Island Intrigue

by Wendy Howell Mills

  Of course, he had come back, like he always knew he would, and settled down to live the clean life.

  “Yes sir.” Guy and Curly had the good sense not to play the smart-alecks. Though, at sixteen, they were smart-alecks and it was an effort for them to pretend otherwise. They made a fast exit and Jimmy sighed. Probably going outside to sneak a cigarette. Jimmy wondered if he had ever been that young and stupid, and knew that he had, and more.

  “Why, Jimmy McCall, I certainly hope you’re not under there looking up our skirts!” Jimmy looked up to see the painted and plucked face of Elizabeth Tittletott peering down at him, coquettishly holding her long skirts against her legs.

  “No, ma’am.” Jimmy ducked back from underneath the bleachers.

  He looked around with satisfaction. Nobody crowding the fire exits, nobody trying to call out the answers to the two children still battling for the title of champion.

  As usual, the spelling bee had turned into a Towner/Waver competition. The flannel-shirted Wavers, smelling of salt and mud, were loudly cheering on Terry Wrightly. The more restrained Towners, though many still in flannel shirts, were rooting for Kitty Tubbs. Jimmy just hoped it didn’t dissolve into a free for all, Towners against Wavers. It had been known to happen, though not in recent times.

  The gymnasium was almost full, and Jimmy had to admit that those rich folks over in Lighthouse Estates had really added a lot to the community. When Bill Large had realized that his boy would be attending a school with only five rooms, and no gym, he put together a coalition of the eleven year-round residents of Lighthouse Estates and raised money for the gymnasium. It was somehow annoying that the man who raised that monstrosity of a brick hotel on Hurricane Harbor had also significantly added to the well-being of the children on the island. Of course, Bill Large, who was unable to keep his mouth shut for very long, soon ruined any good feeling he had amassed when he commented that it was just like the lazy islanders to wait for an outsider to come along and do what needed to be done for their children.

  Jimmy stifled a yawn as Terry Wrightly spelled “Trotskyism.” Where did they get these words?

  He looked up in the bleachers where Darlene and the kids were sitting. Joe had disappeared, and Jimmy hoped he hadn’t joined his friends Guy and Curley out in the parking lot. If that was the case, he’d let Darlene handle it. She was a lot better at the discipline stuff than he was. She saw him looking at her and gave a small, private smile. She had promised him a backrub tonight.

  His walkie-talkie crackled, and Jimmy listened as Billy eagerly reported that he was pulling over a brown Camaro, New Jersey license plates, for speeding out on Long Road. Jimmy sighed. Billy was a good boy, and he meant well. He really did.

  He hoped the driver of the brown Camaro hadn’t been drinking. Visitors to the island seemed to be under the impression that when they were on the island they were outside the reach of the law. They drove a hundred miles an hour down Long Road, drank ten shots of tequila at the Ride the Big One Pub and then drove through Selma Tubbs’ flower bed, and smoked pot on the front porch of the Tittletott House.

  The good news was that was about the extent of the crime on Comico, except for some small-time burglary of empty vacation houses. It was still enough to keep him and Billy busy. Hell, half the time poor Darlene had to dispatch for them. And if the driver of the brown Camaro was drunk, Billy would have to bring him to the station, and Jimmy would have to go down and administer the breathalyzer, since it was state law that the arresting officer couldn’t administer the test. Then they would have to drag Bright Lowry away from the spelling bee, and have him set the bond for the guy.

  “Caliginous. C-A-L—” Kitty was spelling.

  The radio crackled again. Billy had issued a speeding ticket and a stern speech about the dangers of speeding. Jimmy relaxed. His dern back was hurting again, though he really didn’t want to admit it. Every time he went to Doc Hailey, the man insisted that if he lost weight everything would be fine. It just got plain discouraging after a while. He was big-boned, and he hadn’t been under two hundred pounds since he was in the tenth grade.

  But Darlene always knew when his back ached, and made time to give him one of her special back rubs. She tried her best to feed him right. It wasn’t her fault he’d rather have a cheese and ham omelet, with extra bacon, extra grits and hashbrowns for breakfast than the Grape-Nuts and lowfat milk that she tried to serve him.

