“Aye. And don’t try to tell me you’re not, Charlie McNair. You’re moving even more slowly than I am.”
“I confess I am.” He hobbled along beside me as we made our way up a long and laborious path that led to the fascinating creation of Edward Sharkey’s.
“Do you think it was an experiment?” Charlie asked, stopping for a moment to stare at the sharp angles that jutted out in four directions.
“Undoubtedly. Do you think these angles have a purpose?”
He shrugged, moving slowly again. “Knowing Eddie?”
“True. Perhaps they’re access to that hidden tunnel under the house he mentioned.”
“The question is why he created it in the first place,” Charlie said.
“I did wonder that myself. Unless it’s a place to hide from the women in his life. If they show up on the island with hostile intentions, he can make a quick escape.”
Charlie chuckled at that. “Recently he’s had plenty of need for that.”
He nodded toward the house. “There is definitely someone here.”
A man had opened the front door and was walking toward us. He was of slight build, wearing loose jeans and a cotton shirt, with a woven straw hat upon his head. He trotted down the stairs toward us. We both smiled and waved, as if there were a need to assure him that we came in peace.
“Greetings!” Charlie called out.
“Hello.” His smile put us both at ease. “What may I do for you gentlemen?”
“We’re friends of Eddie’s,” Charlie said. “We were nearby and thought we’d stop in to see if he was enjoying himself on Tara Island.”
Well put, I thought, slipping in the name of the owner as well as the island.
“Ah, he is not here, I’m afraid.”
“Do you know where he is by chance?” I asked.
He shook his head. “We haven’t seen him in several days, since he brought some friends up to see the island.”
“Ah, yes, the trip with Sarai and Mok, I said,” implying even more familiarity than Charlie already had.
“But you are welcome to come inside for a drink. My wife will be happy to fix you something to eat.”
We nodded, both of our hands moving to our stomachs as if realizing that we were indeed famished. “Thank you very much,” I said. “That would be lovely.”
As we made our way to the front door, his wife appeared. She too was of slight build, dressed in similar cotton clothes to her husband’s, sturdy sandals on her feet. Their sun-weathered skin indicated that they were most likely in their late forties or early fifties.
“We’re the caretakers,” he explained. “I’m Sam and this is my wife Ella.”
We introduced ourselves and shook their outstretched hands. It was clear that Sharkey had spoken of us.
“Do you stay here fulltime then?” Charlie asked.
“Only about half the time. The rest of our time is spent on Orcas where we have a small home of our own. We rotate every few days to check on things and take care of the garden.” He nodded toward an extensive vegetable garden beyond the house and the flower garden in front of it.
Once inside, he took us on a tour of the house that was a mini version of Sharkey’s home in West Seattle. I wondered which he had created first.
“Looking at the exterior, I would not have thought it resembled his other home,” I said. “Very clever.”
Sam nodded. “If you know nothing else about Eddie, you have to know that he is clever.”
“Have you known him long?” Charlie asked.
“Some twenty years. It was shortly after we were married. He bought Tara and was looking for caretakers. He used to frequent a small pub on Orcas which is where he found us.”
Charlie and I laughed.
“And the hidden tunnel?” Charlie asked. “Are these angled protrusions access to it?”
“Ah, he told you about that?”
“He did,” Charlie said. “He promised to show it to us.”
“You must be good friends,” Sam said.
We followed him through an extensive tour of the house as he had us try to find the hidden tunnel. We had deduced that the odd angles were there for a purpose so we examined those closely. Finally at a loss, we put our hands in the air.
Sam chuckled and once again led us to the metal piece that jutted out from the back of the house. He thumped his hand at the top of what appeared to be a stucco wall and sure enough, a secret door magically opened to expose a dark tunnel.
Charlie and I peered inside, neither of us brave enough to actually step inside. Sam laughed as if detecting our thoughts.
“The purpose?” I asked.
He shrugged. “When Eddie gets a creative idea in his head, he tends to go with it.”
“Is it lit?” I asked.
Sam reached inside the doorway and flicked on a switch that shone light down a narrow corridor, the end of which was no where in sight.
“How do you recognize it at the other end?” I asked.
“A small trap door hidden in the bushes at the base of the hill directly up from the dock. I can show it to you if you’d like.”
“I think seeing this is enough for one day.”
“Has Eddie ever used it for anything?” Charlie asked.
Sam shook his head. “Not that I know of, but it would come in handy if pirates ever showed up on the island.”
“Or angry women.”
Sam laughed heartily. “That too.” He guided us back to the kitchen which was a smaller and slightly less ostentatious version of the one on Pleasant Beach Drive. Ella had prepared egg salad and ham sandwiches for us and offered us a choice of a bottle of Sam Adams or Anchor Steam and we settled down at the barstools near the kitchen island. “Sorry no Guinness. I’ll be picking that up later in the week.”
“This is fine,” I assured him.
“The only room that seems to be missing is the bar room,” Charlie observed.
“Ah, Eddie’s pride and joy.” Ella’s eyes lit up.
“You’ve obviously been to his home in Seattle,” I said.
