The Labor Day Murder

by Lee Harris

Happily, I had married the right man.

  —

  On Sunday the Jorgensens invited us over to share their barbecue dinner. I got Eddie ready for bed and stretched out the stroller in their house, and he cooperated by falling asleep. We stayed late, listening to tales of towns growing, gossip about people we didn’t know, and descriptions of past parades and post-parade parties.

  “Those firemen have it good,” Marti Jorgensen said, as we sat in the light of anti-bug torches after dinner. “But they give back, which is nice.”

  “What do you mean, they ‘have it good’?” I asked.

  “It’s a social thing, you know, being a fireman. They get together every week and have a good time. The department is insured by a company that pays back Fire Island two percent of the premiums for what’s called ‘benevolent purposes for local fire departments.’ In plain English that means beer money.” Everyone laughed and Marti went on. “It’s about three thousand dollars a year, so it’s a lot of beer. I guess they use some of it for the party though. That costs more than five thousand.”

  “That’s an expensive party,” I said, always the penny-pincher.

  “It’s fun,” her husband, Al, said. “It’s the end of the season, everyone’s feeling good. After Labor Day things calm down, the ferries don’t run as often, the groups go home, and by fall there’s only about twenty families left, mostly couples. We’ve been out here in the winter a few times and it’s eerie.”

  “Are the other towns like this one? We’ve walked into two of them but haven’t looked around much.”

  “Every town has its own character,” Al said. He took a sip of the cognac he had poured for himself and Jack. “Green Bay’s the richest one, lot of celebrities living there. Silver Beach is gay.”

  “A whole town is gay?” I said with surprise.

  “Well, I can’t vouch for every person there, but that’s the reputation. It’s a very old community. They’ve been coming to the island, I’d guess, since before the Second World War. Nobody bothers them.”

  I found it very interesting. I leaned back in my chair and listened as Al spoke. This town, that fire department, the senator’s son, the deer encroaching from the park at the end of the island, the need to repost the house, the winds, the tide. Still I felt myself drifting off.

  “Al, that’s just gossip,” I heard Marti say firmly. “You shouldn’t talk about it.”

  “It’s not gossip if it’s true. And it’s true. We all know it.”

  I was alert but had no idea what they were talking about.

  “I think my wife’s falling asleep,” Jack said. “And missing the juiciest stuff.”

  “What did I miss?”

  “Who’s-sleeping-with-whom gossip,” my husband said.

  “The fire chief has a well-earned reputation,” Al said, taking another sip of his cognac.

  “We just met him yesterday at the firehouse. Nice-looking man.”

  “That’s what the ladies say.”

  “It’s really a small town, isn’t it?”

  “Very small,” Marti said. “And the houses are close together. Al always says when you tell a joke in one house, the people next door laugh. But it can work against you.” She looked rather grim.

  “He seemed like a friendly man,” I said.

  “Too friendly.” Al didn’t want to let it go.

  “He’s done wonders as fire chief,” Marti said, as though to move on to a more favorable side of Ken Buckley. “They’ve come to every house to inspect the kitchens, they’ve given us all good tips on grilling out of doors. And of course, they throw the best party of the year.” She smiled.

  “Well, we’ll be there.” Jack stood up and stretched. “I think we should pick up our son and make our long way home.” “Home” was about twenty feet away.

  I was glad he’d made the first move. Ten minutes later, Eddie was in his crib and we were getting ready for bed.

  —

  The next morning Eddie ate his cereal with gusto and drank his milk from the silver cup St. Stephen’s Convent had given him at his baptism. His little teeth were making fine scratches and dents in the rim, which my mother’s old friend Elsie Rivers assured me made it a keepsake. When he was happily crawling on the floor, Jack and I sat down to our breakfast. It was Labor Day and the parade was at ten, giving us lots of time to eat, dress, and walk over to Main Street.

  “Sorry I missed the revelations last night,” I said. “I must have drifted off.”

