A Superior Death

A

“This camera is Tinker’s. So is the film. I’ll see that she gets it. If you bother her, if whatever her big secret is leaks out in any way, I’ll encourage her to have the negatives blown up poster-size and put on trail crew’s bunkhouse door.”

For a moment Scotty neither spoke nor moved and A

“You’ll pay for this,” he growled finally. Despite the threat, she was relieved to hear him speak. “I got friends in damn near every park in this country. Every one of ‘em’s getting a call from me. I’ll by God smear your name from Acadia to Joshua Tree. You want a career in the Park Service? After this little stunt, you haven’t got a snowball’s chance in hell. Not a hope.”

“These people known you long?” A

“Damn right they have.”

“Then I can always hope they’ll consider the source.”

Scotty struggled to his knees. A

A

She closed and locked the door. Scotty would get the cuffs off, but it would take him a while. It would keep him away from her.

Suddenly too tired to stand, she sat back down on the bottom bunk. At her feet was the plastic-wrapped bundle Scotty had come across land and water to leave in Tinker’s way.

A growing dread would not allow her to open it slowly, scientifically. Grabbing two corners, A

But it wasn’t a baby. It was a plastic baby doll and it had been painted blue from head to foot.

TWENTY

A

She wrapped the blue baby in its plastic shroud, then glanced at the clock: a rhinestone Sylvester, tail and eyes twitching off the seconds. After ten p.m. and she was marooned in Rock Harbor with no food, no wine, no dry clothes, no change of underwear, and no place to sleep.

Patience would just be closing the restaurant at the lodge. All A

The lights of the lodge glowed a warm welcome. Coming out of the darkness of the trees, A

Two parties, one of six and one of eight, still lingered in the dining room. Though they were subject to the glares of a waitress and two busboys, A

Patience, looking tired but well groomed, had drifted over to A

Near eleven the larger party called for their check and Patience felt she could go home. Carrie A

“We are practicing togetherness.” Patience explained Carrie’s late hours as A

A

“More star-crossed disappearances?” A

“In spades,” Patience replied.

“Oh God!” Carrie A

“Shut up!” her mother snapped. To A

A

Shortly after they reached the Bittners’ apartment, Carrie disappeared into her room.

“Gad!” Patience threw herself onto the vinyl of an institutional rendition of an overstuffed chair. “I need a drink. Need, not want: the point when co

“Whatever,” A

“Wine! Lord, what would we do without it?” Patience asked rhetorically. “Wine is about the only thing you can count on. Too bad you can’t choose vintage children. Can’t say, ‘Ah, yes, ’78, that was an excellent year for children. Sweet, a little precocious, but not impertinent.‘ Do you remember Prohibition?”

“Not firsthand,” A

“It almost killed the California wine industry. A crippling blow.” Patience brought two glasses of red wine over to the couch where A

“Mmm.” A

“No!” Patience laughed. “Hungarian. Who cares?” she said with a sudden change of attitude. “Wine’s wine. It’ll get you there.”

“ ‘There’s’ not where it used to be,” A

“You sound like a woman who’s had a long day,” Patience observed.

“Long day,” A

“Isn’t Murder, She Wrote on tonight?” she asked. “I haven’t looked at television for a while.”