The Cowboy's Shadow Part 14

Whitaker." Her face froze.

"Don't bother for me," Kyla said. "I'm floating." She turned to Whit; he shook his head.

"Glad you're here, Whit," Mark said. He tapped a map that covered half the table. "You know this country. Marshall and I are trying to figure out where we should concentrate a search. The whole salvage crew from the Pollux will go out, and half the s.h.i.+ft from the Castor."

"Can I fill up my water cans?" Andy asked, tugging at Kyla's sleeve. "Trace and I can lug them back here."

"There's a faucet out front, closer to the truck," Trace said. The boys trudged out of sight. Glenda slid off the bench and gestured for Kyla to follow her.

"I'll make another pot of coffee," she announced. She slammed the kitchen door rather more firmly than necessary. "There's a message for you. Something about a job. They called just a few minutes ago."

Kyla studied the bit of notepaper stuck on the wall beside the phone. A position starting next Monday with a medical supply company. "Be at the temp office at 7 a.m. sharp, to get information."

"Dr. Chase told Sheriff Neligh that Moira was with Whit," Glenda said the moment Kyla lifted her eyes from the note. Kyla shoved the paper in the pocket of her shorts.

"Moira was not with Whit. I was. We drove north and east of here, looking at ranches that Rod visited, and met some nice people named Foster and ate lunch at Tonapah. Then we -- "

"Why should Dr. Chase even think -- "

"How should I know?" Kyla exclaimed, her temper rising. What she had spied behind the juniper, what Whit had told her on the way to Reno, these were his secrets, not hers.

"At first I didn't believe it," Glenda said. "Moira Chase? She's a married woman. Whit always seemed woman shy, understandable because of the way his fiancee died. But after I thought about it, how he moved in on you so quickly, well, maybe he'd not an angel."

Kyla looked at the ceiling and took several deep breaths. "Whit isn't an angel.

But he hasn't been shacking with Moira Chase, either." Kyla considered telling Glenda about Rod and Moira, then decided that was Whit's secret, too.

"But why should Dr. Chase think -- "

"You asked me that before, and I still don't know the answer. Hadn't you better start the coffee maker."

Glenda splashed water down the front of her s.h.i.+rt as she rinsed the coffee pot.

"It's just...just that this has all happened so fast, you and Whit I mean. My little sister comes to visit me, and suddenly she's not home for three nights.

What do I tell Mom?" The cry of a big sister, twelve years older, and nothing to do with a therapist.

"Mom called?" Kyla asked, startled by the guilt she felt.

"No. But she might." Kyla breathed again.

"Tell her I'm out with a friend. I promised Whit I'd help him look for hantavirus sites, and that's what we're doing. Except yesterday afternoon he took me to the state-park with the dinosaurs, up north."

Glenda shoved the pot under the faucet. "Just so he's not using you."

"Maybe I'm using him. Did you ever think of that?"

"The water's running awfully slow."

"It's the boys, filling Andy's water cans. The water tank in his trailer's nearly empty." Kyla hesitated, then decided someone should know. Someone who could take action if necessary. "Glenda, that little boy lives in Generator Flat all alone. His father worked at the Pollux. He took off weeks ago to hunt for work in Idaho. Andy's afraid someone will report him to the county, and that the authorities will carry him off, and the trailer, left empty, will be vandalized."

Glenda concentrated on pouring the water in the top of the coffee maker. "Is there something you want me to do?"

"I don't know. I just thought...someone should be aware. Does Mark have contacts at mines in Idaho? Could he find out if Andy's father applied for work? The kid tries to act like everything's okay, but he's worried."

Glenda nodded. "I'll speak to Mark. Later. This business with Moira Chase has us all upset, because every woman in this town has at some time or another gone walking alone, and we let our children wander about the countryside. What if it's not safe anymore?"

The coffee sizzled on the hot plate, awakening Glenda to the pot still in her hand. She shoved it under the stream. "Dr. Chase hadn't given Moira a second thought. It was only when we turned up for the women's club meeting, and no one was there. You could see she'd started getting ready. China cups and crystal gla.s.ses on the buffet, and jars of sun tea brewing on the patio." She turned a bleak face to Kyla. "Moira Chase did not run off. Someone took her."

Dr. Chase. Hadn't Jim and Vince said as much last night? Or might it be the man who'd slept with her before she took up with Rod. Maybe her abandoned lover resented being shoved aside for a handsome young cowboy with money to buy a ranch. Unless Moira turned up soon, Whit would have to tell the sheriff that Rod had been Moira's lover.

