Mariner's Compass (39 page)

Friday morning, I went to the cemetery alone and took flowers to his grave, standing there for a moment, still trying to grasp that this man was a member of my family. On the way back, I stopped at the mortuary and asked for one thing to be changed on his headstone. It would read—Garrett Jacob Chandler—so he’d at least have part of his real identity back in death. I realized after looking through everything, including his last letter, that he’d left no clue to his last name. I would never know who he really was, and perhaps that was as it should be. Then I drove out to my mother’s grave and just sat with her awhile. The roses Daddy and I had left were already wilted, but I’d brought some tulips from her brother’s garden to replace them. On the way out, I stopped by Jack’s grave and brushed the grass off his flat stone. Leaving the cemetery, my heart felt lighter than it had in years. I felt like I’d hiked a treacherous mountain and was now taking long strides downward on a clear, smooth trail.

Gabe and I talked every morning and every night. The break, I think, had done us good. We were ready to start on this next leg of the journey together that would, I hoped, carry on for many more years to come. I went out to the ranch and told the story to Daddy and Dove. I asked for my father’s forgiveness, which he gave without hesitation. Seeing how quickly he gave me grace, I rethought my feelings about my uncle, and my heart softened just a little. I never told them my suspicions about who I thought my uncle was and I never would.

On Saturday, my last day in Morro Bay, Emory came by to see if I was all right. He’d had breakfast with Gabe.

“He’s really itching for you to come home tomorrow,” Emory said, sitting on the sofa, watching me carefully wrap my mother’s wooden portrait in tissue paper.

“The feeling’s mutual,” I said, touching a finger to my mother’s smooth brow before covering it with tissue.

“He said he’d leave a light on.”

“He doesn’t have to. I could find him in the pitch-black dark.”

He came over and put his arm around my shoulders. “So, how are you, really?”

“I don’t know. All of this happened so fast. It’s hard to believe the two weeks are up tomorrow and I’ll be back home as if nothing happened.”

“Only plenty did.”

I nodded. “My journey has certainly felt rather like Odysseus’s.”

“With a dog named Scout, not Argos.”

Hearing his name, Scout got up from where he lay in front of the fireplace and nosed Emory’s leg. Emory reached down and scratched his chest. Scout stretched his neck in pleasure and smiled in that way that I knew would always make me laugh.

“Scout’s the best thing to come out of this,” I said. “Well, I came to know my mother better, too. That’s something.”

“That’s definitely something, sweetcakes. So, when can I write my story?”

I looked into his kind green eyes. “I don’t know. Maybe never.”

He took my hands in both of his and squeezed them gently. “I’ll ask again in a month or so.”

After he left I watered the plants and pulled weeds in my uncle’s garden. I went down to the nursery near the highway and bought some more red tulips to replace the ones I’d uprooted around the lava-stone birdbath, which Rich and Gabe had set back in place. Maybe, when I sold the house, I’d keep the birdbath. Eventually Gabe and I would buy a house together, and this birdbath in my future flower garden would be a reminder of the sad, troubled man who meant so much to my mother and whose blood did indeed run through my veins.

By eight o’clock that evening, I had everything done that needed to be. My duffel bag and Scout’s dog dish were already loaded in the truck. I’d put his fancy dog bed in first thing in the morning. Feeling as restless as a couple of barn cats, Scout and I walked out to Morro Rock and sat out there, watching the pier lights snap and blink across the dark ocean. I thought about my mother and the brother she lost, then found again—right before he lost her to death—about how our losses form a big part of who we are, soften us or harden us, depending on how we take them, how glad I was that I’d never told Dove or Daddy about my suspicions about Jacob Chandler—my uncle Garrett—being my father. That would have been a wound that would have taken a long time, if ever, to heal.

It was almost 11:30 p.m. when I got back to the Embarcadero. It was a busy evening since the weather was balmy and spring was definitely here. I stood on the dock next to a bar called Harpoon Hank’s that was well known for being a place where singles liked to meet and connect. The band was good with a lead singer who had a decent, whiskey-soaked voice. He was singing “Stardust” in a gravelly, Willie Nelson way when I felt a tap on my shoulder.

“Thought I’d find you somewhere down here,” Rich said. “I was afraid you’d leave without saying good-bye.”

“You know I’d never do that.”

“I’m going to miss you,” he said, bending over and giving the back of Scout’s ears an affectionate scrub. “Not to mention
el lobo
here.”

“We’re only twelve miles away. We’ll visit you. We have to. I’ve become addicted to Rich Trujillo’s famous Mexican cuisine.”

“I’ll expect regular visits. You haven’t tasted my
ropa vieja.”

“I promise Scout and I will come back often.”

“What are you going to do with the house and all that money?”

“Sell it and split the money between the Historical Museum, the Wood-carvers’ Museum, the Humane Society, and the new drug rehabilitation center that’s part of the homeless shelter. That seems right to me, considering how he earned some of it. And I want to send some money to the real Jacob Chandler’s sister in Texas. Money can’t replace all those years she didn’t know what happened to her brother, but I feel like I should do something. And I’m going to give Beau Franklin twenty thousand dollars.”

