by Mary Daheim
Renie gave Judith an exasperated look. “I told you—it’s too early for games.”
Judith ignored her cousin’s pique. “Doc asks the Danfields—or Elrod—for help. They have a boat—they’ve always had a boat, as far as I can tell. But Doc is refused. Why? Because Esther Danfield was also expecting a baby about the same time. Remember, the newspaper said her child was born about ten days later. Despite their lack of real money, Esther and Bates have this lord and lady of the manor complex. I can see them turning Doc down. It would be a terribly selfish act, but somehow it fits.”
Renie sat back down on the stool next to Judith. “Your logic makes some sense. It’s certain that something awful happened, or Francesca wouldn’t have died. That something might have been preventable. Maybe it was simply the weather, though, and nobody could get off the island. Look what happened to Bates’s parents during another September storm.”
“That’s true,” Judith admitted. “But I still think Burrell—Harry Hodge—played some part in the tragedy. Doc acknowledges that Harry was here. It had to be when Francesca died, because Doc also said he wasn’t around when Harry left the island. We know Doc went off to join the Peace Corps or whatever, and then returned to live on Chavez a couple of years later. Harry was gone by then. He must have been sent packing by the Danfields or Elrod.”
Renie sat in thoughtful silence for a full minute. “Doc named his daughter Francesca, after her mother. But that’s not Cilla’s name—it’s Priscilla. If Doc went off to do penance in the Third World, he couldn’t have taken a baby with him. Maybe you’re right—he gave her up to his sister-in-law, and she changed the kid’s name. Another Francesca might have been too painful a memory.”
Judith nodded with vigor. “I think we’re finally onto something. The only problem is,” she went on, growing somber, “I don’t like where it’s leading.”
“To Doc?”
“Right.” Judith sighed. “You mentioned justifiable homicide last night. I can’t help but wonder if that’s what Doc thought, too.”
“Maybe it’s not Doc,” Renie said. “There’s one other person who had a good reason to seek revenge.”
Judith locked gazes with Renie. “Rowena Carr?”
Renie lifted one shoulder. “She could claim she was nuts. Maybe she is.”
“Hunh.” Judith rested her chin on her hands. “I wonder.”
Judith didn’t get the opportunity to speculate further. A chipper voice sounded at the back door.
“Hey-hey-hey and what do you know!” Cilla cried, bursting into the kitchen. “I found my mallet! Sure enough, the toilet in Buck was plugged up, too. When I went to fix it, I found the mallet in the bathroom! Now how do you suppose it got there?”
Judith and Renie stared at Cilla. “That’s a good question,” Judith said slowly. “Why would anybody move it from the shrubbery off the turnaround and take it to one of the cabins?”
“Frankly,” Cilla declared as she emptied the kitchen trash can, “I don’t care how it got there. Now if I could just find my wrench and hammer…Oh!” Her mouth dropped open as she gaped at the cousins. “I see what you mean! Or do I?”
Judith gave a faint shake of her head. “Probably not. Because I don’t see it myself.” She glanced at the metal box which sat by the back door. The handle of the mallet protruded from the screwdrivers, pliers, and other tools. “Lulu McLean’s on her way over here. You’d better let her have a look.”
“Lulu!” Cilla was scornful. “She’ll probably arrest me on the spot. In fact,” she went on with a guileful expression, “I’ll leave the tools here, if you don’t mind, and come back to clean house later. There’s something I should do before Lulu gets here.”
“Like what?” Judith asked in a sharper tone than she’d intended.
Cilla looked startled, then blushed becomingly. “I…Sometimes…About once a week, I clean Rafe’s place. He’s a tidy person, but…it needs a woman’s touch.”
“Decorating,” said Renie. “That’s the thing. We’re redoing our kitchen because we had a small inferno recently. I imagine you can give Rafe some decor tips. Your mother strikes me as someone who might have artistic talent. Does she pitch in?”
The blush deepened. “No. Mother’s not the least bit artistic,” Cilla replied. “Numbers are her thing.”
Renie smiled ingenuously. “Still, it must be nice for a bachelor like Rafe to have you women fawn over him. I’ll bet your mother bakes him pies.”
