A Fatal Fleece: A Seaside Knitters Mystery

by Sally Goldenbaum

  Nell laughed. “A recluse who likes pot roast.”

  “It’s strange, but, then, so is Finn,” Cass said. “He lets me come to the house—if you can call it that—but that’s about it. I’ve often wanted to prowl around and see what else is there. It’s at least three acres. But I don’t. I blindly obey. I’ve just gotten used to it, I guess. The man has earned his idiosyncrasies, is how I think about it.”

  “Ben’s mother used to talk about how lovely that strip of land used to be. I think their dentist had an office there. It was neatly kept.”

  Cass nodded. “I remember it because my dad would pull up in his boat to buy bait. Moira would always have hot dogs ready for us. We loved it. Pete’d eat five dogs, and Finnegan would tease him something fierce. Told him he’d soon be barking.”

  Birdie picked up her knitting and began doing yarn overs on the rim, looping the yarn from front to back, then knitting the next stitch. The yarn lay across her lap like silky seaweed. “It was a lovely structure back then. A twin building was just on the other side of that little access path where the Arts Association is now. Both buildings had a couple of offices and an apartment above. Joseph rented one of the offices—I’m not sure which. Finnegan was different back then. Moira grounded him. He was always intolerant of things he thought were unjust, but Moira tempered it, let him keep his values without hurting people in the process.”

  Cass put her elbows on the table, her chin resting on her hands. “After my dad died, Finn was always there, helping us with the traps, painting buoys, fixing lines. He’d never take a penny. It’s a mystery to me—just like it is to everyone else—why he won’t clean up his yard, but it’s his own business.” Cass shifted over on the bench as Merry Jackson approached, balancing a round tray holding mugs and plates.

  The bar owner squeezed her narrow hips between Cass and Izzy and set the tray on the table. “This is today’s special,” she said. “And probably tomorrow’s, too. My homemade granola. You’ll love it—I promise.” She set down four giant beer mugs filled with fruit, nuts, and fat grains, all topped off with yogurt. Next came a basket of warm elderberry muffins and a pot of whipped butter.

  Izzy scooped up a dollop of yogurt with her finger and licked it clean. “Fantastic.”

  “I especially like the beer mugs. Nice presentation, Merry.”

  “Oh, shush.” Merry swatted Cass with a napkin. “I’m keeping my artists healthy,” she said. “Whether they like it or not.”

  For as long as the Artist’s Palate had anchored the north end of Canary Cove, the Palate’s bill of fare had featured margaritas and thirty-plus kinds of beer served with fried everything—squid, clams, pickles, fish, asparagus. But once her ex-husband was no longer a part of the business, Merry changed things. In nice-weather months, she put out coffee pots and mugs and opened the gate to the deck early in the morning. Hot coffee and orange juice for the Canary Cove artists before they rolled back their awnings and opened their gallery doors. That was her goal. Until the day she saw Ham Brewster munching down potato chips with his hastily drunk coffee. The next morning she added whole-grain muffins and slapped Ham’s hand hard when he reached for a bag of bar chips.

  “It just grew,” she said with a shrug when the Sea Harbor Gazette ran a feature article on her. Her homemade granola and fresh fruit were a hit. And the fact that it meant adding hours to her day didn’t seem to bother the diminutive bar owner.

  “So I heard you talking about Finnegan.” Merry leaned in closer, her body as nimble as a ballet dancer’s. A long blond braid fell over one shoulder. “His daughter’s over there, so keep it low.”

  She nodded toward Beverly Walden, sitting near the railing with several other Canary Cove artists.

  She seemed oblivious to the group around her, her eyes focused beyond the trees at the sea and a small island out past the point. She looked peaceful somehow, happy, as if she were spinning a perfect life for herself out on that little piece of land, or maybe off on one of the luxury boats that sailed out of the harbor and into the sea.

  Beverly was thirty-eight, according to the bio they’d seen at her art show. Not beautiful by Hollywood standards, she was, nevertheless, an interesting-looking woman with a curvy figure and a certain sensuousness about her. Streaked brown hair hung loose beyond her shoulders. She’d been back in Sea Harbor just a few months, but everyone knew who she was—Finnegan’s prodigal daughter, though rumor had it she hadn’t been as well received by her father as her biblical counterpart.