  “You did. Al obviously has a grudge against Ken Buckley.”

  “Maybe Buckley invaded a friend’s territory.”

  “Could be. The way Al describes him, he’s a real ladies’ man.”

  “He was so sweet to Eddie, I thought of him as fatherly.”

  “The two aren’t mutually exclusive. Buckley said he had kids. But it sounds as though his philandering is well documented.”

  “I can’t see how you could carry on an affair in a town as tiny as this one.”

  “There’s the big city everyone goes home to eventually. Don’t forget that.”

  “Well, I’ll give him the benefit of the doubt. He made my son giggle.”

  Jack gave me a grin and went back to his breakfast.

  —

  We got to Main Street in plenty of time. People of all ages were already lining up in front of the houses that faced the street. It had rained last night and there were still small pools of water under the houses. You didn’t need to know much else to understand why so many were on stilts and basements were nonexistent.

  I heard the band from a distance and turned to look. They looked pretty spiffy, with a high-stepping baton twirler at the front and plenty of brass following him. Al had told us that the band played for the privilege of spending the day on the Blue Harbor beach and attending the party. There were a good-looking bunch of teenagers from a school called Bishop Palermo.

  “Look at the band, Eddie,” I said, holding him up to see.

  The band was followed by the fire engines and other vehicles, which just barely made it down Main Street. Several young firemen were aboard, waving and tossing candy to the children in the crowd.

  Behind the trucks came the rest of the firemen, led by Chief Buckley, all in spanking new uniforms. As they marched by, I became aware that off to my left there was a smattering of applause that seemed to be moving along toward me as the parade advanced. I stood on my toes, trying to see what was coming, but couldn’t see anything.

  “What are they clapping for?” I asked a teenaged girl standing near me.

  “Probably Chief La Coste. They always give him a good round.”

  “Is he a local hero?”

  “He’s everybody’s hero,” she said. “He’s the oldest man on Fire Island. He’s ninety-two.”

  “Wow.”

  “Yeah. He lives out here all year long. He was fire chief back around World War Two. Or One. I’m not sure.”

  At that age, it could conceivably have been either. I handed Eddie off to Jack and looked for the old chief. I knew he couldn’t be far because the applause was rippling its way toward me. Finally, as the girl beside me started clapping, I saw him.

  He was a weathered old man, thin, walking as upright as the men half his age. He was wearing an ancient uniform with silver braid on the sleeves, and with great aplomb, he smiled and waved to his fans. I clapped along with everyone else and leaned over to tell Jack who he was. I thought it was pretty amazing that someone his age would be marching instead of sitting comfortably in a fire engine.

  The parade was concluded with a children’s parade, the little ones dressing up in costumes almost as if it were Halloween. They were quite inventive and we gave them a lot of applause as they passed. As the last of the parade went by, everyone standing on Main Street fell in behind the marchers and we all ended up at the firehouse where there was punch and cookies, presumably to tide us over till the real party.

  Eddie thought the sugar cookies were pretty terrific and I took a
n extra one for later. We hung around, talking to people who lived in Blue Harbor and to the band members who couldn’t wait to put their bathing suits on and jump in the water. I couldn’t blame them. It was a warm day and I was looking forward to cooling off myself.

  After a while, we walked home and I fed Eddie and put him down for his afternoon nap. The party was scheduled for late afternoon, which would give him a chance to sleep and me a chance for a swim. A good way to spend Labor Day.

  3

  It was a great party. The food stretched for what seemed like miles under a huge tent set on the beach. I could understand why it was such an expensive affair when I saw the amount of food and tasted it. It was truly a feast. Then there was the open bar under a separate tent, with a steady stream of people, mostly men, filling and refilling their glasses.

  The party was about two blocks down the beach from us, so the noise was less noticeable in our house. When we decided we’d had enough, we’d be able to sleep. I had the feeling this was going to be an all-night affair for some, or at least until the food and alcohol ran out.

