“What the hell? Will you look at that! Gawd damn!”
“Flatter than a punctured state zoologist,” I agreed.
“Gawd damn!” He scratched his head. “Now what am I supposed to do?”
“Change it,” I said. “Put on the spare.”
He looked at me and frowned slightly, as if trying to place me. Then he seemed to recognize me, and stepped back. “You ever changed a tire? I haven’t. I don’t even know if I’ve got one. Gawd damn!” He took another step back and eyed me warily.
I looked at the flat tire. It stayed flat.
I gestured toward my driveway. “My house is down there. You could call a garage.”
He looked at the driveway. “Naw, I don’t want to go down there.” He looked up the road toward Vineyard Haven and saw the driveway, fronted by a stone-carved sign, for the wildlife sanctuary.
“What’s that place?”
“That’s the Felix Neck wildlife sanctuary.”
“They’ll have a phone. I’ll try there.” He looked at the tire. “Gawd damn!”
“Well, good luck,” I said, and walked toward my own drive. I turned and waved and saw him lock his car. He waved disconsolately back and started off the other way. When he disappeared into the driveway to Felix Neck, I threw a U and went back.
I am a poor picker of locks, but the driveway into the Felix Neck sanctuary is a long one, so I knew I had plenty of time. I needed it, too, what with interruptions from passing cars and cyclists, but finally I got the passenger-side door open. Inside, I shut the door and had a look at things.
According to the registration in the glove compartment, where it lived amid a collection of unused film, the owner of the car was Burt Phillips. Burt’s car contained photographic gear along with empty styrofoam coffee cups, pizza packaging, sandwich wrappings, and a half-empty pint bottle of bourbon. There was also a rumpled copy of the National Planet, an incredibly popular paper that specializes in outlandish stories, doctored photographs, and inflamed headlines. In it I found a tale of a deceased celebrity who had returned as a ghost and fathered the child of a woman who now hoped to get a portion of the celebrity’s estate. The byline was Burt’s.
Burt didn’t seem to have a cellular phone, which indicated that he wasn’t quite up-to-date as far as modern technology goes, but his camera was tucked down under the front seat. There were some pictures of me and of Zee’s Jeep and maybe of John Skye’s Wagoneer, too, on that film, and I had no intention of photos of me or mine appearing in the National Planet, so I rewound the film and took it out, then reloaded the camera from Burt’s glove compartment supply. Then I got out of the car, locked the door, and went home. Maybe between the missing film and the flat tire, Burt would decide snooping on me wasn’t worth it.
At the house, I called Zee and told her about Burt Phillips so she wouldn’t worry. Then I made another phone call to Walt Pomerlieu. Walt was still not available, according to the voice on the far end of the line. I left a message telling what I’d learned about the car and driver.
It wasn’t good news, but it could have been worse. It could have been a killer out there, instead of a stringer for a popular rag.
Some better news arrived a bit later in the form of John Skye’s Wagoneer and its four occupants.
The three younger ones were happy and salty. Karen Lea pretended to be, but was not, so I knew Lonergan had gotten through to her.
Debby and the twins were considering plans for the evening, apparently. The idea leading the race seemed to be pizza at Giordano’s, followed by a funky film at the theater across the street.
Debby suddenly remembered she was my cousin as well as my guest, and looked at me and Karen, then back at the twins.
“I’ll call you guys later. Okay? Maybe cousin Jeff has some other plans.”
“J.W., you should let her come with us,” said Jill or Jen. “You really should.”
“You don’t even know if you have wheels tonight,” I said. “Go home and find out if John will loan you his car again before you decide what you’re going to do. We’ll have Debby call you after she washes off some of the sand and salt she’s collected.”
“Rats,” said one twin to her sister. “I never thought of not having the car tonight. Daddy said we could go to the beach, but he never said anything about tonight.”
“We’ll have to butter him up,” said the other twin.
