Night’s Landing

Fifteen

Nate bought a map and rented a car at the Nashville airport and drove east until he came to Night’s Landing, basically a wide bend on the Cumberland River. It wasn’t even a town, really. He pulled into a gas station and started to call Sarah for directions to her house, but there was no cell service. Before using a pay phone, he asked inside.

“I thought Sarah was still in Scotland,” the skinny old man at the cash register said. “I’ve been telling the reporters that. She and Rob used to like to come in here and buy red licorice. I told them it’d rot their teeth.” He eyed Nate suspiciously. “Why should I tell you where they live?”

Nate was in no mood to screw around and showed the man his badge.

Directions involved a cornfield, a country church and a back road he wasn’t supposed to take and one he was.

The back road brought him down toward the deep, slow river, and he turned left, as the old man had instructed, onto a long driveway that led to a log house nestled among shade trees and gardens, its sprawling lawn ending at a dock on the riverfront. On one side of the property were more fields, on the other, thick woods that seemed to go on forever. Spring was further along in middle Tennessee than in New York, the leaves full and dark, a huge pink azalea growing close to the house, a tangle of white roses creeping up one side of the front porch.

Nate parked behind an old pickup with Tennessee plates and climbed out of his car. He could smell freshly mowed grass tinged with the sweetness of flowers and heard a small boat puttering on the river.

In the side yard, a ponytailed man in overalls stabbed a pitchfork into a pile of compost and dumped it onto a plowed vegetable garden. One end had sprouts growing-spinach, onions, loose-leaf lettuce. The man shooed a horsefly with one hand. “Can I help you, sir?” he called to Nate.

Nate walked down to the garden. “I’m looking for Sarah Dunnemore.”

“And you would be?”

“Deputy U.S. Marshal Nate Winter. I work with her brother.”

The man-presumably the property manager Sarah had mentioned-had a black bandanna tied around his forehead. Sweat dripped down his face nonetheless. “You’re the other marshal who was shot with him, aren’t you? Doing okay, sir?”

“Yes, thanks, and you’re-”

“Brooker, sir. Ethan Brooker.” He grinned amiably, not breathing that hard from his work. “Chief manure spreader. Composted or not, horse manure stinks, don’t it? I take care of the place.”

Nate noticed the tattoo on the man’s tanned, muscular right arm. He had on a dirty T-shirt under the overalls. By contrast, Nate had put on a suit for his travels south. His bandaged arm had given him some discomfort on the flight, but he’d taken a couple of Tylenol when he landed.

“Dr. Dunnemore’s in the house,” Brooker said. “Is she expecting you? She’s got company.”

Nate didn’t like the idea of her having company, not after her early-morning phone call. She’d tried to hide her stress and fear, but they were obvious. He nodded to Brooker. “Yes, she’s expecting me.”

He left Brooker to his manure spreading and took a half gravel, half stone path to the back steps. It seemed more like the main entrance than the one on the porch that faced the river. Through a screen door, he could hear Sarah talking to a man with a pronounced southern accent.

They were discussing prune cake recipes.

“My granny always made a three-layer prune cake,” the man said. “She insisted it was best the next day, after the flavors had time to settle and blend.”

Sarah laughed, but Nate could hear a lingering strain in her voice. He wondered if the guy with her noticed. “I like prune cake anytime, anywhere, provided it’s not hard as a rock.”

Nate peered through the screen door. Sarah’s visitor was sitting at a round table. He looked to be in his early thirties, with glasses, close-cropped sandy hair and regular features. He wore a polo shirt, khakis and penny loafers. Sarah was at the counter in a flour-covered pink apron.

She spotted him, her eyes connecting with his, widening, and Nate knew that whatever had prompted her to call him in a panic was still a factor. He wasn’t going to have prune cake and coffee and turn around and head back to New York. Something was up.

The man at the table leaped to his feet. “Sarah?”

“It’s okay,” she said quickly, moving toward the screen door.

Nate pulled it open. “How are you, Sarah?”

“I didn’t hear your car-” She smiled nervously. “Conroy and I have been busy talking prune cake recipes. Here, come in. Conroy, this is Nate Winter, one of Rob’s colleagues from New York. Nate, Conroy Fontaine, a journalist and temporary neighbor.”

Fontaine put out a hand, then pulled it back. “Sorry, sir. I forgot you were hit the other day. The arm, right?”

“It’s fine. Why are you a temporary neighbor?”

The man seemed taken aback by Nate’s directness, but he recovered and smiled. “I’m renting a cabin upriver a piece while I work on a book.”

“He’s working on an unauthorized biography of President Poe,” Sarah said neutrally, then stepped from behind the counter. “Thanks for stopping by, Conroy. Come back anytime for your slice of prune cake.”

