Plum Island

by Nelson DeMille

  “Are you hungry?”

  “Sure. Let me call the shop.” She did, and I poked around the office a bit. I heard her say, softly, “I may not be back this afternoon.”

  No, Ms. Whitestone, you may not be if I have anything to say about it.

  She hung up, and we went downstairs. She said, “We have small receptions and parties here. It’s nice at Christmas.”

  “That reminds me—are you going to Mr. Tobin’s soiree on Saturday?”

  “Maybe. Are you?”

  “I thought I would. In the line of duty.” She suggested, “Why don’t you arrest him in front of everyone and take him away in handcuffs?”

  “That sounds like fun, only I don’t think he’s done anything wrong.”

  “I’m sure he’s done something wrong.” She led me to the front door, and we went outside. It was getting warmer. She locked the door and took the Post-it note off. I said, “I’ll drive.”

  I started my vehicle with the remote. She said, “That’s a nice feature.”

  I said, “It’s good to detonate car bombs from a distance.”

  She laughed. I was not joking.

  We got into my sport utility vehicle, and I threw it into reverse, purposely leaving my door ajar. The female voice said, “The driver’s side door is ajar.”

  Emma said, “That’s a silly feature.”

  “I know. It sounds like my ex-wife. I’m trying to kill it. The voice, not my ex-wife.”

  Emma played with the computer buttons as she asked me, “How long have you been divorced?”

  “Actually, it’s not official until October first. In the meantime, I’m trying to avoid adultery and bigamy.”

  “That should be easy.”

  I wasn’t sure how to take that. I pulled out of the parking area and said, “What do you like? You pick.”

  “Why don’t we continue the mood and go to a historic inn? How about the General Wayne Inn? Do you know it?”

  “I think so. Isn’t that John Wayne’s place?”

  “No, silly. Mad Anthony Wayne. He slept there.”

  “Is that what made him mad? Lumpy mattress?”

  “No … are you historically challenged?”

  “Totally clueless.”

  “Mad Anthony Wayne was a Revolutionary War general. He was the leader of the Pennsylvania Volunteers.”

  “Right. Their big single was ‘My Heart’s on Fire and You’re Sittin’ on My Hose.’ ”

  Emma Whitestone stayed silent awhile, wondering, I’m sure, if she’d made the right decision. Finally, she said, “It’s on Great Hog Neck. I’ll direct you.”

  “Okay.” And off we went to a place called the General Wayne Inn, located in a place called Great Hog Neck. I mean, could I get into this scene? Did I miss Manhattan? Hard to say. If I had big bucks, I could do both. But I don’t have big bucks. Which got me to thinking about Fredric Tobin, who, as it turns out, also doesn’t have big bucks, and there I was envying him, figuring he was on top of the world—grapes, babes, bucks—turns out he’s broke. Worse, he’s in debt. For a man like Fredric Tobin, to lose it all would be the equivalent of losing his life. He might as well be dead. But he wasn’t. Tom and Judy were dead. Connection? Maybe. This was getting interesting.

  But time was running out for me. I could play cop for maybe forty-eight more hours before I was shut down by the Southold PD, the NYPD, and the Suffolk County PD.

  Ms. Whitestone was giving me directions as I ruminated. Finally, she asked me, “Are they leveling with us about the vaccine?”

  “I think so. Yes.”

  “This had nothing to do with germ warfare?”

  “No.”

  “Or drugs?”

  “Not that I can determine.”

  “Burglary?”

  “It looks that way, but I think it has to do with a stolen vaccine.” Who says I’m not a team player? I can put out the official bullshit as well as anyone else. I asked Ms. White-stone, “You have another theory?”

  “No, I don’t. I just have this feeling that they were killed for some reason we don’t yet understand.”

  Which is exactly what I thought. Bright woman.

  I asked her, “Have you ever been married?”

  “Yes. I married young, sophomore year in college. Lasted seven years.” She added, “And I’ve been divorced seven years. Add it up.”

  “You’re twenty-five.”

  “How did you get twenty-five?”

