Waltz Macabre

by Mary Bowers

  “You saw them?”

  “They danced.” I drifted with the memory of it, and as I went with it, I was reeling him in, playing out the line, reeling in again. “It was . . . disturbing. And Barnabas says the others don’t like it.”

  “Others?” He was quickening, adjusting his glasses and getting twitchy.

  “Well, you know that. He’s always had . . . companions, as you put it, at The Bookery. They’re unhappy with the new one.”

  “The young girl in the History Section. She’s unhappy?”

  I had no idea who he was talking about, but I gave him a grim and steady look.

  “Little Wendy,” he said, sitting back and taking his glasses off altogether. Without his glasses, Ed always looks especially bewildered.

  “The new one throws things. Books.”

  “History books?”

  “No doubt.”

  “Oh.”

  He sat beside me, resisting as hard as he could. He set his glasses on the table beside him, right in the puddle of condensation from his iced tea glass, without even noticing.

  I tried not to breathe, and thought as hard and as fast as I could.

  “He got the sheet music at the Carteret estate sale,” I said, gilding the lily. “Wasn’t there some story about the Carteret family? Phoebe’s husband deserting her? Or am I wrong?”

  “No, you’re not wrong. He deserted her all right, and just when she needed him most. I’ve always taken a special interest in the Carteret case. Especially the murder.”

  “Murder? What murder?”

  “It was a long time ago. Let me see, it was sometime in the 1920s, I think.” Finally he put his glasses back on, heedless of the dripping condensation, and looked straight at me. “And Garrison Carteret was the murderer.”

  “Was he running away from the law? Is that why he deserted his wife?”

  “Not at all. After the murder, Phoebe Wilkinson, as she was then, married him anyway. He didn’t leave until several years later, after their son was born.”

  “She married him, knowing he was a murderer?”

  “There was no proof, but the whole town believed it. Phoebe may have been in denial. Or she knew and she didn’t care.”

  “Oh boy.” If Ed didn’t go for this, he wasn’t the man I thought he was. Haunted sheet music, an unpunished murder and a deserted wife? I went for broke. “I saw them. One woman. Two men. One of them must have been the murdered man. I saw all three of them, Ed.”

  He became weak. He slumped and looked down. He made an absent-minded swipe at a drip rolling down his nose from the glasses.

  After three minutes by the clock, he muttered, “When do we start?”

  “Immediately. Barnabas is desperate. But first, we have to come up with a plan to distract Teddy while you look into this. Since I’m no good at ghost-hunting, I’ll take that part of it.”

  “Thank you. And I do not envy you. Nine o’clock tomorrow. I’ll go to The Bookery, and you go to my house. On what pretext will you be going, by the way? You’re always so inventive about your little schemes. I could use a laugh.”

  “You said Teddy had a nervous breakdown?” He nodded. “Well, Porter did too. He loved Lily just as much as Teddy did, and it’s not his fault she left, but he doesn’t understand that. As a concerned animal-lover and the owner of the shelter that placed Porter with Teddy, I have a responsibility. I need to check out Porter’s mental state –“

  He snorted and I shot him a dirty look.

  “ – and see if he needs any kind of therapy.”

  “Therapy? He’s a dog.”

  “Don’t be mysogi-canine-istic. Dogs are people too.”

  “Ah. Personally I thought that dog was insane the moment I met him, but he’s such a happy beast, I don’t want you actually meddling with his mental state.”

  “As if I could. Have they changed the gate code at Santorini yet?” He lived in a gated community, just eight houses, four on each side of a central drive that ran between A1A and the Atlantic Ocean.

  “Of course not. It’s still hashtag 1-2-3-4.”

  “I’m surprised your neighbor across the street hasn’t complained about that. Dan? He seems like he’d be security-conscious. Isn’t he one of those paramilitary types?”

