Island Intrigue (6 page)

“Hello. Mrs. Dunsweeney, I think it was?”

“I'm not married.”

“Ah.” Elizabeth nodded knowingly.

“Did you ever find out who put the laxative in the tea?” Sabrina asked, with a touch of malice.

“It was one of those nasty Wavers.” Elizabeth's eyes narrowed. “I told the sergeant I wanted to press charges but he said it was just a prank and we'd be better off ignoring the whole thing. I mean, really.” She sniffed.

Brad came around the corner and saw the three of them. His face was flushed and he looked excited. “I got a call from Ninja—my uncle just got elected to the Senate, but he used to be the president of the Sanitary Concessionary—” he added as an aside for Sabrina's benefit. “He says he'll definitely support me. He's going to try to make it to the rally on Wednesday night.”

“How wonderful!” Elizabeth gushed, rushing over to her son and patting his arm.

“How wonderful,” Gary echoed, but with a touch of sarcasm. His eyes glittered with something other than brotherly love. Bradford was oblivious, basking in the praise from his mother.

“I just came in for some lunch,” Sabrina said, as she turned to leave. “Congratulations, Brad.”

Surprisingly, Gary called after her in a pleasant voice: “Miss Dunsweeney, please come back any time.”

Sabrina left the Tittletott House feeling uneasy. Something strange jittered beneath the Tittletotts' conversation, something dark and ugly, like hate and jealousy.

Sabrina shivered and hurried out into the stormy afternoon.

Chapter Six

Murky clouds hovered, fat and heavy with rain. Lightening glimmered in their depths, like a faulty light bulb ready to blow. Though it was only early afternoon, the thick air was so dark it could have been dusk.

Sabrina turned left along Hurricane Harbor Circle. Boats of all sizes were scurrying home across the flat pewter water, leaving contrails of foaming water in their wakes, and waitresses were closing the mismatched umbrellas over the outside tables at Walk-the-Plank Pub.

The young, dark man with Brad was a member of the infamous Wrightly Clan, she thought as she walked down the deserted street. A family descended from a vicious pirate and reputedly proud of it.

She passed the Ride the Big One Surf Shop and Bar and followed the curve of the road away from the harbor toward the rickety bridge. She paused on the bridge and looked up at the sky, marveling at the dense purple-black of the clouds. A slight wind began pushing at the heavy air, stirring the drooping leaves on the trees.

“I think I'd better hurry,” Sabrina said out loud, and suited action to words. Her cottage was still five minutes away and as she tottered down Lighthouse Road in her heels, another gust of wind rushed from the sky, bending the trees and swirling leaves through the air. She hugged her bare arms and increased her speed.

She was in the run-down part of the island that Lima called “Waver Town.” Old ramshackle houses and shops leaned haphazardly on either side of the street, and a weather-beaten dock stretched out into the harbor. Rusty work boats chugged homeward in great clouds of black smoke.

This was definitely not the tourist part of town. Old cars and pickup trucks with no tires and very little paint were reposing on blocks in front yards, and crab pots and nets were stacked in every available space. Bearded men dressed in rubber over-alls hurried past her, carrying buckets and rakes. She was rounding the curve by the High Tide Baptist Church when the next gush of wind brought with it cold, stinging rain drops, which quickly increased to a downpour.

“Just wonderful,” Sabrina said, and then spotted the bright welcoming lights of a shop through the hammering rain. She slipped in the muddy street and lurched against the door, falling through it onto her knees.

“Ooooh child, what in the world have you done to yourself?” asked a low, melodious voice. Little hands helped her off the floor, and closed the door decisively on the howling wind.

“Thank you,” Sabrina mumbled, swiping heavy curls out of her eyes, and blinking as she saw the apparition in front of her.

A tiny, elderly woman dressed in a long white robe stood with her hands on her hips. Elaborate designs in green and gold were embroidered on her immaculate robes, and some sort of symbol was drawn in what looked like a black magic marker on her forehead.

“You're the girl staying in our old house,” she said, surveying Sabrina from head to foot. “Dunsweeney. Sally, or Sarah. No, wait. Sandra, Samantha, Savannah—”

“Sabrina.” Sabrina tried to wipe the mud from her knees and discovered with a wince that blood was mixed with the mud.

