Tom paused with his hand on the doorknob. “I don't want to take any chances,” he said simply, pulled the door shut, and left.
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I GOT MYSELF a beer and joined Jack by the picture window at the breakfast table, where we had a ringside view of Faye and Tom's progress up the hill. The snow had stopped falling for the moment, but the sky had gone cold and gray, and the whiteness that coated the ground had lost its brilliance.
My two cerebral friends followed the path up through the boulder train for a short distance, then cut northward. Holding hands. Walking slowly, meditatively. They began to converse. Now and then, one of them would pause, head bowed, and think for a moment, then say something to the other, who would by then have stopped to wait and watch. Finally, long after they were free of the rocks that delineated the tumble of earth that waited precariously above Faye's house, Tom went down on one knee in the snow, held his hands up toward Faye in supplication, and asked her a question.
Faye raised both hands to her face and placed the palms together, her thumbs touching her mouth and nose. Without breaking their union, she drew her hands down to her breast, pressing them into the yogic mudra that honors the heart. She was smiling, her face shining brightly enough to make the earth glisten on a moonless night.
JACK AND I DRAINED OUR BEERS AND VAMOOSED. IT SEEMED a good time to be somewhere else, to be giving Tom and Faye a little privacy.
We went back to my place first, but we didn't stay. I was halfway up the stairs, thumping along on my crutches, when Mrs. Pierce barreled out of her downstairs apartment and addressed my back.
“Consider this notice of your eviction,” she said. “I don't allow my girls to have men up in their rooms.”
I thought of informing Mrs. Pierce that I wasn't one of her “girls,” but I bit my tongue. And I thought of telling her that Jack was actually a cross-dressing roller derby queen, then thought better of that, too. I even considered asking Jack to flash his badge and recite something from the local renter's laws. 1 tossed that idea, as well. Who cared what the law said? If Mrs. Pierce didn't want meânot just the me who left trails of longing in the snow but the larger, more complete meâin her house, then I didn't want to be in it, either. “I'll be out as soon's I can. find another roost,” I answered evenly.
Jack gave his own interpretation of the law by picking me up in his great strong arms and carrying me the rest of the way up the stairs and across the threshold into my apartment, cackling like a madman.
Riding in his arms felt good. It felt joyous. I laughed with all my body as he set me down on my bed and kissed me on the forehead. I arched my back on the pillows and said, “Thank you, most kind and noble sir.”
“Want me to bring the law down on her?” he inquired.
“Nah. I think I just outgrew this place anyway.”
I was still laughing when I looked at my answering machine. I said, “Oh, look: We got us a telly-phone message.” Thinking nothing could daunt me just then, I punched the play button.
The message was from Katie. Her voice sounded exuberant. “Ray told Mama, and Mama told
me
the happy
news!”
she had chirped into the mechanical ear. “Well, I think this is a cause for
celebration.
There's a funeral tomorrow, as I'm sure you know, so we're tied up until late afternoon, but let's get you up here for
dinner.
Now, don't you worry about a
thing.
I'll arrange all the food, and all you have to do is get yourself dressed. Ray will pick you up. Say six o'clock. Great! Give me a call, okay?”
You could have knocked me over with the proverbial feather. I grabbed up the phone and dialed Ava's number. Katie answered. “Katie,” I said, shaking with rage. “It's Em. Just what the fuck do you have up your sleeve?”
“Oh,
nothing,
” she cooed. “Just welcoming you into the family, dear.”
I could get no sounds through my windpipe for several seconds. Finally, I spluttered, “Well! I take it you haven't heard from Ray yet about Enos!”
Katie let out a smug snort. “Oh, that. Em, dear, you have to understand, a wife can be open-minded about her husband's interests in other women.”
“Interests?” I squealed.
“Interests?”
“Really, Em. Ray told me that you tried to tell him that Enos had been
unfaithful
to me. Of course that's not
true,
but so what? Even if he was you don't think that would
matter,
do you?” With
each word, her voice heated a degree. Alternate meanings seemed to slither through her words like poisonous snakes.
“Is Ray there?” I asked, my throat constricting.
“No. He has gone to work. He
works.”
