by J A Whiting
Lin couldn’t recall the woman’s name and silently reprimanded herself for not paying closer attention when she’d introduced herself. “Oh, hi. I’m looking for Viv.”
“I saw her leave a little while ago.” The woman scrutinized Lin’s face. “Is everything okay? You seem a little … frazzled.”
Lin blinked. She could see concern in the woman’s blue eyes, but there was something else showing that Lin couldn’t put her finger on. She shook herself wondering if Greg Hammond’s obsession with Viv’s house and his murder was making her suspicious and paranoid of the people around her. “I’ve been working outside in the hot sun all day. I’m just worn out. I could really use a shower.”
“I thought I saw your truck parked in front of Anton Wilson’s house. Do you garden for him?”
“Today was my first day. There are a number of prior clients that remained with the business after I took it over. Mr. Wilson’s house was my last stop.” Lin wiped her dirty palm on her jeans.
The woman took a step closer. “Have you met Anton?”
“I met him today. He was in the backyard when I got there.”
“What did you think of him?”
Lin thought that was a strange question. “He was very pleasant.”
The woman cocked her head. “Did he have questions for you?”
Lin shifted from foot to foot, wondering what this interrogation was about and why the woman had such keen interest in her interaction with Wilson. She forced a chuckle. “Does Mr. Wilson have a reputation for questioning people he has just met?”
“Anton can be an odd duck.” The woman adjusted the collar of her crisp white shirt.
“Can he?” Lin shrugged a shoulder. “Well. I guess I’ll head home now since Viv isn’t here.”
The woman nodded. “Nice to see you.” As she stepped away to another shelf of books, she spoke over her shoulder. “Keep your wits about you, Carolin.”
A little shiver ran down Lin’s back as she hurried out of the bookstore. When she was outside on the sidewalk and heading up Main Street, she took out her phone and texted her cousin. A minute later, Lin received a reply from Viv saying she was with John, but was heading home now and that Lin could meet her at the house. Lin and Nicky turned at the next corner to walk the four blocks to Viv’s neighborhood and they reached the house just as Viv pulled up on her bike.
“What happened to you?” Viv got off the bicycle. “Did you fall into a pile of dirt?”
“Very funny.” Lin scowled.
Nicky danced around Viv’s legs begging for a scratch on the head and she bent to oblige. She looked up at her cousin. “How was the first day as a professional gardener?”
Lin groaned. “I’m sure I won’t be able to move tomorrow. I didn’t think I was in such bad shape.”
Viv chuckled. “You’re in great shape. You just haven’t used these particular muscles very much. In a week you’ll be fine.”
“Or I’ll be dead in a week.” Lin limped along following Viv around the side of the house to the backyard.
Viv leaned her bike against the tool shed. “You want to use my shower?” She eyed her cousin. “You’re filthy.”
Lin shook her head. “I’m going home in a bit. Can we sit out here? I want to talk for a minute.”
The girls sat at the patio table while Nicky ran about the yard with his nose to the ground.
“Have you found out something about Greg Hammond’s murder?” Viv’s eyes widened with excitement.
“No. I haven’t made any progress on that front.”
Viv looked deflated.
“Who is the pretty older woman who was in your store the other day? White hair, layered around the face, blue eyes. She was there the day we heard about Hammond’s murder. She was with three other older people.”
“That’s Libby Hartnett. They all come in every morning, have coffee, a muffin. They chat, gossip. That’s how they start their day.”
“Is she … odd?”
Viv’s face scrunched in confusion. “Why do say that?”
“They knew me, you know. They said they knew Grandpa. Did Grandpa usually meet with them at the bookstore?”
“Yeah.” Viv nodded. “Most mornings. They were all friends.” She narrowed her eyes. “Why are you asking?”
Lin blew out a breath and told Viv about Anton Wilson and his apparent keen interest in sharing family history details with her and then about running into Libby Hartnett at the bookstore and what she’d said. “Why would Libby be so interested in what Anton talked to me about?”
