Earth Colors Read online

  “The one and only.”

  “Then, um, can you tell me something about him?”

  “Miss Hansen, you are asking me to air the family laundry.”

  “I don’t know. Am I?”

  “Listen, dear lady, I may be the black sheep, but I know which side of the bread gets buttered. And other metaphors as appropriate. I have a devil of a headache, and I should get off the phone before I make a worse ass of myself.”

  “Is he … Would he be a good friend to Faye? Does he treat women nicely?”

  “Oh no … so that’s happening, is it? Well, Miss Hansen, my brother is an unusual person. I cannot say that I approve of him in every way. We are siblings, and siblings are known to have their differences. Tert is an accomplished businessman, respected by his peers. He has never married, perhaps because he has trouble showing a woman half as much attention as he shows to his own image in the mirror. But they said that about Narcissus, too, and his name is still on the lips of the well-to-do and erudite. He doesn’t beat women or stand them up on dates, to my knowledge, if that’s what you’re asking.”

  “Thanks. That helps, I suppose.” I fished around for something short of his favorite shot of whiskey that would get him to open up a bit more. “The other night you said something about concern for your mother’s health. Is everything okay?”

  This prompted a lengthy silence, then, broodingly, “I was probably just raving.”

  “Can I ask about the painting?”

  “What painting.” It was not a question, it was an answer.

  Now I paused. I had already skated too close to breaking Tert’s confidence, and while I had no interest in working with him myself, I did not want it on my conscience that I had ruined a deal for Faye. “I’m interested in … your family’s artworks.”

  “Are you an art historian?”

  “No.”

  “Conservator?”

  “No.”

  Irritably he said, “Well, what, then? Private investigator?” He meant it to be an insulting joke.

  “No,” I said stiffly. “But you’re not far off. I am a forensic geologist.”

  “What’s that?” he said, mocking me.

  I was so annoyed at his tone that I said, “I work with trace evidence. In the case of a painting, I can perhaps discover whether the minerals used in the paint pigments are what the artist would have used. I can—”

  Hector’s response was swift. “I do not recommend you do that, Miss Hansen!”

  “I—I didn’t mean … Hey, listen, I’m just Faye’s friend. I’m trying to understand what she’s gotten herself mixed up in, you get me?”

  “Look, if you ever get to Pennsylvania, look me up. We’ll have some drinks and some laughs. I’ll tell you the story of a family that used to be more than it is today, and we can all look out over Lancaster County and sigh. But I really can’t say anything else that would help you.”

  I let him go and broke the connection. But I copied down the phone number, just in case, putting it with my own papers.

  Then I sat staring at the phone. I did not like what was happening. Faye had been through a lot in the last year and a half. She’d dealt with an accidental pregnancy, a sudden marriage, the loss of her trust fund, widowhood, and the adjustment to motherhood. She had gone from being a highly attractive, single, wealthy, independent woman who had the world by the tail to a highly attractive, highly obligated, highly vulnerable single mother who missed her former life just as much as she loved her child.

  I got up and paced for a while, then booted up Faye’s laptop computer and checked for e-mails from Jack, hoping to find a little comfort in his virtual embrace. As the computer went through its starting-up ceremony, my attention came to rest on one of Baby Sloane’s teething rings, and I thought of her sitting in Tert Krehbeil’s lap. An unseen hand formed a fist around my heart. Seeing the three of them sitting there in the museum had been a terrible shock. Woman, man, and baby. The full complement of personnel. Tert had been holding Sloane as if she were his, all comfortable and easy, Mr. Composure, just dropping in to stay a couple hundred years.

  It’s not Faye I’m really worried about, I realized, it’s the baby. Could this man replace the father she would never know? Or would he in fact be worse than no father at all?

  And it was clear to me now, in the harshness of an empty house, that the idea of being made extraneous in Sloane’s life was part of what had panicked me.

  The computer made a jungle roar at me, a sound Jack had programmed in as its wake-up noise back when he was around enough to capture my heart. Back before he ran off to Florida to help someone other than me.

