The Secret of Hailey's Comments

by Kristy Tate

“Try to stay out of the living room,” Frank said.

  Nodding, I pulled open the door as quietly as I could. I heard Lucy mingling with her friends. My clothes lay folded on the dryer in the mudroom where I’d left them. Beside them I found a fitted, queen sized sheet, folded with the brown stain up. Someone had stuck a safety pin beside the smear. An empty plastic grocery bag sat next to the sheet, and I used it to carry the sheet. I closed the door and changed quickly. Sheer curtains hung in the one small window sitting above the appliances. I kept my back turned, conscious of Frank and Ryan on the other side of the window. I dressed as fast as I could and met Frank, Ryan and Wyeth in the back yard.

  I watched the small, elderly procession of Helen Dunsmuir’s friends. Dressed in black, clustered in groups of two or three, they made their way down Frank and Lucy’s driveway. Pastor Grayson walked alongside a woman in a black, broad brimmed hat. He lifted his arm in greeting and Frank returned the salute. Frank turned to Ryan, his face etched with worry lines. He handed Ryan the keys to the boat. “You sure you can handle the boat?”

  #

  Of course, I knew nothing of Ryan’s boat handling skills. The inflatable Bayliner, a festive balloon-looking boat with an attached outboard motor, bobbed in the lapping tide. The boat was red, white, and blue with yellow letters across the stern spelling YAK ATTACK. Ryan looked at it with a scowl. “There isn’t a steering wheel.”

  I pointed at the lever protruding from the outboard motor. “You steer with that.”

  “Ahoy!” Artie waved from the shore. A breeze pulled at her pink splattered dress. For the funeral she’d abandoned her bandana, and her hair blew around her face. She tried to hold it back as she ran toward us. James trailed behind. He’d lost his dark suit, and he looked young and carefree in a pair of jeans and T-shirt. I thought of Lucy and Frank, their red rimmed eyes, blotchy skin, the tangible signs of grief conspicuously missing from James and Artie’s expressions and attitudes.

  The dock shifted as they approached. Artie dropped a floral knapsack into the Bayliner then turned and winked at me. “Are you guys leaving?” James asked, coming over to pat Ryan’s back. “We’re all sealed and dealed, right?”

  Ryan gave a smile and a shrug. “I’ll be back tomorrow for the inspection.”

  I clutched the Safeway bag holding the bed sheets behind my back. “You’re not leaving, are you?” I asked Artie.

  Artie fairly bounced on the dock. “James has invited me to go to Tanzania! He has business there, but after it’s concluded we’re going to travel! Egypt, Morocco…”

  “Wow.” I didn’t know what else to say. I wanted to ask about the academy, and then I remember it no longer existed. The grocery bag felt heavy. “You’re not leaving for Tanzania right now, though, right?”

  James shook his head. “I’ve got to go through my grandparents’ things.” He turned to me. “In fact, maybe you could help me sell the paintings. I can offer a small commission.”

  I thought of Henry’s gruesome collection and tried to smile. Then I remembered that I’d seen Phil Henderson hide something, maybe a painting, in the tunnel. It seemed impossible that it only been a few hours since my stay in James’ tent.

  I hesitated for an indefinable reason. “I saw Phil Henderson carry something large out of the house and hide it in a tunnel.”

  James looked stunned. He turned to Artie with his mouth open in surprise.

  She blinked rapidly. “Which tunnel?”

  “That’s a good question. I didn’t know there was more than one.”

  They exchanged glances. “The tunnel near the boat house?” James asked.

  I nodded. “Are there others?”

  Artie nodded. “Lots. Lister’s full of bolt-holes.”

  “It might be totally innocent,” I said.

  James shook his head. “Of course it’s not innocent. Thanks for telling me.” He looked hard at Artie. “We’ll have to check that out before we leave.”

  “Right.” Artie turned on her heel as if to go, but James turned toward his boat.

  “Wait,” I said to Artie’s back, “you’re just going to go on your own and confront him?” Artie slowly turned around. She put her hands on her hips and rolled her eyes, body language usually reserved for miscreant art students. “Remember James and I have known Phil almost our whole lives. He has always been a little worm.”

