Presumed Guilty & Keeper of the Bride (15 page)

“You think there was a file on Evelyn? We didn’t see one.”

“He might’ve destroyed it. Or it could have been taken from the cottage. After his death.”

They both fell silent at the implications of that statement. Who but Evelyn herself would bother to take such a file?

“This is crazy,” said Chase. “Why would Evelyn steal it? It was her own damn cottage. She could walk in and out without anyone raising an eyebrow.” He reached for his coffee cup, took a deliberate sip. “I can’t see her breaking in and trashing the place.”

You can’t see her killing anyone, either. Can you?
she thought. She wondered about Chase and his sister-in-law. Was their relationship merely cordial? Or did it run deeper than that? He’d stubbornly resisted the possibility that Evelyn might be guilty of wrongdoing, be it theft or murder. Miranda could understand why. Evelyn was a beautiful woman.

Now a free woman.

There was, after all, an appealing tidiness to a match between Chase and Evelyn. It would keep the money in the family, the same last name on the checkbook. Everyone would slip into their new roles with a minimum of muss and fuss. Chase had spent his boyhood trying to live up to his brother’s image. Now he could slip right into Richard’s place. Much as Miranda hated to admit it, such a mating would have a certain symmetry, a social correctness.

Something I’d never be able to give him.

The waitress came by with the check. Miranda reached for it, but Chase snatched it up first. “I’ll take care of it,” he said.

Miranda took a few bills from her pocket and laid them on the table.

“What’s that for?” asked Chase.

“Call it pride,” she said, rising to her feet, “but I always pay my way.”

“With me you don’t have to.”

“I have to,” she said flatly. “Especially with you.” She grabbed her jacket and headed out the door.

He caught up with her outside. The rain had stopped but the sun had not yet emerged and the sky was a cold monochrome of gray. They walked side by side for a moment, not quite friends, not quite strangers.

“I’ll be honest,” he said. “I wasn’t planning to see you today. Or ever again.”

“It’s a small town, Chase. It’s hard to avoid a person here.”

“I was going to drive back to Greenwich tomorrow.”

“Oh.” She lowered her eyes, willing herself not to feel disappointment. Or hurt. All those emotions she’d vowed never to feel for another Tremain. The emotions she was feeling now.

“But I’ve been thinking,” he said.

Those four words made her halt and look up at him.
He’s watching me, waiting for me to reveal myself. Give myself away as beguiled and bedazzled.

Which, damn it, I am.

“I’ve been thinking,” he said, “of staying a few more days. Just to clear up those questions about Richard.”

She said nothing.

“Anyway, that’s why I’m staying in town. It’s the only reason.”

Her chin came up. “Did I imply otherwise?”

“No.” He let out a breath. “No, you didn’t.”

They walked on, another block, another silence.

“You’ll be looking for the same answers, I expect,” he said.

“I don’t have much choice, do I? It’s my future. My freedom.”

“Look, I know it makes sense, in a way, for you and I to work together. But it’s not exactly…”

“Seemly,” she finished for him. “That’s what you mean, isn’t it? That it’s embarrassing for you to be consorting with a woman like me.”

“I didn’t say that.”

“Never mind, Chase.” In irritation she turned and continued walking. “You’re right, of course. We can’t work together. Because we don’t really trust each other. Do we?”

He didn’t answer. He simply walked beside her, his hands thrust deep in his pockets. And that, more than anything he could have said, was what hurt her most.

They might not trust each other. They might not want anything to do with each other. But the simple fact was, if they wanted answers, the cottage was where they both had to look. So when Miranda pulled into the gravel driveway of Rose Hill the next morning she was not surprised to see Chase’s car already parked there. Ozzie was sprawled on the front porch, looking dejected. He managed a few halfhearted wags of his tail as she came up the steps, but when he saw she wasn’t going to invite him inside he flopped back down into a whimpering imitation of a shag rug.