And I lie around and take up space,
I thought, anger once again edging ahead of fear. “Listen, Katie, Iâ
thank
you for your invitation, but I won't be available.” I was descending quickly to her game of using one statement to make another. Then suddenly, what she had been saying hit me; Ray had not announced that Enos was a murderer; he had told his family that the man had been committing adultery! Ray had misunderstood everything I'd told him. I rewound the tape of memory and replayed it, this time hearing all the double entendres.
I dropped the phone into its cradle without bothering to say good-bye. I swung my feet over the edge of the bed and stared straight at Jack in horror.
Jack studied me with intense interest. “What?”
“I'm rethinking the conversation I had with Ray in the car. IâI asked him to deal with his brother-in-law. He said he would. And I ⦠and he ⦠I suppose I never once said murder ⦠you know, being polite ⦠but I thought he
understood.”
Jack arched one eyebrow. “Did you mention both women?”
“Yes.”
“And Ray went home and accused Enos of adultery.”
“Yes. Or ⦠that's what Katie just spat back at me.”
“Then that means that Enos isn't our killer,” he said simply. “Either that or your boy Ray's in some weird, weird space.”
“Why?”
“Because Ray's a cop, Em. He thinks his brother-in-law is guilty, but not of murder, and murder has certainly occurred. You can't name murdered people around a cop and have him think adultery unless he knows your suspect is innocent. And that means that Enos has an alibi. Or worse, maybe your pal Ray is
playing some kind of mind game on us all. Are you sure
he
didn't kill those women?”
“Maybe he's in denial.” I suggested, knowing as I said it that I was being absurdly hopeful.
Jack said, “If he's that far from reality, I guess it's a good thing I helped you get that ring off.”
I began integrating this new piece of the puzzle. “But Ava got all jumpy around me when I mentioned earthquakes and Dr. Smeeth and Enos, and she wouldn't talk to me this morning. She
knows
something.”
“She has a huge share of that company, Em. You think she doesn't know what's going on there? Come on, she's no room-temperature IQ.”
My stomach sank through my socks. “I don't like this, Jack. This means we can't rely on Ray to be a good cop and lock Enos up.”
“You still think it's him?”
“Yes. The tidiness with which they were each killed. Those killings were engineered. And each was about to expose him.” I stared at the floor. “I know how to make sure if it isn't him.”
Jack shook his head. “You can't take any chances, Em.”
I began to tremble with fear and rage. “Chances? Somebody out there is killing women who know too much about the projects Enos Harkness works on, and I'm the next logical target.”
Jack put an arm around my shoulder. “Come on, Em, I'll take you to my place. You can stay there until this clears up.”
“I'll go with you,” I said. “But I can't hide. If I'm the prey, I'll draw the wolf wherever you put me.”
Jack's lips set into a straight line.
I said, “I just realized something.”
“Tell me.”
“If I'm the bait, then we are in charge of the trap.”
“What are you thinking?”
“The Ottmeier funeral is tomorrow. Everyone who is anyone in the Mormon community will be there, and that will include all the Raymonds; and unless I misunderstand the way business is done in this town, Hayes himself will also attend. We'll have to get Jim Schecter to help us, and get the use of the clock tower at the City and County Building.”
For the first time, Jack looked truly worried.
I saw waves coming up the street and the power lines. A child tried to outrun them on his bike, but the street threw him down. Then a wall hit me.
âJean Schnug, recalling the February 9, 1971, magnitude 6.5 earthquake in San Fernando, California
AS HE WAITED IN LINE TO PASS THROUGH THE DOORS INTO the foyer in front of the sanctuary, Jim Schecter wished he had worn a hat. Saturday had dawned bright but windy, the very wind he feared might further load the weakened roof of the stadium, and the wind presaged another front with yet more snow.
A harsh gust whistled around the entrance of the church, sticking its cold fingers into the faces of the gathering faithful who had come to offer condolences to the friends and family of little Tommy Ottmeier. The place was mobbed; Salt Lake City's Mormon population was mourning as a community, as the integrated, faithful hive Brigham Young had envisioned, and Jim Schecter felt proud to be among them.
He did not feel proud of the TV cameras and the reporters who had set up in siege along the sidewalk. They were unseemly. They were offensive. They were like vultures preying on the dead. Tommy had gone to be with Heavenly Father. It was a time of celebration for his departed soul, not an opportunity for mawkish voyeurism. His family, celebrants though they might
be, must still live with the loss of his precious company.
