A Body on Fitzgerald's Bluff

by Anna Celeste Burke

  “Sure. Stay safe. It’s not always a good thing to get mixed up in other people’s messes, is it? Bye.” With that, Judi Stephenson ended the call.

  “Did you catch all that?”

  “Most of it,” Neely replied as she slowed and flipped on her left turn signal. Seconds later, Neely turned into the Old Cottage Beach lot and found a parking place right away. I had expected the lot and the beach to be busier than it was given that it was a gorgeous day and the summer people had started to arrive.

  As Neely explained when I expressed my surprise, except on weekends, the lot was mostly used by local people picking up or dropping off their kids at the Blue Haven Bluejackets Summer Camp on our left. The resort had a shuttle for the children of hotel guests, some of whom participated in the overnight camp program. According to Neely, the well-appointed lodge was nothing like the bunkrooms for kids at typical camps. Neely had another comment about the summer people.

  “The point of renting a beach cottage for the summer is so you don’t have to drive to the beach and park in the lot since you’re living there already.” I nodded.

  That’s one of the things I enjoy about the location of our community. We have a small pedestrian walkway that takes us over the roadway, so we don’t have to deal with traffic even when there’s a special event at the resort. That also means we have no worries about parking.

  “Where’s the cottage Howard Humphrey’s renting?” I asked wondering once again about his relationship with Diana after what Judi had said. The image of his hasty retreat from the golf shop also popped into mind. Where was he? Had he gone back to his cottage or had the police caught up with him and taken him in for questioning? Hank Miller didn’t strike me as the sort of man you could run from for long.

  For some reason, that thought suddenly made me feel like blushing again. Neely eyed me as if she could read something in my body language. I launched into an account of my call with Judi and eventually ended back at the point where I wondered, aloud this time, if Howard was in his cottage.

  “The old Sinclair Cottage is one of the first places we’ll run into that sits outside the cluster of summer places.” Neely pointed to a mishmash of structures in various sizes and trimmed in an array of bright colors. “That call to Judi points in lots of different directions doesn’t it? Not just different men, but motives, too.”

  “It sure does. I wonder what Midge and Marty found out about Diana’s last breakfast—where she was and, if she had someone with her, who was it? That ought to help steer us one way or another when it comes to narrowing down suspects and motives. I’m getting a headache from intracranial whiplash as I switch directions about whodunit so fast.”

  “Ooh, ‘intracranial whiplash.’ That’s great. Make sure you use that in your story, Murder on Fitzgerald’s Bluff.”

  “I like that title much better than the one I suggested, Neely! I might just steal it, or something like it, if I decide to write about this mystery,” I said. “It’s too bad we’re moving so slowly. At this point, there’s still not much of a story to tell, is there? Maybe we’ll get closer to understanding what’s going on when we meet for dinner.”

  “We don’t have to put off all the debriefing until then. Midge and Marty will be here soon, and we’ll have to decide who’s going to visit which beach houses. They’ll update us when they show up. Let’s see what surprises they have for us. We have more than a few for them.” With that, Neely and I slid out of our seats, stepped into the sea breeze, and found ourselves facing a new surprise. This one did not come from Midge and Marty.

  16 The Blue Haven Bluejackets

  We hadn’t walked more than a few feet from our car when I noticed a group of boys near the entrance to the camp dressed in t-shirts that said Blue Haven Bluejackets on them. They were dashing about, running in and out of bushes and trees near the open gates along a gravel road that led into the camp. Those bushes and trees bore the recognizable mark of the landscaping used at the resort. The Blue Haven Resort logo was etched along with the camp’s name above the entrance. What caught my eye was the fact that several of the boys were tugging at a scarf.

  “Look at that, Neely.”

  “They’ve got a game of Capture the Flag in progress—or maybe it’s just about over since a couple of the boys seem to have the flag in hand.”

  “They may be using it as a flag for their game, but that’s a scarf. Isn’t the design familiar to you?”