  Jimmy looked around the room again, and wondered how long this spelling bee was going to go on. Kitty and Terry had been spelling against each other for almost a half an hour. It was past time for Bradford Tittletott’s speech to begin.

  Jimmy looked for Bradford, and found him near the front of the bleachers, surrounded by Tittletotts. Jimmy looked away, frowned and glanced back at Bradford. The man looked ill. His face was as pasty as dough, and his eyes were flickering nervously toward the front door.

  Ah, Jimmy thought, the great Bradford doesn’t like public speaking. But then, that wasn’t right either. He’d heard Bradford speak in public before, and he had been his normal, self-assured self.

  Sitting near the Tittletotts was the blond woman who was talking to Lima this morning. He searched his well-oiled memory: Sabrina Dunsweeney, that was her name. Fed the cats. Red convertible. He had been seeing a lot of her lately. She really had made inroads into the local population, which was not at all easy to do. She was organizing some sort of play for the kids, he’d heard. Lima was going around bragging that he was the “creative director” for the play, which wasn’t surprising since Lima somehow or another had managed to worm his way into every dramatic production on the island for the last fifty years. Lima was a frustrated actor, was what he was. But it was good that the kids had something to do, besides smoking and looking up girls’ skirts. Miss Dunsweeney was leaning forward, hands clenched as Terry Wrightly stumbled through “malevolence.”

  Miss Dunsweeney wasn’t the only one holding her breath as Terry spelled. Nettie Wrightly, in her white robes and some godawful blinking hat (Jimmy couldn’t shake the feeling that she looked like Luke Skywalker in those robes and half expected her to go around intoning, “The Force be with you.” Maybe that would be next month) was watching with intense, dark eyes, her lips moving in what was probably some witchly incantation. Thierry, the boy’s no-good father, was sitting beside her and he looked about half-lit. As Jimmy watched Nettie, he saw that she kept glancing to the front door, like she was expecting someone.

  Terry got through his word, and the Wavers, who had segregated themselves on the opposite end of the bleachers, rose to their feet. Kitty Tubbs, her small face white and pinched, stood for her word.

  Jimmy noticed that Bradford had started to shake. What was wrong with the man?

  “Extirpate. E-X-T-I—” Kitty started.

  At first, Jimmy couldn’t see what everybody was staring at, though he heard the clanking as the front door slammed open. He wasn’t very tall, and Albers Lowry was standing right in his view of the front door. He could see Kitty Tubbs though, and her mouth seemed to be frozen in a wide “O.”

  Then Dock moved out into the open floor in front of the bleachers, and Jimmy understood what everybody was staring at. And he knew that he had a serious problem on his hands.

  “Billy, I think you better get over here,” Jimmy said into his radio.

  ***

  Sabrina was enjoying herself, though she couldn’t believe how long the two kids were holding out. Terry was pleased when she gave him the role of Romeo this afternoon, though he kicked his feet and tried to act nonchalant.

  She was relishing her popcorn and listening to the various conversations going on around her. Most were about the choice of words, though several people were complaining about the rally preparations and the lack of organization.

  “They paired me up with Virginia Tittletott to do the Fighting Flying Fish Float, and she spent the whole time drifting around and then just disappeared. I had to get Edie and Millie to help
me with the streamers and balloons. Durn Tittletotts!”

  When someone came banging through the metal doors of the gymnasium—the doors had been clanking and clanging every time somebody went through them, but this was especially loud—almost everybody had looked toward the doors. Kitty stopped spelling and looked confused, then terrified.

  Sabrina blinked a couple of times to make sure she wasn’t seeing things, and then she stared in horror at the old man who was slowly walking across the gymnasium floor, tears streaming down his face.

  “Dock!” Nettie’s shocked voice echoed through the gym, and it seemed to release the paralysis on the crowd’s collective vocal chord. Low murmurs rose, like a strengthening breeze rushing through the dying leaves of the fall trees.

  Dock stopped when he heard his wife’s voice, but he just stood in the middle of the gymnasium floor, the tears coming faster, if noiselessly.

