The Light Keeper's Legacy (A Chloe Ellefson Mystery) (21 page)

“I’m being dumb,” Chloe told three cormorants, black avian missiles speeding over the water below. Their apparent hurry only reminded her that precious time was passing. She wanted to find that box, dammit!

“A clue would be good right now,” she said, aiming her words and her thoughts back to Emily. “How big is the box? Did you hide it near the lighthouse? In the woods? Along the beach?”

Still nothing.

Chloe nibbled her lower lip, studying the limestone walls along the steps. If Emily had secured the box in the cliffs, it was at least
possible
that the hiding place still existed. The limestone was rugged, irregular, full of pockets.

OK. She’d take one last stab.

_____

Roelke stalked into the EPD, jerked out the desk drawer where he kept in-progress reports, and settled down at the typewriter. He cranked a piece of paper around the platen, stared at it, got back to his feet, and prowled the room. Finally he turned on the clerk’s radio and tuned it to a sports channel. Everyone was saying that the Milwaukee Brewers could take the American League Championship this year.

“—as we head into the eighth,” the announcer was saying, “the Yankees are on top of the Brewers, twelve-two.”

Roelke threw the radio a disgusted look. Maybe 1982 would not be a championship year after all.

Skeet walked in, clearly startled to see Roelke. “Hey!” Skeet said. “I didn’t think you were on this afternoon.”

“I’m not. I came in to catch up. And to talk to you.”

“Yeah?” Skeet reached into his plastic mailbox on the wall and pulled out the accumulation. “Something going on I need to know about?”

“As a matter of fact there is,” Roelke said. “Mrs. Saddler came by on Thursday. Remember her?”

A copy of
Police Product News
slipped to the floor. Skeet crouched to pick it up, and flipped to the centerfold—a blonde policewoman in hot pants, leaning seductively against a squad car. “Sure.”

“Mrs. Saddler said one of the EMTs stole two pills from her husband’s prescription container of Demerol.” Roelke folded his arms and leaned against the counter.

For a long moment Skeet didn’t move. Then he straightened. “That’s bad.”

“That’s
bad?
” Roelke exploded. “That’s not what happened!
You
were the one who went back in the house to get the container.”

“Yeah, and I gave it to Denise Miller before the ambulance took off. Maybe she took the pills.”

“I asked Denise. And I asked the other guys on the call too. None
of them had any idea what I was talking about, so cut the bullshit. Man up and—”

“Man up? Man
up?
” Skeet flushed. “What the hell do you know about it?”

“I know you committed a crime. And I know I’ll wonder if you’ve got my back next time we’re out on a call and something goes sour. Is this the first time, or just the first time you got caught?”

“I didn’t—”

“
Damn
it, Skeet! You can get addicted to Demerol! Is it just painkillers, or do you balance those with speed? Is that why you’ve been out sick? You were too messed up to come in?”

Skeet clenched fists. Stared at the floor.

“Look, Skeet, if you’ve got a problem, you need to deal with it. I know what it’s like to go through a rough patch—”

“You don’t know shit. Do you have kids? A mortgage? Assignments for your night school classes stacking up like cordwood? A wife who asks every damn day why you got passed over for promotion last month? If that’s what you went home to every night,
you might pocket some Demerol yourself.” Skeet glared at him.
“Have
you forgotten how you got your permanent position,
Roelke?”

“Do
not
throw that in my face.” Roelke thrust his finger toward the other man’s nose. “I never asked you to lie for me.”

“Maybe not. But you sure didn’t speak up, either.”

Roelke shook his head. Before the village Police Committee members made their decision about the permanent hire, Roelke had assaulted a murder suspect. He’d fully expected to lose the position, if not his badge. But Skeet reported in first. Skeet had been the one to lie. Things got complicated after that
…
and Roelke got the full-time job.

The kicker now was that Roelke
had
tried to rectify the situation. His own initial report had described the incident truthfully. But there was no point trying to explain that to Skeet now.

“So,” Skeet said, sounding for all the world like a sulky sixth-grader, “you gonna turn me in?”

“You should turn yourself in.”

“That’s not going to happen.” Skeet lifted his chin. The challenge in his eyes was clear:
I lied for you. You owe me.

Roelke’d had two days to think this mess through. He’d hoped that Skeet wouldn’t put him in this position. Stealing the pills was bad enough. But this
…
Roelke shook his head in disgust.

