by Agatha Ball
"Can I help you?" I asked, trying to figure out how to politely ask this guy to leave.
He pointed a gnarled finger in my face. "Are you the one that found that body?"
If I didn't tell him, anyone else in the town could, so I decided to cop to it. "I am," I offered.
He cut me off, waving his finger once more in my face. "Stay away from these murders," he said. "This is not some game. You keep your nose out of this business."
My mouth was dry and my throat clenched. "Or else...?"
He leaned forward. "Curiosity killed the cat."
And with that, he turned and left the shop. I couldn't lock the front door fast enough. I stood there with my heart pounding, wondering what had just happened. Had I just been threatened? I mean, you can't exactly go to the police and tell them a strange, crazy man dressed like a sailor stood there and whispered a cliché at you. But by the same token, things were not okay.
So, this sailor didn't want me to go around asking questions. The thing was, I hadn't been asking questions. I mean, people came in and gossiped with me, but that was it. Had he been eavesdropping on the conversation Nate and I had on the beach last night?
Chills ran up and down my spine.
It made me wonder if he made a similar visit to Nate. I pulled out my phone, but realized I didn't have Nate's number. I chewed the inside of my lip as I tried to figure out what to do. Granny was at bingo, so she wouldn't miss me if I bugged out for a little while. I hung up my apron, making the decision to swing by Nate's house and find out.
I grabbed my bike from behind the shop and took off toward Old Man Byron's place on the hill. The sun was just setting by the time I arrived at the mansion.
A few lights dotted the windows, but I didn't spot the mysterious sailor anywhere, so that seemed like a good sign. I leaned my bike against the front fence and opened the gate to the yard.
It looked like Nate had tried to rake up some of the leaves that Old Man Byron had left since last autumn, and then given up. Can't say I blamed him.
I went up to the front porch and knocked. A few moments later, I heard the sound of footsteps and the swing of the peephole's cover. The door opened and Nate stood there, looking both happy and worried to see me.
"What are you doing here, Paige?" he asked.
It wasn't exactly the "Great to see you!" I had been hoping for, but a fair question. I shivered, despite the fact that it wasn't particularly cold outside. "Can I come inside?" I asked.
"Of course!" he replied, as if suddenly remembering his manners. He stood to the side and swept his arm toward the hallway.
I walked in and rubbed my arms, trying to chase away the chills. I didn't realize how much that encounter with the sailor had affected me.
"You look like you've seen a ghost," he said, shutting the door, unable to keep the concern from creeping into his voice. "Did something happen?"
"Did you have a visitor?" I asked. "A creepy sort of sailor wannabe?"
"No..." he replied, glancing out the window with full-fledged concern now.
"I just had the weirdest thing happen. This guy stopped by the shop and asked if I was the person who found the dead body the other day. He then told me I was asking too many questions and should butt out of it. And then... I think he may have threatened me..."
Nate didn't even hesitate. He gave me a great big hug. He then held me out at arm's length. "Are you okay? We should go report this to the police." He began walking to the door.
I stopped him. "Nate, you know and I know that reporting this to the police will just make them ask what I did to provoke it and they will probably even side with the sailor." I could see in his eyes that he knew I was talking the truth. I sighed. "Besides, it wasn't a real threat... just a veiled threat... that could have been a threat..." I ran my fingers through my hair, feeling so unsure and confused. "Oh, I don't know. It's just so weird. I mean, I haven't been asking questions. You and I talked about finding out who did it last night there on the beach, but that's it. Do you think he overheard us?"
"I don’t know. Do you think he did?" Nate asked.
"I don't know either," I admitted. "It was all just so weird."
He took my hand. "Come on. I'm going through some of my uncle's old files and I could really use some help. It'll help keep your mind off things... and I don't like the thought of you going back to your cottage alone with someone like that creeping around."
He led me into a musty living room. Or maybe it was an office. It was hard to figure out what exactly it was beneath the clutter. I'd seen tidier rooms on Hoarders. Two Tiffany-style table lamps barely lit the dim room. There was a desk and a sofa, and probably some other furniture, but everything was buried in boxes and paperwork. Half-filled file drawers hung open with sloppy files of wrinkled paper. I did not envy Nate at all.
"Take a pile, any pile," said Nate as he moved me toward the couch.
I picked up a stack of papers on a coffee table. "Been through these yet?"
"Nope," he replied. "Have at it. There's plenty."
I started flipping through. "What are you looking for?"
"Well, I have to dispose of his property, so anything that looks like it might be important or historic... but I'm also looking for anything that might be a reason for people wanting to kill him." He motioned to the mess around the room. "Seems like a pretty stupid way of sleuthing, but I don't have any better leads."
We sat sifting through papers for about an hour when I found an interesting folder. "Nate, it looks like you may have a lot more property to dispose of than you thought..."
"What is it?" he asked, coming over and looking over my shoulder.
"It looks like he was buying all of the land under Main Street. And look!" I pulled out a second set of papers. "He has bids from a series of contractors to tear down all the buildings."
"He was going to tear down Main Street?" He took the file out of my hands and began flipping through it rapidly. "But... it's Main Street. It's why anyone even comes to the island."