  And I followed him.

  And Tom followed me, and got himself killed … .

  The room tilted slightly at the memory of Tom’s stiffening corpse. I fought the sensation, forcing myself to tap in commands and downloaded my e-mail.

  I stared at the results. Tucked in among the spam that pushed on-line Viagra, mortgage re-fis, make money at home schemes, penile enlargements, and red-hot farmgirl “cams,” there was in fact a message from Jack. I told myself this was a good omen. Until I read it.

  Hey there Em

  Looks like no luck on my request for early release. It’s a tough job out here but they say somebody’s got to do it, so why not this old pinniped. Sorry to disappoint you. Can’t say much else as I’m on someone else’s machine and that’s a no no, so give that baby a squeeze for me and I’ll write again soon.

  Love always, Jack

  I read it again and then closed the message. Then I opened it up again, hit REPLY, and wrote:

  Hey there Jack

  Just back from Cody, where I was with Faye as I explained before. I came back early because she’s gotten tight with some

  I erased the second sentence and tried again.

  Hey there Jack

  Just back from Cody, where I was with Faye as I explained before. Had some nice moments with baby S out on the badlands looking for rocks. Surprise surprise I found some, pretty strange considering I’m a geologist and that’s what the world is made of, huh? Well, I sure miss you and

  And what? It was getting harder and harder to write to Jack, and I could not sort out why. The fact that we had not seen each other since a month before Sloane Renee was born was certainly an issue, but that couldn’t have been avoided. It was best that he did not come around just after the baby was born, because after all, it was Tom’s death that put Faye into early labor. Jack was a walking reminder of that tragedy. And Jack had lived. Jack’s absence had seemed reasonable at the time, because I did not want to be reminded, either. We had expected to see each other after, at most, perhaps a month. But then he had been called up from the Reserves, like so many others. Off he went, a forty-one-year-old Navy SEAL sent out to do what the spooky boys do in a time of war, and my discomfort over what was unsettled in our relationship had been conveniently swapped for discomfort over the adversity he was facing.

  And now I faced another communication that felt like no communication at all. I wanted him home. I wanted him safe and sound. And I wanted to see him through his assignment. I couldn’t stand the idea of being the girlfriend who could not take the strain, who couldn’t get her brain around the simple task of writing a few messages, who quit writing, who failed to support him as he supported all of us.

  I settled for typing some more newsy bits, then sent off my e-mail and closed down the computer. I had no sooner gone off-line, thereby clearing the phone line, when the telephone rang. I glanced at the clock. It was seven A.M. Wondering who would call this early, I picked it up and said hello.

  A familiar voice filled the line. “Hi, Em.” It was Ray, the man I had been nuts over before I met Jack.

  I sat there with my mouth hanging open for some good ten or fifteen seconds, because I had not heard from Officer Thomas B-for-Brigham “Ray” Raymond in quite some time. Not since the night all hell had broken loose and he had tacitly chosen his family and his religion
over me. Funny how these interfaith engagements can go. I had thought I would never hear from Ray again, and decided that was just fine, but it seemed that this was my forty-eight hours for emotional jolts.

  “Em? Am I calling too early?”

  “Ray. Uh … hi. No, I’m up. But uh … why exactly are you calling?”

  “Because I want to talk to you.” From the tone of his voice, he thought this was funny. As in, Duh.

  “Uh, okay. So, uh … talk.”

  “No, I mean get together and talk.”

  This did not compute. In part because Thomas B. Whutzisname Raymond was not a talker. But I said, “Okay.” Why? Because sometimes I just don’t know how to say no, such as at moments like this, when I am in fact curious to know what is motivating a pig to take up the habit of sprouting wings and flying.

  “Meet me for lunch?”

  “No.”

  “Dinner?”

  “No,” I said, more firmly. “I’m willing to talk, Ray, but I don’t think I can mix it with food.”

  He chuckled. “Fair enough. Go for a walk, then?”

