Out of Range

NINE

As Joe drove back toward Jackson, a Porsche Boxster convertible passed him like a shot, the blond-haired woman driver slicing in front of him to avoid an oncoming RV as Joe tapped his brakes to let her in. She shot a "Ta-ta!" type wave in appreciation and passed the next car in line. The Porsche had Teton County plates, so she was a local. A local maniac, Joe thought, watching her weave through traffic ahead. As the lights of town appeared, his stomach grumbled. He hadn't eaten all day.

Joe sat alone in a raucous Mexican restaurant filled with tourists and locals out on Friday night. He blanched at the prices on the menu, knowing that the meal would exceed his state per diem. But because it was already late and he was starved, he didn't rise and leave. Instead, he ordered a Jim Beam and water from the helpful waiter who had introduced himself as "Adrian from Connecticut."

He smiled when he found himself contemplating bean burritos and rice.

"The vegetarian plate?" Adrian asked, swooping in from somewhere behind him.

Joe shook his head. "Nope. I'm a flesh-eater."

"Oh my," Adrian said, crumpling up his nose.

Joe ordered another drink during dinner while he cleaned his plate and jotted down details from the ALN call-out in his notebook.

As he finished and leaned back, full and feeling the effects of the bourbon on an empty stomach, Adrian arrived with another drink.

"I didn't order this," Joe said.

"Compliments of the Ennises," the waiter said with a flourish. "They're at the bar."

Joe leaned to the side so he could see between the tables. The bar was in an adjoining room, darker than the dining room, through a rounded, Spanish-style doorway. A couple sat on stools with their backs to the opening. As he looked at them, they swiveled around.

The man was short, compact, with a stern, wide-open face and short silver hair. He wore a jacket over well-tailored clothing. He looked like the kind of man who charged through a room, head bowed, shoulders hunched, expecting everyone to get the hell out of the way. The woman was ivory pale, with piercing dark eyes and full, dark-lipsticked lips. She was well dressed, in a thick turtle-neck sweater with a black skirt, black hose, and black high-heeled shoes with straps over her ankles. Because she rested her feet on the bottom rail of the stool, he could see the pale orbs of her knees where the hose tightened against them in the darkness. Her thick hair was haloed from a neon beer sign. Joe raised the new drink and mouthed, "Thank you."

The man nodded back, businesslike. She smiled, slightly, and turned back to the bar. Then something happened that surprised Joe. She looked back over her shoulder at him, directly at him, full-on at him, and brushed aside a thick bolt of auburn hair, before turning away again. He felt a stirring inside.

"Who are they?" Joe asked Adrian from Connecticut the next time he came by.

Adrian made an exaggerated step back. "You don't know Don and Stella Ennis? My goodness."

"I'm new here."

"Then you need to meet them," Adrian said. "I don't even know where to begin."

After paying the tab, which exceeded his per diem by eight dollars and made him feel guilty, Joe went into the bar. Don and Stella Ennis were no longer on their stools. He checked the booths at the side of the bar, wanting to thank them but reluctant to disturb their late dinner. He couldn't find them.

Joe asked the bartender, "Did the Ennises leave?"

The bartender, like Adrian, widened his eyes when he heard the name. "Are you the new game warden?"

"Yes."

"Mr. Ennis left you this." He pushed a fresh drink across the bar and handed Joe a business card. It read:

DON ENNIS

Developer, Beargrass Village

Joe flipped the card over and found a handwritten message.

"Welcome to town," it said. "I worked with Will. I'll be in touch."

Joe took a sip of the drink, then pocketed the card and went outside. The night air, crisp and sharp, washed over him as he walked to his truck. He couldn't stop thinking about what had just happened. Had she really been looking at him that way? Had he really been looking back?

Yes, he thought, on both counts.

He needed to call Marybeth, but wanted his head to clear first. And he couldn't bring himself to call her while the image of Stella still lingered so clearly in his mind.

Before finding a motel, Joe used a street map ripped from a telephone book to locate Will Jensen's home. It was on one of the old, narrow tree-lined streets near the base of Snow King Mountain, in a neighborhood created forty years before Jackson became the resort it was. Joe remembered the house vaguely from his single visit, and he parked his pickup on the street and looked at it in its dark stillness. Will's truck was still in the driveway. A massive old cottonwood, leaves already turned and crisp, obscured half the roof. The windows were black squares, dead like the eyes of the head mounts in the office building.

Joe reluctantly climbed out of his truck and crossed the street. He tried to open Will's truck door but found it locked. He peered inside, could see nothing in the darkness. The only light was a faint blue vapor light on the corner and the hard stars and scythe of the moon. The keys for the truck, he assumed, would be somewhere in the office building, or with the sheriff, and he would get them tomorrow. Joe walked up the cracked cement walk, crunching dead leaves that were curled together like fists. Three red strips of crime-scene tape sealed the door to the jamb. A letter from the Teton County sheriff was taped inside the screen door, warning visitors that the house was sealed pending the investigation.

