The chocolate frog frame-up: a chocoholic mystery

by JoAnna Carl

  “Right. It’s a huge place. Three stories high, plus attics. After that section of Lake Shore Drive went commercial – back in the thirties, I guess – they tried every kind of business in that house. Boarding house, tourist home, restaurant. The ambulance service was there for a while. It’s been empty for ten years now, and it’s in bad shape.”

  “But still on the historic list.”

  “All of Warner Pier is a historic district, remember.”

  I nodded. ”I’d never even noticed the – what did you call it?”

  “The DeBoer house. No relation to the diamond people. The house sits to the north of the Root Beer Barrel property, but it’s back from the street and those trees you dislike so much hide it. You can’t see anything of it except the roof, and you can only see that from the water.” He swung my pointing finger to the south. ”On the right-hand side of the Barrel is the Old English Motel.”

  “That I’ve noticed. In fact, it always seems familiar to me.”

  “I think there were a lot of motels built on that pattern at one time, fake English cottages, tiny motel rooms with pointed tile roofs. You’ve probably seen one somewhere else.”

  “I guess that’s it. There’s one very similar to it in my hometown.”

  “Dallas?”

  “My real hometown. Prairie Creek, Texas. Home to cowboys for one hundred and fifty years.”

  “You got it take me down there someday.”

  He turned around and put my arms around Joe. He put his arms around me. The moment became quite romantic.

  Until the spotlight hit us.

  We jumped apart. The boat rocked madly, and I grabbed the roof to keep my balance.

  “Dadgum!” I said. ”Is one of those boats court busting?”

  “Court busting? What’s that?”

  “That’s what my dad calls driving up and down country roads shining a bright light into parked cars.”

  “I don’t think that’s what these people have in mind,” Joe said. ”They’re coming right at us.”

  The light was growing closer, and the boats motor was getting louder. I had the impression that it was a big boat, too, at least twice as long as the sedan. I couldn’t see clearly because of the light.

  I realized Joe had ducked back under the sedan’s roof and slid behind the wheel. He looked back at me and yelled. ”Get down!”

  I ducked back under the roof and into the seat on the passenger’s side. The sedan’s motor burbled into life, and we began to move forward. I was dying to ask Joe if he thought we were about to be boarded by pirates, but I couldn’t. The boat was too noisy. But the situation seems ridiculous.

  Joe gunned the motor, and we jumped forward. The sedan isn’t the fastest boat on the lake, but it can move pretty well. And Joe moved it. We headed up the lake, parallel to the shore, at top speed.

  Joe used his thumb to gesture over his shoulder. I deduced that he wanted me to keep an eye on the bigger boat.

  It was easy to see. It had that spotlight aimed right at us. And the spotlight kept coming closer. It was following us.

  Chapter 17

  “Closer! It’s closer!” I screamed the words, but I knew Joe couldn’t hear me.

  He seems to understand. At least he began what I would consider invasive action. He cut the sedans lights, all of them, even the safety lights. He swung hard left. The searchlight lost us, then found us again. He swung the right. The same thing happened. The light lost us, then found us again. Then Joe repeated the maneuver – left out of the spotlight, then – after it focused on us again – right, into the dark.

  All the time he was doing this, the big boat was getting closer. The sedan is a great boat, but it isn’t particularly fast. I knew that eventually the larger, more powerful boat would be able to catch us. Dodging in and out of its searchlight wasn’t going to be a useful escape technique in the end.

  And it could well be the end. If the bigger boat hit us – I pushed the mental picture of flying debris and flying bodies out of my mind.

  I crawled back to the rear seating area and lifted the seat, revealing the hatch where the lifejackets were stored. Right at the moment, a life jacket seems like a really good idea.

  The boat swerved again, and I was thrown sideways. But this time Joe didn’t straighten out. We catch traveling in a circle. Centrifugal force almost glued me where I’d landed, against the side of the boat. But we were out of that damn searchlight.

  I struggled to get up, at least to my knees, and I finally made it. The sedan was bouncing over the waves – I was just grateful that they weren’t very big waves. I looked up and saw the bigger boat going by – I could see oblong portholes, chrome railings, and a big area of smooth and shiny white fiberglass.

  The sedan straightened out then, and I looked around Joe to see where we were going. There was nothing but lake ahead; the big boat was behind us. Joe had made a U-turn, and we were headed in the opposite direction, south instead of north, toward the Warner Pier channel.

  I allowed myself to hope that we make it.

  But the big boat was turning, too. Already it was broadside to us. As I realized that, Joe suddenly cut the sedan’s speed drastically. The boat settled back in the water like a duck landing on a pond, and we were moving at no wake zone speed.

  “What are you doing?” I yelled.” We were getting away.”

  Now Joe turned the boat again, heading it directly toward the shore, which was about a quarter of a mile away. He inched along, the motor gurgling gently.

  I put my lips close to his ear. ”What are you doing?”

  “Trying to hit the channel!”

