by Carolyn Hart
There was a picture from a June 22, 1971, Atlanta Constitution sports page. The computer print had obviously been scanned from an old clipping, but even so there was vibrancy and energy in the replica of the yellowed newsprint. Brown cradled a silver trophy in one arm. His other curved around Meg’s shoulders. Their faces were inches apart, caught in a moment of exuberant joy. He was sunburned, his dark hair damp from heat and exertion, a generous mouth stretched in a triumphant smile. Meg’s spectacular beauty—the narrow, intelligent face, deep-set eyes, hollow cheeks—was evident despite windswept hair and too much sun. Two happy people captured forever in a sunlit moment before the shadows came.
Annie wondered what the memory of that day had meant to each of them. She turned to the next sheet:
Tony Sherman
There is some confusion about her second husband. An old friend of Meg’s, Juliet Thomas, worked with her finding jobs and homes for those fleeing the Vietnam draft. Juliet thought Sherman was from California, but later someone told her he was from Wisconsin. He had been a graduate student working on his doctorate in English literature at Kent State when the shootings occurred. When he was drafted, he fled through Canada and eventually reached Paris, then went to Majorca, where he met Meg. At that time Meg was passionately involved in the antiwar movement. Sherman was glad to avoid the draft, but he was more interested in studying Lord Byron than in the latest troop movements. He was sailing in the Gulf of La Spezia when his small boat went down in a storm.
There were no photographs with this sparse report. Possibly Meg had pictures in old scrapbooks of this husband to whom she had been so briefly married. Or possibly not. Was Meg the kind of woman to have keepsakes? Perhaps her daughter would know.
Jenna Brown Carmody / Jason Brown
Born March 3, 1971, in Stuart, Florida. Jenna periodically saw her mother and spent summers with her father until his death in 1980. Along with her younger brother, Jason, she lived most of the time with her grandmother in Charleston. The children were very young when Meg relocated to Europe. Jenna graduated from the University of South Carolina with a B.A. in English. She lived in Atlanta and worked in fashion merchandising for a large department store. In 1994 she married Hunter Carmody, a fashion photographer. They separated the next year and divorced in 1996. No children. When her stepfather’s health began to fail, she moved to the island. That reunited the family, as her brother keeps an apartment here. Jason, born July 3, 1972, is a top-ranked amateur golfer but has never tried to become a professional. He attended the University of South Carolina but dropped out as a sophomore. A golf reporter once described him wryly in a roundup on up-and-coming amateurs: “Jason Brown doesn’t struggle with Demon Rum as did his father, Carey, but this young man isn’t one to opt for practice over play, especially if the playmate is young and nubile.”
In the margin, Max had scrawled: First things first.
Annie laughed, then continued reading. Not much she didn’t know. Neither Jenna nor Jason had to work. They were TFBs, thanks to the generosity of their stepfather. Her eyes lingered on the abbreviation. Trust Fund Baby. It was a way of life for the Brown children. And for her own husband. Max knew her Puritan ethic had always equated work with worth, but now she was wise enough—she hoped—to understand that there was more to any person than a job. Still, what was life without work? All right, all right. What was her life without work? She knew the answer to that one. Let others find their own answers. And Max was working hard for her—and for Pamela—right this minute.
Her eyes dropped again to the sheet and Max’s conclusion:
Jenna works part-time at Hodder’s Antiques, obviously more for pleasure than money. Sue Hodder was circumspect, but I don’t think she likes her a lot. Sue says Jenna obviously resents her mother, talks about seeing her only occasionally when a child, but she was devoted to her stepfather, said he’s the one who had her and Jason come live with them. Jason’s a chip off the old block, always going off for a cruise on somebody’s yacht, occasionally plays in tournaments and usually does well, lots of girlfriends, buckets of charm, and his mother thought he hung the moon. There’s no indication either sibling is in debt or in urgent need of money. In fact, they both should have plenty of funds since Meg was almost profligately generous with them. Heath left his entire estate to his wife. So an inheritance from their mother doesn’t seem a likely motive. Both Jenna and Jason were at the Heath house on Saturday and Sunday.
