The Buck Stops Here (8 page)

The driver never saw Bryan in the water, never even realized that there was a swimmer in his path. In a moment that was seared into my brain like a firebrand, I could still see how it was right before impact: the sun was warm and the sound was loud and the air smelled like suntan lotion and outboard motor exhaust and Bryan had not a moment to get out of the way.

The sound of his death was like the sound of fiberglass hitting lumber, and I remember thinking it was the sound of the skis being struck by the motor, that Bryan must have simply left them there on the surface and then ducked way down under the water, somehow propelling himself to the bottom of the river until the speedboat had passed. But an instant later the speedboat was gone, the skis were still intact, floating on the water, and Bryan was face down a good 40 feet away, the dark water turning red all around him.

“Oh, oh no,” Michael had cried, pulling our boat up even with Bryan’s body and then jumping overboard to lift him onto the steps. Between the two of us, we were able to drag him on board, and suddenly there were other boats around, someone yelling, someone else taking off after the speedboat.

I sat on the floor of Michael’s Sea Ray and cradled my husband in my arms. He was bleeding everywhere, which at the time I knew meant that at least he was still alive, at least his heart was still pumping. But his heart didn’t pump for very long. He died in my arms of massive blood loss and internal injuries. They told me later that I screamed nonstop for half an hour.

I didn’t remember that. I remembered pretending it hadn’t happened, pretending that I had rewound my watch and taken time backward. Just a few minutes would have been enough to alter the entire sequence of events. When the ambulance came, they had to pry me off my dead husband. Hours later I realized I was still clutching strands of his hair in my hand.

There wasn’t much after his death that I remembered. Somehow, time continued to progress: the man in the speedboat was caught, the police came, the ambulance took Bryan’s body away. I think we stayed locally for a day or two, our families racing there to take charge of the situation and take care of me. My father cried, unashamed, great streaming tears down his weathered cheeks like twin rivers of sorrow. Someone gave me some pills that helped me sleep. Somehow, eventually, I ended up back in our little house in Blacksburg. I didn’t have a lucid thought for at least a week.

The funeral was private, just the family, despite the fact that the whole town wanted to come. Two days later, however, Bryan’s family arranged a memorial service at the church, where I was put into a receiving line like a bride at a reception. At one point, my mother had to usher me out because I started laughing and couldn’t stop. I had a vague recollection of what was funny, something someone said about God taking Bryan home because He “needed another angel up in heaven.” People were so ignorant in their attempts to soothe me that I wanted to kill them.

Michael was beside himself with sorrow and guilt, despite the fact that there was nothing for him to feel guilty about. It had happened, a horrible, horrifying sequence of events that was over practically as soon as it began. It was no one’s fault. Bryan was dead, and it was no one’s fault.

Correction. It was one man’s fault, one man named James Sparks who had been at the wheel of that cigarette boat. But now I knew better. Now there was another person to consider. In some way, Tom was involved with Bryan’s death as well. The thought made me physically ill.

Seven

As I sat on the dock, looking out at the water and remembering the day my husband died, I realized that, in a way, it felt good to be here, to reconnect with this place now that I had several years’ perspective. As Tom had said,
James may be the one behind bars, but all of our lives were irrevocably changed that day
.

My life
had
been changed irrevocably, in an instant. I had everything and then I had nothing. I was left with a void that would never completely be filled, no matter how much I might go on with my life or even love again. Bryan was dead and gone.

I closed my eyes and prayed out loud, thanking God that through it all He had been there to fill that void. His love had kept me sane in the midst of insanity. His steadfast assurance that He would bear my grief saved me from grieving all alone.

Some people, I knew, experienced a tragedy like mine and turned from God, concluding simply that He did not exist. I don’t know why, but that had never happened for me. I spent a long time angry with God, yes, but I never felt He wasn’t there. His presence was far too real to me for that.

A song came to mind, an old hymn, and with my eyes still closed I sang it softly, my voice echoing on the water.

Our broken hearts have left us sad and lonely,
but Jesus comes to dwell Himself within.

Opening my eyes, I stood up and held out my hands, knowing there was no one around to see or hear as I sang the chorus in an act of worship.

When Jesus comes the tempter’s power is broken.
When Jesus comes the tears are washed away.
He takes the gloom and fills the life with glory.
For all is changed when Jesus comes to stay.

“Amen,” I whispered. Then, wiping away my tears, I turned around and walked back to my car.

I drove out of the campground as slowly as I had driven into it, catching one last glimpse of the river as I steered through the trees. Back at the highway, I turned right, heading toward Riverside. In my heart I was determined to learn the truths I needed to know.

When I got back to town, I went in search of a library, certain they would have archives for the local newspapers. Fortunately, there was a good-sized facility downtown, and I parked and went inside, preparing my heart for the brutal truths I was about to encounter.

The library hadn’t put their collections online, but shortly I unearthed a whole week’s worth of stories on microfilm. The first headline was on the front page and said “Tourist Dies in Boating Accident on Appomattox River.” The article was fairly concise, the word “tragic” jumping out from the page in several places. Yes, it was tragic. The photo that was front and center was a distant shot of the water, with an ambulance parked beside it and several paramedics pushing Bryan’s lifeless, blanketed body inside. There were several smaller photos also, including one black-and-white shot of me as the “victim’s wife,” standing on the shore, my bathing suit and shorts covered in what I realized now was blood. I stared at the picture for a long time, at the dazed expression on my face, at the dark stains that marked my clothes, my hands, my legs. I had a sudden memory of Michael making me go in the water to rinse off. At the time I had been so out of it that I hadn’t even understood what he meant. Now I knew.