  “Well, I’ll be a monkey’s uncle!” Neely took off toward the group of a dozen boys. “Yoo-hoo! Can you boys help me, please?” They stopped whatever wrangling they’d been doing and stared at her.

  “Are you lost?” One of them called out.

  “No. But you may have something I lost. That looks like a scarf I’m missing.” Most of the boys backed off when they heard Neely’s reply. Apparently, it was game over. They didn’t exactly run for it, but stepped away and left the two boys holding the flag to face us by themselves.

  “It does?” The older of the two boys asked.

  “Yes. I’m Neely, what’s your name?”

  “Brandon. This is my brother, Nathan. Nice to meet you.”

  “It’s nice to meet you, too. This is my friend, Miriam.”

  “Hey,” Brandon said, acknowledging my presence. “Where did you say you lost your scarf?”

  “She didn’t say,” I replied. I wondered why that mattered to him. In the condition the scarf was in, he couldn’t be concerned about its value. Maybe he thought Neely was going to give them grief about what he and his brother, and their friends had done to it. “You’re not in any trouble no matter where you found it.”

  “I’m not worried about that. I am wondering if I should call the police since you don’t look anything like the woman we saw running on the beach that morning who lost the scarf.”

  “Woman?” I asked.

  “Running—as in jogging?” Neely added.

  “Nah. She and some guy were fooling around—laughing and splashing in the water,” Brandon explained.

  “They were celebrating,” Nathan added.

  “That’s what she told us when we picked up the scarf for her. She told us to keep it,” Brandon said.

  “Plus, she said she had lots more of them. Remember?” Brandon nodded when Nathan asked him that question.

  “This means you’re lying, Neely—if that’s a real name. That’s why I’m pretty sure we should call the police.” The two boys moved a little closer together but stared at us defiantly.

  “Yeah, also because we heard she’s dead,” Nathan whispered.

  “That’s true. We already know that since my dog and I found her a little while later. I’m certain we should call the police,” I said, pulling my phone out to make the call. Neely made eye contact and nodded in agreement.

  “Miriam’s right!” Neely exclaimed. “The police need to hear what you’ve just told us as soon as possible.” For the first time, the two boys appeared as if they might bolt.

  “Don’t get cold feet, guys. Talking to the police is the right idea. Nobody’s going to cause you any trouble since you haven’t done anything wrong,” I said in a reassuring tone.

  “That’s what you think. We weren’t supposed to be out there in the dunes on our own that early in the morning. When our parents hear we sneaked out of the camp, we’re toast!” I didn’t tell them, but angry parents were the least of their worries. As I dug out Hank Miller’s card that I’d tossed into my purse, I was concerned that the man who’d been on the beach with Diana might be interested in tracking down the boys who’d seen him that morning.

  “What did the guy with her look like?” I asked as I typed in the detective’s phone number and hit the call button. I held my breath, prepared for them to tell me about a big, scary-looking man.

  “Ordinary.” Before I could ask Brandon what he meant by that, the detective answered my call. I was a bit surprised since I expected to get his voice mail.

  “Hank Miller speaking,” he said i
n the clipped tones of a busy man.

  “Uh, Detective, this is Miriam Webster. Are you still at the resort?”

  “Yes. Why?”

  “We have two people with important information who need to speak to you as soon as possible.”

  “I’m in the middle of something—can you have them meet me at the police station in Duneville Downs in an hour or so?”

  “No. I don’t believe they can drive.” Both boys looked at me as if I was crazy and shook their heads no. “I’m not sure their parents would want them to get into a car with Neely and me, either.” I put the phone against my chest for a second, so the detective couldn’t hear the question I asked the boys.

  “Are your parents staying at the resort?” That got two nods and two expressions of dread.

  “Hank, I’m going to put Brandon on the phone and let you speak directly to him. I presume his parents will want to be with him when you question him. You don’t want to put that off for long, though.” Then I turned away from the boys and spoke to Hank Miller in a low voice. “They were here at the beach. It was very early in the morning and they ran into Diana with some ‘ordinary’ looking man. They have her scarf.”

