Cutting Loose in Paradise

by Mary Jane Ryals

  “What boat?” Taylor said, turning quickly to frown at me.

  “Laura, you explain it,” I said. “You know, why we got on the boat.” So Laura explained.

  “Murder?” Taylor sat upright and stared at me.

  I plopped down and told him about Trina’s throat, the fact that she’d had no gunshot wound, and the funeral home experience. Tay stared into the table, his mouth open, his eyes sparkling, wide.

  “Someone—somebody killed her?” he said with wonder. He looked around the table at each of us. Laura and Madonna gave him the whole scenario and why we’d gone on the boat—that the garbage man had told Madonna where Trina was last spotted—on the boat. Meanwhile, the timer dinged, and I slid the first sheet of cookies out of the oven to cool and shoved the next one in.

  Taylor was looking at me in a different way. “So you went on the boat looking for stuff that might show she got killed?” He looked excited, his big dark eyes full of possibility and adventure.

  “I don’t recommend doing this yourself, Taylor, sneaking around,” Madonna said. “Though we did find some stuff.” She pulled out the baggie of scraped red rust. I walked back to the bathroom where I’d gone to change clothes, got the photos I found on the boat and laid them on the table. Madonna added a photo to the bunch.

  “This is evidence?” Laura said.

  I shrugged. “Could be.” I handed her the photo of Trina, Fletch, and the little boy. “Tell me this doesn’t look like a happy little family. Maybe thirty years ago.”

  “Trina was quite the cute young woman,” Laura said. “They do look happy.”

  “I saw that picture,” Taylor said. “In their house. Except bigger. In a frame. And some others of the same kid in the living room.”

  “Did she ever say who he was?” Madonna asked.

  “No, but I always thought it was their kid. I had the idea he had died, and she didn’t like to talk about stuff like that.”

  “Fletch wasn’t ugly, either,” Madonna said. “Maybe that’s why he thinks he’s such a lady’s man now. Forgot he got old, not just old but lech-old.”

  “Check this one out,” I said. “Who’s this with Fletch? One of his brothers? They kind of look alike, but he seems too young to be a brother.”

  “Let me see,” Laura said. She studied it awhile. “That face—seems like I’ve seen it recently, but I can’t place it.”

  “I thought the same,” I said, bringing a plate of cookies to the table.

  “And how about this shot,” Madonna said, grabbing a cookie. Mac stood tallest, in the middle of a group of six men. He held up a huge cobia that one or all of them had reeled in. “The Boarders,” was scribbled underneath in pen.

  “Ooo, there’s old man Fielding,” Laura pointed. “The late senator himself. And . . .” She squinted. “I know I’ve seen that one,” she said, pointing to a smaller, heavy man, handsome middle-aged face and dark eyes. She shook her head as she munched a cookie. “Some meeting. Maybe county commission? And there’s Fletch. Can’t determine these others.”

  “So who are ‘The Boarders?’ ” Taylor displayed quote signs like Austin Powers.

  “Good question,” I said. “And now for maybe the best, maybe lamest evidence. Madonna?”

  She pulled out the baggie and dropped it on the table. It looked empty.

  “That’s pretty lame, you guys,” Taylor said, thrusting a whole cookie in his mouth and grabbing another.

  I picked up the baggie. “Dark rusty stuff. Maybe blood.”

  “Oh, man, you are really digging.” Laura shook her head.

  “I told her that,” Madonna said.

  “Come on, you all,” I said. “Give it a chance.”

  “What I want to know is how Fletch can get it on down there with his lard ass on those skinny beds,” Madonna said. “That’s the real mystery.” Everybody laughed, including Taylor. If I’d said it, he’d have said, Mom, how gross.

  “What’s so funny, Mama?” Daisy said, running down the hall, friend in tow. “Do I smell cookies?” They all grabbed a cookie. Daisy tried to peer at the photos.

  “We’re just laughing about Mr. Lutz sleeping on those skinny mattresses in a boat we rode in once,” I said. “That’s all.”

  “Oh,” she said, studying each of us with suspicion. Tay smirked as he sauntered off to his room.

  “I’ll talk to you about it later, honey, okay?” I whispered. She nodded and gave her friend a pointed look and sigh.

  “Well, I’ve got to get going,” Laura said. “Did Jackson tell you—hey, what do you think of him?”

