by Barbara Ross
Sonny was optimistic the weather would clear up in time for dinner service. I let the staff know we’d be closed for lunch and asked Pammie to persuade the lunchtime ticket holders to switch their reservations to dinner.
I never thought I’d be grateful for a storm in August, but I was. Half a day off would give me more time to help Cabe. Thank goodness it was Wednesday, our second slowest day of the week. The financial hit, while meaningful, would be modest. I showered and dressed, then took the backstairs to the kitchen.
Richelle was already up, fully dressed and staring out the window at the rain. “I’m so bored, Julia! I’m going stir crazy. Please, come out to breakfast with me.”
“It’s miserable out there.”
“I don’t care. I’m miserable in here.” She caught herself. “Not that I don’t appreciate . . .”
“You’re not supposed to travel.” I couldn’t help but feel sorry for her. She was used to being on the go, waking up most mornings in a new location. She’d been basically confined to our house for three days.
“There must be plenty of places to eat within walking distance.”
Of course, there were. I looked at the clock on the stove. “Okay, let’s do it. But we have to be quick.”
Richelle jumped up and grabbed her bag. “Quick it is.”
I found an old slicker of Livvie’s hanging on a peg in the kitchen entrance way and handed it to Richelle. Nothing of my mom’s or mine would have covered her long arms. We trudged over the hill to Gus’s, sometimes walking backward to keep the stinging rain, with its briny, sea-smell, off our faces. The howling wind made conversation impossible.
Gus’s was a mob scene of fishermen and lobstermen and half the public works department, all temporarily sidelined by the storm. Slickers were draped on every chair.
I dreaded bringing a stranger into Gus’s. He practically required a pedigree and a certificate of good health and sanity from a doctor. I looked in vain for a table in the back of the dining room, finally deciding we had to grab the last two seats at the counter. Let the third degree begin.
Gus advanced to fill our coffee cups. “Morning, Julia.”
“Morning, Gus. This is—”
“You don’t need to tell me who this pretty woman is. I’d know her anywhere. She’s Georgette Baker’s niece.”
Richelle seemed as stunned as I was. “I can’t believe you remember me!”
“‘Course I remember you,” Gus said, pouring her a generous cup. “You stayed here one whole summer. With your aunt.”
“Great-aunt,” Richelle corrected. Still, it was astonishing. Richelle had been a child.
“Gus Farnham.” He reached across and shook her hand. “Glad to have you back in town.”
“Richelle Rose.”
Gus shook his head. “No, that’s not it.” It was typical of Gus to insist he knew your name better than you did.
“Quite a reception,” I said when Gus had turned back to the grill.
We settled into a nice breakfast. Gus’s special oatmeal served with a dollop of Maine maple syrup for me. Blueberry pancakes with a side of bacon for Richelle. Her appetite was healthy and there was color in her cheeks. I could tell she was on the mend. We ate in silence for a moment, enjoying Gus’s simple, good food.
“Can I say something to you, honestly?” Richelle asked.
I nodded. Where was this heading?
“It’s about your boyfriend.”
My boyfriend. How did she even know about—? Mom. Mom must have shared her disapproval with Richelle. I wasn’t sure I liked this version of my mother, gossiping with girlfriends. “What brought this up?”
“Your mother mentioned him.”
Uh-huh. “I’m sure she didn’t have anything positive to say.”
Richelle didn’t deny, but she didn’t confirm, either. “I’ve seen him around town before, at the cab stand by the pier. Quite the hunk.”
What was I supposed to say to that? Thank-you? It’s not like I’d invented him.
“Is it serious?” She asked the very question I was avoiding.
Richelle looked straight into my eyes. When she realized I wasn’t going to answer, she went on. “I had a great passion once. I was much younger than you are now.” She put down her fork to give all her attention to the subject at hand. “But a person can fall head over heels at any age and do foolish things. Crazy things that mark their life forever. Be careful, Julia. Be careful who you give your heart to. Love can lead you to make terrible decisions.”