  “As in our murder weapon?” Hank asked.

  “No, thank goodness. She dropped this one on the beach before…” I stopped that sentence not able to use words like strangled or murdered with the boys nearby. “…she died.”

  “Okay. Let me speak to him. If he gives me his parents’ names and their room number at the resort hotel, I’ll contact them and have them accompany me to hear what they have to say, start to finish.”

  “That’s great, Detective Miller. I know you’ll tell their parents what an important contribution they’re making to a police investigation. You don’t want your key informants to get into any trouble with their parents, right?”

  “Uh, I’ll try. Are you all in a safe place?” I looked around, suddenly feeling terribly conspicuous. Hank’s mind must have moved down the same track that had convinced me to call him immediately. He needed to act quickly to find out what Nathan and Brandon had witnessed and protect them if the man they’d seen with Diana was her killer.

  “Not exactly.” I explained where we were, but not why. “We can wait for you in Neely’s navy-blue hatchback parked in the beach lot, okay?” Brandon and Nathan both shuffled their feet as if they might be thinking once again about making a break for the campgrounds. Just as they did that, I heard a horn toot. Neely and I turned and waved at Midge and Marty in a cherry red Mustang convertible.

  “Look at that cool car!” Nathan exclaimed.

  “Hank, will you make that Midge Gaylord’s car instead, okay?” I quickly told him how to spot the car now parked next to Neely’s hatchback.

  “Here you go,” I said, handing my phone to Brandon. “Detective Hank Miller needs to speak to you, but he has to contact your parents first. You heard the message I gave him about what to tell your parents. There’s no way you two are going to be toast, okay?” That coaxed a smile from both boys—more from relief than happiness.

  “Hello,” Brandon said as soon as he took the phone. Before he could add anything else, Nathan spoke up.

  “Brandon, tell him about this, too, okay?” Brandon nodded as Nathan pulled a cell phone from the pocket of his shorts and handed it to me.

  “Detective Miller, sir, uh, just to be sure we get off on the right foot, you should know that we have the dead woman’s phone.” Midge and Marty had joined us just in time to hear that news. They let out audible sounds of surprise along with Neely and me.

  “Midge and Marty, meet star witnesses, Nathan and Brandon,” I said. Brandon nodded, but kept talking to Hank Miller.

  “Brandon’s on the phone with Detective Miller, who’s down the road a bit at the Blue Haven Resort where we ran into him earlier,” Neely explained.

  “Okay, but what’s this about Diana’s phone?” Midge asked, getting right to the point.

  “We found it. Later,” Nathan said. “It was just lying out there in the sand. We figured it fell out of her pocket when she was running around with that Howie guy.” My mouth fell open.

  “Howie?” I asked. “You know his name?”

  “That’s what the woman called him,” Nathan replied, shrugging his shoulders as if it was no big thing.

  “Hang on a second, okay?” I asked.

  “Why not? I’m not going anywhere, am I?” He asked and then smiled broadly.

  “Brandon, please tell Hank I need to speak to him again before he hangs up.” He nodded.

  “Well, that beats the heck out of our big news,” Marty sighed. “Howard Humphrey was Diana’s breakfast companion.” Midge jumped in to explain in an excited tone.

  “Doward Wilson told us it wasn’t the first time the two of them had been in the diner at the truck stop for a late-night snack or crack of dawn breakfast. He figured they’d been partying all night and stopped in for coffee to sober up.”

  “It was more than that though,” Marty added. “According to Diana, they needed a big breakfast because they were facing a long trip and wouldn’t get decent food on the plane.”

  “Brandon and Nathan said they were celebrating when they ran into them on the beach that morning. Did he say what they were celebrating or where they were going?”

  “No. They must have had a place nearby where they had their suitcases stashed. Maybe we can answer those questions if we figure out where they were staying or can track Howard down and ask him,” Midge said.