He lifted a lightweight jacket off the back of a chair. “I’ll see you later, Sarah. Deputy, very nice to meet you. I’m so sorry about what happened.”

He slipped out the back door.

Nate glanced around the country kitchen and its squared-off log walls with thick layers of white caulking between them. The oak table and chairs were worn and cracked with age, the simple linoleum floor spotless, the cabinets and countertops timeless and functional. A cross-stitched sampler about friendship hung above the table.

The window next to the table looked out on the side yard with its azaleas and vegetable garden. Ethan Brooker had abandoned his pile of horse manure.

The place was more isolated than Nate had expected.

“Whose truck?” he asked.

“The family’s. Ethan uses it, too. Conroy walked down from the fishing camp where he’s staying.” Sarah returned to her mixing bowl and cutting board of what presumably were chopped prunes. “You were expecting Tara, weren’t you?”

“Well, not Daniel Boone.”

“My parents have lived all over the world,” she said, lifting handfuls of chopped prunes into her mixing bowl. “But this has always been home.”

“I met your gardener. He almost stuck me with his pitchfork. Conroy’s a buff guy, too.” Nate settled on a stool across from her at the counter, noticed the slight tremble in her hands. “How come you don’t have any scrawny old guys hanging around you?”

“Conroy runs to keep in shape-apparently he has a grueling deadline for his book. I met him last fall when he was still deciding if he wanted to take on the project. He wants to interview me, but I keep putting him off.”

“By bringing up prune cake recipes?”

“Watch, he’ll find some way to use it in his book.” She picked up a wood-handled spatula and folded the prunes into the brownish batter. “And Ethan’s the nicest guy. Anyway, a pitchfork’s no match for whatever you’re carrying.”

Which Nate had no intention of discussing with her. She lifted her bowl and started spooning the thick batter into one of the square pans she had set out on the counter. She took a breath, setting down the bowl quickly, as if she’d been about to drop it. The tremble in her hands was noticeably worse.

She avoided his eye and spoke as she stared down at her cake batter. “You didn’t have to come here. I should have stopped you. I’m sorry you’ve wasted your time.” She picked up her bowl again, stubbornly folding batter into another pan. “I’m not in any danger here.”

Nate didn’t respond. She set down the bowl once more, batter spilling down its sides, then tore open the oven door and shoved the pans inside. She turned on the timer with more force than was necessary.

“I need air,” she said, pulling off her apron and tossing it onto the counter.

She moved down a hall toward the front of the house, at a fast walk at first, then a run. Nate could hear her footsteps on the wood floor. He eased off the stool and followed her out to the porch, overfurnished with old rockers and chairs, even an iron daybed.

Sarah had made it down the steps and was well on her way to the river and the small, well-kept dock.

He wondered if she’d run right into the water and try to swim away from whatever was bothering her. It wasn’t him. Or not just him. He was a reminder, tangible evidence that she wasn’t just home on vacation. That was an illusion, a ruse that had helped get her through the morning.

She stopped at the very end of the dock.

Nate walked out to her. An ancient fishing boat bobbed in the dark water. He didn’t blame her. He felt an urge to grab her and jump in the boat, go wherever the river took them and forget about shootings and whatever had frightened her. In an image that felt real, that rocked him to the point his knees almost buckled, he saw them stopped at a quiet clearing, a blanket spread, the sun on them as they made love. It was as if her body were under him now, soft and yielding, their lovemaking tender, slow, as if they didn’t have a care in the world.

Christ. What the hell was wrong with him?

Sarah glanced back at him. She had on jeans and a lightweight zip-up top in a dusty blue-gray that matched her eyes. “How’s your arm?”

The air seemed cooler, damper, on the river. His arm ached. His whole body ached. “Doctor rebandaged it this morning before I left. It’s healing well. Doesn’t bother me that much.” He glanced at the undergrowth and the rocks along the riverbank, upriver, toward the Poe house. “You swim in the river?”

“All the time. The Corps of Engineer dams backed up the river so that it’s wider and deeper here than it used to be. It’s more like a lake nowadays, so the current’s not bad.”

He shifted back to her. “Snakes?”

“Oh, sure, but they leave us alone. Sometimes you can see a water moccasin sunning on the rocks. They’re poisonous. You don’t have them up north.” She looked back at him, her words almost rote. “People often confuse them with water snakes that aren’t poisonous.”

Nate decided to let her talk about snakes and prune cake, until she was calm enough to tell him what was going on, why she’d called him at six her time-why she hadn’t called him again and dissuaded him from coming down here. “You can tell the difference?”

