“I am a detective, you know. And I detect a certain lack of remorse over the demise of your old boyfriend. Let me read something to you. ‘Dead would be good. But as you can see, Detective Martinez, even if he is alive, I don’t think Hudson, wherever the dirty rat bastard may be, would be looking to harm me. As a matter of fact, if I ever see him again, he’s the one who’s going to get harmed. Some folks, like old granny used to say, just need killing.’ Sound familiar?”
Oops.
“Just big talk. Besides, I was in Texas,” I protested, thanking my lucky lone star that Hudson got himself done in when I had an alibi.
Martinez nodded, then said, “But, by your own admission, you have friends in low places.”
Jan said, “Uh, Hetta, maybe we should call Allison?”
“Is she your lawyer?” Martinez asked.
“Sort of. Yes.” I didn’t think he needed to know that Allison wasn’t in private practice. Or that she was actually a prosecutor for another county. Who better than Allison to determine if he had any kind of case?
“I can meet you downtown, unless you want to call her and have her come over here right now.”
“Look Martinez, you know damned well I didn’t drown Hudson Williams in my hot tub. I might’a shot him if I’d had a chance, but I damned sure wouldn’t pollute my own tub.”
“I believe you. I just got to do my job.”
“How do we even know he was murdered?” Jan said hopefully.
“Oh, sure,” I scoffed. “Maybe he was in for a quick dip and fell asleep after closing the cover?” Jan gave me her look.
Martinez rolled his eyes. “We don’t know anything yet. I should have the coroner’s first take in a few … ” The front door swung open and a tiny Oriental man walked in. “Speak of the devil.”
Martinez introduced the coroner, and they went upstairs. An hour later, we watched as Hudson’s drippy, parboiled body was hauled out the front door and carted away. I’d have to have the rugs cleaned. Once again Hudson had rained on my parade.
After forever, Martinez and the coroner came down the stairs talking quietly. My extrasensory hearing picked up only one word: icepick. Either we were gonna have a cocktail party, or it was going to be a very long night.
It was a very long night.
Allison came over within an hour, did her lawyerly magic, and got us cleared to go to Jan’s for what was left of the night. Allison left, Martinez followed, and then the last of the Homicide squad. Yep, Homicide. They suspected Hudson was offed when someone shoved an icepick in his ear. Someone with great taste, I might add. A quick trip to the kitchen with the detective on my tail revealed that my Georg Jensen icepick was missing. Zut, alors! It was part of a set.
Only a rookie remained. His job, it seemed, was to make sure Jan and I didn’t tamper with evidence. We left for the City, our flight fueled by a burning desire to be shut of my haunted house. It was a sad farewell to what had been a happy home for so many years.
Trying to cheer me up, Jan said, “Look on the bright side, Hetta. Hudson won’t be messing with you anymore.”
“All too true. One slight problem, Sherlock. Someone killed him at my house. Or at least left him in my tub. Doesn’t that sound like someone’s trying to scare me? Or threaten me? Or both?”
“Well, yes.” She chewed her lip, a signal that she had more to say, but was reluctant to do so.
“Well, yes but what?”
“You won’t get upset?”
“I’m too tired.”
“Okay, then. How about this. Hudson came to your house, found you gone, decided to stay until you got back, went into the hot tub and someone, seeing him out there in the dark, thought it was you and killed him by mistake.”
“Gosh, Jan, I feel sooo much better now. Thanks oodles.”
31
“They say the two of the happiest days of your life are the day you buy a boat and the day you sell it. I guess that makes us a couple of very happy people, Hetta. Here’re the keys to Sea Cock,” Morris said, handing me two keys on a hopefully non-premonitory miniature life ring.
As I stared at the keys to my new life, he drew an iced bottle of Mumms from a silver bucket, fiddled with the foil and wire, and bellowed, “Betty, come on up here and join me and Hetta in a toast.”
A waft of Joy, tinkling bracelets and the swish of silk preceded Betty’s arrival. She fluttered, aglitter in gold and jewels, into an oversized chair. As always, she looked as though she just stepped out of a fashion magazine, albeit one for graciously preserved seventy-year-olds. Her eyes sparkled like the five carat stone on her finger. “So, the deal is done? How very nice for you, Hetta. Are you all ready to move aboard?”
“Getting there. My morning marathon of sorting, storing, throwing and tagging giveaways is done. I own much more stuff than any individual should. I feel like a great weight has been lifted from my shoulders.” I didn’t mention that a very drippy, dead weight had also been extracted from my hot tub, or that while I was packing up this morning, I had a cop looking over my shoulder. I knew for sure Betty wouldn’t be able to keep a prime piece of info like that from her fellow yacht club members.
“Morris and Betty, I really appreciate your faith in my being able to pay for Sea Cock. I won’t let you down.” I raised my fluted crystal glass to them and hoped I wasn’t telling a bald-faced lie.
Morris cocked his head towards his wife. “You had a little angel on your shoulder, Hetta.”
“Let’s say Morris saw the wisdom of my ways,” Betty cooed, smiling affectionately in his direction. “I admire your spunk, Hetta. The yacht club needs more women who own and operate their own boats.”
