The Complete Mystery Collection

by Michaela Thompson

  She walked to the ferry landing to take a closer look at the weather. The water was gray, with some swells, but it didn’t look too bad yet. Many times storms veered off or lost their strength, and St. Elmo, braced for a hurricane, got a hard rain and nothing more.

  When she turned back to the store, there was a black jalopy that she didn’t recognize parked in front. She saw with a shock that Pearl Washington was behind the wheel. Remembering Pearl’s coolness at the funeral, she hurried toward the car.

  Although the engine wasn’t running, Pearl clutched the steering wheel. “There’s trouble at Mr. Snapper’s,” she said without preamble. “I was hoping maybe you could get the sheriff.”

  Lily felt her throat close. “What’s wrong?”

  “He just sits there, drinking whiskey. He has a revolver right there, in the side table drawer. Since the funeral he don’t talk, he don’t go out. He once in awhile peeks out the window, and that’s all.”

  “Couldn’t it be he’s just grieving for Diana?”

  Pearl snorted. “He didn’t care nothing about that girl. When she was killed, he didn’t hardly bat an eye.”

  “Sometimes it takes people afterward.”

  Pearl shook her head. “He’s going to kill somebody. I’m scared to be there with him.”

  “Pearl”—Lily’s mind was racing—“he hasn’t shot off the gun or anything, has he?”

  “Not yet.”

  “Knowing Woody, he won’t go in there and disturb Snapper when Snapper hasn’t done anything but sit and drink whiskey. He wouldn’t want to make Snapper mad.”

  Lily saw Pearl’s shoulders sag. She’s afraid, and she came to me for help, she thought. I can’t seem to do anything but let her down. “Let me talk to Snapper first,” she said. “Then I’ll see what I can do about Woody.”

  “You shouldn’t go in there.”

  “He won’t shoot me.” Lily hoped she was right. “I’ll meet you there in a few minutes.”

  She left the Closed sign swinging on the door of the store. As she drove toward town, slowly, to give Pearl a chance to reach Snapper’s first, Lily wondered what on earth was going on. She’d just talk to Snapper a few minutes and see how bad it was. Then she’d try to tell Woody, despite his lack of interest in anything she had to say. Or maybe Pearl, upset by Diana’s death, was making more of Snapper’s behavior than it merited.

  When she rang the doorbell at Snapper’s, Pearl answered. “He’s still just like I told you. I’ll let him know you’re here.” She climbed heavily up the stairs.

  In a few minutes, she returned and said, “I told him you was here. He didn’t say a word.” She made a vague gesture toward the stairs.

  Lily had never been upstairs in Snapper’s house, but nerves had gotten the better of natural curiosity, and she hardly noticed her surroundings. At the end of a hall, a door stood slightly ajar. She saw something glittering in the dim crack. It took her a moment to realize that the point of light was Snapper’s eye.

  “It’s just me. Lily Trulock,” she said. He moved back as she approached, and she interpreted this as an invitation to come in.

  The windows and blinds were closed, and the air was heavy with cigarette smoke, whiskey, sweat, a faint suggestion of Vitalis. The room was evidently a study, furnished with a desk, chairs, and a bookshelf with a set of encyclopedias. On the walls hung a stuffed marlin and photographs of Snapper with various notable people.

  Snapper’s rumpled shirttail hung outside his pants, and his hair was greasy and lank across his forehead. Lily had never known him to be less than perfectly groomed. His face looked even more caved in than it had at the funeral, his eyes with the stunned look of a fish flopping in the bottom of a boat.

  At the sight of her, his mouth made a parody of his usual grin. “Miz Lily,” he said.

  “Pearl said you were poorly,” Lily said. “I came to check up.”

  She was close enough now to smell the liquor on his breath. “Poorly,” he said. “You can call it poorly, I reckon.” He crossed to the windows and peered out between the blinds.

  “What’s wrong? Is it Diana?”

  He let the blind snap back into place and turned to her. “They had to have Di, all right. I should’ve known it when they had to have Di.”

  “Known what?”

  “That they wanted me.”

  “Who wanted you?”