There was a stack of full-color brochures in the next folder and I passed them over. "It looks like he may have been planning on building a resort with a high rise hotel."
"This is one of the worst ideas I've ever heard!" Nate exclaimed taking the brochures.
"Do you think someone found out and they decided they needed to put a stop to it... permanently?" I asked.
Nate paused, staring at the pictures of happy couples frolicking across white sandy beaches. "It makes sense..."
"But who?" I mused. "And what about the second body? That stranger I found?"
"Maybe he was someone who worked for one of these companies my uncle was trying to hire?" asked Nate. He began tidying up the papers, stacking them neatly and smoothing out the wrinkles. "Once the body is identified, we'll know for sure."
"Maybe tomorrow we should start talking to people to see who knows what," I suggested. The side of my mouth quirked up. "Plus, if someone was desperate enough to warn me not to dig too deep, it's probably a sign that there's something there to discover."
Nate looked at me and the gratitude practically shone from his face. "Thank you, Paige. No one deserves to die the way my uncle died, and finding out why will give me some closure."
A warm wash of good feelings coursed through me, and I realized that maybe my intentions were not entirely unselfish. Sure, we needed to find the murder to clear both our names, but it didn't hurt that I was going to have to see Nate a lot in order to figure things out. I smiled and stood.
"We start in the morning," I said. "We'll get to the bottom of this."
He put down the folder and walked over to me, giving me a huge, warm hug. His arms wrapped around me and held me close. It felt so safe.
"Thank you," he murmured, his words whispering in my hair. "Thank you."
Chapter Thirteen
Nate walked me home and, fortunately, there were no creepy people lurking in the tall grass. Still, I appreciated it, and there was a swee
tness in the way he said goodnight that kept me smiling till I drifted off to sleep.
He was at the coffee shop first thing in the morning, and a few minutes later Johnny wandered in looking for his breakfast.
"Hey, Johnny!" I said as I put together a bag of goodies for him. "Got a minute?"
"Always. What's up?"
"We're gonna catch a criminal. You in?"
He considered for a moment. "Can I wear a fedora?"
"You got one?"
"Maybe."
"If you can find it, you can wear it."
"I'm in."
I motioned to Nate. "Have the two of you met?"
Johnny jerked his chin in friendly greeting. "Whaddup?"
"Thank you for trying to rescue my uncle," Nate said, reaching out to shake Johnny's hand.
Johnny's arm was sort of noodly, like he didn't exactly know how the shaking hands thing worked. "It's all good," he replied.
As they talked, I walked to the front door and flipped the sign to "Closed." After that sailor somehow knew Nate and I were planning on doing a little sleuthing, I was completely paranoid. We only needed five uninterrupted minutes, so hopefully we could squeeze in our conversation before the caffeine addicts showed up, jonesing for their morning hit.
I walked over to the counter and pulled out a paper map of the main street. It was one of those touristy things we handed out to folks just off the ferry. It was hand drawn and was all about the shops and what they offered.
"So, we know that your uncle was buying up land under all of these shops." I pointed to all of the buildings on the side of the street opposite to the beach.
"And I stayed up late going through his paperwork and saw that he had only gotten as far as this corner." Nate circled the buildings on the right-hand side.
I gave a low whistle. "He was one building away from owning the land under Granny's bookshop."
Johnny let out a breath. "That would have like... seriously sucked. Like. For serious."
"Totally," I agreed. I turned to Nate. "I guess first up, we need to decide if people were mad at him for buying up the land, or mad at him because he was thinking about buying up the land." I stared at the door to Granny's upstairs apartment. "I'll start with Granny and see if she had any idea that your uncle was after this place. She'll be able to let us know if it was general knowledge or something folks found out after the fact."
"And I'll start talking to people on this side of the ferry dock," said Nate.
"Which means I can ask people on this side..." Johnny looked at the map and then squinted at it. He flipped it upside down and then looked outside. "Wait. Which side am I talking to?"
"Anyone you can talk to, Johnny," I offered. "If you run across any of your friends, anyone you know, just chat them up and find out if they heard anything."
"Riiiight," he replied, as if hearing our plan for the very first time.
"And if anybody asks," I said to him, marking up his map so he would know where Nate and I were going to go, "just tell them Granny and I are working on putting together a new brochure for the tourists."
"That is like... super brilliant. They'll never see what hit 'em."
He gave me a half salute and then crossed toward the front door in a half jog. He fumbled with the locks a bit and then turned and gave me another little half salute and tripped out the door.
"Do you think he comprehended anything that is going on?" asked Nate with a note of bemusement.
"Who? Johnny?" I hooked my thumb at where my friend had disappeared. "That guy is crazy like a fox. He'll probably have all this solved before dinner. And hopefully, he'll even remember what he discovered long enough to tell us."
"Him?" confirmed Nate.
"It was no accident he found your uncle." I held up my hands and stopped myself. "I mean, it was an accident, but in the grand scheme of life and the universe and chaos theory, he, of all people on this island, definitely would be the one to stumble across him. What's that whole saying about how God looks after drunks and fools? Well, Johnny's hit his head enough to qualify for the 'fools' part and, I gotta say, somebody upstairs is definitely looking out for him."
