Booked for Trouble (19 page)

T
uesday brought more rain and another busy day at the library as frantic parents sought some way of entertaining bored and restless children.

I'd given a lot of thought to the Gray Woman, Diane, and Curtis. In the aftermath of the shock of seeing them together, I'd been convinced that all three of them had been responsible for the theft of the necklace and the death of Karen.

But then, as I'd run over the accusatory speech I'd planned to give Detective Watson, like a sailboat becalmed, I began to run out of wind.

Diane and Curtis had not been at the hotel, as far as I knew. They were not members of my book club (another mark against them in my mind), and they hadn't seemed to know Karen.

Much as I might want to see them under arrest (and off the library board), I couldn't come up with a reason to suspect them of criminal behavior.

But they and this Irene Dawson, the Gray Woman, were up to something. And whatever it was, it wouldn't be good for the Lighthouse Library.

Unfortunately Bertie was away all day in Manteo at a meeting of the Dare County library directors, and had mentioned that she was looking forward to having dinner with friends after. I didn't think this was something I could talk to her about on the phone. It would have to wait until tomorrow.

“Rain's stopped,” Ronald said as we were tidying up at the end of the day. “It's going to be a nice evening.”

I harrumphed.

“Is your mother still in town?”

“I am beginning to fear she'll never leave.”

“Trouble on the home front?”

“Maybe. I just don't know.” I dropped into a chair. Charles jumped into my lap.

“Wanna talk about it?” Ronald said.

I rubbed Charles's ears. “She wants me to come home to Boston. I've told her and told her I have no intention of doing so. I'm happy here, and I am going to stay. If Ricky crawled all the way from Boston on his knees to beg me to come back, I wouldn't go. I just don't know what Mom's up to. She's not usually sneaky and devious. What my mom wants, she goes for. If she doesn't get it, then she decides she didn't want it after all. All this plotting is making my head hurt.”

“Why don't you just ask her?”

“What?”

“Come out with it. Have a serious mother-and-daughter heart-to-heart. Tell her what you've told me. Point out to her that she can't live at the Ocean Side Hotel forever. Or maybe you could get one of your brothers to phone and tell her to come home.”

“There is the unfortunate matter of her being told not to leave Dare County.”

“Your mother's not exactly a hardened criminal,” Ronald pointed out. “Or a member of the mob or something. She's a respectable citizen with a home and family life. Watson will let her go home if she promises to keep in touch.”

I let out a long breath. “You're right. I won't go to my brothers for help, but I do need to talk to Mom.” I lifted Charles off my lap and stood up. “No time like the present. I'll go over there now.”

“You go, girl,” Ronald said.

I gave him a big hug, and ran upstairs. Ronald was right. It was time to have a good talk with Mom. If there was one word I'd have used to describe my mom, it would be sensible. This insistence on staying on, in the face of everything I said about not going home, was highly uncharacteristic of her. Her behavior over the past week had been so abnormal I was beginning to worry that something was seriously wrong. Was she ill? She didn't look ill. She looked as good as ever, although naturally strained as the police investigation wore on. I'd try to convince her once and for all that I was not going back to Boston and I was not going to marry Ricky. If she refused to give up, I'd demand to know what was going on in her life. She and Louise Jane were supposedly meeting at the hotel this evening. It was a few minutes after six now. Rather than phoning ahead and alerting Mom to my arrival, I'd pop around and hopefully catch them in the act. The act of plotting against me, that is.

Life in the Outer Banks was proving to be interesting, all right, but also complicated. I'd never suspected anyone of plotting against me in Boston. Unless it was Ricky trying to ensure that no one told me he'd gone away for a weekend at the Cape with Marjorie Price.

Silly boy. Of course the minute Marjorie “accidentally” let it slip, all my so-called friends (more like daughters of my mother's friends) called me with the news.

I pulled on a pair of much-loved jeans, a thick, warm sweater, and sneakers, and stuffed my hair into a rough ponytail. I didn't want to be dragged into another dinner with George and anyone else Mom might round up.