  He waggled a finger at her. “Folks. The world has got some mean folks.”

  “But Woody thinks Wesley Stafford killed Diana. If you know different, you should tell Woody.”

  “No siree. Not Woody. No siree.” Snapper’s vigorous shaking of his head disarranged his hair even more. He slumped into a chair. “A man has his way to make in the world, Miss Lily,” he said. “You try to do it, and they will cut you down and thwart you regardless. They’ll hunt you down like you was a squirrel on a tree branch.”

  The desk was piled with campaign posters with a photograph of Snapper’s smiling face and the slogan Experience in Government. Lily perched on its edge. “I don’t understand,” she said.

  “I don’t understand it myself. It’s the way people are.”

  “If you’re in danger, you need protection. I’m going to tell Woody.”

  Snapper’s lip twisted. “No offense, but Woody is about as near useless a lawman as I ever saw.”

  Lily remembered how, after Diana’s murder, she had heard Snapper profess the utmost faith in Woody and Cecil’s crime-solving abilities. And Wanda had said he refused to have extra investigative help brought in. Either Snapper had changed his mind drastically or he’d been lying before. She said, “You keep on like this, you’ll lose yourself the election.”

  “If I don’t I may lose a damn sight more.”

  Lily stood up. If Snapper was willing to write off the election he was in more trouble than she could handle. “I’ll go now,” she said.

  He didn’t reply at first. After a moment he said, “I won’t give them sons of bitches the satisfaction.”

  “That’s right.” She moved out of the room and closed the door.

  Pearl was waiting at the foot of the stairs, and Lily followed her into the kitchen.

  Lily said, “Something is mighty wrong with the congressman.”

  “Yes. It is.”

  “He thinks somebody’s after him.” Baffled, Lily shook her head. “I can’t figure out what he’s talking about. He says they had to have Diana, and now they’re after him.”

  Lily could feel the quality of Pearl’s attention change. “He said that?” she asked.

  “Yes. I don’t understand. But you’re right. I’ll have to tell Woody.”

  Pearl put her hands over her face. “Lord, Lord forgive me,” she said.

  Lily stared at her. “What’s wrong?”

  “My Lord God, I haven’t told you everything, Miss Lily.”

  All of a sudden people want to tell me secrets, Lily thought. Isn’t it the strangest thing?

  “God forgive me if I’m doing wrong,” said Pearl.

  “You’re doing right. He’ll forgive you,” said Lily. “What is it?”

  “I didn’t know it had anything to do with Miss Di,” said Pearl. Tears rolled down her cheeks. “Mr. Snapper is mixed up in a moonshine operation. I heard all about it, right here in this kitchen. There’s a still over on St. Elmo Island.”

  “You can’t mean it.”

  “A big fat man was right here the other night, telling Mr. Snapper about how the Calhouns had found out about their still and were waiting for them, only Bo Calhoun’s wife warned them off. And about how they had dynamited the Calhouns’ still.”

  Lily felt more breathless than she had when Josh knocked her down. “This can’t be true, Pearl.”

  “It’s true. But I said to myself, ‘Pearl, he’s your boss. It’s none of your business anyway.’ But if it has to do with my girl—” Pearl sank into a chair and buried her face in her hands.

  Numbly, Lily skirted the table and patted Pearl
on the shoulder. “Now Pearl,” she said. She squeezed her arm. “We’ll figure something out.”

  “He’s scared the Calhouns will find out and come after him,” Pearl said, her voice tight. “And you tell me he said they got Miss Diana first.”

  Lily’s mind was racing. If she told Woody about this, she would be putting Josh in danger. She had to do something, and do it now.

  She stood up. “Pearl, you better go on home. It’s dangerous to stay here with Snapper like this.”

  Pearl’s face was grim. “I’m going,” she said. “He’s the reason my girl is dead. I’m not staying here.”

  They left together, by the back door. Pearl got in her car and drove away without another word.

