Windward Secrets (9 page)

Just to annoy the officer, Claire opened the kitchen door and Ike burst into the room and went straight for the policeman. Claire grabbed Ike’s collar, ruffled his neck, and spoke to him as if she was talking to a baby. “Isn’t he a sweetheart?” she said, looking up at Chief Peterson with a dumb-witted look.

Peterson was already on the other side of the screen door with his foot braced against the bottom of the door. “Keep that dog under control. If I get any reports that he’s been a nuisance I’ll have him taken away.”

Claire opened her mouth to say something but Diane quickly clamped a hand on her arm to stop her.

“No worries, Chief. He’s just playing. Thanks again for coming.”

Waving as the officer backed his patrol car out of the driveway Diane said, through a clenched smile. “What the hell is wrong with you Claire? You deliberately let Ike out to antagonize that man.”

“Yeah, well. He’s a moron.”

“That may be, but he’s the law around here.”

“Diane, you know very well he was just patronizing us. He didn’t take one thing we said seriously.”

“And that, my friend, is why I let him out of here so quickly. He wasn’t going to help so there was no need to waste any more time with him.”

“Diane, do you remember that lock in the dining room being broken?”

“No, and we’ve been checking the doors and windows every night.”

“Strange. I’ll get a hammer and nails from the shed and make sure no one opens that window again.”

“Don’t you think it would be better to call the realtor?”

“Nah, they might send another Wendell and you’re running low on underwear,” Claire chuckled.

Chapter Seven

Discovery

Claire and Diane walked down to the beach to find Jill sitting next to Caroline as she sketched. Ike searched the dunes for a stick returning to lay one proudly at Claire’s feet.

“How did it go?” Jill asked.

“Waste of time,” Claire answered, throwing Ike’s stick into the water.

Caroline looked up from her work. “Really? No answers.”

Diane sat down next to Caroline and looked at her sketch. “That’s good Caroline! Nope, no answers. He wasn’t taking us seriously.”

Leaning back on her elbows Jill looked up at Claire. “What do you make of it?”

“Diane’s right. He wasn’t interested. I got the distinct impression he thought we were just menopausal maidens with nothing better to do than interrupt his day.”

“What do we do now?” Caroline asked.

“We only have a few more days here, let’s just continue to be cautious and keep Ike as long as we can,” Diane answered.

The morning passed with the four taking turns throwing the stick for Ike while Caroline sat sketching. Each woman remained quiet, lost in her own thoughts.

Shortly before noon Jill stood up and dusted the sand off her clothes. “Let’s pack a lunch and go for a bike ride. There are plenty of places to explore.”

“Good idea,” Caroline agreed. “My butt’s sore from sitting so long.”

Ike pushed past Claire as she opened the kitchen door, and raced through the kitchen and up the steps barking loudly.

“Oh geez, what’s wrong with him now,” Caroline asked.

“I don’t know,” Claire said. “Just ignore him.”

Jill opened the Kelvinator and removed meat and cheese for sandwiches while Diane packed the picnic basket with napkins, apples and the leftover pastries from breakfast.

Ike barked even louder.

“I’ll take my painting things up and see if I can get Ike to come down,” Caroline said, leaving the kitchen.

“Jill, does Ike bark this much when he’s with Drew?” Claire asked, as she removed the breakfast dishes from dish rack and put them in the cabinet.

“No. He rarely barks.”

“Do you think there’s something about us he doesn’t like?” Claire asked, turning to face Jill.

“No. I think there’s something about this house that bothers him.”

Ike suddenly ran into the kitchen and slid across the linoleum to Claire’s side. Grabbing her pant leg with his teeth he pulled her into the parlor.

“Oh Ike, what is it?”

“Girls, come up here!” Caroline shouted. “The door to the locked room is open.”

Claire pried Ike’s teeth off her pants and started up the stairs. Ike scrambled past her nearly knocking her down.

Caroline met them at the second floor landing and together they climbed the stairs to the third floor. They could hear Ike already inside the room sniffing and whining.

Slowly opening the door the whole way the women cautiously peered inside the room.

“It’s just another bedroom,” Jill said.

Claire walked farther into the room. “Let’s look around. There has to be some reason Ike is so interested.”

