Stark words leapt from the page:
… nude body of a middle-aged, unidentified woman discovered early Monday floating in a lagoon in the Savannah National Wildlife Refuge …
Oh, my God! The Savannah National Wildlife Refuge—but that was on the mainland, hallway between the island and Savannah—how could it be?—Henny had been so sure that Ingrid had been kidnapped—and now a body—the Refuge—
Annie plunged down the hall for the stairs.
* * *
The whirling red light atop a sheriff’s car cast a warning glow despite the thick grey curtain of rain. Annie turned the Volvo off Highway 17 at the entrance to the Refuge, which was blocked by two sheriff’s cars. A slicker-clad deputy waving a lantern struggled toward her. Beyond the barrier of cars, a single-lane dirt road snaked into the river-bottom hardwood swampland. By now, it would be a wallow of mud, navigable only by four-wheel-drive vehicles.
The full force of the storm struck Annie as she climbed out of the Volvo. Before she had been wet; now she was pummeled by wind and rain. Her shoes fell immediate casualties to the sucking mud.
“Crime Scene!” the deputy yelled. “Refuge closed.”
She hadn’t come this far to leave Ingrid alone in this hell of water and wind. “I’ve come to identify the body.” An enormous rumble of thunder drowned out her words. “The body,” she screamed. “Identify it!”
It seemed forever that she struggled behind the deputy through foot-dragging mud. She realized, with a thinking part of her mind, that it wasn’t really far. Six hundred yards, perhaps. Barely into the Refuge. They bent against the wind and the pelting rain, exposed on the high road bounded on both sides by rush and cattail-rimmed bayous. They came around a curve. A second blur of light, white lights this time, marked a cluster of men, all slicker-clad, at a spot midway down the bank to the water.
Struggling down the bank, bristly cordgrass plucking at her bare legs, Annie glimpsed a puffy, greyish hand—or what was left of it. A deputy moved, and she saw the body.
No nightmare ever compared with this hideous reality, this swollen, bare, deteriorating flesh.
Annie gave a low moan and struggled not to faint. The deputy turned back and reached out to give her support.
The bloated face was beyond knowing, nibbled upon by swamp creatures, scraped against the rooted bottom, but Annie’s gaze fastened on an earlobe and the large silver hoop earring.
“Oh, God, it isn’t Ingrid. It isn’t.” Ingrid didn’t have pierced ears.
Then Annie covered her face with hands and cried. Life should never end like this.
Never, never, never.
FOURTEEN
Mid-afternoon Monday
A hot shower and clean clothes, a cheerful cotton dress in peach with periwinkle-blue seashells, helped some. But not enough. Not nearly enough. Max took one look at her face as she walked into his office and he dropped his legal pad, said quickly into the telephone, “Call you right back, Henny,” hung up, and hurried around the massive desk to take her into his arms.
Despite the best of intentions, she began to cry. “Oh, Max, Max, it was so awful. Like refuse thrown away. Just thrown away. And they don’t even know who she is!”
He sorted it out finally. “A body—but not Ingrid.”
She scrubbed at her face with his handkerchief, gulped for air, and said gratefully, “No. They don’t know who she is—but Max, it was—”
“Don’t think about it,” he ordered.
She wished her mind would obey. She didn’t want to think about it, but would she ever forget it? She squeezed her eyes shut and nestled into his arms.
Max gently massaged the taut muscles at the back of her neck. “Annie, you can’t do anything about the woman in the Refuge. I’m awfully sorry you thought it might be Ingrid and saw her, but it won’t help you or her to keep thinking about it. And we have plenty to worry about here on the island. Ingrid’s still missing and now it looks like something’s happened to Betsy Raines in San Francisco.”
She opened her eyes and heard the latest news on Betsy with a feeling of growing horror. What was happening to residents of this lovely pocket of the Low Country? An unknown woman dead, Ingrid missing, Jesse murdered, and now Betsy unaccounted for in distant San Francisco.
Max’s phone rang. He shot it a worried glance, but stayed close to Annie.
In a moment, Barbie poked her head in his office. “San Francisco P.D. on the line, Max.”
“Go ahead, Max,” Annie urged, “I’ll be all right.” She knew her smile was wan, but she nodded decisively.
Max squeezed her shoulder. “Sure?”
“You work on Betsy. I’ll concentrate on Ingrid.”