“I don’t know about that ‘operating’ part. I still have to learn how to drive it. Her.”
“My dear,” Betty said, taking a dainty sip of Mumms, “how hard can it be? I mean, men do it.”
Now if I’d said that I’d be called a castrating you-know-what, but Betty got a sweet smile from her husband. Maybe it’s all in the delivery. Or maybe the man.
* * *
“Jan, I’ve got the keys. Can you meet me at the yacht club?”
“Oh, this is sooo exciting. I’ll be there in an hour. Do you want me to stay on the boat with you tonight? Or would you rather enjoy it alone?”
“I know you’ve got plans with Lars. I’ll be fine on the boat by myself for the night. But I wanted you to be the first aboard with me this afternoon. We can have a little champers. I didn’t want...I just…. ”
“I know, honey. It breaks my heart RJ can’t be with us today, but you’re starting a whole new life and you can’t let missing him get you down on such a momentous occasion. If it’ll help, I’ll fart.”
Friends. Ain’t they the best?
* * *
Sea Cock, her fiberglass hull agleam in the spring sun, sat alongside the yacht club dock. Someone, probably Morris, had decked her out in full regalia with all dress flags aflutter.
Majestic? Nope, too dramatic.
I was preparing to step into the aft cockpit when Jan yelled, “Stop, Hetta! Let me take a picture.”
“Why don’t you carry me over the transom?”
“Do I look like Arnold Schwarzenegger? You know, you haven’t been to aerobics lately and I’ve been meaning to mention the fact that you’re getting a lit-tle tubby.”
I sucked in my stomach and posed. “Take the picture and belay the back talk, matey, or you’ll surely walk the plank.”
“Aye, aye, Captain Coffey.”
Captain Coffey. Now that had a nice ring to it. Or did it sound too much like an adult cereal?
I slid open the door to the main saloon and stepped in. The aroma and beauty of a huge fresh floral arrangement—Betty’s doing, no doubt—greeted me. The bouquet of roses, daisies and irises sat on a high-low teak table in front of a nine foot L-shaped settee. My L-shaped settee.
Enthralled, touching things as I went, I walked through the main saloon and descended, via two wide teak steps, into a down-galley equip
ped with a full-sized refrigerator, three burner stove, oven, microwave, and built-in banquette for informal dining. All the comforts of home. My home.
From the looks of it, the entire boat had been professionally cleaned, so all I had to do was go get my own things. I made a mental note of what I had to do first. Like strip off the custom made bed cover and replace it with my own ashes-of-roses duvet and linens. Everything I needed for the boat was boxed and ready, waiting for me to pick them up at the house. And even though my peaches and pinks didn’t exactly match the new blue décor, I planned to live with them until I could afford new stuff. Life is full of little compromises, n'est-ce pas?
The aft sundeck, furnished in slightly faded but freshly scrubbed Brown Jordan fake rattan with blue and white striped cushions, sported an ice maker filled with fresh ice, a rack of blue and white plastic stemware and a wet bar. Everything was showroom immaculate and in its place.
Everything.
“Uh, Hetta,” Jan said, pointing to an open cabinet over the wet bar, “isn’t that Garrison’s stereo?”
“Uh-huh. And those are also his CDs.” We went back inside, and a stem to stern inspection revealed Garrison’s clothes in my closet, his toiletries in a cabinet in my bathroom. Head. Whatever.
Livid, I grabbed the telephone, the one that, as of ten that morning, was unlisted in my name. “Morris, this is Hetta. I’m on Sea Cock.”
“Great. How’s she look?”
“The boat looks great. It’s the accessories I’m not crazy about.”
“What accessories, Hetta?”
“Garrison’s crap. It’s all still on the boat.”
Silence. Then, “Is this a problem?”
“Damn right it’s a problem, Morris. I bought Sea Cock, not Garrison.”
“Hetta, there’s some kind of misunderstanding here. Garrison assured me you two, uh, were….” His voice dwindled off as my blood pressure skyrocketed. I opened my mouth to commence a tirade, but thought better of it. No sense in railing at poor Morris over a misunderstanding of some kind that surely could be easily sorted out.
I took a deep breath, battling to control my fury.
“Let me see if I have this straight, Morris. Garrison led you to believe he was remaining aboard? For the record there is no you two, and for everyone’s information…” As my voice involuntarily rose, I heard Morris muffle the mouthpiece and say something unintelligible to someone in the background. Then, after a minute, Betty’s soothing tones replaced Morris’s confused ones.
“Hetta dear, poor Morris gave me the phone. Actually, he threw it at me as if it were radioactive. Leave it to men to screw things up, poor devils. They think communication means something like Morse code. But, in dear Morris’s defense, I think you should know Garrison has given not only Morris, but everyone in the yacht club, the definite impression you and he are having a fling. I found it hard to believe, but Garrison as much as told Morris he expected to continue living, with you, on Sea Cock.”
“That rat! Thanks for the info, Betty. Please tell Morris not to worry. Everything will be fine. Just as soon as I murder Garrison.”
