Riverwatcher Read online

  “Lord,” Mercy said, “so am I.”

  They were silent inside the Cherokee, watching the slow slide of the river beyond, before Fitzgerald said, “Couldn’t you take the rest of the day off? We could drive somewhere. Over to Traverse City, check out the bookstore, maybe just park and look at the bay. Do something.”

  Mercy shook her head. “I didn’t answer you before. Stroud’s got Rainbow Run closed off, nobody in or out. He had me tell the host couple, letting them know the DNR and his office are together on this. Billie Berry was still too torn up to talk, so I’m going back out this afternoon. In the meantime, Stroud is checking all the campers. They’re all suspects because of proximity. Then I suppose he’ll try to find anyone who might have seen Charlie on the river last night.”

  “Was he fishing last night?”

  “Surprising if he wasn’t. After that he’ll have to look into Charlie’s past—family problems, that sort of thing. It was odd when Stroud told me that, how he’d have to check out the past. I never thought of Charlie having any other life than up here. I don’t know a thing about it. I mean, was he married? Are there children? All I know is he lived in Big Rapids.”

  “He was married,” Fitzgerald said. “He mentioned his wife now and then.”

  “Children?”

  Fitzgerald shrugged.

  “So Stroud’s starting with the campground. That’s where you come in.”

  “Me?”

  “The tourism people in Lansing will be worried witless that citizens won’t think Michigan campgrounds are safe. So I told Stroud we should get out a statement saying this is a one-in-a-million thing. Then we should probably hold a news conference, making the same point. Maybe you could help us some.”

  “Stroud agrees?”

  “He said he’d think about it. But he’ll agree once he starts hearing from downstate. Murder in a state forest campground is serious business.”

  “Charlie’s murder is.”

  “Of course. But I have a job to do, and one side of it—like it or not—is PR.”

  “You know I’ll help in any way I can.”

  “This started out to be such a nice day,” Mercy said after a moment, “I wished I could be out fishing. Now look what’s happened.”

  “When I stopped at the bakery, Bonnie said it makes you think.”

  “Oh, no, Fitzgerald,” Mercy said. “Don’t start on that.”

  5

  THE BIG BROWN’S hiding spot was a wonder of the river that most people, slipping past in a canoe or even wading that stretch of water, never noticed. You had to take your time, search every piece of the bank with your casts before you noticed.

  Calvin couldn’t remember when he had first noticed, but he remembered vividly the first time the big brown came out of the hiding spot and smacked his streamer. He had held his breath as if that would keep the fish from breaking off the tippet or throwing the hook. He wanted to see that fish. When he finally got it to the net, he measured with the span of his thumb and little finger doubled, calculating eighteen inches, and when he cupped a hand under the belly, it felt solid as a log.

  He remembered releasing the fish, feeling the electric movement as it shot from his hand, imagining the return to its hiding spot. The fish would sink deep in the current, hold there, aware of the hurt where the hook had pierced its jaw, realizing . . . Realizing what? That it had made a mistake yet lived to feed another day? Another wonder was that you could catch fish through the years, hold them in your hands, yet draw a total blank when it came to knowing anything of their world.

  “See it?” he said to Gwendolyn Underwood and pointed with the tip of his rod. “The spot cut into the bank? Tell me what you notice.”

  “It’s small.”

  “That’s part of it. The cut’s maybe three feet across. What else?”

  “The current swirls around.”

  “It’s an eddy. So what would happen if you dropped a dry fly in there?”

  “It would go in circles.”

  “Like in a whirlpool, right. So how about a wet one?”

  “You’d get tangled. There’s branches or something in there. You can see just in front of the cut.”

  “So you’ve got a three-foot cut with the current rotating and the whole thing fenced off beneath the surface with woody debris. And inside there, snug as a bug, is a fat brown trout. What’s your strategy?”

  Gwendolyn looked at him with large dark eyes. “Fish somewhere else?”

  “That’s not a strategy. The brown’s got to eat, and he’s not getting enough holed up in there. He’s got to come out, but he’s not going to risk that in daylight. It’s daylight now, and we want to hook him. So what do we do?”