  I looked ahead. The only channel I knew of was the channel of the Warner River, the channel we’d come out of. It was marked with lights. I could see it – still far south of us.

  I stayed on my knees. Maybe prayer would help. I sure didn’t understand what Joe was doing.

  But I understood what the big boat was doing. It was turning in circles, casting its searchlight all around, trying to find us. When it did, it was going to come at us like gangbusters. And instead of racing down the Lake while we had the chance, we were moseying along. A kid with an inflated sea serpent and a good flutter kick could have passed us.

  Just then the sedan shuddered, and Joe through the motor into reverse. We inched backward. Then he changed gears again and we inched forward. We moved a few feet, then the boat shuddered again. Joe through the motor into reverse again. We inched backward, but this time the boat shuddered and stopped moving almost immediately.

  Joe turned the motor off. He turned sideways in his seat and began to pull his shoes off.

  “We’re aground,” he said. ”Shuck your shoes and your jacket. And those slacks. We’re gonna have to swim for it.”

  “Swim! He’ll run us down in the water!”

  “We’ll be inside the sandbar, and he’ll be outside. I think it’s our best chance.”

  I reached for the locker that held the lifejackets.

  “We better leave the lifejackets,” Joe said. ”Or better still…”

  He snatched to lifejackets from me, stood up, and hurled them out into the Lake, away from the shore.

  “Maybe those’ll distract him for a minute. And if he does know how to get around the sandbar – and there is a way – they’d make us to easy to spot.” He planted a quick kiss on the top of my head. ”I think I remember enough about being a lifeguard that I can get us a ashore.”

  “I can swim,” I said.

  “That’ll be a help.”

  I pulled my jacket off. Then I yanked off my tennis shoes without untying the laces. I looked up to see a pair of blue boxer shorts in my face – Joe and I were undressing in close quarters and he’d just dropped his jeans.

  “Keep that scarf on,” Joe said. ”That blonde hair would be easy to spot in the water.”

  “I’m keeping my shirt, too. If I drown, I don’t want my body to be found in nothing but a padded bra.”

  Joe was climbin
g over the side by that time, and he just stood there, with his head and shoulders visible. I peeled my khaki slacks down. ”Is it that shallow?”

  “We are on the sandbar. Come on!”

  Right at that moment the searchlight hit the water about 30 feet from us, and if I had any tendency to hesitate, I lost it. I tumbled over the side like a skin diver, with my slacks still around my ankles.

  The west Michigan theory, is that a southwest wind brings warm but dirty water to the beaches. A north wind brings cold but clean water. Or so swimmers are told. After that night, I’ll never believe that again. The wind and waves might have been moving in from the southwest, but the water was so cold that Lake Michigan might as well have been the Antarctic Ocean. My tumble over the side paralyzed me.

  Joe grabbed me and got me to my feet. I gasped and regain the ability to move. We both ducked down behind the boat. I finished stepping out of my slacks.

  “Ready?” Joe said.

  The searchlight beam bounced off the boat. ”Ready,” I said. I took a deep breath, did a surface dive, and pulled hard in the direction of the shore.

  I came up about 25 feet away. Now my feet couldn’t touch the bottom.

  “Lee! Lee!” Joe’s voice sounded frantic.

  “Come on!” I said. ”I’m heading for shore!”

  I struck off, using the breaststroke with some idea of not splashing. Joe caught up with me shortly. ”You said you could swim,” he said. ”You didn’t mention diving.”

  After that we didn’t talk a lot. We stayed close together, and once Joe suggested that I stop and float for a minute. I must have been panting. He was panting, I remember that. He turned onto his back and pulled me over, so that I was lying on my back on top of him. We both concentrated on floating and breathing easily for a few minutes. Funny how hard something like breathing can get. Swimming may be like riding a bicycle, in the sense that you never forget how, but I was way out of condition. And a quarter of a mile is several laps of an Olympic sized pool.

  About half the time we were swimming that big boat was circling around behind us, but it didn’t move closer to shore, so I thought it was staying out beyond the sandbar. Once the searchlight cut the water quite close to us, and light seemed to be headed in our direction.

  “Sink,” Joe said.

  I held my nose and sank. I stayed under as long as my lungs held out, and when I popped to the surface again the light was nowhere to be seen.

  I stopped looking toward the shore because it seemed so far away. But finally I peeked, and this time the trees lined was looming almost over my head. I put my feet down and felt the rounded stones of Lake Michigan.

  “Maybe I’ll walk the rest of the way,” I said.

  “It’s gonna be mighty cold when we get out,” Joe said.

  The water was up to my armpits. We waded across 10 feet of stones, then sand began. We came out of the water on a narrow beach about 30 feet from a creek. Trees grew up the bank, which towered above us. I would have sunk down and rested, but Joe yanked me along, toward a set of stairs that led up the bank.

  “I don’t want to stop while we’re in the moonlight,” he said. ”Besides, were going to get even colder when we quit moving.”

