Your Chariot Awaits (28 page)

“And it's a very safe vehicle,” Joella said. “It even has bullet-proof windows.”

Matt frowned. “And why is that?”

I explained about Uncle Ned's eccentricity and paranoia, adding Cousin Larry's comment that I'd be safe if I ever decided to take up bank robbing.

Matt was not amused. “There's no such thing as actual bulletproof glass,” he said. “The correct term is bullet
resistant
. Bullets may not go through it, but they aren't going to bounce off like PingPong balls. Isn't that right, Dad?”

“That's right,” Fitz agreed, although he didn't sound happy about having to back up his son's grumpy opinion.

Matt closed the hood. “Nice vehicle. Looks to be in good shape. Too bad the murder puts kind of a stigma on it.”

“There's no—no stigma!” I argued testily. “A neighbor has already asked me to use it for her niece's wedding tomorrow.”

“Hey, great,” Fitz said. “You're in business!” To Matt he added, “Andi is thinking about starting her own limousine service.”

Matt just folded his arms and scowled as if I'd announced I was going into business taking local terrorists on scouting jaunts. “I hope you're prepared for a mountain of red tape and regulations and permits. And you'd better be loaded with insurance. People like to sue, you know,” he added gloomily.

“Andi is very competent at that sort of thing,” Fitz said. “She knows all about insurance.”

I appreciated the vote of confidence, but I had to admit I'd never thought about such complications as permits. And it occurred to me now that my liability policy might
not
extend to cover a new vehicle being used to transport paying customers. F&N handled property and life insurance, not vehicle insurance, so I had no experience in that area.

We went on board then, where Fitz had a barbecue grill set up in the cockpit area. I gave him the article I'd cut out of the newspaper, along with the bouquet of daisies.

“Hey, Shastas, aren't they?” He sounded delighted. “Thanks.”

“It's a really good photo of you in the newspaper,” I added.

“What can I say? I'm photogenic. Aging like fine wine.”

Matt unexpectedly laughed, reminding me that I probably shouldn't take his grumpiness too seriously. “What you are is a senior citizen full of hot air.”

Joella asked if she could see inside the boat, and Matt looked pleased and motioned her through the cabin door. Fitz went inside for a vase and then set it and daisies on a little table near the grill.

By the time Matt and Joella returned, a fragrant scent of barbecuing chicken drifted from the grill, and Fitz and I were enthusiastically discussing daisies.

“I've had really good luck with those Cape Town Blues in the window box in the galley,” he said. “They don't get as much sun there as daisies need, but I set the box outside when I can.”

“He babies those daisies as if they were—”

“The grandchildren you've never gotten around to providing me?” Fitz asked tartly.

To head off what looked like trouble brewing, I jumped in. “I've never tried Cape Town Blues, but I had good luck growing the dwarf Snowcap variety in indoor pots.”

Matt looked at Joella. “How do you feel about daisies?”

“I guess I can take 'em or leave 'em,” Joella admitted, and he awarded her an approving smile.

A few minutes later we were sitting on the padded bench seats surrounding the cockpit, with plates on our laps. The marina lay in the shadow of the hills around the bay now. Fitz's chicken was golden on the outside, tender and tasty inside. Crisp salad, heavy on the alfalfa sprouts. Garlic French bread toasted on the barbecue.

As Fitz and I had agreed, we didn't talk about the murder, but after we'd eaten, he said, “Andi and I are going to take a stroll around the marina and look at the other boats, okay?”

Joella said, “Sure,” and Matt, though he gave the two of us a suspicious glance, asked if she'd like to go inside and see what was on TV.

Fitz and I walked out on one of the side docks that branched off the main dock and, with a circling of seagulls squawking in hope of a handout, sat on a bench at the end. I told him about my late-night visit from Elena and her warning about husband Donny.

“So I think he's a pretty strong candidate. He had motive and opportunity, plus a gun and the expertise to use it.”

“Don't count Big Daddy Sutherland out yet,” Fitz said. He went on to tell me that when he called Shoreline Timber, he'd asked about Benton Sutherland's availability for an interview for an article he was working on.