  I thought this through a moment. Sure, in broad daylight in a public place, we could walk and talk. “Where and when?”

  “How about right now?”

  “Mm.” I was trying to sound noncommittal, because I was in fact free, but did not want to sound easy.

  “I’ll park in front of your house, and we can just walk from there.”

  “Okay … but, wait, you don’t know where I’m living.”

  He laughed again. “Yes, I do. You’re staying with Faye, in that house she bought with Tom … before he died. By the way, I was sorry to hear about that.”

  Hearing his condolences was more than I could handle. If he wanted to get together, then fine, but not on my turf. “I’m coming downtown anyway. I can meet you at Salt Lake Roasters,” I said, venting my annoyance by asking a strict Mormon to meet me at a coffee shop. “And make it ten o’clock.” I did not want him coming to my home, and I’d be damned if he was going to see me this disheveled. I needed time to take a shower and dig out a clean pair of jeans. Why am I so annoyed? I wondered. I’ve moved on with life. Ray is in the past. But there’s something not right about this! I said, “How the hell do you know where I live, Ray?”

  “Oh come on, Em. I’m a cop. Remember?”

  I HAD TO admit, Ray looked good. I mean good, not just his usual handsome self. He had a certain glow about him. He was smiling, and his gait seemed easier, more open. As I joined him on the sidewalk, I decided that he had come to tell me that he was getting married or something.

  He was wearing one of those nice pairs of blue jeans he filled so athletically, his usual pristine white running shoes, and a nice fleece-lined jacket. His indigo-blue eyes were bright, and his cheeks were rosy in the crisp air. He gave me a slight bow, but kept his hands in his pockets.

  I bowed, too.

  He indicated that we could start walking to the east, uphill toward the trace of the Wasatch Fault. We walked. We had gone perhaps a block and a half before he spoke, which seemed more like the Ray I was used to, the one who spoke ten paragraphs in body English for every word that passed his lips. But then the words started, and it seemed he had quite a bit to say.

  “I wanted to talk to you about what happened between us, kind of clear things up. That okay with you?”

  “Sure,” I said.

  “We were engaged, and then all that business with my family happened, and I didn’t handle it well. So I wanted first to apologize.”

  Huh? He was referring to a falling-out of titanic proportions. He was a Mormon and I had precipitated an event that resulted in the incarceration of two of his family members. “I figure you could be forgiven for just about anything that night, Ray. Uh, I think even it’s the other way around. Maybe I should be apologizing.”

  He smiled, a bit more shyly this time. “No, it’s definitely my turn. If you want to make amends to me, you can call me and make an appointment.” He kind of danced his shoulders about as he said this, trying to be funny, keeping things light.

  “Well, fine. I accept your apology.”

  “Thanks.”

  We walked on for about another block or so without saying anything. Gradually, his words sank in, and not just what he had said, but how he had said it. Amends? “Uh, Ray, are you going to Al-Anon or something?”

  He blushed crimson. “Does it show?”

  “What the—Your family are all Mormons. Not a one of them drinks a drop. What are you doing in Al-Anon?”

  Suddenly all the frivolity was gone from his face. “It’s a good program. Surely you know that from your mother.”

  “Well, yeah, the Twelve Steps is part of how she got sober. But she was a drunk, Ray.”

  “And I am part of a … It works for me. That’s all that needs saying.”

  I kept walking, studying the pavement just in front of my feet with great concentration. “I’m impressed, Ray.”

  “Well …”

  “And I’m glad for you.” In fact, I was jealous. Apart from his current embarrassment, he looked jubilant, downright happy, and I was not.

  “So as long as I’m making amends, I’m supposed to be specific about it. I am sorry that I was so hard on you, Em. I’m sorry I asked you to give up what was true for you to try to be with me. I judged you very harshly, and that wasn’t fair. I wanted you to change yourself so that I wouldn’t have to face myself. That was cowardly.”