  “His house and mine are the first ones coming in at the gate. I’m not much of a threat, but having Dan Ryder up at the gate is better than having a pillbox with an armed guard, and a lot less expensive. There are only eight households to split the expenses, remember. The last bad guy who jumped the gate ended up face-down in the driveway, hogtied and crying for the police to come and rescue him. I’m assuming word has gotten around among the local criminal element, because nobody even tries it anymore. Besides,” he added, adjusting his glasses, “the last time we changed it to a random number, three of our residents got stranded on the wrong side of the gate. Including me.”

  “Gotcha. Hashtag 1-2-3-4 it is.”

  Chapter 4

  I awoke the next morning from heavy dreams full of dark figures and ponderous music. Wherever I’d been in the dream, it seemed like the last stop before the gates of Hell. Lost souls straggled around me, trying to ignore the rest of eternity while they drifted and danced their way toward the inevitable, no longer thinking, no longer caring. It was awful. And shreds of the dismal music stayed with me long after the images were gone. The waltz. The sad waltz.

  It took a few minutes to pull myself into the present, remember what day it was, and think through my schedule for the day. It didn’t help that when I opened my eyes, I found myself looking directly into a pair of staring emerald-green eyes. I felt a sharp jab of terror right through my heart and jerked backwards before I realized it was just my cat, Bastet.

  Bastet usually follows Michael around, so the fact that she was there and he was gone was strange. After rearing back, I steadied myself and glared back at her, muttering, “What’s up with you?”

  As usual, I didn’t get an answer. I rolled onto my back and tried to get my thoughts organized again. Today was Monday. Monday I usually go into town and help with the bank deposit for our resale shop, Girlfriend’s, but I already knew that I wasn’t doing that today for some reason . . . .

  Oh, yeah. Santorini. Ed’s gated community. That hot guy – what was his name? Dan. Dan Ryder. The guy who gave the impression he’d been one of the chevaliers of some commando force that nobody ever had quite enough nerve to ask him about. So who knew? He might have been a Navy SEAL. He might have been a car salesman. Whatever it was, he was a loner, retired from something or other, and he had many unexplained skills. Being happy in love was not one of them, by the way. As far as I knew, he still had no lady in his life. He was one of the more interesting characters living in Ed’s community, but I probably wouldn’t even see him. Instead, I would be dealing with –

  Teddy. Teddy and his dog. Oy, what a way to spend the morning. I looked at the clock on the nightstand and saw a big red 7:12. I told Ed I’d be at Santorini at 9:00. Shower, dress, breakfast, drive down there – yeah, I’d better get up.

  I hauled myself up and sat blearily on the side of the bed. Behind me, I heard Bastet jump down and leave the room. Michael, needless to say, was already downstairs cooking breakfast. He needs a lot less sleep than I do.

  I got under the shower and let the water run over my face, still trying to shake off the dream, but the grim undertone of it stayed with me, even after I’d dried off, put on a little make-up and shaken out my short, blond hair.

  By the time I got downstairs, my head was clearer, and I realized that while I’d been reeling Ed in, I’d gotten hooked too. I’d heard of Phoebe Carteret, of course, but I’d never met her in the first two or three years I’d lived in Tropical Breeze, and after that we never met because she was dead.

  When she died, The Beach Buzz had done a longer-than-usual obituary on her, mostly about the kind of plantation family she’d come from. They’d all been relegated to the misty past by then, and the article had ha
d a historical tone. I think I would have remembered any insinuations of murder, though. That part had been left out. Between Barnabas’s bits of information and Ed’s contribution, I was becoming intrigued.

  Michael was a retired lawyer and he’d lived in Tropical Breeze his entire life, so when I sat down at the breakfast bar beside him, I brought it up.

  “The Carterets?” he said. “Yes, I remember them. There was a scandal, of course. Actually, a series of scandals, but that was a long time ago. Why are you interested?”

  I looked sideways at Myrtle, who was busy in the kitchen burning the toast. Michael caught on immediately: I didn’t want to discuss it in front of Myrtle. She had come along with the mansion, like updated plumbing, only less efficient. She’d been the Cadbury’s housekeeper since the dawn of time, and at her age, she wasn’t going to be able to adjust to another situation, so I kept her on. My good deed for the decade.