Miss St. John and Chase had already gone through the second bookcase. The place was looking more and more like a disaster zone, with cardboard boxes filled with papers, books precariously stacked in towers, empty coffee cups and dirty spoons littering the end tables.

“I see you started without me,” said Miranda, careful to avoid looking at Chase. He was just as carefully avoiding her gaze. “What have you found?”

“Odds and ends,” said Miss St. John, thoughtfully eyeing them both. “Shopping lists, receipts. Another love note from M. And a few quite literate college term papers.”

“Phillip’s?”

“Cassandra’s. She must have done some writing out here. A few of the books are hers, as well.”

Miranda picked up a bundle of papers and glanced through the titles. “A political analysis of the Boer conflict.” “Doom foretold: the French colonialists in Vietnam.” “The media and presidential politics.” All were authored by Cassandra Tremain.

“A smart cookie,” said Miss St. John. “A pity that slick brother of hers always steals the spotlight.”

Miranda dug deeper in the box and pulled out the latest note from M. It was typewritten.

I waited till midnight—you never came. Did you forget? I wanted to call, but I’m always afraid she’ll pick up the phone. She has you every weekend, every night, every holiday. I get the dregs.

     How can you say you love me, when you leave me here, waiting for you? I’m worth more than this. I really am.

Quietly Miranda let the note flutter back into the box. Then she went to the window and stood staring out, toward the sea. Pity stirred inside her, for the woman who had written that note, for the pain she’d suffered.
The price we both paid for loving the wrong man.

“Miranda?” Chase asked. “Is something wrong?”

“No.” She cleared her throat and turned to him. “I’m fine. So…where should I start looking?”

“You could help me finish with this shelf. I’m finding papers here and there, so it’s going slower than I expected.”

“Yes, of course.” She went to the shelf, pulled out a book and sat on the floor beside him. Not too close, not too far.
Neither friends nor enemies,
she thought. Just two people sharing the same rug, the same purpose.
For that, we don’t even have to like each other.

For an hour they flipped through pages, brushed away dust. Most of the books, it seemed, hadn’t been opened in ages. There were old postcards dated twenty years earlier, addressed to Chase’s mother. There was a hand-scrawled list of bird species sighted at Rose Hill, and a library notice from twelve years before, still stuck in the overdue book. Over the years, so many bits and pieces of the Tremain and Pruitt families had ended up on these shelves. It took time to sort out the vital from the trivial.

An oversize atlas of the state of Maine provided the next clue. Chase pulled it off the shelf and glanced in the front cover. Then he turned and called, “Miss St. John? You ever heard of a place called Hemlock Heights?”

“No. Why?”

“There’s a map of it tucked in here.” Chase pulled the document out of the atlas and spread it out on the rug. It was a collection of six photocopied pages taped together to form a site map. The pages looked fairly fresh. Property lines had been sketched in, and the lots were labeled by number. At the top was the development’s name: Hemlock Heights. “I wonder if Richard was thinking of investing in real estate.”

Miss St. John crouched down for a closer look. “Wait. This looks rather familiar. Isn’t this our access road? And this lot at the end—lot number one. That’s Rose Hill. I recognized that little jag up the mountain.”

Chase nodded. “You’re right. That’s exactly what this is. Here’s St. John’s Wood. And the stone wall.”

“It’s the Stone Coast Trust map,” said Miranda. “See? Most of the lots are labeled Sold.”

“Good heavens,” said Miss St. John. “I had no idea so many of the camps have changed hands. There are only four of us who haven’t sold out to Tony Graffam.”

“What kind of offer did he make for St. John’s Wood?” asked Miranda.

“It was a very good price at the time. When I refused to sell he bumped it up even higher. That was a year ago. I couldn’t understand why the offer was so generous. You see, this was all conservation land. These old camps were grandfathered in, built before the days of land commissions. The cottages were allowed to stand, but you couldn’t develop any of it. From a commercial standpoint the land was worthless. Then suddenly it’s all been rezoned for development. And now I’m sitting on a gold mine.” She looked at the other unsold lots on the map. “So is old Sulaway. And the hippies in Frenchman’s Cottage.”

