An Eye for Gold Read online

  “Then that’s that. But would you mind telling me what Gretchen MacCallum said?”

  “God damn it, I—”

  “Sorry.”

  “Of course I’ll tell you. I just—”

  Tom fell silent.

  After a moment—in which I reminded myself that I was standing at a pay phone in a public place, surrounded by normal citizens on foot and in cars who were enjoying the sunshine like nothing was totally wrong and confusing—I said, “Listen, it’s not that I’m disinterested in this case, it’s that I don’t like being manipulated into pursuing it. If you’ll be direct with me, I’ll help you where I can. But I am not looking for a job with the FBI, and that’s final.”

  Tom said nothing for a moment, then, “That’s reasonable. What do you need to know in order to help?”

  ‘Tom,” I said, my voice rising again, “you’re still hiding behind words. Cut the shit!”

  He sighed with exasperation. “I repeat my question. What do you need to know?”

  Now that he seemed willing to talk, I had no idea what to ask him. That gave me a nasty sense of déjà vu, like I was back in that restaurant where he had first launched this whole business on me and I was wondering what was hitting me. Which brought to mind the couple that had sat at the next table, and all Tom’s nonsense about asking what the relationship was between them. Intent on throwing that pie back into his face, I said, “So tell me who the people at the next table were, and how they bear on the case.”

  Tom didn’t say anything for quite a while. Then he said, ‘I’m not sure. The father, Morgan Shumway, is a lawyer. The daughter is dating Roderick Chittenden.”

  Now I was silent for a moment “What kind of lawyer?”

  “Environmental.”

  “Nice way to piss Daddy off. Date a land raper.”

  “One would think.”

  I let all this sink in, but it didn’t form a picture for me. Finally, I said, “Gretchen MacCallum said she’s not worried about her husband because he wanders off with fair frequency. She says he told her that Pat Gilmore confided in him that Rodriguez—or I have to presume it was him, Gretchen didn’t know—was trying to smear her, and she was gathering data so she could expose him. ‘Blow the whistle’ is the phrase Gretchen used. Pat Gilmore referred to him as ‘another guy on the team.’ And she says MacCallum didn’t like Stephen Giles any more than I did.

  “Gretchen also said that a couple years ago MacCallum’s Granville stock position was worth two million, but today half that, but that it was no big deal. She’s a nice lady. Smart Self-assured. MacCallum seems nice, too, judging from his workspace and from the woman who loves him, but—” I paused, trying to decide whether I should share my suspicions. V-lie likes expensive wines, and drinks too much when he hasn’t got anything happening. They live modestly. They have two kids and a dog. I like her coffee mugs. That’s about it”

  “So she doesn’t sound concerned.”

  “No, not at all.”

  “And you read her for a straight arrow.”

  “Unusual, yes. Bent, no.”

  “Can you think of anything else?”

  “No,” I said, still uncertain of what I thought of Don MacCallum.

  “Nice work. Thanks.”

  “You’re welcome.”

  “Okay. Give me a call if you think of anything you forgot”

  I stared into the phone a while longer, as if it were supposed to cough out some kind of token of the effort I had just made, but I couldn’t figure out what button to push, or for that matter how I’d wound up in a token booth. “Okay.”

  “Bye.”

  “Bye.”

  The line went dead. I hung it up, and only then realized that I had begun to tremble with excitement

  As LUCK WOULD finally have it, my truck was waiting for me, its brakes once again roadworthy. I paid for the repair, but before I drove to Ava’s house to get cleaned up for my dancing date with Ray, I sat a while and thought. It felt good to be back behind the wheel of my old friend, and at that moment, I needed all the good feelings I could get. That truck was suddenly my oasis of familiarity in a world that was not quite making sense. I had told Tom off, just as I had been planning all the way back from Denver, and yet wanted to phone him back immediately and ask him what the situation in Nevada was all about. Similarly, I was looking forward to my date with Ray, and yet had a sickening feeling that the evening would end with a fight. It was safest to just stay in that truck, and I knew it.

