03 - Three Odd Balls

by Cindy Blackburn

  Skylar smiled to himself, remembering the scene after they were back on more friendly seas. The lady was friendly, too…

  But Eleanor Touchette was tapping him on the shoulder. He recovered himself and remembered his purpose as she confessed how profoundly worried she was. Delta had failed to return for supper the previous evening, and had now been gone for well over twenty-four hours!

  Eleanor wrung her hands. “Whatever could have become of her?” she entreated Mr. Staggs.

  Skylar knew not. But he vowed to find out.

  He did not wish to cause Miss Eleanor further alarm, but a most disturbing thought occurred to him as he took his leave of Emerald Estate. For Skylar Staggs was quite certain that wherever he found his passionate adventuress, he would also find the Pirate of Diamond Island.

  ***

  Speaking of criminal behavior, the Coochie brothers were back at it. I looked up from my work as an utterly uninspired rendition of “Folsom Prison” wafted its way from the Song of the Sea up to the porch at Paradise. Apparently the brothers didn’t realize they needed Johnny Cash for that one.

  Prison. I closed my eyes and listened to the lyrics, and my overactive imagination pictured Christopher Rye behind bars. Okay, so he wasn’t exactly my favorite person, but he was Wilson’s son. And more importantly, he was innocent.

  I opened my eyes and glared at Wilson’s cell phone. What could be taking Russell Densmore so long to call back? After all, Wilson had only given the guy about ninety different assignments the previous evening. Surely the research whiz of the Clarence PD had ascertained most of the answers by now?

  And what about me, for that matter? Why was I, a world-class amateur sleuth, lollygagging around letting everyone else do all the work? Lieutenant Densmore, Wilson, and even Geez Louise were all being far more productive than I. So maybe the conclusion we had reached at breakfast had been accurate. Maybe I was useless.

  I stood up and started pacing to “A Boy Named Sue,” and Sue was embroiled in a rather unpleasant showdown with his father by the time I remembered something I could do. I sat back down and grabbed my own cell phone.

  “Oh, Jessie!” Candy cried the second she answered and commenced sobbing Eleanor Touchette-style.

  I sat up straight. “What’s wrong?”

  “The ca—” she stuttered. “The ca—” A hiccup. “The ca—”

  “The cats?” I said as my heart rate reached for the stratosphere. “Did they hurt each other? Is anyone dead? Oh my Lord, Candy! Is it Snowflake?”

  “It’s Wally!”

  “Wally’s dead!?” I screamed, and the Coochie brothers actually shut up as Candy screamed back a few thousand no’s.

  Hal, or Cal, or whoever called over to ask if everything were okay. I waved a distracted hand and told them to keep playing.

  Then I interrupted Candy’s incessant sobbing. “So Wally isn’t dead?” I clarified in as calm a voice as I could muster.

  “No, but he is hurt.”

  Wally? I scowled at the bougainvillea and reminded Candy everyone got along fine with Wally. It was Snowflake and Bernice who were having such a feline feud.

  “Yeah, but —” Hiccup, sob, wail. “But—”

  “Oh, for Lord’s sake. But what?”

  “But it wasn’t a cat fight, Jessie. It was me!” she squealed and continued crying. “I’m the one who hurt Wally. I stepped on him. I feel so bad about it.”

  I bit down on my right fist and let out a sob of my own. I imagined Candy did feel bad, but probably not as bad as poor little Wally. My friend Candy Poppe is the queen of stiletto heels—four-inch, sharp, pointy stiletto heels.

  “Which pair were you wearing?” I asked in a hoarse whisper.

  “The gold ones. It was at breakfast-time this morning.”

  Okay, so I know what you’re thinking. Gold stilettos at breakfast-time? Well, yes, actually. I could even picture the exact pair, adorned with gold glitter and silver satin bows. Candy is a rather flamboyant dresser. And it was the holiday season, after all.

  “I was trying to keep Snowflake and Bernice from killing each other,” she was saying.

  “Snowflake doesn’t like it when Bernice eats from her bowl.”

  “And Wally?” I asked.

  “He was playing with Puddles. You know Puddles? My poodle?”

  I took a deep breath and reminded Candy that of course I knew who Puddles was, since the little dog spends about half of his life in my condo.