“And Tony Graffam,” said Miranda.

“But what if the zoning decision was a sham?” said Chase. “What if there were payoffs? If that fact became public knowledge…”

“My guess is, there’d be such protest, the zoning would be reversed,” said Miss St. John. “And Mr. Graffam would be the proud owner of a lot of worthless property.”

“But it’s worthless to him right now, Miss St. John,” said Miranda, studying the map. “Graffam needs that access road to get to his lots. And you said the road belongs—belonged—to Richard.”

“Yes, we keep coming back to that, don’t we?” said Chase softly. “That link between Richard and Stone Coast Trust. The link that refuses to go away….” He stood, clapping the dust from his trousers. “Maybe it’s time we paid a visit to our neighbors.”

“Which ones?” asked Miranda.

“Sulaway and the hippies. The other two on this road who didn’t sell. Let’s find out if Graffam put any pressure to bear. Like a blackmail note or two.”

“He didn’t try to blackmail Miss St. John,” pointed out Miranda. “And she didn’t sell.”

“Ah, but my property’s scarcely worth the effort,” said Miss St. John. “I’m just a tiny patch off to the side. And as for trying to blackmail me, well, you saw for yourself he doesn’t have a thing on me worth mentioning. Not that I wouldn’t mind generating a whiff of scandal at my age.”

“The others could be more vulnerable,” said Chase. “Old Sulaway, for instance. We should at least talk to him.”

“A good idea,” said Miss St. John. “Since you thought of it, Chase,
you
do it.”

Chase laughed. “You are a coward, Miss St. John.”

“No, I’m just too old for the aggravation.”

Without warning, Chase reached for Miranda’s hand and with one smooth motion pulled her up in an arc that almost, but not quite, ended in his arms. She reached out to steady herself and found her palms pressing against his chest. At once she stepped back.

“Is this a request for me to come along?” she said.

“It’s more along the lines of a plea. To help me soften up old Sulaway.”

“Does he need softening up?”

“Let’s just say he hasn’t taken kindly to me since I batted a baseball through his window. And that was twenty-five years ago.”

Miranda laughed in disbelief. “You sound like you’re afraid of him. Both of you.”

“Obviously she’s never met old Sulaway,” said Miss St. John.

“Is there something I should know about him?”

Chase and Miss St. John glanced at each other.

“Just be careful when you walk into his front yard,” said Miss St. John. “Give him lots of warning. And be ready to get out of there fast.”

“Why? Does he have a dog or something?”

“No. But he does have a shotgun.”

Ten

“Y
ou’re that boy who broke my window!” yelled Homer Sulaway. “Yeah, I recognize you.” He stood on the front porch, his skinny arms looped around a rifle, his lobsterman’s dungarees rolled up at the ankles. Chase had told Miranda the man was eighty-five. The toothless, prune-faced apparition on that porch looked about a century older. “You two go on, now! Leave me alone. Can’t afford to fix no more broken windows.”

“But I paid for it, remember?” said Chase. “Had to mow lawns for six months, but I did pay for it.”

“Damn right,” said Sully. “Or I’d ’a got it outta your old man’s hide.”

“Can we talk to you, Mr. Sulaway?”

“What about?”

“Stone Coast Trust. I wanted to know if—”

“Not interested.” Sully turned and shuffled back across the porch.

“Mr. Sulaway, I have a young lady here who’d like to ask—”

“Don’t have no use for young ladies. Or old ladies, either.” The screen door slammed shut behind him.

There was a silence. “Well,” muttered Chase. “The old boy’s definitely mellowed.”

“I think he’s afraid,” said Miranda. “That’s why he’s not talking to us.”

“Afraid of what?”

“Let’s find out.” She approached the cottage and called, “Mr. Sulaway? All we want to know is, are they trying to blackmail you? Has Stone Coast threatened you in some way?”

