The Winslow Incident

FRIDAY NIGHT

THE WINSLOW HOTEL

RUBY ROAD

“Be gentle!” Hazel cried.

“Be brave,” her grandmother said, even as her mouth turned down in sympathy.

They sat side by side in high-back chairs at the walnut table in the formal dining room, Sarah Winslow digging splinters out of her granddaughter’s hand with a sewing needle and pair of tweezers.

To distract her mind from the operation and slaughtered animals and threats of blackmail, Hazel studied the fresco painted on the ceiling. She stared at swans and fountains and ladies with parasols, at all the things Winslow never was except on the plaster ceiling of her great-great grandfather’s home. One man’s fruitless stab at bringing civilization to an uncivil mining camp, she supposed. The Winslow stood four stories high, counting the round room at the top of the tower where the ghosts resided. Built in 1889, the fifteen room, Italianate-style mansion was too fancy for its own good, and as caretaker, Sean’s father had to do constant battle with the elaborate roof and ancient plumbing.

“Ouch!” Hazel jerked her hand away after her grandmother probed her pinkie with the needle. “That’s gentle?”

Sarah took firm hold of her hand again. “Only a few more.”

Hazel clenched her teeth as her grandmother pulled a splinter from the tip of her finger.

Eyes concentrated on her task, Sarah said, “Are you planning to tell me what happened?”

Hazel studied her grandmother’s smooth cheeks and thick silver hair, hoping she would look that good at sixty-two. “Well, let’s see. I saw your boyfriend Cal at the Fish ’n Bait. He told me to tell you he’ll pick you up at one sharp tomorrow to escort you to the rodeo. He promised not to smell like trout.”

“Thanks for the warning.” Sarah laughed—a warm cackle that always reminded Hazel of fall leaves underfoot and made her feel in safe territory. And the idea of her grandmother hooking up with worm-loving Cal made Hazel laugh, too.

But Sarah turned serious again, asking, “And?”

“And I tripped and fell in the woods,” Hazel replied.

Sarah glanced up, raising the dark eyebrows that packed extra punch in contrast to her light hair. “I’ll wait until you’re ready then.”

Hazel tried to frown but it felt more like wincing. She had never lied to her grandmother before, and it made her feel polluted and gore-splashed all over again. She had come to The Winslow to get cleaned up and calmed down. After sneaking a shower in an empty guestroom—rinsing blood from her arms and picking pieces of calf hide out of her hair—she had donned one of Sean’s t-shirts over her shorts and sought out Sarah to perform splinter surgery. Until she was in better shape, she had to avoid home and her father because she couldn’t tell him what had happened. As sheriff he’d be forced to report the sick and dead cattle to the proper authorities. Then her Uncle Pard would make good on his threat. And then her dad and Sean would both go to prison.

“My brave girl.” Sarah pulled away the tweezers. “Shall we take a break?”

Hazel hadn’t realized she was crying; now she felt tears running hot and itchy down her cheeks. Only she wasn’t sobbing from the pain, it was due to blossoming panic. Sean had protected her that day at Three Fools Creek, so now it was up to her to protect him.

But a new fear had begun to gnaw at her—the fear that she might prove sadly incapable of protecting anyone at all.





SATURDAY

Day Two of the Heat Wave





YELLOW JACKET PASS

Fritz Earley steered his flatbed truck around the final curve up Yellow Jacket Pass and the simple truss bridge came into view. Along the ridgeline, the early morning sun lit lodgepole pines like candles on a birthday cake. Tinderbox, Fritz thought as he bounced over the cattle guard.

He always felt uneasy crossing the bridge. Not that it was so far across; but it was a gut-dropping distance down. He imagined that one day the weight of his fully loaded delivery truck would collapse the bridge and send him plunging, falling end over end before he slammed into the Lamprey River. There the twisted wreckage of metal and his ample flesh would careen down river until it wedged against the bank to await grisly discovery by some unlucky kid or angler.

So he whistled relief when he popped out the other end of the bridge and passed the familiar sign.

WELCOME TO WINSLOW

(POP. 255)

“JEWEL OF THE STEPSTONE RANGE”

HOME OF HOLLOWAY RANCH

Rather than keep to the main route leading downtown through a tunnel of quaking aspen, Fritz turned south onto Loop-Loop Road and headed for the ranch. He preferred to get Pard Holloway’s delivery over and done with first since the ranch boss was always hollering at him. Then he could finish his deliveries and grab a bite at the Crock before he had to re-cross the chasm and start the long drive back down the mountain.

But halfway down Loop-Loop Road, Fritz had to slam on his brakes to avoid T-boning Maggie Clark’s white Chevy truck parked across the middle of the road. He was surprised to see Maggie—sole Holloway Ranch cowgal—leaning sentry-like against the passenger side. More surprising was that the middle-aged woman’s usually wild hair was reined into a ponytail so tight it looked painful. That and the fact that she was wielding a rifle.

After Fritz eased to a stop, Maggie set her gun inside the Chevy’s cab and then came around to his open window. “Need to unload into mine.” She cocked a callused thumb toward her four by four truck. “I’ll take it overland.”

“What’s doin’?” Fritz asked, worried about what Maggie’s new hairdo and brandishing of weapons could mean. Did this woman—known to round up cattle and sling chow with the same brutal efficiency—feel threatened? Or was she the one doing the threatening?

