Nevada Barr - A Superior Death

Tourists, hunched over bourbons and beers, pricked their ears for any sound of adventure. Anna crouched on the pier, eye-level with Patience standing in the boat. “What is it? Carrie?” As she asked and was answered with a grim nod, Anna suffered a stab of guilt. Denny Castle’s murder, Donna’s disappearance-both damage already done-had absorbed her attention so completely she had forgotten her primary duty: to protect and preserve. She had forgotten Jim Tattinger and his proven penchant for little girls, forgotten Carrie Bittner and her sullen and secretive affair with the mysterious beau.

“She’s run off,” Patience said. “She was supposed to be busing in the dining room. I was busy with the inventory brought on the Ranger Three and was at the dock. My night manager said Carrie left for supper and never came back. I’ve looked everywhere I can think of. I came to the north shore because that’s where she ran to the last time-Lane Cove, remember? She left this at the apartment. It must’ve been about an hour before I got home.”

Anna took the paper Patience pulled from the pocket of her trousers. On a piece of stationery with little faceless girls in oversized bonnets brightening one corner, written with pencil so dull that at first Anna thought it was crayon, were the words: “Living with you is like being in jail. You think you’re the only person that deserves a life. Not everybody thinks I’m a little kid anymore. Like you made my childhood so great! I’m going to end it and you can pretend to all your friends that it’s a big deal.”

“I wasn’t paying attention,” Patience said and water started in eyes already reddened. “I’ve had so much on my mind this summer. Carrie’s boy troubles were a complication I didn’t have time for. She was sulky but I didn’t think she was depressed. I know she won’t kill herself-she’s too big a baby-but even to leave a note…” Patience’s throat closed with tears and she stopped talking rather than break down.

“What day is it?” Anna demanded.

The unexpected nature of the question startled Patience momentarily from her fears. “Friday.” She waited for an explanation.

“Tattinger’s lieu day,” Anna said. “My guess is when Carrie said she was going to ‘end it’ she meant her childhood, not her life.” Anna dropped into the Venture and dragged a life vest out from under the seat. As she buckled it on she told Patience what she had learned of Tattinger.

“The first time she ran off it was Jim who told me where she was,” Anna said. “He was acting fishy but I wrote it off to general assholery, and after Denny was found, I figured his running without lights and creeping around had something to do with that. Carrie was with him, I’m willing to bet. That’s what he was hiding. She was the second shadow I thought I saw in the cabin.”

“What kind of boy could be so unacceptable?” Patience repeated her question of several weeks before. “A boy pushing forty. I’ll kill her.”

Had she been a mother, Anna thought, her first impulse would have been to kill Jim Tattinger. Tattinger couldn’t charm, dominate, or compete with women, so he’d turned his sexual attention to girls so young he could still wow them with his wisdom and maturity. Carrie Ann, awkward, plain, wanting to grow up sooner than her mother thought fit, would be the perfect choice.

Anna said: “Unless you saw a light-colored cabin cruiser called the Gone Fishin‘ on your way here, head south. That’s where I found him that first time. I expect he’s scouted out some little cove.” Patience turned south down Amygdaloid Channel. “I wouldn’t blame Carrie,” Anna said.

“I’m going to kill her for lying and for scaring her mother half to death,” Patience explained. “I’m going to kill Jim Tattinger for the good of the human race.” She shoved the throttle to full and the Venture leapt forward with a speed that took Anna by surprise. Clearly the engine had been overhauled, souped up. It was more powerful by far than the engine in a standard Chris-Craft cabin cruiser.

The roar ripped the stillness of the evening as the keel ripped the stillness of the water. Habitually watchful for snags and other water hazards, Anna kept her eyes on the channel. Her mind rattled on the Fate Worse Than Death they raced to stop, or interrupt. End her childhood: “Do you think Carrie was a virgin?” Anna asked.

“Yes. I’m pretty sure of it. She’s not boy-crazy at all. And it’s not like the seventh-grade boys were lining up to walk her home. Eighth grade was scaring her. They start having dances, dates, all that. God!” Patience exploded. “Barely thirteen. Eight weeks ago she was twelve. I will rip Tattinger in two. It’s not like she’s a Lolita. She’s just a goofy-looking little girl.”

Anna didn’t doubt that that attitude had done half of Tattinger’s work for him, but she didn’t say anything.

Finding Carrie and Jim together, the ensuing scene-certainly if the scandal was made public-the fuss and notoriety, might do Carrie more harm than simply waiting for her to return and dealing with it quietly in the morning. Unless Jim was exerting undue pressure, unless she’d been resisting because she’d not felt ready to commit her body to anyone, unless she was planning on “ending it” tonight not because she wished to enter into a sexual relationship at thirteen but to spite her mother. And at thirteen, does one know the difference?

“Do you think Carrie Ann has had sex with Jim yet? Has she seemed different, said anything?” Anna asked.

“How would I know? I’m only her mother,” Patience snapped. The anger momentarily vented, she gave the question due thought. “Carrie seems dull but she’s not stupid and she feels things. She’s never been any good at hiding things either. If she’d been sexually active I think she’d either have gone religious and remorseful or smug and insufferable-depending on how it went. Mostly she’s just been sulky. My guess is no, she’s too scared, too confused. Damn him! She hasn’t even had her first period.”

No fear of pregnancy, Anna thought. Somehow it made things worse, not better. It made Carrie such a child.

Silence was drummed deep by the throb of the engine. The Venture carried her cargo of anger and worry forward, the peace of the summer night descending in her wake.

“I know it seems like I stopped caring,” Patience said without looking at Anna. “But I didn’t. I just got tired. Single parenting: the formula for guilt. I got tired of feeling guilty because I wasn’t Supermom. I took the last year off, I guess. Kind of a sabbatical from motherhood. Bad timing, but I just ran out of gas.”

There was nothing Anna could say. Merely looking at Carrie Ann shuffling sullen-faced through puberty had made Anna tired. Still, she pitied the girl. Nobody chooses to be from a broken home. Maybe Carrie Ann just needed a dad and Tattinger had chosen to exact a price for playing the part.

“Little girls should never have to pay for love,” Anna said, but she’d spoken only to herself and Patience didn’t hear over the noise of the engine.

They found the Gone Fishin‘ anchored in Little Todd Harbor. A white light bobbed dutifully at the stern. Tattinger was taking no chances on this rendezvous getting interrupted for a petty maritime misdemeanor.

No one was on deck but there was a faint glow from the cabin. Anna wasn’t surprised. Tattinger harbored no affection for nature. He would choose the civilized discomfort of a cramped but man-made cabin to the glories of a summer night.

Patience headed the Venture straight for the side of the anchored vessel and didn’t cut power. For a sickening moment, Anna thought she meant to ram the other boat.