“Those are lies they’re spreading!” Sulaway yelled through the screen door. “Vicious lies! Not true, any of it!”

“That’s not what Tony Graffam says.”

The door flew open and Sully stormed out onto the porch. “What’s Graffam got to say about me? What’s he tellin’ people now?”

“We could stand out here and yell about it. Or we could talk in private. Which do you prefer?”

Sulaway glanced around, as though searching for watchers in the woods. Then he snapped, “Well? You two need an engraved invitation, or what?”

They followed him inside. Sully’s kitchen was a dark little space, the windows closed in by trees, every shelf and countertop crammed full with junk and knickknacks. Newspapers were stacked in piles about the floor. The kitchen table was about the only unoccupied surface. They sat around it, in old ladder-back chairs that look dangerously close to collapse.

“Your brother’s the one they was really pressurin’,” Sully told Chase. “But Richard, he wasn’t about to give in, no sir. He tells us, we gotta stick together. Says we can’t sell, no matter how many letters they send us, how many lies they tell.” Sully shook his head. “Didn’t do no good. Just about everybody on this road went and signed on Graffam’s dotted line, just like that. And Richard, look what went and happened to him. Hear he got himself poked with a knife.”

Miranda saw Chase glance in her direction. Old Sully was so out of touch he didn’t realize he was sitting with the very woman accused of plunging that knife into Richard Tremain.

“You said something about a letter,” said Chase.

“Telling you to sell. Did Graffam send it?”

“Wasn’t signed. I hear none of ’em were.”

“So Richard got a letter, as well?”

“I figure. So did Barretts down the way. Maybe everyone did. People wouldn’t talk about ’em.”

“What did the letter say? The one you got?”

“Lies. Mean, wicked lies….”

“And the one they sent Richard?”

Sully shrugged. “I wasn’t privy to that.”

Miranda glanced around the kitchen with its overflowing shelves. A pack rat, this Mr. Sulaway was. He kept things, junk and treasure both. She said, “Do you still have that letter?”

Sully hunched his shoulders, like a hermit crab about to retreat into its shell. He grunted. “Maybe.”

“May we see it?”

“I dunno.” He sighed, rubbed his face. “I dunno.”

“We know they’re lies, Mr. Sulaway. We just want to see what tactics they’re using. We have to stop Graffam before he does any more damage.”

For a moment Sully sat hunched and silent. Miranda thought he might not have heard what she said. But then he creaked to his feet and shuffled over to the kitchen counter. From the flour canister he pulled out a folded sheet of paper. He handed it to Miranda.

She laid it flat on the table.

“What really happened to Stanley? The Lula M knows. So do we.”

Below those cryptic words was a handwritten note, penciled in. “Sell, Sully.”

“Who’s Stanley?” asked Miranda.

Sully had shrunk into his chair and was staring down at his leathery hands.

“Mr. Sulaway?”

The answer came out in a whisper. “My brother.”

“What does that note refer to?”

“It was a long time ago….” Sully wiped his eyes, as though to clear away some mist clouding his vision. “Just an accident,” he murmured. “Happens all the time out there. The sea, you can’t trust her. Can’t turn yer back on her….”

“What happened to Stanley?” asked Miranda gently.

“Got…got his boot caught in the trap line. Pulled him clean over the side. Water’s cold in December. It’ll freeze yer blood. I was aboard the
Sally M,
didn’t see it.” He turned, stared at the window. The trees outside seemed to close in upon the house, shutting it off from light, from warmth.

They waited.

He said softly. “I was the one found him. Draggin’ in the water off
Lula
’s stern. I cut him loose…hauled him aboard…brought him to port.” He shuddered. “That was it. Long time ago, fifty years. Maybe more….”

“And this note?”

“It’s a lie, got spread around after…”

“After what?”

“After I married Jessie.” He paused. “Stanley’s wife.”