In unguarded moments Jim did wonder how Tommy's parents must feel; they were, after all, negligent in having put such a heavy bookcase next to his bed, but then again, the earthquake might just as easily have occurred during the daytime, and the child could have been playing in the wrong place at the wrong time and have been killed all the same.
The crowd inched forward. Jim passed now out of the wind and into the warm interior of the building.
At least the wind might blow some of the snow off the roof of the stadium,
he mused.
He wrenched his mind from the thought of that roof. That's what his doctor had taught him to doânot to dwell on things. Obsessive thoughts could bring on an attack, and that was to be avoided at all costs. It was okay to go to Tommy's funeral, because that was a positive thing, a celebration, but he must not think about things like that roof.
Or Pet Mercer.
Until I get a chance to deliver my message, he reminded himself.
Dear God, there's Enos Harkness, the structural engineer who specified the roof truss design that failed!
Jim hurried into the sanctuary and sat down as quickly as he could, following the ushers. There, he began his breathing exercises, bringing the thudding in his chest back down to a trot. Ah. Okay, it was ebbing.
The row filled in beside him, and then the one behind. He heard familiar voices threading in and out through the murmuring that rose and fell all around him as those gathered took their seats for the service. He heard a woman's voiceâVelma Williams, he was pretty sureâspeaking to ⦠he turned. It was Ava Raymond.
I must deliver the message,
he reminded himself.
Follow my conscience.
He glanced back nervously. It was good fortune that she'd been seated so closeâby God's will!âbecause that meant that the man he must address was there, too!
“I hear it was shoddy workmanship,” Velma was saying.
Ava did not answer. Her jaw was set in anger.
“That bookcase was built in,” Velma continued, making a study of the way her words sawed at Ava. “It shouldn't have fallen.”
“The service is starting,” Ava replied harshly.
Built in? Then it wasn't the parents' negligence!
Jim reined in his galloping anxieties.
I can wait until afterward to deliver the message,
he decided.
Have to. The service is starting.
Then his eyes widened. At the far end of Ava's row, moving in late past her string of beautiful daughters and grandchildren and her handsome son, Micah Hayes was just taking a seat.
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MICAH HAYES ARRANGED himself in the pew next to Ava Raymond, preparing to think about something else for the time it would take the congregation to dispatch their feeble grief. Then he would leave as quickly as possible.
He looked around at the faces of the congregation, measuring their reaction to his presence. Something was wrong. He was an important, prominent man, and a visitor at this Stake. They should be looking honored that he would favor them by attending this funeral.
He had seen eyes tracking him as he came up the aisle, heard grumblings, a pointed comment here and there that Tommy Ottmeier had been struck by a built-in bookcase in a house constructed by Hayes Associates; see, there is Hayes himself ⦠. This was nonsense of course.
He
had not built that bookcase. In fact, at no time in recorded history had he, Micah Hayes, ever held a hammer. That was filthy work for menial underlings.
The service began, arched over the sadness and joy of the occasion, then drew to a close. Micah Hayes's thoughts had skated away. Were elsewhere. On his stomach. On other prospects. On a new property he had acquired near Park City. It was quite near an avalanche chute, but no matter; he knew which gears to oil
in order to get the variances he needed to build his next farm of faux chateaux there for the Gentiles who were flowing in from out-of-State. They wouldn't be looking uphill towards the avalanche potential, only downhill toward the bars.
At the end of the service, the congregation stood and waited to file from the church; the family first, from the front row, then each row in turn following them down the aisle. As the pew in front of Hayes emptied out, a man stopped abruptly, turned, and stared at him. The man's eyes bulged with anxiety. His skin was the color of paste.
“Mr. Hayes,” the man said. “I am Jim Schecter. I work for the county. I'm ⦠an engineer.”
This is the limit!
Hayes thundered inside his head.
The fools are attacking me at church!
He fought to keep his face blank, his manner impassive.
“I inspected the roof of your new stadium,” the man was saying, his voice now rising and tightening, as if he was about to cry. “IâI think you know what I'm telling you.” He cleared his throat, glanced backward along the row of people he was keeping waiting in the pew.
