Joe was curious to meet Grandma.
The facility had a single-level home that served as the office, flanked by eight small cabins, four on each side. No, Joe thought, seven cabins. On the far east side was a small tangle of burnt framework. That’s where the DCI agent had been.
The tiny office lobby had a counter with a key and a note that read: FOR MR. PICKETT — Sleep tight and hit the bell if it isn’t too late. Otherwise, check in tomorrow. Sweet Dreams, Anna B. All of the i’s were dotted with little hearts. The walls of the dimly lit lobby were smothered with country-themed kitsch — hand-painted farmers and their wives, doe-eyed cows with long lashes, lots of wooden signs with cute and precious sayings like MY HEART BELONGS TO MY GRANDKIDS, IF YOU CLIMB IN THE SADDLE BE READY FOR THE RIDE, MY GREATEST BLESSINGS CALL ME NANA, I’M A QUILTER AND MY HOUSE IS IN PIECES…
Joe sighed, uncomfortable with the cuteness, and pressed a buzzer on the counter while he grabbed the key. He heard a chime ring in a back room, and waited for a moment.
“Mr. Pickett?”
“That’s me.”
Anna B. emerged from the shadowed hallway with a wide grin and eyes that sparkled behind steel-framed glasses. She was doughy and round, and looked like a caricature of a country grandmother — tight silver curls, apple cheeks, an overlarge sweatshirt with hearts appliquéd on the front.
She dug out an old-fashioned registration form from a stack under the counter and handed it to Joe along with a pen with a taped plastic rose on it, apparently so Joe wouldn’t have the urge to take it with him.
“Please fill out all the lines,” she said. “I’ve got you in cabin number eight. It’s our coziest and roomiest, since your reservation said you’d be here for a week.”
“Thank you,” Joe said, filling in his name, address, and license plate number.
“Is it your first time here?”
“Yup,” Joe said.
“So what brings you to Medicine Wheel?”
“Business,” he said. “I’m with the Game and Fish Department. Helping out Jim Latta for a few days.”
“Oh,” she said, pressing her fingertips to her lips, “that poor, poor man. He’s such a nice man. It’s so sad about his family.”
“Yup, it is.”
“That little girl of his — she’s such a pistol. She doesn’t let a little handicap hold her back.”
He completed the registration form and handed it to her with his credit card. She rammed it through a manual slider with surprising determination, he thought.
While she did, he noticed a decades-old certificate on the wall behind her recognizing Anna Bartholomew as Medicine Wheel County Businesswoman of the Year in 1991.
“Are you Anna?” he asked.
“Why, yes.”
“Are you related to the judge?”
“He’s my brother,” she said, with the smile still firmly in place. But her eyes were probing. “Do you know him?”
“Not yet,” Joe said.
“If you’re around here, you’ll probably run into him,” she said. “There aren’t many of us left.”
He looked at his key. “What happened to cabin number one out there?”
“Oh,” she said, as if overcome by the question, “it burned to the ground in the middle of the night. It was horrible, just horrible. It’s so sad, because Mr. Thompson was in it at the time.”
“What caused the fire?” Joe asked.
She shook her head and waved away the dire implications of the question. “They still don’t know for sure, but the investigators said he was smoking in bed. We have a strict rule about not smoking inside our units. You’re not a smoker, are you?”
“No.”
“Well, good. It was so tragic what happened. Mr. Thompson was not a nice man, but he didn’t deserve what happened to him…” She caught herself and shook her head. “I shouldn’t say such a thing about him. I didn’t know his heart, so I shouldn’t say something not nice about him.”
Joe nodded.
“Just in case, we’ve had all our wiring updated and inspected since then,” she said, assuring him, “and everything is shipshape. The sheriff’s department did a thorough investigation and determined we weren’t to blame in any way. So there’s nothing to worry about.”
“I wasn’t worried.”
She paused as she separated his receipt from her original credit card form. “I see your ring. Are you married?”
“Yes.”
“Children?”
“Three girls.”
“All girls,” she said, practically singing. “That must be wonderful for you. Children are such a blessing. And wait until you have grandchildren! They are the most wonderful treasures. Do you have any yet?”
“Not close.”
“Yes, you do look too young. I have four,” she said. “Four little angels that love their nana.”
Joe smiled and chinned toward her many grandma items on the walls while she reeled off their names and ages. The oldest was twelve. She began to tell him about young Josh, and he listened for five minutes.
Finally, she reached across the counter and gave him a friendly swipe on his arm. “Oh, you don’t care about hearing all about them. You’re probably tired and want to get to your room.”
“Well…”
“It’s okay,” she said. “I’m just happy you’re here. You’re our only guest tonight.”
“I see that.”
“This place used to be quite busy,” she said with a defensive edge to her voice. “We used to be filled with coal miners and loggers for most of the year. That’s why every cabin has a kitchenette. But these days, with the economy and gas prices…”
“It’s tough,” Joe said, working his way toward the door.
“Thank God for Mr. T.,” she said. “He sends a few of his hunters here from time to time — plus people who come here to meet with him about something. I know he doesn’t need to do that, because he owns the largest hotel in the county, so I know he does it out of the goodness of his heart. Otherwise, I don’t know what we’d do.”
“Mr. T.? Wolfgang Templeton?”
“Oh, yes, he’s a wonderful man. Wonderful, wonderful, wonderful man.”
“I’ve heard he’s generous,” Joe said, recalling what Latta had told him.
“He’s our savior, almost. This county would just die without him.”
“That’s quite a compliment,” Joe said.
“And every word is true,” she chirped. “You know, the day after the fire, he showed up here himself with rolls and coffee, and he had some of his men help clean up. Some of his maintenance people worked with the sheriff to make sure the wiring was good in all the rest of the cabins, and he never even sent a bill. I didn’t even know him very well — not like my brother — but he said he’d heard about our tragedy and wanted to reach out. That’s the kind of man he is.”
Cabin number eight had a long list of rules on a laminated piece of construction paper mounted over the desk and written in Anna B.’s hand. Joe tossed his bag into the spare room while the ancient electric heater under the window clicked and hummed and filled the cabin with the smell of burning dust and miller moths. He wondered how long it had been since another guest had used it.