Gathering Lies Read online

  She folded her arms. “What about the two of you together?”

  “For God’s sake, Grace!”

  “All I’m saying, Sarah, is how do we know? None of us knows anybody else here. We don’t even know why we’re here—not really.”

  “She’s right,” Dana said tentatively. “I’ve been thinking about that. I mean, I’m not published or anything, and nobody’s ever even heard of me.” She looked at Timmy. “No offense, but I have been wondering why you invited me here.”

  Timmy seemed at a loss for words, and Amelia filled in for her. “In the first place, it’s not true that no one has ever heard of you, Dana. Many people have read your articles in Prevention, and someone recommended you.”

  “Really? I was recommended? By whom?”

  “I don’t quite remember now, but Timmy and I went through a file of recommendations, and you came out with some of the highest points.”

  “I don’t get it,” Dana said. “Who wrote these recommendations?”

  Amelia gave a slight shrug. “People who have been associated with Thornberry over the years.”

  “You mean alumni?”

  “Some are alumni, and some are simply people who supported Timmy when she turned the bed-and-breakfast into a writer’s colony. Most were old friends.”

  Kim spoke up. “What about the rest of us?”

  “You were all chosen in the same way,” Amelia said. “We were very meticulous in our process, weeding out names until we ended up with the best. Timmy wanted women with the greatest potential, who were writing about women’s issues in some way, and who had some experience in life, so that they knew firsthand what they were writing about. Women of conviction, who stood by their beliefs.”

  Amelia went on in this vein, explaining the selection process at length—and at some point I began to doubt her explanation. I was reminded of the old saying that when one is going to lie about something, it’s best to be brief. Inept liars often go into too much detail, feeling they have to explain themselves too much in order for the lie to be accepted. Amelia, I thought, had gone too far, perhaps, with that business about our “great potential.”

  In all modesty, I was ready to concede that Timmy might have looked upon me that way because she had been in on my beginnings as a writer. In fact, she’d been responsible for them. I could also see her thinking that way about Kim. As a film star, Kim had a certain status in the world that could carry her book to success. Presumably, she’d also had some sort of life experience that was worth reading about—even if none of us knew, yet, what that was.

  But Grace? How could Amelia describe her as someone with “great potential”? I’d never seen any proof whatsoever that Grace was even writing a book. I’d almost decided, for that matter, that she was here under false pretenses—one of those people who talks a good talk, but never seems to get around to the walk. Grace had told us she was a graduate student, who lived on grants and went from one writer’s colony to another all year long. I knew there were many young, would-be writers who lived that way—professional students, in a sense. They were often the literary types, who spent so much time applying for grants, they often had little time or energy left over to pour into a book.

  And then there was Jane. She had claimed to write romance novels, yet no one had ever seen a manuscript or heard her read from one. We had all attributed this to shyness, yet I’d wondered if she were serious enough about writing to devote herself to it, with all her concerns about family.

  Not that I had a problem with that. But from what I’d learned about writing in the past few months, I understood it now to be a full-time job, something that required tunnel vision. Writers, I’d learned from reading the bios of the famous ones—the ones who made it—were not necessarily “nice” people, by most accepted standards. They tended to be people who neglected their families, shut themselves up in a room for hours on end, and often didn’t bother to wash.

  This was definitely not Jane.

  Doubting that poor woman, however, was probably my low point that evening. If this went on, I thought, we’d all be at each other’s throats before long.

  Amelia put my thoughts into words. “I think we all need to pull ourselves together, now,” she said firmly. “This is not the time to start accusing each other. We must stand as one until help arrives. And no offense, Sarah, but isn’t it possible that the earth on the edge of that ravine was disturbed some other way? Perhaps from Jane trying to stop herself from slipping down the side?”

  I hadn’t thought of that, and admitted it was possible.

  “But if Gabe is telling the truth about seeing Luke at the ravine—” Dana began, casting an uneasy glance at Luke.