Annie wriggled against the hot leather car seat. No, money was not going to be the motive for Meg’s murder. Unless…
Claudette Taylor
Claudette Taylor was Duff Heath’s executive secretary for the last twenty years of his career. After his retirement, she remained in his employ and after his death became Meg’s personal assistant. Claudette is sixty-four and well regarded in the Atlanta home office of the Heath empire. She is remembered as responsible, careful, thoughtful, and discreet. She grew up in Atlanta. She is single with no living family members. Her last sibling died two years ago. Claudette is active in her church (First Methodist), a past treasurer of the Friends of the Library and current chair of the used book fair, a member of the island Kiwanis Club and the Red Cross. She and Meg appeared to be on good terms. She had no living expenses as she resided at the Heath home. However, much of her permanent savings was in Enron stock so her net worth has declined sharply. Apparently she expected a substantial bequest from Meg.
Annie brushed back damp curls. She almost popped out of the car to go up to the second deck and the small snack bar. Ben Parotti, who owned the ferry as well as the Island Packet excursion boat and the restaurant and a Gas ’n Go, never overlooked a possibility for profit. Right this minute she was desperate for a tall frosty bottle of water. Her lips were dry and her tongue parched. She looked out across the water and the heat haze shimmering above the pea-green surface. She willed herself to stay put. It was only another half mile to shore, and she wanted to finish the dossiers before she set off to find the pier at the end of Slash Pine Road.
Imogene Riley
Imogene Holman Riley, fifty-two, is a native of Bluffton. She dropped out of high school when she married J. B. Riley. The marriage ended in divorce ten years ago. They have two children, Leroy and Terry. Leroy is a truck driver and lives in Atlanta with his wife and two children. Terry is a crewman on a charter yacht out of Hilton Head Island. Imogene has worked as a cook in private residences. She was hired by the Heaths shortly after they moved to Broward’s Rock. She is renowned for her Lowcountry cooking and is active in her church. Her credit rating is good. She makes her car, house, and credit card payments on time. Whether she is among Meg Heath’s beneficiaries isn’t known.
Annie slowly closed the folder. Max’s information, gleaned from credit reports and most likely a church friend or neighbor, was in keeping with the cook’s stolid demeanor. But the matter-of-fact report gave no hint of a woman familiar with Anastasia. It was a lesson all good detectives should remember: Don’t be misled by surface appearances.
Surface appearances…
Pamela Potts spent her days helping others. Could there be more to her bland existence than appeared on the surface?
Meg Heath clearly was a woman who had followed her own desires. By all accounts, devil take the hindmost was the leitmotiv of her life. Who was to have been the sixth guest at her table tonight?
Jenna Brown Carmody wasn’t devastated by her mother’s death and she resented any suggestion of foul play.
Jason Carmody had the reputation of a ne’er-do-well, but his mother adored him.
Claudette Taylor appeared to be a cheerful servitor to Meg Heath. She had been Meg’s husband’s personal secretary. Claudette had never married. She’d stayed with Meg after Duff Heath’s death. Surely that argued fondness for the widow. Claudette didn’t seem to be in debt, but she was among those whose savings went down with Enron. How important to her was an inheritance from Meg?
Imogene Riley was matter-of-fact and calm, showing
little emotion about the death of her mistress. Yet in her last meeting with Meg, Imogene remembered her as looking really special, like a grand duchess or a movie star.
Surface appearances…
The hoarse whistle of the Miss Jolene signaled the approaching shore. Annie dropped the folder on the passenger seat. The ferry jolted up to the dock. As the ramp lowered, she turned on the motor. She stared grimly ahead as the cars slowly bumped off the ferry. Emma better have something good up the sleeve of her caftan. Slash Pine Road and a password!
Eight
THE NEWSROOM OF THE Island Gazette had an air of spent calm similar to that of a beach after a storm or a deserted stadium after a big game, lots of litter and nobody around. The huge gray wastebasket near the newsroom printer overflowed with crumpled computer paper. Styrofoam cups half filled with cold coffee, discarded candy wrappers, and wadded-up fast-food sacks cluttered newsroom desks. The monitors glowed an inviting green, but the desk chairs were unoccupied. The deadline for tomorrow’s Gazette had come and gone, and the troops had withdrawn from the front line for R&R.