“I don’t know.” Viv looked off across the yard, thinking.
“And why would she tell me to keep my wits about me?”
Viv made eye contact with her cousin. “That’s very odd. What’s going on?”
“What do you know about Anton Wilson and Libby Hartnett?”
“Not a whole lot.” Viv put her chin in her hand and leaned her elbow on top of the table. “Wilson is a former professor, retired now. I can’t remember where he taught. He’s written a million books about Nantucket. He’s something of an expert on the island and the inhabitants. Wilson is on the Historical Commission. He gives talks and lectures all over the mainland.”
“So he’s reputable? Not a nut?”
“Quirky, I’d say. Intense, but I’ve never heard anyone complain that he’s nuts. I think he would just love to have been descended from one of the founding families of the island.”
“And Libby? What do you know about her?”
“Less than I know about Wilson. She’s lived here all of her life. She’s quiet, polite. Spends time raising money for island charities, to help the schools, the hospital, the arts. I think her family owned a farm here, but I’m not sure about that. She loves to read, she’s always buying books. She’s a good customer.”
“Why would she tell me to keep my wits about me?” Lin’s stomach felt cold and empty. “Is she warning me about something?”
Nicky joined the girls on the deck and he rubbed his head against Lin’s leg.
“I have no idea what she meant.” Viv gave a weary sigh. “But it wouldn’t hurt for either one of us to keep our heads up and be careful.”
A thought popped into Lin’s head and her eyes clouded. “Libby said she saw my truck parked at Anton Wilson’s house. How does she know my truck?”
Viv’s face looked pinched, but after a few seconds her features relaxed. “Libby was friends with your granddad. She knew his truck. She must assume you inherited it.”
Lin relaxed. “That’s a relief. I wondered if she was stalking me.” She reached down to pat Nicky’s head. “Have you been following the news stories about Hammond? It seems like the guy was sort of a loner. No wife, no kids. Had his business, his boat, but that seemed to be all.”
“There don’t seem to be any leads in the killing.” Viv pushed her hair behind her ears. “According to the news reports, anyway.” She blinked a few times. “It worries me. Are they going to try to pin Hammond’s murder on me?”
Lin put her hand on her cousin’s arm. “You’re innocent. They can’t arrest you for this. There’s no evidence.”
Tears gathered in Viv’s eyes. “I hate this whole mess. What are the connections? Are any of these things connected? Hammond’s desire to buy my house, his murder, the ghosts.” She looked at her cousin. “Have you seen any more ghosts?”
“Only the times I’ve told you about.” Lin was glad that she hadn’t had more visits from spirits. She changed the subject. “Did you get the wall fixed near the fireplace yet?”
Viv gave a long sigh. “It turns out there are boards and plaster over a hollow section in the wall. The workman thinks there’s an old cupboard there that somebody closed up long ago. He called it a parson’s cupboard, or something like that.”
A cold breeze washed over Lin’s skin and she gave herself a little shake.
“He’s coming back to work on it. Of course, it’s more involved than what was originally thought, which me
ans more money than I originally thought.”
Lin nodded sympathetically and joked. “Ah, the beauty of owning an antique home.”
They both chuckled.
The two girls sat in silence for several minutes, and then Lin said, “I guess I’ll head home and get cleaned up. I think we need to go down to the docks and ask around about Greg Hammond. See what we can find out. Tomorrow morning before I start work, I’m going to drive out to Hammond’s landscape business and see if there’s anyone there I can talk to.”
“Be careful. Text me and let me know what’s going on.”
The girls walked to the front of Viv’s house. Lin gave her cousin a hug and then she and the dog walked up the sidewalk for home.
10
The early morning sun peeking over the tall trees hit Lin right in the eyes as she drove toward Greg Hammond’s landscape business. She pulled her sunglasses off the console and slipped them on. As she predicted, her muscles were killing her from yesterday’s gardening. She hoped they’d loosen up as she worked once she headed to her first client. If her muscles stayed tight and sore, she was in for a very long day.