  “If he is,” Amelia interjected, “we will know, sooner or later. Meanwhile, it does no good to be at each other this way.”

  “Meanwhile,” Grace argued, “we do need to watch each other’s backs, just in case. I suggest we don’t allow anyone to go wandering off alone from now on.”

  For the past few minutes Luke had sat silently, listening to the speculation that he might be a killer. Now he spoke in a reasonable tone. “I agree with Grace. None of us really knows each other here—except, of course, that Sarah and I know each other, and both of us know Timmy. In this instance, however, we need to treat everyone in the same way. So I’ll tell you what—I’ll pair off with you, Grace, since you seem the most suspicious of me. Aside from Gabe, that is, and quite frankly I don’t trust myself with him right now.”

  Gabe shrugged. “I’d certainly prefer not to be paired off with a killer.”

  Luke’s mouth tightened, and Amelia spoke up. “I’ll pair off with Gabe.”

  Luke shook his head. “I don’t think—”

  “Don’t even bother to argue,” Amelia said. “I assure you, I’m more than able to protect myself.”

  Luke argued the point a bit more, but Amelia finally won out.

  “All right, then,” he said reluctantly. “Dana—you and Kim seem compatible enough. Which leaves Timmy and Sarah. How do you two ladies feel about spending some quality time together?”

  I wasn’t so sure about that, at first. Being partnered with Timmy would keep me here at Thornberry, when I might have preferred the freedom to roam the island.

  On the other hand, it might give me more time to search among the debris of my cottage for the Allegra case. If I had to pair off with Timmy, she would be the best of all possible worlds. There was no reason, after all, to suspect my old friend of foul play.

  9

  That first night after finding Jane dead was the most difficult, I think, since the quake. I couldn’t get her out of my mind enough to sleep, and the other women tossed and turned all night, as well. I kept seeing poor Jane on that ledge, covered with rocks. She should at least have been buried like Lucy. She should have flowers on her grave.

  She should still be alive.

  That she wasn’t was too ugly, too unthinkable. What if her husband and children had survived and were looking for her? What if they came here with the rescue teams that would surely, eventually, arrive? Who would tell them? How could anyone face those two beautiful children and tell them their mother was dead?

  I thought of Jane’s locket, realizing that I had forgotten to give it to her after Gabe had turned it over to me. She had died without it. A treasured locket with fresh, young faces inside. To grow up without a mother, their lives indelibly changed…who would want to be the bearer of such tidings?

  I lay in my blanket on the kitchen floor and stared at the opening in the ceiling. The rain that would inevitably return was holding off, and stars twinkled brightly as if they hadn’t a care in the world. I supposed that since they had all been dead for millions of years, and only their reflected light was left to be seen, they actually didn’t have a care. Not anymore.

  I wondered if we’d all end up that way—a piece of reflected light in the sky. Was that the only way we, and whatever light we’d managed to create in our lives, would survive
?

  Dark thoughts for a dark time. And now that I had moments alone to think, I had to ask myself: Did I really believe what I’d said about signs of foul play at the ravine? Or was that only the old paranoia kicking in?

  Yes, the ground had been torn up, and it was probably true that if Jane had simply fallen over during an aftershock, that wouldn’t have occurred. Could Amelia be right—that Jane, having begun to slip down the ravine, had clawed frantically at the edge, tearing mounds of dirt from the surface as she slid to her death?

  Or could the others have kicked up the dirt that way, in sheer panic, when they first found Jane? Surely that was the simplest explanation—and if I were to stick to the rule of Ockham’s razor, as taught in law school, the simplest of the two theories would be the preferred one. To quote the old monk, “It is vain to do with more what can be done with less.”

  Or to put it another way, the fact that bad things had happened in Seattle, and to me, didn’t mean they were happening here, and to Jane. That someone here on Esme Island might have murdered Jane was too complicated a theory.

