On Deadly Tides (A Wendover House Mystery Book 3)

by Jackson, Melanie

  He hung his own coat and hat on the brass tree by the door.

  Bryson was known and liked there and we were given a table by the window. Perhaps they had mistaken me for a date. Or maybe they recognized me. Certainly I was aware of the barely hidden scrutiny of the other patrons as we took our seats.

  There was a stone fireplace on one wall but also forced-air heating. The currents made the candles in their wine-bottle candelabra flicker in a way that was rather more alarming than romantic. Unable to stop myself, I adjusted them away from the curtains. Then, since they obstructed my view of Bryson, I blew them out and stuck the waxy bottle on the windowsill.

  Bryson chuckled and pulled off his gloves. His knuckles were scratched and I could see that he had acquired a few blisters on his palms that were almost healed, but still looked sore.

  “I may want to gaze into your eyes at some point—like after the antipasto—and the candles were in the way,” I explained, opening my napkin and not commenting on the state of his hands.

  “If we must wait until after the antipasto then I can see that we have a food emergency,” he said and nodded at a slim, teenage boy standing near the kitchen. He hurried toward us with menus.

  There was no objection from me. I was feeling famished and would rather eat than talk.

  “And let the games begin,” I muttered, taking a menu. “Recommendations?”

  “I like the chicken piccata.”

  “Yes, but appetizers first. There aren’t any laws on the books about letting pigs in restaurants, are there? Because I am afraid things could get ugly if someone tried to turn me out before the tiramisu.”

  Bryson laughed again. Whatever his earlier mood had been, he seemed relaxed now.

  “Not a one. Shall we begin with an antipasto platter, and a feta salad?”

  “Yes. And bruschetta, please.”

  “Good. And two glasses of Burgundy. Manny, make it so,” he said to the boy who nodded and hurried for the kitchen.

  “Had a good day?” Bryson asked and I thought I knew why he had been looking grim earlier.

  “Mostly. I did notice an odd thing though.”

  “What is that?”

  “It didn’t strike me until I was on the way back, but….” I tried to think of a way to express my suspicion about our islands without sounding like a mystic. “I went south. I haven’t toured the mainland before. It seemed a bit different from the islands. Maybe a little less flourishing.”

  Bryson nodded.

  “The last place I visited, it seemed blighted. Depressed. And colder. Much colder. It wasn’t just that things were shabby, but the people seemed … unhappy. Not neighborly.”

  Bryson nodded.

  “Ah. Well, our islands are blessed, warm. Fishing is terrible everywhere else it seems, but so far we haven’t been hurt by the shortages that are affecting fisherman up and down the seaboard.”

  The way he said blessed made it seem like more than a casual phrase. And I think he was also talking about the fact that we lived in a pineapple belt. One that couldn’t be explained by ocean currents but which kept pollution away and fish breeding nearby.

  “We are fortunate then to be living here.”

  “Fortunate. Yes, we are, and most of us are aware of it.”

  Food began to appear and I traded in small talk for eating.

  “Tess, do you want the chicken piccata?” Bryson asked when Manny reappeared and I nodded, my mouth too full to answer.

  When the appetizers were cleared away and I couldn’t avoid talking by stuffing my face, Bryson resumed social convention and inaugurated another conversation. It felt a lot like the last conversation and I realized we weren’t done discussing my trip yet.

  “How far south did you get?”

  “Derrymoor,” I admitted. “Then my courage forsook me. It was so…. Well, I don’t imagine many tourists stay there. I’ve never been anyplace less welcoming.”

  He nodded again.

  “It’s an odd town with a sad history. Disaster seems to strike it every couple of decades. Fires, hurricanes, even plagues. For a while they had a factory that made sulfuric acid for fertilizers. They had to tear it down though because they had a spill and the building kept oozing out corrosives and burning people, even melting their shoes. It is supposed to be safe now but…. At one point, the town was even treated as a kind of leper colony—no actual leprosy there, but the nearby towns noticed that bad luck seemed to follow the people who lived there and would drive them away if they did more than pass through the other villages. Of course, that all ended centuries ago, but I think the shadow of the past lingers there and the people still feel … unwanted. Mostly they stick to themselves.”