Jan shot me a look, one reminding me that, not twenty four hours ago, one of my idle threats had already come back to haunt me. “Kidding, of course. By the way, the boat looks wonderful and thanks for the flowers.” I hung up and told Jan what Garrison, Morris and Betty said.
“You know, Hetta, I told you weeks ago Garrison was hinting around that you two were an item. So now what?”.
My guns were still at the house, so I examined the door lock. Not your standard Master or dead bolt. Fooey, I’d have to hire a professional to change it. “Exorcism, Jan, pure and simple. We’ll have the joint cleared of all things Garrison in no time.”
* * *
I was carrying a load of Garrison’s belongings from my cabin to the sundeck, when someone rapped on the hull.
“Permission to come aboard?” a voice bellowed. I looked out to find an entourage of about twenty yacht club members standing on the dock, Garrison at the forefront. He was holding a magnum of champagne and a large bouquet of flowers. I shrugged helplessly at Jan and invited them all on board.
32
Sea Cock, on Sunday morning, resembled Times Square on January one. There was hardly a square inch of boat not littered with empty glasses, beer bottles, confetti—white, thank God— shredded gift wrap, or soggy canapés. From the deck speakers, Jimmy Buffet lamented bad drinking habits and cheeseburgers in paradise. Jimmy was accompanied by loud snores emanating from somewhere in my boat. Tracing the sonorous trail, I found Garrison in my guest cabin.
“Garrison, wake up. We have to talk,” I yelled, the shout echoing through my own throbbing head. Garrison snorted awake and sat up, dazed.
“Oh, Hetta. Hi.”
“Garrison, I—”
“I know,” he said, “you want me off the boat. No problem. I haven’t had time to find a new place, and I thought you might like me to stick around and show you all the systems. Boats aren’t like houses, you know. All sorts of complicated stuff.”
I’d already noticed. Sometime during the night I’d flushed the toilet and an alarming red light marked HOLDING TANK FULL lit up. What did that mean?
“Yeah, okay, I guess it’ll be okay for a day or two. Come on, help me clean this place up, then we’ll go up to the club for brunch.”
An hour later, Garrison’s gear was moved into the forward guest cabin and Sea Cock was shipshape again. Except for that holding tank thing.
While I took note of the phone number and jargon, Garrison called Privy Patrol, Inc., You Dump It, We Pump It, for dockside pump out service. While we waited for them, we ate breakfast at the yacht club. We had just finished our eggs Benedict when a workboat chugged up alongside Sea Cock.
“Sewer rats are here, Hetta, we’d better go down. You got any cash? Unless you’re a regular customer, they don’t take checks.”
“I’ve got some money. How much is it?”
“Well, being Sunday and all, probably a little pricey.”
“Garrison, when was the last time you had the holding tank pumped out?”
“I don’t recall. I mean, jeez, Hetta, who knew you were gonna have a party?”
Tempted to push him off the dock, I nonetheless bit my tongue and signed up for twice-weekly pump out service. I carefully noted the holding tank service’s phone number and invoice amount in my new Boat Expenses book, a gift from a well-wisher. My first entry and it’s a crapper zapper. Who knew? But what the hey, I’d had to pay a city sewer bill at the house. My first omen of things to come, however, should have been that someone even made a Boat Expenses book. And that it had lots and lots of pages.
Jenks Jenkins knocked on the hull as the sewer rodents were motoring away with their toxic cargo. Before I could say a word, Garrison invited Jenks aboard my boat and offered up a drink.
Mustering every ounce of grace I had left in my soul, I said “Hello, Jenks.” After all, the man had sent me flowers. Gritting my teeth, I tromped below to gingerly strip my bed. Unwilling to sleep on Garrison’s sheets, I had spent a chilly. but luckily mostly comatose, night rolled in the bedspread. And I wasn’t too sure about it.
My sheets were still in my garage, packed with stuff I’d intended to bring to the boat the day before. Before I’d ended up with a houseful, uh, boatful, of uninvited, if well-intentioned guests.
Tonight I planned to sleep under my own silk comforter, swathed in 800 count Egyptian cotton. Tomorrow, Garrison could take his ratty old bedding to whatever lair he found to inhabit. I stuffed his pillows, sheets and even the bedspread that was custom-made for Sea Cock, into a plastic garbage bag and climbed to the main saloon. Garrison and Jenks were playing cribbage, unaware I was royally pissed at their cavalier attitude towards my boat.
“Where do you want this, Garrison?” I asked between grinding molars. If I didn’t get rid of him soon I’d have to have a whole new enamel job.
“Oh, leave it there. I
’ll stow it later.”
I’ll stow you later. “Fine. I’ll be back soon. I’m going to get my things from the house.”
“Need any help?” Jenks asked.
“No, thanks.” Yeah, you can help. You can get your ass off my boat and take Garrison with you.
“Sorry I missed your welcome party last night. Everyone says it was great,” Jenks said. “Anyhow, welcome to the wonderful world of boating.”
I looked at my watch, thinking, gee, wasn’t it about time for his nooner? But I said aloud, “Thanks.” They teach us grace under fire in the South and, once in a great while, I even use it. Albeit reluctantly.
Just Add Water (Hetta Coffey Mystery Series (Book 1)) Page 17