The Alpine Obituary Read online

  I’d started to follow, but Vida put a hand on my arm. “Wait a moment,” she said, gesturing at an approaching car. “I called Doc Dewey. Here he comes now.”

  “Has June gone off her rocker?” I asked as Doc’s modest dark blue sedan pulled in ahead of the limo.

  “That’s a relative thing with June,” Vida said. “I’ve always thought she was a bit mental.”

  Since Vida thought that of many Alpine residents, I didn’t take her diagnosis seriously. With a windmill-like wave, she called to Doc Dewey.

  “Yoo-hoo! They’ve taken June inside. It might take a while to get her in bed.”

  The onlookers, who now numbered more than a dozen, moved closer to the doctor.

  “Is June done for?” called George Engebretsen.

  Doc, who was carrying his medical kit, gave the county commissioner a mild look of reprimand. “June’s upset. She’ll be fine.” He turned to Vida and me, nodding and smiling. “Not uncommon after a loved one has died, I’m afraid.” He paused, his expression even more kindly than usual. “You were very brave after Tom died, Emma.”

  “I was drugged to the eyeballs for a week,” I replied. “Four Valium and a quart of Wild Turkey work wonders.”

  “I didn’t prescribe the whiskey,” Doc said, wagging a finger. “That was your brother’s doing.”

  “I think he drank most of it,” I murmured as we headed into the Froland house, where June’s wails could be heard in the distance.

  “I know the way,” Doc said, leading us past the living room and down a narrow hall. “I visited Jack here a few times.”

  I knew June Froland only by sight, a plump little person with a dour manner. As we crowded into the small bedroom, I was shocked by her anguished appearance as she heaved convulsively on top of the covers.

  Reverend Nielsen’s eyes were cast toward the ceiling. I assumed he was praying. Al was attempting to hold June’s hand, but she kept snatching it away and began hurling words of abuse at the undertaker.

  “Fiends!” she screeched. “Go away! I can feel the evil! Murder! Oh, God!” She turned her face to the wall and began to sob again.

  “Ma,” Max said in a pleading voice, “please. You’re making yourself sick.”

  But Max’s ma kept screaming incoherently. Doc moved closer to the bed, then spoke quietly to the rest of us.

  “It might be best if you’d all leave the room,” he said. “There isn’t much space in here. And make sure those people outside don’t try to get in the house.”

  I immediately turned to leave, but Vida grasped Doc by the arm. “Don’t you need help?”

  Doc shook his bald head. “No, Vida. I’ve done this before. You go along with the others.”

  Doc Dewey must have been one of the few people on the planet who could make Vida obey without an argument. She did sniff slightly but followed the rest of us into the hall.

  “Emma,” she said, gesturing at Max, a bearded man of middle age with sharp brown eyes, “this is Max Froland, Jack and June’s son. I remember him as a little boy, playing with his hula hoop up and down Sixth Street.”

  Max looked pained but forced a smile as he shook my hand. “It wasn’t a hula hoop. It was a ten-speed I won in a Chamber of Commerce drawing. I was fifteen.”

  Al, wearing his usual mournful expression, motioned at Max. “Do you mind if I leave, Mr. Froland? I don’t think there’s any more I can do here, and I have to make preparations for the service tomorrow.”

  Max held out his hand. “Go ahead, Mr. Driggers,” he said in a deep, husky voice. “On your way out, could you disperse the gawkers?”

  “I’ll do my best,” Al promised. He nodded at the rest of us and took his leave just as Doc entered the living room.

  “I’ve given June a sedative,” Doc said quietly. “She’s already calming down and should go to sleep in just a minute or two.” He shook his head. “Poor woman—I guess the viewing was too much for her.”

  “Does she have a history of hysteria?” I asked.

  “No,” Doc replied. “She’s never been an emotional woman. June’s always had remarkably good health. I’ve been her physician since my father died ten years ago.”

  Gerald Dewey, known as Young Doc, had inherited Cecil Dewey’s practice. The senior Dewey, of course, was known as Old Doc. Alpiners still referred to Gerald as Young Doc despite the fact that he was now well into middle age.

  “She’s a woman of great faith,” Pastor Nielsen declared. “She must know that Jack is with our savior now.”