  But say that’s what happened. Then, why? Jane was too ordinary, too innocent, to have been connected in any way to the same people who’d been out to get me in Seattle. Jane, and the Seattle Five?

  I couldn’t see it.

  But it didn’t have to be about me. It was my own fear—and perhaps the fact that Lonnie Mae’s evidence seemed to be missing—that had made me come up with that scenario. Perhaps Jane had brought her own secrets with her from Bellevue, something that had nothing to do with me at all.

  Alternatively, had she, as I’d suggested earlier, seen something she shouldn’t have?

  That opened up even more difficult questions: What did she see, and whom? Who on this island—who at Thornberry, right now—would murder a woman like Jane in cold blood? And why?

  So much for Ockham’s razor. The old monk had a good idea, but maybe life was less complicated in the fourteenth century. None of my theories was simple, and each one led to a question more complicated than the last.

  The only thing I knew for certain was that I’d have to make a thorough search, now, for the Allegra case. If I found it under the debris in my cottage, fine. If not, then someone here had taken it.

  Ergo, someone here posed a danger to me.

  And that same person might have killed Jane.

  By ten the next morning, only Timmy and I were left inside the farmhouse. Everyone else had gone off in pairs, to carry out chores that ranged from searching the horizon for passing boats—in which case, a fire would be built on the edge of the shore—to fishing or gathering clams and oysters off surrounding rocks.

  Contrary to Luke’s plan, I left Timmy alone in the kitchen for what I hoped would not be more than an hour, while I went in search of Luke and Grace. I needed Luke, or someone strong, to help me lift that range in my cottage. Grace might be as strong as Luke, but I felt I could trust him more. If the evidence case was there, I didn’t want anyone else knowing about it—especially Grace. There was something about her I just didn’t like, and I would have to think of some way to get Luke away from her, if only for a few minutes.

  I spotted them through the trees, as I was walking along a path in the forest near Thornberry. A tangle of six-foot blackberry vines lined the path, and I scanned the trees beyond through a break in the vines.

  They were standing by a thick, hollow tree stump with ferns growing from inside it. Grace stood with her back to Luke, running a frond between her fingers in a slow, thoughtful way. Luke said something to her, and I quickened my pace and opened my mouth to call out.

  What happened next stopped me dead in my tracks. Luke took Grace by a shoulder and whirled her around, pulling her into his arms. They stood that way for several moments. Astonishingly, Grace looked frail and helpless, as if she were melting in Luke’s embrace. All I could do was watch, unable to move in any direction.

  When my wits finally returned, I took a step back, more out of shock than a thought to run. My foot landed on a twig, which snapped with a loud craaack. Luke dropped his arms and jerked around, and the look on his face was one I’d never seen before. His facial skin stretched tight, like a cat instantly on the alert for danger. His eyes were sharp as they searched the stand of trees.

  “Who’s there?” he called out.

  I was so shocked, I didn’t answer at first. Then I debated trying to disappear behind the wall of blackberry vines, and running back to Thornberry along the path.

  But when Luke called out again, I couldn’t do it. I stepped forward.

  “It’s me,” I said, shading my eyes and squinting as if it were difficult to see that far. “Who’s that? Oh, Luke. And Grace. I didn’t see you there.”

  “What are you doing out here?” Luke said, his voice still tight. “You’re supposed to be with Timmy.”

  “She, uh, sent me out to look for thistle. She says it’s healing to drink when it’s been boiled, and she thought we could all use some, if only to strengthen our immune systems—at least that’s what Dana says, it helps to keep people from getting sick…”

  I was babbling, saying too much, just as I’d thought Amelia had done earlier, in explaining how we all came to be invited here.

  “Anyway,” I finished lamely, “I’ve only been gone a few minutes. I’m sure she’s all right.”

  “That’s not the point, Sarah,” Luke said angrily, running a hand through his hair. “We need to keep an eye on her, same as everyone else. You never should have left her.”

