White Elephant Dead (3 page)
Max reached into a cabinet for a flashlight. “Let’s check out the west loop of Sand Dollar. I’ll drive to the gate and go south. You drive north. And Annie, keep your cell phone turned on.”
Rain slid thickly over the windshield like water cascading from a fountain. Max doubted he could find an ark outlined in neon, much less an old black car. The gusting rain cut visibility to a couple of feet. As for the woods to his left and the salt marsh to his right, they existed only in his memory. He knew they were there, but they were shrouded in fog and rain. He was more worried about Henny than he wanted to admit to Annie. Of course, Henny could have gotten stuck, or slid into a ditch, but surely she’d found her way to shelter. Even the most remote houses were not more than a mile or so from a neighbor. She might even now be drying off in someone’s clubroom, awaiting a wrecker.
Just in case, Max used his cell phone. There was a recorded message at Ronnie’s Wrecker Service. After the tone, he said, “Ronnie, this is Max Darling. Annie and I are out looking for Henny Brawley. Please let me know—” he left his cell phone number—“if Henny’s called for help. We’re afraid she’s stuck out in this storm. Thanks.”
He peered through the watery glass. He was speeding along at about fifteen miles an hour, but even so, he should be nearing the first major turnoff, Red-Tailed Hawk Road, which angled south. Annie said Henny was looking for the van used to pick up donations. He was no expert on club duties but it seemed odd to him to frolic about collecting discards in this storm. Maybe the van skidded off the road. Whatever, the sooner he and Annie scoured the area, the sooner he could present Annie with his latest superb repast. Had he used just a touch too much garlic? But the master touch was the freshly grated Romano cheese—
Max braked. Slowly. Carefully. He turned onto Red-Tailed Hawk.
The windshield wipers struggled against the downpour. Annie’s eyes swung from one side of the road to the other. She fished out her cell phone, called Emma Clyde. Annie knew that number by heart. Emma was a cherished customer of Death on Demand as well as being one of the star
authors with her very own shelf. Emma had long ago refused to go on author tours. Though she refused to do a formal signing, Emma did deign to come by and autograph her new books. Annie was pleased to be able to offer signed copies of Emma Clyde titles to her mailing list and Internet customers. Emma had dropped by the store a couple of weeks ago to autograph the latest Marigold Rembrandt novel,
The Adventure of the Purloined Python
, and she and Annie had talked about the upcoming Women’s Club White Elephant Sale. Knowing Emma, Annie could count on her having a computer file on pick-up routes. The phone rang and rang. No answer. Damn. Annie thought for a moment, then took a deep breath and punched in her mother-in-law’s number.
“Laurel? Listen, Henny may have had car trouble. Max and I are out looking for her—”
“Oh my dear. I knew there was a reason for my concern.” The husky voice could have led a dirge. “Out of nowhere this afternoon, I pictured monkshood! Monkshood!”
Annie wasn’t about to go down this byway. “Look, Laurel. We need your help. Please get a phone bank busy calling everybody in the Women’s Club. Find out if anyone’s heard from Henny since six o’clock. Call me on my cell phone if you find her.”
“Monkshood,” came the sepulchral tone. “Oh, I shall. But, Annie, the blooms were purple. I am very much afraid. There could be no clearer presentiment that danger is near.”
Annie clicked off the call. Dammit, that was spooky. Trust Laurel to make her feel like a beleaguered heroine in a Mary Stewart novel. However, Laurel, in her own dippy fashion, was dependable. Annie knew that even now phones were ringing across Broward’s Rock. The search for Henny was in full swing.
Annie slowed as she reached Laughing Gull Road, a narrow blacktop that ran east, intersecting Red-Tailed Hawk. Winding, reclusive roads poked south from Laughing Gull in the island’s most prestigious development around the Is
land Hills Country Club golf course. Annie hesitated, then pressed ahead on the main road, unhappily aware that Henny’s car could easily be in a ditch, invisible behind the curtain of rain. Annie was nearing the northern entrance to Red-Tailed Hawk when her cell phone squawked. She punched it on.
