The Croning Part 8

A logger with a furry beard punched a beardless logger who wore a plaid coat and in short order bottles were flying and teeth as well. The jug band upped the tempo and the lead man yowled a tune about a bad person named Black Bill coming into the hollow to rape the goats and carry off the women-folk. A fire started near the bar and Mich.e.l.le and Don took the opportunity to split.

All in all, Don thought as he revved the motor and burned rubber out of the parking lot, a typical evening abroad with his dear wife. He didn't allow himself to contemplate the trouble she got into when wasn't around to whisk her away.

He took a wrong turn and they lost two hours before stopping at a mill and getting directions from the fellow who was locking the place down. Don shouldered the blame with as much self-deprecatory grace as he could muster. Mich.e.l.le kissed his cheek and said nothing. At times during their journey she was entirely present and focused on him with the heated intensity he recalled from their courts.h.i.+p in school; at other moments she drifted miles away and was hardly with him in the car.

b.u.mpy blacktop road unwound before their headlights. A lonely night in the mountains; moonless, starless. The heat had dissipated with sunset. Mist rolled across the fields and through the trees and boiled in the ditches and conjured images of cloaked highwaymen and wolves howling on Scottish moors.

Don switched off the radio and pushed in the k.n.o.b of the dashboard lighter. He stuck a Gauloises cigarette into the corner of his mouth while he waited. He'd tried to quit since Sputnik with intermittent success. Recently, Mich.e.l.le had brought home a knapsack of brunes direct from Paris. "It's dark-dark," he said. "Anything could be out there on a night like this."

"What? Why do you say that?" Mich.e.l.le pulled the collar of her jacket tighter. "Good lord, it was roasting an hour ago. Now it's practically winter."

"We're getting pretty high."

"How I wish. I wasn't going to tell you. But..." She rummaged in the glove box and came forth with a baggie. She expertly rolled a joint and had herself a toke. "Don't you touch that window and whisk away my lovely fumes, Donald Miller, or I'll break your f.u.c.king arm."

He sighed and released the handle as blue exhaust clouds swam before his eyes.

She said in a deep, rasping tone, "Good kitty."

"Excuse me?"

"What do you mean 'anything can happen'?"

"Just look. Might as well be in the Dark Ages, baby-"

"Don't call me baby, baby."

"Okay. Here we are in the countryside at night in the middle of even Daniel-Boone-wouldn't-know-the-h.e.l.l-where. Peasants locked in their cottages, windows shuttered. That's how we lived for centuries. Huddled around fires, listening to the howls from the wilderness."

"Take a ride with me into the non Anglo-world one of these days. Business as usual for a lot of folks."

"Kinda my point. Baby. The night hasn't changed. It's the same as it was a hundred years ago. A thousand." He didn't enjoy how the headlights seemed dim and yellow against the dark and the fog. The dashboard panel flickered ominously. It was a quarter past eleven. The lighter popped and he pressed its glowing coil to the tip of his cigarette. Despite, or because of, the pleasant fuzzy aftertaste of whiskey in his mouth, he wanted a drink; a single malt scotch, cooking sherry, shoe polish, anything. Nerves did that to him-excited his desire for booze and smokes. "How'd the Wolvertons get so rich? How come Paul and Naomi don't brag about this relative?"

"They aren't braggarts, dear. It's the kind of clan where having a job as a banker is hopelessly plebian. Wolvertons aren't supposed to work, they're supposed to lounge around and admire their statuary. The original fortune was made by the family industrialists. Big wheels during the late nineteenth century. This was their bolt hole from civilization."

"Railroads? Bombs? A zeppelin manufacturing company?"

"Rivets and doork.n.o.bs. The family died out, mostly. There's only a couple of them left. The guy who owns the property is one. He doesn't do anything. Lives in South America, or something. Rents the mansion out for tours and special events. They shot a movie on the estate last year. Beyond the Valley of the Dolls rip-off." Mich.e.l.le coughed and waved her hand to clear the air. "Aww, d.a.m.n. That's enough of that. Go ahead, and get some air in here."

"You promise not to hurt me?"

"Never mind. You bruise easily. Just drive." She lighted a cigarette and cracked her window. The wind whistled eerily. "Ha! Funny you should mention it, but yeah, they made parts for zeppelins too. On the side."

