Death at Gills Rock (9 page)

T
he wall clock in Cubiak's office ticked toward eight thirty as he flipped through the stack of weekend incident reports. The familiar litany of offenses was numbing: the usual drunken assault at the Rusty Scupper Tap, domestic violence that varied only by address, a half-dozen fender benders, and a plethora of speeding tickets. Did people never learn?

The red light on the phone console flashed.

“Yes?”

“Morning, sir.” Lisa's cheerful greeting broke the spell. Despite working for the sheriff 's department, where the base side of humanity paraded in constant display, his young assistant exuded a never-ending aura of optimism and grace. “How are you today?”

“Fine, thanks.” Did she believe him?

“Good to hear. Doctor Pardy's on line one.”

“Thank you.” He took the call.

“Emma.” Cubiak liked the name, the old-fashioned ring of integrity it conveyed. He liked saying it out loud.

“Dave. Just getting back to you with the official test results on the three gentlemen at Gills Rock. No question, carbon monoxide. Blood levels for each came in around seventy-two hundred ppm. You'll have the paperwork later this morning.”

“How long …?”

“No way of knowing. If the concentration of CO in the room was low, up to half an hour. If the concentration was high, they would have died within two or three minutes.”

“There was nothing obviously wrong with the space heater.”

“Well, something caused the buildup of carbon monoxide.”

Squirrels, thought Cubiak.

Pardy went on. “I've got a call in to the DA as well. Bathard says Blackwell will want an inquest if only to make the cause of death official and rule it an accident.” She hesitated. “Do you want me to call the families or shall you?”

Cubiak heard chatter in the background. Someone trying to get her attention. “I'll do it. Thanks.”

“Any time.”

Pardy hung up. Cubiak gave a half smile. The coroner was not from Door County and like him lacked the penchant for filling time with niceties. The sheriff held the receiver and fished Ida Huntsman's contact information from his wallet. He was punching in the number when the intercom button flashed red again.

“Urgent call for you, sir. Line two.” Lisa was uncharacteristically terse.

Cubiak jumped to the incoming call.

“Sheriff, Walter Nils …”

“I was just phoning your …”

Walter cut him off. “You gotta get up here, Sheriff.”

“Where are you?”

“Gills Rock. At my mother's place.”

“What's going on?”

“Come see for yourself. It's just hateful. How could anyone do this?” Walter's voice was thick, as if he'd been crying. “Hurry, please.”

F
or the second time in three days, Cubiak made the drive north. Nature had not wasted time extending spring's verdant hue up the peninsula. Grass and trees were kissed with a rich halo of green. In Ephraim, golden forsythia bloomed alongside the crocuses and daffodils. Even the landscape past Sister Bay had shed its gloomy mantle. Only the farthest tip of the land retained winter's somber tones.

The last mile to Huntsman's home was almost a repeat of Saturday: the statue-like gulls perched on the rocks, the barking dog still tethered to the willow. The only difference was the clothesline behind the Smitz house. Before, empty; now, laden with laundry: yellow checked sheets and pillowcases, two faded pink towels, several blouses, and a pair of men's long underwear, dingy from overuse and stiff with frost.

Cubiak started the turn into Huntsman's driveway when he braked and stopped. Something was different. On the other side of the road, three of the plumbing vans had been moved from the lot and parked bumper-to-bumper along the front of the building, obscuring the company logo. That's odd, Cubiak thought. As he walked over for a closer look, a woodpecker started hammering into the trunk of a nearby tree. Although the sheriff couldn't see the bird through the foliage, he sensed that his every move was being telegraphed through the forest. Leaning around the hood of the first van he discovered what was hidden behind the lineup of vehicles—a white wall defaced with angry strokes of red paint that spelled out a nasty farewell: Good Riddance.

Cubiak whistled quietly. The bird's staccato concert paused but began again when he picked up a stick and poked at the crimson streak that underlined the message. The paint was fresh. He looked around but the hard ground yielded no footprints.

The vandals hadn't stopped with defacing the shed. At the Rec Room, they'd dislodged the cardboard from the broken window, smashed several other panes of glass, and made deep scratches in the picture window. The woodpecker transmitted a flurry of reports.