  Vida, who was Presbyterian to her toes, shot the Lutheran minister a sharp look. “It’s how Jack got there that seems to have disturbed her.”

  Pastor Nielsen gave Vida a kindly smile. “That’s not the real point, is it, Mrs. Runkel?”

  “Oh, bother,” Vida huffed, then beckoned me into the kitchen. “Let me tell you what happened. I’d rather that Max didn’t overhear. This must be very hard on him.”

  I recalled the obituary with its list of survivors. There had been only one, the son who lived in Seattle. Max’s sister, whose name I’d forgotten, had died years ago.

  “After the viewing,” Vida began, “Max invited everyone back here for coffee and cake. But suddenly June, who’d been holding up rather well, started to cry. Not sobbing, but more like hysterics, wailing and thrashing about. Naturally, Al Driggers took charge. He did his best to calm her, as did Max, but she wouldn’t quiet down. Finally, she shrieked that Jack had been murdered. That’s when I called Doc Dewey. I honestly believed June had become unhinged. Max announced that they wouldn’t be hosting any kind of do at the house.”

  “I shouldn’t think so,” I put in.

  Vida looked miffed. “Yes, but those greedy pigs outside had already raced off to get here first. No doubt George Engebretsen didn’t want to be cheated of his krumkake. But I digress.” Vida glanced out into the living room. “Pastor Nielsen is leaving. Good riddance.” She paused, scanning the kitchen counters. “I wonder where that krumkake is. Indeed, I wonder if June actually made any.”

  Vida was looking in the cupboards when Doc came into the kitchen. “I told Max that his mother will sleep for a few hours,” he said, rolling down his shirtsleeves. “I’ll be on call, so I let Max know that if she wakes up and resumes her hysteria, she should be hospitalized.”

  Giving up on her search, Vida nodded. “Very wise, Doc. Thank you for coming so quickly.”

  “That’s my job,” Doc said with a weary smile. Like his father before him, the younger Dewey still made house calls, at least to his elderly patients. He’d finally gotten some help at the clinic in the form of Elvis Sung, a young physician originally from Hawaii. But Dr. Sung’s skin wasn’t a pure white shade, and he’d been in Alpine for less than two years. Naturally, the locals still preferred Doc Dewey.

  Doc shrugged into his jacket and eyed me closely. “When was the last time you paid me a visit, Emma?”

  “Umm . . . a year ago?” I’d been in the hospital for almost two days after Tom was killed. I’d checked in with Doc a week after the funeral, then had seen him once more, in early August. There wasn’t much he could do for a broken heart.

  “You look peaky to me,” he said. “Make an appointment for next week. Promise?”

  “Okay.” If nothing else, it might make Doc feel better.

  His stalwart figure moved out of the kitchen, though he stopped for a word with Max Froland.

  I turned to Vida. “As you were saying?”

  “You know the rest. Al drove her here in the funeral home car. Max and Pastor Nielsen rode with them, and I gather that June was incoherent for the entire trip. Of course it’s only five blocks.” Vida eyed the teakettle next to the sink. “I really could use a cup of tea.”

  The kitchen was small, with outdated appliances and worn linoleum flooring. It was not very tidy, but I couldn’t fault June Froland’s housekeeping. As I well knew, death has a way of disrupting routine. There was no sign of preparations for a post-viewing get-together.
Maybe June and Max had planned to wing it.

  I cleared off an aluminum-backed chair and sat down. “I assume June’s accusation was unfounded. Did she say who’d murdered Jack?”

  Vida shook her head. In her black swing coat and a bonnet with its ribbons streaming over her shoulders, she looked like something out of Dickens. “June kept repeating—between screeches—that Jack had been killed.” Vida sat down across from me, waiting for the water to boil.

  “That’s it?” I said. “She made no accusations or mentioned how Jack might have been killed?”

  “Not that I heard,” Vida replied. “Of course I was on the phone to Doc for a short time.”

  “Weird.” I stared at the soiled cotton cloth on the small kitchen table. “June was aware that Jack’s condition was terminal, I assume.”

