Not that she ever pushed for marriage, or even cohabitation. She too had become used to a single life. Still, relationships by their very nature must evolve, and I often feared ours would eventually collapse precisely because neither one of us wanted it to change.
It nearly had ended the previous fall. I’d gone up to Gannet, in Vermont’s remote Northeast Kingdom area, for what I’d hoped would be a working vacation. It had turned out to be a grueling murder investigation. I’d emerged from the traumatic Gannet case dedicated to patching things up between us.
That optimism had benefitted us both. We still lived apart, still pursued our separate interests, but now, having leapt this hurdle of self-doubt together, we’d come to trust one another more deeply, which is why the John Woll time bomb, and the obvious effect its explosion would have on the board of selectmen, chewed at me so constantly.
Gail lived in West Brattleboro, on the other side of Interstate 91, on Meadowbrook Road. Her home had once been an apple barn, isolated at the top of a hill, the lesser of several outbuildings belonging to the Morrison Farm. Now that barn was Morrison’s only tribute, the farm having been sold and subdivided, and all the other buildings demolished.
She’d renovated it, of course, filling it with a dizzying array of platforms and catwalks, all interconnected by enough stairways to satisfy an aerobics instructor. The core of the building she’d left open, so it soared some twenty feet to the rafters. In the winter, the whole place could be heated with the single wood stove in the center of the first floor. In the summer, the heat rose to the high ceiling and was vented through large skylights there, encouraged by two broad Hunter fans that continually moved the air.
I drove up her steep, long driveway, leaving the gloom of the gully and the road behind and becoming increasingly exposed to the sunset-lit view that surrounded her house. As I got out of the car, I felt bathed in the light of the pink-tinged bluish clouds overhead, stretching all the way to the blazing, mountainous horizon.
Gail, barefoot, in shorts and an abbreviated T-shirt that exposed her tanned stomach, lay stretched on a metal-and-plastic lawn chair on the second-floor deck that surrounded three sides of the building. Stepping onto the deck, I walked over to her and kissed her without saying a word. Her lips tasted of salt.
She shifted her gaze from the dazzling sunset and smiled at me. “You are a sight for sore eyes.”
I settled into the chair next to hers, feeling as I did so the last of my energy giving out. “I feel like I’ve been hit by a truck.”
She reached out and took my hand in hers. “How’s it all going, Joe?”
“Well, it ain’t no back-bedroom crime of passion. I have the sinking sensation we’ll be tearing at this for a while, and that before it’s all over, there’ll be more bodies to bury, literally and otherwise.”
She looked at me with her brow furrowed. “Why do you say that?” I waved my free hand toward downtown Brattleboro, invisible behind a masking cloak of distant green trees and hills. “Somebody down there has a serious grudge, and I don’t think he’s half close to getting it off his chest.”
“And you haven’t the slightest idea who he is?”
I shook my head, tempted to tell her anyway. “I have ideas, but that’s all.”
She looked confused. “So you have a suspect, but you don’t know if he’s the right guy?”
I changed my mind and slid away from the truth. “You got it.”
I told her about Gary Nadeau making a grab for some inside information. I put it in joking terms, but she only half smiled.
“Luman Jackson was behind that; I can almost guarantee it. Mrs. Morse finally found someone she could get hysterical with.”
That was not good news, nor was it surprising. Jackson was vice-chairman of the board of selectmen. Once a teacher at the local high school, he’d retired several years back and had decided to right the wrongs he’d claimed had been foisted on the town by its incompetent leaders. Now, no less incompetent himself, he was a brooding, occasionally raging presence on the board, using manipulation, accusation, and sometimes outright blackmail to get his way. I guessed Gary Nadeau was deep in his pocket, and I knew Town Manager Tom Wilson would usually yield rather than stand on principle. I also sensed that a good many other people in town government had become Jackson’s stoolies out of fear for their jobs. He was the man Tony Brandt most frequently locked horns with and was without doubt one of the primary reasons Brandt had chosen his current strategy.
I kept my voice neutral. “He’s getting worked up, is he?”
Gail hesitated before answering. “Well, he’s certainly doing that, but that’s nothing new. He hates Brandt and would love to see him canned. But I sense something else here. Usually, he gets this glint in his eye when he’s really onto something, but this time it’s not as obviously calculating; it’s more emotional. Nothing positive, though; just a feeling.”
I thought of John Woll. “No innuendos to go on?”
She shook her head. “Just the glint, so far, although it seems worse than usual.”
I glanced over at her, her eyes closed, her skin made dark by the blush of the fading sun. She looked very peaceful and in control, not at all awed by the threat of what she’d just forecast. She came from a generation that had cut its teeth protesting the Vietnam War, defending the underprivileged, decrying complacency and the status quo. Her past had prepared her well for her service on the board. People like Luman Jackson were not taken personally or blown out of proportion. She dealt with their actions and avoided the dirt. It was an admirably clear-sighted approach, but I knew it must take its toll. Gail was no saint, after all, and had a nasty temper when properly irked. I knew that from personal experience.
“Has Luman leaned on you over this thing, because of me?”
“Oh, a bit.” She opened her eyes and turned toward me. We were still holding hands. “Not enough to make any difference. Luman lives his life as a conspiracy, so he sees everyone else conspiring against him. To him, you and I aren’t a couple; we’re a plot, a dark and private conduit between the selectmen and the PD. So, sure, he leans on me sometimes, making insinuating remarks, but that’s all he can do. It amounts to a lot of hot air. It might be different if we were creeping around trying to keep this a secret; he would love that. But we’re not, so I wouldn’t worry.”
That made me feel great.
An alarm jangled by her side. “Ah, dinner beckons.”
She got up and I followed her into the house. It was cooler than the deck. The fans overhead were whirling at top speed, making the dozens of plants look like they were enjoying a breezy day by the sea.
The kitchen had once been in a separate room, but Gail had torn down the wall between it and the central core of the house. In fact, the bathroom was the only totally walled-off enclosure left in the building. I noticed that nothing was on the stove and that the oven knob was set at zero. “What was the alarm bell for?”
Gail went over to the icebox and pulled out a large earthenware bowl. “Cold soup; I had to refrigerate it for a couple of hours.” She kept adding to a pile of things on the counter, all from the icebox. “Also cold fruit salad, cold celery and cheese, cold ice tea, and, in the freezer, cold ice cream. It’s a thematic meal.” She was a lacto-vegetarian, eating no fish, fowl, flesh, or eggs.
I looked suspiciously at the cheese on the celery. “What is that?”
“A mixture of bleu and cream cheese. Sorry, they were out of Cheez Whiz.”
“You should switch stores. And this?” I sniffed at the soup, which had no odor whatsoever.
“Carrot soup mixed with orange juice.”
“My God. Is that legal?”
Laughing, she dipped a spoon into the gluey orange substance and held it out for me to taste. I scooped a bit off the end of the spoon with my lips. It was delicious. “Oh, that’s awful.” I finished the spoonful.