“Even though you suspect he was investing it in drugs?”

“Yes. I don’t think what he did was right, but I can’t think of a better place for it to go than for medicine for his wife. I’ve talked to Amanda, my attorney, and I’m going to pay the rent and utilities for Tess Briggstone’s store for the next year. That should help her out without me worrying about her taking the money and handing it over to her flaky sons or bailing them out of jail. Maybe that will give her enough time to get on her feet. Also, I’ll ask her if she wants the quilts she made for Garrett and let her pick some of his wood carvings. She deserves that much. I’ve already sent a wood carving to all the people I met who knew him and I’ll donate the rest to the Wood-carvers’ Museum. I’ll probably have a yard sale for the rest of his furniture and stuff. That money I’ll give to the folk art museum. Heaven knows, our budget needs it.”

“You certainly have this all thought out.”

“I’ve had a lot of time to think these last three days. It’s important to me that I don’t profit from my uncle’s death.”

“So, what do you think happened there? Do you think it was natural?”

I shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe someone helped him along, maybe not. Gabe says there’s not enough evidence to exhume the body, so I guess we’ll never know. I’ll just tell myself he died peacefully in his sleep. The way we’d all like to go.”

He nodded. “I’ll light a candle for him the next time I go to church.”

I looked over at him. “So, what’s next for you?”

“Maybe I’ll light a candle for myself, too, and pray that my new neighbors are as fun as you’ve been.”

I laughed. “Maybe God will answer your prayer and send a feisty widow lady who can’t cook, loves to fish, and has always secretly lusted after firemen.”

He grinned at me. “Now there’s a dream a man can hold on to.”

We stood staring at the bay, listening to the music in a companionable silence. I would miss Rich, too, and realized it hadn’t taken me long to start a life here in this little town. I suppose that was the way most people are, more adaptable than we realize when forced into it. As Dove had always said, it doesn’t matter whether God gifted you with a persimmon patch or a rock farm, because one made good jelly and the other good fences. There was no doubt He gifted me with a woman who could show me the beauty in both.

“I’d better get on back,” I said to Rich. “The quicker I go to bed, the quicker it’ll be tomorrow.”

He glanced at his watch. “Benni, it’s already tomorrow.”

I looked at his bulky black diver’s watch. It was three minutes after midnight.

“You’re right. Technically it is Sunday, isn’t it?”

“Go home. Surprise your husband.”

I gave him a quick hug. “Thanks, Rich, for being my friend these last two weeks. I wouldn’t have made it without you.”

“Yes, you would. But you wouldn’t have eaten as well.”

The drive back to San Celina seemed endless. Why does going home always seem longer than going to a place? I drove down Lopez Street passing Blind Harry’s where the Mother’s Day window display was gone, replaced by one that celebrated graduation and new beginnings. The clock above San Celina Savings and Loan flashed 12:41 a.m. Students bunched around the open bars down near Gum Alley, but the rest of the street was quiet and empty, waiting for tomorrow. On my street, the houses were dark, and the truck’s headlights formed a single beacon in the blackness. Next to me, I could feel the anticipation in Scout, obviously caught from my own.

When I pulled into our driveway, Gabe sat on the porch, waiting. Next to him, a votive candle burned. It was the decorative religious candle I’d bought him at the grocery store once on a whim. It showed a determined, strong-chested angel holding a sword in one hand and scales in the other. The angel was beating down a weak, bat-winged devil. On the side was written
Oración a San Miguel Arcángel
—Prayer to St. Michael. The prayer talked about defending us in battle and God thrusting into hell Satan and all the other evil spirits who wander through the world seeking the ruin of souls.

“For some reason,” I’d told Gabe, “it reminded me of you.”

“That’s probably because St. Michael is the patron saint of police officers,” he’d answered.

The candle flickered, and Gabe stood up. He thrust his hands deep into the pockets of his hooded sweatshirt. Later I would tease him about what he would have done if I hadn’t come home until later that morning, and he would tease me by saying he knew me better than that.

I turned off the ignition and opened the passenger door to let Scout jump out. He bounded toward the porch, and Gabe stooped down to scratch his chest, laughing when Scout licked his face. I stepped out of the truck, pulling my duffle bag with me, slamming the door shut. Gabe looked up and smiled, a smile I knew I’d never grow tired of, a smile I wanted to see on the last day of my life on earth. Without hesitation, I dropped my bag and ran across the dew-soaked grass toward home.

Berkley Prime Crime Books by Earlene Fowler

THE SADDLEMAKER’S WIFE

The Benni Harper Mysteries

FOOL’S PUZZLE
IRISH CHAIN
KANSAS TROUBLES
GOOSE IN THE POND
DOVE IN THE WINDOW
MARINER’S COMPASS
SEVEN SISTERS
ARKANSAS TRAVELER
STEPS TO THE ALTAR
SUNSHINE AND SHADOW
BROKEN DISHES
DELECTABLE MOUNTAINS
TUMBLING BLOCKS