Two for two. Had the house been vandalized, as well? Had Ida been harmed? Cubiak was sure Walter would have said something if his mother had been injured. The sheriff passed the area where the bodies had been laid out the previous Saturday. The gazebo was unscathed but splotches of red paint bloomed like algae on the pier and the side of the power boat. The most spiteful damage was to the cabin cruiser in the sling where large red
x
's crossed over the name
Ida Mae
. Again the paint was still wet. And again there were no tracks in the damp grass. Had the vandals been so bold they'd used the brick walkway rather than cut across the lawn?

The yard and dock weren't visible from the village or any of the waterfront homes. This early in the season, there were probably few people out and about anyway. Perhaps the woodpecker had been a witness but the bird had taken its secret language and flown away. Had Ida heard or seen anything?

Walter waited at the back door. Like Esther Smitz, he blocked the sheriff 's way.

“This was in the mail,” he said, jabbing a white envelope at Cubiak.

The envelope, a standard number ten, was unstamped, the address typed: Ida Nils Huntsman.

“It was in the box with the rest of the mail. My mother thought it was a sympathy note.”

Cubiak pulled a sheet of pale blue paper through the slit in the top of the envelope.
THEY GOT WHAT THEY DESERVED
Typed. All caps.

“Someone must have put it there!” Walter said, twisting his hair.

“Do you have any idea who …?”

“No.” Walter slumped into the door jamb and rubbed a jagged thumbnail against his teeth. “Why would anyone do this? I don't understand.”

“How's Ida?”

“I don't know, she's … she's acting pretty strange. You'd better come in.” Walter stepped aside and let Cubiak pass. Big Guy's jackets and boots had been removed from the mudroom, replaced by a petite, yellow plaid coat and a pair of black clogs.

“In here,” Walter said, leading the way through the kitchen and dining room, past the living room and into the first doorway on the right.

They entered the master bedroom, with its sprawling king-size bed, flanked by matching nightstands; two flowered reading chairs by windows that faced the water; a fireplace with a built-in alcove that was neatly stacked with wood; His and Her dressers made of a light wood, pecan maybe; a luxurious en suite bathroom; and a walk-in closet, one side hung with dresses, skirts, blouses, the other empty.

Ida looked up from where she stood on the other side of the room, separated from them by an ocean of mattress. Dwarfed by the bed, she seemed more fragile than when Cubiak had first met her. She held the sleeve of a brown gingham-checked shirt that lay front-side down in front of her.

“Morning, Sheriff,” Ida said as she draped the sleeve down the length of the shirt, aligning the edge with the side seam.

“Mrs. Huntsman,” he said, watching her fold her husband's shirt. In three quick movements, she packaged the piece of clothing into a neat rectangle, the same way his mother had folded his father's shirts.

“Ida, please,” she said, as she inspected her handiwork and added it to the pile at the foot of the bed. The bedspread was covered in stacks of clothing: pants, shirts, sweaters, ties.

“I've finished with the socks and such,” she said, pointing to a black garbage bag by the wall. “Catholic Charities is coming this afternoon. I didn't want to keep them waiting.”

After his father died, Cubiak thought his mother had acted precipitously, waiting only two months to empty his side of the closet. When Lauren and Alexis were run down, he'd been unable to part with anything of theirs for more than a year.

Ida's haste was difficult to comprehend. Was she in shock? Did she realize what she was doing?

“Walter's told you?” she said, reaching for another shirt.

Her son stared at the floor.

“Yes, he's told me. But I'd like to talk to you about it. Perhaps in the kitchen?”

“Of course.” Ida laid the shirt down and dusted off her hands.

Cubiak waited until Walter had poured the coffee—mugs for the two of them and a cup and saucer for his mother—then he pulled the envelope from his pocket and set it on the table.

“Tell me in your own words what happened,” he said to Ida.

The color in her cheeks rose as she stirred her coffee. She took a sip, carefully set the cup down, and looked up at Cubiak.