  “Yeah, well, Puddles and Wally were running around while I was feeding the other two, and I guess I wasn’t watching what I was doing, and I stepped backwards.”

  I braced myself. “Where?”

  “In your kitchen. Right next to Snowflake’s food dish.”

  “Candy!”

  “Oh,” she said. “You meant where did I step on Wally, huh? His right front paw. He screamed so loud Bernice stopped eating. It was awful.”

  I cringed as I pictured the damage.

  “Crunch,” Candy added, and I cringed some more.

  “You took him to the vet?” I asked.

  “Karen did. I was too upset, so I stayed here with Snowflake, and Bernice, and Puddles.”

  “What did Dr. Smith do?” At the thought of Annie Smith, I allowed myself to feel at least slightly relieved. She’s the best vet in Clarence, and she knows Snowflake, Puddles, and both of Wilson’s cats. If anyone could heal Wally, it was Dr. Smith.

  Sure enough, Candy reported that Wally was going to be okay. “Nothing’s broken, just badly bruised,” she elaborated. “He’s got his paw all wrapped up for a few days. Dr. Smith promises he isn’t in pain anymore, but I still feel so bad.”

  She threatened to begin crying again, so I tried to set her mind at ease, reminding her it was an accident, and how hard her job was, and reassuring her Wilson would actually be grateful she and Karen were taking such good care of his cats.

  “The main thing is Wally is going to be okay,” I added firmly.

  “Dr. Smith says he’ll be good as new. But no more chasing Puddles around. Not this week anyway.”

  ***

  “Wild goose chase,” were the first words out of Lieutenant Russell Densmore’s mouth.

  Clearly under the impression he was speaking to his boss, he didn’t wait for any sort of acknowledgement, but simply continued his report. “Her real name is Samantha Dimmery,” he said as I reached for my mother’s clipboard. “Dimmery has a history of moving from job to job, and island to island. She also has a history of petty crime. I’m guessing the woman has to resort to petty theft, since she can’t seem to hold a job for more than a few days. Her gig at the Wakilulani Gardens was something of a record—six whole weeks. But now she’s moved on to Honolulu, looking for her next job. You want me to keep track of her progress, Captain?”

  I looked up from writing “petty crime” and “Honolulu” next to “Samatha Dimmery.”

  “We’re talking about Rachel Tate?” I asked, and I do believe the Lieutenant dropped his phone. I jotted down “Rachel Tate” in parentheses next to the “Dimmery.”

  “Jessie?” Russell said eventually.

  I verified, but somehow this did not set his mind at ease. “Where’s Captain Rye?” he demanded. “And what about Captain Vega? And what about Chris? Don’t tell me he’s already been arrested? Where is my boss, Jessie? Why are you answering his pho—”

  “Russell!” I scolded. I told him to take a deep breath and explained the latest developments.

  “Let me get this straight,” he said as I finished. “Captain Rye is off somewhere in the jungle searching for a bird?”

  “Bee Bee is not just any bird. We think he’s an important witness.”

  Dead silence.

  “Bee Bee is a very smart parrot,” I reiterated. “But let’s move on, shall we? What else have you found? Some good dirt, I hope.”

  “Are you alone?”

  I gazed out from the porch. The Coochies were within eyesight, but with the maid’s vacuum cl
eaner running down in Louise’s bungalow, I couldn’t hear what they were playing over at the Song of the Sea. I assumed they could not hear me either, but just in case, I picked up the clipboard and went inside Paradise.

  “All alone,” I said and sprawled out on the bed.

  “Are you sitting down?”

  I sat up. “Yes.”

  “Here’s the dirt—Captain Jason Vega and Ki Okolo are friends. They have been for years.”

  “No!”

  “Yes. But don’t get too excited. Ki Okolo has lots of friends.”

  I told Russell I found that hard to believe, even as I scribbled down Ki and Vega’s names and drew a big thick arrow between them. “Ki is very abrasive,” I said.

  “Maybe. But he’s also a computer genius. Practically everyone on that island has needed his help at some point. The Halo Beach PD actually keeps him on retainer. I get the idea Vega’s even worse at technology than my boss.”

  “Wilson’s lucky to have you for all this techie stuff, Russell.”