  I shifted from foot to foot. “He’s a worm that morphed into a felon. Maybe he wasn’t dangerous when he was a kid, but he might be now.” My gaze flicked between Artie and James, they looked unconvinced. “He stole Wyeth.”

  James snorted. “He didn’t want to keep him?”

  I had the unreasonable desire to stamp my foot. “Do you know that some of the villagers think your grandmother was murdered? Of course you know that. Artie, you’re staying with your aunt and uncle, you must know what they think. You should at least get Pastor Grayson to go with you.”

  Artie crossed her arms over her chest. “He’s at the memorial luncheon…I don’t want to bother him.”

  James pressed his lips into a straight line. Artie opened her mouth to say something more, but James held up his hand and cut her off. “She might be right,” he said to Artie. “Why don’t you go and get Pastor Grayson while I prep the boat?” He turned to me and pointed at the grocery bag. “Are you doing some laundry?”

  His smile faded when I explained to him Jeff’s theory about the bed sheets. “Artie, wait,” he called. “I don’t want you to go alone.” Artie stopped and gave him a frustrated look. James turned to Ryan. “I’ve got to prime this engine. Will you guys go with her?”

  Ryan nodded. “Sure.”

  James looked relieved. “That’d be great. If grandmother really has been murdered…” His voice trailed away. “The sooner we leave this place the better.”

  #

  It didn’t take long to escort Artie to Pastor Grayson and within fifteen minutes we were on the water. Going nowhere.

  “I heard you tell Frank that you could drive a boat!” I said as we tried to pull away from the dock for the third time.

  “This isn’t a boat, it’s a flotation device,” Ryan said through clenched teeth.

  I laughed then shrugged and looked east across the water. Wyeth whined and pushed against my leg. I wondered if he were also thinking that swimming would be faster. And safer.

  A mean wind kicked up and swirled around us. Wyeth stood with his paws propped up on the side of the boat, but with every one of Ryan’s jerky attempts at starting the engine, Wyeth toppled to his side, causing the boat to list.

  “Can’t you make him sit?” Ryan had asked.

  I ran my hand down Wyeth’s back. “Down,” I said. Wyeth obeyed. “He was just trying to see. You shouldn’t take this out on him. I wish we could put socks or something on his feet. You don’t think he could puncture the boat, do you?”

  Ryan shook his head, looking grim. “This might look and act like a balloon, but I’m sure it’s strong.”

  We finally pulled away from the dock and slowly maneuvered through the marina. I waved goodbye to Artie. She lifted her hand, and a surge of sadness washed over me. I would miss her. For the past four years I had seen her every day at the academy. She’d been a fixture in my life, no further away than a classroom or a phone call away. I tried to picture her in Tanzania, one of the few places where her bright clothing and bandanas wouldn’t make a statement. I loved Artie’s statements, her comical commentaries on the students and their sometimes-frustrating parents, and her dating antidotes. Her personal cast of male characters had made going to work on Mondays a pleasure. I had always looked forward to hearing how Artie had spent her weekend. Now, all of her weekends would be spent with James, a man who camped on a hill to spy on his own house.

  “Ryan,” I said, “when I first met James he told me he spied on his house to make sure Phil didn’t steal anything, yet when we told him that we thought Phil had stolen something, he seemed indifferent.”

  Ryan didn�
�t answer, presumably because he was concentrating on not hitting a buoy. “Don’t you think that’s weird?”

  The bright orange buoy bobbed at us. It held a sign that read, “Leaving Lister’s no wake zone.” That meant we could increase our speed, but Ryan kept us wakeless. We moved into the Strait of Georgia’s open waters

  I frowned at Ryan. He had his tongue between his teeth in concentration. “We can go faster now,” I said.

  Ryan gave me a cranky look. We trolled past the islands, and as we moved away from land, the waves kicked up. The wind blew saltwater into my face, and the cry of the gulls faded as we steered into deeper waters. The boat picked up speed as Ryan gained confidence. Away from the marina there was little he could hit. I smiled at him as he gunned the engine. He jiggled his eyebrows at me and grinned in return. I laughed and took in the stunning landscape. A red and white-striped lighthouse stood on a distant island cliff. Tall golden grass topped the black rocks jutting out of the gray blue Sound. To our left, a fish jumped high into the water and landed with a splash that sent a spray as crystal as diamonds into the air. I itched for a paintbrush and wished I could capture the sky and sea on canvas.