“We can probably butter up Dad,” said the first twin, “but Mom might not want us driving at night, and it’s a lot harder to butter her.”
They looked at Debby and Karen. “We have to work on our parents. You work on J.W. We’ll talk later. Today was fun!”
They drove away.
I showed Debby and Karen where the outdoor shower was, and Debby and her towel went in. Karen and I walked off a few yards.
“Joan Lonergan called me,” she said. “She doesn’t like this car business, and neither do I. The car is back, by the way. I saw it when we came in, although I didn’t see the driver. I don’t like this situation at all.”
I told her about my adventures with the car and driver. “It could be worse,” I said. “Burt Phillips isn’t a hired gun or some wacko; he’s a two-bit stringer for a scandal sheet.”
“Yeah? Well, what’s he doing out there, watching who comes and goes here?”
I gave her the theories I’d given Zee earlier.
She stared around the yard and looked into the trees. The sound of the shower could be heard clearly.
“Save some hot water for the rest of us,” I yelled.
“I will!” came Debby’s shout.
“And what makes you so damned sure that this Phillips guy is what he seems to be?” asked Karen. “What makes you think it’s not just a cover, in case he gets questioned by the cops? It would be a pretty good one, wouldn’t it? Old Burt Phillips isn’t a hit man. Oh, no. He’s just a seedy, middle-aged stringer trying to make a buck by breaking a story for the National Planet. Car full of crap, including, conveniently, a paper that IDs him as just what he wants you to think he is. You don’t think you got suckered, do you? Is that just slightly possible?”
It did seem just slightly possible, now that she mentioned it.
Debby appeared, wrapped in her towel.
“I love your shower,” she said, grinning as she trotted into the house.
“Everybody loves my shower,” I called after her. I turned to Karen. “Your turn. You’ll love it, too.”
She looked around again, as if trying to see right through the surrounding forest, as if wishing it were glass, so nothing would be hidden from her. Then, a frown on her face, she walked to the shower.
I went into the house and started supper: The bluefish that either Debby or I had hauled in on Monday would now be transformed into stuffed bluefish, always delish. I got the fish fillets out of the fridge and mixed up some store-bought stuffing laced with some extra peppers and hot sauce. I put the stuffing between the two fillets, put the whole thing in a roasting pan, and slapped it into the oven. An army marches on its stomach, they say, and the Secret Service apparently believed we were in a war. I wasn’t quite so sure, but in case we were, I wanted us to be able to move if need be.
The phone rang just about then. The masculine voice on the other end had a familiar foreign ring to it. It was an angry voice.
“What the hell was my wife doing at your house this afternoon, eh? What business did she have with you? Why did you call her to you? You tell me right now!”
“Big Mike? Is that you?”
“Yes! What are you doing, calling my wife to your house? You tell me!”
“She was just here on business, Mike.”
But Mike’s voice only got hotter. “Business, eh? What business is there between you and her, you seducer of women!”
Seducer of women? “Calm down, Mike. Ask Dora, if you don’t believe me.”
“She will tell me nothing! If not for Helen, I would never have learned of this . . . this seduction!”
Helen. So that’s who had first taken my call at the salon. Dora might be tight-lipped, but Helen obviously wasn’t.
“Nobody seduced anybody, Mike. My wife was here all the time.”
“Don’t call me Mike! And don’t tell me about your wife! And don’t see my wife again!”
He slammed his phone down and I looked at mine. Good grief, just what I needed: a mad Mike Qasim. And until Monday, which was five days away, neither I nor Dora could tell him why she had really been here, because Mike couldn’t keep a secret in a bushel basket.
Mad Mike and his Persian dagger.
What next, O Lord?
— 5 —
Debby J. wiped her lips and looked appreciatively at the scant remains of supper left on her plate. “Good,” she said. Then she looked less appreciatively at Karen Lea. “I don’t see why I shouldn’t be able to go to the movies with Jill and Jen. I want to go.”
She seemed a little petulant.