  “I’m sure she was,” Vida replied. “She always went to the doctor with him. Or so my niece Marje Blatt told me.”

  Marje, the receptionist at the clinic, was one of Vida’s many sources who were also related to her. I sometimes thought her news network rivaled CNN.

  “June’s in denial,” I remarked as Max Froland rather diffidently came to stand in the kitchen doorway.

  “May I?” he asked.

  “Goodness, yes!” Vida cried, the black ribbons swinging at her shoulders. “This is your home, isn’t it? Would you care for some tea?”

  “Yes, thanks.” Max looked wistful. “My parents didn’t drink alcohol. Frankly, I’d prefer a stiff vodka martini.”

  I was about to agree with Max, but Vida intervened. “Your mother is an abstemious woman. In my opinion, that’s a virtue.”

  “Pa wasn’t so virtuous,” Max said with a droll expression. “But Ma wouldn’t let him keep liquor in the house. That’s why he spent so much time at Mugs Ahoy.”

  I remembered the line from the obit that mentioned Jack Froland’s drinking partners at the local tavern. “It doesn’t seem that drink killed your father,” I noted.

  “No.” Max shook his head sadly. “I think it kept him going. In fact, I came up here to visit two weeks ago. He seemed better than he had in months.”

  “Perhaps he’d gone into remission,” Vida said, finding some mismatched cups and saucers in a cupboard. “Cream or sugar?”

  “Neither,” Max replied, leaning against the counter by the stove. There were only two chairs in the kitchen. There was no dining room, and I wondered where the Frolands entertained. Maybe they didn’t.

  “I don’t know about remission,” Max said after Vida had handed him his tea. “My folks never mentioned it when I was here. To be candid, they weren’t quick to pick up on medical terms, even with Pa’s cancer. They were old school, the kind of people who never question what the doctor says and don’t ask for explanations.”

  “So foolish,” Vida murmured.

  “I agree,” Max said. He had the burly build of his father, but his mother’s dark coloring. In physical terms, I could imagine the son following the father into the mill. But he hadn’t. Max looked comfortable in his dark suit, pale blue shirt, and tasteful tie. I suspected he was some kind of professional man.

  “So,” Vida said, also still standing, “do you believe your mother was out of line when she said your father had been murdered?”

  “No,” Max replied. “I assume she meant murdered by cancer. Or the medical profession that couldn’t save him.”

  “I see.” But Vida sounded dubious.

  Max caught the tone in her voice. “Do you mean you put some stock in her rantings?”

  “N-o-o,” Vida answered slowly. “But it did strike me as a strange thing to say.”

  Max’s smile was ironic. “You mean my mother wasn’t a particularly imaginative woman.”

  “Nor fanciful,” Vida allowed.

  Max set his cup and saucer down on the counter. “That’s true. But why would anyone murder Pa? It’s absurd. My parents had nothing except for this house, Pa’s pension, and a bit of savings. I live alone, I don’t need money. Except for the usual bickering with his coworkers before he retired. I can’t think of any enemies he might have had. You don’t kill over who doesn’t pony up for a round at Mugs Ahoy.”

  It would have been tactless to ask if Jack and June got along, so I kept my mouth shut. Vida, of course did not: “Your parents seemed to live separate lives.”

  Max chuckled. “Are you hinting at a love triangle, Mrs. Runkel?”

  “No,” Vida responded, “of course not. But your father spent his spare time at the tavern or watching TV. Your mother was a member of the Burl Creek Thimble Club. She crocheted and read romance novels. I don’t recall them ever taking any big trips. I interviewed them only once, six years ago when they drove to Spokane for a family wedding.”

  “They didn’t like to drive,” Max said. “Not after Lynn was killed in that accident up at the summit.”

  Lynn. I recalled the name of the late Froland daughter from the obituary. I didn’t recall the accident. It must have happened before I arrived in Alpine.

  “Yes,” Vida said, “I can see how such a tragedy might affect them. But of course that was in the winter and there was black ice on the road. Your family has had its share of sadness. Especially you, Max. It seems like only yesterday that your wife passed away.”

  Max lowered his gaze. “Jackie was only thirty-two. We’d been married less than five years. You don’t expect such a young person to die of an aneurysm.”

