Cottage on Gooseberry Bay: Charmed Summer

by Kathi Daley

  “Did she know he was absent today?” Jemma asked.

  “Not until she heard about Zane and called the school to check on him. When she found out that he hadn’t made it to school today, she called Deputy Todd.”

  “Okay,” I said. “So Kalen was last seen Saturday morning, and Zane was last seen last Sunday afternoon when he told his mother he was heading out to go paddleboarding.”

  “That’s correct. When I spoke to Todd earlier, he didn’t think the two cases were related despite the fact that both missing boys are fifteen-year-olds who attend the local high school, but then shortly before I left the office to come over here, I found out that a third boy, Trevor Wilson, never made it home from school today.”

  “So does it look as if he was abducted?” Josie asked.

  “Todd didn’t know. Trevor was last seen leaving school on his bike at three o’clock. He was grounded after getting in trouble for breaking curfew over the weekend and told to come straight home after school let out. When he didn’t show up at home, his father went looking for him, but so far, he’s been unable to find him.”

  “So now we have three missing kids,” Jemma said. “All boys, all fifteen, all students at Gooseberry High. This can’t be a coincidence.”

  “At this point, Deputy Todd is beginning to suspect that all three boys have been abducted,” Parker confirmed.

  “Were they friends?” I asked.

  “Not really,” Parker replied. “Zane is an athlete and tended to hang out with the jocks, Kalen played sports in the past but wasn’t nearly as committed as Zane, and it appears he dropped off the teams he’d participated with last year. Based on what I’ve been able to find out, once Kalen’s father left, Kalen began hanging out with the gang at the auto shop. And Trevor is a genius of sorts who hung out with an academic crowd.”

  “So, is there any way we can help?” I asked.

  Parker hesitated. “You know how I like to be in the middle of things, but Todd is talking about bringing in the FBI. We are, after all, talking about three missing kids. If the FBI does get involved, I seriously doubt that they would tolerate any outside interference the way Todd can usually be convinced to.”

  “So you aren’t going to investigate?” Josie asked Parker.

  “I didn’t say that. But if we are going to poke around, we’ll need to be discrete. And careful. Even more careful than usual.”

  Josie, Jemma, and I all agreed we were there for Parker if she needed us.

  After Parker finished her meal and left, Jemma asked me about the charms I’d come by to show them in the first place. I shared the story of my new client and her quest to find her biological parents. There wasn’t a lot to go on at this point, but she did have the charm bracelet and the blanket, which I described in detail.

  “I took photos of the charms on the bracelet. Do any of them mean anything to you? Keep in mind that the date on the shoe is ninety-six, so it might be possible that all the charms were collected around that time.”

  “Some charm bracelets take years to complete,” Josie pointed out.

  “That’s true, but Ellery was born in nineteen ninety-seven, and the shoe has ninety-six stamped beneath B2B, so at this point, we’re assuming the person who owned the bracelet was involved in the Bay to Boardwalk Run in nineteen ninety-six. Of course, we don’t know that with any degree of certainty. There are other runs that would work with B2B, and I suppose it’s even possible that the ninety-six means something else entirely.”

  “How exactly does your client think that this charm bracelet is going to help her find her biological parents?” Jemma asked. “Does she have a theory?”

  “I’m not sure. My client told me that she was left in a small community church just hours after her birth in April of nineteen ninety-seven. She was wrapped in a white blanket with red roses stitched along the hem but was otherwise naked. The charm bracelet was tucked into the blanket, so I guess she figures that if her biological mother went to all the trouble to leave the charm bracelet behind, it must be significant. I think my client realizes that finding her biological mother based on clues provided in a charm bracelet is a longshot, but I also think she realizes that other than the blanket, the bracelet is the only clue she has.”

  “Maybe your client’s biological mother had a summer romance in nineteen ninety-six which led to her becoming pregnant with your client. What’s her name?” Josie asked.

  “Ellery.”