  “Forty-two?”

  She said, “Turn right here. Right is toward me.”

  “Thanks.”

  It was a pleasant drive, and we soon found ourselves on Great Hog Neck—which is yet another peninsula that juts into the bay, lying somewhat east and north of Nassau Point, sometimes called Little Hog Neck.

  I’ve noticed that around here there are three main sources of place names—Native Americans, English settlers, and realtors. The latter have maps with nice names that they make up to replace yucky names like Great Hog Neck.

  We passed a small observatory called the Custer Institute, which Mrs. Wiley had mentioned, and I got a briefing on that and on the American Indian Museum across from the observatory.

  I asked Emma, “Were the Gordons interested in astronomy?”

  “Not that I knew about.”

  “You know they bought an acre of land from Mrs. Wiley.”

  “Yes.” She hesitated, then said, “That was not a good deal.”

  “Why did they want that land?”

  “I don’t know…. It never made sense to me.”

  “Did Fredric know about the Gordons’ buying that land?”

  “Yes.” She changed the subject to the immediate environs and said, “There’s the original Whitestone house. Sixteen eighty-five.”

  “Still in the family?”

  “No, but I’m going to buy it back.” She added, “Fredric was supposed to help me out, but … That’s when I realized he wasn’t as well off as he appeared.”

  I didn’t comment.

  Like Nassau Point, Hog Neck was mostly cottages and some newer weekend homes, many of them gray-shingled to look like ye olde. There were some fields that Emma said had been common pastureland since colonial times, and there were woods here and there. I asked, “Are the Indians friendly?”

  “There are no Indians.”

  “All gone?”

  “All gone.”

  “Except the ones in Connecticut who opened the biggest casino complex between here and Las Vegas.”

  She said, “I have some Native American blood.”

  “Really?”

  “Really. A lot of the old families do, but they’re not advertising it. Some people come to me actually wanting to expunge relatives from the archives.”

  “Incredible.” I knew there was a politically correct thing to say, but every time I try to do PC, I blow it. I mean, it changes, like weekly. I played it safe with, “Racist.”

  “Racial, though not necessarily racist. Anyway, I don’t care who knows I have Indian blood. My maternal great-grandmother was a Corchaug.”

  “Well, you have nice color.”

  “Thanks.”

  We approached this big white clapboard building set on a few acres of treed land. I actually recalled seeing the place once or twice, when I was a kid. I have these childhood memories of places in my mind, still-life summer scenes, sort of like looking at slides through a viewfinder. I said to Ms. Whitestone, “I think I ate here with my family when I was a wee lad.”

  “Quite possible. It’s two hundred years old. How old are you?”

  I ignored this and asked, “How’s the food?”

  “Depends.” She added, “It’s a nice setting, and off the beaten path. No one will see us, and no one will gossip.”

  “Good thinking.” I pulled into the gravel driveway, parked, and opened my door a crack with the engine still running. A tiny little bell chimed and the schematic of my vehicle showed a door ajar. I said, “Hey, you killed the voice.”
r />   “We don’t want your ex-wife’s voice annoying you.”

  We got out of the vehicle and walked toward the inn. She took my arm, which surprised me. She asked, “When do you get off duty?”

  “Now.”

  CHAPTER 18

  Lunch was pleasant enough. The place was nearly empty and had undergone a recent restoration, so if you let your imagination go, it was 1784 and Mad Anthony Wayne was stomping around ordering grog, whatever that is.

  The food was basic American, nothing tricky, which appeals to my carnivorous tastes, and Ms. Emma Whitestone turned out to be a basic American girl, nothing tricky, which likewise appealed to my carnivorous tastes.

  We didn’t discuss the murders, or Lord Tobin, or anything unpleasant. She was really into history, and I was fascinated by what she was saying. Well, not really, but history coming from Emma Whitestone’s breathy mouth was not too hard to take.