"Cool," replied Nate, totally on board after hearing my reassurances. "I'll look forward to seeing what lands in his lap before sundown." He picked up the map. "Mind if I take this? I'm still learning my way around."
"Have at it!" I replied. "I'll meet you at Yvette's café around one for lunch?"
"I dunno," he said. "I hear her place has a 'no shirt, no shoes, no killers' policy."
"We'll see if she serves us anyway," I replied, giving him a wink.
He laughed. "See you then," he replied. He walked over to the door and then stopped with his hand on the handle. He turned back to me, a small, warm smile creeping across his mouth. "Thanks for doing all this, Paige. I don't know why you're doing it and I don't know how you got mixed up in it all, but I'm glad that you're in this with me. And I'm glad that we're working on this together. If I had to face this all alone... well..."
A rush of heat flared up in my cheeks, and I'm pretty sure I had turned as red as the cranberries in my orange cranberry scones. I don't take compliments too well. "Well. Of course. You know. I just... I just wanted to help. It's wrong what happened and I'm sorry that you have to go through all this. Plus, my behind is on the line, too."
He smiled at me once more as he left, but there was a knowing look in his eye. I didn’t know that a bell ringing over the door could send my heart into mushy palpitations.
I put on my apron and managed the morning rush. Granny showed up around 11 AM, her hair perfectly coiffed. She gave me a hug and looked over at the till. "Busy day?"
"Things are picking up," I replied. "I think we're on the verge of the tourist season."
"Glad to see that word is getting out." She picked up a duster and went into the shop, tidying up and putting things back in their proper place. Captain was sleeping on a leather chair by the window, next to a little sign encouraging people to tag their photos of him with our suggested tag of "#CaptaintheSuperCat."
"Granny?" I asked as she puttered around.
"Yes, darling?" she replied, not even looking up from the stack of books she was putting away.
"Did you know that Old Man Byron was about to buy the land under your shop?"
She froze, horrified, as if I had just announced I was pregnant from a one-night stand with a recently freed convict. "He WHAT?"
"I was over at Nate's last night, helping him sort through some paperwork. We discovered that he was buying up all of the land under Main Street and yours was next on his list."
"Well, that son of a—-" She stopped herself. "Now, I'm not one to speak ill of the dead, but that BASTARD. I mean, I know he bought up half the town, but who in tarnation does he think he is, waltzing in and buying up land under MY shop?"
"It was the weirdest thing," I replied. "He bought up everyone on the other side of the ferry and was working his way down this way. Would you mind too much if I found out if anyone knew what he was doing?"
"Oh..." She seemed to be sorting through a whole list of things she wanted to say, but settled on an explosive, "I will most DEFINITELY help you find out who he was planning on swindling. In fact, I'll head down the street right now to start talking to people!"
"Someone needs to run the shop..." I reminded her.
"Oh, forget the shop," she replied, waving me away.
"I know your friends will swing by for their afternoon cup. Maybe if you could just casually talk to them when they come in and find out what's what. I don't want to start some witch hunt. It could be that everyone who sold knew what he was up to...?"
"I can't imagine that," she replied with conviction.
"Just, let me ask around... quietly... and if I can't find anything out, then we'll send out the big guns."
She hitched her hip and placed the end of her feather duster in her pocket like a holster. "You just let me know when you're ready, because I'm locked and
loaded."
Chapter Fourteen
Nate just happened to be at the end of the block as I came outside. His arms were full of shopping bags. I gave him a wave and he strolled over.
"How is it going?" I asked wondering what on earth he had bought.
He shrugged. "Slow going. For some reason, people aren't exactly the most forthcoming to an accused murderer who happens to be the nephew of Byron Edwards, and who also is nosing around for information on their business dealings." He lifted up his purchases. "I resorted to bribery."
"Did it work?"
"Not as well as I had hoped." He set down his bags and dug around for a jar. He read from the label. "Need some lavender honey sugar algae face scrub?"
He put it in my hand, and I took it with a laugh. "I see that you've been in to visit Wanda's souvenir shop."
"Let's just say that lady made sure all my holiday shopping was done before she would open up."
"They'll warm up to you," I assured him, tucking the jar into my purse.
"They better, otherwise you may have to free me from debtor's prison, too." He glanced over at my map as he fell into step beside me. "Where is your first stop?"
I pointed to a place at the far end of the road. "I think I'm going to start with Tim in the fish and tackle shop."
Nate looked at the quiet shop. "Really? It doesn't seem like he would have many visitors."
"A bait shop? On an island? You really are a city slicker, aren't you?" I teased before explaining my reasoning. "It was a sailor who threatened me. And if you're a sailor, odds are you're going to have to fish for dinner, at least every now and then. And where else are you going to go? Plus, a fish and tackle shop is perfect for buying weapons that don't actually seem like weapons."
"How so?"
"Knives to gut fishes. Oars to knock people over the head with. Ropes to choke people with."
"Remind me never to tangle with you." Nate grimaced. "I'll leave you to it," he said and then gave me a little salute. "See you at the café in about an hour to reconnoiter?"