THE KUDZU TUNNEL TO Jim O’Conner’s hideaway was becoming as familiar to me as my own driveway. I had phoned an hour before with news of the additional bone theft, along with a discouraging reassessment of our prospects for recovering Leena. “I was pretty sure she was somewhere in Cooke County, in the hands of somebody who wears a badge,” I said. “Now I have no idea who’s got her, where she is, or whether we’ll ever get her back.”
He took the news more calmly than I’d expected; he even tried to console me over the loss. “Well, I hope you recover the bones, and I hope you nail whoever took ’em. But remember, those bones aren’t Leena. They’re just what’s left of what used to be her, a long time ago.” This from the man I’d sent reeling, not once but twice—first with the news of her discovery, then with the bombshell about her pregnancy. He was a remarkably resilient human being. “Listen, if you’ve got the time, come up and see me,” he said next. “I’ve got something to show you. As an anthropologist, you’ll find it interesting; might cheer you up.”
That was all he would divulge over the phone.
On the drive up, my mind raced with the possibilities. Had he found something that shed light on Leena’s death, on the identity of her killer? His phrasing puzzled me, though: “as an anthropologist”—what did that mean? Had he unearthed some clue or piece of evidence from three decades ago? Some groundbreaking article about cave burials? Why would I be more interested in whatever it was as a scientist than as a guy who’d been dragged all over the hills of Cooke County—and underneath a few of them, too?
When I pulled up in front of the vine-draped farmhouse, I noticed that the kudzu seemed to have swallowed another foot or two all around the edges. O’Conner seemed unconcerned, though. He was sitting in the same rocking chair where I’d first met him. He lifted a hand in greeting, but continued to rock in big, easy arcs.
As I mounted the sagging steps to the porch, O’Conner reached over and pushed down on the arm of the rocker beside his, setting it into motion. I synchronized my timing, then eased down into it. I found my rhythm matching his.
“Hey.” I said, “Why aren’t you in jail? The sheriff said he was gonna arrest you days ago.”
He chuckled. “They’re watching my house in town. They don’t know about this place yet.”
After a minute, he reached into his shirt pocket and took out a photo and handed it to me. Its corners were unraveling and the colors had faded with age, but there was no mistaking the pretty blonde girl smiling at the camera. It was Leena.
“She sent me that while I was overseas. Last letter I ever got from her.” I studied her face; she looked almost like I’d imagined her, but there was a trace of sadness or fear in her face that I hadn’t expected. Perhaps things had already started to unravel for her, too. Or maybe I was just imagining things in hindsight.
“Mind if I borrow this and make a copy? I’ll take good care of it.”
“ ’Course not. Anything that helps. Any headway on the case?”
“Not really. Not unless you count the breakin and the cave-ins as headway. There might be some disgruntled students who’d consider an attempt on my life to be a step in the right direction, but it doesn’t shed any light on the murder.”
“Maybe not directly. But somebody’s mighty nervous. Afraid there’s something more you’re about to find out, or about to figure out.”
“Well, I wish I were as smart as someone seems to think I am.”
“Answer’s bound to bubble up soon. You’ve just got to let it simmer for a while.” He stood up. “Speaking of simmering, how about a cup of tea?”
“Sure, if you’re having some, too.”
O’Conner disappeared through the screen door, then emerged a minute later and handed me one of two pottery mugs, handmade, imprinted with the outlines of lacy ferns. “Nice mugs,” I said, remembering some of what Kathleen had taught me about shapes and glazes. “Local potter?”
He smiled. “Local as you can get. Made ’em myself. Everything you’re holding in your hand came off this property—the clay, the ferns, the spring water, the honey, even the tea.”
“You’re a regular one-man biosphere.”
“I like being self-sufficient when I can. Meeting your own needs for food and utensils seems satisfying at some deep level, at least to me. Helps keep a man honest, somehow.”
For a reputed outlaw, O’Conner was quite the renaissance man: philosopher, potter, beekeeper, tea farmer. I took a sip of the steaming brew and swirled it in my mouth, startled—it wasn’t like any tea I had ever tasted. Underneath the honey, there was a bitter, rocky tang to it. It tasted somehow of mountains and leaves and roots and springs. “That’s interesting. I think maybe I like it, but I’m not quite sure. What is it?”