I studied her to see if she was teasing, but she wasn’t. It was serious advice, seriously given. Did she know? Did she know I was teetering on the brink of declaring my love for Chris? “I’ll be careful, Richelle. I promise. I understand how much I could screw up my life.”
“I doubt you do,” she responded. “Truly. Follow your head, and not your heart—or any other part of your body. That’s all I’m saying.” She smiled to show the difficult topic was closed and changed the subject. “Any news about that young man you were looking for?”
“Lots,” I answered, “but none of it good.” I told her about the deaths of Cabe’s adoptive parents, the murder accusation, the institution, and group home.
Richelle pushed her half-finished plate of blueberry pancakes away. “That poor, poor kid.”
“I know. I can’t stop worrying about him. Listen, do you think you can get home on your own? I have some things to do in the back harbor here.”
Richelle nodded that she could. She insisted on picking up the check, but then couldn’t because Gus doesn’t take any form of payment except cash. He’d demand gold coins if he could get away with it.
Chapter 29
I walked the short distance to Bud Barbour’s small boat repair business. His home and boathouse were on the water, accessed by a narrow dirt lane that led behind another small house. I slipped and slid down the dirt road, a river of mud. My boots were caked by the time I reached the house and I stood for a moment wondering what to do.
A string of expletives exploded out of the boathouse. A lobster boat I recognized as belonging to one of Gus’s customer’s was in the shop, hoisted out of the water on a set of rails. Bud was somewhere inside it, and judging by the banging and the swearing, not having much luck with whatever he was attempting. As I listened, I felt myself blush. I wasn’t a prude by any stretch—I’d spent my whole life on the water and in boardrooms, two places where people used more swear words than regular ones, but the verbal combinations Bud put together were so colorful and so anatomically impossible, I didn’t know whether to laugh or retch.
“Bud!” I called, hoping to interrupt the flow of words. “Bud, it’s Julia Snowden!”
Morgan poked her head out of the boat first, her red kerchief blazing. Wagging her tail, she jumped out and sniffed my hands in greeting.
“What?” Bud’s head poked up from below deck.
“I want to talk to you.”
Bud sighed. “Give me a minute.” He wiped his hands on a dirty rag, then climbed down the ladder on the side of the boat. When he reached my side, he repeated, “What?”
There was no way to ease into it. Mainers of Bud’s age and disposition didn’t go for small talk. “Bud, why were you on the pier the morning Stevie’s body was found?”
Rain dropped off his white beard onto his flannel shirt. “Who says I was?”
I moved under the shelter of the boathouse roof and motioned for him to do the same. “I saw a photo of Morgan on the pier. If Morgan was there, you were, too. You told the committee you’d ‘rather be dead and buried in a New York Yankees’ uniform,’ than participate in the opening ceremony. You told the cops you were at your camp up north. I told the cops you were at your camp up north.”
Bud put a greasy hand out. “You have a photo of Morgan, you say. Let me see it.”
I hadn’t thought to print a copy before I came. A few of Bud’s colorful curses ran through my mind.
“I thought so,” he said. “You
’re bluffing.”
“Bud, I can go get the picture if necessary, but why don’t you answer the question and save us both time?”
“There are a load of black labs on this peninsula.” He climbed the ladder, headed back to work. I was dismissed.
I debated whether I should follow him up and corner him, but no good could come of it. Better to go home, print a copy of the photo and come back another time. As I made my way up the ribbon of mud toward the main road, I noticed two things about our conversation. Bud had accused me of “bluffing,” not “lying.” And he hadn’t actually denied being on the pier.
I was nearly opposite the little house at the top of the lane when I heard a rapid tapping, accompanied by a muffled shout. It was hard to tell over the sound of the rain, but the noise seemed to come from the house. Morgan barked a blue streak from Bud’s yard below, adding to the cacophony.
Bunnie Getts’s head stuck out of the partially opened screen door on the back deck of the house. “Julia! I was banging on the window to get your attention. Everyone comes through the back door at this house. Have you finally come for tea?”