  “What you said before? Try a Woolly Bugger?”

  Calvin nodded. “All you can do. Bugger with no added weight. Cast up tight to the woody debris, real tight, see if you can tempt him to eat the fly. Get the right angle so the fly swims the length of the wood.”

  “It’s only three feet.”

  “All you need. And luck.”

  “I’ll try,” Gwendolyn said, and lifted her rod for a backcast.

  “One other thing. You get too close to the wood or get too deep, find yourself hung up, you’ll have to break off. The water between here and there is over our waders.”

  “Oh, swell.”

  “Makes it interesting,” Calvin said, “problems like that.”

  *  *  *

  “GO TELL HIM,” Verlyn said.

  “He’s downriver with Gwendolyn Underwood.”

  “I know where he is. Put on waders, go tell him. I don’t want him hearing from somebody else.”

  “How’s he going to hear when he’s on the river?”

  “Dammit,” Verlyn said. “Tell him.”

  Kit shrugged. Whatever Verlyn was doing in town every morning, running off in a rush, was working. He came back in a better mood and picked up where he’d left off in the fly shop, running the cash register and chatting up the customers. This morning was like that until one of Willard Stroud’s deputies came in the shop and explained why, earlier, an ambulance had roared past on the bridge road. An old guy who camped all summer at Rainbow Run had been shot to death through the tent wall while he was inside for the night.

  Kit knew him, Charlie Orr. You couldn’t be around the river any amount of time and not know. He came in the shop now and then, but he wasn’t a big spender, a few spools of tippet material being about all, and he didn’t hang around half the day swapping lies with the guides. Kit didn’t pay much attention to him. Now and then he saw Charlie Orr fishing on the river, the South Branch ordinarily and usually when it was getting dark, and nodded in recognition, but that was the extent of it. What was there to talk about with an old guy like that?

  Verlyn and Calvin seemed to find plenty, which probably showed they were getting old themselves. Kit knew they fished with Charlie Orr some nights, and some nights they went to his camp and sat around, telling fish stories. So it was understandable that Verlyn would be interested when the deputy told what had happened at Rainbow Run, but it didn’t follow that he would be all worked up. It was like Charlie Orr’s death was a death in the family.

  Since he was first with the news, the deputy was full of himself and inched out the story, Verlyn locked in on every word. When the deputy mentioned that Willard Stroud had called Mercy Virdon out to the campground, you could tell Verlyn meant to call her himself, getting more dope on what had happened. Verlyn told the deputy a reward should be offered to help get Charlie Orr’s killer, but the deputy said it was too early in the investigation for something like that. For all he knew, the sheriff might have pinpointed the killer already. Verlyn seemed to think that unlikely, which figured since he had a low opinion of Stroud’s ability and said that Charlie’s friends on the river would put up the money for the reward if the sheriff didn’t have the killer within twenty-four hours.

  “Dead or alive,” Verlyn said. “That kind of reward.”
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br />   It was after the deputy left the shop that Verlyn told Kit to get on waders and go downriver and let Calvin know about Charlie Orr. “He’ll want to quit fishing,” Verlyn added as Kit was heading out the door. “He’ll want to come back here.”

  “What for?”

  Verlyn ignored him. “Stroud’s a waste of time. Tell Calvin we’ll get together with Mercy. She’ll know what’s up.”

  “The guy’s dead,” Kit said. “There’s nothing you and Calvin can do.”

  “Get your rear in gear.”

  “Okay,” Kit said, “but what about Gwendolyn if Calvin wants to come back here?”

  “Fish with her.”

  “Take over for Calvin, you mean?” Kit cocked his head and gave Verlyn a sly smile. But Verlyn didn’t seem to notice. Whatever feeling had been stirred up by the presence at the Kabin Kamp of Gwendolyn Underwood had been overridden by the news of Charlie Orr’s death.

  *  *  *

  CALVIN WASN’T WHERE he was supposed to be, downstream between the lodge and the canoe landing. He had taken Gwendolyn farther down, beyond a tight bend in the river, ignoring Verlyn’s instructions.