  I nodded, believing. I had seen how things were in the islands and it didn’t take a huge stretch of imagination to believe that there had once been some kind of a curse laid on unfortunate Derrymoor.

  “A curse is a good way of putting it,” Bryson said and I realized I had spoken aloud. “Except we aren’t sure who laid it. There is no story about witches or anything. Just one day the cows stopped giving milk, the sea went barren, and a lot of folks moved away. The ones who stayed got sullen and secretive.”

  Witches. Didn’t want to talk about that. I frowned at my empty glass of wine and made up my mind not to drink any more. Fortunately our entrees arrived and I was able to give up speaking.

  Bryson seemed satisfied with what I had told him and didn’t try forcing conversation again until excusing himself to speak to the owner of the restaurant. Probably about a shipment of illegal whisky, I thought, and then mentally slapped myself for assuming the worst.

  His gloves were resting on the edge of the table and he knocked them to the floor as he got up to see the owner, who was also the cook and busy in the kitchen and unable to get away. Though it made me groan and belch, I managed to lean down and retrieve them off the floor. Then, still under observation by other diners, I began to feel silly holding his battered gloves in my hand like a butler, and stuffed them in my purse which was already bulging with my accumulated jam and syrup which I had forgotten to leave in my room.

  Manny, bless him, offered to get me another tiramisu to go, but though it was the best I’d ever tasted, I declined. I had a feeling that my meal was already going down in the annals of island history.

  Bryson paid the bill while he was away and so we were ready to go when he returned to the table.

  By then I had had enough of the diner’s scrutiny and the garlic-scented air and was ready to leave.

  “Woman, I have never seen anyone of your gender eat like that,” Bryson said when we stepped outside and closed the door behind us. There was a smile in his voice. I lifted my face to the sky, grateful for the falling drizzle that washed some of the odors gathered on my skin. “Can you walk or shall I borrow a wheelbarrow?”

  “A hundred feet? I can waddle. I just hope I don’t fall asleep on the way. A meal like that is better than barbiturates.” I pulled my coat tighter against the cold. “Do you have far to go?”

  “I’m over just one street. See that cedar? It’s in my backyard. The cottage belonged to my folks. I use it when I’m on the mainland.” He shook his head, still looking amused. “Better take my arm. You look half-asleep already.”

  It was easiest to follow his suggestion. Moving closer I found that I liked his aftershave. I tried to think of something to say but was ambushed by a giant yawn.

  * * *

  The stairs to the second floor seemed impossibly long and steep, but I made it to the top without assistance. I fumbled a bit with the key, but soon had the door open and managed to locate my sensible flannel nightgown and struggle into it.

  I looked around my rented room with sleepy eyes as I pulled off my socks and had some last groggy thoughts. I liked the room and the inn. Not as much as I liked home, but it was a pleasant place on a stormy night and I would sleep well enough in my borrowed bed.

  And I liked Bryson. I liked a lot of people in the is
lands—and I loved Kelvin and Barney and Wendover House.

  None of which I would have if my great-grandfather hadn’t disappeared. Or died, but I had a strong feeling now that he wasn’t among the island’s spirits.

  It’s a melancholy fact that everything fades with time—beauty, health, memory. How much had Kelvin lost before he rebelled and tried to defy Fate by escaping? At least Death had had the courtesy to wait until my great-grandfather was old before coming close, maybe a consolation prize for spending all his life on Little Goose so my grandma and her children could be free.

  The rain was picking up when I finished brushing my teeth and lightning crackled far away. And the wind too grew restless. It moaned in the eaves. It was the kind of night when ghosts walked, at least for some of us.

  But none of the ghosts was Kelvin and that was good enough.

  I turned off the light and pulled the covers over my head.