  I knew he was right, though I was about played out. We kept going, across the beach and up the stairway. When we got to the top, I did stop.

  “Joe! This is somebody’s backyard.”

  “Right. Maybe they left a beach towel on the porch.”

  “Maybe they’ll call Aunt Nettie to come and get us.”

  Joe nodded.

  But the house was dark, and there was no beach towel on the porch.

  My teeth were chattering. ”Sh-sh-should we b-b-break in?”

  “I’m not sure I can manage to burgle a house barefoot and in my skivvies. Let’s go around in front, see if we can spot a light somewhere. We may even know somebody in this neighborhood. Once we figure out where we are.”

  I checked my watch and discovered it was still running. ”You’d think some of these people would want to stay up to watch the eleven o’clock news,” I said. ”There ought to be a light someplace.”

  We made our way around the house – trampling a flower bed in the process – and found ourselves out on what had to be Lake Shore Drive. Suddenly I recognized a landmark. ”Joe! That big tree! The one almost out in the middle of the road. I know that tree!”

  “Yeah. Were at the back of Clem’s place.”

  “I don’t suppose there’s a security guard there.”

  “No, but I can get in.”

  Hand in hand, almost naked, soaking wet, and shivering in the 50° temperature, we headed toward the Ripley place, the one that was giving Joe such fits as he tried to settle Clementine Ripley’s estate. I’d become acutely aware that my wet T-shirt didn’t cover my underwear. I wasn’t willing for everybody in Warner Pier to be sure I was a natural blonde, so I wrapped my scarf around my waist like a pareo, and it clung to me like a sheet of ice. But the hardest part of the deal was my feet. I kept stumbling over rocks, and I’ll swear there was more gravel the blacktop on that road.

  “I think I’m leaving bloody footprints,” I said.

  “Just keep leaving them.”

  We persevered, though I cast a longing glances as we passed a couple of houses with lights. But Joe seemed eager for us to reach the Ripley place before we asked for help. After about 5 min. of pussyfooting down the road we came to the big gate that marked the entrance to the estate.

  Joe went to the keypad next to the gate. I shivered and my teeth chattered. Down the road, I saw lights reflected off the trees.

  “Here comes a car,” I said. ”Maybe they’ll help us.” I stepped toward the street.

  Joe grabbed my arm and pulled me back into the bushes. ”Let’s make sure they’re not looking for us,” he said.

  We waited until the car had gone slowly by. I hated to see it go; it had represented help. I sighed. ”I guess I probably wouldn’t stop if I were driving down a lonely street and a couple of naked people jumped out of the bushes at me.”

  Joe didn’t answer. He just pushed buttons on the keypad, and the gate to the Ripley estate slid open. Then we had another long walk up a blacktop driveway. This one was completely shaded by trees, so we had only intermittent patches of moonlight to see by. Gravel had been scattered on it, too, and had landed in the most unlikely places. My feet hurt so bad I almost forgot how cold I was.

  We had to go clear around the house to reach the keypad that opened the back door. Once we were inside Joe hit the light switch, and I saw that we were in the back hall, with the kitchen beyond.

  “Whew!” I found a kitchen stool, sat on it and rubbed my feet. Joe went straight to the telephone. He found the directory on a shelf under the phone, searched for a number and punched it in. “Mike? Is Mom there? It’s important.”

  A pause. “Hi, Mom. Lee and I were out in the seddan, and we had a little excitement. We wound up having to abandon ship and swim ashore.”

  I heard squawking noises from the telephone.

  “We’re okay! We’re okay! Lee’s a good swimmer.” Joe turned and grinned at me. “We came ashore not far from Clem’s place, so we came in there. But we need clothes and shoes. Can you get something from my place and bring it out here? There’s a key behind the downspout.”

  More squawking. Then Joe looked at me. “What size shoe do you wear?”

  “Nobody’s feet are as big as mine. Tell her not to worry about shoes. My feet are beyond help already.”

  Joe repeated what I’d said. “But hurry, Mom. Okay? I left the sedan aground, and I want to go get it.”

  Joe hung up, then immediately looked for another number. ”Harry? Hope I didn’t get you up.”

  I realized that he was calling Harry Barnes. Harry ran a marina in Warner Pier.

  Joe quickley sketched our problem—but I noticed he hadn’t told either his mother or Harry how we got in this fix.

  “I left the Shepherd Seda
n aground,” Joe said. “I want to get it off quick.”

  He listened, then spoke. “I was trying to hit the little channel that runs out from North Creek. But it’s too narrow this year.”

  He paused. “Harry, you can laugh all you want later. Right now I need two favors.”

  Harry’s voice echoed on the phone. “Yeah, yeah. I’ll tell you about it later. But I need you to give me a tow. And on you way, see if that Tiara 5200 of Jack Sheldon’s is docked.”

  He was silent. “Just see if it’s in its slot! I’ll meet you at the Ripley boathouse, okay?”