Weight of Silence (13 page)

Fitzgerald and I have gone our separate ways for the moment. Fitzgerald is focusing on getting a search dog over here, and on trying to trace the whereabouts of Griff from the GPS in his cell phone. I will be meeting with the other deputies to give and receive updates on our progress in finding Calli and Petra.

Our sheriff, Harold Motts, is getting on in years, and has taken a mostly hands-off approach to his job in the past year. He’s passed as many of his duties that he could over to me. There has even been talk that I should run for sheriff in the next election. Most of the staff have been accepting, though grudgingly, of my leadership role, but one. Deputy Logan Roper has tried to make job as a deputy sheriff hell. I figure it had more to do with Roper being a close pal of Griff Clark more than any genuine dislike that he has for me, but who knows? We’ve come to a mutual understanding. We show professional respect toward one another and communicate when
we need to, but that’s all. It’s too bad, actually, but as long as our tension doesn’t interfere with the job, I can live with it.

Griff and Logan were five years ahead of Toni and me in high school. I never really knew much about them, just that they were wild and could be mean. I’m not sure how Griff and Toni were first introduced, but I suspect it was through her job as a clerk at the Gas & Go, a convenience store on Highway Ten. Toni worked there on weekends and after school. I told her I didn’t like her working in a gas station so late at night and so close to the highway; anyone could take off with her and would be well on his way without anyone knowing. Toni would just laugh and call me “cop boy.” I hated that.

By April of our senior year of high school, Toni wasn’t talking to me and was dating Griff, apparently hopelessly in love with him. I thought she was trying to make me jealous and it worked, but I wouldn’t give her the satisfaction of letting her know that. I didn’t think, however, that a year later she would be married to him.

November of our senior year was when Toni and I really started talking about our future together and what we wanted. We had spent a chilly early winter morning walking through the woods. She wore an old brown barn coat that belonged to one of her brothers and a multicolored hat knit by her mother, who had died earlier that fall. She had cropped her hair short and it made her face seem even younger than her seventeen years; she had lost weight since her mother passed and she looked breakable. I was excited. She knew I wanted to go to college. Toni said she was supportive of that, but I could tell she wasn’t really. I couldn’t afford the tuition at St.
Gilianus so a state college was my only option. The problem was that the University of Iowa was over a hundred miles away from Willow Creek. I had already filled out my application and had been accepted; I would leave the following August.

As I told Toni, she wouldn’t even look at me. She sat on the edge of the fallen tree we called Lone Tree Bridge because it fell across a portion of Willow Creek. Her normally unguarded face went stony as I described to her that the college wasn’t really all that far away and that I’d come to see her on holidays and on weekends. I went on to say that there was nothing stopping her from coming with me. She could enroll in classes or get a job. We could still be together.

“Everybody leaves me,” she whispered, tucking her arms into the pockets of her coat.

She meant her mother dying and her brothers moving away. It was just her and her dad in their house, and according to Toni, her dad was thinking of moving to Phoenix to be with Tim, his oldest son.

“I’m not leaving, not for good,” I told her. But she shook her head.

“You won’t come back. You’ll go to college with all these important people and important ideas. You’ll outgrow this place,” she said matter-of-factly.

“No,” I insisted. “I will never outgrow you.”

“All I’ve ever wanted was to live in a yellow house,” she said softly before she walked away, leaving me standing alone among the naked trees. I could hear crispy leaves crunching under her feet long after I couldn’t see her anymore. We tried to carry on as we always had for the next month or so, but something had changed. She would shrink from my touch,
as if the feel of my hands on her hurt her somehow. She would become uncharacteristically quiet when I talked about college and a shadow came across her face whenever I tried to make love to her. I hadn’t even left yet, but she was already gone.

She broke up with me at the beginning of December and from then on, it was as if I didn’t exist. She didn’t take my phone calls, didn’t answer the door when I came over, walked right past me in the hallways at school. I finally cornered her in Willow Creek Woods. She was walking slowly, her head down, her eyes on the trail before her. It was snowing, the flakes impossibly big. I briefly considered scooping up a snowball and pelting her in the back with it. I was pretty pissed at her. But I didn’t. There was something about her walking there alone that made her seem as naked and vulnerable as the giant, leafless trees. “Toni,” I called softly to her, trying not to startle her. She whipped around, clutching her chest. On seeing me, she dropped her hands, fists tight, as if preparing for a fight. “Hey,” I said. She didn’t respond. “Can we talk?” I asked.

“There’s really nothing to talk about,” she said, her voice as cold as the air around us.

“Do you really want to do this?” I asked.