There it is,
thought Miranda. The secret. The shame.

“Mr. Sulaway?” asked Chase quietly. “What did they have on Richard?”

Sully shook his head. “Didn’t tell me.”

“But they did have something?”

“Whatever it was, it didn’t make him sell. Had a hard head, your brother. That’s what got him in the end.”

“Why didn’t
you
sell, Mr. Sulaway?” Miranda asked.

The old man turned to her. “Because I won’t,” he said. She saw in his eyes the look of a man who’s been backed into the last corner of his life. “Ain’t no way they can scare me. Not now.”

“Can’t they?”

He shook his head. “I got cancer.”

“Do you think he killed his brother?” asked Miranda.

They were walking along the road, through the dappled shade of pine and birch. Chase had his hands in his pockets, a frown on his brow. “What does it matter now, whether he did it or not?”

Yes, what did it matter? she wondered. The old man was about to face his final judgment. Innocent or guilty, he’d already lived fifty years with the consequences.

“It’s hard to believe Graffam was able to dig up that story,” said Miranda. “He’s a newcomer to the island. What he had on Sully was fifty years old. How did Graffam find out about it?”

“Hired investigator?”

“And he used the name ‘Sully’ in that note. Remember? Only a local person would use that nickname.”

“So he had a local informant. Someone with his finger on the island’s pulse.”

“Or someone in the business of knowing what goes on in this town,” she added, thinking of Willie B. Rodell and the Alamo Detective Agency.

They came to a sign that read Harmony House.

“Used to be called Frenchman’s Cottage,” said Chase. “Until the hippies bought it.” Down a rutted road they walked. They heard the tinkle of wind chimes before they saw the cottage. The sound floated through the trees, dancing on the breeze. The chimes were of iridescent glass, sparkling as they swayed from the porch overhang. The cottage door hung wide open.

“Anyone home?” called Chase.

At first only the wind chimes answered. Then, faintly, they heard the sound of laughter, approaching voices. Through the trees they saw them—two men and a woman, walking toward them.

None of the three was wearing a stitch.

The trio, spotting unexpected visitors, didn’t seem in the least perturbed. The woman had wild hair generously streaked with gray, and an expression of placid indifference. The two men flanking her were equally shaggy and serene. One of the men, silver haired and weathered, seemed to be the official spokesperson. As his two companions went into the cottage, he came forward with his hand held out in greeting.

“You’ve found Harmony House,” he said. “Or is this just a fortunate accident?”

“It’s on purpose,” said Chase, shaking the man’s hand. “I’m Chase Tremain, Richard’s brother. He owned Rose Hill Cottage, up the road.”

“Ah, yes. The place with the weird vibes.”

“Weird?”

“Vanna feels it whenever she gets close. Disharmonic waves. Tremors of dissonance.”

“I must have missed it.”

“Meat eaters usually do.” The man looked at Miranda. He had pale blue eyes and a gaze that was far too direct for comfort. “Does my natural state bother you?”

“No,” she said. “It’s just that I’m not used to…” Her gaze drifted downward, then snapped back to his face.

The man looked at her as though she were a creature to be pitied. “How far we’ve fallen from Eden,” he said, sighing. He went to the porch railing and grabbed a sarong that had been hanging out to dry. “But the first rule of hospitality,” he said, wrapping the cloth around his waist, “is to make your guests comfortable. So we’ll just cover the family jewels.” He motioned them into the cottage.

Inside, the woman, Vanna, now also draped in a sarong, sat cross-legged beneath a stained glass window. Her eyes were closed; her hands lay palm up on her knees. The other man knelt at a low table, rolling what appeared to be brown rice sushi. Potted plans were everywhere, thick as weeds. They blended right in with the Indonesian hangings, the dangling crystals, the smell of incense. The whole effect was jarred only by the fax machine in the corner.

