Rich pushed aside the hairy sumac branches and saw that the vehicle was a relatively new Chevy pickup, probably still worth some money. It wasn’t Chet’s truck, that he knew for sure—Chet was a Ford man. What would it be doing in his
woods?
The grass had grown up around the tires and he could barely make out a path where the truck had driven into the woods. Didn’t happen yesterday.
Maybe, during his walk, he had crossed over the property line. He wasn’t sure exactly where Chet’s property ended. But still, why would anyone dump a decent truck like that in the weeds? You’d think even if it didn’t run anymore, a salvage company would come and pick it up just for parts.
One more thing he’d have to ask Chet about when he saw him next.
* * *
As the end of the day approached, Amy wasn’t looking forward to going back to her hot apartment. Bill had already left, but she might have to call him up and bribe him with some ice cream to let her stay over. She had had no luck with the tree guy and was quite disappointed that her find hadn’t panned out. Maybe a discarded red t-shirt is simply a discarded red t-shirt, not some clue to solve the crime of the year.
She had called all the tree services in Red Wing and the surrounding area. She had even gotten a call back from the two services she had left messages with. Everyone she talked to sounded disappointed when they found out she wasn’t calling about needing any work done.
One of the owners had explained to her it had been a relatively quiet summer, not many storms, no tornadoes or straight-line winds, so there hadn’t been as many felled trees as
usual. As a result they weren’t using many extra workers and none of them had any workers who were missing.
None of them knew anything about a red shirt with a tree on it. Maybe the tree guy was from Wisconsin after all. She thought to herself,
Maybe I’m barking up the wrong tree,
and had a short fit of hysterical laughter.
She was just about ready to give up when she picked up the Shopper and read an ad for a tree service located between Red Wing and Hastings. It was just a small note in the classifieds. Seemed odd for them to be advertising in a Wisconsin paper, but it answered her first question, which was “do you do work in Wisconsin?”
She called the listed number and a woman answered the phone, not with the name of the company, which was Timber Tree Services, but just a simple, “hello.”
“Hi, is this Timber Tree Services?”
There was a pause and then the woman said, “My husband isn’t available just right now.”
“Oh, but he runs Timber Tree Services?”
“Yes, when he’s around.”
“May I ask where he is?”
“Who is this?” the woman’s voice rose.
“Oh, sorry. I’m calling from the Pepin County Sheriff’s Department. My name is Amy Schroeder.”
“What do you want? Is there some problem?”
“I know this is an odd question, but does he have a red t-shirt with a tree on it?”
“He had a bunch of those shirts made up for him and the guys. Why?”
Amy sucked in her breath. “I need to talk to your husband. Do you know how I can get hold of him?”
“My husband’s not here. He’s been gone for nearly a week this time and I haven’t heard a peep.”
“Have you reported him missing?”
“Not worth the trouble. He’ll show up in the next day or two with some lame excuse about where he’s been. I don’t get too worried about it. Is he in trouble or something?”
“What’s your husband’s name?”
“Dean Swaggum.”
“Is he a big guy?”
“Yeah, weighs about two twenty, over six feet tall. Why?”
Amy was afraid to ask the next question, the make-it or break-it question. “Does he have a tattoo?”
The woman’s voice quavered as she answered, “Yes. He got it when he started the business.”
“May I ask what it is?”
“Why? What’s happened to him?”
“Maybe nothing. Can you describe the tattoo?”
“A whole tree, not just the branches, but the roots too.”
Amy sat stunned in her chair. Now what did she say? She had never broken the news of a death to someone before. She wished Claire were here. “Mrs. Swaggum, I’m afraid I’m going to have to ask you to come to Durand.”
A
my was sitting in front of the computer when she heard someone running in the main room. Bernice, the secretary, called out Claire’s name. She heard someone say that Claire had been hurt, was in the parking lot passed out on the ground. Amy pushed her chair back so hard it tipped over and she ran out the door.
By the time she got there, Jeremy and three other deputies surrounded Claire. Amy pushed Jeremy away and squatted down to check on Claire. Her face was blotchy red and covered with sweat. She was unconscious, but breathing.