  The Jorgensens were there, and members of the fire department, most of them now in casual, hot-weather clothes. Ken Buckley remembered me and stopped to talk for a minute. When he left, I sought out the old man, Chief La Coste, and introduced myself to him.

  “Hope you’re enjoying your vacation,” he said. “That’s a nice house you’re staying in. Max built it himself about twenty years ago.”

  “It’s wonderful. Where do you live?”

  “Over on North Avenue. My house is a little smaller than yours. And a lot older. But it suits me.”

  “I heard you live here all year round.”

  “This is the only home I’ve got. I like it even better in the winter. Not so many strangers around.” He gave me a quick smile. “I didn’t mean you, ma’am. It’s all these young folks that rent a house and come out for the weekends. They’re not as careful as they could be with the property, if you understand what I mean.”

  I did and I said something sympathetic. It was the old tug of war between the generations. They got on each others’ nerves.

  “Hard to be tolerant when they don’t respect the rights of others. Bunch of damned noisemakers, if you ask me.”

  “But they’ll be gone soon,” I said, to soothe him.

  “Not soon enough. How long are you staying?”

  “Till the end of the week. My husband’s a police officer in New York and he’s studying law at night. His school starts next week.”

  “Well, you come round tomorrow and we’ll have a little talk,” he said with a smile. “Things’ll be calmed down by then. Just ask anyone where Chief La Coste’s house is. They all know.”

  “Thank you. I look forward to it.”

  Jack and I stuffed ourselves with food, enjoying it and having a good time. Eddie’s dinner and bath schedule would go by the board today but he seemed to be enjoying himself as much as we were, what with people stopping to talk to him.

  Suddenly there was a long, high-pitched scream and the voices around us stopped. “Fire!” the screamer shouted. “There’s a fire! Look! Look at the smoke!”

  We all looked toward the houses of the town and there, off to the left, was an ugly funnel of dark smoke. The firemen didn’t wait to be told; they ran. As they headed toward the firehouse, a wailing siren sounded.

  “I don’t like the look of this,” Chief La Coste said at my side.

  “Looks like big trouble,” I agreed. “Can the Blue Harbor company handle it?”

  “The companies from the neighboring villages will join them. Hear that? That’s another siren. They’ll be here. They’ll get it under control.”

  “I hope so.” I spotted Jack, who was carrying Eddie. Eddie was crying. Sirens scared him, but there was nowhere to go to avoid them.

  “I’ll look for you tomorrow,” the old man said, reminding me that we had an invitation.

  “Thank you, I’ll be there.” Then I ran across the sand to Jack.

  —

  Along with most of the town, we headed for the fire. By the time we got there, the Blue Harbor firemen and two other companies were already pouring water from hoses attached to hydrants onto the burning house.

  “It’s the chief’s house,” I heard someone say excitedly behind me, and I looked around for the old man I had been talking to on the beach, but couldn’t find him.

  “Chief La Coste?” I asked the man.

  “No, Ken Buckley. I hope his family’s outta there.”

  I hoped so, too. I looked for him, but all the firemen were now in their heavy jackets and hats and I couldn’t recognize anyone. “Someone says it’s Chief Buckley’s house,” I told Jack.

  “They look like they know what they’re doing. There’s probably no one inside. Everyone’s at the beach. Or they were.”

  “Everyone” seemed to be at the scene right now. I wondered if the chief’s children were on the island, whether they might have stayed behind in the house while their parents were at the party. The thought gave me an unpleasant sensation in the pit of my stomach.

  “Let’s get Eddie out of here,” Jack said. “I don’t want him breathing the smoke.”

  “I’ll walk back to the tent. He doesn’t seem very tired. You can stay here if you want. If I’m not on the beach, I’ll be back at the house.”

  “I’ll hang around here for a while.” He looked concerned. He leaned over and kissed both of us.

