thought she might actually hug me, but instead she shook my hand hard enough to crush bones. “I’m really sorry, Mike.”
“Me too. About everything.” My throat was so dry my voice was just a rasp.
“Don’t beat yourself up.”
“You were right about my dad. I don’t know why I couldn’t see it when it was so clear to everyone else.”
“You were too close to the situation.”
“That’s what you kept telling me.”
“It’s my eternal curse not to be believed, Grasshopper.” It was the best she could do for a joke under the circumstances, but I appreciated it. She stuck her thumbs in her gunbelt, a question obviously weighing on her mind. “So what the hell happened up there?”
I could have told her about the murder of Russell Pelletier, and my fight with Truman Dellis, and the part I played in the drowning of Brenda Dean, but I was too tired. Rather than say anything more, I cut to the heart of the matter. “He shot himself.”
She would have to get the rest of the story from someone else. I glanced toward the admitting desk. “Do you know anything about Charley?”
“They’ve got him in the ICU. He has some internal injuries, and they’re worried about his heart.”
“He lost a lot of blood out on the lake.”
“You did what you could.” She reached into her pocket and handed me something. In my palm was a Warden Service I.D. card. “I guess I forgot to give this to Malcomb. Oops.”
Just then, as if summoned by the sound of his name, the lieutenant came hurrying through the emergency room door. He always looked so stone-faced, but tonight there was real fear in his eyes. He had just lost his wife last year to cancer, and now his close friend was also near death.
“How is he?” he asked Kathy in his gravel voice.
She told him what she knew.
He listened intently without even a glance in my direction. If he was concerned about me, he didn’t show it. But after Kathy finished, he turned and stared into my eyes and, after a long silence, said, “It sounds like you saved his life, Warden.”
Hearing him call me “Warden” was a surprise after everything that had happened, but I wasn’t getting my hopes up. “It was my fault he was injured.”
“I doubt Charley would agree with you.” He removed a pack of cigarettes from his pocket, then remembered where he was and stashed them back. “He’s a tough old bird. He’s walked away from crashes before.”
I got the impression that Malcomb was trying to convince himself of this. “So now what do we do?” I asked.
“We find a doctor to check you over. And then we wait.”
“Would you mind if I borrowed your cell phone first? I have someone to call.”
“Michael?” said my mother. I’d reached her at the home of Neil’s daughter in Long Beach, California, where they were staying until my father could be brought to justice. “Michael, what is it?”
“He’s dead, Mom.”
She caught her breath, loud enough for me to hear. “What-? What happened?”
“He shot himself. It’s true what the police said. He was the one who killed those men.”
“No.”
“He was guilty all along, but we were too blind to see it.”
“No.” Her voice was shaky. She was close to sobbing. “Why? Why would he do such a thing?”
I didn’t intend to be cruel to her. The truth was brutal enough. But who was I to shield her from it now? “It was all over a woman that he loved. But she’s dead now, too. He came back to Rum Pond for her, and when she died, he must have decided that he couldn’t go on without her.”
“Who was she?”
“Just a girl.”
“I always thought-” She was crying openly now, no longer holding anything back. “I always thought it would be me.”
So there it was. Fifteen years ago, after her divorce, she had expected a similar phone call, but it never came. Was it my imagination, or was she jealous that in the end he had loved another woman more?
“Michael?” It was Neil. He had taken the phone from her. “Your mother is-she’s very upset. My God, it’s horrible news.”
Holding the phone to my head, I put a hand to my other ear to cover the clamor of the hospital. What more was there to say, at this point? “You were right, Neil. You were right, about him, and we were wrong. We should have listened to you.”
He paused. “You weren’t thinking clearly-neither of you were.” He paused, and I could hear her sobbing in the background. “What’s going to happen? What are people saying up there?”
Why was I surprised that neither of them had asked about me? “I’m sure it’ll be front-page news tomorrow. If you’re worried about the media, you might want to stay out there for a few more days.” Across the room I saw more wardens streaming into the waiting room. Charley Stevens had friends beyond counting. “Neil, I have to go. Tell my mom that I love her.”
After I hung up, I took a step toward the gathering wardens, then looked down at the cell phone in my hand. Finally, I got up the nerve to call Sarah.
“I’ve been so worried about you,” she said.
I’d wanted so much to hear her voice, but then when she answered, I found that I could barely speak. “Thanks.”
“Kathy called me on her way to the hospital. She told me what happened. It’s so horrible.”
“You don’t know the whole story.” My voice broke as I said this.
She must have sensed something about my emotional state because she paused a long time before she spoke. “Mike, did he hurt you?”
“No,” I lied.
“Can you tell me what happened?”
I could feel something inside myself starting to give way. I don’t know whether it was the long day catching up with me at last or hearing Sarah’s voice again. But I feared that I might break down in the hospital corridor if I continued this conversation.
“I can’t,” I said. “I will when I get back, OK?”
“I’ll be here,” she said, and I knew it was a promise.
At 11:45 the following morning, Charley opened his eyes. It seemed like half the members of the Maine Warden Service had come by during the night, as well as assorted other law enforcement officers and citizens of Flagstaff and Dead River. Sally Reynolds was there, and so was Donna, the mousy waitress from the Dead River Inn. Most everyone left me alone. I was dozing in a corner of the waiting room when Charley woke up. He asked to see me almost immediately.
He smiled weakly at me when I came around the movable screen.
Ora sat beside the bed, as did their oldest daughter, Anne. She was an attractive brunette, about thirty, with her mother’s high cheekbones and her father’s strong jaw. She had a cup of ice chips she was feeding him to quench his thirst.
“They won’t give me water,” he told me.
“The bastards,” I deadpanned.
He grinned again, and I saw some of the old impishness in him return. “You look like shit.”
“I guess no one’s shown you a mirror.”
“They did, but darned if it didn’t crack.”
“How’s the leg?”
“Still attached to the rest of me.”
“That’s something.”
“Yes, it is.”
“He’s going to need a lot of physical therapy,” said Anne.
Charley rolled his eyes.