“Several times. Sometimes when Eddie comes here to stay for a while, we take advantage of the chance to get away and head for his West Seattle home.”
“To enjoy city life?” I asked.
“Exactly,” Ella said. “Bookstores, lavish department stores.”
“Night life,” Sam interjected. “We always take in a play or musical. Whatever happens to be playing.”
“And don’t forget the coffee bars,” Ella said.
“Although we have plenty of cafes on the islands, we do manage to hit a few of those. The atmosphere is different,” Sam added.
“You mean noisy and crowded?”
They both laughed at that.
After gorging ourselves on multiple sandwiches and listening to stories of Sharkey and the challenges he’d had building the house on the hilly and remote island, including the cost of bringing in all materials by boat, we all went to the living room to enjoy a cup of tea and freshly baked pie.
“You’ve been very hospitable,” Charlie pointed out.
“We always enjoy company,” Ella admitted.
“And you gave me an excuse to procrastinate weeding the vegetable garden,” Sam said. “A welcome respite. So, what made you think Eddie would be here on the island?”
Charlie and I glanced at each other, as if determining how much to divulge. I let him make the decision on that. “We haven’t seen him for a couple of weeks now. According to Sarai, he went to Thailand.”
“But?” Sam asked, his furrowed eyebrows reflecting his concern.
“But it’s odd that he didn’t let us know he was leaving,” Charlie said.
“Does he always?”
“Lately. We’ve been keeping an eye on Sarai for him.”
“Ah.”
“So, we found it odd he didn’t let us know,” I said. “Also, his not returning in time for the soccer game we played today on Waterloo.”
&nb
sp; Ella’s eyebrows arched in harmony with her husband’s. “Now that is odd. Eddie missing a soccer game in the islands? Especially the one he was so excited about having arranged?”
“You find it odd as well then,” I said.
“Definitely,” Sam said. “But one thing we have learned about Eddie over the years is that he is very unpredictable.”
Ella nodded in agreement. “Probably the only thing you can say consistently.”
“So, we shouldn’t worry about the lad, then?” Charlie said.
Ella and Sam exchanged looks that were hard to read, no doubt for having developed over a long marriage. “I must admit, I’m a bit concerned myself now,” Sam said. “But every time I’ve worried about him in the past, there’s been an explanation.”
Of course, they probably did not know about the threats he had received or the warnings in the form of damage to his car. “You’ve worried about him in the past?” I asked.
Sam shrugged and looked to Ella for support. She smiled and said, “He doesn’t always make the best decisions. Particularly where women are concerned.”
“Ah, you’ve met Moira and Aileen, I assume,” I said.
“Oh, yes. And Chantal and Evelyn.”
“Chantal?” I asked. “Evelyn?” The names were familiar. Sharkey must have mentioned them.
“Evelyn was his second wife. Chantal was the girlfriend who followed her.”
Charlie and I braced ourselves for more stories, but Ella shook her head. “Don’t ask.”
I nodded. “Okay. We won’t. But you’ve met Sarai as well. What do you think of her?”
“There’s hope there,” Ella said.
“Why?” Sam asked. “Because she’s as different from the others as possible?”
“Exactly.”
Charlie and I listened to a few more stories before we hobbled back down the long pathway to our boat, accompanied by both Ella and Sam.
When we passed a group of bushes at the bottom of the hill, Charlie said, “Trap door?”
“Good eye.” Sam nodded toward the entrance to the tunnel.
“Easy to spot if you know it’s there,” Charlie said.
“We enjoyed the visit,” Sam said after we thanked them profusely for the meal and their hospitality. “We hope to see you again soon.”
We waved good-bye as we sailed off into the Strait.
Charlie was uncharacteristically quiet. Something was going around in that wee detective head of his.
“What are you deliberating upon, Charlie?” I finally asked.
“I’m not sure what to think, Malcolm. All I know is that something in my gut is not happy.”
“Maybe it was that fifth wee sandwich you insisted on eating.”
He raised an eyebrow but his smile was reluctant. “I wish.”
“You’re not revisiting the idea that Eddie is up to something illegal, are you?”
“I’ve not crossed it off the list of possibilities,” he said. “Especially with that tunnel he’s built. I do think we need to find out everything we can.”
“So we know if we can trust him or not?”
“That and—”
“To determine whether or not he needs help,” I finished for him. “So, where do we start?”
“His house,” he said calmly as if he had already given it a great deal of thought. Clearly he had made the decision to move forward with the same conviction he would if this were a case he had been hired to do, as if it were indeed an actual case.
* * *
After returning the boat to Burt Burrows’ rental on Anamcara, we sat in Charlie’s Bentley and stared straight ahead. I knew Charlie’s mind was in the same place as mine.
“You’re trying to decide how much to tell Jenny, aren’t you?”
“Aye, you know me well.”
“I do that. We’re not telling her anything, Charlie. Other than that we went to Tara.”
“She won’t like it, Malcolm. She does not like being kept out of the loop.”
“I don’t give a damn what she likes.” It came out more harshly than I’d meant it to. It must have been the tension in my gut.
“Don’t you?” he asked, staring at me with his detective eyes.