"No kidding?"

"I think it was a short-lived venture. I didn't do much research on that angle."

Don tapped the wheel and frowned. "I read something about that house. d.a.m.n it...a bunch of murders."

"The place has a b.l.o.o.d.y history. One of the Wolvertons got p.i.s.sed outta his gourd and shotgunned the gardener back in the 1920s. There was a jealous mistress and a hatchet murder around World War Two-"

"This was more recent. The past couple of decades for sure. And a high body count."

"You're thinking of that bloodbath in Amityville. Guy slaughtered his family in that big old house."

"I'm not feeble, woman. Recent, but not last year."

"Huh. It's possible, I suppose. After what I've seen I wouldn't be surprised if there was a Lizzie Borden style ma.s.sacre on the Wolverton property at some point."

"Oh. It sounds lovely. That black book got anything about a kitten torturing festival? We could hit that next."

Her eyes were large and dark. She placed her hand on his thigh.

They emerged into a stretch of field in a ma.s.sive, glacier-dug valley. With the fog and darkness pressing against the windows, it felt little different than the previous tunnels of forest. A moment later the road curved and they were in the firs again. Don resisted the urge to press harder on the pedal. Already the car floated as if unmoored from the pavement. If a deer jumped into his path, he'd never have time to brake.

He said, "My dad hit a deer with our truck once. I was a tyke. I hate driving in this weather."

"Want me to take over for a while?"

Don remembered how erratically his wife drove, and shuddered. "No, no. That wasn't a hint. Just thinking aloud."

Their weekend tour of the Wolverton estate might be the very thing to kick-start his ambition, galvanize a final push to completing the cursed book.

Don glanced sidelong at his wife, taking in her "civilization camouflage" as she called it: bouffant hair and hoop earrings, lots of eye shadow, a slinky dress, heels, all a far cry from the pith helmet, mosquito netting, pants and hiking boots that often comprised her field attire. A strong, lean woman, Mich.e.l.le appeared much as she had during college. She wore the same yellow-tinted starlet gla.s.ses day or night, the same indistinct perfume from the same unlabeled bottle.

She said, "There should be an intersection in a mile or so. Go right. It's about fifteen miles after that-the place is above the snow line. Too bad we got such a late start. d.a.m.ned thing is mostly over by now. There was a fancy dinner and a slide show."

"A slide show!" He chose not to remind her that the reception was to be spread over the entire weekend. Very likely the mind-numbing biopic of Plimpton and his life poking and prodding surly country folk to get access to their burial grounds was yet to come. At least there'd be a boatload of free booze to dull the pain.

"Hmm, yes... So I'm mistaken that your eyes glaze when I show mine to my friends from the inst.i.tute?"

"I'm a victim of bad lighting. Not to mention a bit gla.s.sy-eyed by nature."

The intersection was a T illuminated by a blinking amber caution light that seemed a forlorn reminder of civilization here among miles of peaks and evergreen forests. Don turned right and continued along a steadily ascending grade. Except for his impulsive adventure on the Yukon he hadn't strayed far from the suburbs for what had it been? Five, maybe six years? So, not only had he lapsed into the role of prune-dry fuddy-duddy with the sense of adventure G.o.d gave a stick, he'd slipped into a sedentary routine like a foot into a comfortable old boot. G.o.ds, the crow's feet around his eyes and the softness of his belly weren't just cosmetic; atrophy was spreading throughout the entire mechanism. Das.h.i.+ng Don the Caver out to pasture with nary a whinny of protest. This gloomy realization heightened the sense of mystery and danger plaguing him since Mich.e.l.le plucked that skinny black book off the tourist shop rack.

Despite that warning in the back of his skull, he did as he'd become accustomed and followed Mich.e.l.le's marching orders, cliffs be d.a.m.ned.

And he laughed ruefully a few minutes later to see that the Wolverton Mansion indeed perched upon a cliff. The cliff overlooked a swath of forest and the rocky sandbars of a shallow river. The house was a truly palatial cabin hewn from ma.s.sive timber, huge as the wood and rock castle of a Viking lord. Don recognized it instantly from his recollection of at least a half dozen exterior shots in low budget films, although its majesty deserved the cinematographic genius of an artist such as Bergman.

