leave out any details, even if you think they might be irrelevant.”
He wrote down my story impassively, and there really wasn’t much to it. I was diving, I got caught in a rope tied to a rock, and there was a dead body tied to the other end of the rope, floating free about ten feet from the surface of the lake. The Chief never asked me why I was diving in the first place, and I wondered if he already knew about the diamond necklace. He seemed to have an inside track on much of the town, possibly because of the off-hours “business ventures” he was rumored to have going with Kennie. I decided if he didn’t know, I wasn’t going to tell him.
He kept writing after I finished. When he finally snapped his notebook shut, he looked at me for twenty long seconds, his expression unreadable. “You shouldn’t dive alone.”
“I know. Can I go?”
“You can go, but don’t stray too far from a phone. I might have more questions later.”
The driver of the Mitsubishi offered me a ride home, and my still-shaky legs screamed at me to take it, but I was not going to relinquish the feeling of earth under my body, even if I had to crawl home. I said I would walk. It was less than two miles, and even though I was wearing a wetsuit and swim booties, it would be a welcome trek. The divers agreed to take the rest of my equipment back to the Last Resort, including the BC once it was retrieved.
Judging from the angle of the sun, it was pushing late afternoon. It truly was a beautiful day, and I had new appreciation for the warm June air and the buzz of the leopard frogs in the sloughs I was walking by on County Road 82. The tiny shock my muscles felt with each step on the pavement was ecstasy, and I smiled at the passing cars. I was alive, and I was on land.
My heartbeat revved up a little, and I actually whistled until it became too painful for my vomit-seared throat. I had shoved thoughts of my mother back into the detention room in my head that I saved for my family, and I was living life. Thirty minutes later, turning down my half-mile driveway, I contemplated the wisdom of a nap. I was mentally and physically bone-tired. I didn’t want to close my eyes quite yet, though. I had looked at the inside of my eyelids enough for one day.
I found my feet leading me past the turn in the driveway that would have taken me to Sunny’s, and before I knew it, I was at Sunny’s little beach, where I had taken off on this dive a lifetime ago. I stripped off the wetsuit and booties, rolling my eyes at myself as I got to the dive knife strapped around my left thigh. I could have used it to cut the rope tying me to the lake bottom if I hadn’t been so panic-stricken.
I slipped the shorts, T-shirt, and flip-flops that I had left on the shore over my swimsuit. Shading the sun from my eyes, I stared out at the to-do that was still happening on the lake. There were now two official-looking speedboats circling my inner tube, but I didn’t see an ambulance at the access, and there was only one police car visible. That surprised me. I had learned last month that they always call in an ambulance, even if the body is dead. There must be another tragedy tying up the county ambulance elsewhere. The body I had found certainly could wait. I looked off to my right at the oak-shaded drive that led to Shangri-La and started walking. I studied the bland rocks under my feet and considered what I would do when I reached the resort. It didn’t matter. I just wanted to keep walking.
I knew the owners, a retired married couple, Bing and Kellie Gibson. I recalled that they had bought the place three years earlier from the Woolerys. The Woolerys’ main claim to fame, besides the resort, was that their son was Chuck Woolery, one-time host of Love Connection . He used to visit them and eat at the local restaurants. That was juicy stuff in a small town like Battle Lake. We didn’t see a lot of stars in the North Country.
The closest I had come to someone
He wrote down my story impassively, and there really wasn’t much to it. I was diving, I got caught in a rope tied to a rock, and there was a dead body tied to the other end of the rope, floating free about ten feet from the surface of the lake. The Chief never asked me why I was diving in the first place, and I wondered if he already knew about the diamond necklace. He seemed to have an inside track on much of the town, possibly because of the off-hours “business ventures” he was rumored to have going with Kennie. I decided if he didn’t know, I wasn’t going to tell him.
He kept writing after I finished. When he finally snapped his notebook shut, he looked at me for twenty long seconds, his expression unreadable. “You shouldn’t dive alone.”
“I know. Can I go?”
“You can go, but don’t stray too far from a phone. I might have more questions later.”
The driver of the Mitsubishi offered me a ride home, and my still-shaky legs screamed at me to take it, but I was not going to relinquish the feeling of earth under my body, even if I had to crawl home. I said I would walk. It was less than two miles, and even though I was wearing a wetsuit and swim booties, it would be a welcome trek. The divers agreed to take the rest of my equipment back to the Last Resort, including the BC once it was retrieved.
Judging from the angle of the sun, it was pushing late afternoon. It truly was a beautiful day, and I had new appreciation for the warm June air and the buzz of the leopard frogs in the sloughs I was walking by on County Road 82. The tiny shock my muscles felt with each step on the pavement was ecstasy, and I smiled at the passing cars. I was alive, and I was on land.
My heartbeat revved up a little, and I actually whistled until it became too painful for my vomit-seared throat. I had shoved thoughts of my mother back into the detention room in my head that I saved for my family, and I was living life. Thirty minutes later, turning down my half-mile driveway, I contemplated the wisdom of a nap. I was mentally and physically bone-tired. I didn’t want to close my eyes quite yet, though. I had looked at the inside of my eyelids enough for one day.
I found my feet leading me past the turn in the driveway that would have taken me to Sunny’s, and before I knew it, I was at Sunny’s little beach, where I had taken off on this dive a lifetime ago. I stripped off the wetsuit and booties, rolling my eyes at myself as I got to the dive knife strapped around my left thigh. I could have used it to cut the rope tying me to the lake bottom if I hadn’t been so panic-stricken.
I slipped the shorts, T-shirt, and flip-flops that I had left on the shore over my swimsuit. Shading the sun from my eyes, I stared out at the to-do that was still happening on the lake. There were now two official-looking speedboats circling my inner tube, but I didn’t see an ambulance at the access, and there was only one police car visible. That surprised me. I had learned last month that they always call in an ambulance, even if the body is dead. There must be another tragedy tying up the county ambulance elsewhere. The body I had found certainly could wait. I looked off to my right at the oak-shaded drive that led to Shangri-La and started walking. I studied the bland rocks under my feet and considered what I would do when I reached the resort. It didn’t matter. I just wanted to keep walking.
I knew the owners, a retired married couple, Bing and Kellie Gibson. I recalled that they had bought the place three years earlier from the Woolerys. The Woolerys’ main claim to fame, besides the resort, was that their son was Chuck Woolery, one-time host of Love Connection . He used to visit them and eat at the local restaurants. That was juicy stuff in a small town like Battle Lake. We didn’t see a lot of stars in the North Country.
The closest I had come to someone
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