  “See that look on her face?” Merry said. “I’m thinking she has a boyfriend. Man friend, I suppose you’d say. She’s been wearing makeup, edgier clothes.” Merry’s mouth lifted in a mysterious smile. “I know the look.”

  “She’s nice-looking,” Birdie said, turning back to the table. “She looks like her mother, with that long nose and high cheekbones. Rather mysterious, I think. She certainly doesn’t look like Finnegan.”

  She was standing now, leaning on the railing that overlooked the sea in one direction and the parking lot in the other. When she lifted her hand in a wave, Nell followed its direction. Davey Delaney stood below on the asphalt, next to a Delaney truck. His hands were on his hips, sunglasses cutting the glare, and he looked up at her, as if maybe he’d been there watching for a while, hoping she’d look down.

  Merry moved in closer and Nell’s view was gone.

  “They’re probably both pleased that she doesn’t look like her dad,” Merry was saying. “There isn’t much love lost between those two.”

  “That’s the rumor. But how do you know?” Izzy asked.

  “Same way you know all the gossip at your end of Harbor Road, Iz. Your knitting customers talk, just like folks do out here on the deck and at the bar. You keep your eyes open and the world spills out its secrets right in front of you.”

  Cass leaned in. “So spill it, Merry. What do you know?”

  Merry laughed. “I know everything, Cass. And mostly I know when there might be trouble. Like last night.” She paused for effect, then continued.

  “Beverly was in here alone, having a few beers. I worry a little when people are drinking alone, so I took her over a crab cake and sat with her for a minute, suggesting some of this great new tea I got in. She was nice enough and not offended. She assured me she was fine, she had a nice evening to look forward to and was not going to get sloshed and ruin it. Very fine were her exact words. She looked happy, instead of that ultraserious look she had when she moved here.”

  Mother Earth—that’s who Merry Jackson is turning into, Nell thought. When she took the microphone from Pete at a Fractured Fish performance, she poured her soul into their songs like a seasoned performer, but here in her bar and grill, the tiny blond dynamo took care of the world, or at least this little corner of it.

  “And?” Cass prompted.

  “And then Finnegan came in. He hangs out here sometimes. He’s like our own Canary Cove security guard—watches out for all of us and never takes a dime for it. So I give him coffee or food when he stops by. Payment, sort of.”

  “It’s a wonder you make any money, dear,” Birdie said.

  Merry laughed. “Oh, don’t you worry about me, Birdie. I’m doing fine. Anyway, Finnegan sat down over there at the bar and I could tell he was watching us. Soon as I left Beverly’s table, he walked over and took my place.”

  Nell glanced over again at the object of their conversation, but Beverly was gone, a coffee cup left behind. She looked around the lot and toward the galleries, but the only thing she saw was the tail end of Davey Delaney’s truck rounding the corner.

  “Finn went over to her? That couldn’t have been good,” Cass was saying.

  “Unless they’re both swallowing old feelings and making up,” Izzy suggested.

  “Well, I was hoping for that, too. Lately I’d seen some signs that maybe she wanted to make up. But I don’t know. There’s bad blood there. It had something to do with her mother’s death, I think.”

  “Moira
Finnegan died of cancer,” Birdie said.

  “That’s what I hear from the Brewsters. Ham and Jane liked Moira. They said Beverly never came to see her. No one even knew where she was. So I’m not sure what her gripe with her father is. Seems he might have the better reason to be upset. Don’t you think?”

  Birdie had told Nell the story of Finnegan’s daughter one night while they sat on the Favazza veranda, Hudson’s Bay point blankets covering their legs as they looked up at a star-filled sky. She and Birdie had gone to the art opening where Beverly Walden’s paintings were on display for the first time. Later, under the spell of a full moon and Birdie’s sherry, they’d hashed over the evening—who was there, conversations they’d had. The art they’d liked and not liked.

  Beverly’s paintings lent themselves readily to the conversation. Turbulent, rolling oils, bright and bold, filled her canvases as unpredictably as the sea itself.