  She lives in the mansion with us and doesn’t get into town much, but when it comes to gossip, she can broadcast and receive like a ham radio. She has her sources. Quite a few Breezers come to the Cadbury estate, volunteering at the shelter, and there’s always Myrtle’s sister, Florence, who runs Girlfriend’s. Myrtle and Florence don’t get along, but they’ve discovered the wonders of texting, which is quicker, easier and less irritating than calling one another on the phone and actually talking. That’s a roundabout way of explaining that if I mentioned Barnabas’s name in front of Myrtle, his troubles would be all over town in a hot second.

  Michael looked from Myrtle to me a few times with his misty-blue eyes, letting me know he’d understood the warning.

  “I’ll tell you what little know,” he began. “They had a plantation just north of Tropical Breeze. It actually adjoined the Cadbury estate, here. I don’t think the Cadburys and the Wilkinsons got along, though, and after the scandal –“ he glanced nervously at Myrtle.

  “Oh, you mean the murder?” she said.

  “Ye-es, there was a murder. After that, the Cadburys distanced themselves from the Wilkinsons.”

  “Naturally,” Myrtle said. “Invitations were no longer sent. Or accepted.”

  “Ah. The scandalous marriage,” I said. “So the Cadburys skipped the wedding reception, eh? Did Phoebe Wilkinson’s fiancé really kill somebody?”

  Michael shrugged. Lawyers. So maddeningly discreet. “That’s what everybody thought. You seem to know a certain amount about it already. Yes, after the murder, she stood by him and married him, despite the rumors. Then he turned around and left her. It was all much more shocking and serious at that time than it would be now. Financially it was ruinous, and socially it was worse than death. In a small town like Tropical Breeze, it must have been almost unbearable.”

  “Set the town on fire,” Myrtle said with relish. “She was better off without him, that’s what everybody said. She was a fool for marrying him in the first place. My mother told me all about it.”

  She arranged the smoking remains on a plate, came over to the breakfast bar and set the toast down between Michael and me. Michael picked up a piece and ate it anyway. He has impeccable manners and a good heart. I took a piece and set it on my plate. Maybe I’d take a bite later, just so she wouldn’t glare at me.

  Myrtle set herself down at the end of the counter and went on with the story. “Everybody knew he was a murderer, and she went ahead and married him anyway. I say she was lucky he left her. Who knows? She might have been next.”

  “Now, Myrtle –“ Michael began.

  “Who’d he murder?” I said quickly.

  Michael lifted an eyebrow and then concentrated on his breakfast.

  “The man she should’ve married, but didn’t. Her family had made a good match for her, but girls always want the bad boys.”

  “Garrison Carteret was not a bad boy,” Michael said primly. “He came from a family of lawyers, like me.”

  “Ah. So your dad knew him?” I asked, turning to him.

  “He clerked at my family’s firm while he was in law school. Grandfather was very impressed with him. For all we know, he made a success of his life, wherever he ended up after he left Tropical Breeze.”

  “New York,” Myrtle said.

  “That was never confirmed. All I know is, my grandfather never had a bad word to say about him.”

  “He deserted his wife and son,” Myrtle said flatly.

  “Well, there is that.” Michael focused on his breakfast and retired from the conversation.

  “So – the one her family wanted her to marry? The dead guy? Who was he?”

  “Barclay Lodge,” Myrtle said. “His family had a plantation adjoining the Wilkinson’s, to the west.”

  “Well, that would have made sense,” I said. “It would have united the plantations, and he probably knew how to run the business. Sounds like she would’ve been better off, since the plantation failed after that. How did he die?”

  “Shot dead through the heart.”

  “That’ll do it. Did he and Garrison have a duel or something?”

  “No. Or maybe, but nobody witnessed it. He was found in what his family called a folly, a kind of gazebo, set away from the house, with a nice view. He liked to go there by himself and read. One morning they realized he wasn’t in the house and they started a search for him. They found his body in the gazebo.”

  “Couldn’t it have been suicide?”