Then Amy saw what the problem was. Claire had tucked her arm in her shirt, but the break was so exaggerated that the arm bent where it shouldn’t. At least it hadn’t broken through the skin yet, but she could see the bone pushing against the forearm from the inside.
Frank pulled a squad car up as close as he could get to Claire and opened the back door. “Let’s get her in here. No sense waiting for an ambulance. We can take her just as fast.”
The four of them lifted Claire up and laid her in the back seat of the car. Amy got in from the other side and put Claire’s head on her lap, trying to stabilize her body. “Let’s go,” she said.
“Just take it nice and easy.”
Claire moaned and opened her eyes. “What?” she asked.
“You’re going to be fine. We’re taking you to emergency. Hang in there.”
“Chet?” Claire said the word as if there was more.
“What about him?” Amy asked.
“Chet got away.”
“He was with you?”
“He ran through the woods, then across the highway.”
“Shit.” Amy turned and said to Frank. “I think Chet Baldwin’s loose. Maybe give a holler back to the department and let them know.”
“He got away,” Claire mumbled again.
“Don’t worry. The guys will find him.”
Reaching down with her good hand, Claire felt along her other arm. “I think it’s broken.”
“Looks like it.”
Claire gave a wan smile. “At least it’s my left. I can still write and drive.”
“You might have to take some time off.”
Claire shook her head. Then she touched her broken arm again. “I suppose they’re going to have to straighten this out. Not looking forward to that.”
* * *
“Claire was right here. Looks like he ran into the woods down there a ways.” Bill pointed out a path in the underbrush.
Sheriff Talbert glanced up at the sky, then shook his head. “What the hell do we do now? We haven’t arrested him, at least
not formally. We need to talk to him, but I’m just not sure we should do a large-scale manhunt for Chet. Technically, no reason he couldn’t walk off if he wanted to.”
“But what about assaulting a deputy sheriff?” Bill asked, disappointed that he wasn’t going to be allowed to organize a major search and concerned about the treatment of a fellow officer. “After all, Claire’s got a broken arm.”
“Did he do that?”
Bill had to admit he wasn’t sure. “Where do you think he’d go?”
“Well, I’m sure he’s headed home. But who knows, he might have gone downtown for a cup of coffee.”
“Can’t a few of us guys go looking for him?”
The sheriff motioned to him to head back to the government center. “I think that’s a good idea. If nothing more than just to check on him and make sure he’s all right. After all, he’s tried to kill himself once. I’d suspect he might try again. In fact, you might want to go see if he’s on the bridge over the Chippewa.” Then the sheriff shook his head. “Although I don’t think it’s high enough to kill anybody if they went off of it. Who knows what he might try to do? I’d sure feel better if he was back here in our custody.”
“Where would you suggest we start?” Bill held the door open for the sheriff who thanked him and walked through it.
“Geez, Chet could be anywhere.” The sheriff thought about it for a moment, then continued, “If he makes his way over to the Tiffany Bottoms along the river, we’d never find him if he didn’t want us to. In this warm weather he could stay out for weeks. Chet knows all this land around here like the back of his hand. He’s hunted just about every square inch of it. And hunter that he is, he can live off the land for as long as he needs to.”
“He’s been gone about a half an hour.” Bill looked at his watch. “Might not be in the best shape of his life after what he did to himself. I’m thinking we form a circle about four miles out from Durand and try to catch him that way.”
“Wait a second here. First of all, I’d check a few places in town. Just to see if anyone has seen him. Don’t go skipping over the easy stuff. Let’s talk to Claire before we go off half-cocked.”
“Gotcha.”
“Now if he’s serious about this—if he really wants to go disappear—it’s not going to be easy to find him. He won’t be on the roads or anything. He’ll cut right through the woods. He can swim the Chippewa for that matter.”
“How many deputies can I have to do this?”
“Why don’t you take Frank, Red and Amy?”
“Frank and Amy took Claire to emergency.”
“Well, they’ll be back soon enough. Oh, in the meantime, why don’t you take Jeremy?”
“Jeremy? He doesn’t know his ass from a hole in the ground.”