“Look at you, child, you scraped your knees. Sit down, and I'll fix you up.” The woman pulled Sabrina over to a chair, and then disappeared into a back room.

Sabrina caught her breath as she looked around the store. Though the exterior of the store was unfinished and rough, the inside was bright and cheery, with white tile and walls, red checkered tablecloths on the two tables, and long gleaming display cases displaying various types of cookies, cakes and bread. And the smell! The smell was intoxicating.

Outside, it was impossible to see more than a few feet past the windows. The rain was drumming on the roof, the wind picking at the edge of the door, threatening to throw it open. Sabrina looked around, wondering what the old woman was doing.

“It's a regular devil's blow out there,” the diminutive lady said as she came out of the back room and carefully closed the door behind her.

“You're right. I thought I could beat it home. Should we be worried about tornadoes?” Sabrina glanced out the window as a hard gust of wind smacked the building.

“I'd be more worried about water spouts if I were you.”

The woman crouched in front of Sabrina and, using a wash cloth, wiped the blood and mud from her knees.

“Water spouts?” Sabrina winced despite the woman's gentle touch.

“Tornadoes on the water. They normally stay out on the water, but you never know, sometimes they'll come ashore. Like that one.” She gestured at a picture on the wall. “That one came ashore ‘bout ten years ago and wiped out a row of houses.”

Sabrina looked where she was pointing and saw a picture of a white lighthouse, dwarfed by a large black funnel cloud, stretching from the water to sky.

“You got a picture of it? Weren't you scared?”

“I just happened to be volunteering at the Lighthouse that day, and here comes a storm, from slick cam to devil's blow, in a matter of minutes. And there was the water spout, just getting bigger and bigger and coming closer and closer. Nowhere to go, really, so I just took pictures of it, until it veered to the side and came ashore where Lighthouse Estates is now. Killed one old tourist fellow, picked him up and dropped him down slam bam on top of the recycling center. Scared the helius out of Missy Garrison, who was working there. I always wondered what it felt like, to be picked up by that big old wall of wind and water, and flown through the air. I'd say it wasn't a bad way to die, flying through the air. There, how does that feel?”

Sabrina realized that she had been so fascinated by the woman's story that she hadn't paid any attention as the woman smeared on brown ointment and taped soft white bandages across her knees. Now, she peered with interest down at the bandage and saw that it had been professionally applied. Sabrina made a mental note to apply antibiotic cream when she got home, and to look in her medical book to make sure there was no exotic germ or fungus she might have picked up in the mud.

“Thank you. I feel like a kid at the nurse's office.” She flexed her knees, ouching a bit as she did.

“I'm Louise Nettie Wrightly.” The woman thrust out her hand, smeared with the brown ointment. “Call me Nettie.”

“I'm Sabrina.” Sabrina shook her hand. This was the matriarch of the infamous Wrightly family? “What kind of ointment is this?” She smelled the pungent stuff on her fingers.

“My own special recipe,” Nettie said, getting to her feet as agile as a child. “Raccoon's blood, turtle's teeth, bat dandruff…” She broke off, her eyes gleaming.

“How nice. Your broom's in the closet, I presume?”

Nettie burst out laughing. “No broom. I'm not a witch, though Wicca has always fascinated me. I call myself an Experimentalist. I experiment with religions. I've got a real talent for them. I embrace all religions, all denominations, and I plan to start my own one of these days.”

The wrinkled face was set in earnest lines, a slight hunch to her shoulders giving her a coquettish upward tilt to her face, as if she was always peering toward the sky. Her bright cinnamon eyes were small and lively, an impish gleam in them as she waited for her visitor's reaction.

Sabrina wasn't quite sure what to say. She decided to stay on the safe side of the slippery slope of religion. “I love your shop. It must be a wonderful place to come to work every day.”

“It's nice all right.” Nettie looked around and nodded in approval. “I just wish those infernal Tittletotts would sell it to me so I wouldn't be beholden to them for my livelihood.”

“You don't own the shop?”

“No, the Tittletotts own this building, and most every building in Waver Town. They lease them to us, but it sticks in our craw to have to pay them rent every month. And if they ever decided to take against a body…well, they would have us over a barrel, let me just say that.”