“Mother doesn’t bake.” Cilla had become nervous, almost agitated. “Look, I’d better get going…”
“Quilts,” Renie said, gazing up at the beamed ceiling as if she were reading off a list of potential female accomplishments. “Sweaters. Mittens. Argyle socks. Surely your mother must do something with her time?”
“She doesn’t do it for Rafe,” Cilla retorted. “Mother doesn’t like him. She thinks he’s…bad.”
Renie was now playing her middle-aged ingenue role to the hilt. “Is he?” she asked in a shocked voice.
“Of course not!” Cilla said with fervor. “He’s a wonderful man! He’s…he’s haunted, that’s all. But Mother blames him for…our misfortune.” Cilla hung her head.
Judith and Renie exchanged swift, puzzled glances. “You mean…?” Judith began, but for once, words failed her.
In one of her exaggerated gestures, Cilla threw her hands up in the air. “Oh, pooh and double pooh! This is the end of the twentieth century! Who cares about love affairs and children born out of wedlock? I’m not ashamed of it! Why should Mother care if anybody finds out that Rafe St. Jacques is really my father?”
Judith was gulping down aspirin tablets as if they were chocolate-covered peanuts. “I can’t stand any more of this,” she declared, turning a stricken face on Renie. “Is it true? Is it possible? Am I the one who’s going crazy?”
“It’s all a dream,” Renie said in a dazed voice. “Pretty soon we’ll wake up in our own little beds and discover that we never went to Chavez Island, that my kitchen never caught fire, that your car didn’t crash into the wall at Falstaff’s, and that our mothers have never caused us an ounce of trouble.” With that pronouncement, Renie slid right off the stool and onto the kitchen floor in an extreme gesture of despair.
“Get up,” Judith urged in a cross voice. “Somehow we’ve got to sort all this out. Let’s start with Rafe. I’ll admit, his age is a little hard to guess. I figured around forty, but he could be older—or younger. Let’s say he’s forty-five—that would certainly make it possible for him to be Cilla’s father. But if so, my theory about Doc Wicker’s baby is shot to smithereens.”
Renie struggled to her feet. “It would explain why Rowena Carr doesn’t want Cilla hanging out with Rafe. She hasn’t yet forgiven him for leaving her with a baby to raise.”
“Maybe.” Judith rubbed at her temples. “So what happened to the real Francesca Junior? Maybe she’s Marcia Barber after all.”
“Maybe she was adopted by somebody in North Dakota and has never heard of Chavez Island,” Renie said. “If so, lucky her.”
“Rats!” Judith pounded at the kitchen counter and hurt her knuckles. She was massaging them when Lulu McLean arrived with Rafe St. Jacques.
“Rafe got into Laurel Harbor just as I was about to leave,” McLean announced with a kittenish glance at her companion. “Okay, take me to your mallets.”
Wearily, Judith pointed at the back door. “There’s one of them. Cilla’s showed up in her toolbox.”
“I’ll be damned,” McLean breathed, gazing at the object. “Where’s Cilla?”
The query startled Judith, who turned to stare at Rafe. “She was going to Hidden Cove to clean your place. I take it you missed her?”
Rafe shrugged. “I left early this morning. I had a breakfast meeting with a biologist from the university lab on Sanchez Island.”
Lulu McLean was slipping on a pair of nylon gloves. She picked up the mallet and placed it in an evidence bag. “Okay,” she said, looking st
ern. “Let’s see that croquet set.”
“I can show you,” Rafe volunteered. “It’s behind the cabins by the woodpile.” He put a familiar hand on Mc-Lean’s arm and steered her through the back door.
“I guess that puts us in our place,” Judith said. “Now what?”
“Frankly,” Renie said, “facing Elrod Dobler’s shotgun sounds like a snap after all this. Shall we?”
“Why not?” sighed Judith. “We’d better go now so we’ll be back when Rafe brings the guests from Perez Island. He’ll probably get Lulu to Laurel Harbor about the time the ferry comes in.”
The fog was still drifting across the road as the cousins walked past the Wicker Basket. Doc was nowhere to be seen, nor was there any sign of Rowena Carr when they passed the neat little Victorian house farther down the road. Indeed, except for the wind, the island seemed strangely silent. Not even the gulls were making their presence known on this September morning.
The stone fence appeared first, then the iron gates, and, finally, the outline of Stoneyhenge. But there was no sign of Elrod Dobler or the Danfields. Judith approached the metal grill and fumbled with the buttons.