“Here’s how it’s going to be,” he said finally. “I am not going to tell the chief about this—”

Skeet sagged against his locker, all bravado gone. “Thank you.”

“But I will not lie for you. Fix things with Mrs. Saddler.”

Skeet nodded earnestly. “I can do that. I’ll just tell her that—”

“I don’t want to hear it!” Roelke barked. “And let me be very clear:
you and I are square now. You will never mention that job thing again. And if I ever so much as suspect that you’re doing drugs, I will bust your ass. No second chances.”

“Nope, we’re cool.” Skeet buckled on his duty belt and reached for the car keys. “It will never happen again. I
…
” He was still making promises as he backed out the door.

“And the New York Yankees beat the Milwaukee Brewers fourteen-two,” the announcer said.

Roelke turned off the radio. Then he closed his eyes, pressing one knuckle against his forehead. Skeet’s right about one thing, he thought. I have no idea what it feels like to support a wife and kids on a part-time cop’s salary. Just the thought made him nervous.

Well, he evidently didn’t have to worry about that with Chloe.

He sighed, opening his eyes. He wished Chloe wasn’t up on that
dumb island—instead of here talking about what she wanted. And he especially wished she wasn’t up on that dumb island all by her lonesome. He understood that she liked being independent. But once she got all revved up about something, she sometimes did stupid things.

Thirty-eight

Chloe tried to convince
herself that she wasn’t doing something stupid as she descended the stairs to the narrow beach. You won’t think so if you find the secret box Ragna gave Emily, she reminded herself. She trudged along the cliff walls, first in one direction as far as seemed reasonable, then the other. She examined the limestone carefully, sometimes climbing a precarious foot or two to investigate a promising space above her head. No luck.

She had given up, and was making her way back to the wooden steps, when a pileated woodpecker shrilled above her head. Glancing up, she noticed an opening in the cliff. She hadn’t seen it on her first pass because the opening angled away. The cavity was about the size of a breadbox, and maybe twelve feet above the beach. It seemed extremely unlikely that Emily Betts, wearing the feminine garb of the day, had climbed up the cliff to hide Ragna’s box.

Then again
…
maybe not. Beaches were impermanent entities, shifting with every storm. Waves pounded, walls eroded, stones landed and fell. Maybe the hidey-hole had been more accessible in Emily’s time.

“All right,” Chloe announced. “This is my last try.”

She eyed the wall carefully. She’d done some climbing in her days in the Outings Club at West Virginia University. While she wasn’t a natural—some of her more spider-like friends could climb brick walls—she did have a little experience creeping up rock faces with only fingertips and toes to help her along.

Of course, she’d done so while roped and harnessed for safety, wearing a helmet, guided by pals above and below.

Just start climbing, she ordered herself. She eyeballed the first few steps and went at it.

The ascent wasn’t too bad. She moved carefully, always keeping three points anchored while searching for the next fingertip- or toe-hold. Other than fretting about tiny plants (if they were hardy enough to live in these exposed crevices, it seemed quite unfair to crush them), she made it up the wall without difficulty.

The recess was shadowed, dark. Her flashlight was on the beach below. Chloe made sure that her left hand and both feet were firmly wedged on solid rock. Did badgers live in stone walls? No, she reminded herself, those particular chomping creatures lived underground. Hoping like anything that some other defensive creature was not in residence, she slid her right arm into the space.

Her groping fingers met only stone.

Chloe fought another wave of disappointment. Had she really thought that Emily had somehow guided her to notice this particular spot? Evidently so.

“Idiot,” she reproached herself. Well, she’d tried. She’d failed. And she was now done. Shadows were growing long. She had some reading to finish tonight. Time to head back to the lighthouse.

As Chloe began to descend, she belatedly remembered something important: it was, for her at least, much harder to climb down a rock face than to climb up.

For a long moment she clung limpet-like to the wall, frozen, trying to decide if she needed to move a hand or a foot first. When this had happened in college, her buddy Ethan had always been on hand to help. “There’s a great little ledge six inches to the right of
your foot,” he’d call, or “You can do it. Just make sure your hand-hold
is stable before putting any weight on it.”

No Ethan here. Evidently no Emily either. She was on her own.