“Nothing happened. I came out this morning to see if the deer had returned and noticed what looked like red smears on the boat. It was early, just past dawn, and I thought the light was playing tricks on me. You know the way clouds sometimes catch the sunlight and reflect it back? I thought it was sunlight bouncing off the clouds and then off the water and the stern. Anyway, I came outside for a closer look. It was upsetting at first to see my name defaced but I thought it was just kids, you know, being stupid and mean the way kids sometimes are. I didn't notice the company shed until later, when I went out for the mail. So there it was again, more ugly red paint saying that hurtful stuff. And in the box, the envelope.”

“Was it mixed in with the rest of the mail or lying on top?”

“It was right on top, the first thing I saw.”

“And you brought it into the house and opened it?” As he talked, Cubiak extracted the letter and laid it flat on the table, turning it toward Ida.

She blushed again. “Yes.”

“But you didn't call me? Why?”

“I told you, I thought it was kids.”

“You mean teenagers? Punks?”

“Yes.”

“Ma!” Walter leaned forward as if reaching for the note. Then he fell back in his chair and grabbed at the corners of his mouth.

Cubiak wondered if Walter had come to the same conclusion he had: that teenagers pulling a prank wouldn't bother typing and printing out a note; they'd scrawl their nasty message without thinking.

“My son disagrees, but I still believe it. Terrence sometimes had to shoo them away, not just boys, girls too. They came down from the park and snuck around the cabin. There was nothing in there worth stealing, but they wouldn't know that and he thought they might break in.”

Cubiak glanced at Walter. “But you don't think it was kids responsible for the vandalism and the note.”

Walter rubbed his hands together. “At first I didn't. But now, I don't know. Maybe my mother's right.”

Cubiak reached for the note. “You don't need to have this around,” he said.

Ida and Walter watched him fit the letter back into the envelope.

“Doctor Pardy called this morning. Tests confirm that the deaths were caused by carbon monoxide poisoning.”

Walter cleared his throat and stared at the table, but Ida met the sheriff 's glance. “They didn't suffer, then,” she said.

“Very little. If at all.”

“I see.” She sat still for a moment. Then she scooted her chair away from the table. “May I, Sheriff ? I have work to do.”

O
utside, both men glanced at the water as if to confirm that the damage to the pier and the boats hadn't been something they'd jointly imagined.

“You got someone to help with the cabin windows?” Cubiak said.

Walter shook his head. “I don't want people coming by. You know, gawking. I'm just putting up plastic anyhow, from the inside, and I'll put a tarp over the back of the boat so my mother doesn't have to look at it. At least she can't see the company shed from here. I moved the trucks so no one driving by can see the shit on the wall but I won't be able to do anything more until after the funeral.” There was bitterness in his voice.

“You staying up here awhile?”

“Yeah, at least another couple of days.”

They walked side by side across the yard, having to talk over the sound of waves crashing onto the shoreline rocks. “Roger come by?” Cubiak said.

Walter stopped and Cubiak saw the worry about the boy layer over the worry about Ida and the grief about his father. “Roger? How do you know Roger?” He tried to make his voice light.

This was not the time to bring up the incident in Fish Creek. “I saw the article in the paper last spring.”

Walter started down the path again. “Yeah, that was nice, wasn't it? Roger was here last evening. Came to see his grandmother.”

“He'll be back for the funeral?”

“Sure. Why wouldn't he?” Walter spun around. “You'll be there, won't you?”

“Of course.”

“You think it's okay, having the one funeral for all three of them? It's the same people coming for each of them. Be too hard to make them come for one and then another and then again. Better this way, wouldn't you say?”

“Yes. I'm sure. It makes sense.”

G
ood people
, Mabel had said of Terrence Huntsman, his wife, and the others when she served him lunch on Saturday. Clearly, the waitress hadn't spoken for the entire community or the peninsula. Someone resented the three men enough to try and dirty their reputation. Why? The graffiti on the plumbing office looked like the cheap-shot work of kids who didn't like being bossed around.
Good riddance
to whom? Presumably to Huntsman, the one who got on the wrong side of the marauding teenagers. Same with the vandalism on the cabin and dock. The property belonged to Big Guy and was easily accessible. But the note to Ida was cruel. Not the kind of thing a bunch of kids would write. And, the message didn't apply just to Huntsman.
They got what they deserved
meant all three men.