  “I’m not sure Howard wants to be found, but the police are looking for him. We were going to check on a cottage he’s renting when we made the rounds of the summer cottages here. I’m not sure we need to do that, now.” I was about to fill them in on the details about the news Joe and Carl had delivered earlier about Sinclair Cottage, and about Howard Humphrey’s sudden departure from the pro shop. When Brandon stepped toward us and handed me the phone, I asked Neely to do it instead.

  “He’s ready to talk to you now.”

  “Thanks, Brandon,” I said as I grabbed the phone.

  “It’s me again, Hank. I want to make sure you’ll ask Howard Humphrey what he was doing with Diana Durand on the beach the morning she was murdered when he was supposedly at his uncle’s house. Brandon can confirm it when you get here. He and Nathan heard Diana call the man she was with, Howie. You’ll put Howard Humphrey on the spot about that, right?”

  “When we catch up to him, we sure will.”

  “Since you don’t have your hands on him already, you should have someone watching for him at the nearby airports,” I said and told him what Midge and Marty had learned from speaking to Doward Wilson. Not only that the two of them were out for breakfast together, but mentioned that they were about to leave for a trip somewhere that involved a long plane flight.

  “You all have been busy, haven’t you? Until we catch up with this guy, no more poking around!” Issued as an ultimatum, I didn’t argue, but I replied curtly.

  “Sure, it’s already been a long day. I need to go home and liberate Domino. She’s been cooped up since I left early this morning.”

  “Go home. Take care of the dog. That’s perfect.” I was about to hang up when he spoke again. “Did the boys use that phone?” I blinked a couple of times trying to understand what he was asking. Then it hit me.

  “Diana’s ghost, huh?”

  “Yes.”

  “Let me ask.” The boys had wandered away to get a closer look at Midge’s Mustang. I cupped the phone as I called out to them.

  “Nathan, Brandon, did you make any calls on the cell phone?” They took a few shuffling steps back toward me and glanced at each other warily. “It’s okay, you can tell me. You’re not in any trouble.”

  “Yes. Nothing personal or anything like that. When we got back to the camp, we tried to find someone who could tell her that we had her phone,” Nathan responded.

  “We checked her profile and found her name,” Brandon added. “Then we
went to her speed dial numbers and called ‘Daddy,’ but he didn’t answer. There was a weird voicemail message, so we didn’t say anything.”

  “Weird, how?”

  “Well the guy on the voicemail said his name was Edgar, but his voice sounded a lot like that Howie guy. It was confusing.”

  “We weren’t sure what to do next because right after that our friends, Carter and Kevin, told us there was a dead woman on the beach at Blue Haven. We looked up the story and saw it was that same woman, even if it wasn’t the same beach.”

  “Why didn’t you call the police?” Midge asked. They scuffed their feet and looked down at the blacktop without answering her question.

  “They didn’t want to be ‘toast,’ right?” Both boys bobbed their heads in agreement with me. I could hear Hank Miller saying something.

  “What was that about toast?” He asked.

  “Nothing important. The short answer to your question is that the boys called Edgar trying to reach someone who could tell Diana they found her phone. The mystery of Diana’s ghostly call from the grave is solved. Once you take them someplace safe and go over all the details with them, they may remember even more. You’ll be here soon, won’t you?” I suddenly felt anxious for the two brothers. They were doing their best to be brave despite finding themselves involved in a murder investigation and in possession of the dead woman’s scarf and phone. Of course, in true teen fashion, parental sanctions topped the list as their biggest fear.

  “Yes. We’ve located the parents. I’m going to speak to them now.” That sounded like yet another abrupt end to a conversation, but I was wrong. “I shouldn’t do anything to encourage you and your active adult companions to get into more trouble, but you handled this well, Miriam.” I was floored! It took me a long pause before I could utter a reply.

  “Thanks. I’ll share that with my gang of old ladies.” He laughed as he said goodbye. When I turned to tell the others that Hank had actually paid us a compliment, I froze. My heart rate sped up as I strained to make out the figure of a man. When I blinked, he was gone.