“All right.” He turned for the phone, but took time to scoop up a sheaf of printouts. “Here’s all the stuff on the Courts residents. Maybe you’ll find something in there.”
She took them gratefully. The printed words would be a barrier of sorts between her thoughts and the memory of the rain-riven bayou and that bloated heap of flesh that had once been a woman.
Carrying the papers into the front office, Annie paused by Barbie’s desk.
The secretary looked up, her eyes wide. “Did Max tell you—Mrs. Raines is missing and she had $220,000 with her. Her daughter’s called five times and Alan’s going crazy. He thinks maybe he should fly out to California and help look for her.”
“He can’t do more than the police,” Annie said. But she felt sorry for Alan. She knew just how he felt. She wanted so desperately to find Ingrid. Well, she’d better keep after it, now that Max was diverted into the long distance inquiry on Betsy. She clutched the printouts tightly. Maybe there would be something in them, some fact that would catch her eye and lead them to Ingrid.
She settled in a comfortable wingback chair and welcomed a cup of coffee from Barbie.
She began to read, and arched an eyebrow in surprise.
Jesse Penrick had a solid work record. Somehow, Annie hadn’t expected this. He’d logged in sixteen years at Harbester Marine Salvage in New Orleans and nine years at a local marine store on Broward’s Rock. (Owned by Ben Parotti, of course. Annie was beginning to have an appreciation that Harley Jenkins III wasn’t the only successful entrepreneur on the island.) According to Oscar Harbester, Jesse was damn bright with machinery (“The old sourpuss could fix anything!”), but ill-natured, hostile, and vindictive. “Don’t ever get crossways with Jesse,” a coworker on the island declared. “He was a nutty son of a bitch. Every damn tool had to be exactly in its place, not a quarter inch out of alignment.”
Annie underlined that comment. Here was corroboration of Jesse’s passion for order, and she intended to make sure it didn’t escape the attention of the circuit solicitor, along with the list of evidence and conclusions she’d composed in the basement women’s room of the county courthouse. But when would she ever have a chance to present her list to Posey?
The front door to Confidential Commissions burst open and Henny shot inside. She shook a huge black umbrella, then furled it and stalked toward Annie.
“What’s all this about Betsy?” She stood with her hands on the umbrella crook and with her head cocked to one side. Beneath her rain cap, only a fringe of fluffy hair was exposed. As Annie told what she knew, Henny paced, like an aging bird, tapping the floor with the umbrella point and frowning acerbically.
Despite her rapid-fire report, Annie was mentally skimming her file of fictional detectives. Something about Henny reminded her of a small, dusty-brown sparrow. Oh, of course!
She paused in her description of the hotel maids actions and asked, “Inspector Cockrill?”
Henny flashed a brief smile of commendation, but motioned for Annie to continue. As she concluded, “Cookie” fastened bright, birdlike eyes on Annie and exclaimed, “There’s more to this than meets the eye—and I am not persuaded that there is no connection between Betsy’s disappearance and this flood of criminal activity which the island has suffered since Saturday.”
<
br /> Annie sorted out the negatives. “You mean you think Jesse’s murder and Ingrid’s disappearance and the problem with Betsy are related?”
“I certainly do.”
“Oh, Henny, that’s absurd. Why, Ingrid barely knew Betsy, and Betsy disappeared in San Francisco.” She suddenly felt a sharp disappointment in Henny. Usually, Henny’s mind worked as well as those of some of her fictional favorites, say, John Appleby or Inspector Ghote. But she obviously was way off base with this preposterous linkage.
Henny drew herself up. “I have only one idea—to preserve truth.” Wheeling, she charged back into the rain.
Annie sighed and picked up the printouts.
She scanned the rest of the information on Jesse. Sixty-four. No record of marriage. Dropped out of high school at sixteen. Shipped out of New Orleans as a wiper on a freighter. Joined the Navy in 1939. Honorable discharge as Seaman First Class in 1946. Effects found on body: wristwatch but no other jewelry, except for wedding ring on chain around neck. Billfold containing Social Security card, drivers license, membership in Adult Film Club of Savannah, one ten, two fives, three ones. Clothing: navy blue turtleneck cotton sweater, blue denim pants, tank-top white cotton undershirt, white cotton boxer shorts. Sneakers and worn white socks found beside body (Why, for God’s sake?) Shirt and undershirt bloodstained with knife rents. Billfold in hip pocket. Front pant pockets empty and only partially elongated, indicating a possibility they had been searched.