  Beverly had been a fifteen-year-old runaway, Birdie told her, long before Nell and Ben had settled into the sprawling Endicott home on Sandswept Lane. She’d been a troubled child and youth—a bad seed, some called her—and one summer she began stealing things from local stores, hiding bracelets and books and T-shirts beneath her loose clothing. But nothing was really hidden in Sea Harbor. Most people looked the other way because she was Moira and Finn’s daughter.

  But after a while, and with hopes that the girl might get some help, Archie Brandley had turned her in. It wasn’t the books she’d taken from his store, he’d said. He didn’t give a hoot about them. But he guessed Beverly was stealing for the thrill of it, grabbing obscure books on business planning, menopause, and physics. Pencils and bookmarks. Things he rightfully assumed she had no interest in. Stealing for thrills was a sickness, in Archie’s opinion, and the girl needed some help.

  But instead of facing the consequences, Beverly had run away. And taken a substantial amount of Finnegan’s hard-earned money with her.

  For Moira’s sake, Finnegan hired an investigator to find her, but to no avail.

  “I don’t know why Beverly came back all these years later. Finn says it was to torment him,” Cass said.

  Merry shrugged. “She told me she’d changed. But I told her I was about three when she ran away, so what did I know?”

  “Maybe she doesn’t steal anymore, but she sure doesn’t treat her father well,” Cass said. She wiped some muffin crumbs onto the deck for the birds. “So, what happened last night?”

  “Oh yeah, that. Well, Finnegan was huffing and puffing about something. He didn’t sit down, really, just put his hands on the table and started talking at her. He kept his voice low, but his eyes about seared right through her head.”

  “So you didn’t hear anything?” Cass asked.

  “Oh, I heard enough. Not the close face-to-face stuff. But after he had his say, he started to walk away, then looked back again, like he’d forgotten something. I couldn’t tell if Beverly was mad or sad. But I know she had tears in her eyes when he said the next thing.”

  Merry lifted her brows and paused for effect.

  “Yes, dear?” Birdie said, urging her to continue.

  “By then I was wiping off the table next to them and I could hear him plain and clear. He told her she’d ripped a piece right out of her mother’s heart and killed it. And wasn’t that enough for her? Hadn’t she ruined enough lives without killing any more?

  “Those two didn’t like each other,” Merry concluded. “Not so you’d notice, anyhow.”

  Chapter 7

  Nell had twenty minutes to run into the Cheese Closet before getting home to help Ben. As usual, she wasn’t sure who would show up for Friday-night dinner on the deck, but cheese, wine, and the cheese shop’s spicy sausages were a staple, no matter who—or how many—came. And on the rare occasions when there was too much food, Father Northcutt’s soup kitchen and sometimes Father Larry himself were grateful for any leftovers.

  The Cheese Closet was on Oak Street, nestled between the library and the old three-story stone building that housed the city offices. It was one of Nell’s favorite places in Sea Harbor, and she fervently hoped it would escape the plight of so many small shops that disappeared in the blink of an eye. But as Ben often said, if the Endicotts’ purchases were typical, Peggy and Tim Arruda’s Cheese Closet would be around for a long, long time.

  She pulled into an empty parking place and walked into the welcoming shop, taking a basket from the stack just inside the entrance. Getting in and out was usually difficult for Nell—she nearly always ran into acquaintances. But today, much to her surprise, the shop had only a half dozen people savoring its cheeses, exotic olive oils, sausages, and spreads.

  “A temporary lull,” Peggy Arruda assured her from across a display case. “Friday is always a busy day.” The owner handed Nell a toothpick holding a square of cheese. “Try this. It’s Nisa—from Portugal. Timmy and I honeymooned there. The cheese is to die for. Ben will be crazy about it.”

  Nell nibbled on the small square. “Very smooth and creamy. Goat’s milk?”

  “No. It’s from sheep. Merino, just like Izzy’s lovely fleece yarn.” She handed Nell another piece. “We both appreciate that magnificent beast. Izzy uses its amazing coat, and I use the milk.”

  Peggy was right: Ben would love it. Nell added a round to her basket, then moved through the aisles, filling the rest of it with far more than she had come in for. Enough, she scolded herself, and stepped into the short line that had formed at the checkout counter.

