Chapter 40
“It’s not looking good,” says Judd. His voice is small and weak but steady.
“We now have three eyewitnesses saying Teddy was dead,” Judd adds. “Damn kids should have told us the truth from the beginning—they’ve put us through hell. And now I think we have to assume the worst. Still a lot of unanswered questions, like where the hell is Teddy’s body?”
Judd responds with a nod. Cawing crows and wind fill the small home until Deb speaks.
“This is the worst part,” says Deb. “The knowing and not knowing. If Teddy was still where they found him, then we wouldn’t be in this purgatory. I mean, it sure feels like he’s dead. The complete absence of contact. But we can’t grieve. At least I can’t. Not yet. Not until it’s final.”
“Nor should you,” says Mei. “I see this at the hospital when a patient is clinging to life. There’s very little chance of recovery, but the family cannot grieve. They can be devastated and heartbroken but part of grief is healing and that process cannot begin until after the person has died.”
“I’m going to the bluff, too,” says Deb. “I can’t sit here any longer.”
Clay sits on the couch. Braedon sits on the floor, leaning back against Clay’s shins. Clay puts his hands on his son’s shoulders and says, “Deb, we’ll do everything we can to make this purgatory time, as you call it, as short as possible.”
Zoey says, “I’m sorry things are looking the way they are.”
Clay watches Deb process what she’s hearing, or at least her attempt to.
Thank God it’s summer, he thinks. She can get outside and see life.
And beauty. The world’s afterlife following Minnesota’s unforgiving winter.
A small consolation, but it’s something.
And in situations like this, something is better than nothing.
Mei says that she and Braedon have been cooking all morning and that they’ll serve lunch. Judd doesn’t want to leave Deb for a minute. As Braedon and Mei head into the kitchen, Clay asks Zoey to step outside.
“I have a hunch,” says Clay. He speaks just above a whisper since every window in the doublewide is open. “About how Teddy died. Want to go for a ride before that search team is crawling all over the bluff?”
Forty-five minutes later, they stand atop Miller’s Bluff.
They can see the entire town of Riverwood and then some.
The creeks and rivers of Fillmore County wind and merge in and out of forest and fields.
Clay remembers coming up here as a kid and thinking, My world can’t be this small. And it is small. Small but beautiful.
“I’ve never been to the top before,” says Zoey. “Pretty.”
“But there’s something that’s not pretty. That’s why the city council voted to get rid of it.”
“The power lines,” says Zoey. “And the metal towers that hold them up.”
Clay nods, steps over to the base of the stanchion, and says, “Call for help if I fall.” He swings one leg up and begins to climb.
Up he goes from brace to brace until he reaches a ladder for maintenance and repair.
Clay knows he should have some sort of safety harness, but there’s no wind, and he’s still in excellent shape.
He doesn’t dare look down—he knows how that will feel.
He keeps his eyes on the old power line that still runs over the bluff.
The city replaced it with a buried line and hasn’t gotten around to taking this one down yet.
He’s ten feet from the top when he sees it.
One of the thick, heavy power lines is cut halfway through.
The old insulation is singed and charred around the cut mark.
Clay’s hunch is correct. He can’t prevent his eyes from blurring with tears.
But like a soldier on the battlefield who’s just seen his friend fall, Clay knows mourning will have to wait.
He climbs all the way to the top and carefully lets go with his right hand, grabbing the stanchion more tightly with his left.
He reaches into his back pocket, removes his phone, takes a picture, and starts down.
When Clay sets his feet on the ground, Zoey’s eyes reflect what he’s feeling. He goes to her, falls into her embrace, and feels his shoulders heave with sobs. For Clay, the grieving process has started.
“Tell me,” says Zoey.
Clay wipes away his tears, takes a breath, looks up at the power line, and says, “Teddy was trying to cut down the power line. That’s why he had the sawzall.
There was no current running through the lines.
The city council was just taking its time hiring someone to cut it all down.
That thick copper wire is worth quite a bit at the scrapyard.
Tens of thousands if you cut down enough of it.
My guess is Teddy tried to saw through it.
That’s when he lost his balance and fell. Or maybe lightning struck.”
“The tower?” says Zoey.
“Possibly,” says Clay. “Or it could have struck anywhere along the power line. Even miles away. That kind of power running through a line thick enough to carry it—it would have killed Teddy instantly. Either way, he probably fell onto the hard limestone. Remember, they didn’t turn him over.
The backside of him might have been banged up pretty bad.
And if the limestone was wet, he would have slid down to the spot where the boys found him.
If it rained up here, it would have washed away the blood. ”
“Was there a storm early Friday morning?” says Zoey. “I don’t remember one.”
“It must have blown through pretty quickly,” says Clay.
“One of those early summer storms. But it definitely rained. I know because I’d planned on going fishing Friday morning, but there was a stain on the water from the runoff.
Wasn’t a big storm or the river would have been chocolate milk.
Completely unfishable. But there was enough brown in the water to keep me off the river. ”
“So what happened to the body?” says Zoey.
Clay shudders and chokes down tears. “Maybe an animal or person dragged him away. Hopefully the dogs will pick up his scent.” Clay walks around the area, looking at grasses and shrubs. “Everything looks perfect,” says Clay. “Which means it was probably a person who used the path.”
Zoey gives Clay a moment to find a balance between investigator and grieving nephew, then says, “So not the boys? Someone else found him and decided to hide the body?”
“That doesn’t make much sense, does it?” says Clay.
“No,” says Zoey. “It doesn’t. But who else would have known he was up here? And why would they want to hide the body?”
Clay disappears in mind and spirit. It’s something that’s happened to him before.
Both on the pitch and as an agent. More frequently in athletics when the conscious mind yields to what feels like other forces.
How are the most magnificent athletic moments achieved?
Most athletes don’t understand it themselves.
How did they score that seemingly impossible goal?
Or make that mind-boggling catch? In the post-game interviews, all they can do is give the credit to God.
Of course, they always say God was with them.
They never say God wanted the other team to lose.
Clay’s heard artists talk the same way. I’m just a conduit for the universe.
The universe is working through me. Clay believes just the opposite.
Everything he’s ever seen, heard, smelled, experienced …
it’s all inside him. He is a product of everything he’s been exposed to.
He’s like a hard drive full of data. Accessing it, assembling it, interpreting it is a conversation between one part of his brain and the other.
So when he has sudden realizations, he doesn’t question where they come from. He doesn’t give credit to an outside force. And most importantly, he doesn’t doubt his realizations. When the voice in his head speaks with such clarity, it’s rarely wrong.
“We need to talk to Thomas Becker again,” says Clay. “And this time, I want his parents and a lawyer to be present.”
“I’ll have Mike and Andy bring him in,” says Zoey. “And I’ll bring in a second team to search Liar’s Creek from the bottom of Miller’s Bluff all the way down to the Mississippi River.”