  “I don’t know,” I said, low, staring at the table. Daisy walked over to eavesdrop. “I just don’t—it’s been years since I’ve . . . dated. I don’t know what I’m supposed to do anymore.”

  “It’s like riding a bike,” Madonna said. “You never forget. It’s time you got yourself some, Rue.”

  “Madonna, shh!” I thumbed at Daisy and her friend. Madonna shrugged, winking at Daisy who was watching all our faces.

  “He’s a good guy,” Laura said. “He doesn’t . . . expect things.”

  “Anyway, you were asking me if he told me something?” I said, skirting the issue.

  “Yeah, did he tell you he turned me onto a big story on the river?” she said. “Looks like they’ve got some nasty runoff pouring into the river.”

  “Gasoline? The oil spill was about sweet crude, not gasoline,” I said.

  “Yeah, like that’s news,” Madonna said. “Which river?”

  “Oh, this is news. St. Annes, but they think it’s running straight into the Magnolia Springs. They’ve got—well, they’ve got more than we ever knew about. I can’t say now, but I’ll tell you when I get more facts. It’s not sexy like oil or gas. It’s septic tank seepage running along the aquifer.”

  “Oh, they always leave you hanging when it comes to the shit,” I said, feigning heartbreak. “Still. Wait.” I thought again. “Another water pollution story? It’s a surprise we have any water to drink at all. The Magnolia? Our gem? The spring that feeds all the fresh water?”

  “Rue, you’re ranting. You need to watch less oil spill news. I gotta go, too,” Madonna said, gathering her things to leave. “Got to get some rest.” Tonight she would work steady weekend drunks and the folks depressed about Monday. And the guys working the spill. “None of my customers tip enough, but at least I’ve got customers.” She shook her head. The Rusty Rim waiters, she’d said, had just lost weekly hours.

  Daisy and I scraped the last of the cookies off the sheets and onto waxed paper. We had a chocolate chip oatmeal cookie infestation. I was going to see Mac in a while, and I’d be giving the grocer a hair and mustache trim. Later, I’d go to the nurseries to check out the plants.

  I was working with a guy who liked me. Dread rolled over me.

  CHAPTER 15

  DAISY HAD GALLIVANTED OFF to play with her friend up the street, and Taylor was on the phone, explaining to his girlfriend why he slept through Saturday night. This meant he’d get in the van and zoom off soon, too. He’d surprisingly offered to babysit Daisy so that I could go out. The weather sat stubborn in the low fifties, but the sun always has its way with the islands. Now sun’s fullness shone in the Main Street windows. I was placing the cooled cookies in several containers when a knock came at the door.

  “Is it already that close to ten?” I said. It was Jim, the grocer.

  “Yep. Morning is my best time,” Jim said, “and it’s gone before I know it.”

  I told him where to sit and covered him up with a silver cape. “Don’t worry, I won’t offer you any coffee.”

  He laughed. “Wouldn’t mind some, really.” So I poured him a cup. I offered him cookies, too, which he took. He wanted a hair and mustache trim, and I got to work clipping. When you touch people, they’ll talk to you. It’s a funny thing about us humans. Jim and I traded teenage horror stories since he was raising a son a year older than Tay. “Finally, he’s started coming around again,” Jim
said of his boy. “For a while there, we thought he was gonna drop out of school like the rest of them around here. But he decided to stick it out. Now he’s on his way to junior college.”

  “I know you’re relieved,” I said. I had expressed worry that Tay wouldn’t finish out of sheer boredom. “We look for the good signs, don’t we, Jim? Have to.”

  “I see you’ve got a picture of Fletch and Trina with little Curtis,” Jim said, pointing to the table. I had forgotten to remove the photo from the table. I’d put the rest of the evidence in a big Ziploc to show Jackson later.

  “Curtis—oh, yeah, the picture. Yeah, Taylor brought this home from the Lutzes’ house once,” I lied. “I was thinking about getting it redone for Tay to remember Trina by.” Who was this Curtis he was talking about?”

  “That was a tragedy,” he said.

  “I didn’t know Curtis,” I said.

