Chapter 141

"I come up in the dark Saturday morning before dawn. Before I go home I'll swing in here and put the phone behind that tree with the broken branch." I pointed. "Anytime after Monday morning you can come collect the phone, but you might want to just leave it here and only use it from here."

"That probably would be safer."

"I will be working on our problem and when we talk again I may have a plan."

"Good! I am so glad you finally found out, and I'm sorry you found out." Her eyes were full and one tear ran down her face.

"How long have you been suspicious?"

"Bill never used to attend conferences. He said they couldn't tell him how to farm. Suddenly, just before Thanksgiving, he said he was going to a conference. When he got back all his clothes were clean. Not even a dirty sock in his suitcase. Two weeks later I heard that Charlene had gone to the conference too."

"And?"

"And they have been at four conferences since. Bill hasn't bought anything at any conference. Two weeks ago they were gone on a Tuesday and Wednesday but the conference had been cancelled. When I unpacked Bill's suitcase there was a pair of yellow thong panties in the suitcase."

"OK. We know, but need proof. What do you think Bill will do when he gets caught?"

"If he gets caught by me, I'm probably dead. If he gets caught publicly he'll bluster and cave in."

"That's good to know."

"What will Charlene do?" "Either disappear or beg for forgiveness and blame Bill."

"OK. I'd better get back. I told my sister I thought I saw our dog. He ran away two weeks ago. Actually I think Bill killed him as payback for something I had done to displease him."

"OK. I'll wait here for a while and then go home."

I watched her walk to her Ford and drive off. I waited a while thinking about what we might be able to do, then I went home. As I walked in the phone rang.

"Hello?"

"Honey?"

"Yup. How's the conference?"

"Boring. What're you up to?"

"Oh a lot of homeowner's to-do list stuff. There's a list of stuff I'll pick up in Portland and then I can finish some projects when I come back. Let's both pray for good weather and no conferences for next weekend."

"I'll pray for that."

"When will you be home?"

"We'll be leaving Bend at about noon on Monday. I figure we'll be back in Trout Lake by dark."

"I'll be thinking about you as we're both on the road Monday."

"I'll think of you too."

She sounded sincere. I was torn. What was going on? Would she plead the "I was lonely" defense? Would she accept fault or attempt to hand it to me? Over the next few hours at home I looked for and thought about how I could get the evidence we needed. I ate a straight-from-the-can dinner and turned on the TV. Trout Lake gets three channels, unless you have a dish. Two of the three are far enough away that the signal has snow year round. The third is based in Trout Lake and does craft shows, PTA meetings, city council meetings and such. A craft show was on. Five women were showing how they were making a double-wedding-ring quilt. The show was shot in the home of one of the women and linked to the valley transmitter.

When I went to bed I had a strange dream. I dreamed about people tuning in for the quilt show and seeing Charlene and Bill romping on the quilt on our bed. In my dream the phone lines buzzed and soon everyone was watching them fuck on Valley Public TV.

As I drove back to Portland, the dream started looking more and more like a plan. While I was at work I talked with the techies at work about how to do a remote transmission to Valley Public TV. They gave me a list of the equipment I could rent and how to set it up. One of them made a few calls and found the frequency we needed to broadcast on.

By Thursday I had all the equipment I needed and had even tested it so I knew what I was doing. The techies even gave me a way to trigger the transmission without being anywhere near the equipment. \

I called Charlene at work and told her that I was coming home on Friday morning instead of Saturday morning. I made a joke about getting her boyfriend out of the house because I was coming home early. There was a hesitation before she laughed. Yeah, guilty!