“Annie dear, picture a fleur-de-lis.” A pause while, presumably, Annie pictured a fleur-de-lis. “Oh, the dear iris, harbinger of spring, a message of lovely weather to come, if you will.”
Annie wouldn’t. She gritted her teeth.
Laurel’s throaty voice brimmed with cheer. “Harbinger. Isn’t that a gorgeous way of indicating a message?” To make the point clear, she said distinctly, “Fleur-de-lis. Message. Indeed”—Laurel spoke at a brisk clip, perhaps sensing impatience in her listener—“I have an important message. Serena Harris just called—and isn’t it a wonder how much her hair looks like parsley, so spriggy—although only faintly green—but certainly so appropriate to one imparting useful knowledge.” Just in case Annie’s wits were moldy from the rain, Laurel added sotto voice, “Parsley, useful knowledge.” Then, loudly and very quickly, “Serena reports that she saw Henny’s car turning onto Marsh Tacky Road shortly after six. Serena did wonder a bit, since that’s a dead end, but she simply had to get home in time for the rerun of Andy Griffith. Which always brings to mind the red camellia, which symbolizes unpretentious excellence and—”
Annie forbore saying it sure as hell didn’t bring any such thought to her mind. “Laurel”—forcefully—“is Serena sure it was Marsh Tacky Road? The little lane that runs west from Red-Tailed Hawk and dead-ends at King Snake Park?”
“My dear.” Laurel’s tone indicated disappointment in such churlish questioning of her source. “Quamoclit.”
Annie pressed the receiver against her ear. “What? What did you say?”
“Truth to tell—”
Always an interesting claim when made by Laurel.
“—I’ve not actually encountered the quamoclit flower. However, the import is clear: busybody. Add to that a dash of thistle—sternness—and I believe we may rest assured that the message is correct. In fact, we may adorn Serena with a wreath of liverwort, the token of confidence. Of course, liverwort is rather thick, like a bunch of moss on a log. Perhaps it might be difficult to create a wreath but—”
“Thank you, Laurel.” Annie ended the connection. Liverwort. She hoped it looked better than it sounded. As she punched in the number of Max’s cell phone, she slowed to a crawl, peering through the rain. Yes, she was at the turnoff to Red-Tailed Hawk.
Max answered on the first ring. Quickly, Annie reported the sighting of Henny’s car.
“Marsh Tacky Road?” His voice was puzzled.
“Yes. It runs west off Red-Tailed Hawk between Laughing Gull and the south loop of Sand Dollar.”
“I’m on Red-Tailed Hawk and almost to Sand Dollar. I must have passed Marsh Tacky. I’ll find a drive and turn around.”
No matter the static and buzz, just hearing his voice made Annie feel brighter and happier. Was the rain easing just a little? She felt a surge of relief. Yes, oh yes. And they had a definite place to go. “I’ll meet you there.”
The big black car loomed out of the rainy night, its taillights bright as warning lights on a channel buoy. The interior of the car was dark but the headlights speared through the night, twin beams illuminating silvery slanting rain.
As Annie jammed on her brakes, Max’s crimson Maserati roared to a stop behind her. Annie was grateful for her yellow slicker and billed hat and rubber boots. She was already slogging toward the old black Dodge—why had Henny left on the lights?—when Max caught up with her.
“Henny!” Annie shouted. The call sounded as forlorn as the cry of a mourning dove.
They reached the car. Max pointed an oversize flashlight
inside. Henny’s cell phone lay in the passenger seat. A crammed-full book bag rested on the floor. Henny never took a step without plenty of books to read.
Max swung the beam to the back. Empty.