  He was covered in blood, from head to toe.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Everybody started talking at once. Nettie tripped on her long robes as she scrambled down the bleachers, landing face down on one of the seats. Sabrina was the only one paying any attention, and she made her way over to the older woman who was struggling to right herself.

  “Tippier than an egg on the day before the winter solstice,” she said as Sabrina set her on her feet. “I call the Gods of Wind, Water and Earth—” She continued her muttering as Sabrina helped her down the stairs and over to Dock. No one had gotten near him, except for Sergeant Jimmy McCall, who was busy talking on his radio as he ran his hands over the old man.

  “It’s all right, Ms. Nettie,” said the rotund police officer as Nettie put a shaking hand to her husband’s grizzled, blood-streaked face. “Can’t find a mark on him. I don’t think the blood’s his.”

  Dock reached out and grabbed Nettie’s hand, tears flowing from his eyes, but no sound emerged when he worked his toothless mouth.

  “Shush, it’s all right, I’m here,” Nettie crooned to the old man. “It’s all right, honey, it’s all right.” She repeated the words over and over again, as if repetition would make them true.

  “The ambulance will be here soon,” Jimmy said. “I want to get him checked out, just in case.”

  “Where did all this blood come from, Dock? What’s going on? Oh, honey, don’t cry, you’re going to be just fine. Everything’s going to be all right. I’m sorry I haven’t watched TV with you for a while, I swear I will, if you’ll just be all right.” She stroked Dock’s cheek over and over again, trying to wipe away his tears.

  “Dock,” Jimmy said in his gentle voice. “Look at me, Dock. Where did the blood come from? Are you bleeding?”

  Members of the rescue squad, carrying a stretcher and medical bags, burst through the front doors of the gymnasium and hurried over to Dock. Within moments, they had him lying on the stretcher, his shirt open. Several people came out of the bleachers, presumably emergency squad volunteers, and assisted the paramedics. After verifying that there was nothing life-threatening about Dock’s condition, they strapped him onto the stretcher and carried him out of the building. Nettie accompanied them, holding Dock’s hand.

  Sabrina followed Nettie and the stretcher. Outside, a fire truck, an ambulance and several blue H2O Rescue trucks were parked, their blue, red, white and yellow lights twisting in a dizzying kaleidoscope against the side of the building. A white police car with “Teach County Sheriffs” written in tan across the side careened around the corner into the parking lot and screeched to a stop in front of all the emergency vehicles. A young man in uniform tumbled out of the car.

  “What’s up, Sarge?” he asked as he swaggered over to Jimmy, hands on belt, chest out. He had a round cherubic face with apple cheeks, small blue eyes, and blond hair already thinning across a bright red scalp.

  “Billy, could you please move your car out of the way of the ambulance?” Jimmy asked in a calm voice.

  “Uh—ten-four, right away, sir.” Billy hurried back to move his car.

  “My God,” Sabrina heard Jimmy sigh. His walkie-talkie was crackling with messages. From what Sabrina could hear, they were phone calls from concerned citizens, wanting to know what all the fuss was about at the school.

  One of the calls was a bit more ominous. “Sheriff, is that you? It’s Cue. I’m down at the New Dock, and I think you better get down here. You’re not going to believe this, but I just found a body. A dead one, I’m pretty sure.”

  Jimmy was already moving fast. He slid into the passenger seat beside Billy, and the powerful police car accelerated out of the parking lot with a roar, narrowly missing a stop sign. The ambulance pulled out at a more sedate pace, with Dock and Nettie inside.

  People were pouring from the gymnasium. Sabrina decided that Bradford probably wasn’t going to speak tonight, so she hurried after the police car on foot.

  It was almost dark, and the muzzy light rendered potholes and ruts in the road invisible. Sabrina walked quickly, wishing for just a couple of streetlights. By the time she got to Post Office Road, she heard the wail of sirens and saw the parade of emergency vehicles, minus the ambulance but plus several unmarked trucks with flashing lights in their windshields, careen past her and barrel down the road toward the docks. She got the feeling that these people were enjoying the lights and sirens entirely too much.