  Chapter 7

  Morning found me feeling stronger and happy to see the storm had passed off in the night.

  The urge to go home was still strong, but so was the inclination to have one more chat with Bryson now that I wasn’t half-blind with exhaustion. And I needed a ride back to the island, so why not drop in on my favorite officer of the law?

  Anyway, I still had his gloves. It was only courteous that I call.

  I hadn’t visited Bryson’s cottage before and I assured myself that dropping off his gloves was a good excuse for a visit.

  My walk was short and appealing, decorated with daffodils. The cottage was small but charming, slightly Italianate in style and set back in a stand of lilacs that would be stunning in May though now they were depressingly bare. The narcissus were up though, their oils released by the pummeling rain and their smell strong enough to be intrusive, though usually I liked them.

  I walked slowly up the path that began at the narrow gate. Most of the snow was gone and I could see the brick was new, laid in a charming herringbone design that worked better for curving paths than the more standard running bond pattern so many homes used.

  Herringbone. My shadow self, the one who works on intuition rather than logic, told me that this was important and to pay attention to this observation or it would start making mischief in my dreams.

  My first thoughts were obvious. Of course the tomb came to mind and for a moment my legs went weak—but only for a moment. But what on earth would Bryson have to do with stealing bodies? I couldn’t think of a reason. Didn’t want to think of a reason. And anyway, he might have hired someone to lay his path. Probably he had.

  And yet….

  I had a moment of dizziness. Television, newspapers, churches, social clubs, they all condition us to expect a certain reality. Show the brain something different than this lifelong expectation of normalcy and it resists. My conscious mind was in denial that there was any reason for Bryson to be involved with my great-grandfather’s death. Or non-death. Or delayed death. But the subconscious was looking things over and drawing conclusions.

  “Tess?” The door opened and Bryson stepped out. He had a mug in his hand and it steamed violently in the cold.

  I held up his gloves and made myself smile.

  “Guess what I found.”

  “So that’s where they went. Want to come in? Coffee’s fresh.”

  “Just for a moment, thanks. I need to be getting back to Little Goose. It isn’t that Ben isn’t a great dogsitter but I don’t want to abuse his hospitality while Barney is teething.”

  “You were admiring my path?” he asked, holding the door open. His gaze was direct, but I thought that it would be helpful if he came with some sort of translator that could explain his expressions and silences. With Bryson, menace might come with a smile. “Everett and I laid it last summer. The pattern is more common in Boston than up here.”

  I met his stare, surprised at his candor. My face probably looked frozen as my brain sorted through responses.

  “I was admiring it. Mind you, it isn’t a patch on the crazy one I have in my backyard.” My voice was so light. I was proud that there wasn’t a trace of that nasty suspicion anywhere.

  The inside of the cottage was as pleasant as the outside, sort of bachelor shabby chic. There were some carved ducks but no hunting or fishing trophies. We sat in what might have been called a parlor once but which was now a kind of office/breakfast nook. The table was new but the chairs were old and covered in some kind of animal hide. I smelled horsehair when I sat and it made me think of my grandmother and her old and very uncomfortable sofa.

  “You take it black?” Bryson asked.

  “Yes, please.”

  “Miss MacKay, I don’t want you to take this the wrong way, but you are inconveniently smart. Sometimes it’s annoying.” He brought me a white mug that had red roses on it. It was too small for his hands and I was sure that it had belonged to his mother.

  “I need to brush up on my poker face,” I said. “And thank you for the coffee. This smells delicious.”

  It did. I sipped and found it to be flavorful but not so robust that it etched tooth enamel.

  “I have been sitting here this morning, contemplating my mortality, and I have decided that I can’t afford to die yet. Not if there is any chance of hell being real,” Bryson said.

  “Isn’t that a little morbid before nine o’clock, especially for a younger man?” Of course, mortality had been on my mind too. Only not my own.