“Hi, Lisa.” Max waved hello to the receptionist, a svelte blonde with a ready smile and a sharp gaze.
“Marian around?”
Lisa pointed down a hallway near the printer. “Coffee room.” She started to rise. “I’ll get her.”
Max opened the swinging gate that led past a counter into the newsroom. “That’s okay. I know the way.”
Lisa settled back in her chair. “Do you know an eight-letter word for an Australian eucalyptus tree?”
Max was crossing the newsroom. “Ironbark.”
He heard a muffled whoop as he opened the door to the coffee room.
Star reporter Marian Kenyon sat cross-legged on the floor, eyes closed, back straight, arms folded. Marian’s salt-and-pepper black hair stuck out in odd tangles, most likely disarranged by frantic hand swipes as she worked. An empty one-ounce sack of roasted peanuts was crumpled beside the can of Pepsi in front of her. One arm unfolded. The can was seized, lifted to vivid red lips. Marian combined chewing and drinking, returned the can to the floor. “Whatever it is”—she didn’t open her eyes—“come back next week.”
Max pulled out a straight chair from the table, turned it around to straddle. He folded his arms on the back, prepared to bargain. “Like they say in literate crime flicks, quid pro quo.”
One dark eye opened, regarded him without warmth. “I haven’t seen a literate crime film since Chinatown. As for you, it better be good. I’m down to my last quantum of energy. Saturday night we picked up the report of a man found shot to death. I got the bulletin written, then went out to the crime scene. Sunday night I came back on the last ferry from Savannah and got the scoop on Pamela’s plunge from the Island Packet. I was the early bird at Billy Cameron’s office this morning and nobody tells the press nada until my deadline is closer than a guillotine to a French aristocrat’s neck. Then from the funeral home we get”—she turned up fingers one by one—“a well-known community do-gooder dying as the result of her fall from the excursion boat and the unexpected death of an island socialite who was once a world-class model. Then it turns out the murder victim in snazzy clothes has no ID. I had to get the facts and write the copy for all three stories by noon. Do you know how many inches I wrote between eleven twenty-five and noon? Do you care? I care. Seventy-two inches. In thirty-five minutes. It may be my personal best.” She closed the eye, raised the Pepsi, drank, and chewed.
The eyelid fell, but Max noted that her face had lifted and turned toward him. Were the eyelids slitted? Whatever, Marian was alert and listening.
Max dangled his bait. “I might be a Deep Throat”—would the truth behind the elusive source used by Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein ever be revealed?—“with some interesting stuff about Pamela and Meg.” Emma Clyde would be appalled at leaking suspicion of murder to the press, but Max figured Annie’s accusations would surely be known to the murderer, if murderer there was. If both deaths were accidental, no harm done.
Marian’s dark eyes popped wide. “What’cha got?”
“Some questions you might want to ask Chief Cameron.” His smile was pleasant. And innocent. “Guaranteed to raise hackles at the cop shop.”
Marian finished off the Pepsi and peanuts, stiffly rose. She scooted a chair to face Max, perched on the edge, dark eyes bright and penetrating. “And you want what?”
“Everything you know about the unidentified man found shot to death near Ghost Crab Pond.” Max fished a small notebook from his pocket.
“The cop shop questions?” She reached into a wastebasket, retrieved crumpled computer sheets, turned them to the blank side, and pulled a pen from her pocket.
Max wasn’t surprised. Marian’s fearsome reputation as a reporter who always got her story hadn’t resulted from being an easy touch. She would judge the worth of his offering before sharing what she knew above and beyond the official statements. “Who gave Pamela Potts a free ticket to the mystery cruise and why? Pamela apparently fell from a ledge on the far side of a chained-off area by a lifeboat. Pamela was deathly afraid of heights, so how—”
Marian wrote fast, her face scrunched in concentration.
“—did she end up on that ledge? Why was a scrap from a garbage bag snagged in the bottom of the lifeboat where she went over? Pamela Potts visited Meg Heath Friday morning.” He let a long pause provide emphasis. “She was scheduled to see Meg this morning.” Another pause. “So”—he made the linkage clear—“this morning Pamela died and Meg Heath was found dead from an overdose of Valium. How was it administered? Why did Meg plan a celebratory dinner for tonight? Who were the guests to be? And finally”—his tone was pleasant—“the Gazette might inquire if the police plan to release a plea for anyone with information about Pamela or Meg’s final days to contact them.”