  “Maybe Ellery hopes that she can use the charms as clues to recreate her mother’s movements that summer,” Josie continued. “Maybe she hopes that someone will recognize the bracelet and remember her mother.”

  “I guess it’s possible,” Jemma admitted. She looked at me. “You know, if Ellery’s mother participated in the Bay to Boardwalk Run in nineteen ninety-six, we might be able to get a list of participants for that year. I’m assuming one existed at the time, and if it was digitized, which I would assume by that point it would have been, it may still exist.”

  “It could provide a starting point,” I agreed. “Assuming, of course, that the shoe represents that specific run and that the bracelet did, in fact, belong to Ellery’s mother. Can you access the list?”

  Jemma shrugged. “I can try.” She got up, crossed the room, and picked up her laptop. She returned to the sofa, tucking her legs up under her body and settling the laptop on her lap. She then began to type. I knew this might take a while, so I turned my attention to Josie.

  “The other charm that we feel fairly certain about is the book,” I said to Josie. “The book has the name Brewster’s inscribed on it. Ellery did some research and discovered that there had indeed been a bookstore named Brewster’s Books in Gooseberry Bay back in the nineties.”

  “Sure. I remember that place. It was located in the building where the museum is now housed.”

  “How long ago did it go out of business?” I asked.

  Josie paused and then answered. “Maybe four or five years ago, I guess. The little store lasted longer than some of the other independents in the area, but the owner, a woman named Kendra Hart, decided to retire, so she liquidated the stock and sold the building to the historical society.”

  “Does Kendra still live in the area?” I asked.

  “Yes, she does. In fact, Kendra volunteers at the museum.” Josie’s eyes widened. “You’re hoping that she’ll remember the woman with the bracelet.”

  “It’s worth asking.”

  “I’m off tomorrow. I’ll go to the museum with you if you want. If Kendra isn’t working tomorrow, whoever is should know when she’ll be in. It might be a good idea to bring the actual charm bracelet when you speak to her.”

  “Let’s confirm she’s available to speak with. If she is and she wants to see the actual bracelet, I’ll call my client and have her meet us there.”

  “Okay, guys. I have the list of entrants for the Bay to Boardwalk Run in nineteen ninety-six,” Jemma said.

  “That’s wonderful,” I said. “How long is it?”

  “There were six hundred and forty-two entrants.”

  “Yikes!” I narrowed my gaze. “That’s a lot. Can we narrow it down?”

  “I eliminated the men and pulled up a list of women only, which brought it down to three hundred and eighty-four.” Jemma sat staring at her screen.

  “I know this is a guess, but if Ellery is correct and her mother spent the summer in Gooseberry Bay, only to end up pregnant and alone, chances are she was young. How young, I don’t know, but abandoning a naked baby in a church doesn’t sound like something someone with maturity would do.”

  “I guess I can set some age parameters. The run is open to everyone sixteen and above, so how about sixteen to twenty-two?” Jemma asked.

  “That sounds like a good place to start.”

  She typed in the parameters we’d discussed and then sat back. “It didn’t help much. There are still two hundred and four entrants.”

  “Okay, let’s print out a list with those nam
es,” I suggested. “Let’s also print the list of all the female entrants. Maybe someone will be able to remember some of these individuals. I have to assume that quite a few of them were local. We can ask around and begin to eliminate those individuals who are known to others and who definitely weren’t pregnant during the winter between the summer of ninety-six and the spring of ninety-seven.”

  Josie sat on the sofa, thumbing through the photos on my phone. “A couple of these charms, like the shoe, if it turns out that it is associated with the Bay to Boardwalk Run, seem like they might provide a clue, but other charms, like the ice cream cone, are too common to be of much use. Even if you settled on the idea that the cone represented an ice cream shop and the shop was important to the story, which shop?”

  “I suppose we can go down to the Chamber of Commerce and get a list of all the ice cream shops in Gooseberry Bay that held licenses and did business in nineteen ninety-six,” I said. “There couldn’t have been that many. Sure, Gooseberry Bay is a beach town which probably does have a higher ice cream shop to population ratio than some towns, but still, we’re probably only looking at a handful of vendors.”

