“Well, it has occurred to me. If the body in the rose garden wasn’t his, he could be alive, you know.”
“True. But the other big question is, of course, whose body is it?”
“Oh, my goodness, yes! I’ve wondered about that too.”
“And have you come up with any theories?” I asked, quite relieved that I had successfully steered her in a different direction.
“Oh, goodness, I’ve been thinking so much about that gardener—” She looked like a school girl with her flushed cheeks and her dancing eyes. “I must admit, I haven’t given much thought to the other situation. You know what I mean.” She nodded in the direction of my garden and my brand new koi pond that was yet to be filled with koi.
“I understand. But if you do get a notion of who it might be, please let me know.”
“Of course, dear. I will.” She set down her tea cup and stood up. “It could have been one of those artist friends of your aunt’s.”
I doubted that. Winnie would have written in her diary about someone leaving or disappearing. The only one she had mentioned was Alistair, as far as I’d read anyway.
“Myrtle, tell me something, if you would.”
“Anything, dear, as long as I can remember it.”
This, I was sure she would remember. “How did your husband die?”
“Oh, my.” Her hand touched her heart and I instantly regretted having asked.
“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have brought it up.”
“Oh, no. It’s fine, Jenny. It’s been many years now. Why fifty some years, 1951, to be exact. He had an illness.”
“What kind of illness?”
“Incurable.”
What kind of incurable? And why weren’t his records on file in Sam’s computer? But how could I ask her? She was obviously still in pain over the death of her husband. “That must have been very difficult for you.”
“Yes, it was. But in a way, it was a relief when he went.” I was relatively certain she bit her tongue in regret at that moment.
“I understand,” I said quickly. “It’s very hard to watch someone you love wither away.”
“Yes, that’s precisely what I meant. Precisely,” she said again as though trying to convince us both of her sincerity.
After Myrtle left, I sat on the porch swing watching the rain—rather low clouds as we Northwesterners are inclined to call it. Frustration was building inside of me. I knew nothing more than I had known the moment we had discovered the body.
Maybe it was time to give up on this unsolved mystery and get on with my life in the here and now. Of course, not certain I believed in time at all, who was to say that this body’s presence wasn’t as present as I was on that porch swing.
Augh! I had to stop thinking about this. A ferry boat ride was just what I needed. I dug my navy pea coat out of the bedroom closet, pulled on my faux fur lined boots, and headed for the ferry. When I reached Gael Island, I waved good-bye to Ned and drove Winston off the ferry and toward the library. I didn’t need to go to the library for anything, but when Winston made up his mind, I didn’t argue.
I signed in, left my library card at the desk, and picked up the key to the history room. After finishing out the search for Henry’s and pretty much coming up empty, I gently thumbed through the old phone books. I stopped at E. Eaton. Enby. Eston. Ewell. George Ewell. No Lilly. How odd it was that women weren’t considered worthy of having their names in phone books back in 1951. Or maybe it was an effort to protect the “weaker sex.”
I continued turning the pages. O. Ormsby. No Jeffrey. Only Myrtle. Had he died already? I grabbed the 1950 phone book off the shelf and went directly to the O’s. Still no Jeffrey. 1949. Still no Jeffrey. 1948. Jeffrey. No Myrtle. I rubbed my arms as though I were cold, all the while knowing it was stifling hot in the history room of the Gael Island library.
If Jeffrey Ormsby died in 1951, why had his name disappeared from the phone book in 1949? Did Myrtle have the number put in her name as soon as he became ill? This was too bizarre.
Suddenly I wanted to get out of this room, out of this building. The pet shop sounded very tempting, but my fingers refused to close the phone books. They just kept flipping pages. I stopped again at W. Wainwright. Right there in black and white. My address. My aunt. My mystery.