  Driving back as fast as she could go, clouds scudding overhead, Lily gauged the progress of the storm. She could be on the island in twenty minutes after leaving the landing, if the weather held as she thought it would. If the storm hit while she was there, she could wait it out at Sam Perry’s. The important thing was to get to Josh as soon as possible. If Snapper was in danger from the Calhouns, Josh was also. And she had to tell him that Snapper was the man behind the island moonshine operation. She pushed the accelerator and watched the sand blowing in a fine layer across the road in front of her.

  So it came down to the Calhouns and Snapper, Snapper versus the Calhouns. With Diana somehow caught between them. With Diana caught. A thought hit her with such mesmerizing force that she almost swerved off the road. A poem Diana had written danced in her mind. She couldn’t quite remember. But didn’t it have to do with choosing between her father and someone else? Choosing someone else? Had Diana had to choose between her father and the Calhouns?

  She skidded to a stop in front of the store, got out of the car, and ran across the street toward her house. Pearl had said Bo Calhoun’s wife warned Snapper’s bunch of an ambush. Why would Sue Nell Calhoun do that? She would have to be angry—very angry—with her husband to betray him that way. Lily thought of Bo staring at Diana’s grave, and of Sue Nell’s absence from the funeral. All Diana’s poems, she thought. All Diana’s poems were written to Bo Calhoun.

  She slammed into the empty house, the screen door banging behind her. She found Diana’s composition book on her bedside table and leafed through it, her hands shaking. Here it was:

  Honor thy father and mother,

  The Bible tells us to.

  My mother is gone, my father’s like stone,

  And I’d rather honor you.

  I didn’t know it would mean choosing,

  And choosing is hard, it’s true.

  But when it came to a decision

  I knew I would have to choose you.

  I’d like to have honored my father

  If it hadn’t been so hard to do.

  So I won’t even try, just let it go by,

  And instead I’ll honor you.

  That’s it, that’s it, thought Lily. She chose Bo. And I’ll bet she wrote that letter to the Beverage Department. She’s the reason Josh is here.

  She pulled a flowered oilcloth table cover out of a kitchen drawer, wrapped Diana’s book in it, and tied it with string. With the package under her arm, she tied a scarf on her head. An old raincoat of Aubrey’s was hanging on the coat rack, and she snatched it and put it on. It hung almost to her ankles, the sleeves brushing her knuckles.

  The Calhouns will find that still, and then there’ll be trouble, she thought. She stopped just long enough to lock the house and then, under a lowering sky, ran down to the landing and her boat.

  38

  Lily’s Warning

  Lily had handled a boat in rough water before. This wasn’t the worst, but it was bad. Whitecaps were starting to form, and occasionally one broke against the boat and she caught the spray in her face. Still, she felt excited by the adventure of what she was doing, and not particularly worried. She made steadily for the island, the boat slapping over the waves, the wind in her face making tears form in her eyes.

  The need to wipe away the moisture made her turn around momentarily. After blotting her eyes with the end of her scarf, she blinked. Two boats were behind her, just leaving the mainland.

  The boats were too far away for her to see who was in them, but Lily had a strong suspicion it was the Calhouns. Nobody without a compelling reason would be on the bay at all. If the Calhouns had discovered that their rivals were on the island, though, the possibility of a hurricane wouldn’t stop them.

  She turned her face forward again, her confident mood gone. They probably didn’t know exactly where the still was. She’d have to get there first. She turned around again and saw, or imagined she saw, that the boats had gained on her a little. She thought she could make out two figures in each boat. Her throttle was open as wide as it would go. She set her face forward.

  The wind was increasing steadily, and in its teeth rounding the end of the island took twice as long as usual. The sight of the open Gulf was stunning. Whitecaps all the way to the horizon, both sky and water gunmetal gray.

  Lily’s arm was stiff from clinging to the tiller. The coast of the island was altered by the rapidly rising tide. Now I just need to find that creek, she thought.

  The buzzing of the Calhouns’ motors mingled in her mind with the ocean noises. She tried to remember what had led her to the creek before. A break in the grass? But the grass was quickly being inundated by the swirling water. There had been, she thought, an unexpected plant. A yucca plant. And up ahead she saw it, its spiky bulk still obvious above the tide. As she turned into the creek, she looked back and saw that no boats had rounded the point.

