by Clover Tate
chapter five
With the constant jingling of the bell at the shop’s front door, helping customers, and the repair of a lovely sunrise-pink kite that had taken a nearly fatal dive into a sand dune, I was busy all day. You’d think I’d be thrilled, but I was still antsy about Avery. She’d asked me to let the matter rest, but I couldn’t help wondering if I should at least recommend she get an attorney.
Thanks to poetry night at the Brew House, she wouldn’t be home until late. I decided to burn off some of my anxiety with a walk on the beach. Yesterday’s sunny weather hadn’t lasted, and now the breeze held misty rain. My thoughts kept returning to Avery. She wasn’t telling me everything about her and Miles. I was sure of it.
A familiar figure, shoulders draped in a cerise shawl, came toward me from down the beach. Stella. She looked distracted and didn’t see me, and I didn’t want to disturb her while she was so absorbed. We passed so close, though, that it wasn’t civil not to greet her.
“Hi, Stella. Nice evening for a walk, huh?”
“Oh. Emmy.” Stella was somewhere else completely, and wherever it was, it wasn’t a happy place.
“Is everything all right?”
She stopped and turned toward the ocean. With each wave, the sea drifted lazily toward our feet. But the meandering water was deceptive. The ocean’s real force showed in the waves that shattered over the rocky outcroppings just offshore.
“I didn’t know it was Miles you’d found.”
“That’s right. You knew him from the Tidal Basin. I’m sorry.” No wonder Stella was so despondent. There was no leaning in for gossip or urging me for gruesome details, either. No, this was pure grief. Stella and Miles must have been close.
“Why don’t we walk together? I wouldn’t mind the company,” she said. I turned back to town with her. She linked her arm in mine. “I was getting a little melancholy on my own.”
“If you’re sure.”
“Absolutely. Usually the ocean helps me sort out my thoughts, but sometimes it simply makes me maudlin. Besides, I had an idea for a kite that I wanted to talk to you about.”
“Really?”
“Inspired by a fishing net. In fact”—she stopped and turned to me—“why don’t you come up to my place and I’ll show you? Or maybe you have plans.”
The breeze blew a few strands of white gray hair across her mouth, and she pulled them away. I had the feeling Stella was honest. Straightforward. What you saw was what you got, and I saw a refined, openhearted woman. After the last couple of days, I’d welcome her company.
“I don’t have plans, and Avery’s out for the evening. I’ll need to check on my dog, but I could meet you in, say, an hour?”
Stella jotted down her address, and we parted ways by the docks.
After an hour nearly to the minute, I arrived at Stella’s. She lived in a 1950s ranch-style house high enough on the bluff above Rock Point to have a sweeping view of the ocean and far enough that I couldn’t hear the surf—only the occasional shrieks of seagulls. I climbed the steps up to the front door and didn’t even have to ring the bell. Stella was already at the open door, smiling widely, but still with a hint of the sadness I’d seen earlier. She held a paintbrush and wore paint-smeared overalls.
“I saw you coming up the street. Come in,” she said. “Would you like some tea, or maybe a glass of pinot gris? I was just opening a bottle.”
“Wine would be nice.” Stella’s front room was flooded with light. In front of the stone fireplace, instead of the traditional couch and matching side chairs was a circle of armchairs from different eras, surrounding a low, round coffee table stacked with books and framed photographs. A white cat with one blue and one amber eye lounged in a Swedish-style teak-framed chair. Nothing matched, but all the same the room’s feeling was harmonious.
Stella noticed me surveying her decor. She picked up a silver-framed photo and handed it to me. “My husband.”
The photo showed a tall man with kind features and thick white hair leaning against a brick wall. I replaced the photo on the table. “Do you miss him?”
“Every day.”
“I’m sorry.” After a moment, I turned to the seating area. “I love the mix of chairs.”
“I thought a couch would be too stuffy. I so much prefer everyone to have their own armchair. More convivial, don’t you think? Have a seat. I put my kite sketch there, next to the candle. And that’s Madame Lucy.” She nodded toward the cat.