He was surprised to see a handful of smartly dressed guests standing around the colonnaded porch, drinks in hand, sweaters drawn up to their chins. The double doors were open and warm light from a chandelier illuminated their faces, rendered their figures soft around the edges in a bloom effect.

A valet trotted over and took the keys. The young man pulled the car down a side drive and disappeared into well-groomed ranks of hedges. Don breathed in the bitter pre-dawn air. Mich.e.l.le winked at him and moved toward the congregation. Their footsteps crunched on the gravel and Don had a vision of a carpet of dried yellow finger bones snapping beneath his shoes.

Mich.e.l.le introduced him to a man in a turtleneck-Connor Wolverton himself. He was a few years younger than Paul with a full head of black hair, the crow's feet just beginning to set in around his eyes. He smelled of good whiskey and fir needles and his entire demeanor was that of Christopher Lee welcoming victims to his castle. Don hated guys in turtlenecks. Guys in turtlenecks reminded him of the ivy tower princelings who'd lorded it over their domains during college years. Middle-age had tenderized him in many ways, but it hadn't dampened his fire-hot antipathy for preppie a.s.sholes.

Connor said, "Ah, you made it! Paul was getting worried. These roads are h.e.l.l at night. One of my boys will come around to escort you to your rooms. Meanwhile, permit me to show you a much more important feature of Wolverton Mansion." He led the way through a foyer with a ceiling that vaulted to imposing heights and into a drawing room. He left them at the bar with a bartender in a white tuxedo. Mich.e.l.le handed Don a Canadian Club and clinked gla.s.ses hard and the liquor splashed onto his fingers.

Standing there near the bar, slightly apart from his wife, Don watched guests trickle in to refresh their drinks. He inclined his head toward Mich.e.l.le and said, "How many guests are there anyway?"

She sidled closer and hooked her arm with his. "I don't know the roster. Not many. Twenty, twenty-five. It's an exclusive club."

"d.a.m.n, what am I doing here?"

"Hanging onto my coattails. And Argyle's. Speaking of the devil, he doth appear. Argyle, my dear!" She extricated herself with the efficiency of a serpent and intercepted Argyle Arden as he entered the parlor, s.h.i.+ning like a subdued star in his cream-colored suit and golden nose cone. They kissed and Argyle introduced his chauffeur, a brawny lad with short black hair and eyes perhaps a scooch too close together. Don thought all of Argyle's young, strapping companions were "sorts" as opposed to real people, and they blurred into a composite of beautiful and sullenly aggressive American masculinity. Winter would bring a new cla.s.s and a new companion for the white-haired aristocrat.

This new fellow, Mickey Monroe, as Don soon learned, was working his way through graduate school at Saint Martin's. "Mick's going to be a librarian when he grows up," Argyle said in his thunderous voice as the second round of introductions were made. "Almost as boring as licking stamps or sorting rocks, hey, Donald?"

"Stamp-lickers and frog dissectors and sorters of index cards have me beat by a country mile," Don said with a broad smile. "Luckily, I've lost the craving for traipsing about bogs and falling down mineshafts."

"He isn't kidding," Mich.e.l.le said. "Except, it's worse. Can't get him to budge from the sofa without a red hot poker to the a.s.s."

"Oho! Is that how you chivvied him along this arduous wagon trail?"

Mich.e.l.le grinned at Don. "Honey, bend over and show Uncle Argyle the handle."

"To the moon," Don said, making a loose fist, but the others had already turned from him, Mich.e.l.le quickly changing the subject to her most harrowing and infamous hike through a stretch of jungle ruled by headhunters and jaguars. The expedition had been organized by several foundations and included photographers, journalists, guides, and a small army of porters. The expedition leader, a Russian anthropologist named Boris Kalamov, had made his bones unearthing Aztec temples and other ruins and he'd claimed to possess doc.u.ments legitimizing legends of a city in the heart of the Congo. The team never located Ophir, but three porters were dragged away by leopards or jaguars, two knifed each other in a dispute, and everybody down to the pack mules contracted dysentery and almost died.