  At first she didn’t recognize the woman standing in front of her. It was the beautiful bottle of wine in her basket that caught Nell’s eye. A flock of painted butterflies circled the bottle, merging together almost like a Rorschach test. Surrounding it were cheese and crackers, a package of colorful napkins, and two plastic wineglasses.

  Beverly Walden turned and smiled at Nell.

  “I was admiring your choices,” Nell said. “It looks like the makings for a lovely, romantic picnic. All you need are candlesticks.”

  Beverly glanced at her basket, then blushed slightly. “I’m splurging.”

  “It’s difficult not to in here. Is it a special occasion?”

  “Special? No, not really. Well, yes, maybe. I guess it is special.” A slow blush colored her cheeks.

  Nell smiled. “Good. We all need special now and then.”

  “It’s for a picnic over on the island,” she said suddenly, as if needing to share her happy evening.

  Tim, Peggy’s husband, motioned to Beverly that he was ready for her. She lifted her basket to the counter.

  Her hair was loose today, and she brushed it back from her cheek absently as she chatted with Tim. She seemed more at ease in her body than Nell remembered from the few times they’d been together. More relaxed. No. She seemed happy; that was the difference. The frown on her face and the slight hunch to her shoulders had been replaced with something lighter and brighter, and it had transformed her into a lovely, sensual woman.

  Maybe Merry Jackson was right. Beverly had someone special in her life. And that someone liked cheese and wine.

  Perhaps a dose of happiness would allow her to see her father in a new light. Nell was all for happy endings.

  The pot was simmering on the stove, nearly ready. Pitchers. Trays. Glasses. Knives. Everything they’d need.

  Outside the kitchen window the sky was deepening and sounds of Ben preparing the grill drifted in. In the distance a band began to play. The yacht club, Nell thought, leaning toward the window, listening to the happy sounds. And later there’d be fireworks over the ocean, celebrating a June wedding or anniversary or birthday. Signs of summer.

  She breathed in the magic of Sea Harbor. The joy of friends. And the deep satisfaction she felt getting ready to welcome them into the home she loved.

  The kitchen was the home’s soul, a major renovation project when she and Ben made his parents’ vacation home their permanent residence. They planned it together, and that’s what it meant to N
ell: a piece of her, a piece of Ben—a shared dream. They had wanted an open space where friends would gather and chop and dice and drink in the pleasure of being together. And that’s exactly what it had become.

  At the other end of the open space, a smooth stone fireplace, flanked by a comfortable sofa and chairs, warmed them on winter nights. The room beckoned—and friends and family responded. Sisal rugs softened the cherry floors, and the light neutral palette of the furniture—tans and whites with hints of soft green—gave full play to the sky and pine trees, the sloping green lawn, and the ocean beyond the woods, a piece of it visible from every window along the back of the house.

  A slice of heaven.

  Sam Perry was the first to walk into Nell’s reverie, the sound of his boat shoes on the wood floors pulling her from her thoughts.

  “What’s this? And early. Aren’t you missing someone? Where’s your bride?”

  Sam dropped the bouquet on the kitchen island and wrapped Nell in a giant hug.

  “My amazing wife got stuck at the yarn shop, handling some crisis. So I’m here to help Ben with his martini making.” He found a vase on the shelf beneath the island and filled it with water, stopping only to breathe in the aromas of wine and basil and butter floating up from the pot.

  “The flowers are beautiful. Izzy has domesticated you, Sam. First a flower garden. Now a plot over at the community garden. What’s next?”

  Sam laughed. “You’re so subtle, Nell. But who knows? We have a house. A garden. A sailboat. Maybe we’ll get a dog next.”

  Nell laughed.

  “So how’s the scamp doing?” Sam asked.

  “You must mean Gabby.”

  Sam nodded. “Ben and I are taking her out on the sailboat soon. She’s quite the personality. A charmer.”

  “You must be talking about my granddaughter.” Birdie walked into the kitchen, carrying a bag of rolls from Garozzo’s Deli. “Step-granddaughter, I suppose I should say, but that doesn’t roll off my lips quite as easily. Granddaughter. Oh, my. I must admit, I’m beginning to like the taste of it. A week ago I was worried about her having to spend part of her summer with an old lady. What fun is that? But that doesn’t seem to be an issue with Gabby.”