“What article?” I cut in.

“I might write an article; who knows?” He gave an airy wave. “I've done a few. Anyway, they said they doubted he'd be in this area in the near future, because—get this—he'd recently spent several days here.”

“Did you pin them down on a date?”

“He arrived three days before Jerry's murder and left the day after it. Although the woman I talked to didn't phrase it that way, of course.”

Interesting. Also interesting that no one back in Georgia had clued Ryan in on this trip. “What was he doing here?”

“Holding meetings with management, touring the facilities, talking with workers, etc. But not so busy, I'm thinking, that he couldn't have made a quick jaunt down to Vigland to get rid of a bothersome son-in-law. Which I suspect may have been the real reason for his trip.”

“But what about the break-in at my place last night? He couldn't have done that.”

Fitz's eyebrows scrunched thoughtfully. “That seems to point more toward the Donny guy, all right.”

“Unless Big Daddy made a return trip.”

“I'll make another phone call to Sutherland's office in Georgia and try to find out if he's been out here again.”

“And I'll see if Elena can tell me anything about Donny's whereabouts during the break-in time.”

When we got back to the boat, Fitz dished up strawberry shortcake with whipped cream for dessert.

Then Matt, obviously knowing his father and I hadn't gone off to look at boats, said, “I suppose you two have now worked up some wild James Bond scheme for capturing the murderer?”

“What we really need is a Batmobile,” Fitz said. “It's hard to be a real crime buster without a Batmobile.” He frowned and spoke as seriously as if he'd been searching the classifieds for a used model.

“Dad, you've got to be serious about this,” Matt said. “You're both getting in way over your heads. Murder isn't for amateurs. It's not a TV show.”

Fitz sighed. “It isn't as if we're trying to corner the killer in a dark alley.”

“Doesn't it occur to you that if the killer didn't find whatever he was looking for when he broke into Andi's house, he may decide to try some other tactic? Like coming after Andi herself?”

It wasn't a thought that had occurred to me, and I felt something cold and slimy slither up my spine. “Why would he do that?”

“He may think this guy who was killed—what was his name?”

“Jerry,” Fitz supplied.

“He may think this Jerry confided in Andi before he was killed, and Andi may know where whatever it is he's after is located.”

“But Jerry didn't confide in me—”

“The killer doesn't know that. He may even think the two of you were involved together in whatever it was that got Jerry killed. You go stomping around in this like the Keystone Kops, and he may decide to eliminate
you
like he did Jerry.
”

Much like what Elena had said regarding her husband. Only somehow it sounded even more menacing in Matt's angry tones. Even Fitz looked worried, and Joella gave a little gasp.

“You're in danger, both of you, don't you realize that? You're daisy detectives”—Matt flicked his fingers disdainfully at the flowers in the vase—“meddling in a shark-eat-shark world.”

I thought Fitz might be getting angry too. Matt was really laying it on about our level of amateurism and incompetence.

But after a long moment, Fitz leaned back, a thoughtful look on his face. “The Daisy Detectives,” he mused. Then he smiled. “I like it! There we have it, Andi, a ready-made name for our private investigative business when we add it to your limousine service.”

Matt made no further comment, just made a noise that sounded something like
aarrghh
, threw up his hands in disgust, and stalked off into the cabin.

I looked at Fitz. “A detective business
and
a limousine service? Not for me, thank you. All I want is to find Jerry's murderer, and then I'm out of the murder business.”

Fitz smiled. “I just like to rattle his cage now and then. Matt can be a fussbudget at times.” He hesitated. “Although he made a pretty good point there about the killer thinking you may know more than you do.”

Right.

Now my cage felt a little rattled too.

31

W
ith the sliding door not yet fixed, and with both Fitz and Joella nagging at me about safety, I spent another night on Joella's sofa. Next day, JoAnne's niece's wedding went off without a hitch. I wore my snappy uniform, picked Tanya up at her parents' home, and afterwards ferried the newlyweds to Sea-Tac. JoAnne had invited me into the reception, where I glommed onto some spectacular crab hors d'oeuvres and a hunk of wedding cake, picked up a nice check for a few hours' enjoyable work . . . and landed another limo job!