  “No. There was no gun. It was never found. He’d been dead for hours. Garrison Carteret had been visiting at Phoebe’s house that night, and he’d gone out for a walk by himself.”

  “Why? When you’re a guest, you don’t just wander away for a while.”

  “He’d come to talk to Miss Phoebe, and they had a fight.”

  “She probably told him she wouldn’t marry him, so he went across to the other plantation to have it out with Barclay and ended up killing him.”

  “That’s what I think.”

  Michael silently managed to retire even further from the conversation. Myrtle and I were actually talking over him, since he was sitting between us at the long counter separating the kitchen from the great room. We didn’t let that hold us back. It was just too juicy a topic for Myrtle to keep up her usual worshipfulness toward Michael.

  “That was shocking enough,” Myrtle said, “but the next thing you know, Miss Phoebe ups and marries Garrison. Just when things begin to settle down after that, Garrison deserts her and tongues are wagging all over the place again.”

  She talked happily, as if recalling fond memories. I began to realize what a full-blown scandal it had really been.

  “I’m surprised she moved into town after all that,” I said.

  “She had to. The Great Depression was on, and she couldn’t keep the plantation going. But don’t get the idea she became the toast of the town. She shut herself up in that house and became a recluse. I don’t know of anybody who admitted to being her friend. Yes, it was a big commotion when Garrison Carteret took off like that. Everybody was actually looking for him for a while, thinking he’d had an accident or something. Then there were reports of him being in New York, and it became obvious to everybody that he’d run off. Phoebe finally admitted he’d left her a note, but she wouldn’t show it to anybody; said she’d kept it quiet, hoping he’d change his mind and come back, and when he didn’t, she destroyed it. He probably wanted a fresh start somewhere. Someplace where he could forget all about Tropical Breeze and Phoebe, start another family –“

  She would’ve kept on embroidering if Michael hadn’t interrupted her suddenly.

  “He was a lawyer. If he started practicing in New York, there’s a record of it,” he said. “I’ll see if I can look him up, if you want me to. If you care.” He seemed to immediately regret making the offer.

  “Thank you, Michael, I’d love to know,” I said.

  “Why?” Myrtle was all agog.

  “Oh, it just came up. Somebody in town was talking about it, I think.”

  “In town?” Michael sai
d. “You went in to see Barnabas last night, didn’t you? I meant to ask you, what did he want? It was strange, the way he invited you over. He’s never done that before, has he?”

  “We’re good friends,” I said. “It was nothing. There have been some issues over the parking spaces behind his building and Girlfriend’s,” (no there hadn’t), “and he wanted to discuss it over tea, nice and genteel, like he always is.”

  It really was so much the kind of thing Barnabas would do that Michael was satisfied, but Myrtle wasn’t.

  “So, did you get it all hashed out?” she asked.

  “Oh, sure. No big deal. We’ll put up a sign there in case somebody wanders down the alley. Something like, ‘Reserved for Manager,’ to keep people from parking behind either building.”

  I’d have to mention it to Barnabas. It was a good idea.

  “Oh, did you know that Teddy Force was back in town?” I said, deftly changing the subject.

  “He is?” That was Myrtle. She thought he was a hunk. She never said so, in so many words, but trust me, she did. And I think she watched his show, and not just for laughs.

  “He’s staying with Ed. That nice girl left him, and he’s distraught.”

  Michael gave me the eye. “I can’t picture Ed consoling him.”

  “Neither can Ed. Actually, I’m going down to Ed’s place today to check on things. Teddy’s got Porter with him, and I want to make sure he’s not being neglected while Teddy mopes around feeling sorry for himself.”

  Michael took a beat and said, “Really?”

  “You’ve met Teddy. I don’t think he’s got a mean bone in his body, but he’s not exactly organized and responsible. He adopted Porter from Orphan’s, and I feel like I’ve got to check it out. Won’t take me long.”

  “Okay. You go do that. I’ve got a 9:00 tee time over on the mainland.”

  Myrtle slid off her chair. “Well, you’d better get going if you’re going to make it. I’ll clean up. You two git.”