  I folded my arms and bristled. “Well, I’m sorry if I can’t quite see Timmy as a serial killer, but if you want to, that’s your prerogative, I suppose. Anyway, what about you? And Grace?”

  He hesitated, giving me a sharp look. “What about us?”

  “What are you two doing that’s so helpful today? Aren’t you supposed to be down by the shore? I thought your job was to hunt for oysters and clams—whatever you could find that was edible.”

  “We’re on our way there,” he said irritably.

  “Oh, and you were going to carry all these oysters and clams in what exactly? Your pockets?”

  His face darkened. “What the hell are you talking about?”

  “I’m just saying I don’t see any buckets.”

  Luke stared at me, opened his mouth, then shut it. He turned with a frown to Grace. “She’s right,” he said. “You didn’t bring the buckets?”

  Her chin went up. “No, I did not bring the buckets. I thought that was your job.”

  “Grace, I’m sure I told you to bring the buckets.”

  “Well, I didn’t hear you say to bring any buckets.” She planted her hands on her hips.

  “So what did you think we’d do without buckets?” Luke said.

  “I guess I fucking thought we’d carry those crappy little things home in our crappy little pockets!”

  There was a moment of silence as the two of them stood nose to nose, like two fighting cocks. Then all of a sudden, Luke laughed. Grace, to my amazement, broke into laughter, too. They laughed so hard, they both doubled over, tears running down their cheeks.

  I watched them for a minute, and when they didn’t stop, I began to feel more and more like an outsider. Luke—one of my oldest friends, and my first love—had for some reason connected with the one person in our group I’d never been able to stand.

  What’s more, they had connected as a man to a woman. Apparently, Luke had lied about his feelings for Grace.

  Disgusted, I turned and left, heading for my cottage.

  On the way to my cottage I thought about what I’d seen. Luke’s initial anger toward me, I supposed, might have been just a reaction to having been caught at whatever he and Grace were doing.

  But why? Neither one was married or otherwise involved, as far as I knew.

  Of course, I didn’t know. And that was the thing. Since the quake, the other women and I hadn’t asked many questions of one another. Survival had seemed the prime
directive. I did know Grace had claimed to be single when we first talked after arriving at Thornberry.

  But what about Luke? Except for our talk in the woods earlier, in which he had said he’d been married but wasn’t anymore, I didn’t know much about his current life.

  Putting logic to work—and being as honest with myself as possible—I asked myself why seeing him there like that with Grace had upset me so much. After all, hadn’t I been telling myself for months that I didn’t want to be involved again with a man? That I didn’t have time for it, and didn’t trust it?

  I was feeling shaken, I reasoned, only because Luke had stirred up old feelings from a younger, more innocent time. And who wouldn’t want to go back to those times, if only in memory? Who wouldn’t be swayed by them?

  I didn’t know why I used the word “swayed.” It came naturally to my mind, and from there I had to wonder if Luke had been deliberately trying to sway me into caring about him again—and not for romantic reasons. Had he been manipulating me? And if so, for what purpose?

  Entering my cottage, or rather its rubble, I still had no answers. I only knew I would lift that damned range by myself, if it killed me.

  It almost did.

  The range had fallen facedown. I had found a short two-by-four, and managed to slide it underneath in a two-step process. First, I used a thin but semi-sturdy stick, sliding it past the burner knobs and lifting the range just enough to create a space of a few inches. Then, quickly, before the stick could break, I shoved the two-by-four under. By wiggling it back and forth, and pushing it at the same time, I eventually managed to work it halfway under the stove.

  This took far longer than I’d imagined it would, and when I was done I was tired and sweaty. My limbs shook, which I attributed to a lack of protein in my diet over the past few days. I hoped Gabe and Amelia would have some luck fishing today. Amelia had declared herself an old hand at backpacking, and it was clear now that her “tough old bird” act was more than that. She was proving to be strong physically as well as mentally, now that the initial shock of the quake had worn off. I had no doubt that if Gabe Rossi tried anything with her, she’d flatten him.