  She went on about the Reverend Youngs, who led his flock here from Connecticut in 1640, and I wondered aloud if they took the New London ferry, which got me a cool look. She mentioned Captain Kidd and lesser-known pirates who sailed these waters three hundred years ago, then told me about the Hortons of lighthouse fame, one of which built this very inn. And then there was the Revolutionary War General, Francis Marion, the Swamp Fox, after whom, she said, East Marion was named, even though I argued there was probably a town called Marion in England. But she knew her stuff. She told me about the Underhills, the Tuthills, and a little about the Whitestones, who were actually Mayflower Pilgrims, and about people with first names like Abijah, Chauncey, Ichabod, and Barnabas, not to mention Joshua, Samuel, and Isaac, who weren’t even Jewish. And so on.

  Ping! Whereas Paul Stevens had bored me senseless with his computer-generated voice, Emma Whitestone had me bewitched with her sort of aspirating tones, not to mention her gray-green eyes. Anyway, the net result was the same— I’d heard something that caused a delayed reaction in my usually awake brain. Ping! I listened for her to say it again, whatever it was, and I tried to recall what it was and why I thought it was significant. But to no avail. This time, however, I knew it was on the tip of my brain, and I knew I’d have it out very soon. Ping!

  I said to her, “I feel the presence of Mad Anthony Wayne here.”

  “Do you? Tell me about it.”

  “Well, he’s sitting at that table by the window, and he’s been sneaking glances at you. He’s giving me dirty looks. He’s mumbling to himself, ‘What hath he got that I haveth not?”’

  She smiled. “You’re crazy.”

  “Haveth not got? Or goteth not?” “I’ll teach you eighteenth-century English if you stop being a jerk.”

  “I thank thee.”

  Well, before we knew it, it was three P.M. and the waiter was getting antsy. I hate to interrupt the flow and energy of a case to chase panties—detectus interruptus. It’s a fact that the first seventy-two hours of a case are the most critical. But a fella has to answer certain biological calls, and my bells were ringing.

  I said, “If you have time, we can take a spin in my boat.” “You have a boat?”

  Actually, I didn’t, so this might not have been a good line. But I had waterfront property and a dock, so I could say the boat sank. I said, “I’m staying at my uncle’s place. A farm bay estate.”

  “Bay farm estate.”

  “Right. Let’s go.”

  We left the General Wayne Inn and drove toward my place, which is about twenty minutes west of Hog Neck.

  As we traveled west along Main Road, she informed me, “This used to be called King’s Highway. They changed the name after the Revolution.”

  “Good idea.”

  “Funny thing is that my alma mater, Columbia University, was called Kings College, and they also changed it after the Revolution.”

  “I’ll tell ya, if we have another revolution, there are a lot of names I’d like to change.”

  “Such as?”

  “Well, first, East Seventy-second Street where my condo is. I’d like to call it Cherry Lane. Sounds nicer.” I continued, “Then there’s my ex-wife’s cat, Snowball—I’d like to change his name to Dead Cat.” I went on with a few more name changes, come the revolution.

  She sort of interrupted by asking me, “Do you like it out here?”

  “I think so. I mean, it’s nice, but I’m not sure I fit.” She informed me, “There are a lot of eccentrics out here.”

  “I’m not eccentric. I’m nuts.”

  “There are a lot of those, too.” She added, “This is no rural backwater. I know farmers with Ivy League degrees, I know astronomers from the Custer Institute, and there are the vintners who studied in France, and the scientists from Plum Island and Brookhaven labs, plus academics from Stony Brook University, artists, poets, writers, and—”

  “Archivists.”

  “Yes. I get annoyed when people from the city think we’re hicks.”

  “I certainly don’t think that.”

  “I lived in Manhattan for nine years. I got tired of the city. I missed my home.”

  “I sensed a certain city sophistication about you, coupled with a country charm. You’re in the right place.”

  “Thank you.”

  I think I passed one of the more important tests on my way to the sack.

  We were driving through farm and wine country now, and she said, “The autumn is long and lazy here. The orchards are still heavy with fruit and many of the vegetables haven’t been picked yet. It can be snowing in New England around Thanksgiving, and we’re still harvesting here.” She asked me, “Am I rambling on?”