Once again that elusive hint of something small, something missing, something the murderer desperately sought.
Annie thoughtfully smoothed the sheet. So many unanswered questions. She sighed and looked at the next printout.
TOM SMITH. Resident of Broward’s Rock since 1978. Miniaturist. Sells from his house and at flea markets. No advertising, word of mouth. Drinks two beers every Saturday night at Ben Parotti’s Bar and Bait Shop. Responds when greeted. Never initiates conversations. Never voices opinions. Will talk about football. No known friends.
Max had marked a vigorous check by a series of sentences:
No bank account.
No insurance.
No drivers license. (No car. Travels by bicycle or bus.)
Pays bills by money order.
In rental application listed Los Angeles address. No record of a Tom Smith ever having lived at the address.
Max had circled his final comment in bright red:
The invisible man.
What else, Annie thought, could be expected of a man with a past that had to stay hidden? It shouldn’t take even Posey long to trace the persons listed in that article on missing activists. Then they would know the truth about Tom Smith.
But would that truth lead them to Ingrid?
Barbie opened Max’s door. His irritated voice boomed out: “Why can’t you open the attaché case?”
In a moment, he strode into the anteroom, shoving a hand through his thick blond hair. He dropped into the chair beside her, his usually good-natured face twisted in a scowl. “Red tape. For God’s sake, here we’ve got a woman missing, and the idiot hotel won’t even open a piece of luggage without a damn court order. I wonder if they’d insist on an order from the fire marshal before they’d use a hose on a flame!”
The phone rang, and he popped up again. Annie wasn’t sorry to see him go. Determinedly, she concentrated on her own quest.
OPHELIA BAXTER. A Gemini. Forty-six. Born in Cucamonga, California. Two years of college in Long Beach. Worked as flight attendant on local airline until fired for overweight. Married three times, to a fireman, a Zen motorcyclist, and a wood carver. A waitress at a health food store. As a result of a mystic experience in 1978 (a choir of angels humming Om in ragtime), she set out to find an untrammeled center for occult visitation.
Annie grinned. Both the staid, moneyed residents of the Broward’s Rock resort area and the down-to-earth natives would be astounded at that assessment of their island. They would agree Broward’s Rock was lovely, idyllic, and unspoiled. But an “untrammeled center for occult visitation”?
As she continued to read the printout, however, Annie decided there might be more to Ophelia’s choice than geographic and spiritual location.
“All I know is,” explained James Madison, who had served as chauffeur to a wealthy reclusive widow, “Mrs. Simpson got this idea voices were talking to her—and they made her real nervous. Then she met this lady out in Colorado at some kind of mystic place, and she convinced Mrs. Simpson she was on a wavelength with some star out in the Milky Way. Mrs. Simpson hired Mrs. Baxter to be her companion, and she lived with us until Mrs. Simpson died a couple of years ago.”
A nice bequest relieved Ophelia of concern for mundane earthly expenses, allowing her to move into Nightingale Courts and devote herself to crystal communcations without charge.
The chauffeur’s opinion of Ophelia Baxter: “A Looney Tune, but a nice lady and real sweet to Mrs. Simpson. Made her feel a lot better about the voices. She convinced Mrs. Simpson that when the voices said mean things, it was just a code. Ophelia translated the voices’ messages, made them real cheerful, so Mrs. Simpson was a lot happier those last couple of years.”
Which was, Annie decided, not socially harmful. Still, was it really all right for Laurel to hobnob with someone who actually believed all this New Age hogwash? (Annie wasn’t sure whether Laurel was actually a devotee of the occult or merely indulging herself in the most entertaining—and delicately rebellious—facet of the late twentieth century. There was a glint of amusement in Laurel’s spacey blue eyes that didn’t quite jibe with the utter seriousness of the true believers. In fact, Annie felt unhappily certain that you could never be sure of anything with Laurel.)