  “Such a loss,” Vida said with a sad shake of her head. “And then to find out that she was six weeks pregnant. How did you bear it, Max?”

  Max gave Vida a grim look. “Is there a choice other than putting a gun to your head?”

  “No.” Vida glanced in my direction. “You have to be strong. And you have been, Max. I greatly admire you for it.”

  I turned away, reaching for the sugar bowl. I didn’t feel strong. And I certainly wasn’t admirable.

  Maybe I really was a grief diva.

  Maybe it was time to change.

  Vida insisted that I attend Jack Froland’s funeral the following morning. “Don’t you want to see what happens next?” she demanded.

  I started to reply that I’d attended one too many funerals already but thought of my resolve the previous evening. “Do you really expect that something will happen?”

  “Who knows?” Vida retorted. “That’s the interesting thing about funerals.” She suddenly blanched. “Oh dear, I shouldn’t have said that! Never mind, you don’t have to go if you don’t want to.”

  I searched my conscience before making a decision. “The truth is, Vida, I’ve got a paper to put out. Yesterday we wasted half the afternoon going through those old issues of the Blabber. I think I’d better stay close to the office and figure out an interesting feature for Scott and an electrifying editorial for me.”

  “You have the fire story for your lead if nothing more current comes along,” Vida said. “Scott must have taken some excellent photos.”

  Scott had come to work late, which had worried me. But instead of being turned into toast at Embro Lake, he’d merely been tired. The fire was still burning, but under control. Scott had waited for the formal announcement, which had come shortly before five in the morning. Four hours sleep hadn’t affected his looks, however.

  “So how did the fire start?” I asked after Vida had returned to her desk and begun two-fingered typing on her old upright.

  Scott was pouring himself a second cup of coffee. “They don’t know. Careless campers are always good suspects, but there’s no good place to pitch a tent in that area. Hikers, maybe, stopping for a smoke or a toke.”

  Leo Walsh, who had been on the phone, slammed down the receiver. “Dammit, Fred and Jack Iverson are pulling their standing ad for next week. Fred says he’s doing it out of respect for Jack Froland.”

  “Hey,” Scott put in, “aren’t there too many Jacks in this town? Whatever happened to originality?”

  Vida looked up from her typewriter. “Both Jack Frolan
d and Jack Iverson are actually named John. Indeed, Jack Iverson was named for his uncle. Both Jacks were grandsons of Trygve Iverson, though born fourteen years apart.”

  Scott shook his head. “I don’t know how you keep everybody in this town straight, Vida. Why don’t they just call all the guys Swede?”

  “Because the Iversons are Norwegians,” Vida said.

  I perched on the edge of Leo’s desk. “Couldn’t you talk Fred and Jack into running an In Memoriam ad?”

  Leo made a face. “I tried. No go. By coincidence, Fred and Opal are going on vacation next week. They’re closing the Venison Inn for repairs.”

  “Then hit them with a big reopening ad,” I said.

  “I will,” Leo replied, looking determined. “The upside is that they’re also pulling the Venison Inn ad from KSKY.”

  “That restaurant could use some work,” Scott remarked. “It looks like it hasn’t been renovated since the Sixties.”

  “That’s correct,” Vida said. “They closed down after President Kennedy was killed in 1963. That’s the last time they remodeled.”

  “They could use a new menu, too,” Scott said. “There’s only one decent place in town for a really nice meal, and that’s the ski lodge.”

  “Don’t forget Le Gourmand out on the highway,” I said. “They often make the top twenty lists of best restaurants in the state.”

  “But it’s way out of my price range,” Scott responded, no doubt blaming me for his less than opulent salary. “A meal for two costs close to a hundred bucks if you want a couple of glasses of wine.”

  Scott was dating a professor from Skykomish Community College, a somewhat older beauty named Tamara Rostova. Even college instructors made more than Scott, an economic fact that no doubt embarrassed him.

  “We need more ad revenue,” I declared, with a glance at Leo.

  “We need more advertisers,” Leo shot back. “Since when don’t I work my butt off scrounging up ads?”

  “Of course you do,” I said, “but maybe we should come up with a special promotion to tide us over between now and Halloween.”