The room was definitely decorated for a little girl. It was large with two windows overlooking the sea and two facing the driveway. An ornate, iron bed with a once frilly, pink bedspread held an assortment of tired looking, stuffed animals. There were pictures of ballerinas on the walls. The furniture, once white, was now grey from years of dust permeating the paint. The windows had the same lace curtains as the other bedrooms, and there was a window seat in an alcove under one of the windows facing the ocean. At the foot of the bed was a wicker settee with an old fashioned scrapbook propped against its back.

Claire sat down on the settee and a mushroom of dust floated into the air. She picked up the scrapbook and examined the brown leather cover now cracked and brittle with age. When she opened the book and started to turn the pages, they nearly disintegrated. Carefully she studied the old snapshots held in place with black triangular holders at each corner.

Opening the closet Jill pulled out a little girl’s dress. “Look at this. The closet is filled with little girl’s clothes and shoes. These styles are at least forty years old.”

Diane examined the top of the bureau, which held a mirror on a stand, hairbrush, comb and miscellaneous bottles and hair barrettes. Pulling open the top drawer she said, “Old clothes here too.”

Caroline was standing next to a bookcase containing books and dolls. “This room looks like nothing has been touched in years.”

Claire suddenly gasped. “I can’t believe this.”
              Diane quickly crossed the room and sat down beside Claire. “What is it?”

Claire pointed to a picture of five children playing on a beach. “This is me.”

“What?” Jill said, returning the dress to the closet and hurrying to stand on the other side of Claire.

Caroline moved beside Diane and they all looked where Claire was pointing.

“Look. This is me. This is my brother Will, and the other three children are Betsy, Patty and their brother David. We played with them every year that we came to The Point.”

“Did they live in this house?” Diane asked.

“I don’t remember that, but they must have. We were always on the beach, playing games, or riding bikes. If we came to this house I don’t remember. That’s so weird, how could I forget this big old house?”

“How old were you?” Caroline inquired.

“I think I must have been about eleven. Will would have been fourteen. He and David were the same age. Patty was a year older than me; and Betsy was, I think, about three years younger.”

“What was their last name?” Jill questioned.

“I don’t know. I’m sure I knew their name. I believe Mom stayed in touch with their parents over the years. I can’t remember much else. I think this was the last year we came to The Point,” Claire said, slowly turning the pages. There were more pictures of the children digging for clams, building sandcastles and in front of the house sitting on bicycles.”

The corner, picture holders were dried out and no longer secured many of the pictures. Claire studied each picture closely before moving onto the next page. Halfway through the scrapbook were two old, yellowed, newspaper articles, one of which had a picture of Betsy and a headline that read, “Local Child Missing.”

“Oh God,” Claire declared, as she quickly scanned the articles. “Oh no. Something happened to Betsy. She either wandered off or was kidnapped and they never found her… or, at least, by the second article several months later there was no trace. I never knew this. I wonder if this is why we didn’t come back after that year. Will and I never understood; we loved it here. If Mom and Dad knew about this they never told us.” Finishing the article she looked up at Jill, “Carter. Their last name was Carter.”

Claire slowly worked her way through the book again, this time from back to front. Leaning forward, and looking closer, she picked up one of the pictures and walked to the window for better light.

“What is it?” Diane asked.

“Take a look and tell me what this is Diane,” Claire requested, pointing to the side of the photograph.

Diane squinted and studied the photo. “It’s an old truck. You can barely see it camouflaged among the trees and scrubs.”

“Look at the door,” Claire encouraged.
              “It looks like W-E-N-D. That’s all I can make out. Are you thinking it’s Wendell’s truck?”

“Well, of course it’s not the same truck, it would be too old, but it’s a pickup. I bet if we could see more of the lettering it would say Wendell’s Plumbing.”

“What are you saying?” Caroline interrupted. “Do you think Wendell may have had something to do with Betsy’s disappearance?”

“Maybe. I’m going to study every one of these pictures.”

“Surely, the authorities would have picked up on that?” Caroline offered.

“Not if they had the same attitude as Chief Peterson,” Claire said.

“Claire, don’t jump to conclusions,” Diane stated.

“Diane, look at the way the truck is positioned. There are no houses around and no other cars or people. This truck looks as if it was being hidden on purpose. Someone could have easily been watching us without us knowing.”