Annie bent close to him. “Where can she be? There aren’t any houses on this road. It just leads to a little park supported by the Women’s Club. There’s a big lagoon and some picnic tables. The golf course is on the other side of the lagoon.” Not a destination of choice on a rain-drenched night. “Why in the world…” She didn’t complete the sentence. There didn’t seem to be a rational reason why Henny would turn onto this road. Except…
Annie turned, moved quickly to the front of the car. The headlight beams shone straight ahead. “Look, Max, look!” Annie broke into a run, or the nearest approximation, her boots squishing and sliding on the muddy road. If she hadn’t looked hard, she’d never have seen the dark blue van. Henny had driven into the storm in search of the Women’s Club van.
Annie swung her flashlight, and yes, there was the insignia on the door:
WOMEN’S CLUB, BROWARD’S ROCK, SOUTH CAROLINA
. But Annie couldn’t imagine what had led Henny here, to this remote and unfrequented lane. Oh well, of course she
could
imagine, as could any sophisticated mystery reader: a sighting on the main road, a determined chase, the cornering of the quarry on this deserted road.
But what then?
Despite the warm embrace of her slicker and only a vagrant splash of rain on her face, Annie suddenly felt as cold as Roderick Usher approaching Madeline’s tomb. She took a deep breath, tried to stave off a clammy sense of horror. Maybe deep familiarity with detective fiction had its drawbacks. This was no dreary House of Usher, it was simply the club van. And yes, Henny’s car was abandoned, but there were no indications of violence or injury. Annie had a sudden mental picture of the sailing ship, the
Mary Celeste
, found adrift off the Azores on December 3, 1872, breakfast
partially prepared in the galley, and not a soul aboard and never a hint to the fate of the crew and the captain, his wife and daughter.
Max pulled open the front door of the van. His light danced across the seats, revealing the disarray of an upended purse on the passenger seat and the gaping car pocket with tangled papers. Tape cassettes and CD cases spangled the floorboard.
Annie whirled and ran to the back of the van. She reached up, grabbed the handle and pulled.
The door swung open. The beam of her flashlight skimmed across bulging piles of clothes thrown helter-skelter. A broken wooden chair leaned against the mound of clothing. Wadded brown grocery sacks were stuffed in a corner. A worn wool blanket covered a lumpy form. The flashlight in Annie’s hand wavered as she stared at the exposed sole of a woman’s shoe and at a pale white ankle.
“M
ax!” Annie’s voice was thin and terrible, piercing the sodden night. She knew there was a body beneath that blanket, an utterly still shell without life.
Max’s strong arm came around her shoulders. “Hold on.” He swung his flashlight into the van. The beam illuminated the uneven bunching of the thin olive-green blanket, the mud clinging to the black leather shoe, the bare ankle.
“Annie.” He spoke quietly. “Go to your car. I’ll call—”
But she was already moving, shrugging free of Max’s touch, thrusting her flashlight at him, clambering into the van, reaching for the blanket. Yes, she knew the protocol for crime scenes, how the evidence would be handled by Ed McBain’s Steve Carella of New York’s 87th Precinct, Barbara D’Amato’s Chicago officer Suze Figueroa and Susan Dunlap’s Berkeley cop Jill Smith. But Annie wasn’t a cop, she was a friend. Henny. Dear Henny, so crisp and clever and kind. Annie gave no thought to fingerprints or DNA as she grabbed the end of the blanket and yanked, pulling hard
against a dreadful, unyielding weight. She scrambled next to the still form, pushed and pulled until the blanket slid away.
Blood matted dark hair.
Annie was so shocked that for an instant she could scarcely believe what she saw.
Not Henny. “It’s not Henny. Oh Max, it’s not Henny.” It felt like a shout even though she scarcely managed a whisper. There was an instant of unimaginable relief, but that was swiftly superseded by a wash of horror as she recognized Kathryn Girard, a brutally dead Kathryn, her skull crushed by a powerful blow. The ferocity of the attack made Annie feel sick and frightened.
Unwillingly, Annie reached past Kathryn, making sure there was not another body there. But no, that was only a quick nightmarish fear, impelled by the grisly discovery. There was no room for anyone else in the van.
