Crunch Time

Which, of course, I had no intention of doing.

13

Outside, the sun was shining, but the air was still cold. The plows had rammed dirty walls of ice onto the roadsides. Even so, the pavements were still swathed with thin blankets of snow. Driving would be treacherous, and I had enough problems without ending up in a ditch. I opened the side door of my van and carefully flung in my tote, followed by the plastic bag of detritus from one of Donna’s rentals. Maybe this evidence wasn’t technically from adulterers, maybe it was just from sort-of-young, sort-of-thin people, teenagers even, seeking a thrill. But it was something, and if Ernest had been investigating this couple, the evidence might be connected to his death.

Once inside my van, I turned on the engine and wished I’d worn gloves. It was twelve forty-five, and I was unaccountably hungry. The enchiladas were a memory and the coffee cake was calling. I unwrapped it, broke off a hunk, and chewed thoughtfully while staring at Donna’s list. The one rental she’d checked, the one where the lovebirds had made their most recent nest, was way out by the Aspen Meadow Wildlife Preserve. I wasn’t sure I had the time, the tires, or the tolerance to find a house in that area. Worse, there was no way to find out if the plows had been through the vast labyrinth of dirt roads that lay around the preserve.

I rewrapped the cake, poured myself some coffee, and stared again at the address. I knew Tom would be furious if I drove out there and poked around in an empty house, alone. But Donna had been on her way to do just that, right?

I could hear Tom’s voice in my head saying, You’re not Donna.

Wait a minute, I thought. I had a friend who lived in that area, not far from the rental, if I was judging distances correctly. Sabine Rushmore was a librarian whom I had known for years. I’d catered the retirement party she’d held at her house. She was sixty-five, but you’d never guess it. Except for her long, frizzy gray mane, she didn’t look a day over forty. My theory was that she kept herself youthful with her work as a peace activist, her long treks to remote parts of Colorado and the Mountain West to hunt for dinosaur bones, and of course—of course—the labor she put into growing organic vegetables. To me, it all sounded exhausting, but Sabine thrived on the activity.

Unfortunately, I didn’t know Sabine’s home phone number. There was no way the privacy-obsessed staff at the Aspen Meadow Library would give it to me, even if Sabine needed a kidney and I had one on ice in the van. And anyway, I thought, as I punched the buttons for Information, what if Sabine’s number was unlisted? What if she lived so far off the grid that she didn’t even have a phone?

Well, glory be. There was a Rushmore listed on the same county road as the rental. I punched in the number and couldn’t believe it when Sabine answered.

“Goldy, wow, I can’t believe you’re calling,” she said, out of breath. In the background I could hear crunching noises, and I guessed she was digging out her driveway. “It’s so good to hear from you. Gives me a chance to give up on clearing snow.”

I pictured her steep, rutted dirt driveway. “Don’t you have anyone to help you?”

“Not at the moment. Greg’s taken the four-wheeler into town for supplies for our horses. I wanted to surprise him. Anyway, I’m almost done.” She took a deep breath, then said, “Good thing I brought my phone outside in my pocket, huh? Maybe I subconsciously wanted an interruption. What can I do for you?”

I explained that I was hoping she could come with me on a bit of a hunt, sort of like one of her fossil-seeking expeditions.

“It’s really exactly like looking for dinosaur bones. Only easier,” I said.

“Goldy the caterer. Making the link between pastry and paleontology, eh?” she asked, a smile in her voice. “Sounds more like one of your crime-solving capers. I remember you found a body in the library once.”

“Hey,” I said in protest, “it wasn’t my fault the guy was murdered there.”

“And,” she continued, “you said the perpetrator of another murder was in the library at the same time.”

“Aspen Meadow Library is a popular place.”

“So what I’m asking, Goldy, is this: Are we going to need to be armed when we go on this expedition of yours?”