I continued into the yellow pages. Bakeries. The Anamcara Bakery had been there in 1951. Remodeled a few times since, I suspected. Beauty parlors. Cut and Curl used to be where Marilyn’s Cut, Curl, and Color Hair Salon now sat. One hardware store on the island in 1951. Ewell Hardware. The store Randy Crebbs now ran. Who had run it after George died and before Daisy grew up and married Randy? Had Lilly gone to work for a while? Or maybe George never worked there. Maybe he had inherited it from his father, but he preferred teaching or writing poetry. I laughed aloud at my thoughts. Good thing I was alone.
One market, where Daisy’s Main Street Market now stood. No pet shops. No pubs. On to shoe stores. Two on the island even back then. One featured boots, the other, children’s shoes.
Enough of this. I headed for the pet shop. I chose eight koi. I paid for them and told them I would be back in a little while to pick them up. Ned’s ferry hadn’t done the trick. I went for a walk along the beach where I had spotted Seth with his friend that day. Then I drove over to the state ferry and took a lovely ride through the islands and back. I focused on the fresh air and the water and the sea gulls and the tourists coming and going from the islands—anything but what had monopolized my thoughts for the past couple months.
I got off the ferry again at Gael Island and treated myself to an Americana and a lovely flaky butter croissant. Then I picked up my koi and headed back to Ned’s ferry and home again. After delivering my koi safe and sound to their new home, I jumped back in the car and drove directly to 23 Peach Tree Lane. The address had stuck in my mind since I had seen it in the 1951 phone book. I looked around for a few minutes to see if any other cars were in the driveway or people in the house. With the gray clouds and intermittent rain, it had remained a dark day, so the lights were on in the house already. That made it easy for me to see and to count the heads that went by the living room window. There was only one.
I knocked on the door. “Jenny! My goodness, what are you doing here, dear?”
“I’m sorry to disturb you, Lilly, but I need to ask you some questions.” I had thought of fifteen excuses to be here, but none felt right. There were times when being direct and asking honest questions was the only thing to do.
“What is it? Come in, come in.”
We sat down in the living room and I accepted the tea she offered since the kettle was already whistling.
“Now, tell me what it is, dear.”
“Well, it’s difficult. It might be painful and I don’t want to cause you any pain.”
Her forehead wrinkled more than it did naturally. “What could you ask that would cause me pain?”
“It’s about your husband.”
Her hand flew to her mouth. “Oh, my. Why would you ask me about George?” She was eyeing me with a curiosity that was new.
“I’m actually a private detective, Lilly, and I’m working on a case, a very old case.”
“A private detective? Like that Thomas Magnum fellow?”
I laughed. “I suppose so.”
“Will wonders never cease! I watch his reruns, you know. So, what is it you wish to ask?”
“What kind of work did your husband do?”
“Oh, we owned the hardware store, still do actually. George ran it. I helped him out sometimes at the counter and all. It wasn’t what he loved to do, mind you. He only did it because his father before him had done it.”
“What did he want to do?”
“He loved working with wood. Wanted to make furniture. He did make some. You see that chair over there?” She pointed toward an exquisite rocking chair in front of the window.
“It’s beautiful.”
“My George made it. With his own two
hands.” Tears welled up in her eyes and I realized why her daughters were so protective of her. “It was a gift for the birth of my first child, my Eleanor. And our dining room chairs. He made all of them.”
“I’m sorry. This must be very hard for you.”
“I’m fine, really. I’m just an emotional sort, is all. So, why are you asking me about George’s work?”
“I’m not sure really. I just—” I couldn’t answer that. I had no idea why I had asked her that and why I was even here.
She smiled again. “Ah, that little voice inside your head, just like Thomas’s.”
I laughed again. Maybe Magnum and I had more in common than I realized—aside from the scrapes he got himself into and the hot red car, and the great legs, that is. After all, we both did live on islands.
“Do you think I could see some photographs of George?” I asked.
“Certainly.” Lilly went to an armoire, pulled an old album off the shelf, and sat down beside me. It reminded me of the cover of one of Winnie’s diaries, made of silk.