The article concluded with a paragraph about Sparks:

The driver of the speedboat was arrested less than a mile from the scene when he stopped at the Docksider Grill, allegedly unaware that he had struck Webber in the water. The suspect, as yet unnamed, was taken into custody and is being held without bail.

Feeling oddly detached from the stories in front of me, I went to the next day’s paper, which also had an article on the front page, this time with a photo of the speedboat being impounded by the police as evidence. “Speedboat Killer Tests Positive for Intoxicants” claimed the headline, though the paper didn’t say whether those intoxicants were drugs or alcohol or both. There also wasn’t any information about where he had been staying in the area, though it was clear he had been the only person on board the boat at the time. A local resident, Harry Stickles, had witnessed the accident from his own motorboat and had pursued the speedboat to the Docksider Grill.

“That fellow had no idea what he done,” Stickles was quoted as saying. “When we caught him at the dock, he was absolutely shocked.”

I didn’t know until reading the article that Sparks had been taken under citizen’s arrest until the police could get there. A photo at the bottom of the page showed him being carted off in handcuffs by an policeman identified as Officer Darnell Robinson. Strangely, I felt a wave a pity for Sparks, who thought he’d been out for a little boat ride, only to learn he had just committed a hit-and-run.

My pity didn’t last long. In the next day’s paper, the test results had been released: The driver’s name was James Sparks, and his blood alcohol level was listed as 1.2, way beyond the legal limit for any kind of driving. His mug shot was featured prominently, next to a photograph of Bryan, with the caption: “Sparks Held for Manslaughter; Architect’s Life Cut Short in Hit-and-Run.”

Bryan’s photo was a professional head shot that had been taken for a company brochure the year before. In the picture he looked studious and handsome, brown hair cut short, his wire-rimmed glasses adding just the right intellectual touch. The article had apparently been written with information supplied by one of Bryan’s brothers, who was quoted as saying, “Bryan was a very special guy. He will be greatly missed by all who knew him.”

That was the last article that earned the front page. There were other mentions inside later issues of the paper, but the whole thing eventually became less about the specific incident and more about the perils of drinking and boat driving. When it had degenerated into mere statistics, I concluded my search. As neither the killer nor the victim were locals, there didn’t seem to be any further follow-up articles.

At least I had some names. I returned the tapes, signed out at the reference desk, and wandered from the library, my notebook and pen in hand, pausing at a pay phone near the front door to look in the local phone book. I found a phone number for a man named Harrison Stickles on Oakmont Road and copied it down. I also noted the address of the police station.

By the time I got back into the car, I realized I was starving. I found a small restaurant up the street and went inside, ordering tea, vegetable soup, and a grilled cheese sandwich, all comfort foods. As I waited, I scribbled thoughts in my notebook, scary thoughts that made me vaguely nauseous.

Tom feels guilty about Bryan’s death,
I wrote.
Culpable. Why? Did he drive the boat? Supply the boat? Supply the alcohol?
I was reaching, I knew, but there had to be some reason why Tom blamed himself.

If Tom knew James Sparks, there were many ways he might have somehow been involved in Bryan’s death. I just needed to learn where the gaps were—what Sparks had been doing in the area, who he was with, if it was his boat. I knew that cigarette boats cost a fortune, and that frightened me. Certainly, Tom had a fortune to spend on a big fancy boat if he wanted to.

By the time the food was put in front of me, my appetite had waned a bit. Still, I sipped at the tea and picked at the sandwich. I needed to keep going, and I wouldn’t last long without eating.

Once I finished and paid the bill, I called Harrison Stickles from the car, feeling a rush of relief when he confirmed that, yes, he was the same Harry Stickles who had helped out with that hit-and-run boating accident a few years back.

“Who wants to know?” he drawled. “You a reporter or something?”

He sounded eager, as though he missed the attention the whole incident had brought him. I said that no, I was the widow of the man who had been killed that day.

“Oh, I’m so sorry,” he said. “I didn’t realize. What can I do for you?”

“To be honest,” I replied, not being honest at all, “I was passing through the area and I realized I never really thanked you for your help that day. I just wanted to give you a call and let you know how much I appreciated your efforts.”

He sounded touched, like a sweet old guy who would have done his civic duty either way, but it was nice to be acknowledged.

“I did what any good citizen would do,” he told me. “When I saw that boat plow into that guy—uh, I’m sorry, into your husband—I didn’t even think. I just took off behind him.”

“You followed him all the way to the Docksider Grill?”

“It weren’t too far. Maybe a mile at the most.”

“So he was never out of your sight the whole time?”

This was the question I didn’t want to ask, terrified that perhaps Sparks hadn’t been the one at the wheel that day at all but had somehow made a quick switch with Tom.

“Never out of my sight,” Harry said. “He wasn’t getting away from me no way, no how.”

“And there was never any moment where you didn’t see him?” I pressed. I had to be sure.

“Nope. Lemme tell ya how it was,” Harry said, his voice warming to the tale. “My son and I was down at the river that day, trying out the new five-point seven-liter MerCruiser we put in our ski boat. When you folks came by, we had just put her in the water, and J.T. was parking the car. I was sitting there idling the boat when I heard that big sucker come roaring ’round the corner. I saw what was gonna happen, and sure enough it did. Pardon me, but the sound that boat made smacking into your husband’s body still gives me nightmares.”