“Bonjour, Madame,” I said. The cat stood and stretched, then circled in the chair to settle with her back facing me. Well. She knew a dog person when she saw one, I guessed. I chose the rocking chair and gratefully took the glass of wine Stella offered. It was crisp and floral, like spring. “This is nice.”
Stella lowered herself into a leather deco club chair with a mohair throw tossed across its back. “Willamette Valley vintner. I traded him a painting for an annual case of his pinot gris.”
Stella handed me a sketch pad. She’d drawn a stunt kite—the kind that you handle with two lines, but which can dip and swoop—with net joining the kite’s wings in a long, braidlike tail. She’d wisely left off trying to sketch in the kite’s mechanics.
“This is good,” I said. “The trick would be to make sure the nylon doesn’t weigh it down. I could even weave the net from different colors.” My fingers itched for a pencil to jot down a few details. “Do you—”
“Right here.” Stella pulled a pencil from the front pocket of her overalls.
I sketched in the placement of the bridle to counterbalance the net tail. Nice. “If you’d like, we could work on this together in my workshop.”
Stella’s face softened. “I’d love it.”
“Where’s your studio?” The scent of turpentine and oil paint that I remembered so well from art school lingered in the air, but I didn’t see an easel.
“Downstairs. Since the house is built on a hill, I have a nice bank of windows down there and a few big walls for my larger pieces. Would you like to see it?”
“I would.”
She led me past the kitchen and down a staircase on the hall’s right. The house’s ground floor, open in the front, glowed with the west sun. The trappings of a painting studio—utility sink, jars of paintbrushes, primed canvases—were there, sure, but what caught my attention were the landscapes in various stages of completion lining the walls. The paintings were vivid and wild, churning with emotion.
Stella set her wineglass on the paint-stained table holding her palette. “What do you think?”
“I love it.” The paintings were so rich that they almost seemed to move on their own.
“The light’s from the west. It’s not ideal, but when the Realtor brought me down here, I knew this was the house for me.”
“I don’t mean the studio, although it’s great. I mean your paintings. They’re wonderful.”
“Thank you.”
I took in the sweeping view of Rock Point, down the sloped streets of the northern edge of town to the ocean. The sunsets here must be almost as gripping as those from Avery’s porch. That, at least, hadn’t changed since yesterday morning.
“I hate to bring it up,” Stella said, “but how are you doing? I mean, with everything. As you might imagine, people are talking about Miles—and your friend.”
“Honestly?”
Stella nodded. “I worked at the Tidal Basin last night, and the staff was feeling down. Chef Miles.” The light in her face vanished.
“It’s awful. Poor Avery. The sheriff seems to have made her his number-one suspect, and she’s not even fighting it. She’s walking through it all like a zombie. Just kind of stunned.”
“Did you—could you—?”
I remembered her tact the morning before, when she didn’t press me on finding the body. Of course she’d want to know more now. “I was taking the d
og for a walk on the beach, and I found him washed up on a cluster of rocks just below the house.” It sounded so simple, almost clinical. “He was facedown. When the sheriff came, he rolled him over, and, well—” My voice dropped off.
“It was clear he was murdered. No doubt,” she said.
“Yes.”
Stella seemed to withdraw. Her expression closed down, and she gazed out the studio’s windows toward the ocean. “Avery lost her parents not long ago, am I right?”
“A little more than two years ago.” I understood where Stella was headed and nodded. “Miles’s death on the heels of that—well, it’s a lot to take.”
“She clearly didn’t do it, though.”
“Of course she didn’t.” I paused. “I know that, but not everyone else is convinced.”
“Well, why should she have killed him?” The violence in Stella’s response startled me. Until now, she’d seemed despondent. Anger clearly burned under her grief.
Madame Lucy emerged from the stairwell and hopped onto a chair.