After the months of summonses, I was trapped. Though I’d been innocently passing by, I decided the time was right to have tea with Bunnie. I had something to ask her.
This was Bunnie’s house? It was a neat, but tiny Cape. And in the back harbor, the least fashionable part of town. I’d assumed Bunnie lived out on Eastclaw or Westclaw Point, where the rich people lived. But sure enough, her dark green, full-sized SUV was in the driveway, the car I’d seen so many times parked in front of the Tourism Bureau office. I climbed the steps to her back deck. I was glad I could busy myself taking off my slicker and muddy boots while I adjusted to this new idea of who Bunnie might be.
“Sit down, sit down.” She bustled around the kitchen, putting the kettle on and setting out things for our tea. “You look nearly drowned. Let’s get something warm in you.” She put a plate of blueberry scones on the kitchen table along with two bowls, one of clotted cream and the other blueberry jam. “I made them myself. The scones, the jam.” She waved airily, taking in the whole of her kitchen. Another new idea of her.
While she brewed the tea, she talked a blue streak. Bunnie, stripped of her clipboard, agenda, and neat checkmarks, turned out to be a yakker. It was going to be tough to get a word in edgewise. She talked on about our fellow committee members. She had positive things to say about all of them. I tried to remember any time over the months of planning she’d said anything positive to someone’s face. When we came to the subject of Bud, she said, “Oh, that Bud,” in the same affectionate way the old-timers around town did. “And poor Stevie” she added, shaking her head. “Just so sad. In the prime of his life.”
Is she going to cry?
As she talked on, I looked around. The house seemed as small on the inside as it did from outside. Just the eat-in kitchen and a sitting room on the first floor, crowded with furniture much too big for the home’s tiny scale. It was a Cape and I bet there was just one bedroom or at most two upstairs. Was Bunnie one of those Yankee misers, or was it possible she was living in the harbor on very little money? Maybe she actually needed her job with the Tourism Bureau. Who would have ever thought it?
I looked out the picture window beside the kitchen table. The view, over the top of Bud’s boathouse, was beautiful. In the back harbor, fishing and lobster boats bobbed in the rain.
I remembered back to the first meeting of the Founder’s Weekend committee. I could have sworn Bunnie introduced herself to all of us, including Bud. And Bud, too, seemed not to have previously met Bunnie. Was it possible they didn’t know each other? He lived essentially in her backyard.
Bunnie put the teapot on the table and sat across from me.
“Beautiful view,” I said.
“Yes. That’s what sold me on the house. Although I had no idea the harbor would be so noisy early in the morning. I can’t leave my windows open at night, or I’m awakened before dawn by boats going out and men shouting to one another.”
A typical sentiment by someone From Away. They buy a house on a working harbor because it’s charming, and then complain because the lobstermen make noise. I sighed and broke open a scone. I was still full from Gus’s oatmeal, but felt I had to be polite. I spread the clotted cream on the scone, followed by the jam, and took a big bite. Man, it was good. I savored the sweet of the jam and cream, balanced by the dense texture of the scone.
I heard the name “Reg” float by and realized Bunnie was talking about Reggie Swinburne. “How long have you and Reggie been a couple?”
Bunnie ducked her head like a bashful virgin. “Just a little while. My late husband . . . well, he died rather tragically. I was quite young.”
“Bunnie, I’m so sorry.” I’d never given a thought to what had happened to Mr. Getts.
“After he died, I didn’t think I’d ever get involved with a man again, much less—” She stopped.
Much less what? Much less a man who lived in a camper?
“I was on the library fundraising committee with Cindy Kelly, and she introduced Reggie and me at the annual gala.”
The “gala” was held at the Grange Hall and involved lots of gelatin-based salads. My conception of Bunnie continued evolving.
“Reggie is so”—she hesitated—“reliable. Steady. My husband was, I guess you would say, impulsive.”