Hayes turned and looked also. The entire Raymond clan had taken note, all eyes and ears focused sharply on the interchange. Hayes could see the whites of Enos Harkness's eyes clear around his pupils. Katie's eyes were half closed, her lips curling upward. Ava was focused in fury on this ⦠engineer. Hayes looked back at Ray, whose eyes were blank, unreadable.
The man squeaked, “I ⦠was wondering if you'd ⦠ah, like to see what a seismic retrofit can look like. I'm ⦠um, going to the City and County Building to do my inspection there. I invite you to come along. Six o'clock this evening. I ⦔ He paused, gulped, stared at his feet, his hands, his agitation growing. “There will be a geologist along as well, meeting me there. Her name ⦠her name is Em Hansen. She says she has something to tell you about the feasibility of your new building site. The Towne Centre
project. Right next to your new stadium!” Suddenly, Schecter's face contorted with anger. “I know you used your influence to silence Sidney Smeeth. You should be ashamed! And that bookcase! Unspeakable!”
Hayes blurted, “You're raving!”
Schecter struggled onward, beginning to stutter, although he looked like he might faint at any moment. “I've ⦠I've told M-miss Hansen to come a little later. Six-thirty. So you and I c-can talk first. M-maybe there are things sh-she doesn't need to know about. Do you understand me?” He stopped speaking. His eyes gaped even wider. He seemed to rise up on his toes as if threatening and at the same time, begging for comfort, an answer, admonishment.
Hayes fixed a commanding look on the man. “I'm sure I don't have time for such twaddle,” he grunted.
“Six o'clock,” Schecter said, his voice going into a sing-song of recitation. “The building will be locked. The guard won't be thereâcalled away, I understandâbut I'll leave the east door unlocked for you. Remember that. East door.” With that, the man departed, almost leaping from the end of the pew like a flea.
Which is what you are on the hide of mankind,
Hayes decided, rage filling the whites of his eyes with a tracery of red. He turned and looked behind him. Dozens of people had heard the interchange, and not a one now looked friendly.
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WENDY FORTESCUE STARED into her monitor, adjusting the crosshairs along one more small aftershock that represented the release of perhaps a dinner table-size area along the Warm Springs branch of the Wasatch fault. She had a bad feeling. That bad feeling had lingered with her all week, had grown rather than lessened. The aftershocks just weren't significant enough. It was too quiet, just like the whole Salt Lake segment of the fault had been since long before they began to record seismic activity. She
feared with every bone that the fault was winding up for something much, much larger than it had dealt out on Monday.
Big quakesâground-rupturing quakesâhad, in pre-European times, ripped the Wasatch fault systematically, and doubtless would again. The towering steepness of the Wasatch Range, and the repeatedly torn apron of debris flows and alluvium that flanked it, attested to that. But those giant temblors had always shaken a landscape that had no structures, no buildings that could collapse. Wendy knew with certainty that when the next giant struck, buildings would fall. The older homes would collapse, their chimneys toppling through roofs as outer walls crumbled. Hospitals would fall, and civic buildings. The City and County Building might ride it out, but the state capitol, with all its countless tons of massive crystalline rocks, not braced by seismic retrofit, would be demolished. Perhaps the dome itself would plummet on the legislature, squashing the damned fools who refused to fund its retrofit. Highway bridges would collapse, and roads would split, making it impossible for emergency vehicles to do their jobs; and the airport control tower would rack and runways would crack, thwarting the arrival of aid. Power would fail, and water supplies would dwindle as lines and underground pipes ruptured. And far west of the city, Great Salt Lake would slosh like a bathtub, ricocheting shock waves from one side to the other, generating inland tsunamis that would crest the levees. And, as the valley slowly tipped to accommodate the addition of several new feet of real estate, that lake would flow eastward, flooding first what was left of the airport runways and next back up the waters of the Jordan River and City Creek, inundating the city itself. The brave new spruced-up center of the city would be hardest hit as its older brick and stone buildings tumbled, and businesses would close under the strain of interruptions and the cost of rebuilding.
She thought of the thousandsâno, tens of thousands, perhaps hundreds of thousandsâwho would die, and of all who would be sick, and hurt, and homeless. And she wept.