Glenda handed her two mugs. "Take these out."

The men leaned over the table, heads close together, jabbing at the map. The boys came around the corner of the house, clothes dripping. Filling the water cans had obviously ended in a water fight. Trace leaned in the back door.

"Hey, Mom! You got any lemonade in the frig?"

"Stay outside until you've dry," Glenda said. "I'll bring the lemonade out."

"No one's walked this gully," Mark said, his finger tracking a two-inch line on the map.

"Most of that's visible from the highway," Whit said. "I wouldn't think -- " His eyes flicked over the boys, and he closed his mouth. Kyla s.h.i.+vered, realizing the men were discussing places to look for a body. Or a grave, dug safe from prying eyes.

Glenda emerged with a pitcher of lemonade in one hand and the coffee in the other. "Kyla, run in and bring out some paper cups for the boys. Andy, could you refill everyone's mug?" She thrust the full pot at the boy, who grasped it with both hands. Kyla stared at Glenda. Trusting her new coffeepot to a twelve-year-old? The corners of Glenda's mouth twitched for a split second.

"I'm afraid I've been critical of Andy," Glenda whispered. "The way he dresses, no haircut...I didn't understand. Trust is a two-way street. Best all around if Andy finds some adults to trust, under the circ.u.mstances."

Chapter Ten.

Kyla admired the play of Whit's arm muscles as he hoisted the water cans, tipped them up, emptied them into the trailer's tank. No matter how a.s.siduously a desk-bound man worked out in the gym, he could never achieve this easy, natural strength.

Trace tied a hand-drawn map to his handlebars, a guide to the area he and Andy would search. Another of Glenda's plots to draw Andy into a circle of adult friends.h.i.+p.

"Come on, Andy," Trace said impatiently.

"If you spot anything unusual," Kyla said, "come back for the sheriff. You could destroy vital evidence getting too close."

"You told us that before," Trace said.

"Go ahead," Whit said to Andy. "I'll leave the water cans under the trailer."

Andy nodded, but looked back more than once as he and Trace pushed their bikes up the rocky slope.

"I hope they don't find anything," Kyla said.

"Marshall and I gave them the least likely spot, a long gully, almost all of it visible from the highway." He heaved the last water can from the truck. Kyla gathered the empties and stuffed them under the trailer.

"Do you think it's possible that Dr. Chase killed Moira?" Kyla asked. "You saw him this morning."

The splash of the water changed tone as the tank filled. "Chase looked awful, but I've never seen a murderer on the morning after, so I can't judge." He eyed her, questioning. "You still thinking of going home today?"

As they climbed into the truck, Kyla told him about the message from the temp agency. "Dr. Chase is too busy right now to make trouble for me. I'll stay until Sunday. What's today's itinerary?"

"There's hardly enough left of the day to nose around the national park and those three ranches," Whit said. "We'd have to stay overnight, and with this latest development -- "

"Sheriff Neligh expects you to stick around," Kyla finished for him. He nodded, turned the truck toward the ranch. "The sheriff asked you about your friends.h.i.+p with Moira?"

"Naturally."

"I expected him to come in the cafe and quiz me," Kyla said, "since I'm the witness to your whereabouts."

"My word's good in the county. How about helping me shop for furniture?"

"Furniture? You're not joining the search?"

"Searches like this turn up exactly nothing. They just make everyone feel better. Either in the next day or two Dr. Chase gets a phone call from a very contrite wife, or toward fall a hiker or a cowboy calls the sheriff to report bones in a wash. Neither very pleasant for Dr. Chase. The first ends in a nasty divorce, and the second in a belated funeral."

"There's something even worse," she said. "Silence. Never learning what happened. I hope she phones."

"So do I. Now, I want you to look at the family room and tell me where a couch should go. And a coffee table. Measure it, so we'll know what size we need. No sense making two trips to Bishop."

Whit hit the doorbell as he opened the front door, and the music set Kyla tingling. "I need more light," she said, standing in the middle of the room.

Whit pushed a b.u.t.ton, the drapes slid apart, revealing an expanse of gla.s.s, and beyond a flagstone patio and the blue plastic of a pool cover.

"A swimming pool?"

"I don't heat it. Just let the sun do its work. It's nearly warm enough for evening dips. Just a second, I'll get a measuring tape." He disappeared into the kitchen.

A light fixture made from a wagon wheel hung in one corner of the room. To light the eating area or perhaps a game table. Should the couch face the patio, or the fireplace? On one side the stonework of the fireplace extended well beyond the hearth, and water stains marked the stones from floor to ceiling.