Nicky was in the passenger seat. He had his paws resting on the armrest so he could move his nose up closer to the crack in the window. Lin was afraid the dog would lose his balance and fall out if the window was down all the way, so she only opened it a couple of inches.
A sign on the left side of the road indicated Hammond Landscaping, so Lin turned her truck into the gravel lot and parked next to a small cottage that was used as the office. Before getting out, she looked around the property. Behind the office, there were several trucks parked beside four large greenhouses and a section of the space contained potted trees and plants lined up in rows.
No one was in sight so Lin and Nicky got out of the truck and walked to the office. Expecting the door to be locked, she was surprised when she turned the knob and the door opened. It was a small space with a couple of orange plastic chairs pushed against the wall near the entrance and a waist-high counter stood at the other side of the room.
“Hello?” Lin looked around the space. There was a door to a back office with a sign on it that said, “Bookkeeping – Employees Only.”
No one answered.
An old wooden desk was placed against the wall behind the counter. A calendar hung from a loose screw on the wall. Next to a rusty metal lamp on the desk stood a gold metal nameplate with the words Greg Hammond, Proprietor engraved onto it and attached to a wooden holder. Papers and folders were strewn over the desk’s surface with a stray pen and pencil and a few paper clips scattered here and there.
The door behind Lin opened with a thud causing her to jump.
“You need something?” A tall skinny man with a dark tan and a scruffy beard stood just inside the open door. His jeans and T-shirt had smudges of soil on them. “The place is closed today.”
“Oh.” Lin blinked. “I didn’t see a sign.”
“That’s ‘cuz there isn’t one. You a customer?”
“I wanted to buy some plants.”
“You can’t. The place is closed.” The guy narrowed his eyes at Lin and his creepy gaze gave her a shiver.
Nicky stepped around and stood in front of his owner to block the man from getting closer.
“Is Mr. Hammond around?” Lin pretended she didn’t know anything about the events of the past few days.
“He’s dead.”
“Oh.” Lin feigned surprise. “I’m sorry to hear that.”
“Yeah, I’m sure Greg is, too.” The guy chuckled. His open mouth showed missing teeth and the few he did have were broken, yellow, and crooked.
Sweat dribbled down Lin’s back. She wanted to recoil from the awful man, but she kept her face neutral. “Are you the manager?”
“I’m the worker.”
Lin decided that this guy would be the first to go if she ran this landscaping business. “Is the business being sold?”
“Yeah.”
“Who’s handling the sale?”
“How do I know?” The man’s voice was gruff. “The lawyer, I suppose. You need to go. I got work to do.”
Lin started for the exit giving the rude employee wide berth. “Come on, Nick.” When she glanced down expecting the dog to be at her feet, Nicky wasn’t there. She heard rustling behind the counter and hurried over to look. The dog was snuffling under the desk and ignored Lin when she called a second time.
Walking around the counter, she bent to fish the dog out from under the wooden workspace. Just as she lifted Nicky, her gaze spotted a book on the floor that must have slipped from the desktop. When she read the title and author, she narrowed her eyes.
Ghost Mysteries of Nantucket by Anton Wilson.
A little shiver of unease washed over the young woman as she was about to carry her dog out of the office. In her hurry, she almost bumped into a husky man who was entering the building. The guy looked familiar to Lin. He had a patch sewn onto his blue work shirt with the words Bill Ward, Manager - Hammond Landscaping embroidered on the oval.
“You need some help?” The man looked at Lin with heavy-lidded, dark brown eyes. His light brown hair was tinged with streaks of gray and his face was lined from years of outside work. The manager eyed the guy standing just behind Lin. “You got some work to do, Leonard?”
Leonard, the creep, slunk away to the back room of the office.
The manager kept his voice low. “Leonard doesn’t have much in the way of social graces. Can I answer any questions for you?”
Lin gestured to the retreating Leonard. “He said the business is closed.”