Dear God, where was Henny? One murder was clear to see. Had there been two?
Annie heard the wail of the siren, but she didn’t pause in her slow, careful survey of the rain-drenched salt myrtle and bayberry and yaupon holly shrubs on either side of the road. Water glistened on ferns. She was looking for some trace of crushed branches or, worst possibility, another still form. Back and forth she swung her flashlight. She didn’t bother to hunt for footprints in the sticky mud of the narrow road. The steady rain would have washed out any trace. The siren choked off in midsqueal. Bright lights pierced the darkness behind her, signaling the arrival of the police. Max was at the van to hail them. He’d been reluctant to let her seek Henny, but he understood that she must. And, as she’d informed him, murderers don’t linger. Annie felt she was safe enough. If only Henny was safe…
A police radio crackled. She glanced back. A stark light flared behind the van. The methodical gathering of evidence had begun. No doubt a careful search was being organized.
Annie followed the curve in the road. The road widened
into a turnaround. An iron grillwork arch marked the entrance to King Snake Park. Annie suppressed a shudder, though a naturalist friend had once waxed rhapsodic about the glorious nonpoisonous Eastern King with its golden markings and its penchant for eating poisonous snakes. Annie took comfort in the fact (surely this was true) that snakes don’t like to be cold, so none of the glorious creatures should be writhing about near her on this rainy night. Her light played across a series of picnic tables, the beam poking here and there, as ineffectual in illuminating the darkness as the flicker of fireflies. Beyond the tables was the murky lagoon, undoubtedly home to alligators. Alligators hunt at night. The fearsome creatures reach fourteen feet, weigh five hundred pounds and have mouths with teeth that can rip small dogs into morsels.
If Henny was in the lagoon, she was long past help. If she was lost or hurt somewhere in this rugged terrain, she had to be found and found soon. The rain had eased. Now it was a steady, fine drizzle, but the temperature had dropped into the sixties. Obviously, Henny wasn’t on her feet, wasn’t able to call for help. If she were to lie unmoving too long, hypothermia would kill her.
Annie whirled and ran back toward the lights and the metallic squawk of the police radio.
A searchlight on the bed of a small pickup threw the back of the Women’s Club van into garish relief. Rain misted against the open rear door, beaded the floor.
Max was gesturing toward the woods. “…need to round up a search party. There’s no trace of Henny Brawley. My wife’s looking for her.”
“I’m in charge here.” Rain dripped from a snap-brim hat sheathed in plastic, rolled down the gray plastic poncho. The voice was gruff, the posture straight and stiff, and both seemed at odds with a youthful, rounded face with plump cheeks, dogged blue eyes and a snub nose. In the blazing spotlight, the earnest young man staring up at Max looked
more like a choirboy than a law officer. “Chief Garrett. My immediate duty is to secure the crime scene—”
“Chief”—Max’s voice was dangerously quiet—“we have a missing woman. She’s elderly, defenseless and—”
“Thought your wife told you this Brawley woman had chased after the victim.” He pointed at the van.
Annie skidded to a stop beside Max. “Henny went after the van because she was worried about Kathryn—”
“We’ll see what the lady says when we talk to her. You folks can wait over—”
“Chief!” Annie wished she were as imperious as Amanda Cross’s sleuth Kate Fansler. “You don’t understand. Henny Brawley is missing. There’s her car”—it was Annie’s turn to point—“and we haven’t found any trace of her. None.”
“She can’t get far. Now you folks need to get out of the way. This is a crime scene.” He swung toward the van. “Pirelli, make sure you get a complete sweep with the videocam—”
Lou Pirelli was stocky and muscular. His posture didn’t change, but he stared at his boss in surprise for an instant, then said, “Yes, sir.”
“—and Cameron, get on the horn, get some dogs out here. Tyndall, check out that car”—he pointed toward Henny’s old black Dodge, the headlights beginning to dim as the battery ran lower—“lift some prints from the steering wheel, see if you find a match in the van.”