“Well.” Sabrina floundered for yet another safe subject. “I wanted to tell you how much I've enjoyed staying in your cottage.”

“My husband grew up there.” Nettie was easily diverted, Sabrina was thankful to see. She sat in the chair opposite Sabrina and smoothed her white robes. “He built the New Wrightly House for me when we got married forty years ago, but I always liked the old one best. So many people lived and died in that house. It's over a hundred years old.”

“I never would have guessed.” Sabrina kept a straight face.

“We never expected to rent it out like this, but that real estate friend of Thierry's told us how much money we were missing out on every week we let it sit empty, so we thought…why not?”

“I'm certainly glad you decided to. I think I may have seen your son, Thierry, today.”

“That boy.” She sighed. “Sometimes it's a real trial being a parent. You don't have children, do you? No, I didn't think so. You love your children no matter what, no matter how much they disappoint you. Thierry's been following after a bad man—he's always been easily swayed by pretty talk, you understand. Thierry's like that, never thinking much before jumping into something. He means well, but sometimes I think he's not so smart. But you love them no matter what, you have no choice.” She sighed again, then smiled. “May says you've made yourself quite at home, with your little sparrow. I'm glad. Lora is happy to have you there, I think.”

“Calvin's a parakeet.”

“A parakeet? You should bring him over to meet Horatio.” Nettie beamed a crinkled smile at Sabrina.

“Horatio?”

“My cockatoo. I'm glad you're a bird person, so few of us are. You've got your cat people, and your dog people, of course, and some people are even rodent and reptile people, though I've never really understood that. And then you've got your bird people. We're a special breed, my dear.”

“Really? I didn't know.” Sabrina found herself relaxing with this sweet, slightly batty, matriarch of the Wrightly clan, and barely able to get a word in edgewise.

“My, yes. A special breed. Now, if you were a twelve twelve person as well, that would be a real coincidence.”

“Twelve twelve person?”

“Yes. I'm attracted to the number twelve twelve. Have been my whole life. I always look at the clock at twelve twelve, my first child was born at twelve twelve, the last four digits of my phone number are twelve twelve. I could go on and on. It means that I'm one of the special people who will help lead the people of the world to the light after Armageddon. Though it better happen soon, or I'll be dead, and all those people will wander around aimlessly without me.”

“Sometimes I look at the clock at 3:04,” Sabrina said. “Does that mean anything?”

Nettie cocked her head to one side like a bird, and thought. “I'm not sure. I'll have to look it up. It may mean that you have some small task after Armageddon, like leading the birds to safety, or helping clean the roads that lead to the light. Something like that. The good thing is that you're a numbers person. That means we have even more in common. Well, it looks like the rain has stopped.” She got to her feet. “It's been wonderful talking to you, why don't you bring your parakeet over tonight, maybe around eight? Good. I'm sure Horatio would love to meet him. Here's some cookies to take with you, my specialty, Millionaire Cookies. Good-bye.”

A moment later, Sabrina found herself outside the shop, holding a fragrant white bag, and wondering at Nettie's version of “Here's your hat, what's your hurry?” She hadn't been able to ask any questions about Lora.

***

“She's gone,” Nettie Wrightly said as she came into the back room of the shop. “I don't think she suspected anything. You have to be more careful. If anybody sees you…” Nettie lowered herself to a chair, feeling the pain in her joints. Well, why not? She was almost sixty-five years old. Or was it seventy-five? Anyway, she was old enough to know better, that's for sure.

“No one saw me,” the man said. He was seated in the back corner of the store room, his black clothes blending into the shadows. A black hat was pulled low over his eyes, and a long sword in a black sheath rested by his side.

“You're just lucky then,” Nettie snapped, but then her tone softened. “It was a bad storm. I don't blame you for wanting to get out of the rain. Now you better stay here until it gets dark, and then slip out the back. I'll pack you some more sandwiches, and I've got a bag of shrimp I boiled up after Dock brought them in yesterday. This can't go on too much longer.”

“It doesn't have to,” the man said in a low voice. “It'll all be over Wednesday night.”

Nettie was troubled. “I wish you would tell me what this is all about. It's been so long, are you sure…?”

In the corner, the shadow stirred. “He's got to pay for what he did.”