Bunnie spread clotted cream and jam on a piece of scone. “But what about you? I’ve seen you around town with that good-looking cabbie. What’s the story there?”
What is this? National Interrogate Julia about Her Relationship Day?
“Is he . . . reliable?” Bunnie asked.
Was he? Yesterday, he’d disappeared with no explanation. But then again, on the same day, I’d taken off on an eleven-hour round-trip without a word to him. As far as Chris knew, I’d been working at the clambake. More important, in the larger sense, Chris was reliable—in his work ethic, his concern and support for the underdog, his love of the sea and this harbor.
I had no intention of saying any of this to Bunnie so I simply said, “Yes.”
Managing for the first time to take control of the conversation, I asked the question I’d come inside to ask. “Why are you so convinced Cabe murdered Stevie?” She’d been bleating about Cabe from the start, and I wanted to know why.
Bunnie sat back in her chair. “It makes sense, doesn’t it? The boy was tending your clambake fire and he ran away.”
“That’s not really evidence. You’re talking about putting a young man behind bars for life.”
“Well, there is one more thing. I was around quite a bit the morning of the opening ceremonies, checking on things at the pier. Before the cooking even started, that boy was acting strange. Like a scared rabbit. I remember clearly. I came up behind him to ask a question and he jumped a mile.”
Bunnie could have that effect on people. And, neither Sonny nor Livvie had said anything about Cabe acting strangely. But it had been a busy morning, their attention would have been elsewhere. They might not have noticed.
“Did you tell the state police about Cabe being nervous?”
“I certainly did. They were very interested, let me tell you.”
There didn’t seem to be much sense in arguing with her. I stood and thanked her.
“I hope we can do it again,” she said.
I went to the back hall, climbed into my muddy boots, and slipped into my soaked slicker. As I stepped out onto the deck, Bunnie stuck her head out the door to say good-bye. The minute she did, Morgan began barking.
“That damn dog,” Bunnie said. “Always making a racket. I can’t even enjoy the deck.”
Morgan hadn’t barked when I first went out, only when Bunnie appeared. Bud had his dog so well trained, she wouldn’t have barked like that unless he’d taught her to.
When Cabe told me the address of the boarding house where he’d lived, I knew the place exactly. Old Man Carver had inherited the
big Victorian just off Main Street from his grandparents when I was a kid. Rather than sell it or fix it up for summer rentals, he threw two or three mattresses on the floor in every room and rented it to as many college students as he could, kids wanting cheap lodging so they could work low wage summer jobs. Usually, there were more renters than mattresses. He counted on shift work, along with summer hook-ups, to make up for the shortage.
I stood on the street in the rain, looking at the crumbling building. An overgrown lilac bush hid the front porch and grew into what was left of the gutters. I climbed up the rickety front steps and opened the sagging screen door. Like every other house in the harbor, the door was unlocked, though in this case I understood. Far too many kids coming and going. Besides, if Old Man Carver started giving out keys with his first renter, there’d be hundreds in circulation by now.
Inside, I was nearly bowled over by the smell of unrinsed beer cans, old pizza boxes, and marijuana. Like every kid in town, I’d been to parties in this house during my college years. It hadn’t changed a bit. Not even the smell. There was a metal pot in the front hall positioned to catch water that dripped steadily from the ceiling, but no one had thought to empty it, and the water had overflowed in a big, wet ring. I didn’t bother to take off my boots.
In the front room, two guys, one brown-haired and one blond, sat on a mattress playing a video game on an enormous flat screen TV. Neither looked up when I entered.
“Excuse me.” I said it. And then shouted it.
The brown-haired one looked in my direction. He was dressed in a white button-down shirt and black pants, which marked him as a waiter, bartender, or busboy. Had he worked a breakfast shift or were these the clothes from the night before?
“Yeah?”
“Do either of you know Cabe Stone?”
Blank looks, but they did pause the game.
“Cabe,” I prompted. “Five foot tenish, skinny, dark blond hair. Worked at the clambake.”