  “What about all the ice cream carts on the boardwalk?” Josie asked. “There are a bunch of them in the summer, and I’m not sure they have business licenses.”

  “I guess that’s true,” I admitted.

  “And we don’t know for certain that the ice cream cone represents an actual place. Maybe the woman who owed the bracelet simply liked ice cream.”

  I wrinkled my nose as I considered this idea. “There are seven charms on the bracelet. Seven memories were chosen to commemorate a summer filled with hundreds of experiences. If we’re correct, and that’s what was going on, I think we should assume the charms are important and not a whim.”

  “Like the rose,” Josie said. “You said the blanket Ellery was wrapped in had roses on it, and the bracelet also has a rose. I would think that a rose is an important clue.”

  “Maybe, but it’s also pretty general. Maybe the woman who owned the bracelet just liked roses. And even if it is an important clue and we can track it back to a flower shop, we don’t know for sure that all the charms were all gathered over one summer, let alone all in Gooseberry Bay,” Jemma pointed out. “Perhaps we can determine that this piece of information will help us with the remaining charms, but at this point, the only charm associated with nineteen ninety-six is the shoe.”

  Jemma was right. I supposed I was getting ahead of myself.

  Josie continued to thumb through the photos, pausing to consider each one. “I wonder if the movie reel is supposed to commemorate Gooseberry Bay’s annual Movies on the Beach event the town holds every other Friday during the summer.”

  “There’s a movie on the beach event?” I asked.

  She nodded. “A movie is shown on a huge screen made out of an old sail down on Land’s End Beach every other Friday from the last Friday in June through the last Friday in August. It’s a free event, and the movies are definitely not new releases, but it’s fun. It’s also sort of romantic since the movie doesn’t start until it’s completely dark.”

  “So it’s one of those things where everyone brings their own chair or blanket,” I confirmed.

  “Exactly.” Josie grinned. “A lot of the younger couples who show up for the food and socializing portion end up sneaking off down the beach for a bit of romance after the movie starts. I wouldn’t be surprised in the least to find out that Ellery was conceived at one of the movie nights.”

  “It sounds fun,” I said. “Kind of like a drive-in theater without the cars. And I can imagine that sitting out under the stars with your guy or gal of the moment would be very romantic. The only problem is that a movie under the stars with a make-out session on the side doesn’t give us much information to go on. Not like the run that led to a list or the book we hope will lead to a woman who might remember the woman who wore the bracelet.”

  Josie shrugged. “I guess that’s true, but maybe there’s more to it.” She looked at Jemma. “Can you pull up a list of movies shown on the beach during the summer of nineteen ninety-six?”

  “I can try.”

  “Do you think the clue might be the movie?” I asked.

  “It could be. If a movie called High School Romance or One Long Summer was playing, that might actually help confirm the theory you’ve been working from,” Josie said. “That’s if the title is the clue, of course. At this point, this whole thing is pretty random. I mean, it is possible that the person who left Ellery in the church, presumably her mother, just wanted her to have a memento from her, and the charms really don’t mean anything.”

  “Yeah,” I agreed. “I suppose it is equally likely that the charms aren’t clues as it is that they are. But my client wants to follow that idea, and I plan to help her however it works out.”

  Jemma typed a series of commands into her computer. “There were five movie nights that summer,” she said. “The movies featured were: Back to the Future, The Karate Kid, The Princess Bride, Goonies, and War Games.”

  “If the movie is a clue, it has to be The Princess Bride,” Josie said.

  “Probably. But I guess that isn’t enough of a clue to really be a clue,” I pointed out.

  “What are the other charms?” Jemma asked. “In addition to the movie reel, the shoe, the rose, the book, and the ice cream cone.”

  “There’s a ship, a large one. Maybe a cruise ship or I suppose it could even represent the ferry. There is also a Ferris wheel. I suppose that might be a reminder of a carnival if one happened to have been in town at the time.”