“Esther?” she called, hearing her own voice echo back. “Bates?”
“Elrod!” barked a voice from somewhere in the fog. “Hands up!”
“Screw it, Elrod,” Renie said in a tired voice. “It’s us, Jeanne Barber’s stand-ins.”
Elrod materialized out of the mist. “What now?” he demanded, sounding as weary as Renie.
Judith forced herself to put on her most engaging face. “Mr. Dobler, we need to talk to you. We’re in a pickle.”
“Who isn’t?” Elrod retorted. “Life’s a pickle, and a sour one at that. Start talkin’.”
Judith shook her head. “Not here. Can’t we sit down like civilized people, in the guesthouse?”
The astonishment that crossed Elrod’s wrinkled face indicated that such an idea was as foreign to him as flying to the moon. “I don’t have no guests,” he said in a truculent tone. “Who do you think I am, some ritzy society snob?”
“I think,” Judith said plaintively, “that you’re a very wealthy landowner who prefers his own company. Which I understand. But what we want to discuss is very important, not just to you, but to everybody who lives on Chavez Island. Chavez means a lot to you, doesn’t it, Mr. Dobler?”
The old man leaned on the shotgun. “It’s my home,” he said simply.
“Then let us try to help you save it,” Judith persisted. “Right now, it’s sinking into a sea of lies and evasions and murder.”
“Tcaah!” Elrod spit into the dirt. “People! They ruin everything!”
“Exactly,” Judith nodded. She waited for Elrod to make up his mind.
“Okay,” he finally agreed. “Come on. But don’t expect anything fancy. I got needs, but no wants. Life oughtta be simple.”
It was, up to a point. Everything in the little stone cottage was even older than its occupant. Dark, heavy oak furniture, a well-worn Oriental rug, sagging damask draperies, and lamps that looked as if they’d been converted from gaslights suggested that Elrod had equipped his home with leftovers from his father’s mainland castle. The atmosphere was gloomy, almost sepulchral, especially when Judith noticed that the room’s focal point was a small shrine: Above the mantelpiece of the small stone fireplace hung an oil portrait of a handsome woman dressed and coifed in a style from fifty years ago. A half dozen tapers burned at each side of the painting, and a fresh bouquet of dahlias and mums stood in a tall crystal vase.
“Flora?” Judith asked in a whisper.
Elrod couldn’t seem to bring himself to look at the portrait. “Yep.” He remained standing and didn’t offer the cousins a seat.
“I’ll try to be brief,” Judith began.
“You’re damned right you will,” Elrod broke in.
“My cousin and I know quite a bit about various events that have taken place on this island,” Judith went on as if Elrod hadn’t interrupted. “We know about Arthur and Clarice Danfield’s financial reversals. We know how Doc lost his wife when their child was born. We know that Rafe is doing penance for being involved in a big oil spill off Chavez. We know that Rowena Carr is deeply troubled, but that somehow she and her daughter are managing to live on next to nothing. We even know,” Judith continued after taking a deep breath, “that H. Burrell Hodge is the same Harry Hodge who used to work on the island before he got fired for being drunk. And, of course, we know that Esther Danfield is your daughter and Simon Dobler is your son.”
If Elrod was surprised by Judith’s recital, it didn’t show. “Ain’t you the smarty-pantses?” he said in a sarcastic voice. “If you know so much, why are you askin’ me questions?”
“Because,” Judith said simply, “you know most of the answers. For instance, why didn’t Doc Wicker take his wife to Laurel Harbor when she went into labor?”
The old face sagged. “Oh, my!” Elrod sat down on the arm of a faded mohair sofa. “That takes me back, it does!” Feverishly, he rubbed at what was left of his thinning gray hair. “Don’t you go blamin’ Esther! It was that damned Bates who caused the trouble. Him ’n that drunken Harry. I shoulda knowed when Hodge showed up the other day it was him. I shoulda knowed he’d cause more trouble. That was his real first name, far as I’m concerned. T. for Trouble.”
“You didn’t recognize him when he came to see Bates?” Judith inquired.