  Presently, I switched on the ignition and began the drive to Ava’s house, already stiffening against any comments she might make which would be designed to pry out of me where I’d been that day and with whom. She was for the most part a very reasonable person who did not stick her nose in where it was not wanted, but I was, after all, a guest in her home, and a non-Mormon in whom her devoutly Mormon son was interested. I was sure I gave her the willies.

  Further luck was with me, and Ava was not home. I let myself in with the key she had lent me and headed upstairs to take a shower. I scrubbed my hair and did my best at blow-drying it into some semblance of a style, then reached into the closet for the one item of clothing I had brought along which might be described as a dress. It was in fact a blouse and skirt, made of rayon, so it hung pretty nicely around my so-so figure. I brushed my hair up to a high gloss, and was even thinking of digging the one tube of lipstick I owned out of the bottom of my toilet kit when I got to looking at the framed photographs of Ava’s daughters which graced the walls of the room. Every girl over fifteen was wearing lipstick. They were gorgeous, each one of them, to the bone, but the cosmetics made them look not just pretty, but also . . . I struggled for a word, and then it struck me. They looked compliant. Or at least, that was how they looked to good ol’ Em, the dog peeking in from outside the fence.

  I left the war paint where it lay and went downstairs to wait for Ray, wondering what I thought I was doing in a skirt.

  IT WAS THE first time I had been entirely alone in Ava’s house, so I indulged in a little wandering around and looking at things. I won’t call it snooping—I opened no closed drawers or doors, and I lifted no papers to look underneath—but it was definitely an inspection. Everywhere, I found photo-graphs and other mementos of happy family events. Sadness began to well up inside of me. I had no such events to re-member.

  I let myself into the backyard and sat down on a bench and had a small, quiet cry. As I was growing up on my parents’ ranch in Wyoming, I had dreamt of being part of a bigger, happier family, but now that I was being included in one, I felt isolated and alone. The feeling made little sense to me. Certainly, I took issue with the price of being part of that family—giving up my beliefs, at least nominally, and giving up my status as an independent, solo entity—but that wasn’t all of it. As the tears flowed, I realized that, at the pit of my being, I feared that I could not receive the bounty of belonging and togetherness they offered, and I could not understand why.

  As the minutes ticked by, I watched the sun dip toward the western horizon, toward Nevada and all of its open loneliness. I wondered why I felt so much more at home in the emptiness of an arid landscape than chin deep in the comforts of a true family. I liked some of Ray’s relatives more than others, but that was to be expected. And they seemed willing to receive me simply because I was important to Ray. But I was not one of them, and would never be. I began to berate myself, telling myself that I was only putting off the split that had to come between myself and Ray and his big, close family. I decided that I had to be pretty callous to take a sip of their happiness, knowing that I was almost certain to walk away. I asked myself, What business do I have visiting here, soaking up their kindness, when I know I can’t be one of them? I hung my head, contemplating my selfishness. I felt a pervasive sense of shame.

  I heard Ray let himself in through the front door and move through the house, his rhythmic, catlike stride clicking off the front hall tiles, then muffled on the carpeting, and finally sounding
on the concrete walkway outside the sliding door I had left ajar. When he saw me, he moved quickly to my side, put a hand on my shoulder, and asked softly, “What?”

  I rubbed the tears from my eyes. “Oh, nothing. Just trying to sort myself out.”

  Ray came around in front of me and took my hands and guided me up into his arms and kissed me, long and gently, then tucked my face into the warm place beside his throat and held me.

  In spite of my guilt, I felt safe. “I’m sorry,” I said. “This was supposed to be a happy evening.”

  ‘Tears first, then dancing,” he murmured. “No hurry. You look wonderful.”

  I tightened my arms around him and drank up his kindness. It was perhaps five minutes before I came back to the surface of the world and began to feel uncomfortable that at any moment Ava might return and see us embracing in her garden. “I’m ready,” I said, giving him another kiss on the neck. “Let’s go.”