  It was dark under the pines. The thunder began as she guided the boat along the twisting waterway. A moment later, a drop of rain hit her wrist. She docked her boat where she’d tied up before. Another drop of rain landed in the bottom of the boat near her foot. As she started off through the woods, she thought she heard the motors again.

  She ran, heedless of noise. Lightning flared briefly, followed by thunder. She’d have to hurry to beat the Calhouns.

  The blond man grabbed her arm before she saw him. She had assumed, without thinking about it, that Josh would be guarding the still as he had before. Being confronted with an angry-looking stranger holding a shotgun was the last thing she had planned on.

  “Where you heading?” His voice was harsh.

  Lily shook her head, temporarily shocked out of speech. Rain began to patter lightly in the woods around them. “I need to see Josh.”

  The motors were louder now, unmistakable. The blond man glanced in the direction of the noise, then back at her. “What the hell for?”

  Lily was damp with sweat and rain. “Please let me see him.”

  “I’m taking you to camp.” He dragged her along, her raincoat catching on brambles. In a few minutes they entered a clearing where two men—one fat, one with bristly hair—were moving equipment. Relief swept over Lily when she saw Josh nailing boards across the windows of a shed. He turned, and his arm fell slack when he saw her. The other two men stopped work and straightened up.

  “Found her in the woods,” the blond man said.

  Lily wasn’t sure what to do. She decided waiting would be a mistake. “The Calhouns are coming,” she blurted out. “They left right behind me.”

  The little group converged on her. “What do you mean?” the fat man said.

  “They’re on their way. You can hear the motors.” Nobody said anything. The only sound was the rain and wind in the trees.

  “Sure you can,” the fat man said.

  The blond man, who still held her arm, said, “I did hear something a while back, though.”

  “They’ll be here any minute,” said Lily.

  The bristly-haired man said, “Oh God,” and looked around at the trees.

  “She asked to see Josh,” the blond man said.

  The fat man squinted at her. “What’s your name?”

  “Lily Trulock.”

  “From the grocery store?”r />
  “Yes.”

  He looked at Josh. “You know her?” Josh nodded, looking numb. The fat man indicated the shed. “I want to talk to both of you. Get on over there.”

  Lily and Josh had almost reached the shed when a sharp crack split the air followed immediately by the glare of lightning. Lily turned and in the weird illumination saw the bristly-haired man grab at his stomach. Josh pulled her toward the bushes beside the shed, and from their cover she watched the blond man aim his gun and fire at the moving figure she could see through the trees. The rain began to pour in sheets. Through it and the thunder, Lily heard the screams of the man who’d been shot. The fat man, more nimbly than she would have supposed, grabbed a gun and crouched behind the table.

  “Oh Christ. Oh Christ,” Josh said. “They shot Larry.”

  “It’s the Calhouns,” Lily said. “I came to warn you. And to tell you—”

  Suddenly Josh scrambled from their hiding place toward the wounded man who was lying, quiet now, on the ground. Startled, Lily waited a second, then followed. Amid the gunfire, Josh took Larry under the arms and Lily took his feet. They dragged him into the shed.

  The drumming of rain on the corrugated tin roof almost drowned out the muffled thuds of the shots. “Larry,” said Josh.

  Larry’s eyes flickered, unfocused. “Hey ” he said, and Lily saw his mouth fill with blood. His head fell to one side, and the blood oozed onto the dirt floor.

  “Oh God,” said Josh. He put his head to Larry’s chest, then felt his pulse. When he turned to Lily, his eyes looked large and very black. “He’s dead. Let’s go,” he said. They slipped out the door and into the trees behind the shed.

  Several times during their frantic progress through the woods Lily thought of letting Josh go on without her. Her legs felt rubbery, and she seemed to be constantly watching his back disappear. At the point she’d decide she’d lost him, though, he would turn and wait. Her heart labored, and she wondered if this were how Aubrey felt when he had his attack. She was no longer conscious of her streaming hair under the wet scarf, or the ground squelching under her sandals, or anything but the tightness in her chest.