  “Maybe. But the Halo Beach cops don’t have me, they have Ki Okolo. They call him Sherlock.”

  “Everyone calls everyone Sherlock around here. Vega uses the expression, as does Ki.”

  “Like I said, they’re friends.”

  “Sooo.” I wrote Sherlock in parentheses under Ki’s name. “If Ki’s the murderer, it’s in Vega’s best interest to protect him. He needs to keep Ki out of prison and available for the next Halo Beach PD computer crisis.”

  “Don’t get too excited, Jessie. We have no proof Ki’s the killer.”

  “But Vega always lets the locals off the hook. Rumor has it he always blames a poor hapless tour—”

  “Let’s stick to the facts,” Russell said firmly.

  “You’re just like your boss, you know? Facts this, facts that.”

  “So here’s what we know for fact,” he continued, dismissing my complaint. “Ki Okolo visits police headquarters at least once a week to work on something or other, and he and Vega usually take a long lunch afterwards.”

  I shook my head in dismay. “How did you learn all this stuff, Russell?”

  “Practice,” he said humbly and turned the subject to the other Okolo brother. “Big brother Ki might have clients all over the place, but Palakapola, a.k.a. Buster Okolo, has never worked anywhere except the Wakilulani Gardens. He moved in with his grandfather at age eleven and never left.”

  “Buster loves it here,” I agreed. “His grandfather Pono trained him to take over the business.”

  “Good sleuthing, Jessie.”

  “More like simple observation.” I scanned my notes. “So who else did you get the dirt on?”

  “There’s very little dirt,” Russell said.

  “But there has to be dirt,” I insisted and explained a few of the intriguing love-triangle theories to prove my point.

  Bless his heart, Russell gave each some consideration.

  “I found nothing to suggest that Samantha Dimmery, a.k.a. Rachel Tate, was engaged to Davy Atwell,” he said eventually. “And there’s no evidence Bethany Iverson was involved with the guy either, even if she does know how to mix what the Captain tells me are some damn fine pink cocktails.”

  “But Russell,” I whined. “We worked so hard to figure out those love triangles.”

  “Okay, how about this? I will agree that any triangle involving Carmen Dupree might have potential. She and those kids she had with Atwell could stand to inherit a fortune.”

  I wrote “Carmen Dupree” in big block letters on top of my notes. I almost confessed our plans to break into Davy Atwell’s house later that day, but thought better of it and instead mentioned the Beyond the Beach tour.

  “Carmen’s a tour guide, so we’re going this afternoon,” I explained, and suddenly antsy to get going, I got up from the bed to pace the room. “Beyond the Beach actually makes a stop at Davy Atwell’s mansion.”

  Russell told me to have fun. “Better yet, learn something useful. Break into the place. Captain Rye certainly knows how.”

  I stopped short and blinked twice.

  “Try to find Atwell’s will while you’re in there,” Russell suggested. “Computers might stump him, but Rye can crack a safe faster than anyone I know.”

  Excuse me? Not only was Wilson Rye adept at breaking and entering, but he could also crack a safe?

  I was standing in front of the closet, and for some reason felt compelled to open it and take an inventory of Wilson’s stunningly silly shirts. My beau—the clown, the cop, and the criminal. What’s the saying? An enigma wrapped in a mystery? And wearing a fluorescent green shirt. The pink and orange spider-web specimen caught my attention, and I remembered another expression—something about tangled webs and deception.

  “Jessie? Are you still there?”

  I snapped out of it and closed the closet. Skeletons in the closet.

  I snapped out of it again. “Umm, Russell,” I ventured. “You don’t by any chance happen to know anything about Wilson’s past?”

  Dead silence.

  I soldiered on. “Something about a Dianne Calloway?”

  I heard a loud clang and ascertained that the good Lieutenant had once again dropped his telephone.

  Chapter 21

  “Housekeeping. Knock, knock!”

  I glanced through the open doorway to see the maid struggling up the stairs with a vacuum cleaner.

  Mother’s clipboard and Wilson’s phone landed in the nearest dresser drawer, and I met the maid on the porch with a big smile on my face. Maybe I wasn’t having such a useless morning after all. I mean, there before me stood a member of the Wakilulani staff who had not yet been interrogated. At least not by me.