  “There is a traveling carnival that sets up down near the marina for a week in July every year,” Josie said. “And they do have a Ferris wheel.”

  “I’m not sure knowing about the carnival will help us figure any of this out,” Jemma said.

  “Maybe not, but let’s start with what we have,” Josie suggested. “Let’s talk to Kendra from Brewster’s Books and see if she knows anything about the book charm. Maybe she’ll remember the woman who wore the bracelet, and we’ll have our baby mama without even having to figure out the other charms.”

  The three of us agreed to meet up tomorrow and head into town. Josie, who’d lived in the area longer than Jemma or me, knew Kendra and agreed to introduce us and ask for her help, while Jemma promised to brainstorm and try to figure out what the charms on the bracelet might relate to. I planned to work on it myself, although I really hadn’t been around long enough to be able to notice associations, even if they did exist.

  Chapter 5

  I got up early the following morning to take the dogs for a long run. The museum opened at eleven, so I planned to meet Josie and Jemma at their cottage at ten-thirty. Most of the time, I took Kai and Kallie to the office with me, but since I would be out and about today, I decided to leave them home, hence the extra-long run. I felt my muscles warm as I settled into a steady pace. The view along the bay trail was exceptional this morning. Small fishing vessels that would stay in the bay dotted the water, but it was the large open water vessels heading out toward the channel that would take them to the sea that most enchanted me.

  I loved these early mornings with the dogs. Running relaxed me. It was an activity that allowed me to challenge my body while resting my mind, which I found more and more a necessity as the answers I’d been seeking began to unfold. Sometimes, I found it difficult to quiet my thoughts, but more often than not, I found the quiet and solace I sought by being out here on the trail as the sun greeted the day.

  There were actually a lot of running trails in the area, each with its own special appeal, but I found that the dogs and I most often chose the trail that hugged the bay on the south end and then climbed up onto Piney Point and the trail that led to the back fence of the estate owned by Adam and Archie. Both Winchester brothers had been out of town lately. Adam frequently traveled as part of his job as the administrator for the family foundation, but Archie tended to travel
more for pleasure. The last I heard, he was heading to French Polynesia with a woman he’d met at a fundraiser he’d attended just after Valentine’s Day while Adam was in Europe taking care of family business.

  When the dogs and I reached the estate’s back fence, I paused briefly before heading back. We’d run hard up the hill, so my plan was to mostly walk on the return trip to prevent the dogs from becoming overworked.

  As I slowly began to make my way along the point toward the trail that would take me to the cottage, an image of my best friend, Keni, flashed into my mind. I’d been meaning to call her. I made a mental note to do so today. Keni had been saying that she would come for a visit for months, but so far, every time she’d set a date, she’d ended up canceling. I missed her a lot and hoped she’d finally be able to make the commitment, but I also understood that she lived a busy life and her career as an actress came first. I was proud of Keni. She knew what she wanted, and she worked hard to get it. There was no doubt in my mind that one day her name would be plastered on billboards for the world to see and know.

  As the trail flattened and began to hug the waterline, I slowed even more so the dogs could splash around. I pulled my phone out of my pocket to check the time and noticed I had a missed call from Adam. Deciding to call him back in the hope of catching him, I hit the call back button and waited.

  “Adam, I’m sorry I missed your call. The dogs and I were out running, and I guess I didn’t hear the phone ring.”

  “I should have known you might be out running. I guess it’s early morning there in Gooseberry Bay.”

  “Where are you?” I wondered.

  “Actually, I’m in New York.”

  “New York? I thought you were in France.”

  “I was, but I finished up there, so I’m heading back home via the east coast. I have a shareholders meeting Thursday for a company I hold a significant amount of stock in, and then I have a gala to attend in Boston Saturday. I was going to head home after that, but I had dinner with the president of a private children’s hospital I partially fund last night, and she managed to persuade me to stay around long enough to attend a fundraiser they have planned for the following weekend.”