“Because,” said Karen patiently, “there’s a man out there watching this place and we don’t know who he is.”
“Mr. Jackson says he’s a writer for the National Planet. Besides, he couldn’t have seen me in the car when we went out because I was sitting on the far side, and there wasn’t even anybody in his car when we came back.”
Karen ate the last of her bluefish. “The point is that we don’t know who he is. He might be some guy just pretending to be a writer.”
“He’s not even out there anymore,” said Debby, with just a touch of the little whine that teenagers get in their voices when they feel unduly constrained. “So there’s no reason why I shouldn’t be able to go. No one will recognize me. I was with the twins all afternoon, and even when I took my glasses off to go swimming, they didn’t know who I was. You saw that yourself.”
Karen finished her glass of wine. “You’ve already had supper, so you won’t be having pizza, in any case. Besides, we don’t even know if the twins’ parents will let them have the car. As a matter of fact, I’m sure that if they’d gotten it, they would have called by now. They’re still probably trying to talk their parents into it.”
“We don’t need their car,” said Debby. “We can use your car, Karen. Nobody was watching when we drove it in, so even if that guy is out there again, he won’t know who’s in the car if we keep the windows up. We can drive over and pick up the twins and all go to the movies together. Come on, Karen, say we can go!”
I decided I was on both sides of the issue. “Look,” I said. “Here’s what we’ll do. I’ll go up and see if Burt Phillips is there. If he is, we’ll have to think some more, but if he’s gone, you two can go to the movies. How’s that?”
“That’s good,” said Debby, for whom any step in the direction she wanted to go was okay.
“What do you say?” I asked Karen. “If he’s gone, there’s no reason for you two not to go up to the flicks, is there?”
She looked at her charge. “What if you’re recognized, Cricket? What then? You’ll have to go back to the compound.”
Debby shrugged. “That could happen anytime, anyplace. But with my hair this way, and these glasses, why should it? Nobody will be looking for me there at the movies. Come on, Karen!”
I stood up. “You two rinse the dishes and stack them in the sink. I’ll wash them when I get back.”
I walked up the driveway, ducked into the woods, and from behind a tree looked at Burt Phillips’s car. It was right where it had been before. I walked farther through the woods and looked again. The back tire was still flat.
I crossed the road to the car. I tapped on the driver-side window.
Nothing.
I went around to the other side, got out my picks, and went to work on the door. When I got it open, I looked inside. Nobody home. Everything looked the same as it had when last I’d been there. Burt had not come back to his car.
I locked the door again and walked back down my driveway.
“The car is there, but Burt isn’t,” I said to my make-believe cousins. “I don’t see any reason why the two of you shouldn’t go. Give the twins a call, and tell them you’ll pick them up at their place.”
“Oh, good!” Debby J. clapped her hands and looked at Karen. “Please, Karen! Be a good sister!”
“I’m not your sister,” said Karen, “I’m your bodyguard.”
Debby J. came over and very ceremoniously gave her a hug and a kiss. “You’re a sister to me, Karen, dear. A nice, sweet big sister who wants her little sister, Deborah, to have a fun night at the movies, just like all the other girls are doing.”
“I think you have a future in politics yourself,” said Karen, giving in. “All right, all right, let’s call the twins.”
“Yes!” Debby pumped a fist into the air and headed for the phone.
After Debby made her call and headed for the bathroom to ready herself for her big night out, Karen phoned Walt Pomerlieu to tell him of the evening’s plans. Walt was back on the job.
“He’s not too happy,” she said when she hung up. “But he says it’s okay. He has two sons about Cricket’s age, you know, so he knows how kids that age feel about things. If I know Walt, he’ll have somebody or -bodies there at the theater, just in case. But Cricket doesn’t need to know that. He’s going to call again late tonight to make sure Cricket’s bedded down for the night.”