"Whit, something's leaking," she said when he appeared with a tape measure.

"See, water's run down these rocks, and not just a trickle."

"Leak?" He laughed, ran his fingers over the whitish deposits. "That's the humidifier. Fill the tank, turn on the pump, and water comes out little pipes near the ceiling and spills down the rocks, into a trough at the bottom. The guy who built the house saw one just like this at Scotty's Castle in Death Valley.

Of course, modern humidifying systems work much better, but this is more elegant."

"I want to see it work," Kyla said. She licked a finger, rubbed it across a stone. Agate, that wet would glitter in a spectrum of color. The fountain, she realized, determined the color scheme of the room. The tan rug, the pale green tile of the wet bar, the desert-red of the drapes.

Whit filled a pitcher at the wet bar, unscrewed a cap set flush in the floor, and poured the water in a narrow stream. He pushed another b.u.t.ton -- the whole house seemed to operate on tiny silent motors -- the wall gurgled, air hissed from pipes long dry, then a dribble of moisture, a cough, another dribble. The sheen started at the top, and flowed downward like undulating silk. The rocks had been arranged to create minuscule creeks, ponds, and waterfalls.

"Incredible!" Kyla whispered. Whit stepped to her side and slid an arm about her waist.

"It's beautiful. Thanks for asking. I never turned it on before."

"Never? In six years?"

He said nothing. He faced the glistening stone, but his eyes were closed and a muscle worked in his jaw. Jenny. He regretted that Jenny had never seen the fountain? Kyla turned out of his embrace, and lay the tape measure on the floor.

Judith had warned her. The lost angel who possessed Whit would never let him go.

"Now," she said briskly, to break the spell of the fountain, "it looks like something six or seven feet long would do. What style of furniture do you have in mind?"

He shook himself, like a man suddenly awakened. "The statue. Something to match the Remington and show it off. I saw one mounted on a pedestal made of barn wood, but it might be more restful on a coffee table, where you could sit down to look at it."

"Western style, then. Wood and nubby upholstery. Maybe tile on the coffee table, just so it isn't too slick. Terra cotta, to match the entry hall. Nothing elaborate, because you've got two very dramatic, rough-hewn focal points."

"What?" he asked. "Would you mind speaking English?"

"The Remington and the fountain wall."

"How do you know these things?"

"My Aunt Edith, my mother's sister, is an interior decorator. You learn by osmosis. She never visits but she gives lots of good advice that mother never takes. Mother believes the best decor is EYS."

"EYS?".

"Early Yard Sale. Mother's Sat.u.r.day mornings are a dead loss if she doesn't hit at least two sales. If we needed a table or chest of drawers, we waited until she hauled one home. This is going to be an adventure! I've never bought new furniture before."

"And on the way we'll look for fresh tire tracks heading off on side roads. I'll get a map."

Kyla found a few loose yarns of the carpet against the baseboard, and with a pair of nail scissors carefully clipped a smidgen of the drapery fabric from a seam. She hoped nothing came of tire tracks on side roads. Sickness and death in a hospital, that she found acceptable, but dead bodies in the desert?Stiff upper lip , she told herself. For a woman who had wanted to be a doctor since she was ten years old, she was dreadfully squeamish.

The moment Whit started the truck, the dog came tearing around the house. He ordered it away, and it slunk to its lair with its tail between its legs.

"I suppose," he muttered as he turned the pickup around, "I'd better buy some dog food while I'm near a supermarket. It seems I've got a dog. Open this." He pulled a map from under his leg, a detail map of west central Nevada. "Look for secondary roads west of Argentia that follow the bottom of a gully, or go over a ridge right after leaving the main road."

The map accordioned open and a paper skittered off her leg, onto the floor.

"What's that?" Whit asked without taking his eyes from the road.

A legal-sized sheet folded into thirds, scribbles here and there over printed text. Circles and arrows on a crude sketch. Hole-in-Rock Resort Casino.

"A mock-up of that brochure," Kyla said, wary, knowing she held something not intended for a stranger's eyes. "A first draft, a printer's proof, I don't know what to call it." Whit pulled to the edge of the road and reached for the paper.

"You haven't seen it before?" Kyla asked. "What's it doing in your map?"

"Not my map," Whit said. "Vince brought it into the office with the stuff from Rod's truck." He tipped the paper away from the bright sunlight, studied both sides, refolded the map with the paper inside. "We won't bother with side roads.

You aren't too anxious, are you?"