  RAY TOOK ME to a place called the Manhattan Club and taught me some of the finer points of swing dancing. Gliding across the floor with him was a delight, or as close to being totally delighted as I’ve ever experienced while dancing. Much as I like dancing, I’ve always thought myself a no-talent But Ray was a strong and dependable lead, and he quickly taught me to balance myself better and move more smoothly through a number of steps. For the first time, I really understood how to place my feet so that he could guide and spin me, and when to brace myself so that he could pivot around me. I must say also that it was a feast to spend that much time touching him, woman to man, seduction being one of many things that dancing was invented to communicate. During the slow dances, I moved right up close to him, and let him feel my hips move against him, and was pleased to feel him respond with even more sensual movements. He was strong enough and had such exquisite balance that he could lift me and roll me across one thigh like I’d seen professional ballroom dancers on TV do. It was really fun, and the whole experience had me in something of a lather by the time he gave my hand a tug and led me toward the door, the parking lot, and what I presumed would be the drive straight home to Mama’s.

  But Ray did not drive me back to his mother’s house. Instead, he took me up the hill to the mouth of Emigration Canyon, from which we could enjoy a view of the city lights. “Donner Park?” I asked, noticing a sign. “You mean, as in the ill-fated Donner party, of what’s-eating-you fame?”

  Ray gave me a dour look and kept on driving to the opposite side of the canyon, to the This Is the Place State Park, the place where Brigham Young first viewed the Salt Lake valley with his emigrant Mormon faithful. He parked the car and came around and opened my door and took my hand, silently inviting me to take a walk

  We ambled along for a while, his arm tightly around my shoulders, until we came to a flat rock that formed a rustic bench. He settled me on it. Then he went down on one knee, looked deep into my eyes, and said, “Emily Hansen, will you be my wife?”

  My jaw about hit my knees.

  He waited.

  I gasped for air.

  He began to look a bit frantic. “Well, will you think about it?”

  “Oh. Ah. Sure, I’ll . . . think about it.”

  “What did you think I had in mind?” he asked heatedly, but then he put a hand out to indicate that he wanted to take that question back, and said, “I’m sorry,” and hung his head.

  I took his chin in my hand and lifted it. “Don’t be.” For once, I was the one who was short on words.

  He stared up into my eyes, his own filled with hope and worry and unasked questions.

  I wanted to kiss him, but couldn’t. I was too scared. Finally, I found my voice, and blurted, “I’m supposing that being your wife means the whole bit, doesn’t it?”

  “Bit?”

  Now we were back on familiar ground, where I prattled away like I had verbal diarrhea and he answered in monosyllables. “Well, I mean, you bring me up to this park. It’s like you want the whole thing: wife, children, church. And probably not in that order. Like I’d have to give up birth control, for heaven’s sake, and have a dozen kids, and this is coming out all wrong.”

  “Yes.”

  “Yes, the church? Or yes, it’s coming out all wrong?”

  He opened his palms upward. “Yes. Church.” As in, what were you thinking?

  “No.”

  “No?”

  “No . . . I mean, I’m not sure. I mean, Ray, I know so little about—I mean, damn it! Ray! So that’s the deal? I give up my world, my profession, my . . . life as I know it for yours, right?”

  Ray’s eyes had grown dark with anger. This was the fight I had been avoiding, and the look in his eyes was why. But then suddenly he closed them, and I felt alone and scared in a different way. I wasn’t sure I could breathe.

  A long while afterward, his lips moved again, and he said, “Please consider it,” and fell silent. Only then did I realize that he held a ring of gold in his strong, elegant fingers, ready to slip it into place on my hand, the better to anchor his life to mine.

  23

  AFTER A FEW FRACTURED HOURS OF SLEEP, I GAVE up on lying with my eyes closed and got up to pace around the thick, sumptuous carpeting in Ava’s guest room. At about four A.M., I dressed and drove out across the sleeping city in search of a cup of coffee and a place to walk, or even run. Some time after daybreak I found myself well north of Salt Lake City on the causeway that leads out to Antelope Island.