What would it be like to live in a house where the previous occupant had shot himself in the head? Joe shivered and tried to shake off the thought.

He found a cheap motel that honored state rates and checked in. The bedspread was green and thin, there was a single thin plastic cup and a bar of soap on the sink, and the television was locked to a stand and mounted to the wall so no one could take it. The tiny desk was just big enough to hold his briefcase.

Sitting on the bed, he put the spiral notebooks in front of him. He would start with #1 tonight, maybe get through #2. Tomorrow, he would begin the search for #11, Will's last notebook.

But first he needed to call home. He looked at his watch. It was 11:30, an hour past when they usually went to bed. He debated whether to possibly wake her, simply to tell her he had made it. Then he pictured Marybeth up and awake, maybe reading, upset he hadn't called, possibly worried that something had happened.

He picked up the telephone. The line was dead. The receptionist, a sleepy woman with bloodshot eyes, must have forgotten to turn on his phone when he checked in. Should he rouse her? He decided not to. He pulled out his cell phone from his day-pack, then punched the speed dial button. Marybeth answered in four rings.

"Joe?" He could tell she wasn't happy. She sounded tired, and there was an icy edge to her voice. "You were supposed to call when you got there."

"I didn't get a chance," he said. His speech was slurred, as much from exhaustion as the bourbon. "I was too busy getting reamed by the assistant director and then I got called out."

"It's nearly midnight."

"I know," he said lamely.

"Why didn't you call this afternoon, then?"

"I told you. I hit the ground running over here."

"I just fell asleep. What are you doing up?"

"I just got in."

His cell phone chirped. It was about to run out of battery power, and he needed to recharge it, he told her.

"You sound like you've been drinking, Joe. And why are you calling me on your cell phone?"

"I tried to call from my motel, but the phone wouldn't work."

"Where are you staying?"

Joe looked up. What was the name of it? Jesus … One of those old western television series names.

"You don't know?"

"The Rifleman," he said finally, feeling stupid.

"Okay …" There was an edge of suspicion in her voice, and Joe didn't like it.

"Marybeth, I couldn't call earlier, all right? I'm sorry. There's a lot going on here and I got wrapped up in it. I'll call tomorrow and we can catch up, okay?"

"I'm wide awake now, Joe," her voice hostile.

His cell phone blinked off. He cursed and stared at it as if that would make it come back on. The charger was in his truck, and he started to get up, but stopped at the door. He wasn't exactly sure where he'd put it, and looking for it would take a while. He was tired, and resentful of her again. What was she accusing him of? Didn't she know he had a job to do? Why was it necessary to pile on the guilt? He got lonely, just like she did. All he wanted was for her to say she loved him, she missed him, and that everything was going to be fine.

He sighed. He'd call tomorrow, when he had some time, when he'd gathered his thoughts. Maybe before the funeral.

He picked up notebook #1 and began to read. Soon, the writing began to swim off the page.

Joe awoke to the sound of gunshots. He sat up quickly, disoriented for a moment. He glanced around, remembering where he was, surprised that he was still dressed and the bedside lamp was on. The opened notebook was on his lap.

No, it wasn't a gun. It was something on the other side of the motel room wall. Joe stood, rubbing his eyes. He looked at his watch: 4:45 A.M. He heard rustling in the next room, then another bang. The sound was coming through his closet. He opened the closet door, where he'd hung his uniform shirt and jacket on hangers that couldn't be removed from the rod.

He sighed, knowing now what had happened. Someone in the next room was packing up their clothing from the closet. Because the hangers couldn't be taken off the rod, as each piece was removed the rod swung back and banged into the wall.

Cheap motels, Joe thought. State-rate motels. Marybeth probably imagined him in someplace much finer. Maybe he should call her now and tell her how great it was.

He shook his head, ashamed at his thoughts, while he gathered up the notebooks and papers on the bed and stowed them neatly in his briefcase. He brushed his teeth, folded his clothes, turned off the light, and crawled into bed.

That's when something about Will's office hit him. Will Jensen was a meticulous man, from what Joe knew about him. His notes were precise, detailed, well reasoned. His office was spare and utilitarian, without a single frill or anything personal in it. Will was known for his even temper, his calmness. He was probably like Joe, who even when flustered or bad-tempered couldn't just forget about something and move on until everything was neat and in order. It didn't fit that Will, contemplating his own suicide, would rise from his desk in his office with papers scattered and a half-drunk can of Mountain Dew on his desk, his computer still on, and go home and end it all. Wouldn't Will have at least cleaned up a little, knowing what he was going to do?