Their host, who went by the surprisingly mundane name of Fred, poured rose hip tea and offered them carob cookies. They came to Maine every summer, he said, to reconnect with the earth. New York was purgatory, a place with one foot in hell. False people, false values. They worked there only because it kept them in touch with the common folk. Plus, they needed the income. For most of the year they tolerated the sickness of city life, breathing in the toxins, poisoning their bodies with refined sugars. Summers were for cleansing. And that was why they came here, why they left their jobs for two months every year.

“What
are
your jobs?” asked Miranda.

“We own the accounting firm of Nickels, Fay and Bledsoe. I’m Nickels.”

“I’m Fay,” said the man rolling sushi.

The woman, undoubtedly Bledsoe, continued to meditate in silence.

“So you see,” said Fred Nickels, “there is no way we can be persuaded to sell. This land is a connection to our mother.”

“Was it hers?” asked Chase.

“Mother Earth owns everything.”

Chase cleared his throat. “Oh.”

“We refuse to sell. No matter how many of those ridiculous letters they send us—”

Both Miranda and Chase sat up straight. “Letters?” they said simultaneously.

“We three have lived together for fifteen years. Perfect sexual harmony. No jealousy, no friction. All our friends know it. So it would hardly upset us to have our arrangement announced to the world.”

“Is that what the letters threatened to do?” asked Miranda.

“Yes. ‘Expose your deviant lifestyle’ was the phrase, I think.”

“You’re not the only ones to get a letter,” said Chase. “My hunch is, everyone on this road—everyone who didn’t want to sell—got one in the mail.”

“Well, they threatened the wrong people here. Deviant lifestyles are exactly what we wish to promote. Am I right, friends?”

The man with the sushi looked up and said, “Ho.”

“He agrees,” said Fred.

“Was the letter signed?” asked Miranda.

“No. It was postmarked Bass Harbor, and it came to our house in New York.”

“When?”

“Three, four months ago. It advised us to sell the camp. It didn’t say to whom, specifically. But then we got the offer from Mr. Graffam, so I assumed he was behind it. I had Stone Coast Trust checked out. A few inquiries here and there, just to find out what I was dealing with. My sources say there’s money involved. Graffam’s just a front for a silent investor. My bet is it’s organized crime.”

“What would they want with Shepherd’s Island?” asked Chase.

“New York’s getting uncomfortable for ’em. Hotdog D.A.’s and all that. I think they’re moving up the coast. And the north shore’s just the foothold they’d want. Tourist industry’s already booming up here. And look at this place! Ocean. Forest. No crime. Tell me some poor schlump from the city wouldn’t pay good money to stay at a resort right here.”

“Did you ever meet Graffam?”

“He paid us a visit, to talk land deal. And we told him, in no uncertain terms, to—” Fred stopped, grinned “—fornicate with himself. I’m not sure he knew the meaning of the word.”

“What kind of man is he?” asked Miranda.

Fred snorted. “Slick. Dumb. I mean, we’re talking
really
stupid. The IQ of an eggplant. What idiot names a development Hemlock Heights? Might as well call it Poison Oak Estates.” He shook his head. “I can’t believe he got those other suckers to sell.” He laughed. “You should meet him, Tremain. Tell me if you don’t agree he’s a throwback to our paramecium ancestors.”

“A paramecium,” said the woman, Bledsoe, briefly opening her eyes, “is far more advanced.”

“Unfortunately,” said Fred, “I’m afraid the rezoning is a fait accompli. Soon we’ll be surrounded. Condos here, a Dunkin’ Donuts there. The Cape Codification of Shepherd’s Island.” He paused. “And you know what?
That’s
when we’ll sell! My God, what a profit! We could buy a whole damn county up in the Allagash.”

“The project could still be stopped,” said Miranda.

“They won’t get their hands on Rose Hill. And the zoning could be reversed.”

“Not a chance,” said Fred. “We’re talking tax income here. Conservation land brings in zilch for the island. But a nice little tourist resort? Hey, I’m a CPA. I know the powers of the almighty buck.”