No great success story for Kalamov or his backers. On the other hand, Mich.e.l.le landed on her feet as usual and doc.u.mented a connection between the local headhunters (some of whom actually came down from the hills for a friendly campfire chat) and two other large and modernized tribes dwelling thousands of miles away. The connection was tenuous and compilation and collation of data remained for the drones who performed such labor, and given the glacial pace of such work it would be years before she received any real recognition; nonetheless, here in the latter half of her highly decorated tenure, she continued to produce the goods, so to speak.

A third book was doubtless in the works, if only she'd relent on her most recent pa.s.sion-the Mock genealogical survey-long enough to get the ma.n.u.script typed. Or her clothes changed and hair washed. Her elegant and admittedly s.e.xy coiffure for the Wolverton s.h.i.+ndig notwithstanding, Mich.e.l.le was the picture of a crazed Macbethian crone when she emerged from lengthy stays in the den in the Olympia farmhouse, her hair in disarray, her dark eyes wild with chaos and malignant rapture, fingers cracked and ink-stained from pen and quill. Sometimes she wrapped herself in a filthy, tattered robe, sometimes not, and skulked through the kitchen and pantry in the small hours of morning, foraging like any wild animal.

Don missed his children. He also thanked the G.o.ds that they weren't often around to test their mother's patience these past several years. Kurt especially might've suffered a grievous injury.

Leaving his wife, Argyle and friend to their devices, he went into the parlor where many of the guests had gathered chatting quietly, then ducked out again, following strains of chamber music. Don floated in a decaying orbit of that murmuring magnetic cloud, content to exile himself to an antechamber populated by a handful of disaffected partisans and b.a.s.t.a.r.d princes. Don was no stranger to many of them. His presence provoked a visible ripple of unease. Many had known him off and on since his youth and noted a dramatic change in his demeanor over the last few years. He'd become tougher and more reckless, his humor sardonic.

None of the dandies, playboys or pampered dilettantes that comprised this particular subset of the elite strata could be completely certain where he roosted in the pecking order. It was quietly acknowledged that while being a lowly middle-cla.s.s lout, he possessed entirely too many connections to be dismissed outright. They settled for exchanging brittle smiles and hollow pleasantries and watching from the corners of their eyes for signs of weakness. Then, because Plimpton's influence had extended to the academic spheres, a motley collection of professors, administrators and civil engineers mixed freely among the n.o.bility, albeit with gawky discomfort. This latter consortium were guzzling champagne and wolfing down the smoked salmon and cheese with fanatical zeal and surrept.i.tiously (or not) ogling the decolletages of simpering trophy wives.

Don had ignored the ritual for years, grown a thick skin, cultivated a wary obliviousness. He frequently swiped drinks from the trays of circulating waiters, which made the proceedings a touch more palatable, and shortly the crowd resembled clockwork automatons bunched in awkward groves, smacking gla.s.ses of Glenlivet and blurting cynical apothegms by rote as their glittery, lifeless eyes rolled about like ball bearings.

"Mr. Miller-" Don caught that snippet as a sort of c.o.c.ktail party effect. He glimpsed a swarthy fellow with a bushy mustache, a Latin Tom Selleck, raise his hand in a drowning gesture. He struck Don as familiar somehow...

The dark man was body-blocked by a cataclysmically stoned surveyor from the Army Corps of Engineers, then Paul's wife, Naomi Wolverton, sailed into the room, regal as Queen Victoria in her austere mourning dress and elegantly somber mien, lacking only tiara and scepter to complete the image. She waved to Don as he endured the verbal crossfire of a man in a bad tweed jacket, a history professor by the look of him, and from across the state line, Melvin Redfield the prodigal poet and heir apparent of the Pierce County Redfields, who owned enough of said county to convert it to a duchy were they so inclined. Melvin was a onetime high school baseball captain, fulltime wastrel, and prematurely gray. He'd always been shrill and his voice was in fine form after a snootful of Hennessy.

"My lord, Don, are you okay?" Naomi wrinkled her nose in mock horror at the sight of him shambling her direction.

Don casually shouldered aside a journalist from the Spokane Star and the journalist's date, a leggy blonde who dressed as if she'd come fully accessorized from one of the local escort services, and kissed Naomi Wolverton's gloved hand-it smelled of lilacs. His lips were rubber-numb and it was like nuzzling a piece of wood. He winked. "I've been abroad. Does it show?"