  “Come on, Eddie,” I said. “Let’s go back and watch the sun set.”

  I eased my way through the crowd, watching the firemen as I went. Each town wore slightly different uniforms, I noticed, and they worked together as though they had trained that way. I hoped they would get inside to see if any of the Buckley children were there.

  As I was strolling my way through the crowd, I felt a hand push me aside. It was a girl with what looked like a fireman’s yellow-striped coat pulled over her head. As she turned her head my way, I recognized her.

  “Tina,” I said. She was a member of the group renting the house closest to ours. “Are you all right?”

  She looked at me almost with horror, her diamond stud earrings picking up the last light of the day, and then dashed away, pushing herself through the crowd with her head down. Instinctively, I followed in her wake, clutching Eddie to my shoulder. She moved very quickly out of and then beyond the crowd, finally darting between two houses in a direction I realized would take her more directly to the house she was sharing.

  Something made me go after her. She never looked back and it certainly looked as though she were running away from something. All of a sudden she came up against a chain-link fence, and she uttered the loudest “Shit!” I had ever heard in my life. She repeated it several times, pounding the fence and sounding more hysterical with each rendition.

  “Tina, can I help?” I called, standing away out of fear that she might turn her anger on me, and not anxious to walk through grass that might hold ticks.

  She looked back then, and I could see that her face was smudged with dirt, her eyes wide. “No!” she screamed, and took off around the other side of the house.

  I gave up and walked back to her group’s house, using the more conventional streets. The front door was open, which was not unusual, but no one was around. I stood quietly and listened. The whole area seemed deserted. If Tina had come home, she was keeping still.

  I turned toward the beach and walked back to where the happy party had been in full swing less than half an hour before.

  —

  The tent was not entirely deserted. A woman had taken the place of the fireman bartender and was filling glasses. Several women were behind the tables of food, whether to help serve or to guard the food I wasn’t sure.

  “Is it really Ken Buckley’s house?” one of them called to me.

  “That’s what I was told.”

  “Anyone inside?” Her face looked tense.

  “I don’t know. I was only
there a few minutes.”

  “There’s a lot of smoke, isn’t there.” It wasn’t a question. “Why don’t you help yourself to some dinner? Before the crowds come back. I’ll hold the baby if you like.” She smiled, but Eddie would have none of it.

  “He’s getting tired,” I said. “I’ll fill a plate and take it home. Thanks for the offer.”

  By the time Jack got back, I was back down in the living room with my book.

  “You guys OK?”

  “We’re fine. Is the fire out?”

  “Looks like it. They’ll stick around for a while to make sure. Someone died in the fire, Chris.”

  “Oh, no. A child?”

  “The chief. They brought Ken Buckley’s body out a little while ago.”

  “How terrible.” I felt my eyes fill. “Did he die fighting the fire?”

  “He wasn’t in uniform. Looked like he was sleeping. They found him on his bed.”

  “I saw him at the party, Jack.”

  “You sure?”

  “Absolutely. We said hello.”

  “Maybe he was tired. Maybe he didn’t feel so good. He must’ve gone home and gone to bed.”

  “I wonder.”

  “About what?”

  “You know that grouper house just down the street? The one across from the Wagners?”

  “Yeah. We’ve said hello a couple of times.”

  “I saw Tina from that house. She was at the fire and she was trying to get away from it as fast and inconspicuously as possible.” I described how she had been dressed, with the heavy fireman’s coat pulled over her head, how her face, when I finally saw it at the fence, had been smudged with smoky grime.

  “You trying to make this sound ominous or am I just reading big trouble into this?”

  “I’m just telling you what I saw. I lost her at the fence. I was carrying Eddie and didn’t want to run a race to follow her. When I got to the house, either no one was there or they were being very quiet.”

  “For a change.”

  “Yes.”

  “You think she could have been inside the house during the fire?”

  “How else did she get so dirty and sooty-looking?”

  He looked at his watch. “If this was arson—”