She took me on a tour of her marriage and her daughters’ childhoods. The way she talked it was as though her wedding day, and Eleanor’s first tooth, and Daisy’s fifth birthday were that very day.
“Do you think I could borrow a photograph?”
She hesitated. It was the first time she had. This was her life we were talking about and she wasn’t sure she was willing to part with a piece of it.
“I’ll bring it back by this evening,” I assured her.
“Well, okay. But why do you want it?”
“I’ll explain later if that’s okay.”
She looked me in the eye. Then she smiled and stroked my cheek. “Yes, of course. Is there a particular one you would like?”
I pointed to the one I preferred and after she slipped it from its corner holders, and carefully wrapped it in tissue paper, I took it directly to Sam’s office.
We set it up on the projector with the slide of the skeleton. “Whose picture is it, Jenny?”
I helped him superimpose the two figures. When the bone structure fell into perfect place, I looked up at him and said, “George Ewell.”
“But I thought he went over a cliff in a car.”
“Apparently not.”
“They never did find his body. Everyone just assumed . . . he disappeared and it was his car. So how did you figure it out, Jenny?”
“I’m not sure. Must have been that ferry ride.”
“Hunh?”
“Intuition, I guess you could say. I wasn’t even sure why I went to Lilly’s or why I started asking about George, but suddenly I was asking to borrow his photograph.”
“That’s it?” Sam scratched his head and looked at me as though I had turned purple with bright orange polka dots. “I wish I could solve all my cases that easy. Not that I have that many.” He chuckled at himself.
“I think it must have been the teeth. I remember reading in the report that the front teeth were chipped.”
“And?”
“And George Ewell loved working with wood, making furniture and things. He probably had nails in his mouth a lot.” An image of his son in law holding nails in his teeth while hammering shelves in the store, per Charlie’s description, flashed through my mind. “Anyway, that must have been what made me ask for his picture. By the way, don’t say anything to anyone about this. I’ll return this to Lilly, and tell her, but let’s keep it quiet until we know who did it. Maybe even longer than that.”
“I’m with you on that one. We don’t need anymore speculation on murderers.”
“No, we don’t.”
By the time I returned to Lilly’s, there was a car in the driveway. Eleanor’s if I wasn’t mistaken. I waited for fifteen minutes, but it didn’t look as though she were leaving any time soon.
I walked up to the door and knocked softly. Eleanor opened it.
“What do you want?”
“I need to speak with your mother.”
She stepped outside and closed the door behind her. “Oh, no you don’t.”
“Yes, I do.”
“You can tell me instead what you came for.”
“I came to return something I borrowed.”
Her forehead furrowed and she suddenly aged ten years. “You borrowed something from my mother?”
“Yes. And if you’ll excuse me, I need to speak with her. Privately.”
She was blocking the doorway and I had no intention of reducing this to a physical brawl, no matter how much Thomas Magnum and I had in common.
Just when I thought I was going to have to leave and return another time, the door swung open. “Oh, Jenny, thank you for coming back so promptly.”
“You’re very welcome. Lilly, I need to speak with you alone, if you don’t mind.”
“No, of course not. Eleanor, let Jenny in!”
Eleanor stepped out of the way and allowed me to pass, then followed me into the house.
“I really must speak with your mother alone,” I said clearly.
“I’ll go in the kitchen,” she said when her mother gave her the look I’ve so often used on my own children.
“That’s not necessary,” Lilly said. “You can go home, dear. I can finish putting away the groceries.”
Eleanor scowled at me despite her mother’s disapproving look. Then she left the house, but I did not hear a car engine so I knew she was lurking about outside in hopes of eavesdropping on our conversation. Or perhaps she was planning to attack me when I came out of the house. I really had to get Thomas Magnum out of my mind!
“Now, what is it, Jenny? What do you wish to talk to me about.” Lilly nodded toward the couch where we sat side by side.