I blew out a lungful of air and ravaged my eternally messy hair. “You know I do. And you know exactly what I’m saying. All I care about right now is keeping her safe. We’re dealing with threats to someone’s life here. She’ll understand.” I wasn’t sure if it was the threatening letters or the slashed tires or severed brakes, but somewhere along the line, I had begun to feel that this situation had the potential for danger. All I knew was that the one message that was coming through loudly and clearly was, keep Jenny out of it.
“You don’t know Jenny.”
“The hell I don’t. I’ve loved the woman for twenty years.”
Startled, I suppose by my blatant confession, Charlie jolted back against his seat. Then he put up his hands as if to say, “I give in. It’s your decision.” But I had gleaned something more from that gesture. Somewhere in the midst of this conversation it was as if he had given his daughter over to me, at least a wee bit. Just as a father who handed over his daughter to her husband on their wedding day. But somehow I doubted he had felt that way when she’d married Joe Campbell. I smiled at the thought.
I think I must have been smiling all the way back to the cottage on Lighthouse Road. That is, until I saw Jenny’s face as she walked down the porch stairs to greet us. She was wearing corduroy slacks with a fisherman’s knit sweater to ward off the chill in the air. Despite the scowl on her face, she looked beautiful.
“Thanks a lot. If I hadn’t been so worried, I’d be furious with the two of you.”
“Sorry, darlin’. We got a wee bit side tracked,” Charlie squeaked out.
Jenny looked from her father to me and back again more than once. “Too much to drink?”
“We didn’t even make it to the pub after the game,” I told her.
She stared at me for so long, she could have written a book with her eyes. She finally settled for, “What are you two up to?”
“Nothing, lass,” Charlie said. “We just made a wee detour to Tara Island.”
She squinted and her forehead furrowed in that adorable way she has when she’s trying to find out more than her father is willing to tell her. “Why?”
“Our friend Eddie didn’t show up for the game so we thought we’d pop in to see if he was on his wee island,” Charlie said.
“He wasn’t there but we stayed to visit with the caretakers,” I offered.
Stiff and sore, we made our way up the porch steps, Jenny still eyeing us suspiciously as she commented on our state of disrepair.
“I assume your fingers are bruised?”
“No, our fingers are fine,” Charlie answered before I could stop him.
“So, what’s your excuse for not calling?”
Charlie groaned, realizing that he’d walked right into that trap.
I felt myself frown. Guilt. Determined to maintain some control over what was divulged here and what wasn’t, I said, “We tried, McNair, but we didn’t have cell service where we were.”
She was staring so deeply into my eyes, that I was certain she could read my every thought. I blinked, as if that would break her focus. It didn’t. But I knew what she was thinking. She was trying to decide if she was going to believe us or not. Then I smiled. Hers was slight with a skeptical edge, but it was enough to convince me that she had decided to believe us. It didn’t mean that she didn’t also see through us, enough to believe we were up to something, something in which we were not including her.
I wasn’t certain why I felt so strongly that we needed to exclude her from our mission. It was quite simply that every time I considered telling her about Sharkey and the possibilities of what he might be up to or the trouble he might be in, my stomach clenched and tiny beads of sweat formed on my forehead. Jenny McNair was known for her tenacity. Once she knew something was amiss,
she did not give up until she got to the bottom of it, even if it meant putting herself in harm’s way. And right now, she had her hands full with trying to keep her young houseguest safe at the same time as trying to ascertain why he was in hiding. She did not need more to worry about. Nor did she need to be putting herself in danger.
That thought struck me hard when I realized what it meant. If I was trying so hard to keep Jenny out of harm’s way, what did that say about the danger that was looming over Charlie and me? The danger that our friend Sharkey was already facing?
Chapter 11
Sarai opened the door only slightly as the chain was still attached. After seeing who it was, she closed it again, released the chain, and let us inside. “Mr. Malcolm! Mr. Charlie! You go away long,” she said, her face flushed with fear.
“Yes,” I said. “We stayed on the islands for a few days. Have you heard from Eddie?”
She swallowed hard and I noticed the slight shake of her head, but then as if self-correcting, she said. “Yes.”
“You did?” Charlie asked, looking at her as intensely as I had been. “When?”
“D-day before,” she stammered.
“Yesterday?” I asked.
She nodded, looking away, looking at the water, looking at the kitchen, at the floor, at anything but us.
“Where is he?” Charlie asked.
“T-Thailand.”
“You’re sure?” Charlie put a hand on her arm as if encouraging her to confide in us.
She nodded as she stepped back and walked toward the kitchen. “You want to drink tea?”
Charlie and I glanced at each other and both declined. We did not have time for tea. Clearly, we had work to do. The woman was lying.
“What the hell is going on?” I asked Charlie as we made our way across the street toward his house.
“I wish to hell I knew,” he said. “She’s upset, worried, scared, and lying.”
“So either she hasn’t heard from Eddie and she’s afraid something has happened to him and she’s not telling us because—”
“Because she’s afraid she’ll have no where to go and will be deported back to Thailand,” Charlie finished my train of thought.
“Or, she knows what’s happened to him and she’s still not telling us, because—”
Saving Sharkey Page 13