Naomi drew him aside, put a towering rubber plant between them and the bickering duo and a.s.sorted gawkers. "Paul was hoping you meant it when you said you'd come by. My bet was Mich.e.l.le hopping a ride with a motorcycle gang and leaving you at the ranch with the cat and the tumbleweeds."

"It's a farm. Lots of weeds, true." He glanced around for Lou's ex-wife. "Cory-is she-"

"Oh yes, over there." Naomi frowned in the direction of the parlor where Corinthia Plimpton held court, flashes of sequins and crimson through the sea of black suits. "The b.i.t.c.h brought a date to her husband's funeral. Some sleazy producer. Can't go without a man for ten seconds, can she?" When she was angry her lips made a ruby slash, her cheeks paled.

There was no safe answer to that one, so he changed the subject with c.u.mbersome gallantry. "I wouldn't have figured Lou to draw this big a crowd at his going-away party." Don tossed down the dregs of his bourbon, craned his neck to catch a glimpse of Corinthia's companion, the sleazy producer; a short, pasty guy in a charcoal suit, wraparound shades and a fistful of rings that twinkled in the dull chandelier blaze. All kinds of teeth. He was apparently in his element.

"He didn't. The crowd is for her, obviously." Which precisely mirrored Mich.e.l.le's sentiments regarding the funeral gala, except his lovely wife had deployed exceedingly colorful language to enhance her opinion.

There was no love lost between Naomi, Mich.e.l.le and Corinthia and that simmering resentment went way back to some prep school feud, an aborted teen romance-the women had suffered crushes on Melvin Redfield's elder brother, Kyle, who, according to all reports, was cut of a different cloth than his dilettante sibling, had made lieutenant in the Navy, gone into the family law business. Too bad Kyle clipped a power line while cruising around the Hanford Nuclear Reservation in Luke Whitman's ultra-lite. The Whitmans were still smarting from that public relations disaster.

Naomi kissed his cheek and departed, swept up by a pa.s.sing throng of Fortune Five Hundred types. Don grabbed another drink and pressed through the bodies and possibly someone called his name again, that celebrated phenomenon of biological acoustics. He kept pus.h.i.+ng until he'd gone past the French doors onto the veranda where all was cool and subdued. The chairs glimmered rain-slick, so he leaned against the railing, bourbon in hand, and toyed with the notion of lighting his second cigarette of the season and dooming himself to yet another failure of character. Instead, he regarded the gathering darkness while his blood pressure descended and his nerves steadied.

Finally, he noticed a boy sitting in the opposite corner on a fancy iron bench. Bronson Ford, a preadolescent Ethiopian boy the Rourkes (who'd lost their first child under mysterious circ.u.mstances) had adopted the previous summer. Somebody, probably Kirsten Rourke, had dressed the kid to the nines in a Little Lord Fauntleroy getup complete with spats and a soft cap.

"Jesus," Don said and gulped his triple Jim Beam in commiseration. Bronson Ford stoically rolled a cigarette, lighted it and smoked. His eyes floated oily and diabolic in the cherry glow. His skin shone like petrified mangrove. Don realized the boy was one of those who seemed ageless, a glider in the twilight between youth and maturity and the only clues were the lines on his brow, his cold eyes and the pockmarks of an impoverished ancestry.

Don wrinkled his nose at the pungent odor of marijuana, was touched by dizziness. He sneaked a few more glances at the boy before he mustered the courage to commit the egregious inanity, "Some party, huh?"

Bronson Ford exhaled and smirked knowingly. Amber light from the windows splashed his face as if it were the black oval of a projector screen. The night had fully crept among them and Don s.h.i.+vered and his gla.s.s was empty. He considered a.s.saying the maelstrom inside.

"Mr. Miller!" The swarthy man with the heroic mustache emerged from the house. A second man, much taller and leaner, followed. Both men wore serviceable suits; nothing shabby, although hardly on par with the heavyweights, yet a cut above the professors and a.s.sorted engineering types.

Don had dealt with enough governmental agencies to recognize the handmaidens of the bureaucracy when they appeared; devils sans the requisite puff of smoke. "Well, well," he said. "You two were at the funeral. The lurkers."