She nodded. “Water moccasins are a kind of pit viper. They swim on top of the water with their heads above the surface-water snakes tend to swim under the water. They’re not as fat as the cottonmouths-that’s what people call water moccasins-and they’re more likely to hang from trees and slither off when they’re startled. A cottonmouth will stand its ground.”

Like her, Nate thought. Like her brother. Even in the short time they’d worked together, Nate had done enough arrests with Rob to know he didn’t like to back down. “Ever run into a cottonmouth?”

“All the time. Rob and I used to catch them when we were kids, but Granny Dunnemore told us to leave them alone. None of the snakes will bother you if you don’t bother them. It’s when they’re startled or feel threatened that they bite.”

He smiled. “I’ll try not to startle or threaten any snakes.”

She didn’t smile back, seemed barely aware that he’d spoken. “Even most cottonmouth bites aren’t fatal.” She stared into the water, as if she were looking for snakes. “Thank you for coming down here. It was a decent thing to do. I know I must have sounded awful on the phone this morning. I’m sure I overreacted to something.”

“Tell me about it.”

She shook her head. “I have to show you.”

But she didn’t want to show him. Nate could see her reluctance in her body language. Tight, closed, afraid. Showing him meant that the “something” that had prompted her to call him was real.

She dropped her arms to her sides and pushed past him with sudden energy, almost knocking him into the river.

He followed her back to the house, into a country-style living room with quilts and afghans in odd colors piled onto overstuffed furniture and shelves bearing an eclectic collection of books, including scholarly works and what had to be every mystery Rex Stout and Agatha Christie had ever written.

“Wait here,” she said, her tone more tired than commanding, and retreated back to the kitchen.

Nate debated going after her, but decided to do as she’d asked. He stood in front of the stone fireplace, noting a wedding picture on the mantel. The parents, Stuart and Betsy Dunnemore. He was handsome, she was beautiful-startlingly beautiful. And very obviously much younger.

Sarah returned with an envelope and a sheet of paper that she laid on the marble-topped coffee table. “Here. I’ve already touched them, so they have my fingerprints on them.”

Nate took in the words in a single glance.

If I can get to your brother, I can get to you.

“Jesus Christ,” he said under his breath.

She seemed almost relieved at his reaction. “I didn’t know what to do. It was in with a bunch of cards and letters, some of them kind of nutty.” She sank onto a chair and took a breath. “It’s amazing what some people will stoop to. I don’t want to take any chances, but I don’t want to send you all on a wild-goose chase, either.”

“This was in your mail?”

“Ethan piled it on the kitchen table, unopened. It was here when I arrived. I opened it this morning.” She leaned forward and stared at the paper, her cheeks pale, but she seemed calmer now that she’d told him about it. “After I called you, I checked all the phones for bugs. I don’t even know what one looks like, and I imagine there are ways for someone to tap a phone line that I’d never find.”

“Sarah.”

“I couldn’t make myself tell you on the phone. I was really spooked. I let my thinking run wild.”

She was upset, uncertain, a capable, intelligent woman not used to being out of her element-not used to having to trust someone, count on someone, besides herself.

But Nate knew there was more. Something else.

She twisted her hands together, working one of her delicate rings up to her knuckle, then back down again. “I don’t want anyone else to get hurt.”

“None of us does.”

“Rob, my parents. If something happens to them because of something I did or didn’t do…” She trailed off, not finishing.

“Your parents are still in Amsterdam.”

She nodded, taking in a small breath. “I know. I called them, too. I didn’t tell them about the note.” She stopped abruptly and lifted her eyes to him. “I really don’t like being afraid, you know.”

Nate sat on the edge of the couch and folded his hands. His head ached now, too. But his thinking was clear, sharp. After he’d left her last night, he’d thought about finding her collapsing in Central Park-thought about her body language and how similar it was to when he’d caught her following him to Sister Maria’s.

Sarah Dunnemore wasn’t a bad liar. But she wasn’t a good one, either.

“What happened in Central Park?” he asked her.

She almost slid off her chair. “What? Rob-” She took a breath. “You know what happened. You were there. It’s where you and Rob were shot.”

“To you. What happened to you in Central Park? Why did you almost pass out?” He settled back on the couch. “Don’t tell me it was the ‘twin thing.’ That won’t wash twice.”

“Nothing happened, at least, nothing that relates to the note.”

“Sarah, you’re a smart woman. I’m sure you’re a hell of an archaeologist, not that I’d be able to judge. It’s not my area of expertise, like law enforcement isn’t yours.”

She was silent, still twisting one of her rings.

“You’re feeling isolated,” he said, “and you don’t need to.”

“I don’t want to send you all off on some wild-goose chase. If I tell you what happened, which was nothing, you’ll investigate.” She shook her head. “No, it’s crazy.”

