U Is for Undertow (Kinsey Millhone 21)

“Absolutely. What’s that, four miles round trip?”

“Close enough.”

I took a minute to pull off my running shoes and socks. The socks I stuffed in my jacket pockets. I tied my shoelaces together and hung my shoes around my neck, letting them dangle in back. I wasn’t crazy about the persistent bump-bumping between my shoulder blades as we trudged through the soft sand, but it was better than walking fully shod.

She was already moving toward the surf at a pace I might have found daunting if I hadn’t been faithful to my jogging routine. On the ocean, waves broke a dozen yards out, and once we reached the hard pack, the water rushed forward in an icy flurry, covering our feet with foam before sliding out again. The Pacific is cold and unforgiving. You can usually spot a few hardy souls swimming in its depths, but no one had braved it that day. Two sailboats tacked toward the islands and a speedboat, at full throttle, paralleled the shoreline, keeping a para-sailor aloft, attached by a towrope scarcely visible against the pale blue sky. Hang gliding and parasailing are second and third down on my list of the one thousand things I never want to do in life. The first is have another tetanus shot.

Deborah said, “I understand this whole business originated with Michael Sutton. What’s the nature of your relationship?”

“I wouldn’t call it a relationship,” I said. “I met him for the first time a week ago when he hired me for a day’s work.”

I sketched in the situation, starting with his appearance in my office and his story about the two pirates he’d seen in the woods. “They claimed they were digging for buried treasure, but he noticed a bundle on the ground nearby. A few weeks ago, he came across a reference to the Fitzhugh kidnapping and the penny dropped. Now he’s convinced he saw Mary Claire’s body wrapped for burial. The only snag is when the police excavated the site, they found a dead dog. According to the ID tag, his name was Ulf.”

She seemed taken aback. “Well, that’s bizarre. I can assure you he wasn’t ours.”

“I know. I drove to Puerto and talked to the man who owned him. He said he’d taken Ulf to Dr. McNally for hip dysplasia. X-rays revealed a nasty tumor instead and the vet recommended euthanasia. Someone removed the dog’s remains from a shed at the rear of the clinic and transported the body to your property, where they buried him.”

The look she turned on me was perplexed. “Pardon my skepticism, but it sounds like all of this is predicated on the notion that it was Mary Claire’s body he saw. What makes you so sure? It seems like folly to operate on the idea when all you have is his word for it.”

“Agreed. I’m not even sure we could say we had his word on it. Call it a hunch.”

“Call it anything you like, it’s still odd. If something went wrong in the course of the kidnapping and they had to dispose of her body, why would they bury her in our yard when Horton Ravine has acres of woods?”

“I’ve been asking myself the same question. If we’re lucky we’ll find answers. On the other hand, we may never know.”

“There’s a certain irony in here somewhere. I haven’t heard Michael’s name in years. His parents, Kip and Annabelle, were our best friends.”

I looked over at her with interest. “Really. Michael’s parents? When was this?”

“During that same period. We met at the country club when she was six months pregnant with him. They were the dearest people in the world. I lost Annabelle, Kip, and Patrick in a span of two years.”

“Avis told me your husband died in a plane crash,” I said. I was reluctant to bring up the subject of his death, but it seemed to me the conversation we were embarking on had better be rooted in reality. The fact that we were walking, with our attention directed outward, allowed a more intimate exchange than if we’d been chatting eye-to-eye over a cup of tea.

“Some days I think I’m reconciled, that I’ve dealt with the pain and it’s over and done. Other days the grief is just as fresh as it was the first moment I heard.”

“What were the circumstances?”

“Rain was just starting graduate school, working toward her master’s degree in social work at the University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee. This was the fall of 1985. She and Patrick drove out in her car, with all her stuff in a four-by-eight cargo trailer. His plan was to get her settled and then fly on to Atlanta for a business meeting. I’d have gone with him, but it made more sense for me to tend the home fires and let the two of them have the time together. The Midwest Express flight to Atlanta went down after takeoff. The right engine failed and then a whole series of things went haywire. I was here in California without any intuition whatever. It’s hard to realize your life can change so radically with no warning at all. When Rain phoned, she couldn’t even speak. I thought it was a crank call and nearly hung up on her.”