Great minds think alike, or so they say, and my phone rang as I was waiting at the end of the lighthouse drive for the highway traffic to pass.

Mom got straight to the point. “If you've finished work, dear, Louise Jane's here and we're about to go for a walk. Why don't you join us? There's nothing nicer than a stroll along the beach as the sun sets, is there?”

Right about now, a root canal sounded nicer than a walk while Louise Jane and Mom schemed to get me back to Boston. I'd try to think of some way to get rid of the pesky Louise Jane so Mom and I could have that talk.

“Oh, and Detective Watson called a few minutes ago. I thought you might be interested in what he had to say. When shall we expect you?”

“Five minutes.” I threw the phone onto the seat, and pulled into the traffic. Outer Banks drivers seemed dreadfully impatient today. A man leaned on his horn and waved at me in an unfriendly gesture. Must be the weather.

I parked and walked up to the hotel entrance. To my considerable dismay, whom did I see heading in the same direction but Theodore Kowalski?

“Hi, Lucy,” he said, sounding genuinely surprised to see me. And, dare I say, pleased. Today's outfit was gray slacks, blue shirt, blue-and-white-striped linen jacket, accented by a white cravat with blue stripes. All he needed
was a straw hat to look like he was heading for the Royal Enclosure at Ascot.

I looked into Theodore's eyes. He was eccentric all right. But did that eccentricity go any further than dress and fake accent? Was he a killer?

How the heck could I tell? What did a killer look like, anyway?

“What brings you here?” I asked.

“Your mother suggested a stroll on the beach. Perhaps an ice cream on the pier.”

“And you just happened to have a suitable outfit handy?”

“Of course.”

I was about to ask him straight out if my mother was giving him money to buy the Ian Flemings. But I swallowed the words. What Mom did was her affair. I'd never spared a thought to how she or my dad spent their money in the past. I wouldn't now. I had more than enough on my plate.

Theodore held out his arm. “Shall we?”

“Oh, all right.” I took it, and we walked into the lobby. Mom smiled broadly at the sight of us together.

I reconsidered asking about the books.

Louise Jane also smiled. As usual she resembled a shark playfully circling a hapless fish.

I had no doubt that I was the fish.

Mom and Louise Jane had empty glasses in front of them and a book spread open on the table. I knew that book. It had come from the library.
Legends of the Outer Banks.
The page was open to a black-and-white sketch of the Bodie Island Lighthouse. It was night and wispy clouds drifted across a full moon. The light of the moon shone on a Civil War–era soldier, holding a lantern aloft against the dark.

My teeth were beginning to ache from all the gritting I'd been doing lately. “I'm tired,” I said. “It's been a heck of a long day. You know that book's fiction, right, Mom?”

“Legends,” Louise Jane corrected. “Myths and legends have their origins in true stories.”

“Not always.”

“You can't deny that strange things have been happening at the lighthouse since you arrived, Lucy. Why, you hadn't been there for a week when poor Jonathan Uppiton was killed.”

“That had nothing to do with me!”

“And now Karen Kivas.”

“I didn't—”

“My point exactly. You had nothing to do with either of those tragedies. But you clearly have stirred up something that had been quiet. Quiet for a very long time.”

“I hope you're not proposing to come back to my apartment and spread more
protection
?”

“You mean like a spell?” Mom asked.

“Fat lot of good that did last time,” I pointed out.

“You're still here, aren't you?” Louise Jane snapped.

“No thanks to—”

“This is the first I've heard,” Mom said, “of any last time. Now, I'm not one for the supernatural—” That at least was true. Mom was nothing if not totally practical. “—but it does seem as though this lighthouse is not a safe place for you to be living, Lucille.”

“My living arrangements are not open to discussion.”

Mom got to her feet. Louise Jane closed the book and put it into her cavernous bag.

“Now, let's have that walk,” Mom said. “By the time we get to the pier, it'll be dark. We can take a cab back.
Theodore, dear, you walk with Lucy and try to talk some sense into my daughter.”