Billy Cameron had been on the Broward’s Rock police force ever since Annie had arrived on the island, a gentle, sweet giant, towering at six-foot-three, handsome as a rugby player in a sport drink ad. He ducked his head as he passed Annie, obviously unhappy with his new boss, but Billy followed orders. As would Officers Pirelli and Tyndall, who made up the rest of the Broward’s Rock police force. Joe Tyndall had a complete collection of Mike Hammer paperbacks. He liked to kid Annie that the Mickey Spillane novels were the only politically incorrect books still in print. He,
too, avoided her gaze as he broke into a trot, heading for Henny’s car.
This was Annie’s first meeting with the new chief, who had succeeded their old friend Frank Saulter. Frank was celebrating his retirement by going on a round-the-world trip with his oldest grandson via tramp steamers, hostels and hitchhiking. Yesterday they’d received a card from South America:
Going up the Amazon. Found a signed first edition of
The Glass Key
in a little store in Tefé. Cost $2 American. Love, Frank
.
Annie felt the quick burn of tears. She’d shown the card to Henny, who considered Frank an intense rival in the world of mystery collecting. Henny had clapped her hands together. “That’s a real coup. We’ll have a party for Frank when he gets back.”
Annie wished Frank, dear laconic, saturnine, dyspeptic Frank, were here tonight instead of this newcomer who was too busy establishing his authority to listen. Annie forgot to remember her long-standing resolve to curb her quick tongue. “Look here, it doesn’t matter whether Henny’s fingerprints are on the van. You could find her prints on the murder weapon and it wouldn’t mean a thing! Henny would never hurt a soul. And she’s out there somewhere”—Annie’s arm swept toward the wet shrubs and dripping forest—“and she could die if we don’t find her soon.”
A satisfied smirk transformed the plump face. Garrett looked like Hamilton Burger confident he’d finally cornered Perry Mason. “Do I understand that you have searched the immediate area and found no trace of the missing woman?” His voice had the stentorian ring of a prosecutor.
Garrett certainly lacked people skills, but Annie was pleased that he finally seemed to get the point. “That’s right.” Annie once again gestured into the darkness. “I’ve checked along both sides of the road all the way to the park.”
Chief Garrett nodded. “The conclusion is clear.
She
has not been a victim of violence. If she’d been attacked, she
would have been found. Obviously, she left the scene under her own power. But she won’t get far. After all, this is an island. Not even a ferry crossing until morning. We’ll have her in custody by then.” He turned away, moved with stiff dignity to the van. “Pirelli, label the film case. As a backup, take Polaroid shots from every angle. Then…”
Max reached out to grab Annie’s arm, but he was too late. She bounded after Garrett faster than Craig Rice’s Bingo Riggs and Handsome Kusak on the trail of money, theirs or someone else’s.
Annie flung herself between Garrett and the van. “Are you an idiot?”
Garrett’s round face congealed like a Mary Roberts Rinehart dowager encountering the lower classes.
Too late, Annie realized that maybe on a ranking of interpersonal skills, she and Garrett might be dead even with slab-faced, monosyllabic Sgt. Buck, the misogynist sidekick of Leslie Ford’s urbane Col. Primrose.
Before Garrett could respond, a gray station wagon slid to a stop near the chief’s car. Garrett brushed past Annie. “Dr. Burford. Over this way, please.”
Max reached her in an instant. “Come on, Annie. It won’t do any good to go after Garrett. And he won’t be thinking about us, since the ME’s arrived.”
“But Max, we’ve got to—”
“I know. And we will. Come on.”
The first car arrived in ten minutes. Max set up a command post on the hood of his car.
Garrett bustled over. “What’s going on here? Who are all these people—”
The local bird-watching society, splendidly equipped for a cross-country expedition, was setting off to the south.