“Do what?” she asked as if she didn’t know what I was talking about.

“This!” My voice echoed through the trees. She took one step toward me and then stopped, as if coming any closer to me might make her change her mind.

“Lou,” she said firmly. “For months I watched my mother die…”

“I know,” I said. “I was there, remember?”

“No, you weren’t there. Not really. For months I watched my mother dying. There was nothing, nothing, that I could do to make her better, to make her live. Now I’m losing my dad. In a completely different way, but the minute I graduate he’s out of here. Out of Willow Creek forever. He can’t stand the thought of living here without my mother. I do not want to end up like that. Ever!” She looked at me fiercely.

“It’s not the same,” I pleaded with her.

“It’s exactly the same,” she shot back. “You’re going to leave, and that’s fine, whatever. But I’m not going to spend the rest of my life waiting for you. I spent way too much time on you as it is.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” I asked angrily. “That I was just a waste of time?”

“It just means that I’m not going to invest one more minute in someone who isn’t going to stick around, who doesn’t love me enough to stay. Just leave me alone!” She turned away from me and moved noiselessly through the woods. I shouldn’t have done it, but I did. At that moment, I hated her. I bent down and scraped up a handful of the wet snow, forming a perfect white ball. I didn’t throw it hard, but at the last second she turned to say something else to me, and the snowball pelted her right in the face. She stood stone still for a fraction of a second and then turned and ran. I tried to follow her, to apologize, but she knew the woods better than anyone, plus she was faster than I was. I never caught up to her, never said I was sorry. Never found out what she was going to say to me before the snowball hit.

In the end, she outgrew me, or maybe I outgrew her, I guess. I knew I was starting to look like a fool. Everyone knew
I loved Antonia and that she wanted nothing to do with me anymore. She married Griff that next year, while I was away at school, and had Ben soon after. I learned about Toni the way strangers learned about her, through newspaper clippings and idle gossip. We had become strangers, she and I.

I met Christine four years later and we married. She reminded me nothing of Toni, and I didn’t mean to hold that against her, but I guess I did. I’m surprised, actually, that Christine was this patient with me, especially after I brought her here to Willow Creek to live and raise a family. She never quite settled in, always felt out of place, unwelcome. It’s not her fault that the people of Willow Creek are intertwined by a common history and by blood. Maybe she doesn’t fit in because she doesn’t want to, or maybe because I don’t want her to. I don’t know. But I don’t have time to waste on this; I have to focus on the matters at hand.

As soon as I walk into the station, Officer Tucci is there, waiting for me.

“We got some info on some of the names you wanted run,” he tells me. “There’s not much. Mariah Burton, the babysitter, is completely clean. Chad Wagner, one of the students, was arrested when he was in high school for underage drinking. Got a hold of him and he’s home visiting his mom and dad in Winner. Nothing’s come up on this Lucky Thompson, but we can’t contact him. He isn’t at home or he isn’t answering his phone. The men from the furniture store are accounted for and are being interviewed. We’re also checking on all the teachers at the girls’ school. Calli spent a lot of time with the school counselor, a Charles Wilson. We haven’t been able to contact him, either. Only other red flag
was on Sam Garfield. He teaches at St. Gilianus. Been here for about three years. Before that he was at another college in Ohio. Left under a cloud. Had an affair with a student.

“Oh, and Antonia Clark called about twenty minutes ago,” Tucci says. “She says she’s found footprints that look like Calli’s, and a man’s footprints, too. She was very upset, crying and carrying on. Couldn’t make much sense of her after that.”

“What did you tell her?” I ask.

“Told her I would let you know as soon as I could. She said she wanted to talk to you. Had to talk to you. I tried to explain to her that you weren’t available at a second’s notice.” Tucci sounds irritated. “That you’re a busy man.”

“Who’s over there now?” I ask, already heading back out the door.

“Logan Roper,” he says.

“Great,” I mutter under my breath.

“Well, he was there and available,” Tucci blusters, sounding confused. “Shouldn’t he be the one?”

“That’s fine,” I say regretfully. “I just want to be made aware of any developments in this case. Call me no matter what from here on out.”

“Do you think it’s like that McIntire girl?” he asks.

“I don’t know. But that outcome is the one we want to avoid.” I pause at the double doors. “Is there anything else I need to know before I head on back to the Clark place?”

“Actually, yes. Channel Four’s been calling all morning asking about the missing girls. They want a statement. And Mrs. McIntire called twice. She wants you to call her back. Wants to know if she can be any help to the families of the missing girls. Says she’s driving over this afternoon.”

