Blood Hollow

18

The next morning, Cork paid a visit to Aurora High. He stopped at the office first, spoke with Jake Giles, the assistant principal, and was given both a schedule of the classes Charlotte Kane had taken while attending the high school and a list of her extracurricular activities. Then Cork went to see Juanita Sherburne.

Sherburne was the school psychologist. Her office was on the second floor of the new consolidated high school that had been built three years earlier just west of town, near the gravel pit. An athletic woman, Sherburne could often be seen jogging along Lakeshore Drive with her husband and their two Afghan hounds. The Sherburnes were avid canoeists and regularly led groups of students into the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness, north of Aurora. She was fortyish, had short black hair, and despite her vaguely Hispanic features, spoke with a flat, nasal accent that pinned her upbringing to somewhere in the heart of the Wisconsin dairy land. In addition to her duties as the school psychologist, she coached the girls’ softball team.

“Cork.” She stood up from her desk and reached out to shake his hand.

“I probably should have made an appointment, Juanita. I’m wondering if I could talk to you for a few minutes.”

“About Annie, I assume.”

“Annie?”

“Those slipping grades. Isn’t that why you’re here?”

“Should I be concerned?” Cork said.

The office was spare, neat. Tan filing cabinets lined the walls, and above them hung photographs of the teams she’d coached over the last five years. Behind her, the window opened toward the west where, visible beyond a line of white birch, stood the tall conveyor of North Star Aggregate’s gravel pit.

Cork waited until the woman took her seat, then he sat down, too.

“I don’t think it’s anything to worry about, Cork. She’s a little distracted these days. I see it on the ball field, too. I’ve just chalked it up to normal teenage stuff. You know, boys, social status, boys. Does she have a boyfriend?”

“She just started dating Damon Fielding.”

“Damon? Very nice. Well, there you go. I wouldn’t worry unless her grades don’t rebound, but I believe they will. Annie’s not a frivolous young woman. She’s serious in the things she cares about.”

“Used to be just sports and religion,” Cork said.

“If you’d like, I’ll talk to her about it, see if I can get her to focus a little more on her studies. And her pitching.”

“I’d appreciate it.”

“I have a selfish motive. She’s a big part of a winning season for the Voyageurs. Is that all?”

“There’s something else,” Cork said.

The bell rang and the hallway outside her office became a crazy river of bodies with currents running every which way.

“Just a moment.” She got up and closed the door.

“I’m very concerned about another young woman I know. She’s only seventeen, and I believe she may be having an affair with a married man.”

“What’s your interest?”

“I’m concerned is all. Wouldn’t you be?”

She returned to her desk and sat down. “What can you tell me about her?”

“Poor self-esteem. Depressed. She tried suicide once. Fixation with death.”

“Compulsive sexual behavior?”

“Possibly.”

“Drugs? Self-injury? Eating disorder?”

“Drugs, yes. I don’t know about the others. Why?”

“These are all signs that might be indicative of sexual abuse. Generally speaking, the more severe the symptoms, the more long-term the abuse.”

This made Cork sit back.

“I’m not saying they are,” she hastened to add. “Many teenagers exhibit some of these symptoms. It’s a question of number and degree. I’d have to do a complete assessment.”

“If you saw these things in one of your students, you’d be required to report it, wouldn’t you?”

“If I saw it. The thing is, adolescents who’ve been sexually abused can be very good at hiding the symptoms from general view.”

“If it was sexual abuse, who might be the perpetrator?”

“Well, statistically speaking, it’s most likely a family member.” The chaos in the hall died away, and the psychologist’s office dropped into a well of silence. She gave him a long look. “Annie wasn’t the reason you came.”

“No.”

“Can you tell me who?”

“I’d rather not, unless I’m sure.”

“I understand, Cork. But a young woman in this situation desperately needs help and usually doesn’t know how to ask for it.”

“It’s a bit more complicated than you realize.”

“This kind of thing is always complicated.”

“I’m wondering if a teacher might be involved.”

“A teacher here?”

“If it’s a teacher, it would be here.”

She gave her head a faint shake. “The symptoms you’ve described are more consistent with long-term abuse, something that began before this girl ever entered high school.”

“A girl like this, though, would she be more vulnerable to a sexual relationship with an adult?”

“Possibly.”

“So she could be involved with a teacher, someone who had nothing to do with her earlier abuse?”

“I suppose so, yes. Cork, I wish you’d tell me who this is so I can help.”

“She’s beyond help, Juanita.”

The woman puzzled for a moment, then a light came into her eyes. “Jo’s defending Solemn Winter Moon. You’re wondering about Charlotte Kane.”

“I don’t think Solemn had anything to do with the girl’s death.”

“He’s a troubled kid.”

“I still don’t think he did it. Solemn believes that before her death, Charlotte was seeing someone, maybe a married man.”

“A teacher, you think? Someone here? I hope that’s not what you’ve come to me for. I won’t even begin to speculate on something like that, Cork.”