“Just for today. We’re doing inventory. The business is in the process of being sold, hopefully to me. Right now, we’re reorganizing and finishing up the contracts we already have. In a couple of weeks, I’ll be able to start taking new business.”
“I’m interested in having some stonework done in my yard. A walkway and some stonewalls.” Lin made this up and she had no intention of hiring Hammond Landscaping. “I’ve heard good things about your work. I wondered if I might get a few customer names so I could speak with them about the work that was done for them.”
“Sure.” The manager led Lin back inside the office. He moved to the desk and the toe of his boot hit Anton Wilson’s book that was resting on the floor. He bent and picked up it, placing the book facedown on the desk. He pulled open a file cabinet that stood to the left of the desk and he rummaged through some files. When the manager found what he was looking for, he wrote three names, addresses, and phone numbers on a piece of paper which he handed to Lin. “These folks don’t mind being contacted for testimonials.”
“Okay, thanks.” As Lin was folding the paper to put in her jeans pocket, she recalled that she’d seen Bill down at the docks on the morning of the murder. “Sorry about Mr. Hammond.”
Bill stiffened. “Yeah. Well, stuff happens.”
Lin got the impression that the manager-soon-to-be-owner wasn’t too broken up over the death of his employer. A shiver of disgust ran through her body. “I thought you looked familiar. You were down by Greg’s boat the morning of the murder, weren’t you?”
Bill looked surprised. “The cops called here after they found the body. I answered. Greg didn’t have family. The police asked me to come down.”
A whoosh of cold air drifted over Lin. Her heart sank. She knew what it meant and she steeled herself for what she would see. Standing right behind the manager in the far corner of the room was the eighteenth-century ghost. Lin forced her face to stay neutral.
An auburn-haired, middle-aged woman carrying a briefcase opened the door to the building and stepped into the office. She acknowledged Bill and gave Lin a hasty nod.
“This is Joan,” Bill said. “She’s the bookkeeper.”
Joan turned to Bill. “I have that paperwork you wanted to go over.” She went through the door to the back office.
“Drop by or give us a call after you talk to those people on the list
I gave you.” Bill gestured to the paper Lin still held in her hand. “We’d be glad to do the stonework for you. We’ll come out and give you an estimate. Let us know as soon as you can and we’ll get your job on the work-list.”
Lin nodded and thanked the man. Before she and Nicky left the building, Lin took a quick look to the corner. The ghost was gone. Once outside, she thought about the coincidence of finding Anton Wilson’s book on ghosts under Greg Hammond’s desk.
Walking to her truck, she decided that it might be a good idea to get a copy of that book.
* * *
Lin, Viv, and Nicky strolled towards the docks. The sun was sinking lower in the sky and the air was much cooler than it had been during the afternoon. Viv had a canvas bag looped over her shoulder. “I brought you the book. I haven’t read it. I wonder what mysteries Anton Wilson thinks can be found on the island.”
“It’s an odd coincidence that Hammond had Wilson’s book in his office. I can’t wait to look through it.”
The girls headed to the section of the docks where Viv’s boyfriend John kept his boat. Nicky trotted along after them.
“So John said the guy who used to berth his boat next to Greg Hammond’s boat has moved to the slip next to John. John called me this morning before he took the ferry back to the mainland. He’s going to Boston to visit his brother for a week. He was surprised to see a different boat beside his when he woke up this morning.”
“What’s this guy’s name?”
“Nate Johnson. He told the Harbor Master that if he couldn’t move his boat, then he’d leave the island. John thinks he was freaked out by Hammond’s murder and he didn’t want to be anywhere near where it happened.”
“Some people are superstitious.” Lin kept looking over her shoulder. The last time she was at the docks she saw the ghost and she was hoping that he wouldn’t make a reappearance.
Viv led the way along the docks. “John said we should use his boat and maybe we’ll get a chance to talk to Nate Johnson about the murder. We’ll have to be subtle though. We don’t want to scare him off.”