Winterkill

“Neither do you,” Melinda Strickland said, her face hard.

“Hit the son-of-a-bitch again,” she ordered. And despite Joe’s shout to stop it, McLanahan did.

Eight

Joe was pleased to see that the plow had come down Bighorn Road that day as he drove home. It had cut a single lane through the drifts, and massive flagstone-sized plates of wind-hardened snow had been flung onto both sides of the cut, making the edges look jagged and incomplete. He smiled slightly to himself, thinking how disappointed the girls would be that they would have to go to church after all.

But, he thought, I need to go to church, even if they don’t. He needed to leave the blood, gore, and violence of the last few days behind him. The Christmas Eve service wouldn’t wash him clean, but it might, at the very least, change the subject to something better and more hopeful. The apprehending of Nate Romanowski left a sour taste in his mouth. Although from the outside, it might look like a highly successful investigation and arrest—hell, they identified the killer and captured him all in the same day, and in miserable conditions—to Joe things seemed tainted. His mind melded the death of Melinda Strickland’s little dog with the rifle-butt beating of Nate Romanowski. He couldn’t get the image of Romanowski’s face pulled tight with confusion out of his mind. Given the eyewitness testimony and the discovery of what appeared to be the murder weapon, there was no reason to think that Romanowski wasn’t the killer—except that something in Romanowski’s face bothered Joe. It was as if the man had expected to be arrested, but for something else. Or, Joe thought, as if Romanowski thought he had a perfect alibi but no one was biting. Something . . .

Joe wanted a sense of massive relief that this was over, that the murder investigation was complete, that the thing he had started had finally ended. But he didn’t feel that way.

Maybe I’m asking for too much, he thought. Maybe these things just weren’t as neat and clean as he hoped they would be. His experience pointed in that direction, after all. Maybe this was a hangover of success, and tomorrow he would see it all in a different light.

He needed to put it out of his mind, at least for a while. And he needed to go to church.

While they dressed, Joe told Marybeth about what had happened during the day. She listened intently.

Moments before, Marybeth had entered the living room where the girls were playing, clapped her hands sharply and announced, “Ladies, we are going to church.”

Sheridan was silent, but glared at her mother. April had moaned. Lucy had begun to chatter about what she would wear.

“So we might have wrapped this thing up,” he said now. “Like a Christmas present to Saddlestring.”

Marybeth paused a beat. “Why don’t you sound convinced?”

He saw his own bitter smile in the mirror.

“I’m not sure,” he said. “I need to sort it out in my mind, I guess.”

She nodded, but kept her eyes on him. He had tried to sound upbeat, but she always read him correctly. He could see her reflection watching his.

“That poor little dog,” she said, shaking her head.

“Yup.”

“Do you think it was deliberate?” she asked.

“That’s my suspicion. Either she wanted to punish the dog by making it run behind the Sno-Cats, or to leave it up there, or to set the stage for what happened. I just don’t know.”

“She might have let that dog in the Sno-Cat if you or someone had said something,” Marybeth said. “Maybe out of shame, if nothing else.”

Joe whistled. “I don’t know, darling. I don’t think anyone knew the dog was out. And she doesn’t seem the type who feels shame.”

Marybeth shook her head. “At least now she’ll go back to wherever she came from.”

“Let’s hope,” Joe said, admiring his wife in her dress. “You look like ten million bucks, you know.”

In a tie and his unfashionable topcoat, Joe Pickett herded his children into the aged minivan after the Christmas Eve church service. Missy, dressed to the nines in black formal wear and pearls she had packed for Jackson Hole cocktail parties, joined her grandchildren in the backseat with a sigh. Marybeth slid into the passenger seat.

The service had been good, Joe thought. Surrounded by his family while the songs and message washed over him, he felt partially cleansed of the scene of unnecessary savagery he had witnessed earlier in the afternoon. Lamar Gardiner or no Lamar Gardiner, there had been no reason for McLanahan and Barnum to beat Nate Romanowski. He said a prayer for Mrs. Gardiner, and a little prayer for the dead dog, but he felt self-conscious doing it.

Sheridan was seated directly behind Joe in the van.

“How about two presents, just in case the first one is clothes?” she asked.

“Sheridan has a point,” April said from the back.

Joe grunted as he started the motor. The influx of bodies into the car steamed all of the windows. The night was clear so far, although snow had once again been predicted, and the moon was framed by a secondary halo.

If it came to a philosophical debate, he knew he would lose on passion points. He was inclined to let them open everything. Just as he was inclined to back Marybeth.

“It’s tradition. One present on Christmas Eve,” Marybeth interjected, turning in her seat. “And besides, you need clothes.”

“But I don’t want clothes,” Sheridan whined.

“Me neither,” April added sourly.