  Wyeth leaned against me and I hugged him close. I forgot about murderers, intruders, yaks and heat-packing priests. I felt uncommonly happy until I scratched Wyeth belly. He was wet. I looked down at the crevice where the side of the boat met the floor. An inch of water had seeped in from a widening hole.

  Ryan, his face turned into the sun and wind, had lost his apprehensive concentration.

  I looked back down at the growing pool of water then searched the Strait for the closest island. I tied the handles of the plastic grocery bag into a tight knot and hoped the brown smear wouldn’t be washed away.

  I looked around the boat. Maybe if it’d been a proper boat there’d be compartments, nooks or crannies holding a repair kit, maybe a flare, a first aid kit, or a whistle. I slipped off my sneaker and tugged on my Band-Aid. It still had plenty of stick. I pulled it off, careful to keep my wound out of the Sound’s salty water. I bit my lip and looked at the far distant shore. The boat ride had lost all pleasure.

  Ryan watched me. “What are you doing?”

  Holding the Band-Aid in one hand, I used my other hand to try and find the source of the leak. I felt Ryan’s gaze on my back.

  I hoped the problem would be an innocent fraying of a seam, but where the side met the bottom a small, clean slit, likely made by a knife, let in a growing stream of water. The Band-Aid proved useless.

  Ryan turned off the engine and without the motor’s drone, everything was quiet and still. “Don’t stop!” My voice verged on panic. “We need to drive as fast as we can before we sink.”

  “You should probably take off your clothes,” he said, lifting off his own T-shirt.

  Chapter Eleven

  The last person that had asked me to undress had been a blonde nurse practitioner with black chin hairs. Despite the breeze, sweat dotted Ryan’s brow and glistened on his chest. I looked away and clutched Wyeth’s leash tightly while I fought a flutter of terror.

  Ryan reached for a coil of rope and tossed it aside to reveal a pile of orange life preservers. He flipped a small and medium sized vest at me, one for me and one for Wyeth. I felt jumpy and began to sweat. I pulled Wyeth against my side.

  “It’ll be easier to swim without our clothes,” Ryan said.

  Or underwear from Cleo’s closet, I thought, slipping off my shirt, exposing the lime green bra with hot pink flamingos. I still couldn’t believe I’d let Grammy Hailey talk me into ever setting foot into that store. I’m sure she’d never envisioned this scenario.

  Ryan quickly looked away, but his lips quirked slipped as he slipped on the vest and tugged at the straps that barely fit around his chest. He kicked off his shoes and took off his jeans, exposing a pair of boxers that resembled Spiderman’s suit.

  “Savannah bought them,” he said, catching me looking.

  I pulled off my shorts and told myself that Ryan had seen me countless times in my swimsuit at the gym. While I put on my vest, Ryan slipped Wyeth’s paws into the small life-jacket. Ryan Everett, realtor, devoted uncle, a critic of Hailey’s Comments, and dog savior. After tightly securing the straps around Wyeth, who didn’t like wearing sweaters let alone bulky orange life vests, Ryan restarted the engine with a roar and we barreled toward the closest island. Buoys beware.

  I floated on my back with the grocery bag sitting on my chest. I had tied the handles tightly and had maneuvered the sheet so that the smear sat at the top of a small sheet teepee. I had almost no hope of the sheet remaining dry. Wyeth splashed beside me while Ryan swam to my right, with one arm stroking through the water, the other held the deflated inflatable’s rope.

  I’d grown immune to my stinging cut foot. The mild breeze had taken a mean turn and it whipped along the surface splashing me. I kept my mouth firmly shut to keep from swallowing salt water. My silent tears ran down my cheeks and disappeared into the Sound.

  “We’re almost there,” Ryan lied to me in a ragged voice. I admired him for towing the partially deflated boat. It couldn’t be easy. A lone bubble of air that Ryan called the “safety pocket” remained. I suspected that he knew nothing about inflatables or “safety pockets,” but for once I didn’t say anything, mostly because I didn’t want a mouthful of the Sound’s salty water.

  I hoped Lucy and Frank would appreciate his efforts to rescue the boat. Pennies were undoubtedly more precious to Frank and Lucy than to either Ryan or me. I hoped he wasn’t risking his life to save a boat. I speculated on the likelihood that our predicament was accidental.