  “No, not at all. You’re painting a beautiful word picture.”

  “Thank you.”

  I was now on the first landing of the staircase leading to the bedroom.

  Basically, we both kept it light and airy, the way people do who are really sort of edgy because they know they might be headed for the sheets.

  Anyway, we pulled up the long driveway to the big Victorian, and Emma said, “A big painted lady.”

  “Where?”

  “The house. That’s what we call the old Victorians.”

  “Oh. Right. By the way, my aunt used to belong to the Peconic Historical Society. June Bonner.”

  “Sounds familiar.”

  “She knew Margaret Wiley.” I added, “Actually, my aunt was born here, which is why she talked Uncle Harry into this summer place.”

  “What was her maiden name?”

  “I’m not sure—maybe Witherspoonhamptonshire.”

  “Are you making fun of my name?”

  “No, ma’am.”

  “Find out your aunt’s maiden name.”

  “Okay.” I stopped in front of the painted lady.

  She said, “If it’s an old family, I can look it up. We have a lot of information on the old families.”

  “Yeah? Lots of skeletons in the closets?”

  “Sometimes.”

  “Maybe Aunt June’s family were horse thieves and whores.”

  “Could be. There are a lot of those in my family tree.” I chuckled.

  She said, “Could be that her family and mine are related. You and I could be related by marriage.”

  “Could be.” I was at the top of the stairs now, the bedroom door was about ten feet away. Actually, I was still in the Jeep. I said, “Here we are,” and got out.

  She got out, too, and looked at the house. She said, “And this is her house?”

  “Was. She’s deceased. My Uncle Harry wants me to buy it.”

  “It’s too big for one person.”

  “I can cut it in half.” Okay, into the house, tour of the ground floor, check my answering machine in the den—no messages—into the kitchen for two beers and out onto the back porch and into two wicker chairs.

  She said, “I love watching the water.”

  “This is a good place to do it. I’ve been sitting here for a few months.”

  “When do you have to go back to work?”
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  “I’m not sure. I’m scheduled to see the doc next Thursday.”

  “How did you get involved in this case?”

  “Chief Maxwell.”

  She said, “I don’t see your boat.”

  I looked out at the rickety dock. “Oh, it must have sunk.”

  “Sunk?”

  “Oh, I remember. It’s in for repairs.”

  “What do you have?”

  “A … twenty-four-foot … Boston Whaler … ?”

  “Do you sail?”

  “You mean like a sailboat?”

  “Yes. A sailboat.”

  “No. I’m into powerboats. Do you sail?”

  “A little.”

  And so forth.

  I’d taken off my jacket and docksiders and rolled up my sleeves. She’d slipped off the thongs, and we both had our bare feet on the rail. Her little beige number had slipped north of the knees.

  I got my binoculars, and we took turns looking out at the bay, the boats, the wetlands—which used to be called a swamp when I was a kid—the sky, and all that.

  I was up to beer five, and she was going one for one with me. I like a woman who can pound down the suds. She was a little lit by now, but still had a clear head and voice.

  She had the binoculars in one hand, and a Bud in the other. She said, “This is a major meeting point on the Atlantic Coastal Flyway, a sort of rest stop for migratory birds.” She looked through the binoculars at the distant sky and continued, “I can see flights of Canada geese, long skeins of loons, and a ripply line of old-squaws. They’ll all stay around until November, then continue on south. The osprey winds up in South America.”

  “That’s good.”

  She rested the binoculars in her lap and stared out to sea. She said, “On stormy days, when the wind blows hard out of the northeast, the sky turns silvery gray and the birds act strange. There’s a feeling of eerie isolation, an ominous beauty that has to be felt and heard as much as seen.”

  We stayed silent for a while, then I said, “Would you like to see the rest of the house?”

  “Sure.”

  My first stop on the tour of the second floor was my bedroom, and we didn’t get much farther.

  It actually took three seconds for her to get out of her things. She had a really beautiful all-over tan, a firm body, everything exactly where it belonged, and exactly as I’d pictured it.