“Guess what, Dr. Dunnemore. You don’t get to decide.”

That brought her up short. “All right. Fair enough. I’ll let that be your job.”

He smiled, trying to take some of the edge off his demeanor. But his arm hurt, and he still had an image of the two of them on the blanket. “That is my job.”

She didn’t relax. “I saw a man I thought I recognized. He was up on the street, on Central Park South, looking down into the park.”

“Recognized him from where?”

She hesitated. “Amsterdam.”

Hell.

Nate didn’t speak. He wanted her to do the talking.

“I’m sure it was just my mind playing tricks on me. He reminded me of a man I saw at the Rijksmuseum. We were all there-my parents, Rob, me.” Sarah jumped up abruptly, turning away from him and gazing out a window onto the porch, down to the river. “I was on my own. Waiting for my mother, actually. Rob and my father were off looking at the Delftware. It’s a huge museum-we limited ourselves to the Dutch collection.”

“Where was your mother?”

“Viewing Rembrandt’s The Night Watch. It’s an incredible painting-it’s in its own rotunda. I was in an adjoining gallery. I don’t even remember what I was looking at. Earlier Dutch works, I believe. This man approached me, and we chatted for a minute or two about the paintings, the museum. He was friendly. French, I think. My parents know so many people, I assumed it was one of their friends or acquaintances.”

“Did you ask them about him?”

“No. It didn’t occur to me. It’s not as if he said outright that he knew them.”

“Describe him.”

She didn’t hesitate. “About five-ten, angular features, dark hair that’s long in front. Nate, he can’t be the same man as the one I saw at the park. It’d been a long, stressful day. I couldn’t swear-”

“What was he wearing?”

“Black leather jacket and black turtleneck. So was the man at the park. That must be what made me think I recognized him.”

“Rob didn’t see the man who approached you at the museum?”

“I don’t know how he could have.”

She turned from the window, her arms crossed on her chest, a way, Nate thought, for her to keep him from seeing that her hands were still shaking. She was a woman accustomed to staying in control. She wouldn’t want him to see just how the events of the past few days had rocked her. “You’re going to tell Agent Collins, aren’t you?” Her tone was cool now, almost resigned. “About both the letter and the man in the park.”

“Damn straight.”

She nodded and let her arms drop to her side. No shaking hands now. “I wasn’t holding back on you. I was convinced-I am convinced the man isn’t the same man I ran into at the museum. Even if it is, so what? It doesn’t mean he had anything to do with the shooting. It could just be one of those weird coincidences. If I hadn’t gotten the letter…” She didn’t finish.

“We’ll get to the bottom of whatever’s going on.”

“Maybe it’s nothing.” She tried to smile. “I should show you my letter from the psychic.”

Nate got to his feet, feeling the silence of the place, the isolation on this quiet stretch of river. Obviously Rob hadn’t expected his sister to come home to a threatening letter.

It was postmarked the day of the shooting. Whoever sent it hadn’t wasted any time.

“What goes on prune cake?” Nate asked.

Sarah seemed to have no idea what he was talking about. “What?”

“Frosting.” He wanted to pull her out of her spinning thoughts, just as his uncle had done with him with his talk of his orange eggs. “Does it have a frosting, or do you eat it plain like gingerbread?”

“It has a caramel glaze. You put it on when the cake’s still warm.”

He could hear the southern roots in her words, a soft lilt that seemed to match the breeze off the river. “You can probably finish making it before the FBI gets here. I’ll call Joe Collins in New York and find out what he wants to do.”

She nodded, her breathing shallow, then started for the kitchen. She paused in the hall doorway and glanced back at him. “I’m glad you’re here.” Then a quick smile, a welcome flash in her eyes. “I think.”

Nate glanced at the note.

I’ll know if you talk.

Wait.

She’d waited-she’d waited to tell him.

Everyone assumed the answers to the sniper attack were in New York, embedded somewhere in what he and Rob did for a living. Nate was no longer so sure. He had a feeling they could be here, in Night’s Landing, in the lives of a well-known, progressive southern family who happened to be friends and neighbors to the president of the United States.

He dreaded making the call to Joe Collins in New York.

And Rob-what to tell him about his sister’s letter?

Nothing, Nate decided. At least not until he knew more.

He could smell the prune cake baking, filling the house with warmth and the scent of cinnamon. Cozy, homey smells. She’d imposed normalcy onto herself as a way to cope. He pictured Sarah racing around that morning, pulling apart phones, trying to talk herself into believing the note didn’t mean anything, that she’d been right about the man in Central Park, after all, and he was no one.

Maybe she had a point. Maybe the wide coverage of the shooting and something about the Dunnemores themselves had brought out the head cases.

But Nate didn’t think so.