  That was among the things Kit liked about Calvin. Technically speaking, Verlyn was Calvin’s boss since he assigned the guides from the fly shop and guiding was how Calvin made his living, but that didn’t stop Calvin from doing what he felt like doing. Calvin wasn’t anybody’s peon. He was the only one around, in fact, Mercy excepted, who gave Verlyn the needle now and then. As far as Calvin was concerned, Verlyn was just someone he had been around since they were both kids growing up in the north woods.

  Kit waded down the center of the river, moving quickly along the level bottom while out of habit checking trout cover along the banks. If he had known Calvin and Gwendolyn were so far down, he would have taken a canoe, though there would be a problem hauling it back upstream. Kit knew some portage routes overland to the Kabin Kamp, but they led through private property, and Verlyn was a stickler for respecting property rights along the river. Calvin wasn’t, which was another reason Kit liked him.

  All property along the river, Calvin maintained, ought to be public. Kit pointed out that Calvin’s cabin was on the South Branch of the river, but Calvin said he would put his money where his mouth was. He would turn over his property to the state the minute Verlyn turned over the Kabin Kamp. The two properties weren’t of equal value, and Kit considered his own future wrapped up in the future of the Kabin Kamp, but he favored open access to the river anyway. He followed Calvin’s example and tore down every no-trespassing sign he ran into.

  Ahead he spotted Calvin and Gwendolyn, the two of them facing the bank just below a stretch of riffle water. Gwendolyn was casting, and Calvin was beside her, looking twice her size and pointing to where she should drop the fly. Gwendolyn kept shaking her head from side to side, giving the impression she couldn’t get it right, but she kept on casting to where Calvin was pointing. When Kit got closer, he decided to call out, not wanting to come up behind the two of them without warning.

  “Hey, Calvin.”

  The big Stetson swiveled around, ponytail swinging beneath, and Calvin lifted his sunglasses so he could see better. When he noticed who it was, he called back, “Hey, Kit,” and turned to face the spot where Gwendolyn was casting. When Kit came up beside him, Calvin said, “Stay put. Gwen’s got a fish in there.”

  Gwen? Kit looked at him but Calvin was intent on where Gwendolyn was placing her fly. “What fish?”

  “Big brown. He holds in that little cut. I’ve got him a couple times.”

  Kit watched Gwendolyn make a few more casts, decided she was wasting her time as far as hooking any big brown went. “Listen,” he said to Calvin, “I’ve got something to tell you.”

  “How come you’re not fishing?”

  “I didn’t come down to fish.”

  “You’ve got a rod.”

  “Listen,” Kit said. “Verlyn sent me.”

  Calvin probably thought that meant Verlyn was checking up on him. He didn’t shift his eyes from the bank. “You hear the siren before?” Kit said. “He wanted you to know what happened. Charlie Orr got killed.”

  Calvin turned his head slowly, and Kit could feel his eyes behind the sunglasses looking back. “The ambulance was going to Rainbow Run, but it was too late. Charlie was dead already. Somebody last night blasted a shotgun through his tent while he was in there.”

  Calvin said evenly, “How do you know?”

  “One of Stroud’s deputies stopped at the shop, told Verlyn. Verlyn said to come down, tell you.”

  “Zack Cox?”

  “What?”

  “Which deputy stopped?”

  “I don’t know his name. It wasn’t Zack. The older one—beard, big belly, out of shape. What’s it matter?”

  “It doesn’t,” Calvin said.

  “Stroud had Mercy out to the campground. Verlyn said you two could talk to her. She’ll know more.”

  “That’s good.”

  “You want to head on in,” Kit said, “it’s okay. I’ll fish with Gwendolyn a while, bring her back to the lodge.”

  Calvin nodded. He started moving downstream, circling around the area where Gwendolyn was fishing, heading toward the bank. He meant to go the quick way, overland, through private property. Halfway to the bank, he stopped and looked back at Kit.

  “They know who did it?”

  Kit shook his head. “Stroud’s working on it. Verlyn said something about getting up a reward.”

  “That’s good.”

  “For the killer dead or alive.”

  “Preferably dead,” Calvin said. “Save the state the cost of housing the creep.”