  “You were a young’un then,” he said. “Curtis was only a child himself,” Jim said. “Fell off the boat when he was out with Fletch and Preston. Drowned before Fletch could even get to him. Out on the Magnolia River up by the bluff. Trina never forgave him, I don’t think. How can a mother go on after a child has died?” He shook his head. “And Fletch, that ole Fletch got the message out that he didn’t like nobody talking about it.”

  “Oh,” I said. I wanted to sit down. Poor Trina. So she had been a mother. A teen mother. My kids served as her grandkid substitute. Indeed, how does a mother live her life after her child dies, I wondered. Or live with a husband she feels had responsibility in the child’s death? How do they go on together? And who the hell was Preston? Why hadn’t I known about the child? Fletch had really put a cap on any talk, that was certain. “Jim, do you think Trina was—depressed?” I said.

  He turned his head and looked at me. “’Tween you and me?” I nodded. “I think there was hanky panky going on there.”

  “Hanky panky? You mean she was having an affair? What makes you say that?” I said.

  “No, not that kind,” Jim said, waving his hand. “Take it from me.” He looked at me pointedly. “Trina was honest as a summer day is long, and Fletch is just as dishonest.” Then he shut his mouth. I trimmed his mustache, trying not to tickle, and not to cut anything besides hair. “You know some of them Coltons got hired by BP,” he said after a bit. “Said they won’t let the fellas wear respirators when they’re working with them chemicals. Said they’ll sack ’em if they wear any protection.”

  “That’s horrible,” I said. “Those big companies don’t care a thing about the Gulf’s farmers. We can’t fish, so we have to go get poisoned cleaning up their mess.” I stepped back and looked at his hair. “There,” I said. “All done.” He stood and went for his wallet.

  “LaRue, between you and me, those books them guys kept of their businesses?” he said, shaking his head. “They were screwy. Trina came to me complaining, since I run a clean business. She kept the books for all of us around here, you know. And she told me she was scared.” He shook his head and pulled out a hundred-dollar bill. “All kinds of funny money around here, swapping it up here and yonder, and she couldn’t keep hide nor hair of it. Knew it would be her hide if anybody got caught.” He handed me the bill.

  “Oh, I don’t have change—” I said, putting my hands in my back pockets.

  “I don’t want change,” he said. “I may have to count on you for the same sometime.” He threw the bill on the table. “So just don’t forget me.”

  “Jim?” I said. “I can’t take this—”

  “Rue,” he said, sternly.

  “Well,” I said, sighing and dropping my shoulders. “Okay. I won’t forget it. But there’s something I wanna ask. Did Fletch and Trina fight much? The books? Or—” I trailed off, then pointed to the photo. “Or Curtis?”

  “I don’t know about that,” Jim said, pointing to the photo. “But the funny money? All the time,” he said. “Trina, she tried to get people to come clean, but they ignored her.” He shook his head. “Well, you take care, now, hear? And don’t be a stranger. Hope you get your reputation back soon!” He smiled, waved and was gone.

  THE FIRST NURSERY on the county road took almost twenty minutes to reach. I’d almost gotten to Wellborn. All kinds of showy pinks, purples, and oranges sat out front at Logan’s Nursery, a new building made of light wood. I wondered how a business kept from folding in a recession. I entered the fenced area and began to saunter, searching for the palms. They stood toward the back of the main room. Sure enough, palm trees that looked like the one that landed on my front stoop. Only in different-sized pots.

  I asked a sales clerk if he could check the bar code for fitting their inventory or cash register. He sized me up, shrugged, and ran it through. “Yep,” he said. “Purchased here October first.” Whoever delivered the plant to me had bought it five weeks earlier. The premeditated precision made the skin on my back crawl.

  I asked if he could trace who’d purchased the fern, and he shook his head no. I thanked him and checked out some hibiscus I wanted to plant at Panther Pit, a coral color. By the time I made it back to the island, the sun had passed towards mid-afternoon.

  An hour later, I was standing at Mac’s door, knocking. Mary answered, wearing a scanty white nightshirt thing, surprising me. I knew she saw my expression, and she said, “Oh, um, I’m just helping Mac out until he can be up on his feet. Come in.” I followed her to the kitchen.

  “Want a beer?” She grabbed one for herself and popped the top. I stared at the hallway that led to Mac’s room. I’d just stolen onto a boat he owned. I’d supposedly poisoned him several days ago. I’d just found out he kept iffy books. Of course I wanted a beer. But I figured I’d better not.