An elegantly coiffed and dressed older woman named Trudy Vandervort, someone JoAnne knew from a library fund-raising thing, said she'd like to hire the limo for a trip up to the Port Townsend area the following Tuesday. It was a considerable distance up to the north end of the Olympic Peninsula, so I quoted her a fairly hefty price, to which she responded, “Fine,” and wrote out a check for half the amount on the spot. She gave me her home address, and I agreed to be there at two thirty on Tuesday.

Hey, maybe I
was
in the limousine business!

I INTENDED TO go into the DMV on Monday morning to get the title on the limo transferred and check on that ominous permit business Matt had mentioned, but Letty Bishop called before I got out of the house. She said the higher-ups in San Diego had just approved her request for an assistant. Could I come in right away, this morning, in fact? There wouldn't be any benefits with the job, but the hourly rate sounded good.

Oh, yes! With no steady job in sight, I needed this.

A complication, however. I was already scheduled for the limo trip up to Port Townsend Tuesday afternoon. I called the woman, explained my problem, and asked if starting the trip later in the day, about five thirty, would be okay.

“That's fine. Just so you get there before dark. The Captain doesn't like to travel at night.”

“There'll be two of you for the trip, then?”

“No, dear, just the Captain. He'll be staying with my niece while I go on a cruise.”

That settled, I rushed to the F&N offices. Letty immediately put me to work on some client computer files that had been corrupted and on which information had to be resurrected from their original insurance applications.

On my lunch hour I tried to call Elena, but someone in the publicity department at the pet food company said she was out for a few days. I didn't have a home phone number for her, so that temporarily ended that.

Fitz had better luck. He called that evening from near Port Orchard, where the
Miss Nora
was anchored for the night, to say he'd talked with Ben Sutherland's offices in Georgia. A woman there had told him Mr. Sutherland was “out of the office for a few days,” but she wouldn't give any further information.

“So,” Fitz said, “he could be off trying to add some other unfortunate creature to the trophies on his wall—”

“Or he could have been here in Vigland when my house was broken into!”

“He could still be here, trying to decide how big a danger you pose to him,” Fitz warned. “Is the door fixed yet?”

“No. The repairman called and said he had the new door, but his back went out, and he has to see a chiropractor before he can do anything.”

“Andi, I don't like you being there alone with the door broken.”

“The repairman fixed a metal rod to brace it, but I'll stay with Joella again, okay?”

He hesitated, as if doubtful about our joint competence to hold off a burglar. Finally he said, “Just don't take any chances, okay? Call 911 if you hear
anything.
”

I DECIDED TO drive the limo to work the following morning. That would enable me to go directly to Trudy Vandervort's house after work. When Letty found out the limo was right there in the parking lot, she got excited and begged for a ride on our lunch hour. I'd have taken her anyway, but when she offered lunch at The Log House, one of Vigland's nicer establishments, as an inducement, I gave her my best bow and sweep of hand. “Your chariot awaits, madam.”

When we went out at noon, she was chattering gaily about the only other time she'd ever ridden in a limousine. When she saw the car, she slapped her palms to her plump cheeks. “Oh, Andi, it's so elegant! How can you even think of selling it?”

I was just ushering her into the rear door when Mr. Findley and Mr. Randolph started across the parking lot. I'd angled the limo behind a tree, because it was too long for the parking spaces, so they didn't see it until they were almost behind it. Mr. Findley stopped short. His gaze went from limo to me and back to limo.

“What's this doing here?” he demanded as if I'd appropriated his private parking space, though I'd been careful not to do that.

“This is Andi McConnell,” Letty interposed. “She used to work here, and now she's come back to help out temporarily. We were just going to lunch.”

“Andi McConnell . . .” Mr. Findley frowned as he studied me, as if he thought he should know me but couldn't quite place either the name or face.