“I understand. But, Juanita, if Solemn is innocent, there’s a murderer still out there somewhere. Maybe even walking the halls of Aurora High. You’ve already said that a student-teacher liaison isn’t an impossibility.”

“One that ends in murder is.”

“I’m not asking you to accuse anyone, just help my thinking. It may save an innocent young man. Could it have been a teacher?”

“I’m sure that kind of thing goes on in schools somewhere, but not here. I’m not going to continue this conversation.”

“Just hear me out.”

“We’re done.”

Cork started to argue but saw how tense she’d become. “All right. I didn’t mean to put you in a professionally awkward position. I’m just trying to save a boy I believe is innocent.”

“I understand.”

Cork stood up and offered his hand. Her face slowly relaxed.

“I heard Solemn claims he talked with Jesus,” she said. “Is it true?”

“Where’d you hear that?”

“Around. I also heard that Jesus was wearing Minnetonka mocassins.”

“That’s what Solemn says.”

She allowed herself a brief smile. “That’s funny. I always figured Him for a Birkenstock kind of guy.”

That night after Cork got home from Sam’s Place, Jo cornered him in the kitchen.

“Annie said she saw you lurking in the halls at school today.”

“I didn’t see her,” Cork said. “How come she didn’t say hello?”

“Are you kidding? Acknowledging the existence of one of your parents at school? What planet are you from?” Jo was about to make a pot of decaf French roast coffee. As she lifted the bag to pour the beans into the grinder, she asked, “So, what were you doing there?”

“I had a talk with Juanita Sherburne about Charlotte Kane.”

“Cork, you didn’t.” She dumped beans all over the counter. “After you promised.”

“I said I would behave myself. And I did. I was very polite.”

“You’re splitting hairs. And you’re splitting them because you know you’re wrong. Oh, Cork.” Angrily, she began to gather the spilled beans. “If we have to go to trial, and even before we’ve selected a jury you’ve turned this whole town against us-”

“Charlotte may have been sexually abused.”

That made her pause.

“Why do you say that?”

“Some of the things Juanita told me. I think Charlotte exhibited a number of telling symptoms.”

Jo looked thoughtful and troubled. “Did you talk about who it might have been?”

“Not specifically. But according to Juanita, usually it happens among family members.”

“Family, as in…?”

“The only family we know about is Fletcher and Glory, so maybe we start there.”

She shook her head. “I think we should leave it alone, Cork.”

“Fletcher’s a widower. No lady friends. He’s certainly an odd duck. And remember what Solemn said about Charlotte being so secretive. Maybe it’s the reason she hid so much, and why the one person who should have known she was troubled did nothing. Jo, I’m not accusing him. I’m just saying we should check it out.”

“Due diligence?” She gave the words a sarcastic sting. “It’s a dangerous speculation, Cork.”

“Look, this girl had problems. Someone somewhere along the line messed her up. Maybe that same someone killed her. Or maybe someone else preyed on her and then killed her. The more we know about Charlotte, the better we’ll be able to understand what happened.”

“How did Juanita react to your questions?”

Cork paused a moment. “When she understood I was asking about Charlotte, she clammed up.”

“She didn’t want to go there with you, right? And she’s a professional. Imagine what the average citizen of Aurora will think. Solemn already has a lot of black marks against him in Tamarack County. If jurors know that we’re casting aspersions on their friends, their neighbors, God knows who all, even before Solemn’s been charged, they’re going to be sworn onto that grand jury already prejudiced against him. And us. They may not admit it to themselves, but the prejudice will be there. The fact is that the character of their town is being called into question, and they’ll be looking for the easiest way back to normalcy. In their minds, I guarantee you, that way will be to indict and then convict Solemn.”

“That’s a lot of speculation, Jo.”

“I know how juries think. That’s part of what I do. It may be that the questions you ask lead nowhere. Suppose Charlotte was sexually abused. Does that mean it necessarily had anything to do with her death?”

“Jo, they’re going to charge Solemn with murder eventually. First-degree, second-degree, whatever. I promised him I would help. This is how I do that.”

“I understand that, Cork. And I hope you understand that I’m trying to handle a very delicate situation here, a balance between my client’s needs at this point, the prejudice of this community, the long-term effect of every move we make, and the fact that you can’t even sneeze in this town without everyone knowing it.

“Charlotte’s been dead for several months. Will another week or two change anything? Once Solemn’s been officially charged you can ask your questions. People will expect it then. They may not like it any better, but they’ll understand.”

“You ask for my help and then you ask me to sit on my hands.”

“I know.”

Cork stooped and picked up a bean that had fallen to the floor. He looked at it, hard and black in the palm of his hand. That was him inside.

“All right,” he said. He threw the bean onto the counter and turned toward the side door.

“Where are you going?” Jo asked.

“I need to be by myself for a while.”

He opened the kitchen door.

“Cork,” Jo said to his back. “It’s good information. I’m sure it will be a big help if we have to go to the mat for Solemn. Thank you.”

“Yeah.”

He stepped out under the early night sky and walked away into the gathering dark.