  “No, thanks,” I said. “But some tea or water would be great. Whatever you’ve got.” I leaned on the marble bar of his modern gleaming kitchen. Black and white carpet, red leather furniture in the living room. Very Asian, teak and sleek. The windows with their angular shapes stretched across the Gulf side of the high-ceiling living room.

  “He’s getting damn frustrating,” Mary said, pouring a glass of water. She handed the tumbler to me, plunking a piece of ice in it as an afterthought. “Wants to get back to work. Says he needs to see this guy, got to get a loan from that bank, and call somebody about the other project. And he’s been watching those football games.” She took a deep glug of beer. “He gets as mad as that Spurrier guy used to get when the Gators did something wrong. You know how that coach used to throw his hat on the ground like a spoiled brat?” I nodded. “Last night, you’d have thought Mac was the coach the way he threw pillows at the TV.” She shook her head. “I thought he was gonna cry when that team—whoever it was—started losing the whatever game today.” She took another long drink and sighed.

  “Maybe that’s his way of getting frustration out,” I said. “He’s really a dedicated worker. He loves work. Lives work. You know. When do you think he’ll be back at it?”

  “Tomorrow, probably. The doctor said not until next week, but if the man can walk, the man will work,” she said. “Thank the Lord.” She finished her beer, crushed the can and hesitated. She looked at the tin of cookies I’d brought. “How nice of you.”

  “Think I can see him?” I said.

  “Sure. Wait here.” She opened the fridge, popped another beer, and headed up the stairs. I sneaked into his study, scanning. Papers from a Tallahassee law firm, stationery with the heading ECOL, a legal document that looked like a property description. Somewhere out the county road. I stole back into the kitchen. Mary descended holding her beer can.

  “You can go up in a minute,” she said. She turned around in that skimpy pj’s thing. She was married to Cooter, probably out on patrol. If not, he was drinking at the Hook Wreck, or sleeping off a hangover. Mary had some presence the men liked, like Tiffany. They were always swarming around her. Now Mary seemed to be hovering around Mac.

  “Mary, you know I didn’t put that poison in Mac’s coffee, right?” I asked
.

  “Of course, LaRue,” she said, not looking me in the eye.

  “Do you know who did?” I asked.

  “Nope,” she said, staring into her beer can, frowning. “Sure don’t.” Tight lips.

  “Come on, surely you have an idea of who hates him, you know, who’s jealous, or greedy, or vengeful,” I said. “You’re around him a lot.”

  “Dang,” she said. “Greedy, vengeful, jealous? You make it sound like a Greek tragedy.” I was often surprised by Mary. She sounded like a drunk humanities major. And she’d been committed to a mental ward, now on her way to drunk. She was hanging out with a guy twice her age, married to a cop without the brains God gave him. Talk about your Greek tragedies.

  “Help me out, Mary. I didn’t poison him. I need to get back to business, and the only way to do that is to find out who—”

  “I don’t know,” she said, her words flying. Her neck grew red. “I really don’t. Go on up and see him. Take him the cookies. I have a headache.” She put her arm to her forehead and took a sip of beer. I headed up the steps.

  The bedroom sprawled huge, white, navy, and austere. The furniture, scant and nautical. A skylight was set in the ceiling over the king-size bed. The headboard brought to mind a ship’s wheel. “Well, there she is,” Mac said, “the evil witch with the poisoned apple.”

  He sat with newspapers, coffee cups, and dishes expanding in disarray around him. The sailor in his shining pajamas. Mac did have beautiful hair, and the tan, media-star handsome against his white hair. But his eyes looked puffy.

  “Here, sit on the bed,” he said, then saw my face. “Or grab that chair and pull it up.” He pointed at a white wicker chair in the corner. “What’d you bring me?”

  I handed him the tin, and as he opened it, his eyes gleamed. He pulled a cookie out and held it up. “Now, some folks would tell me not to touch what you brought me.” He took a bite. “Umm mmm. But I’d say to them, ‘Don’t you fret over Mac Duncan. He and LaRue Panther, they’re tight.’ ” He winked, and smiled. We’d helped each other in business, referred people to each other, been active in the local chamber of commerce together. But I’d never been in his home, next to his bed with cookies, or talking around murder attempts versus trust.