“You should practice calling her Debby,” I said, and gave directions to John Skye’s farm. After Debby emerged from the bathroom, Karen went in. When she came out, the two of them left in Karen’s nondescript car. I wondered if I should build a second bathroom. If Zee and I ever had any daughters, I’d need at least one more, that was for sure.
Through the early-evening air I could hear sirens from the direction of Edgartown. It was a common sound during the summer, and usually had to do with yet another moped or bicycle accident, or with a heart attack victim. Much of a police officer’s work has nothing to do with crime.
I listened as the sirens came along the Edgartown–Vineyard Haven Road, then I went inside to get at the dishes. The sirens stopped somewhere not far to the north, and I thought that probably Karen and Debby had met the cruiser and ambulance coming out as they headed into town before taking West Tisbury Road to the farm.
As I washed the dishes, I thought about Burt Phillips. It seemed strange that he’d neither managed to get help nor even come back to his car. Burt hadn’t seemed like the type to wait around in the woods or down at the Felix Neck buildings when he could be sipping whiskey in his car and listening to the radio and maybe, just maybe, getting an exclusive picture of the president’s daughter that would earn him some good bucks.
When I had the dishes stacked in the drainer, I went out and climbed into the Land Cruiser. At the end of the driveway, I turned right and drove by Burt’s still silent car, then took another right onto the long sandy road that leads to Felix Neck.
I didn’t get far. There were police cruisers a couple of hundred yards in from the highway, and a uniformed Edgartown cop was waving me down. The cop was Janie Lewis. I got out.
“What’s going on, Janie?”
“Some bird-watcher walked over there to get a better look at that osprey nest and found a body,” said Janie, gesturing with her thumb. She was trying to be cool, but was obviously pretty excited. “Looks like a homicide!”
That explained the sirens.
“Homicide?” Homicides occur on Martha’s Vineyard, but they’re not common.
“Yeah! Guy got his neck broken. He’s out there in the woods with a broken neck. Can you imagine that?”
“Who is it?”
“Nobody’s told me. Male. Forty, maybe fifty. That’s all I know.”
I had a sudden certainty. “There’s a chance I might know the guy,” I said. “Can I go back there?”
Janie hesitated. She wasn’t sure. I saw Tony D’Agostine come through the trees and pointed him out to Janie. She waved him over.
“J.W. here says he may know the guy
.”
“Oh, yeah?” said Tony. “Come on back and take a look.”
We walked back through the woods until we came to the body. I looked down at Burt Phillips. His head was at an odd angle, and his eyes were wide open. I told Tony who he was and that the car out on the road belonged to him.
“Okay,” said Tony. “That squares with the ID we found on him. How do you know him? He’s not a local guy.”
I decided I’d walk carefully through these waters. “I met him up at his car,” I said. “He had a flat and decided to come down here to phone for somebody to fix it.”
Tony looked down at the body. “How come he didn’t go down to your place? That’s a lot closer.”
“I offered, but he said he’d come here.”
“Looks like he made the wrong choice,” said Tony. “We’ll want a statement from you. What are you doing down here, anyway?”
“His car’s still out there. When I was driving by just now I saw it and wondered what had become of him, so I thought I’d come down and maybe catch up with him. I never figured anything like this.” I looked around. “How do you read what happened here?”
“Beats me,” said Tony. “Our detectives are waiting for the medical examiner, and the state cops are on their way. Right now we’re just keeping the site clean for them. You say this guy came down this way to make a phone call?”
“That’s what he said.”
Tony shook his head. “He didn’t break his neck falling down. He had help. What did he do for a living? You know?”
“I think he worked for a newspaper, or something like that.”
“Reporter?”
“I don’t know. I only talked with him for a minute.”
I looked again at poor Burt. No more stakeouts for him. No more cold pizza and cold coffee, no more bourbon by the pint, no more pictures snapped with his telephoto lens, no more bylines in the National Planet. No more Burt. I felt a little sick.
“I’ll come down to the station and leave a statement,” I said, and walked away, trying to think.
A Deadly Vineyard Holiday Page 5