“Hell, no.” Elrod put a shaking hand in front of his face. “See that? More’n I can do half the time. My eyes ain’t so good. Anyways, he was a lot different—older, fatter, balder. ’Course he was sober. Never saw him sober when he was a young’un. I can’t think why Bates ever let him live down at Hidden Cove. Maybe it was because nobody else wanted to. That boathouse wasn’t more than a shack in those days, leaky roof, busted windows, no heat or running water. Rafe’s got it fixed up real nice now.”
Elrod had gotten off the track. Judith tried to steer him back in the right direction. “So what did Harry and Bates do that was so awful?”
“’Course Harry didn’t want much money,” Elrod went on as if he hadn’t heard Judith. “And Bates didn’t have none to speak of, so he paid the kid in booze. Stupid. But that’s Bates all over. Sometimes I wonder. Maybe Esther woulda been better off getting herself educated and being a schoolmarm. Marriage isn’t the answer for everybody. But you coulda fooled me—my Flora was tops. Esther wasn’t so lucky, but then she never went out in the world to find anybody. Bates was right here, under her nose.”
Judith had never considered the courtship of Esther Dobler and Bates Danfield. But Elrod was right: The two young people had been raised together on the island. Even if they had gone to school in Laurel Harbor, propinquity was an overpowering aphrodisiac. Then there was the money issue. The Danfields must have been desperate to marry their son to the Dobler daughter.
Despite the detour the conversation was taking, Judith couldn’t resist a question. “Has it been an unhappy marriage?”
Elrod stared at his scuffed work boots. “Esther and Bates don’t know what happy is. You know something?” He looked up at the cousins. “Oh, that’s right—you know everything. But maybe not this—if you’re a monkey in a zoo, how do you know what it’s like for the monkeys in the jungle? Those two never got out much in the real world. They know Chavez Island, and that’s about it. Me ’n Flora thought we was protectin’ our girl. Simon was another matter—he’s a boy. But maybe we made a mistake. I reckon it’s too late now.”
“It’s never too late,” Renie put in, her voice unusually soft.
“Ehhh?” Elrod shook his head. “Maybe. Maybe not.”
“The trouble?” Judith said, also very quietly.
Elrod frowned at the cousins. “Hey—why don’t you two sit down? You’re makin’ me nervous, standin’ around like that. Try a couple of them easy chairs.”
Judith removed a birdwatcher’s guide and sat down; Renie picked up three boxes of shotgun shells
before seating herself. Elrod hunched his shoulders and rested his chin on his fists.
“So there we were, back in September of…I forget the exact date, about twenty-odd years ago. Along comes this young couple to the cabins, paddling from Perez in a canoe. The damned thing had sprung a leak. Harry said he’d fix it, but ’course he didn’t. Too damned drunk. The next day, the little woman—Missus Wicker—started havin’ her baby. Now don’t go askin’ me what went wrong, ’cause I’m no medico. But Doc—only we called him Mister Wicker then, ’cause we didn’t know he was a doctor—told Harry he had to take them in the launch to Laurel Harbor. Harry said okay, just bring the missus down to Hidden Cove. Well, that weren’t so easy. But Doc finally got her there only to find Harry passed out and no gas in the engine. Somehow, Doc brought Harry around and sent him tearin’ off to my place. I didn’t have no boat—never saw the need of it. What did I want with goin’ to the big islands? Chavez was good enough for me. Anyways, I went with Harry to Stoneyhenge to get Bates to take his nice big cruiser. But a storm was brewin’, sudden-like.”
Elrod stopped, stood up, and walked in his bowlegged fashion to the window. He opened the damask drapes slowly, revealing a view of the water through the trees. The fog had dissipated, but gray clouds hung over the island. As the wind picked up, Judith could see whitecaps on the incoming tide. She felt as if Elrod had somehow managed to re-create that autumn day from a quarter of a century ago.
“Bates wouldn’t risk the cruiser, damn his hide.” Elrod shook a fist in the direction of the main house. “I didn’t know nothin’ about runnin’ the thing. Harry said he’d give it a try, but Bates wouldn’t let him. They got into it then, nearly comin’ to blows. Esther came cryin’ and yellin’ into the room, sayin’ if they didn’t stop, she’d have her baby. I grabbed Harry and got him out of there. By the time we got back to Hidden Cove, it was too late. Missus Wicker was dead, and the newborn baby was bawlin’ its head off. Doc was bawlin’, too. It was a terrible thing.” Elrod closed the drapes.