  I tripped, and there wasn’t even any broken pavement to trip on. My feet just got in each other’s ways, and I stumbled. “Ray—” In the movies, this is where the guy is supposed to reach out and take the girl in his arms, and it’s all sweetness and mush and the music swells and off we go to la-la land. But this was Em Hansen and Ray Raymond on a sidewalk on a brisk morning in Salt Lake City, and he kept his hands stuck in his pockets while I found my footing and lurched forward, hurrying to keep out of range just in case he got his hands out. I did not think that physical touch from another human being would help me get my bearings just then. I opened my mouth and closed it several times, trying out sounds that did not quite emerge from my throat, and then finally managed to say, “Thank you.”

  “Thank you for listening.”

  We walked on for quite a while, he with his head up, me with my head bowed like I was pressing into a high wind. We must have looked quite a pair. So this is the gag, I was thinking. He did not phone me up to say, “Let’s get together,” or “I still miss you terribly and will pine for you forever.” No, he’s rattling my cage just to free his self. Well, I can’t fault him for that, but I must admit—

  Admit what? That I’m a vain idiot who can’t see that life is marching on without me?

  Ooo, I scolded. Here we go again, arguing with ourself!

  Ray broke the silence. “You’re a good person, Em. A good friend. I’ve missed your company.”

  Ah. Now it starts.

  Suddenly his throat sounded tight. “I’d like it if we could get together now and then, or talk, just on the phone if that’s okay.”

  “I don’t know, Ray.”

  “I know, I know. When you blow someone’s trust like I did with you, well … you’ve simply blown it, and they’re not going to trust you again all at once, so you have to earn it back in tiny bits. This isn’t a boy-girl thing I’m trying to press on you, so please relax. I just don’t like to leave it like it was. I want to be worthy of your trust, because you’re someone I admire.”

  My brain had now reached full boil, and I wondered if steam was pouring out of my ears. I did not feel admirable in the least, or even trustworthy, let alone someone whose trust should be sought. I felt like a prize idiot who had been mistaken for a woman with sense. I wanted simultaneously to mount a valiant steed in my Joan of Arc suit and to turn around and kick this man in the shins, and I could not explain either urge to myself.

  We walked on.

  Eventually we turned right, and then right again,
passing between the square Victorian grandeur of the City and County Building and the ultramodern curves of the new city library, and by and by we were back at Salt Lake Roasters. “Everything going okay with Faye?” he asked. “Or at least as well as might be expected?”

  I clenched my teeth. “Oh, she’s doing just fine,” I said, a bit too forcefully. I was thinking that right now, she was on the road with what’s-his-name, laughing and preening, preening and laughing, and that Sloane Renee was probably strapped into her little car seat all by herself in the back, all lonesome. I imagined her crying, unheard, ignored. I tried to erase that thought, not wanting her to feel an instant’s pain, then I decided that I was going insane as I felt a sharp urge to grab Ray by the wrist, give him a yank toward me, and say, Want to make a baby? Right now? Right here?

  But I did not, because who’d want to get it on with a nut case? Oblivious to what was going on inside my head and heart, Ray gave me a final smile, or perhaps he gave it to himself. “Thanks for meeting with me,” he said. “I’ve got to go.”

  And he left.

  7

  YOU’D THINK I WOULD HAVE FOUND IT PLEASING TO RECEIVE AN apology like that, but something about it did not stick to my ribs. In fact, I felt quite annoyed at Ray, and the longer I thought about it, the stronger that annoyance grew. So I did the only reasonable thing: I pushed the conundrum of the meeting out of my mind and stormed into Salt Lake Roasters in search of a cup of coffee, muttering to myself that if there were a twelve-step program for caffeine addicts, I’d make a good poster child for it.

  I met a pal at the counter: the incomparable Tanya, the woman who managed the local FBI office, the one where Tom Latimer worked before he married Faye.

  Tanya was her usual appallingly cheerful self. She was just purchasing a latte and a chocolate cookie, and she invited me to join her for a tour of the roof of the new library.