He smiled at her, and she had to repress the instinctive urge to take a step back. Or maybe forward. “Sounds good to me.”
They sat down to moose salad sandwiches and ate to the accompaniment of Katya banging her spoon against the tray of her high chair, scattering pureed moose salad all over Bobby’s black T-shirt. “Goddamn!” he roared, dabbing ineffectually at his chest. “That’s the second shirt today. I thought we was only supposed to be going through diapers by the dozen around here.”
“Goddamn!” Katya said, and banged her spoon again.
“Goddamn!” Bobby said, a huge grin on his face. “Did you hear that?”
“Yes,” Dinah said.
Bobby saw Dinah’s expression and whispered to Katya, “Bad word, honey. Mommy pissed off. We’ll talk later.”
Katya laughed, a gurgled baby chuckle, and held out her arms. Her father swooped around the table and scooped her out of her chair, tossing her up in the air. Conversation deteriorated into Park gossip. Had they but known it a rehash of a similar conversation held not twelve miles down the road the night before, only Bobby had a lot more appreciation to express for Bernie’s new barmaid. Dinah gave him a halfhearted swipe and he tucked Katya beneath one arm and scooped Dinah up in the other for a humming, prolonged kiss, which Jim observed with professional approval.
Dinah emerged from the embrace blushing, breathless, and laughing, and Bobby, satisfied, said, “She’s a beauty, but cold.”
It took Jim a moment to realize that Bobby was talking about the new barmaid. “Oh yeah? What, she said no to you?”
“Cheese it,” Bobby hissed, jerking his head at Dinah.
“Sorry.”
“I’ll say. I don’t know, I just don’t warm up to her is all. She takes advantage. Dan walked into the Roadhouse the second day after she got there, and as soon as she got his job description, she made a beeline straight for him. Guy didn’t have a chance.”
“Poor guy,” Jim said.
Bobby looked at him and raised an eyebrow.
“Up yours, Clark.”
Bobby grinned. “Who else you talking to?”
Jim ticked down a mental list. “You, George, Billy, Auntie Vi. I think I’ll head out to Bernie’s, see what he says.”
“Give my love to the new girl in town,” Bobby said, and caught a wet sponge upside the head. “That does it, woman. Now it’s war!”
5
An hour after opening time, the Roadhouse was still quiet, and Bernie had time to sit and listen. “Well,” he said when Jim came to the end, “it’ll sure as hell make my life easier.”
“What do you think the general reaction will be?”
Bernie napped a hand. “Nothing to worry about. Hell, the bootleggers’ll run for cover, the dopers will keep their heads low, and ordinary citizens might even think twice about whatever trouble they were planning on getting into. I don’t see much but good coming out of it, Jim. And it won’t raise my taxes, which always makes me happy.”
“Nothing raises your taxes, Bernie; you do business in a federal park.”
“Shows how much you know about being an employer,” Bernie said. “I just took on a new server-”
“I saw. Yum.” He looked around. “Where is she, by the way?”
“She doesn’t come on shift until four. She’s renting the Gette cabin from the new owners.” He looked up from polishing a glass and checked the window. “It’s a gorgeous day; she’s probably out skiing somewhere. She’s a telemarketer, she tells me. That’s why she moved here-for the snow.”
“Oh yeah?”
Bernie leveled a stern forefinger. “You stay away from Christie Turner, goddamn it. She’s working out. I don’t need her screwed up by some slick talker who only wants to get in her pants.”
Jim grinned. Bernie sounded a little wistful, as if sorry he had to follow that rule himself. Edith must be keeping him on a tighter leash than usual. Not that Bernie didn’t stray now and then, but strictly when he thought he could get away with it. “I hear she’s already taken anyway. Hands off, Scout’s honor.”
Bernie gave him a skeptical look, but whatever he had been about to say was interrupted by the front door slamming open and banging off the wall.
“Hey!” Bernie said indignantly.
Dandy Mike barreled through the doorway, bundled in down pants and parka, his eyes wide and his expression anxious. He spotted Jim and crossed the floor in hasty steps. “Jim, thank god. You’ve got to come, right now.”
“Where? And why?” Jim stood up. “Dandy. You’ve got blood all over your pants.”
Dandy glanced down, up again. “I know. It’s Dina and Ruthe. I went up to deliver their mail, and they’re-” He swallowed. “They’re dead.”
“What?” Bernie said.
“Dina and Ruthe. Somebody broke into their cabin, and Dan-”
“Dan? Dan O’Brian? What about him?”
Dandy swallowed again. “Jim, just come, come right now, okay? Come on.”
Billy’s Explorer made it up the narrow and nearly vertical track to the little cabin, but only just barely, and not without scratching the finish on low-hanging spruce boughs. Dandy’s father was going to be pissed.
Dandy pulled his snow machine to a halt in front of the stairs. Jim parked behind him and got out with the briefcase that held his crime-scene kit, without which he never went anywhere. “Hold it, Dandy,” he said when Dandy put his foot on the bottom stair. “Let me go first.” He checked the camera to see that it held film, got out his notepad and pencil. “Okay,” he said, “I don’t want you in the room. Stay in the doorway and keep everybody else out.”
“Who else?” Dandy said, and even as the words left his mouth, they heard the buzzing of approaching snow machines. He gaped at Jim. “How did you know? How did they know?”
“First thing you learn when working out here: The Bush telegraph is faster than the speed of sound. Keep them out.”
“Will do,” Dandy said, shaken but staunch. Dandy Mike, a charming wastrel with an eye for the ladies every bit as keen as Jim’s own, might have a little bit more backbone about him than Jim had previously supposed.
The door, which Dandy had not closed all the way in his haste to depart, slid open with a snick, and Jim stepped inside. He stayed where he was, immobile except for his eyes, which were surveying and cataloging the scene.
His peripheral vision picked up movement, and he crouched and whirled, one hand on his weapon.
It was Dan O’Brian, pulling himself painfully to his feet, looking bloody, bruised, confused, and dazed.
“Dan!” Jim said incredulously. “What the hell?”
And then a second sound made them both jump. One of the bodies on the floor moved, groaned, whimpered. Jim leapt forward, hurdling the piles of pulled-out books and pushing the overturned table in an effort to reach Ruthe Bauman. Landing next to her, he pressed two fingers against her throat. “Son of a bitch!”
“What’s the matter, Jim?” Dandy said from the porch.
“Ruthe’s still alive!”
“She can’t be!”
“Didn’t you check for life signs?”
“I-” Dandy was at a loss. “I didn’t even go in after I opened the door. I saw them both lying there covered in blood and Dan standing over them. I thought they were dead. Jesus, Jim, I’m-”
“Never mind that now. Back the truck around!”
He checked Dina’s body just to be sure. No pulse, no breath sounds. She was dead, a graceless heap of brittle bone and sagging flesh, her thinning white hair disarranged from its usual neat roll. Her jaw was slack, her mouth a little open. He pulled out his radio, but of course he was out of range. He cursed Dandy for not checking for signs of life more thoroughly, for losing so much precious time in getting Ruthe to help. He cursed himself, too, steadily and out loud, for not bringing the Bell Jet Ranger on this trip.
“Jim?”