  “A bit, but I’m creeping up on fifty, did you know that? And I have found that fairness in life isn’t always in the cards, that sometimes life really is about choosing between the devil and the deep blue sea. I’m thinking this may be one of those mornings.”

  “Does the sea usually win?” I set my mug down on the white tile table. A part of me was nervous, but I was also relieved to have it out in the open. Being closer to home had revived me.

  “Usually. It’s tradition in these parts.”

  We both sipped. It was my move and I considered what to do.

  “You know that my parents died when I was young and that my grandmother and I were very close?”

  He frowned a little at my sideways approach.

  “Yes.”

  “Yet, close as we were, she never said one word—not one—about the state of affairs here in the islands. She didn’t tell me about Kelvin, or the family history. And I think that is because some situations don’t have good answers. Some realities defy rational explanation to people who haven’t lived them. A smart person makes allowances for the moral context in which decisions are made. I guess that maybe makes me a relativist. Bryson, I am not all that young anymore either, and I have found that sometimes life just comes down to choosing whatever option will let you sleep nights.”

  “Even if it’s a morally indefensible choice?” He sounded only mildly interested, but I wasn’t fooled. He was listening oh so carefully.

  “If it was totally indefensible, I doubt you’d do it.” His smile was crooked but at least it was there. “And we are speaking of personal morality, not legality. That is something else entirely, as I am learning.”

  He raised a brow at me.

  “Everything the Nazis did was legal,” I reminded him. “Doesn’t mean it was right. What Martin Luther did was illegal—doesn’t mean it was wrong.”

  He nodded thoughtfully.

  “You make concessions yourself then.” It was more statement than question.

  I snorted. He didn’t know how many, since I had never revealed what I knew about his and Everett’s smuggling activities. His eyebrow was up again and I picked my words carefully.

  “Sometimes life demands it. We aren’t human if we can’t—in certain circumstances—show compassion. Mercy. Or adapt to different cultural situations. And the only punishment that is supposed to be eternal is Hell—which God decides, not society. I don’t believe the sins of the fathers should be visited on the children. They sometimes are, but it doesn’t mean it’s right.”

  I was speaking of Kelvi
n then and allowing him to walk away from his old life of imprisonment. If that was what he had done. I was pretty sure he had. The more I thought of the nasty little room, the less I believed my great-grandfather had ever been there, but that did not preclude him escaping from the island.

  Bryson nodded.

  “It wasn’t that I didn’t sympathize. Kelvin was old and growing bitter. We’ve all wanted to walk away from something at some time in our lives, and it wouldn’t have been humane to stop a friend—and he was a friend—from having a last bit of peace.” He shrugged. “But sometimes an act of compassion leaves trouble behind for everyone else. I didn’t realize how much. Didn’t reckon on how alive the old beliefs still are.”

  He was talking about the islanders’ fear that their homes would be destroyed if there was no Wendover on the island.

  It was my turn to nod.

  “It’s annoying when an act of kindness turns on us. When irrational people discover things and panic. It’s good that Harris found me in time to avert a full-scale disaster.”

  He smiled a little at my guess.

  “Some people are crazy,” he agreed. “Some people might even go to an extreme—if they were frightened enough. And there are still some of your kin around. Ones from the wrong side of the blanket that no one acknowledges, but everyone knows are there.”

  “The family resemblance is amazing,” I agreed wryly. “People everywhere know me.”

  “The features always breed true. I don’t think they are very smart though, these cousins of yours.”

  Tom. He was speaking of Tom Fischer. We were getting close now. I tried to quell my nervousness. Someone or something had killed Fischer, ending everything—good and bad—that he had ever been. And that wasn’t right. Wasn’t fair. But….

  Checking my own moral compass, I was a bit dismayed to find it was no longer pointed to magnetic north. I was coming to accept the islanders’ lopsided view of the world. People would do almost anything to protect their prosperity, their children, their homes.

  And, truth to be told, wouldn’t I prefer that the dead man be Tom Fischer rather than my great-grandfather?