  “What in the world is going on?” Sabrina said, stepping into the grass to avoid being run over by a monstrous four-wheel-drive truck.

  She hurried down the road toward New Harbor and found a crowd of people already gathered on the dock. Several short piers extended into the harbor, with boats tied up on either side. Billy was zealously guarding the entrance to one of those piers.

  “I remember paddling your diapers, Billy-boy,” one lady called out to him. “Don’t think I can’t still do it.” Billy’s ears turned bright red.

  Jimmy and several people in the yellow of firemen and blue of rescue squad were standing around a work boat, lit by spotlights. Sabrina recognized it as Dock’s old boat, usually tied up down the road from her house. What was it doing in the New Harbor, way over here in Towner territory?

  Jimmy was talking into the walkie-talkie, but the distance was too great to hear what he was saying.

  “Cue said it was a body,” someone said in the dark. “Billy, is it a body? Do you know whose it is?”

  Billy thrust out his chest and pretended he didn’t hear.

  “They said Dock just showed up at the rally, all covered with blood. You think he killed someone?”

  “Been telling Nettie she needs to keep Dock locked up. He’s been getting worse and worse.”

  “Crazy as he is, no telling what he’ll do. I went over there the other day to talk to Thierry, an’ the old man, he took one look at me and started yelling at the top o’ his lungs. Tried to climb under the couch, he did.”

  “Can anybody see who it is? Who’s dead?”

  “I think I heard Jimmy say Dock didn’t have a cut on him. Whoever it is must look wors’n he does.”

  Jimmy was walking around the boat, looking down inside it from different angles. It was impossible to see what he was looking at, but his face was grim.

  “Know how to give DWI’s, all right, but when it comes down to something serious, they’re lost,” someone said maliciously.

  “Am not!” Billy retorted. “We’ve taken courses for this type of thing. The sarge knows what he’s doing.”

  “And what the sarge is doing,” said Jimmy, coming up behind Billy, “is calling the Sheriff’s department for backup, and the state police. The show’s over, folks. Go on home. It’s going to be a long wait before anything happens.”

  “Who is it, Jimmy?” several concerned voices asked.

  The police officer hesitated, and Sabrina saw pain in his gentle, teak-colored eyes. “Can’t say at this time, I’m afraid. Got to tell the next of kin first. You know how it works. Go on home, now.”

  Grudgingly, the crowd began to disperse, and Sa
brina, with one last look at Dock’s boat, walked back down Post Office Road. She was half-hoping Lima and Bicycle would be sitting on the general store’s brightly-lit front porch, but for once they weren’t. Sabrina walked on, at a loss.

  Finally, she decided to go see how Nettie and Dock were doing. She remembered seeing the medical center in the little strip mall where she had bought the pizza and hurried on in the sweating, heavy night. Thunder rumbled in the far distance, just a subliminal grumble she felt deep in her chest.

  Another crowd was gathered outside the medical center, silent Wavers, waiting for news about Nettie and Dock.

  “How is he?” Sabrina asked, and several people just stared at her.

  “Dock? How is he?” she repeated.

  “Not a mark on him,” someone said, after a moment. “He’s in emotional distress, though.” The words sounded strange coming from the stocky, taciturn fisherman, and Sabrina suspected that he was quoting verbatim what the nurse, or doctor, had said.

  Several people, dressed in tennis whites or expensive-looking casual clothes were going in and out of the pizza shop and the grocery store. They ignored the motley bunch of Wavers, and gave them a wide berth.

  “Dern Estaters,” one of the Wavers muttered.

  Sabrina was surprised at the expensive cars in the parking lot. BMWs and gasaholic SUVs were a far cry from what she normally saw on the island. These must be the people from the Lighthouse Estates, the exclusive housing development of mansions. She had seen some of them at the gymnasium, but they obviously weren’t too concerned about the fate of one of the nasty, dirty Wavers.

  A few minutes later, a police car pulled into the parking lot. Jimmy maneuvered out of the front seat.

  “There’s Jimmy, he’ll tell us what’s what!”

  “Hey Jimmy, Dock didn’t really kill someone did he? Is he going to be okay?”

  “You’re one of us, Jimmy, give us the scoop!”