“—and what do you think—”
Mayor Cosgrove, who moved like a penguin but earned more than a million dollars a year in real estate commissions, wobbled up the lane and greeted the young police
chief in a booming bass voice. “Good thinking, Garrett. Time to get the community involved. To think a Women’s Club volunteer has been murdered and our own Henny Brawley missing! We’ll leave no stone unturned. Though I’m relieved the search won’t involve the beach. Think of the sea turtle eggs!” The mayor was a passionate defender of sea turtles. “All right now, Max, I’ll give you a hand. Let’s get a grid together. Have to know who’s going where.”
Within twenty minutes, a bus from the First Methodist Church disgorged the women’s missionary society, Boy Scout Troop 19 and the a cappella choir. Laurel arrived at the wheel of a produce truck and out spilled the members of St. Mary’s Altar Guild.
As Laurel waited in line for her assignment, she called out dolefully to Annie, “Monkshood.” Then, chin high, which always showed her aristocratic throat to good advantage, “We must be positive. Think geranium, dear Annie.”
Annie nodded absently. Among the calls she’d made on her cell phone was one to Emma Clyde. This time Emma had answered and she was on her way. Annie hated to stand waiting while searchers fanned out in all directions, their flashlights bobbing, but if there was anyone on the island of Broward’s Rock who could outthink the world, it was Emma Clyde. Annie had stopped fuming about Garrett’s unexpected conclusions and was trying to figure out what could have happened on this remote stretch of road. Though it had taken much longer than it should—she glanced at her watch, it was half past eight—a thorough search was now well under way. If Henny was there to find, she would be found.
As Laurel joined a group striding toward the park, she sang out, “Nutmeg geranium, my dear. It always heralds an expected meeting. We shall meet with Henny, never fear.” Laurel disappeared around the bend.
Raincoated figures scurried in all directions. There was an undertone of noise, people talking, the polite but harried directions barked by Officer Pirelli to keep the searchers
away from the van, the patter of light rain, the squish of feet on the muddy road, an occasional honking horn.
“Hi there, Emma.”
“Emma, good to see you.”
“Did you bring Marigold along? We need a real detective tonight.”
Annie looked past the brightly lit van at the road leading to King Snake Park. The spill of light from the spotlight illuminated a swath of the road. The cheery hellos were coming from that direction. Annie knew Emma was amazing and her latest car was a pink Rolls-Royce but unless it came equipped with wings, Annie didn’t see how Emma had driven from her house on the marsh side of the island over the golf course, which abutted the park, and chugged across the admittedly shallow but very wet lagoon.
Search volunteers split into a V and here came Emma in a golf cart. Oh, of course. Emma’s elegant home overlooked the ninth green. The fourteenth hole ran along the other side of the King Snake Lagoon. Smart Emma. She’d figured that the narrow road into the park would be choked with vehicles.
Annie ran to greet her. Emma scared the hell out of her sometimes, but if she ever had to man a barricade, she’d definitely pick Emma as her leader. Max was dear and sexy and swashbucklingly brave, but Emma was tough.
Emma switched off the cart, climbed majestically out, her clear plastic raincoat flapping. Emma was always majestic, tall, broad-shouldered and athletic. She was still golfing though she was now in her late seventies. Her blunt face would have been a natural for a Mount Rushmore of mystery authors, perhaps featuring Emma, John D. MacDonald, Erle Stanley Gardner, and E. C. Bentley, square-jawed all. However, even an accomplished sculptor might find it difficult to re-create Emma’s hair. Emma, in fact, seemed to find it difficult to re-create her hair, which ranged from varicolored spikes to tight white ringlets to a bluish pompadour possibly inspired by childhood memories of Marie Antoi
nette. Currently, she was sporting bronze ringlets bright as a new penny. Emma’s hair was no match for the multihued caftans which were her dress of choice. Tonight’s glowed beneath the clear plastic, an improbable mixture of lime and purple. Her cornflower-blue eyes swiftly scanned the scene. “Good show, Annie. Good people. They’ll find Henny. Now tell me what’s happened.”