“Dear Lord,” I mumble. “Get me Fitzgerald. We need to get an official statement written up for the press. When was the last time you spoke with Mrs. McIntire?”

“About forty minutes ago, I guess. She should be here anytime now.”

I retreat to my desk. I’d have to see about Toni later. For now, I had to trust my department, especially Roper, to do what they were trained to do. I quickly jot down a rough copy of a statement that could hopefully satisfy the press, and my phone rings. “Deputy Sheriff Louis speaking,” I say.

“Yeah, Louis,” Fitzgerald begins, “I just got word about the footprints at the Clark house. The state crime lab should be pulling up there momentarily. Who do you got over there?”

“Officer by the name of Logan Roper. Should be fine, except…” I hesitate.

“Go ahead. Say it. Something’s bothering you,” Fitzgerald prods.

“He’s a decent cop, but he’s also great pals with Griff Clark. Conflict of interest, maybe,” I say. Like I was one to talk, but I didn’t trust Griff and I didn’t quite trust his buddies, either.

“I see what you mean,” says Fitzgerald. “Pair him up with someone you completely trust. How ’bout you?”

“Well,” I begin, “there could be a bit of a problem with that, as well.”

Better to get it all out now, Toni and my history together. Shouldn’t matter, but it does. I settle in to tell Fitzgerald all about it when I hear a soft clearing of the throat, and at my desk I see the tired, sad face of Mrs. McIntire.

“Hey,” I say to Fitzgerald. “Let me call you back.”

We disconnect and I face the woman I had hoped not to
see again until we had the man who destroyed her life and lives of her family members, the woman whose battered, abused daughter was found dead in a woody area ten miles from her home on the other side of the county. The woman who I had to help pick up off the floor of the morgue after she identified the body as her Jenna’s, and the woman who cursed me last time she talked to me for having to bury her daughter without knowing who had done this to her.

“I want to help,” she says simply.

I offer her a chair and try to figure out the best way to tell her that the last thing the Gregory and Clark families want is any sort of reminder that their daughters could be dead.

I can’t sit around and wait. I tell Fielda’s mother that I am going to check on the investigation and I drive back toward my home. I park on the shoulder of Timber Ridge Road. Something is going on at the Clark house. A flurry of activity. Several police cars drive past and turn down the Clarks’ lane. My heart quickens and for a moment I think that I am having a heart attack, but I do not collapse, though I feel a heart attack would be preferable to what is going through my mind right now.

The sun is bearing down more ferociously now, if that is possible. The car thermometer reads ninety-nine degrees, and that does not even include the heat index. I step from my car and make my way toward the Clark house.

The woods and this quiet, uneventful neighborhood were what brought Fielda and me to our home. We like the fact that, while we have neighbors, there are only four close by. The Olson and Connolly families live to our right and the Clarks and old Mrs. Norland are on the left. One hundred
yards separate each of our homes, so we are close enough to call each other neighbor but far away enough for privacy’s sake. We never let Petra visit the Clark house when Griff was home from wherever he works, the Alaska pipeline, I believe. We don’t tell Petra that Griff is the reason she cannot go over there at times; we simply say that Calli has so little time with her father that we must not disturb their family time. Petra accepts this good-naturedly, and I do not believe she knows of Griff’s illness. Calli certainly never speaks of it.

On the other side of Timber Ridge is another line of trees, not the forest that lies behind our homes, but a high bluff that separates us from the rest of Willow Creek. Many miles down Timber Ridge a few other homes are situated in much the same manner, neighbors here and there with backyards fading into the forest. My feet crunch on the grass, burned yellow from the sun and lack of rain. From a distance, I see some officers speaking with Antonia in her front yard. She is pointing and gesturing, but I cannot see her face.

I see a van speed past and turn down the Clarks’ drive. It is a television van. I can’t quite make out the call letters, and they are obviously in a great hurry. Again my heart flutters and I quicken my step. I decide to cut through the back of our yards to hopefully avoid any reporters or cameras. Antonia, too, sees the media van and hurries into her home while the officers stride toward the vehicle, arms waving, ordering the driver to stop. I run a football field’s length to the Clarks’ back door and a police officer stops me short. I am covered with sweat and I bend over to try and catch my breath. Why so many police officers, I wonder.

“Sir,” the officer addresses me, “you are not supposed to be here. This is a crime scene.”

“I’m Martin Gregory,” I explain as another police officer steps past me and begins unwinding yellow crime scene tape and attaching one end to a concrete birdbath settled among Antonia’s garden. “What’s going on?” I ask.

“Martin Gregory?” the officer asks.