Slowly, slowly, Chloe crept down the wall. The old rhythm finally kicked in: grope with right foot, then right hand; then left foot, left hand; repeat. She wedged her toes onto tiny outcrops, grasped more tiny outcrops with her fingertips, and made progress
…
until she reached a flat expanse.

Shit. How could this be? She’d climbed up this way. There
had
to be protrusions. But try as she might, she couldn’t find any.

Chloe forced herself to look down over her shoulder. She was only about three feet above the beach, but those loose cobbles below were discouraging. If she landed wrong she might break something she’d rather not break.

On the other hand, her fingertips were starting to ache and her knees were developing an uncontrollable telltale quiver. OK. She’d try one more time to move her right foot down. If that didn’t work, she’d have to jump.

That plan was abandoned as soon as she lifted her right toes from the wall. Her fingertips revolted against the extra weight. Chloe fell.

She landed hard and lay stunned on the rocky ground. Pain screamed through her right hip and arm—oh
geez
, had she broken her arm? Was it too late to get off the island? Shit, it was. She’d have to get through the night, and ’fess up to her stupid climb in the morning. How humiliating.

Eventually she forced herself to move again, gingerly taking stock. Her right arm exhibited not bone protruding through skin, but blood seeping from a bad scrape. Perhaps she’d cracked a bone, but that was it. That was good news, although how an arm could hurt this badly and not be snapped she didn’t know.

The hip still functioned, too. Chloe staggered to her feet, limped to the steps, and plodded back toward the lighthouse.

Twilight was in full descent by the time she reached the clearing. She washed and bandaged the scrapes. Then she made a stop at the pit toilet and got out her stove. She wanted nothing more than to make a cup of tea, lock herself inside Pottawatomie, and retreat to her sleeping bag with a lantern to finish reading the final RISC files.

At the last minute she remembered the repeated bits of childish laughter she’d heard the night before, over and over. She nibbled her lower lip, thinking. Then she nodded. There was one more thing she wanted to do.

Chloe had done lots of backpacking in the southern Appalachians, often in the summer’s worst heat, sometimes in dry spells where drinking water was scarce and wash water only a memory. Her trick for combating discomfort was to tuck a small container of baby powder into her pack. Her friends scoffed, but she found the indulgence worthwhile. When settling into a dry campsite, sticky-wet with sweat, it felt good to dry off with a dusting of powder.

She still had some powder in her necessaries bag, and she fetched it. Outside, she sprinkled the powder on the ground in an ephemeral ring around the lighthouse. Inside, she sprinkled more on the second floor, the steps, and the first floor.

All right, she thought, as she settled in to bed. At first daylight she’d quickly clean the powder away, before anyone could stop by and gain more evidence that the guest curator was a wee bit batty. But first, she’d look for child-sized footprints.

_____

Chloe slept poorly, waking several times to the sound of the Betts children having fun. Or were
dreams
of the Betts children waking her? She couldn’t be sure. Some of the giggles and chortles seemed random. Others repeated themselves.

She was up at first light on Sunday morning, feeling stiff and achy. Bruises the size of Rhode Island had blossomed in vivid color on her arms and legs, courtesy of the previous day’s rapid descent from limestone wall to cobbled beach. Lovely.

Fortunately the morning was cool and drizzly. Chloe pulled on a pair of jeans, and a warm sweater over the T-shirt. She was anxious to clean up the baby powder she’d sprinkled before someone asked what for.

The dusting inside was undisturbed. Feeling ridiculous, she wiped up evidence of her folly. Then she went outside to kick the powder ring into oblivion. But on the lawn outside her bedroom, she
did
find footprints.

Chloe’s skin abruptly felt one size too small. She extended one leg, holding her shoe above one of the clear tracks. Her foot was only slightly smaller than the footprint. “Shit,” she whispered. Someone had walked outside her east window while she’d been sleeping. And whether corporeal or not, the trespasser had been an adult.

She squatted for a better look. It was difficult to discern much. Several prints were smudged, as if the person had come, turned around, and walked away again.

Narrowing her eyes, she tried to understand what she was seeing. The footsteps were clear enough, but
…
there. Something was different. A bit of baby powder had been marked with the corner of something square. A box? Or
what
? There were no shrubs around the lighthouse, no flower beds, no place to hide anything. Whatever had been placed on the ground was gone.