“You could be right, Claire. Do you recognize the beach location?”

“These rocks,” Claire said, pointing to another section of the picture. “I remember them but I don’t know where they are. They’re probably totally covered with sand or totally exposed by now; could go either way after all this time.”

Ike had finally settled down and was lying on the floor next to the bed.

“Look,” Caroline said. “Ike’s calm. It’s like he needed to show us this room.”

“This is all too weird,” Jill replied. “I’m hungry. Let’s go down and have some lunch.”

***

Claire sat at the kitchen table studying the scrapbook as she ate a sandwich. The other three women looked at each other anxiously waiting for Claire to say something.

Getting up from the table Claire started opening kitchen drawers. Finally, she pulled out an old telephone book and paged through the yellow pages. “Here’s what we’re going to do.”

“Why am I afraid of what she’s going to say?” Caroline asked, nervously stirring her iced tea.

“Because it’s probably not going to be good,” Jill replied.

Diane waited in silence and then nodded at Claire to continue.

Claire looked at each as she spoke. “Wendell lives at 29 Beach Haven Road, that’s farther down this road, a mile or so. Jill, you will take your phone and your car to the edge of Haworth. Caroline you will take your phone and car a mile past Wendell’s house. You two are going to be the lookouts. Diane and I are going to ride our bikes down to Wendell’s and see what we can find. If either Jill or Caroline see Wendell coming in our direction they will call us. It will be easier to hide the bikes than a car and if we get caught we can say we were just taking a rest from biking.”

“Claire, you’re nuts. This is dangerous. We have no business snooping around Wendell’s,” Caroline said.

“Well, he had no business stealing Diane’s underwear. If my suspicion is correct, he’s a sicko and might have had something to do with Betsy’s disappearance.”

Diane finally spoke up. “I’m game.”

“Diane, you can’t be serious,” Jill said, surprised at Diane’s statement.

“I am. I’m sick and tired of creeps getting away with all kinds of crap because honest citizens are afraid to do anything. We’re only going to look around. We won’t break and enter. We’re not planning on stealing anything.”

Caroline still looked apprehensive. “Who takes Ike?”

“Ike stays here,” Claire said. “He’ll keep anyone out of the house who might try to come in while we’re gone.”

“If we’re going to do this, let’s get it done,” Jill said.

Claire took Ike outside to take care of business while the others got their cell phones and car keys. After doing a final check of the doors and windows to be sure they were locked the women adjourned to the driveway. Jill and Caroline backed their cars out of the drive and headed in opposite directions as Claire and Diane casually rode their bikes toward Wendell’s. Approaching his driveway, they nonchalantly looked for his truck.

“Looks like he’s out,” Claire said, jumping off her bike and pushing it toward the tall grass beside the road. She walked the bike deep into the weeds and laid it down. Diane did the same.

“I say we just act like we are looking for Wendell to do some plumbing,” Diane said. “No one can object to that.”

“Unless they ask why we hid our bikes,” Claire said, with a grin.

“Minor detail.”

The drive curved to the right slightly and they could see a small cottage sitting deep among the pines.

“Geez Louise,” Claire said. “It looks like a puff of wind could blow it down.”

“What a mess,” Diane said.

The house was in bad need of a coat of paint. Some of the shutters were hanging precariously from their hinges. There was litter and unrecognizable pieces of junk scattered around the yard. An old sofa, with its stuffing hanging out, sat on the front porch.

Claire tapped Diane on the arm and pointed to the far side of the house. “Look over there Diane.”

“Holy hell,” Diane whispered. “That looks like the truck in the picture.”

The truck was nearly rusted beyond recognition. The tires were gone, the windows were broken and someone had tried to scrape the lettering off the door.

Claire was about to step up on the porch when Diane stopped her. Pulling a Zip-Lock bag from her pocket she opened it and handed Claire a pair of surgical gloves.
              “What the heck?”

“Okay, so I’m a germaphobe. I always carry gloves and Clorox wipes in my suitcase for cleaning hotel bathrooms. In this case, we won’t leave any fingerprints.”

“You’re a genius, Diane.”

Stretching the gloves over her hands Claire walked onto the porch and tried the front door. Locked.