The sheriff shot him a look. “That’s why this would be good for him, Bill. In fact, I’d like to see you take him under your wing. Teach him some of your good-old expertise.”
Bill knew he should have kept his mouth shut.
“We don’t need to go crazy, but try to find Chet.” The sheriff leaned against the wall right outside his office and shook his head. “This isn’t looking good for him, this running away.”
* * *
Rich stretched out on the twin bed in the cabin and stared at the beadboard ceiling. How had he gotten here? Hard to backtrack and go home again after all he had said to Claire. Not that she made any big plea for him not to leave her, but she had tried to explain why she had waited to tell him about Chet.
His thoughts kept returning to Chet and Anne. Anne dead and Chet trying to kill himself. What had gone so very wrong? Rich hadn’t seen Chet much lately, just the time of year, so much to do at the end of summer. Haying, getting the pheasants ready for market, harvesting the gardens.
The last time they had been together was down at the Fort. About a month or so ago, Chet had called him up and asked if he wanted to go have a beer or two and shoot some pool. They had played a few games, drank a couple brews, then sat and talked for a bit afterwards.
He didn’t remember much of what they talked about, the usual—weather, crops, animals—but just as they were leaving, Chet had turned to him and said, “So how are things with you and Claire?”
The question had surprised him. They didn’t tend to talk about their relationships. Rich had said fine.
Chet had taken a swig off his beer bottle, then asked, “You guys still getting some exercise in the sack?”
What a weird way to ask if they were having regular sex, Rich had thought at the time, plus, none of your business. He had nodded noncommittally.
“We’ve slacked off,” Chet said.
Rich had mumbled something about getting older, these
things happen. Then he had asked Chet if he’d been doing any fishing.
Now he wished he had not changed the subject, but had asked Chet what was going on with them. The one thing he did know about his friend was how important the physical side of love was to him. Before Chet married Anne, he had had a number of woman friends, even some coming down from the Cities. He would mention from time to time how good they were in bed, not going into any gory detail, but letting Rich know that he was a satisfied man.
Rich wondered, as he had constantly for the last two days, what had happened the night Anne died, if it had had anything to do with the slacking off of sex between them. He just couldn’t imagine Chet going to that length to get rid of her.
If she hadn’t killed herself then it had to have been Chet who shot her. Rich supposed there was a possibility that someone had come over to the farm while Chet went for his walk and shot Anne and then Chet returned and thought she had killed herself. But not likely.
Trying to understand what happened to Chet and Anne—if their relationship could have gone so very wrong—Rich couldn’t help but think about Claire. He knew it was to be expected that the sex thing died down a little, and actually that wasn’t a big problem for him. They connected often enough for him to remember how intense it had once been. A mellower, gentler love-making suited him just fine.
What rubbed him the wrong way with Claire was that he felt taken for granted. Much of what he had admired about Claire when they first met had started to wear thin: how focused
she was on her work, her need to always be right, the way she had to be in charge. Claire wasn’t like that in bed—not that she was submissive, but she let him call the shots whenever he wanted to. Maybe that was what was important.
Just thinking about her in bed made him think it was time to head back home, at least for a night or two.
From his vantage point on the bed, Rich could see under the footstool on the opposite side of the small room. There was what looked like a crumpled Kleenex in the shadows.
Rich got off the bed and reached down to see what it was.
He was so shocked by what he found in his hand that he threw it back on the floor and said, “Goddamn, Chet! What were you thinking?”
Inside the Kleenex was a condom that had obviously been used.
D
urand was located about sixteen miles upriver from the mouth of the Chippewa River, at the point where it turned and headed south toward the Mississippi River. Chet stood in the shadow of a brick building just south of the Highway 10 bridge, facing the river. He needed to take a breather before his next move, which would be to cross the river.
A few cars were parked along the back street. Chet sank down in the shade of a big oak tree close to the river. He knew they would be looking for him. Claire hadn’t followed him across the highway, he figured she had gone back for reinforcements. He hoped she hadn’t been too hurt when she fell. What had he started? But he needed to get away from everyone and figure out what he was going to do.