Marian’s eyes glittered. “Billy Cameron didn’t mention Pamela or Meg, and he sure as hell never suggested either was a homicide victim. I get it. Billy’s probably opted for accident with Pamela, suicide with Meg.” She shook her head, curls quivering. “Just like a guy. Any woman would know better.” Her glance at Max was piercing. “I’ll bet there was a Private or No Trespass or No Admittance sign on the chain by the ledge. Pamela was born to follow the rules. As for Meg Heath, giving up wasn’t in her game plan. I’ll start with Doc Burford, go from there.” She wrote with a flourish, wadded the folded sheets into her pocket.
Max flipped open his notebook, waited, pen poised.
Marian’s bright dark eyes scoured his face. “You want info on the dead stranger. How come?”
Max didn’t point out that his motives weren’t part of the bargain. Right this minute Marian held the cards. Besides, he didn’t mind revealing Annie’s reasoning. Marian knew Annie well enough not to be surprised. “Annie’s convinced there has to be a link between Pamela getting shoved off the boat and Meg overdosing. Annie’s theory is that maybe the two of them knew something about the dead man.” It sounded weak as he explained. “Or maybe it would mean something special to them if they found out he’d been shot.”
“So somebody kills them to keep them from finding out this guy was shot Saturday night?” Marian stretched her face in disbelief. “Sounds pretty damn drastic. But for what it’s worth…” She briefly pressed the tips of her fingers against her temples, took a deep breath. “Got a tip there was a crime scene about eleven o’clock Saturday night. Enough for a bulletin in the Sunday paper. I buzzed out there. The mosquitos and chiggers were big enough to have served in Patton’s Tank Corps.” She pointed at a series of red welts on her wrists. “I was smart enough to wear long sleeves, but the damn things bit me right through the cloth. I’ll probably get West Nile.
“Anyway”—a weary sigh—“a Boy Scout troop on a campout found the body.” For an instant her gamine face lost its tough patina. “Poor guys. Bad stuff to see when you still think you’re invincible.” She scrabbled in the other pocket of her slacks, dragged out a sack of h
ard candies, popped a red ball in her mouth. She sucked, gave Max a level look. “Not good even when you know life’s like walking across a bog. You can get sucked down without warning. Anyway”—she rolled the candy to a corner of one cheek—“they were almost finished when I got there. Doc Burford had left. Floodlights were set up on the corners, body still in situ. Looked like he’d been shot and the force knocked him down. He was on his back, wedged between a saw palmetto and an old log. One hand clutched at his chest. Congealed blood on his fingers. I’d guess he died pretty quick. Doc Burford can probably tell you. Nifty clothes—-if you ignored the blood. White-and-blue-striped blazer, pink linen shirt, white trousers. Pretty pricey stuff. Even white shoes. He’d been a good-looking guy. Silver hair now, probably blond when he was young. Trim little mustache. Kind of reminded me of an older Jeff Kent.” Her eyes warmed. Marian was a big-time baseball fan. “Slick.”
Max raised an eyebrow. “Doesn’t sound like the kind of guy to be wandering around a swamp.”
The reporter nodded, her wiry curls bouncing. “You got that one right. Now get the rest of the picture. The body’s lying next to this rough track. It’s not a road, just a couple of sandy ruts. The track comes off Marsh Tacky Road and dead-ends at Ghost Crab Pond.”
Max knew the area well. Ghost Crab Pond was part of King Snake Park, a pocket of wilderness that abutted the developed area around the golf course. It had been the site of the murder of a mysterious island resident several years ago.
“Okay. The body’s on the ground next to the sandy lane.” Marian leaned forward. “You remember that torrential downpour we had last Friday?”
Knowing Marian, Max assumed that the weather detail was not a non sequitur. “Washed out my golf game.” He’d missed playing, but all had not been lost. He remembered the passionate afternoon with Annie. As he’d later told her, a rainy day has its own charm.