to fold in on itself. And she still wore too much lipstick. When she smiled, smears ran across her top front teeth. Osborne looked away quickly, realizing he hadn’t heard a word she’d said.

“… So I was thinking maybe this Friday we could try the fish fry at the Pub? They just started serving bluegill.”

“Gee, I’m sorry, Brenda. I’m afraid not. Not this Friday. I’m expecting Mallory—”

“Next Friday then.”

Osborne faltered. He hadn’t given any thought to what he was doing ten days down the road.

“Good. I’ll mark my calendar,” said Brenda as she rose to leave, a satisfied smile on her face. “And don’t you be surprised if you’re surprised a time or two between now and then,” she warned, wagging a finger at him as she poured out her remaining coffee in the sink, then rinsed the cup. She had a way of being in his house as though she belonged there.

“Paul”—she paused at the back door—”I am so happy this is working out. You know, with Mary Lee and Harvey gone—we should do more together. Nothing serious; we’ll just have a good time.” She raised her eyebrows invitingly, giving him another lipstick-streaked smile as she opened the back door and stepped out.

Osborne watched her move her body across the driveway to the road. She stopped to look back and caught him watching her. He waved, she waved, he felt trapped.

 • • •

Osborne hurried through the breakfast dishes. Before heading into town with Ray, he wanted to check his office files for anything he might have on Jack Schultz. Granted they were dental files, but looking at the records of Jack, the wife who left him and their three daughters might jar some other memories. A final cup of coffee in hand, Osborne made his way across the yard to the garage.

On the side of the garage that faced the lake, he had screened in a small porch for cleaning fish. A door in the back of the porch opened into a long, narrow storage area, separated by a wall from the main garage and protected from sunlight and fumes. It was the one space Mary Lee had forgotten about after their home was built. The day she had insisted he deliver his office files to the landfill, he had waited until she left for the grocery store, then carted them up from the basement to this space.

And thank goodness he had. They were proving to be more important than even he had imagined. For one thing, when he opened his practice, he had acquired the records of the retiring dentist whose practice he had purchased, so his files held dental records dating back to the early 1920s. Even though he was retired, Osborne still subscribed to the leading dental journals, which kept him well aware of advances in DNA research and genetic coding, advances that made dental records such as these valuable in ways that dentists of his generation had never anticipated.

The archives worked for him on an emotional level, too. The smell and feel of the triple-folded cards with their pale green grids made him feel like he was in the company of old friends, people for whom he could do something that mattered.

He pulled Jack Schultz’s record. It was as if the man were in his dental chair at that very moment: The dates, the smudged ink notations, the diagram of Jack’s mouth conjured an image as potent as human flesh. They had always talked fishing, of course.

Jack had been a carpenter whose first love was bass fishing. He might not have been the most outgoing of men, but he sure could argue live versus artificial bait. When Jack had run into financial difficulties after his wife left, he had paid his bill with two bookcases he made from trees he’d cut on Osborne’s land. The bookcases still stood in his living room.

Osborne pulled the files on the Schultz girls. He didn’t have the ex-wife’s in this cabinet. Hers would be in a file drawer with those of other patients who had long ago moved away from Loon Lake. But the girls were there with their father: Evelyn, Edith, and Esther. Old-fashioned names today, but popular back then. Evelyn and Esther had both married and settled in Loon Lake. But whatever happened to Edith?

He looked over the Polaroids he had taken of each of the girls from their junior high days. They all had that same genetic crowding of the lower front teeth. Though he’d sent them to Wausau for their orthodontics, he had kept current with their cleanings, with an eye out for any signs of decay on the enamel under their braces.

The expressions on the faces of the younger girls were open and relaxed, if slightly embarrassed. But not Edith’s. Her eyes were so old, too old for a girl barely into her teens. She was the oldest and possibly the one that was most aware of the reasons for the breakup of her parents’ marriage. She was also the one who took her father’s death the hardest—and stepped in to take his place.

Her photo had been taken a year after his suicide when the girls were living with an aunt. Edith was only fourteen but her expression was so tense and knowing that she might have been at least ten years older. The eyes were too solemn. There was no youth in that face.

Osborne walked over to the doorway to examine the photo better in the natural light streaming into the cleaning porch. He knew Jack didn’t murder that teenager. A man who cared so deeply for daughters nearly the same age as the victim? Whose concern for their health and well-being drove him to work late nights in order to have something to barter for their dental care? It didn’t make sense. He could understand Jack murdering his ex-wife—but a child like one of his own?

The victim—her file should be in there, too. Osborne pulled open the drawer holding the files from A to E. As his fingers walked through the B’s, he could recall the sight of the corpse but he couldn’t remember ever hearing how Jack was supposed to have killed her.