J is for Judgment (Kinsey Millhone 10)

I sat in my car and waited. Since my car radio wasn’t working and I hadn’t brought anything to read, I found myself ruminating about the sudden acquisition of family relationships. What was I going to do about them? Grandmother, aunts, cousins of every description…not that they’d lost sleep over me. There was something troubling about the feelings being stirred up. Most of them were bad. I’d never devoted any thought to the fact that my father was a mail carrier. I had known, of course, but the information had no impact, and I usually had no reason to reflect on the significance. All that news being delivered…the good and the bad, debts and remittances, accounts payable, accounts receivable, dividend checks, canceled notes, word about babies being born and old friends dying, the Dear John letters breaking off engagements …that was the task he’d been charged with in this world, an occupation my grandmother apparently judged too lowly for consideration. Maybe Burton and Grand truly felt it was their responsibility to see that my mother chose well in this matter of a husband. I felt defensive of him, brooding and protective.

With Liza’s revelation, I’d caught a glimpse of whole dramas that had been acted out without my knowledge: quarrels and rituals, the gentle cooing of women, raucous laughter, cozy chats in the kitchen over cups of coffee, holiday dinners, babies born, advice offered up, the hand-embroidered linens passed down from one generation to the next. It was a ladies’ magazine picture of the family: abundant, cinnamon-scented, filled with pine boughs and ornaments, football games on the color TV set in the den, uncles dazed by too much to eat, children glassy-eyed and hyper from all the naps they’d skipped. My world seemed bleak by comparison, and for once the Spartan, stripped-down life-style I so cherished seemed paltry and deprived.

I stirred on my seat, nearly paralyzed with boredom. There was no reason to believe Renata Huff would show up. Surveillance is a bitch. It’s tough to sit and stare at the front of a house for five or six hours at a stretch. It’s hard to pay attention. It’s hard to give a shit. Usually I have to think of it as a Zen meditation, imagining I’m in touch with my Higher Power instead of just my bladder.

Daylight began to fade. I watched the color of the sky shift from apricot to blush. The temperature was dropping almost palpably. Summer evenings are usually chilly, and with this storm system lurking off the coast, the days seemed as short as some premature autumn. I could see a fog bank moving in, a wall of dark clouds against the rapidly accumulating cobalt blue of the twilight sky. I crossed my arms in front of me for warmth, slouching down on my seat. Another hour must have passed.

I felt my awareness flicker, and my head jerked involuntarily as I lurched out of sleep. I sat up straight and made a conscious effort to keep myself awake. This lasted about a minute. Various body parts began to hurt, and I thought about how babies cry when they’re tired. Staying awake becomes a physical agony when the body needs rest. I shifted, turning sideways. I pulled my knees up and swung my feet onto the passenger seat, resting my back against the car door where the armrest protruded. I felt like I was drunk, my eyes rolling in their sockets as I fought to keep them open. I imagined the chemicals from all that junk food coursing through my body with this narcotic effect. This was never going to do. I had to have fresh air. I had to get up and move.

I checked my glove compartment for my penlight and set of key picks. I tucked my handbag on the floor out of sight and grabbed a jacket from the backseat. I got out, locked the car door, and crossed the street at an angle, moving toward Renata’s with a devilish urge to snoop. Really, it wasn’t my fault. I can’t be held responsible when boredom sets in. For the sake of good manners, I rang the doorbell first, knowing in my heart that not a soul would come to answer. Sure enough, no response. What’s a poor girl to do? I let myself through the side gate and moved around to the rear.

I moved down to the dock, which seemed to rock beneath me. Renata’s boat, ironically, had been named the Fugitive, a forty-eight-foot ketch, sleek white, with an aft center cockpit and an aft cabin. The body was fiberglass, the deck oiled teak, the trim a varnished walnut, fittings of chrome and brass. The boat would probably sleep six in comfort, eight in a pinch. There were numerous vessels moored on either side of the key, lights shimmering against the black depths of the barely rippling water. What could be better for Wendell’s purposes than to have ready access to the ocean through the keys? He might have been sailing in and out of here for years, wholly anonymous, wholly undetected.

I made a feeble effort to “halloo” the boat, which produced no results. This was not surprising, as the boat was dark and shrouded in canvas.