“No reason. No reason at all.” Motive. That was the one thing the sheriff seemed determined to ignore. Avery had no motive to kill Miles. “But, then, who would want to kill Miles?”
Stella rested a hand on Madame Lucy’s back. “I’ve been thinking about that. Miles and Annabelle dated way back in high school, and Annabelle’s had her eye on him ever since. They even started seeing each other again before he started dating Avery, but I think Miles called it off for good. At least, that’s the word on the street.”
“Word does hit the street pretty quickly around here.”
“It’s a small town. Lenny, down at the filling station, listens to the police radio and keeps his eyes on people’s comings and goings. Jeanette at the post office generally stops by the filling station on her way to work for a coffee and gets the lowdown. Then she’s the info relay during the day. Everyone who checks their mail or buys stamps either gives or gets the latest gossip.”
“She doesn’t go to the Brew House for coffee?” Around these parts, most residents were pretty choosy about their morning java.
“Oh yes, but that’s during her afternoon break. That way she’s plugged into all the major news outlets.”
So Avery couldn’t so much as buy a can of tuna in Rock Point without everyone knowing her business. “Is there any talk about Annabelle? Or anyone else for that matter?”
“Of course there is. Everyone’s speculating, and I’ve seen enough of humankind in my time as a teacher to know Annabelle’s type. She’s proud, and she bears a grudge. Unfortunately, the money seems to be on Avery right now.” Stella shifted on her feet. “I think the sheriff would be wise to pay a little more attention to the Tidal Basin, though.”
Madame Lucy had removed herself to the floor and was vigorously grooming her hindquarters.
“Why’s that?” I asked.
“Well, Miles didn’t seem fully committed to the job. Every once in a while he’d simply not show up for work, and the restaurant’s owner, Sam, wasn’t keen on it.”
“You’re kidding.” The Tidal Basin had garnered national reviews. Any foodie passing within a hundred-mile radius made dinner reservations. The chef simply not showing up for work—well, that was serious. “Did he have health problems or something?”
“No. Every few months he’d go hiking and lose track of time. Or he’d be scouring antiques malls in Lincoln City for old cookbooks. He didn’t share Sam’s urgency.”
“But someone had to lead the kitchen, right?”
“The sous chef is decent, and Miles usually had the upcoming week’s dishes planned out, so the restaurant could limp through on those days.”
Interesting. “Avery said Miles could be kind of dreamy, sort of do his own thing.”
“That’s a fact,” Stella said. “It’s one of the things I appreciated most about him, actually. We were simpatico that way.” She wandered to the window and took in the view before facing me again. “There’s more. Last week, some strangers showed up at the kitchen door, and there was a kerfuffle. The dishwasher—he’s a beefy guy—had to throw them out.”
“Could you tell what it was about?”
“I’m at the front of the house and can’t hear everything, but one of the line cooks said they threatened Miles, said he’d ‘pay for’ what he’d done.”
“The sheriff should be all over this.”
Stella nodded. “I agree.”
“I’m glad you’re looking beyond Avery. I hate to think of the sheriff going any further down a dead-end trail. It wasn’t her.”
“I have my own reasons for wanting to know who killed Miles.” I waited, but Stella didn’t elaborate. Then, in an apparent change of subject, she said, “I’m thinking it’s time I give up my job at the restaurant.” Her voice sounded far away.
“I thought you liked the distraction from painting.”
“I’ll find something else.” She seemed to snap to and now faced me.
An idea came to me. Right now my plan was to close the shop on Mondays and Tuesdays to take a break, but if Stella were willing to fill in, I could keep Strings Attached open all week. It would be great as tourist season picked up. Stella’s kindness and schoolteacher’s savvy would be a plus for the shop.
“Well, if you’d ever consider a few hours in a kite shop from time to time, I’d love to have you. It wouldn’t be more than two days a week, but it would be less strenuous than hostessing.”
An eyebrow lifted a notch. “That’s not a bad idea. They’re such lovely kites. I’d see more children, too.”