Ophelia was an active member of the Audubon Society and during the last Christmas bird count (the 24th Annual) had infuriated the leader of her group by making bird whistles to a ruby-throated hummingbird which she insisted was her great-great-grandmother, Lavinia Fitch of Philadelphia. Ophelia was a volunteer at the islands animal refuge, where she communed with the cats, all of whom, according to her, had in past lives been humans. (No one believed her assertion that the large tortoise shell with luxuriant whiskers was formerly Teddy Roosevelt, but he was adopted by an island fan of T.R.’s, Eugene Ferramond, who reported, almost in awe, that Teddy, the cat, was especially fond of fried chicken at breakfast, a trait he shared in common with the twenty-sixth president.)
Annie sniffed at that. What cat wouldn’t like fried chicken for breakfast?
But Ophelia’s efforts at the animal refuge emphasized her fondness for cats. And her own cat had been poisoned, Ophelia believed, by Jesse Peririck.
Annie wriggled uncomfortably and wondered where Max’s mother was at this moment. Lord, it was hours ago that she and Ophelia had taken out the speedboat. Where were they? Still out? And why didn’t Max have sense enough to be worried, too? She looked toward the front windows. Rain streamed against the plate glass. But if Max wasn’t concerned, it wasn’t her place to sound an alarm.
“Annie, want some more coffee?” Barbie asked.
Coffee. Her stomach rumbled. Abruptly, Annie realized she was famished. She glanced at her watch. Three o’clock. No wonder. She’d missed lunch.
“We missed lunch,” Annie exclaimed.
Barbie looked at her in disbelief. “Miss lunch? We never miss lunch. Max had just finished eating when you called from Beaufort. Do you mean you haven’t had a bite?” Barbie was a thirtyish blonde with an ample figure, who spent her spare time at Confidential Commissions clipping recipes from Southern Living and listening to George Jones, Hank Williams Jr., and Randy Travis. She immediately rose to the challenge. “Don’t worry. There’s lots left,” and she hurried into the room that held the small refrigerator, microwave, and coffee apparatus. Her voice wafted back to Annie. “Chicken scallopini with peppers and potato-broccoli vinaigrette. I can heat it up in the microwave. And would you like a glass of Chablis?”
Annie cast a bemused glance t
oward Max’s open door. Did he eat that kind of lunch every day? It scarcely seemed American. And who cooked it? Barbie?
But it all smelled so appetizing. Max might be on to a good thing. She was just finishing when Barbie caroled, “Phone for you, Annie.”
“I hate snakes—real snakes and human snakes.”
There was an odd twist to this accent. Annie couldn’t quite place it. Obviously, it was English mastered as a first language, and yet there was a Latin rhythm to it.
“I’m furious. Everyone is trying to thwart me. But I intend to prevail. At least, thank God, I didn’t have to take an airplane to get to Beaufort!”
Annie made the connection. Captain José Maria Carvalho Santos da Silva, of Brazil, who hates airplanes, snakes, and women in pants. Henny.
“Why are you in Beaufort?”
“I’m at the morgue. Waiting for clearance to see that woman they found in the Refuge—Annie, why didn’t you tell me she had red hair?”
The hideous picture flashed in Annie’s mind. She drew in a breath. “Oh God, Henny, how could anyone tell?” The hair, dark from its immersion in water, had been plastered close to the battered skull. At the morgue, they must have dried it, which created other images she didn’t want to pursue.
“Red hair. For God’s sake, didn’t you even think of Betsy?”
Gratefully, Annie supplanted her grim pictures with a memory of Betsy at a Fourth of July Low Country Cookout, her bright hair glistening in the sunlight, looking up and laughing as she talked to Alan beside the pool at the Palmetto House.
Annie felt her patience eroding. “Henny, Betsy’s in California. Three thousand miles from here.”
The Brazilian accent fell away. “I hope so, Annie. I hope so.” A pause. “I’ll soon be able to tell you.”
Annie replaced the telephone with an exasperated head shake. Henny was going to regret this foray. Carrying her dishes to the kitchen area, Annie rinsed them and hurried back to her chair and the printouts.
MAVIS BEESON. Twenty-one. Married to Henry Clark Beeson of Chastain after graduating from high school. Kevin born two years later. Neighbor in Chastain, Emily Kemp, said she heard screams from the Beeson house several times, but didn’t call police. Not sure, and some people yell a lot. Saw Mavis twice with bruised face. Mavis had been gone since last summer. Henry wouldn’t talk about her, but had been picked up for DWI twice. The Beeson family powerful in town, his father a local lawyer. Mavis from a divorced family, her mother a secretary at local junior high.
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