  Beside me, Ryan grunted, turned, and stood up. The water reached his mid thighs. The partially submerged Spidey undies filled with air. He reached out, plucked the grocery bag from off my chest and examined the smear.

  “Still brown.” He gave me a tired smile and reached out to pull me to my feet. I stood close to him for a moment, enjoying his warmth, but then he moved toward the shore, dragging the inflatable and rope behind him. I shivered and went after him. The island we landed on looked deserted. A flock of seagulls stood sentry on crop of black rocks, and craggy pines guarded the bank above the strip of shore. I wondered how long it would be until someone thought to look for us.

  On the horizon a small vessel moved in our direction. I waved my arms and shouted, “Hallelujah!” We weren’t sailing into eternity after all.

  A figure on the boat stood and returned my wave. The little boat picked up speed and headed toward us.

  Ryan turned to look at me, relief in his gaze. His hair was wet and matted, he had dried salt in his eyebrows, and a piece of kelp was tucked behind his ear. I threw my arms around him anyway. I laughed in relief as I held him close, my wet, cold body shivering against his. I felt disappointment when he pulled away too soon, but then warmth filled my body when his lips softly pressed against mine.

  Chapter Twelve

  “Am I interrupting?” The man wouldn’t meet my eye.

  Ryan laughed and moved away from me. I really wanted him to answer the man’s question with something more than a chuckle. While Ryan made introductions, explained our predicament and arranged our return to the mainland, I shivered and my mind raced with questions that mostly had to do with kissing.

  Leonard, the fisherman, would look at my hair, or at my feet, but from the moment Ryan pulled me over the edge of the small fiberglass boat, he refused eye contact. I think it had to do with my flamingo underwear that was not quite hidden beneath my orange life preserver.

  Because the crab cages took up most of the sitting room, Ryan, Wyeth, and I had to squish on a bench. Ryan and Leonard had tied the deflated inflatable to a towrope, and it cut through the water behind us.

  Leonard wore a Mariner’s baseball cap over his bald head and a polo shirt buttoned over a mat of gray chest hair. He was a living testament to the adage that growing older meant your hair stopped growing on your head and started poking out o
f other, more unusual places. His skin had weathered to a wrinkly rawhide. His tan to extended the middle of his biceps, but his skin was pure white beneath the sleeves of his polo shirt.

  Crabs clicked their claws at me from inside their cages. Some cages housed two or more crabs while others only held hunks of dead fish. I huddled beside Ryan and kept an arm around Wyeth. Both felt warm and solid against my goosepimply skin. Ryan had rolled our clothes into a ball that he had tucked under his arm. I thought about asking for at least my shorts, thinking that if I covered up my flamingo panties Leonard and I would be more comfortable with each other. But since our clothes were wet, comfort was beyond reach.

  I wanted to ask Ryan about the kiss, but of course, Leonard made that impossible. Or at least, uncomfortable. More uncomfortable.

  “You sure have a lot of crab,” Ryan commented. “Are you a commercial fisherman?”

  “Heck no,” Leonard said. “I just do my crabbing and sell some of my leftovers to the Cassie’s Crabby over in La Conner. Lucky thing I saw you two, you could have been waiting on that island half a life time.”

  “It certainly seemed like half a lifetime,” I said, shivering.

  Leonard looked from my hair to Ryan’s face. “You two married?”

  We both shook our heads. “Just friends,” Ryan said.

  I gave Ryan a sideways glance. Just friends? Because that kiss wasn’t a friendly peck. I know pecks. That was a kiss that scorched, and scorching is always difficult, but especially difficult, when you’re bordering on hypothermia in the middle of the Puget Sound. I wondered if Ryan had felt the same heat.

  He lowered his eyebrows at Ryan. “Ever been married?”

  “Huh, no. Close. Engaged once.”

  Leonard waited, clearly expecting an account. To my surprise, Ryan gave one. Maybe he thought a little soul bearing was a small price to pay for a rescue. “Lindsey was a lot of fun, but she was more interested in fun than a family…she didn’t want children.”

  Leonard’s eyes flicked to my bra. “You look like fun on a pogo stick,” he said.