  Still smiling, I stepped forward and introduced myself.

  The fifty—or maybe even sixty—something woman put down her vacuum with an exaggerated grunt and gave my hand a cursory shake. “Leslie Coochie,” she said.

  My mouth dropped open, but Ms. Coochie didn’t even notice since she was already back to struggling with her machine.

  I stepped in her way. “Coochie, as in Hoochie Coochie?” I fluttered a few fingers Song of the Sea-ward.

  “Cousins,” she mumbled. She got a firm grip on the vacuum cleaner and maneuvered it around me and into Paradise. “I’ll be about a half hour if you want to wait down by the pool.”

  Yeah, right.

  While she moved back and forth carrying loads of sheets and cleaning supplies from her cart to the bungalow, I hung around on the porch pretending to fiddle with something on my laptop. How had we failed to notice this woman in all our sleuthing?

  Well, she must have cleaned our room while we were out spying on Carmen Dupree the day before. And the morning before that she would not have disturbed us. That had been the morning after Davy’s murder, when we slept in. Also, maybe we had simply not given the cleaning staff much thought. I scolded myself for being such a snob and walked to the doorway.

  Ms. Coochie had already stripped the bed and was arranging the clean sheets. She looked up at me. “Can I help you?”

  “No, but I can help you.” I hastened to the opposite side of the bed and gestured for her to throw me a corner of the sheet.

  Instead, she clutched the sheet in both fists. “What are you doing?”

  “Umm, I thought I’d help,” I said weakly. “I don’t mind.”

  She frowned and asked me to please get out of the way.

  So much for being helpful. I stepped back to let her get on with it, and with a few more frowns in my direction, she made the bed. She was tucking in the last corner on Wilson’s side when I gave up and resorted to honesty.

  “My friends and I are curious about Davy Atwell’s murder,” I blurted out as she hustled her way into the bathroom.

  “Tell me something I don’t know,” she called from the vicinity of the shower.

  “Actually, I was kind of hoping you could tell me something I don’t know.” I smiled encouragingly as she emerged from the bathro
om with an armload of dirty towels.

  She dropped the towels onto the pile of dirty sheets. “Not likely.” She gathered up all the laundry, and left me while she carried it outside to her cart.

  I reminded myself an amateur sleuth’s job is never easy and waited patiently for this annoyingly efficient maid to return. Sure enough, she came back with a stack of clean towels, but I stepped directly into her path to the bathroom.

  She stopped. “Whaaat?” she said. “I don’t know anything, okay? I just work here.” She looked pointedly around me. “At least I’m trying to.”

  I reached out to her shoulders, backed her up toward the bed, and firmly pressed down until she was forced to sit.

  She shook her head. “Ki warned me about you.”

  “Excellent!” I said and noticed the slightest hint of a smile.

  I encouraged the effort and pulled up a chair to face her. Smiling or not, Ms. Coochie was still holding her stack of clean towels and was poised to spring towards the bathroom at the first opportunity. Therefore, I ignored my rather involved list of suspects and love triangles and got right to the point. I asked only about the Coochie cousins. When need be, I, too, can be efficient.

  She shook her head again. “You’re wasting your time and mine,” she told me. “Hal and Cal did not kill the bartender.”

  “Oh, no, no, no,” I hastened to agree. “But they were here that night. They had just checked in. And, well, I’m just curious is all. I love their music.”

  Ms. Coochie ever so slowly raised an eyebrow.

  “Okay, so maybe not,” I said to the eyebrow. “But I am curious about them. I understand they stay here every year.” I pointed to her maid’s uniform. “And you have to admit, it is an intriguing coincidence that you work here. Have you had this job long?”

  Leslie—she relaxed enough to let me to call her Leslie—informed me she was new to the staff, and with a few persistent prods and pleas from me, offered a bit of her history. Apparently Hal and Cal were her second cousins, sons of a favorite cousin on her father’s side. And Leslie was a retired school teacher trying to make a little extra income to supplement a not-so-great pension.

  “After decades of dealing with kids, parents, principals, and anyone else who cared to blame teachers for every problem under the sun, I wanted a job where I can work all alone.” She again raised an eyebrow. “Something where I don’t have to talk to anyone. Where I’m ignored and left all alone.”