Boundary waters

37

Jo was startled awake by the ringing of the phone in her bedroom.

“Jo. Wally Schanno.”

“Yes.” She rose up in bed, struggling to shake off her sleep. “What is it, Wally?”

“I’m sorry to bother you so early.”

She glanced at the clock on the nightstand: fivethirty A.M. “That’s all right.”

“They found a body. One of the search parties did. Last night. Out in the Boundary Waters. A helicopter’s airlifting it to the morgue at the community hospital right now.”

“Have they identified it?”

“No. Only a brief description.”

It was like seeing the flash from a muzzle and waiting for the bullet to strike.

“Go on.”

She heard him take a deep breath. “Male. Caucasian. Red-brown hair. Brown eyes. Medium height and build. Age probably mid- to late forties. It’s vague, Jo.”

“No, it isn’t, Wally.” The bullet had struck. Dead center in her heart.

“You don’t have to come down. I-just thought-”

“I’ll be right there.”

Her blood was racing when she hung up. Her breath came rapidly and with effort. Her throat was taut and dry. Dear God, let it be someone else.

The hall light went on. Rose stood in the doorway.

“I heard the phone ring,” she said.

“They found someone. In the Boundary Waters. A body.”

“Oh, dear.” Rose put her arms around herself as if she were suddenly cold. “Do they know who?”

“No.”

“Do they-?” It sounded as if Rose’s throat had gone tight, too, and she’d choked a moment on the words. “Do they know how?”

“I don’t know. They’re bringing the body in by helicopter.” Jo was up and looking for clothes, anything. “I’m going down to the hospital. I need to be there when it comes in.” She pulled on jeans, thick socks, a sweater, no bra. She stopped dead and looked at Rose. “The description fits Cork.”

“Oh, my God, Jo.”

“That doesn’t mean it’s him.”

“No,” Rose agreed.

Jo lurched toward the closet, grabbed a pair of boots. She sat on the floor and jammed them on. The laces wouldn’t cooperate. “Fuck.”

“Jo, it’ll be okay.” Rose knelt beside her and took her in her arms.

Jo buried her head in her sister’s chenille robe. “Oh, Rose. I think of all the things I never said, the good things. And I want to take back all the hurt.”

“I know. I know.”

Jo gathered herself, wiped her eyes. “Not a word to the kids.”

“Of course.”

She pushed herself up. “When I know something, I’ll call.”

“All right.”

Jo was out the door, down the stairs. She pulled her coat from the closet and headed through the dark kitchen to the back door. As she opened it, she felt Rose come up quickly to her side and put a hand on her shoulder.

“I’ll be praying.”

Jo closed her eyes a moment. “Me, too.”

A light snow had fallen in the night, covering Aurora in a thin layer of white. Like the sheet over a corpse, Jo thought as she drove to the Aurora Community Hospital. Morning was crawling up the eastern horizon. The snow clouds had moved on. The sky was a pale blue-white, the color of deep, hard ice on a lake.

Because the hospital served a large, rural area, a heliport had been constructed on the eastern side of the building. In summer, especially, the heliport got a great deal of use-accidents with axes or chainsaws, drownings, cardiac arrests in city men who eagerly shed their suit-and-tie identities and, envisioning themselves as latter-day voyagers, embarked on canoe expeditions far more demanding than their flabby, cholesterol-ridden bodies could endure.

Wally Schanno was in the parking lot near the heliport, hunched up in his leather sheriff’s jacket, hands sunk deep in the pockets. Booker T. Harris and Nathan Jackson were there as well, sitting in a blue Lumina, engine running to keep them warm. Schanno walked over to Jo’s Toyota when she parked it.

“I’m real sorry about this,” he told her as she got out. “I probably should have waited until I knew some thing for sure.”

“I’m glad you didn’t,” she said.

She scanned the sky. Lots of stars were still visible, particularly in the north, the direction from which the helicopter would come.

Schanno looked at his watch. “ETA about ten minutes.”

“How’d they find the body?”

“One of the search parties set up camp at nightfall at a landing on the north side of Embarrass Lake. Guy gets up in the middle of the night to relieve himself and stumbles over a pile of rocks. He pulls off a few and sees that there’s a newly dug hole underneath. Digs down a little and finds the body.”

Dear God, Jo found herself praying, please don’t let it be Cork.

“You okay?” Schanno asked.

“No.”

“Yeah.” He nodded sympathetically.

“Wally” She wanted to know, but couldn’t bring herself to ask.

As if he’d read her mind, he said, “It wasn’t an accident, Jo.” He studied the sky with undue interest and the muscles at the back of his long jaw twitched. “An ax blow. To the neck.”

“Jesus,” she said. “Oh, Jesus.”

Lights around the heliport came on. The double doors of the hospital opened and two orderlies in parkas appeared, pushing a gurney. They moved into the glare of the lights, men Jo didn’t know, looking tired, as if they’d been on duty all night. There was no doctor with them. What the helicopter was bringing was far beyond healing.

“Here it comes.” Schanno motioned toward the north.

Jo heard it, too. Then she saw it, coming in low over the trees, its lights tracking across the sky like shooting stars. Harris and Jackson got out of their car and waited. Harris cast a glance in Jo’s direction. The helicopter came down in a swirl of blowing snow. Jo could see the body bag on a sled secured to one of the runners. A couple of men jumped from the helicopter. They wore jackets that had TAMARACK SEARCH AND RESCUE printed across the back.

“Wait here,” Wally Schanno said.

Jo nodded, barely able to breathe and unable to talk at all. Schanno went to the helicopter, joined by Harris and Jackson along the way. They gathered around the sled. Jo saw them zip open the body bag and confer. Schanno turned, remained hunched under the blades of the chopper that hadn’t stopped spinning, and started back toward Jo. She turned away. She didn’t want to try to read his face.

Schanno put his hand lightly on her shoulder. “It’s not Cork.”

Jo almost collapsed. Tears of relief blinded her momentarily. She put her hands over her eyes a minute, then she faced the sheriff. “Who is it?”

“The man named Grimes.”

The orderlies wheeled the gurney with the body of Grimes across the parking lot and into the hospital Harris and Jackson approached Jo and Schanno.

“I want a meeting with Benedetti,” Harris said “And I want it now.”

“You don’t think Vincent Benedetti is responsible for this?” Jo asked.

“What I think is that there are six more people out there and I’m scrambling for answers before any of them show up dead. Get Benedetti. We’ll be at the Quetico.”