  Antelope Island is a state park and nature preserve formed by a bald, rocky mountain range that rises from Great Salt Lake. It had just the brand of loneliness I needed: just me, a few thousand shore birds, and a long view to the west. The six-mile-long causeway cuts out across the lake about a half-hour’s drive north of Salt Lake City, and leads past rafts of grebes and bobbing gulls. When the kiosk opened, I paid my admission fee, parked the truck, clambered over a crude trail that led to the northern tip of the island, and stared out across the early-morning stillness of the lake, which is famous for its high salinity. There is no outlet; all waters that flow in from the surrounding highlands stay put until they evaporate in the desert heat, leaving behind salts in concentrations far exceeding that of sea water.

  I looked out across the emptiness toward the west. The Great Basin. Salt Lake City crouched at the eastern edge, and Reno waited at the west. What had Peggy said about the western spoke of the medicine wheel? That it represented the bear, or Introspection? She was right, I seemed to have the temperament of a bear. Perhaps the Great Basin was a place where there was ample room for me to wander until the wheel brought me around again to my senses.

  From the point, I found my way south along the western edge of the island, from which I could look out across thirty miles of hypersaline water to the far edge of the lake. I walked along the shore to a thin meadow in die desert scrub. The wide trail that had been formed by the tramplings of human feet was cross-cut every few feet by much subtler pathways formed by much smaller animals, mostly rodents. Here, a very narrow one led to a burrow; there, several small ones coalesced into a rodent super-highway that was still a faint trace next to the one obvious enough for humans to follow.

  I sipped the last dregs of the coffee I had bought, stuffed the cardboard cup into my back pocket, and stepped down onto a sandy beach. I would have taken off my shoes and enjoyed the feeling of the sand between my toes, but there was a haze of flies dining on a paste of dead critters along the strand. Wondering what they were, I crouched down and picked up a handful, and fished into my jacket pocket for my hand lens.

  Ten-power magnification told me I was looking at two very lovely things. The first was oolitic sand, which is composed of tiny crystals of aragonite rolled up into minute balls. The chemical is precipitated from the hypersaline waters of the lake, and the waves roll it into concentric shells, like so many pale seeds. I had seen oolite samples in my freshman Geology lab at college. Geology students find them cosmic, because they’re so nearly perfectly spherical.

  The other thing I saw
was the remains of a few thousand tiny brine shrimp. I pulled the U.S. Geological Survey flyer I had gotten at the entrance booth out of my other pocket and fell peacefully into several long, semiconscious minutes of self-education. The flier informed me that the lake is too salty for larger organisms, such as fish, but that the ghostly brine shrimp, bacteria, and algae make up a rich ecosystem. The shrimp population overwinters as eggs and dormant embryos. As warming waters bring a late-winter algal bloom, the little critters hatch out and begin to meet, greet, lay eggs, and crank out a series of short-lived generations of the minute swimmies. By late May, the shrimp have grazed the algae to a nub, and they gradually die off until December, when water temperatures drop below the point that will sustain the adults. They then die, leaving just eggs and cystose embryos until the water warms again in March.

  Hence, the paste of dead shrimp carpeting the beach. Just another example of the balance of nature: Times are good, you live; times aren’t favorable, you die.

  I thought ruefully that there were hundreds of thousands of very successfully breeding humans living on the shores of this lake, and I couldn’t seem to join their numbers. Mixing my metaphors, I wondered if it was because I couldn’t stand to roll around under the pressure of the currents and become perfectly round and smooth with all the other little grains.

  I lifted my gaze to the far shore again, longing for the emptiness and privacy I had seen two days earlier in Nevada.

  I PHONED RAY from Ava’s house, catching him on his lunch break. Ava stood in the doorway listening, so I kept it brief. “Ray. I’m going to Nevada for a few days, so I can think things over. I’ll be back.” It was the best I could do, balancing forthrightness with an overwhelming need to protect myself from the loss I already felt.

  On the other end of the line, Ray said merely, “Oh.”

  “I’ll, urn, call,” I said, feeling guiltily that I should add something. Like perhaps an explanation or an apology for my chicken-heartedness.