The Clam Bake Murder: A Windward Bay Mystery Read online

  “So, what’s new with you?” It was probably the first personal question I’d asked him, for shame.

  “Huh?” Wrenched out of his Ketchup coma, he sat up straight, took a quick sip of Cherry Coke, pretending like the past fifteen minutes hadn’t happened.

  “I asked what’s new with you? You taken up any new sports?”

  “No new ones, no. Some of the guys asked if I wanted to play soccer—they’ve got a five-a-side thing going, one night a week. But I’m more of a water sports kinda guy. You know me, never happy unless I’m soaked head to toe.”

  “Are those the guys at the station?”

  “Nah, those guys would drop dead if they even set foot on a soccer pitch. I’d love to see em have to chase somebody on foot.”

  “Doughnuts and vending machines, huh?”

  “Yeah, and you can add smokes and suds to that diet. When I think back to what the guys were like at the CGA, the way they looked after themselves, it blows my mind.”

  “So they’re all smokers—at the station?”

  “Pretty much.”

  “Any of them quit recently?”

  He cast me a quizzical glance. “Why do you ask?”

  “No reason.”

  “You sure you’re not an undercover Fed or something?” he joked. “Man, are you curious about this town or what!”

  “Or what. It’s strange behavior I’m curious about.”

  “And quitting smoking is classed as strange behavior?”

  “When it’s pertinent to my investigation.”

  He snapped off a salute. “Yes, ma’am.”

  “Oops. I guess I am starting to sound like one of those damn government agents. Don’t mean to. It’s just that—”

  “I’ll ask around—about the smoking thing,” he said. “There’s no law against you running your own investigation, as long as it doesn’t interfere—”

  “With the official one. Yes, I remember. And Billy?”

  “Hmm?”

  “Thank you for listening. You’ve been sweet, putting up with me like this.” I leant over and kissed him on the cheek. He responded with a slightly dopey smile.

  “Any time,” he said, swilling the Coke and ice around in his cup. “Keep me updated on the whole Briggs-Brady thing. If you like, I could check out Elysium Homes, see what turns up.”

  “Really? That would be...fantastic!” The most impressive part was that he had actually been paying attention. I was sure I’d bored him into an early grave with my non-stop conspiracy theories. “You’re sure the Chief wouldn’t mind?”

  “If he asks, I’ll just say I’m following up a lead that might be connected to the case. The key phrase there is might be. He’s not gonna think twice, he’s that busy.”

  “Deputy Sneakypants.”

  He snickered. “It’s you! I swear you’re a bad influence.”

  “Oh, I’m bad.”

  “You can’t help it. Everyone thinks you’re so sweet and innocent, but I know the real Sylvia Blalock.”

  “She’s finally showing her claws, huh?”

  “She’s showing something.” He cheekily pointed to my tattoo, which wasn’t usually visible on account of it being quite low down on the back of my hip. It meant my jeans had become loose; I hadn’t eaten properly in a while, and it was starting to show.

  I yanked the hem of my T-shirt down to cover it, but before I could think up a witty comeback, Billy was up out of his seat and already paying the check.

  I didn’t see him again for a few days—Mattson and the State Police kept him very occupied—but I thought about him often, about lost opportunities, cruel twists of fate, and how cut up I’d been after he’d left the last time. Something told me he wasn’t back in Windward to stay, at least not permanently, that he hadn’t given up his Coast Guard dream quite yet. And getting involved with him again, reopening those old wounds, would probably break my heart for good if history repeated itself.

  If only I could have been as take-charge in my love life as I was in my investigation.

  I was restless that evening, couldn’t sit still for longer than a few minutes without jumping up and pacing about the living room. Manuka meowed every time I got up; he relied on routine, and his prime lap-time was being denied him. He loitered on the sofa arm just in case I did settle, but I couldn’t. Not while there was a potential crime scene out there I hadn’t investigated. It was off-limits; the police cordon line said so. But they had to have gathered all their evidence by now, taken all their photos, swept for prints, combed for hair fibers, used a black-light or whatever the damn thing was called to find any blood spatter. It seemed almost churlish to deny me the right to look around. After all, who could possibly be more diligent, more tenacious in her search than a family member with the bit between her teeth? Mattson wouldn’t let me in on the case, so I’d have to take the initiative he and his bureaucratic boys in blue seemed to have fumbled thus far.

  I waited till it was pitch black outside. Dressed darkly, I took a flashlight and a pair of gloves and drove out to Alice’s place. The sound of breaking surf and the rustling of dry reeds in the wind were the only noises thereabouts. I still had the back door key Uncle Sean had given me for when I wanted to take the rowboat out. The “life saver”, a small plastic box full of emergency equipment, first aid and a few rations, was in the kitchen, and he’d always insisted I take it with me whilst on the sea and bring it back after, no matter the weather or the time of day, a rule I still followed.

