He smiled at her and said, “Clemmie, old girl, we are doing pretty damned good, know that?” Because it was true. Hell, if he’d had a sword, Mitch would have launched it triumphantly into the ceiling just like Tyrone Power had in The Mark of Zorro. But Mitch had no sword. So instead he wept.
CHAPTER 3
It felt very strange to be easing her cruiser thumpety-bumpety over the narrow wooden causeway out to Big Sister again. Des couldn’t help recalling the very first time she’d set eyes on this private Yankee eden with its choice handful of Peck family mansions scattered across forty acres of meadows and woods. That snug little carriage house where she’d first met a certain pudgy, sad-eyed widower named Mitch Berger. She’d driven down from Central District headquarters in Meriden that day to investigate the body he’d found. She was still a homicide investigator on the Major Crime Squad then. A lieutenant. One of only three such women in the state. And the only one who was black. She’d been hot stuff all right-until she stepped on the wrong toes.
Seeing the place once again, Des realized that Big Sister felt a lot like home. There was that strip of private beach where she and Mitch had walked together for the very first time. And the sandy, twisting path they took home the night they went skinny dipping in the moonlight. And the lighthouse where he’d proposed marriage to her.
It all seemed so long ago now. And yet it was still right there inside of her heart. She could feel her chest tighten as she pulled into the driveway next to Mitch’s plum-colored 1956 Studebaker pickup. He’d left it behind for Bella. Had no use for it in the city.
Quirt came running across the garden toward her when she got out, rubbing up against her leg and yowling in outrage over her prolonged absence. She bent down and picked him up. He wouldn’t let her hold him. Just squirmed in her arms until she released him. When Bella came out the front door to greet Des he darted inside the house.
“Oh, thank god!” Bella said excitedly. “I’ve been trying to get him inside for weeks. Quick, quick, close the door…”
Des shut the door behind them. “What are you going to do with him?”
“Find a good home for him-unless you want him.”
“Bella, you know I can’t take him.”
“I don’t know anything anymore,” Bella blustered, standing there in her ratty, ancient black ERA-YES sweatshirt and black stretch pants. She looked like an angry Jewish bowling ball. “I used to, but those days are over.”
Des let her rebuke slide on by. “I like what you’ve done with the place,” she said, glancing around.
Bella had opened up Mitch’s drop-leaf dining table and moved it in front of the bay windows, which gave the room a much homier air. There was a bowl of fruit on it. Also her laptop computer. Mitch’s sky blue Fender Stratocaster and stack of amps were stashed in a corner by the door. Des was surprised he hadn’t taken it all with him to New York.
“He said he hasn’t felt like playing his music lately,” Bella explained, following her gaze.
“He called that music?”
“To him it was. Which, being an artist, you ought to be able to understand. How is your drawing coming?”
“I’ve been a bit short on time lately.”
“Uh-huh.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means uh-huh.”
“Sounded like something more.”
“Then you’re having a conversation with yourself, not me.” Bella looked her up and down, brow furrowing. “Tell me, just exactly how many pounds have you lost?”
“Who says I’ve lost any?”
“I do. You’re nothing but skin and bone. As for your color…”
“My color?”
“It’s distinctly sallow. You used to glow. You don’t glow anymore.”
“Bella, is this a for-real prowler call or did you just lure me out here to tell me how lousy I look?”
“You don’t look lousy. You look unhappy.”
“Just step off, okay? Brandon and I are getting along great. Why can’t you accept that?”
“Because I lived through this before, that’s why. I remember how close he came to destroying you.”
“Bella…”
“And don’t you tell me he’s changed because he hasn’t. People never do.”
“Bella, if we’re going to stay friends then the subject of Brandon will have to remain off-limits. Deal?”
“Fine,” she snapped. “But only if you eat a little something. How about a nice, thick brisket sandwich? I’ve got fresh challah.”
“Why don’t you just tell me about this prowler?”
“I’m not sure it’s a prowler. But I do keep finding signs that someone has taken up residence out here.”
“You mean like a homeless person?”
“Come, I’ll show you.”
She led Des outside to the barn. The stray cats that they’d rescued together were parked inside in their cages, waiting not-so-patiently for homes. A lanky, bespectacled girl of about ten was feeding them.
“Hey, Bella,” the girl said, studying Des guardedly.
“Molly, this is Trooper Mitry.”
Molly had curly blond hair and freckles and a pink, busy little nose. “Hullo…”
Des smiled at the girl. “Hello, yourself.”
“Now, do you see the way these tarps and dropcloths are all laid out?” Bella was motioning to the sprung, moth-eaten old sofa. “Every morning, I find them rearranged. One morning, there was a pea coat here. A man’s coat. Next morning, it was gone. Also, someone has been taking food from me. When I came home from the dentist the other day my fruit bowl on the table was empty.”
“Have any of the other residents seen him?”
Bella shook her head. “Bitsy Peck thinks I’m seeing ghosts.”
Which was only natural, Des reflected. The whole damned island felt haunted. “How about you, Molly? Have you seen anyone out here who doesn’t belong?”
“Absolutely not,” the girl answered vehemently, her cheeks mottling.
Des studied her curiously. “You sound pretty sure about that.”
“Because I am.”
Des gestured for Bella to follow her back out into the sunlight. “Talk to me about this Molly,” she said to her softly.
“She helps me with the cats. Lives on Sour Cherry Lane. She’s a bright little thing, but a bit lost. Her parents have split up.”
“Last name Procter?”
“That’s right.”
Des stood there thinking about her conversation of last night with the regal Patricia Beckwith. Putting two and two together. Wondering what it added up to. “If you don’t mind,” she said, her voice raised, “I think I will have that brisket sandwich.”
They went back inside, Bella charging straight into the kitchen. “Do you want mustard or mayo on that?” she called to Des.
“Neither,” Des replied, watching the barn through the bay window in the living room. “And you can hold the sandwich.”
“I don’t get it, tattela. What are you doing?”
“Playing a hunch.”
Sure enough, little Molly soon came scurrying out of the barn. She shot a wide-eyed glance over her shoulder at Mitch’s cottage, then skedaddled down the path to the lighthouse. Des went out the door after her, following from a careful distance as the path wound its way through the wild beach plum and beach roses. Molly dashed past the lighthouse toward the island’s narrow stretch of beach. Her destination was a little sand knoll about thirty feet back from the high tide line. A valiant cluster of little cedars grew there. Molly squeezed in between them and then vanished.
Des followed, her footsteps silent on the soft, dry sand.
There was a protected little burrow there amid the trees where the man was seated on his pea coat. He was thin and unshaven, with receding sandy-colored hair and a long, sharp nose. He wore a torn, bloodstained blue button-down shirt and khaki trousers that were filthy. He’d been in a fight. His eggplant-colored left eye was swollen shut. His lower lip all fat and raw, as was his left ear. In his hand was a plastic bottle of Poland Spring water.