I unwrapped the photograph from its tissue and returned it to her. “I took this to the Sheriff’s office, Lilly,” I spoke in a quiet voice.
“Why would you take it there?”
“Did you read about the skeleton that was found a couple months back?”
“Oh, yes, at Winnie Wainwright’s. I did read about it.” She laughed. “My girls tried to keep it from me. They actually hid my newspaper, thinking I wouldn’t catch on. They’re so silly sometimes. I don’t know why they wouldn’t want me reading about it.”
“I think maybe it’s because they assume the mention of Winnie’s name bothers you.”
“Why that’s ridiculous. I have nothing against Winnie. I didn’t always approve of her lifestyle, mind you, but I did admire her!” She looked at me closely, then said, “You remind me of her. She had a lot of spunk too, you know. It’s a shame you couldn’t have met her.”
“I did.”
“You did?” She gave me a puzzled look. “Have you been to the island before?”
“Many times. Winnie Wainwright was my great aunt.”
She sucked in her breath and her eyebrows flew up. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because I knew your daughters hate my aunt, and I was concerned you might as well. Then you wouldn’t speak to me.”
“That’s nonsense! I’m going to have to have a talk with those girls of mine. They mean well, mind you, but really! I have nothing against Winnie or you.”
I took her hand and squeezed it. “I’m very glad to hear that.”
We both inhaled and exhaled slowly in silence for a moment. Then, as though her thoughts had cleared, she said, “I’m still confused, Jenny. You haven’t told me why you took George’s picture to Sam.”
“Because I had a feeling it might be a match with the picture of the skeleton we discovered on my property.”
“And was it?”
I nodded. “Yes, it was.”
“Oh, my goodness! What does that mean?”
“I’m not sure, but I think it means—”
“George was murdered.”
“Very likely.”
“But who would do such a thing?”
The same question I was asking myself.
Chapter 19
Seth set his wine glass on
the coffee table and leaned back beside me. He was wearing my favorite fisherman’s knit pullover and one day’s growth of beard. He looked tired tonight.
“I think you’ve done an amazing job, Jenny. You actually figured out whose body it is.” He raised a single eyebrow and leaned closer. “Now, are you sure you can’t tell me? I promise not a word will be printed.”
I laughed and pushed him away. “Sorry.”
“You don’t trust me.” His lower lip puckered under.
“It has nothing to do with trust. It’s just that it’s not my place to say anything.” Sam and I had agreed that we would keep this information between us and Lilly Ewell, at least for a little while until we knew more.
“I understand.”
But the way he said it I knew he didn’t. Safest to guide the conversation elsewhere. I asked him about his favorite subject—work. He told me about an environmental story he was working on. He hoped to have it published in a national magazine. As he talked about it, I realized that he was not as content with his life as he professed to be. He had stayed on this island for a reason, and it wasn’t just because it was home. It wasn’t just because it was the easy thing to do, taking over a newspaper in your hometown because you’re the best writer on the island.
Stop with the overanalyzing, Hamlet. Oh, dear, I had taken to calling myself Hamlet now that Joe wasn’t around to do it for me.
“What’s wrong?” Seth asked. I hadn’t realized I’d sighed until he spoke.
“Nothing. Just left over ghosts from my past.”
“The skeleton again?”
“The marriage again.”
“Oh.”
I shook my head to assure him it was nothing. “I guess you don’t realize how many little strings there are tying you to someone until you try to cut them.”
“I guess.”
“Why didn’t you ever get married, Seth?”
“You are a direct one, aren’t you?”
“Sorry. I didn’t realize I was prying.”
“You’re not. Well, you are, but that’s okay. Just never met the right woman, I guess.”
“Do you miss having children?”
“Sometimes. When I see someone jogging along with their kid in a stroller or pushing them in the park swing or playing catch— but it’s a lot more than that, isn’t it?”
Winnie's Web Page 18