I thought of Arch using the weeder on our would-be intruder. “Well, it might not hurt if we took some sharply pointed garden equipment. Just kidding. I think the perps have fled.” I rushed on to give details that she would have to promise not to tell the paper: that apparently, a couple had broken into an A-frame near her, to have sex, most likely, and I wanted to see if there was anything left that would help me aid the real estate agent in figuring out who they were. “The agent was on her way out there when I volunteered to make the trek,” I told her.

“I know the house,” Sabine said. “The owner’s home-based business collapsed. He had to move his family back in with his wife’s parents down in Denver, where he’s working in a restaurant. Their house has been for rent for a while. People don’t like to commute to Denver from way out here.” She took a deep breath. “Yeah, sure, come on ahead.”

I said I would see her in less than half an hour and turned the van in the direction of the Aspen Meadow Wildlife Preserve. I knew there would be no wrath equal to Tom’s if I did not tell him what I was up to, so I put in a call to his voice mail. I informed him of everything Donna had told me and added the caveat that he couldn’t put it into the sheriff’s calls in the paper. And, I said, I had a friend who was going to go into the empty house with me. By the way, I concluded, had he been able to question Charlene Newgate? And did he have the canvass, time of death, and ballistics and accelerant results back from Ernest’s murder and the arson? “Just curious,” I said, “trying to help.” I could imagine Tom shaking his head.

I drove down to Aspen Meadow Lake, which blazed with sparkles from the afternoon sun. Vestiges of snow laced the water’s edge. There was no traffic, so I pulled over. Something was niggling at the back of my brain after the call to Tom. Oh, yes, the informal dinner gathering at the Bertrams’ place on Thursday, so everyone could remember Ernest. I wanted to help.

I dialed SallyAnn Bertram’s number and put the phone on speaker. As her number rang, I turned right onto Upper Cottonwood Creek Road. When my tires skidded to the left, I inhaled sharply. Slowly, I started up the winding road. I needed to be on the lookout for black ice as well as snow that might have blown over it. An innocent-looking swath of white stuff could conceal a hazard that flipped your vehicle.

When SallyAnn answered, I identified myself and said I wanted to help out with the potluck supper on Thursday night, when the department was going to gather to remember Ernest. What did she need me to bring?

“Oh, Goldy, you’re a dear! I don’t know what to tell you, because I haven’t even started to organize this thing, but I do know somebody is bringing hamburgers, because John wanted us to have this outside, so we can grill. But now I worry that it will snow again, or even rain, and if it rains or snows, everyone will have to come inside. That’s really terrible, because this place is such a wreck, I hate to imagine what everyone’s going to think when they walk through our doors. I think John has that disorder, you know, where someone hoards stuff? He built a six-car garage on our property, and it has one truck in it, plus a bunch of junk, including the lawn furniture that we never did bring out this summer. But John, you know? When he can’t find something in the garage? He buys a new tool or other thingamajig, and puts it into one of the closets in the house. So our closets are all spilling over with stuff. What’s supposed to be our living space is now filled with junk, and we don’t have room for these people that he invited over here without even telling me—”

“SallyAnn, wait a sec.” I had to interrupt her, because not only was she having a panic attack, she was about to give me one. And anyway, I’d just cleaned out Donna Lamar’s refrigerator. That was all the mental space I could give to decluttering in one day. “One thing at a time,” I said slowly. “Can you get a pen and paper?” When she rummaged for those, I heard what sounded like pots falling onto the floor. Maybe John wasn’t the only one with a hoarding disorder. “First of all,” I said, “let me bring something hot, because the weather has turned cool. If one of the guests is bringing hamburgers, then how about if I bring homemade cream of mushroom soup? Everyone seems to like it, no matter what the weather.”

“Okay, but I don’t know what to do about all the mess—”

“No problem there, either. I’ve already arranged a cleaning lady who owes me a favor to do some extra work. I’ll pay her to clean up your house Thursday. How about that?”