Chloe rose and walked around the building. The powder ring was intact on the north, west, and south sides of the lighthouse. Hugging her arms across her chest she turned, scanning the clearing, the woods beyond. Was someone watching her, right this minute?

Unease prickled the back of her neck. She abruptly ran to the summer kitchen door, scrambled up the steps, plunged inside, and locked the door behind her.

Then she paced, palms clutching elbows, trying to think. Maybe she was overreacting. Maybe the footprints belonged to a visitor. Dix had certainly crawled all around the lighthouse. Another lighthouse fanatic might have done the same, wanting to examine every construction detail. Or perhaps one of Herb Whitby’s workmen had arrived early.

“Nice try,” she mumbled, “but no cigar.” She’d sprinkled the powder at dusk, and found the prints at dawn.

Should she report the footsteps? If so, to whom? How would she explain why she’d sprinkled baby powder around the lighthouse in the first place? “I was sorta looking for some ghost children,” she imagined saying to Stig or Garrett, “but evidence of a grown person walking beneath my window at midnight was more than I bargained for.” Maybe she should just keep this information to herself.

But
…
no, she had to let Stig know. She’d tell him that she’d powdered the ground as defense against intruders. She’d sound neurotic, since she’d insisted on staying, but given all that had happened on the island lately it was at least plausible.

One little problem: the first
Karfi
run was hours away. Stig or Garrett might, or might not, be on the island. There was no way to know for sure if they’d boated over without hiking down to the park’s main compound.

She marched into the bedroom and sank onto the bed, considering. Her backpack leaned against one wall. Her daypack sat beside it. She needed to ready one of them. She wasn’t sure which.

Whoever left those prints
could
have harmed me and didn’t, argued one side of her brain. If someone wanted to hurt her, there’d been ample opportunity. Maybe the footprints truly were a coincidence of some kind. Maybe the person who made them wanted only to scare her into leaving the island.

But that didn’t make sense either. Unless Midnight Walker had watched from the woods while she sprinkled the powder, he would have had no idea he was actually leaving footprints behind. That brought her reasoning full-circle. What possible reason would someone have for being there?

Chloe thought again of that right-angle print she’d noticed. A possibility niggled at the back of her brain—a possibility that would explain the repeated sounds of childish glee she’d heard over and over. Had someone planted a cassette player after dark, and retrieved it again sometime before dawn?

She considered her options. Even now, the thought of being on the island during the
day
didn’t make alarm bells ring. But this was the last day of her trip, and she hoped to track down the last potential donor on Washington Island.

She had planned to enjoy one final night in the lighthouse. And maybe I still should, she argued with herself. She’d wanted to stay on Rock Island after finding a body on the beach below the lighthouse. She’d even wanted to stay after finding Sylvie’s body in much more troubling circumstances.

For the first time, though, the thought of spending the night here, even locked inside, was disturbing. Those man-sized footprints made her uneasy. Too uneasy to sleep alone on the island.

She muttered a Norwegian curse, grabbed her backpack, threw it on the bed, and started shoving belongings inside. When her down-filled cocoon billowed in all the wrong directions, she punched it into its sack with furious vehemence.

“You win, you SOB,” she told Midnight Walker. “Deputy Fjelstul better arrest your sorry ass because my pacifist heart has had enough. If I find you before the law does, you will find yourself in a world of hurt.” The boast was empty, though. Leaving a day early pissed Chloe off royally, but she harbored no illusions about her ability to actually kick anyone’s butt.

Once her gear was subdued she selected a few of the reference materials the RISC committee had left, including the photo of Emily Betts, and tucked them into her backpack. Then she went out the summer kitchen door and locked it behind her.

Swiping at an angry tear, she took one last look around the clearing. Even on such a gray day, it looked peaceful. She didn’t plan to go far; she would simply move over to Washington Island, find a cheap and sterile motel room, and spend her final twenty-four hours working there. But she hated leaving the lighthouse, this ground. There was more for her to do here, she was sure of it! Her heart ached as she shrugged into the backpack and clicked the hip strap in place.

It wasn’t fair. She’d made a commitment to this project, and to exploring the tangible records and the impressions emanating from past lives on this island. She’d opened herself to her growing perceptive abilities—even though that made the likelihood of a romantic relationship with Roelke McKenna drift out of reach like an autumn leaf on the lake.