  Ducking under the cordon tape, I had to practically crawl into the house on my hands and knees. So this was what Manuka felt like whenever he went through the cat flap? There didn’t seem anything amiss in the kitchen. But I’d already glimpsed the wreckage in the living room. Strolling through it was like wandering through the aftermath of World War Three: The Domestic To End Them All. It looked as if someone had gone round the room like a spiteful tornado, leaving no ornament untrashed. The only breakable things that weren’t broken appeared to be the 60-inch LCD TV and a framed photograph of Alice, Uncle Sean, my dad and me on the deck of a fishing trawler, taken in Gloucester the summer just before Alice and I had started Senior High. It brought back bittersweet fragments of memory: images, feelings, smells, hopes for the future. Little did that girl in the picture know that before she reached thirty, she would be the only one left alive.

  So what had happened here? The forensics team probably had a more detailed tale worked out, but it seemed clear to me this was Alice finally snapping, exploding after years of spousal abuse. She’d left that one photo unbroken, had smashed everything else. That fact meant the world to me, that she’d stopped to think of Dad and me even in her craziest rage. Uncle Sean’s college baseball bat lay in two pieces on the carpet. The head was badly scratched and stained with a reddish liquid, matching that splashed on the wall: not blood but wine—a bottle and two glasses lay shattered nearby.

  To break a baseball bat required a swing far heavier than skinny Alice’s. A man’s swing. So, Gordo or Ray Moreno? The systematic wreckage suggested a domestic quarrel, a hate-filled crescendo. But it could have been a jealous ex-boyfriend. Maybe Ray, after one too many that night, had burst in and decided to take what he felt was owed him after all those years. He’d stalked poor Alice around the living room, smashing everything on the way, and when he’d finally gotten his hands on her and saw how resistant she was, it had made him even more furious and he’d beaten her to death. Taken her body outside, down to the jetty, rowed her out and dumped her overboard, not thinking, in his drunk, agitated state, that the tide would wash her back to shore.

  That was one theory.

  Then there was Gordo, the jealous, controlling husband who’d already flipped at the clam bake when he’d seen Alice and Ray trading insults. It wasn’t much of a leap to imagine him downing half a bottle of Cabernet Sauvignon and then picking up where he’d left off, taking his beating out on her. Maybe he’d gone ballistic with the bat, trashing his wife’s family home; his to
tal disappointment of a wife, her home he’d never liked in the town that had always hated him. He’d killed her, then taken her body out and dumped it in the bay. Again, alcohol had fogged his reasoning, making him overlook the tide and the fact that he hadn’t weighted her at all.

  That was another theory.

  But neither of them quite gelled. For one thing, the rowboat had been found way over on Aylesbury Beach. Why would the killer have rowed all the way across the bay, to a remote beach from which he’d then have to escape on foot without being seen? Or if the boat had simply drifted all that way, how had the killer got back to shore? Why would he leave the boat to drift away? It made no sense.

  Something was missing.

  A pile of unopened mail had been placed next to the telephone. I leafed through it, for no other reason than I was stumped. Most of the letters were adverts. A couple were from the bank. One A4-sized envelope bore a fancy logo with an elaborate E over a diamond backdrop. Shining my flashlight on the back print, the return address, I whispered, “Elysium Homes.”

  Then I noticed the envelope had already been opened, ever so neatly, probably with a sharp letter opener. Inside was a thin, slick brochure advertising the kind of paradise properties the average person could save for all her life and not even meet half the asking price. Golf courses, communal yoga classes, yachting wharves, etcetera. It wasn’t condos this time, but it was exactly the kind of thing Windward’s officials had thwarted the last time around. The town was fine as it was, with a good blend of the wealthy and the not-so-wealthy, a place where anyone could speak to anyone and not feel the need to put on airs or condescend. Elysium, on the other hand, was for the super rich, an exclusive enclave where the ordinary folks of Windward would not be wanted (and probably wouldn’t visit even if they were).

  If I’d had a vote on the subject, I’d have given Elysium the thumbs down. It just wasn’t right for our town, and I expected most Windwarders would agree.

  The strangest thing about the brochure, though, was that it was addressed to Gordo McNair’s home in Kentucky. He’d brought it with him to Windward. Why? Who was he going to give it to? Surely he couldn’t be so dumb as to try the same tack as last time. My gut told me he’d hatched a more devious plan, involving someone else in town, maybe more than one, in order to sell Elysium to the Town Select Committee.

  But what?