I pushed my luck a little further. “It sounds like we share an interest, as well, in finding out who killed Miles.”
She examined me a moment. “Perhaps, but what are you getting at?”
“I don’t mean we should go all Nancy Drew, but maybe if we had a few ideas to feed the sheriff, it could help point him in the right direction. Avery is not the right direction, and I hate to have people around town talking about her.”
“The sheriff is good at his job. Fair. We can count on him.”
“Sure, but how many murders does he investigate?” I waited for Stella’s response, and getting none, I continued. I was starting to get excited about the idea now. Stella knew the residents of Rock Point better than I did, plus she had an in at the Tidal Basin. “If we happened to stumble over something that could help him find Miles’s real murderer, we could let him know.”
“You own a kite shop, and I used to teach middle schoolers. We’re not FBI material.”
“True.” Madame Lucy nudged her head at my ankles. I knelt and scratched her white ears. “But we live right among Rock Point’s residents. We see things that a sheriff wouldn’t. I’m worried about Avery. And what about Miles?”
“Miles,” Stella nearly whispered. She picked up her wineglass. She seemed to be turning something over in her mind. “Tell you what. Why don’t you come have dinner at the Tidal Basin tonight, and we’ll talk about it more?”
chapter six
I returned home once again and quickly changed into something more presentable than the jeans and blouse printed with tiny kites I’d worn during the day. Despite the low-key title of “gastropub,” the Tidal Basin’s prices were steep and its clientele tony. They might not be dripping diamonds, but their “casual” blue jeans probably cost more than my entire wardrobe.
As I drove my Prius toward town, I reflected that it wouldn’t earn pride of place in the restaurant’s parking lot, either. It was a first-generation model, in dirt-collecting white, that my dad drove for a few years before deciding he couldn’t give up the VW bus. As a result, my bumper exhorted drivers to “Save Tibet” and “Kill Your Television.” One bumper sticker curiously read “Bowl Naked,” even though neither of my parents were bowlers.
The Tidal Basin commanded part of a new building on the
fancier side of the docks, the side the town called the “marina,” where the small yachts and tourist fishing outfits were tied up, rather than the plain old “docks,” where generations of fishermen anchored their crafts and where Avery’s family’s boat was. I opened the restaurant’s front door to the sound of jazz and the murmur of conversation, punctuated by bursts of laughter here and there.
Stella had told me I could sit at the bar and pick on a salad for a few hours without breaking the bank. Plus, she’d said that from the bar I’d be able to get more of a feel for what was going on, anyway. I didn’t know what I was looking for, exactly, but the artistic process was like this, too. Sometimes you had to pick up a pencil and trust that the concept would come. Maybe if I sat at the Tidal Basin and observed, I’d have some kind of hint to throw Sheriff Koppen’s way. Stella said that during her break we could talk about setting her up with a few shifts at Strings Attached.
“Emmy.” Stella stood at the podium just inside the door. She’d changed into a soft wrap dress and boots, and with her hair pulled into a loose chignon and a touch of rose lipstick, she could have walked from the set of a French movie. “I saved you a seat. Follow me.”
Stella led me through the dining room to the bar toward the rear and pulled out a chair facing the open kitchen. This wasn’t a bar as in “cocktail lounge,” but rather a strip of seating facing one of the kitchen’s stoves and a counter where kitchen staff quickly stacked fish and vegetables into mini-tableaux. Stella plucked a tiny “Reserved” sign from my seat and handed me a menu.
“The cioppino is really good today. Enjoy. I’ll check in later,” she said before returning to the front of the restaurant.
I ordered as Stella recommended, then looked around the room. Most of my meals out in Rock Point had been in brewpubs or coffeehouses like the Brew House, and Mom’s casseroles hadn’t exactly prepared me for haute cuisine, so when the seafood stew I’d ordered was set in front of me, its aroma was exotic with herbs I didn’t recognize. I could see getting used to this.