Nick leaned toward me, resting one hand on the back of my chair. “Sarah, I’m sorry I wasn’t straight with you, but I can’t apologize for caring about Rose.” The marimba ring tone of his phone interrupted before I could answer him. He stood up, took a step away from the table and pulled the phone from his pocket.
Tina came then and delivered Jess’s beer. “Could I get you anything else?” she asked.
“Another order of chips and salsa,” Jess said. She glanced at me. “This one’s on me.”
Nick ended his call and came back to the table. From the corner of my eye I saw Sam and the rest of the band making their way back to the stage. Around us people began to clap and cheer.
Nick leaned over my chair. “I have to go,” he said. “But this isn’t over.”
I watched him walk away. I knew it wasn’t over. I just wasn’t so sure we had even gotten started.
Chapter 10
I woke up the next morning feeling like I hadn’t slept at all, the sheet and a cotton blanket both wrapped in a tangle around one leg. After I’d gotten home from the pub I’d been too wired to watch TV. I’d spent some time searching around online, trying to learn more about Jeff Cameron. I’d remembered his sister saying he’d disappeared once before, after their grandmother died. I called Chloe Sanders, who told me Jeff had mentioned his grandmother only once. She was fairly certain the woman’s name had been Catherine, but that was all she knew. I didn’t have any luck finding an obituary for the woman.
I made coffee, scrambled an egg in the small cast-iron skillet Rose had insisted I needed, and ate it with a dish of stewed rhubarb that had grown in my backyard. Charlotte had been horrified that I’d been pulling out the plants and composting them because I thought they were a weed. Elvis hopped onto my lap to mooch a bite of egg.
My cell phone rang. I slid it across the counter and checked the screen, smiling when I saw who was calling. “Hi, Mom,” I said. I leaned back, shifting Elvis sideways on my legs. He made a grumble of annoyance.
“Hi, sweetheart,” she said. “How are things?”
“Things are fine,” I said. I’d just talked to her and Dad less than a week ago. I had a feeling I knew what had prompted this call. “Have you been talking to Gram?”
I heard her laugh on the other end of the phone. “Guilty as charged. I just wanted to hear it straight from you that Rose was all right.”
Elvis had jumped down to the floor to investigate what I’d put out for his breakfast.
“Rose is all right, Mom, I swear,” I said.
“Isabel said someone hit her over the head with a boat fender?”
“Liz claims the fact that it was Rose’s head is what saved her.”
Mom laughed. “Not that anyone would ever suggest that Liz herself can be a little hardheaded.”
I laughed, too. “Oh no, never.”
“Is there anything I can do?”
“Not you, but maybe Dad. Is he around?”
I heard her take a sip of her tea, iced, I guessed, because of the time of year. “He went out for a run, but I can pass on a message. What do you need?”
My stepfather had been an award-winning newspaper reporter for many years. Now he taught journalism and writing at Keating State College in New Hampshire.
“Would you ask him if he could find out anything about the death of a Catherine Cameron? He’d be looking about three years ago. I don’t know if that’s Catherine with a ‘C’ or a ‘K.’ She would have been about eighty and she had two grandchildren, Jeff—probably Jeffrey—and Nicole. I don’t know where in New Hampshire they lived.”
“Does this have anything to do with what happened to Rose?” she asked.
“Maybe,” I said. “Rose was doing a favor for a customer. I’m not sure whether or not he was being straight with her. I’d just like to know a little bit more about his background. Mr. P. has been searching online, but sometimes face-to-face works better.”
“I’ll give your father all the information as soon as he gets home.” I heard a squeak, which told me she was at her desk in her office, which overlooked the backyard.
“Are you working?” I asked. Mom wrote an elementary school series of books that featured a talking gerbil named Einstein.
“Copy edits,” she said. “Where do you stand on serial commas?”
“Umm, for them?” I said uncertainly.
“Well, of course. If only I could convince my copy editor that they’re important. Or your father, for that matter.”
“I have faith in your persuasive skills,” I said.
She laughed again. “I may be able to make the copy editor see the light, but I think your father is a lost cause.” I heard her shift once more in her squeaky desk chair, probably reaching for her tea. “I better get back to work, sweetie,” she said.
“I’m glad you called, Mom,” I said. “Talk to you soon.” I ended the call and set the phone back on the counter as Elvis came across the kitchen floor.
Since he’d finished his own breakfast, he jumped onto the stool next to me and eyed my plate expectantly.
“I already gave you a taste,” I said.
He hung his head, giving me a mournful look while making sure I could see the scar that cut diagonally across his nose. That maneuver always worked on visitors to the store.
I gave him another bite of the egg. Clearly it worked on me, too.
Elvis murped a thank-you, ate the egg and then proceeded to wash his face. I cleaned up the kitchen and was about to go brush my teeth when the cat suddenly swung his head in the direction of the door. He jumped down, crossed the room and looked pointedly at the door before looking back at me.
I waited, half expecting to hear a knock, half expecting it would be Nick. There was no knock. Elvis sat down and continued to stare at the door. Feeling a little foolish, I walked over and checked the peephole. No one was there.
“Your radar is off,” I said, bending down to give his head a scratch as I went past. He made a disgruntled sound in the back of his throat.
I finished getting ready, grabbed my bag and my keys and discovered Elvis was still sitting in front of the door. “You’re persistent. I’ll give you that,” I said.
I stepped into the hallway and there was Mr. P. in a blue golf shirt and a Red Sox ball cap, his messenger bag over one shoulder. Elvis looked up at me, and the look on his face plainly said I told you so.
“Hello, Sarah,” Mr. P. said. He smiled down at the cat. “Hello, Elvis.”
I smiled back. “Good morning.”
Rose came out of her apartment then, carrying not one but two tote bags. Mr. P. hurried over to take one of them from her. “You’re here,” she said, beaming at him. She turned to me. “Sarah dear, I told Alfred he could drive over to the Clarks’ with us.” She held up a paper bag. “I have Casey’s dog biscuits.”
Mr. P. pushed his glasses up his nose. “Are you sure it’s all right, my dear?” he asked. “I don’t want to take advantage.”
“You’re welcome to drive with us anytime,” I said, setting down my own bag long enough to lock the door. “And you aren’t taking advantage. I enjoy your company.”
“So do I,” Rose said.
Elvis meowed loudly.
“It’s unanimous,” I said with a grin.
We started out to the SUV with Elvis leading the way.
“You know the cat tower you built is still his favorite place,” I said to Mr. P. “I think the only thing that could make it better was if it were in front of the TV so he could sit at the top and watch Jeopardy!”
One of the cat’s little quirks was watching the game show every weeknight. He had some kind of internal clock that told him just when the show was beginning. My best guess was that he’d watched the show with his previous owner. I had no idea what the cat’s life had been like before he’d turned up along the harbor front more than a year ago now.