Page 26 of Dead Mountain

“Nora, listen—I really, really want to thank you for your assistance on this. I mean, not only with the bodies, but liaising with the local tribe, fending off the press . . . everything.”

A pause. “Why does this sound like the lead-up to yet another request?”

“Because it is. Would you please take a look at the site where the old tent was pitched?”

“You mean, as in fifteen years ago? There’s a monument there now. Souvenir hunters have probably scrubbed that place cleaner than the latrines at Parris Island. That’s another imperishable line of my brother’s.”

“Look—I know it’s a big ask, with you still having to work with the Tribal Council and everything, but you said it yourself—those were souvenir hunters, not archaeologists. There’s no telling what you’ll find. Or what fifteen years of rain and snow might have unearthed.”

Another pause, followed by a sigh. “All right. I guess Stan and I could do a survey.”

“Thanks a lot, Nora. Get home safe.”

As she hung up, she heard one slam, then another, as Nate rolled the corpses into their berths and shut the steel doors. “Guess that’s it,” he said, climbing out of his suit, going through the usual wash-down procedures, then turning off the morgue lights and stepping into the main lab. “You coming?”

“I’ll be along in a moment, thanks.”

Nate pulled on his coat. “Okay. See you tomorrow.” And he slipped out the door, leaving Corrie alone in the lab.

She sat at the desk, the light in the lab now relatively dim—just her and the two bodies hidden in the alcove beyond. She wondered for a moment why she’d lingered, rather than leaving with Nate. Then she realized what it was: that slam of metal upon metal had stirred a memory—a deep memory she hadn’t recollected in years.

She’d been thirteen, and five months had passed since her father had left home without leaving a note—or so she’d thought. Five months and two weeks, give or take. And in all that time, her mother hadn’t spoken a word to her. The first night, her mother had manhandled the old TV from the living room of their trailer into her bedroom, and after that, Corrie had to be content amusing herself with library books and used paperbacks. Her mother drank—a lot—as she knew from the clink of all the vodka minis she smuggled home from work. A sixth sense had always warned her from asking any questions when her mother was drinking. Questions like when her dad would be coming home, or what she should make for supper. So she lived on cornflakes and bagged dry ramen while she endured the teasing and bullying of her schoolmates and waited for her father to return.

During those middle and high school years, she hadn’t realized how much anger was building up inside her—directed in an unfocused way on Medicine Creek and Kansas and the whole world—until one afternoon when she’d passed the Wagon Wheel Tavern. Inside, she could see the local sheriff at the bar. He was drinking a rum and Coke, though no one would ever admit there was any rum in the red plastic glass, and eating an éclair. And no doubt talking trash about her father, as he did at every opportunity—or so his son, the local bully, informed her: how her dad was a no-good easy rider who, when he’d grown tired of banging his hag of a wife, had hopped a freight train out of town.

Without waiting, without thinking, she’d deviated from her intended path, crossing the street to where Sheriff Hazen’s dusty cruiser was parked. She didn’t know a lot about cars, but she knew how to let air out of tires. She was on the last one when Hazen came out of the tavern.

Ten minutes later, after struggling and biting his finger, she was sitting in the lone holding cell of the jail, her body still shaking from the slam of the cell door.

Metal on metal. Just like the two corpse lockers.

She sat in the cell for hours. For a while, the sheriff’s son came in to mock her, but eventually he got bored and left. She wondered if it was even legal to keep someone her age locked up so long. But she did her best not to show her fear, consoling herself with the knowledge that her mom—who had a mean streak as long as your arm—would let the sheriff have it for making her come into town after work to bail her daughter out of jail.

Finally, she heard voices out in the main office: it was her mother and that new deputy, Tad Franklin. The sheriff must have gone home for the night. Five minutes later, the deputy appeared, unlocked her cell, and led her out into the office. Her mother stood there waiting, her face dead and expressionless. As soon as she saw Corrie, she turned and walked out of headquarters, letting the screen door bang loudly in the Kansas night.

Corrie trailed after her as they walked toward the AMC Gremlin. “Mom,” she began, “that sheriff keeps bad-mouthing Dad and—”

Her mother turned—faster than Corrie thought possible—and smacked her across the face. Hard. Corrie sprawled into the dirt. Tears sprang into her eyes, as much from surprise as from pain.

“I just had to pay forty bucks to spring you loose,” she said, standing over Corrie. “That’s two weeks of food money.”

You mean drinking money, she thought, but said nothing.

“Which means two weeks of you getting your own food. And if you mention that bastard father of yours to me again, you’ll get the beating of your life. Now get your ass in the car.”

Thirteen-year-old Corrie, ears ringing and one hand instinctively rising to her aching cheek, stood up and got into the car. And in the present day, Agent Swanson rose from the desk and—after a final walk around the lab—snapped off the lights and locked the door behind her.

16

TOM GARDINER SAT in the Barcalounger, in the far corner of Adele Mastrelano’s living room. Her house had by now a comforting familiarity, like that of a favorite in-law’s residence: the high-ceilinged entranceway in fashion when the Briargate subdivision was first developed; the Native American décor, domesticated for suburbia; the World Book Encyclopedia and Folio Society books lined up on the shelves, along with the fading family pictures. A few more pictures had been added, Gardiner noticed: mostly of Ralph Mastrelano, Adele’s husband, who’d passed away eighteen months ago after a long struggle with colon cancer.

The potluck food was now spread out on the long dining room table, and through the living room columns Gardiner could see people lining up to get plates. In recent years, these meetings—now just annual—had become increasingly ritualized. People brought the same dishes: ranch lasagna, cheddar bacon jalapeño poppers, Lady Bird Johnson’s Pedernales River chili. Now, with every meeting, there was almost always some recent death to console or retirement home transition to talk about. After dinner, the ritual would begin: the lighting of the candles, the naming of the victims—followed by those still missing. And always, a period of silence and prayer after each name.

Gardiner looked around the dining table, instinctively checking for anyone missing or for any unexpected additions. As always, he found himself doing this in the order their children were found. Besides himself and Adele, there were the Marchenkos, Dmitri and Ann, as always dressed in black. Next, Terry Van Gelder, once an outgoing high school math teacher, now a widower. Then the Hightowers, Fred and Doris, always sitting alongside Ray Martinez. Their children, Luke and Lynn respectively, had been found in May of the year following the tragedy, the bodies lying on top of each other in a ravine, with horrible and inexplicable injuries. Doris Hightower never spoke, and Gardiner wondered if this was some sort of stroke or product of grief, or if she merely chose to be silent at their meetings.

Now his eye moved to Paul Tolland Sr. and Cosmo and Cassy Wright. Fate had dealt most harshly with these three—fifteen years of not knowing, not having a body to bury. Torture. Paul, a dental surgeon, was now widowed. Cosmo and Cassy, plump and sad, both retired.

And then finally there was Melody Ann O’Connell, a real estate lawyer. The odd one in the group. She had joined the group four years ago, the widow of Harry O’Connell, who himself had been widowed after the tragedy and remarried her. That made Melody Ann technically the stepmother of Rodney O’Connell, the ninth victim, although she had never met the young man. Melody Ann was a powerful personality who had quickly become the most active, most organized, and most vocal of the Manzano Families Memorial Association. She had given the group its official name, gotten it 501(c)(3) status, drawn up bylaws, and made it official. While she could be abrasive, a lot of the families felt that after all this time a little abrasiveness was needed, and they were all grateful for her organizational abilities, even if they felt little affection for her as a person.

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