Squinting in the direction of the ranch did her crow’s feet no favors. “Road’s washed out up ahead.”

Fritz leaned forward against the steering wheel as far as his belly allowed, and peered through his bug-splashed windshield at the dirt road beyond Maggie’s truck. He had been up this road just last week. And it hadn’t rained in over a month.





HAZEL’S HOUSE

PARK STREET

“I don’t have time for this, Dad.” Hazel threw her spoon and cereal bowl into the kitchen sink with a clatter. “I’m late for work.”

All night she’d been haunted by images of calf brains leaking into pasture grass and Sean in handcuffs that sliced into his wrists and the badge ripped from her father’s shirt. So this morning she was feeling, as her grandmother would say, burnt around the edges.

“You don’t start work till eight. Don’t you think I know that?” Her father set his own bowl on the counter. Cereal was as elaborate as breakfast ever got around their house. Hazel noticed that he had barely touched his and the flakes looked soggy and bloated. “Now, where were you last night?” he asked.

“Can’t you find somebody else to interrogate?” she said. “You’re the sheriff—shouldn’t you be out protecting the town or something?”

He opened the breadbox and pulled out a loaf, all the while giving her his look that said, I don’t know what to do with you. Then he warned, “I’d better not find out you bought pot from those carnies.”

“You’re completely paranoid!” She couldn’t handle this right now. Pretending last night never happened was hard enough, she didn’t need extra grief from him today, especially considering that her evasiveness was for his sake. His and Sean’s. She spun out of the kitchen, griping, “Quit harassing me.”

He followed her into the living room. “I wouldn’t be ‘harassing’ you if you’d come home at a reasonable hour.”

The knot in Hazel’s stomach just kept growing. After she had crept home from The Winslow and snuck quietly (or so she’d thought) up the staircase to her room, it had been past one in the morning. Now she glanced around at the overstuffed furniture in their Victorian house, and felt like she was suffocating.

Continuing to avoid her father’s dark blue eyes, she said, “I was at Patience’s house helping her with her rodeo outfit.” A lame lie, but she was too nervous to invent a better one. She’d never lied to her father before either. Not about anything important anyway. More inner pollution—she was beginning to feel downright toxic.

“How was I supposed to know where you were? When you were coming home?” He ran a hand through his short hair, making it stick up in dark spikes all over his head. “If you were coming home. You could’ve been lying dead in the ravine for all I knew.”

That’s a lovely image, she thought. “You’re always worrying about things that never happen. Relax, Dad—take a pill.”

He stared at her without saying anything else. It was his way of making her think about the things she’d said, to consider her next words. And it always pissed her off. She bit down hard on her lip, battling the urge to tell him everything, resenting him because, really, wasn’t he supposed to protect her and not the other way around?

Finally, she huffed in frustration. “I can just leave, you know.” She slammed out the front door and stomped extra loud down the porch steps.

Then she glanced back and instantly regretted saying those words, words that for all she knew were the last her mother had ever spoken to him. For there her father stood at the open screen door, still holding the bread, looking at her with a crumbled expression.

Hazel flushed with shame for getting into it with him in the first place. This situation wasn’t his fault; none of it was ever his fault.

She was considering how best to apologize when he shoved the loaf of bread into their big antique mailbox. “Dad!” She laughed. “You weirdo!” But then she saw the genuinely startled look on his face and her amusement fizzled out. “What are you doing?” she asked, concerned.

“What?” he said. Confusion clouded his features. He glanced back at the mailbox, and then he laughed, too, before retrieving the squished bread. “I wanted to make toast.” Looking slightly embarrassed, he asked, “Do you suppose I’ll have better luck with that in the toaster?”

“Probably.” She noticed that he hadn’t shaved yet, and his beard stubble and messy dark hair stood in stark contrast to his suddenly pale skin. “Seriously, Dad, are you all right?”

“I’m fine,” he said, glancing away from her. “Go on, now—you’ll be late for work.”

Late? she puzzled. He’d already called bullshit on that one, but she wasn’t about to argue against her own fib. Instead, she turned to go, silently vowing to make it all up to him somehow.

Add it to the list, she thought, of her growing litany of missteps and mishaps, secrets and lies.

The moment she placed one foot on the stepping stones to cross the front yard, Jinx fell in step beside her. As usual, he’d been waiting for Hazel. The Irish setter was Winslow’s dog-about-town who belonged to nobody in particular and who always managed to track down Hazel.

She glanced at him. The dog looked concerned.

“Not you again,” she said.

He wagged his tail.

“You’re not my dog, you know.”

Wag wag wag.

“I’ve got enough problems right now,” she explained as they continued together onto Park Street, “without having to worry about you, too.”

Jinx listened intently, all floppy red ears.

She stopped walking in front of Patience’s house next door, stooped down to his level, and cradled his head in her hands.

He gazed at her adoringly.

“Do you understand? I’m blowing this one-horse town soon. And once I’m gone, I’m never coming back.”

The dog cocked his head, looked at her quizzically: Surely she didn’t mean that, did she?

“That’s right. No birthday cards, no phone calls, no visits just to see if you’re even still alive.”

His tail thumped on the sidewalk and her irritation dissolved. “Okay, let’s go, you stupid dog.” They resumed walking in the early sunshine toward Fortune Way. “But don’t say I didn’t warn you.”