“Petra Gregory’s father,” I say impatiently.

“Uh, yes, sir. I’m sorry. Please step toward the front of the house.”

“What’s going on?” I repeat. “Did you find something?”

“I think I should let Agent Fitzgerald speak with you,” he says over his shoulder as he walks into the house. “Please stay here.”

I ignore his direction and follow him into the house. “Antonia,” I call out. She is sitting on her couch, her face in her hands. “Antonia, what’s going on? Did something happen? Did you find something out?” My voice is trembling.

“Footprints,” Antonia says, shaking. “We think we found Calli’s footprints and a man’s.”

“What about Petra? Did you find some footprints that may be hers?” I ask.

Agent Fitzgerald speaks up, I had not even seen him in the corner of the room, speaking with another man who could have been a policeman, but was dressed in everyday clothes. “Mr. Gregory, I’m glad you’re here.” He reaches out his hand to shake mine, and I wipe my sweaty palm on my slacks before I accept his.

“What is going on?” I ask yet again. No one is really listening to me.

“Please, come sit down,” Agent Fitzgerald says as if this is his own living room.

I sit.

“Mr. Gregory, Mrs. Clark has noticed a child’s footprints, along with an adult male’s shoe prints. They could have been there for quite some time. As you know, it hasn’t rained for a few weeks. We’re concerned because it appears, from the impressions in the dirt, that there was a struggle between the adult and the child. We are investigating this. We will also be checking more thoroughly around your home, as well. At this point, however, there appears to be only one set of child’s footprints.” Agent Fitzgerald pauses, letting this information soak into me, then continues. “We’ve called in a crime scene unit from Des Moines. They’ll be here shortly. The crime lab will be doing a thorough search of this yard and of your yard, as well, to see if any other footprints or evidence can be found.

“The media has arrived,” Fitzgerald announces. “This is a good thing for you and Mrs. Clark, although it makes things somewhat more difficult for us logistically. We don’t want anyone getting in the way of us doing our job.”

“I need to go tell Fielda what is going on. What should I say to her?” I ask.

“Tell her the truth. You can’t hide anything from her during this. You two need to stick together and be strong. But I have to insist that you stay away from your home.” To Antonia he says, “Mrs. Clark, we need you to also stay away from your home. This is now a crime scene. Do you have anyone with whom you can stay?”

Toni looks dazed. “I think…I suppose Mrs. Norland’s
house—over there.” She motions weakly toward our neighbor’s home.

“Good. If the reporters ask you questions, tell them you will be speaking with them in about…” Fitzgerald checks his watch “…one hour. Will that give you enough time to gather your thoughts and speak with Mrs. Gregory?”

I nod, though, in fact, I have no idea if I will be ready or not.

“You and Mrs. Gregory and Mrs. Clark will speak first. Then I will give the press a brief overview of the status of the investigation and answer any questions that may be asked. Okay?”

I nod again and stand. “I’ll go and get Fielda,” I say resignedly.

All at once there is a commotion outside, a series of shouts, not in anger. The press, perhaps. Agent Fitzgerald moves quickly to the front of the house.

“Mr. Gregory, you better get out here,” he instructs. “Damn press,” he mutters.

I rush to his side and see what concerned him so. I see Fielda emerging from her mother’s car, walking dazedly down the Clarks’ lane. A lone reporter and cameraman begin to press in around her, and she looks so confused. Her eyes dart anxiously around for help and I fly out of the house and run to her side.

“Are you related to one of the missing girls?” the reporter asks. “What do you know about the evidence that was found in the backyard?”

Fielda looks at me desperately. Her flowered sundress is wrinkled, her hair is flattened on one side, disheveled, her mascara is smudged beneath her eyes and one cheek bears a slight imprint left behind from the bed linens.

“We have reports that the mother of Jenna McIntire is in town. Have you met with Mary Ellen McIntire? Has she given you any advice on how to handle this?” The reporter, a serious woman in a red suit, thrusts a Channel Four microphone under her chin.

Fielda goes rigid and she gapes up at me. For one horrible moment I think she will faint. Her eyes briefly roll back in her head, but I wrap my arms firmly around her shoulders and hold her close to me. She steadies and I lead her away from Antonia’s house. Antonia follows close behind us. Agent Fitzgerald steps forward and introduces himself to the reporter.

Fielda takes several deep breaths. “I’m fine, Martin. Tell me what’s going on. I can handle this.”

I must look doubtful, because she gives me a steely glare. “Martin, I am fine. I promise. I need to be fine if I am going to be any help to Petra. Tell me what is going on so we can figure out what to do next.”