  *  *  *

  KIT WATCHED UNTIL Calvin stepped out of the river and moved into a wall of pine. He turned to Gwendolyn, looking back at him with wide eyes beneath a long-billed blue cap. “Bad news, huh?”

  “He’s an old guy who spends all summer at the campground at Rainbow Run. He’s been doing it for years. All the fishermen know him.” He stopped and corrected himself. “Knew him.”

  “To get shot at night inside your tent. That’s horrible.”

  “There are a lot of nut cases around, even up here. You never know when you’ll cross paths.” It seemed a worldly-wise thing to say, but Kit didn’t like the sound of the words when they came out of his mouth. He sounded like an older brother instructing a kid sister. He glanced quickly at Gwendolyn. She wasn’t that much of a kid.

  “You knew him, too?”

  “Not as much as Verlyn and Calvin. They fished with him at night over on the South Branch and hung around his camp. Mercy, too.”

  “Who’s Mercy?”

  “My mom. She runs the DNR field office in town. She fishes a lot, too.”

  Kit could feel Gwendolyn looking at him, her head tilted to the side. “I don’t have things straight, I guess. I know Verlyn’s your dad. But he’s married to Jan.”

  “Before,” Kit explained, “he was married to Mercy. Now Mercy’s living with a guy in a big place just up from the bridge, other side of the river. He’s a newspaperman who won a state lottery.”

  “Wow,” Gwendolyn said.

  “I don’t live with either Mercy or Verlyn. I’m on my own since I dropped out of college. Verlyn lets me use one of the back rooms of the lodge. That’s because Mercy got on his case. Before that I camped at Danish Landing.”

  “Wow,” Gwendolyn said again.

  “It was a good place to camp, good fishing along there, but Mercy got uptight about it, my being alone. I wouldn’t mind going back, matter of fact, but now Mercy will really be uptight.”

  “Because of the dead man?”

  “Things happen. You can’t live your life worrying about everything that might.” Kit stopped himself. He realized he was contradicting himself as far as worldly-wise instruction went. “You want to catch some fish,” he said, “let’s go downstream a little more. There’s a place you can hook some brook trout.
They aren’t big—maybe eight inchers—but brookies are neat.”

  Gwendolyn pointed with her rod to the cut where she had been casting. “Calvin said the brown in there is a monster.”

  “Yeah, well, that’s Calvin. He’s got hiding places like that up and down the river. Half of them, you want to know, are probably in his imagination. The other half only he can figure out how to hook the fish.” When Kit glanced at her again, seeing how she had taken the remark, he found Gwendolyn smiling at him. “He’s a good guy, though. Best guide on the river.”

  Gwendolyn kept smiling at him, which was puzzling. He didn’t know how to take it. Was she agreeing with him or making fun of him or what? He tried to figure out the meaning by saying, “We could go back to the lodge, you’d rather.”

  “I’d rather fish for brookies,” Gwendolyn said.

  “It’s a long walk back up,” Kit said, still not sure, “wading against the current.”

  “I don’t mind.”

  “Or we could take a shortcut through the woods, cutting across some private property. We could do that if you wouldn’t let on to Verlyn. He’s got a thing about private property.”

  Gwendolyn didn’t hesitate, which caused Kit to smile back at her. “Let’s catch some brookies,” she said, “take the shortcut back.”

  6

  WHEN MERCY VIRDON arrived, Billie Berry told Burt he wouldn’t need to stay at her side. He could wait outside, getting himself some fresh air. Mercy said that wasn’t necessary, that he could be present while they talked, but Billie said Burt had been cooped up with her in the fifth-wheeler, comforting her, ever since she had discovered the Odd Fellow.

  “I’m better now,” Billie said the moment the door closed behind Burt.

  “Are you really?” Mercy asked her.

  “When you came before, I felt so—”

  “Of course you did.” Mercy had taken both her hands, was peering into her eyes. Billie had to steel herself inside to prevent tears from welling up once again. “It was horrible for you finding Charlie that way.”

  Billie waited until Mercy released her hands. She asked then if Mercy would like something, iced tea or lemonade, and Mercy said no, she wouldn’t be staying long.