The swarthy one made the introductions. "Vaughn Claxton. You remember my colleague Maurice Dart. Nice to see you again. We'd hoped to chat." Not, So sorry, old chap, about your mate what offed himself, or, Condolences, my friend, sorry for your loss. Instead, We hoped to chat.

See him again? Chat? Don automatically disliked the sound of it, whatever it meant. The duo smelled of airport aftershave and Mr. Claxton smiled fiercely as they shook hands. Mr. Dart didn't smile at all. His face hung oblong as a waterlogged pinata and was utterly melancholy. Mr. Claxton nodded at Bronson Ford. "Hiya, kiddo. California Gold? Nope, too dark-no offense. Colombian, then. Make with the bud, eh?" There was no warmth in the greeting, only a queer, pseudo familiarity, the implication of accustomed authority lent by official credentials and jackboots.

Bronson Ford expressionlessly took another long hit. He slowly held forth the joint in his left hand and Mr. Claxton strode over and took it and squinted as he dragged. He coughed and his cheeks darkened. He handed the joint to Mr. Dart and Mr. Dart drew in the smoke, held it expertly in the manner of a blooded veteran, before exhaling. His expression was a pallid, moony reflection of Bronson Ford's. The tall man offered the rapidly dwindling joint to Don.

"Um, thanks anyway," Don said, edging from their tribal campfire circle toward the doorway, from which spilled light and the tidal roar of tipsy conversation. Civilization and its protections seemed suddenly remote. Three pairs of eyes focused upon him and Mr. Claxton frowned ominously.

"It's easier than slicing our palms, trust me," Mr. Dart said.

Don said, "Okay, sure. One can't hurt." He accepted the joint and inhaled clumsily; it had been ages since his days of rebellious toking behind the bleachers at school and later in the dorms at college. The rush almost knocked him over. He tried to speak and ended up hacking and retching. Claxton smiled benignly, as if to acknowledge that all was well, that they had forged a brotherly compact and now secrets could be safely exchanged, and retrieved the joint.

No one spoke for a minute or two, or fifteen, Don wasn't certain because time had become rather elastic and he was dizzy. He gripped the rail for dear life and peered at the black ma.s.ses of tree tops on the hillside below the house and wondered about the songbirds in their secret nests, the scrabbling mice, the silently gliding owls. The stars jumped. He could not remember the best gra.s.s ever having such a visceral effect upon his senses. Kent Pepper had confided that the native strains were getting stronger with each new crop.

Bronson Ford rose quickly and scuttled back inside and the men watched him depart.

"I'm Sicilian with a Welsh influence," Mr. Claxton said, his voice booming like a G.o.d speaking from the clouds. "Tom Jones meets the Cosa Nostra. You were staring."

"The Sicilian for cruelty and ruthlessness, the Welsh for his charm," Mr. Dart said. "You should hear him in the shower. Lawrence Welk more than Tom Jones, I'd say. Vunnerful, vunnerful."

Mr. Claxton said, "You work for AstraCorp."

"I'm a consultant," Don said.

"A long-term consultant."

"Eh, the projects last as what they last...Say, what is it you fellows do?"

"We've got government jobs. Great dental." Mr. Claxton showed his teeth. "Yeah, AstraCorp. Man, the Rourkes sorta own that baby. Don- may I call you Don?-you're working on a job on the Peninsula. Lot number, oops, lost it. Slango Camp it's called. Timber company logged the s.h.i.+t out of those mountains during the 1920s. Now it's being prepped for some new development, yeah?"

Don nodded warily. "Sure, that's public knowledge, I guess." He didn't volunteer the fact AstraCorp was conducting its portion of an environmental impact study for some energy development company in California. Don hadn't gotten physically involved-his task was to line out the surveyors and other specialists and ride herd on the paperwork. He eyed Dart and Claxton (instantly dubbing them Frick and Frack) and tried to guess their angle. Possibly they weren't feds after all, and instead represented rival interests to AstraCorp; espionage was common in the industry, but seldom this overt.

"Right on. Slango's got a history. How many loggers disappeared from that camp in 1923? Two hundred wasn't it?"

Mr. Dart said, "You have a big-time physicist on the clock up there. Vern Noonan. Hot s.h.i.+t dude, huh? Kinda like swatting a fly with a sledgehammer bringing in a gun that size. Come on, level with me-what's really on the agenda at Slango?"