Mom and Louise Jane marched away, leaving me with Theodore. He was probably the last person in the world I'd take advice from.

He gave me a rueful grin. “The library always seems like a perfectly safe place to me.”

“You don't really feel like a walk, do you?”

“Sure I do,” he said. Acting was not his strong suit.

“Oh, come along, then.” I grabbed his arm and we followed my mother.

The storm had cleared and the clouds had moved on, leaving a beautiful twilight. The beach was full of families and couples enjoying the last rays of light. Children ran here and there, searching for flotsam washed ashore by the winds and high waves. The ocean, of course, is to the east, so there isn't a spectacular sunset when the great ball drops beyond the rim of the earth, but the soft, gentle light is diffused with orange and pink, deep grays and purple. Everything looks so fresh and clean and the world seems like a peaceful, calm place. I took off my sneakers and held them in my hands. The wet sand was deliciously cool under my feet, and the surf purred as it stroked the shore. Out at sea, lights were coming on, specks of yellow and white in the blackening water and sky.

Mom and Louise Jane walked ahead of us. I snapped my head out of my appreciation of the evening as I remembered why I'd been lured on this pleasant little stroll, anyway. “Hey!” I yelled. I abandoned Teddy and ran up the beach. “You said you had something to tell me, Mom. About Detective Watson?”

“Oh, yes, him. He called earlier. Said I am free to leave.”

“That's great! Did he say why?”

“No, but I immediately called Amos. He told me that the police simply have no reason to continue to restrict my movements. They had to admit that anyone could have put that necklace in my bag, and as for Karen . . . even they were forced to agree that after a life of perfect respectability, the idea that I would turn into a cold-blooded murderer over a minor slight is preposterous. Amos did, I gather, convince them that if I had killed Karen, I would have confessed and thrown myself on the mercy of the court.”

“Have they arrested someone?”

“Amos says the investigation continues. He added that Watson has my address and I may be called back.”

“When are you going home?”

“In a couple of days.”

“Why not tomorrow? Aren't you anxious to get home and put all of this behind you?”

“I've had enough walking. Let's turn back and have a drink in the bar.”

She retraced her steps. Louise Jane scurried after her and they soon caught up with Theodore. My mom was cleared of the theft and the murder. I had not for the slightest moment thought she was guilty, but now that the suspicion was lifted, I wasn't feeling as happy as I should be. I'd been worried about Mom from the day she arrived. She'd been behaving so strangely. Why wasn't she taking the chance to dash off home?

I glanced down the beach. Children played in the surf and young couples held hands and kissed in the deepening twilight.

I would have liked to continue with the walk. Take some time to forget about the death of Karen Kivas and
enjoy the ending of the day. I wouldn't forget Karen. But the cause of her death was no longer my concern.

I walked back to the hotel, deep in thought, following my mother's footsteps in the sand, slowly fading as the tide moved in.

I had no intention of joining them for a drink. Leave the three of them to plot all they want. When I walked through the lobby, planning to head straight for my car without even saying good-bye, Mom was standing at the reception desk. She held a piece of paper in her hand and had a puzzled look on her face.

“What's up?” I asked. “Where's Louise Jane and Theodore?”

“I told them to go ahead. The clerk called me over. She said someone left this for me. What do you make of it?”

She handed me the note. It was on hotel stationery, the type left out on tables in the alcove by the windows overlooking the dunes. A strong, rough hand had written:
I know your secret. Be in your room 8:00. Or else I make some phone calls.

I checked my watch. “It's almost eight now. Ask them to move you to another room. Or better still, check out of the hotel altogether. You can go to Ellen's.”

“I want to see what this is about.”

“Some nut wanting to get you alone in your room. That's what it's about, Mom.”

“Then why the warning?”

Why indeed?

“This must have something to do with Karen,” she said.

“That's entirely possible. Which is why I don't want you meeting him. I'm going to phone the police.”

“No. I don't like that Watson. I don't trust him.”