  How much had Alice known about it?

  I went upstairs to her room, that cute, timeless room I hadn’t visited in ages. It still smelled vaguely of bubblegum and reminded me of homework left undone—pure teenage Alice. One of her old exercise books from school was on the dresser. Her overdone floral handwriting and cringe worthy doodles were so much like mine I couldn’t help but remember all the time we’d spent in here, lounging on her bed, coming up with any excuse not to do our homework. Had she been reminiscing about that just before the end? The idea made me tear up.

  What about her old diary? I thought. Did she take it with her, or is it still here where she—

  The answer was both...and neither. There was a diary in Alice’s original hiding place under the fake bottom of her top dresser drawer; but it wasn’t the original diary, the one she’d written in every day throughout her adolescence. That was long gone. This new one was black and silver, looked expensive. And the entries were shorter, sharper, more like sound bites and primers than the good old waffling journal prose of old.

  It was this year’s diary. She’d brought it with her from Kentucky, and had made several recent entries. The scrawled writing appeared agitated, rushed, not at all like the flowery lettering Alice had been vain about in school. It was definitely her handwriting, though, just a little tough to read, especially by flashlight. So I decided to take it back to my place where I could study it at length. Sure, I was breaking all sorts of laws, but Alice was family. I had a right to know what she’d been through in the last months of her life.

  Chapter Four

  A woman’s secrets were pretty much like a girl’s secrets, only less Disney, I decided after trawling through a couple of months of Alice’s adult diary. The same vague dissatisfaction, the intermittent beacons of hope that made her feel things would be better soon, the crushes, the jealousies, the injections of pride, the occasional little nods to the past and the future but the overwhelming preoccupation with the here and now, that particular day on which the entry was written. The way her brain worked had not changed. But as I read on, I was struck with an almost a crushing sense of confinement, as though I was reading fragments from the journal of a prisoner slowly coming to terms with her captivity.

  March 9—Another fundraising dinner with G. Felt like the whole evening was scripted. He’s like a bad stand-up comic in love with his own worst boring-ass stories. Meh. Maybe I should hire him a scriptwriter. Better still, maybe I should marry one. Woohoo!

  March 11—Went for another fitting at Cuissier’s. Must’ve tried on two dozen outfits. G’s taste is getting worse. He picked one that makes me look like Katharine Hepburn playing golf. Ugh! If he buys me clubs I’m officially killing myself. After I’ve killed him. Swing!

  March 17—G suggested we visit Windward this summer. Great news but odd. Wonder what L will say when I tell him. Counting the days till rendezvous with L. Can taste him already. God it tastes good!

  March 28—G is out of town. I spent night (and half next day) with L. Ate hot dogs and drank beer—ages since I last did that. Felt great! L thinks it isn’t the right time for me to leave G. Maybe after Elysium deal is sealed. God knows when that will be.

  April 15—G & L met up again for Elysium talks. Can’t believe how cool L is when he’s with G & me. He’s def in the right job. I wish Elysium was done already so they can fight it out. Let them fight for me as long as L wins. G wouldn’t last two seconds.

  She mentioned the mysterious L more and more as the weeks went on, and seemed to be pinning all her hopes on him. She even seemed to be coping with Gordo’s increasingly cold and controlling behavior, until I came across the following:

  May 1—Could be real trouble on horizon. I think G suspects L & me—says L mustn’t come here any more. We’ve been careful but what if he’s hired someone to follow me? No choice but to cool off for a while, wait till Elysium is locked in.

  May 17—Windward here I come! Only weeks away now. Can’t wait to see L again, and Cousin Sylvia too! Poor Sylvia. She has no idea what’s happening. And I can’t tell her anything about anything...at least not yet. Wait till after Elysium though! After Elysium there’ll be nothing and no one to stop me.

  And the final two entries, made in the days preceding the clam bake, pretty much confirmed the complicity of her mystery lover, L, in the Elysium plot.

  July 21—Overheard G telling L “the ammo is in the mail.” Elysium is getting serious! I pray it’s over soon. It’s turning G & L into monsters. I’m trapped between two monsters and their monstrous plan. Maybe I should warn someone. But who?

  July 22—Excited about seeing Cousin Sylvia! What will she make of my new look? L says he won’t show his face at the clam bake. Hopefully G says the same. Just one day to myself (with sweet Sylvia)—is that too much to ask?

  I cried myself to sleep after reading that, but had to drink a tot of rum to help the sleep arrive. Manuka curled up on the bed next to my pillow. He hadn’t done that in a while, not since the summer temperature had made prowling around outside preferable; I think he must have known I was in distress, and snuggled next to me out of pity.

  But poor Alice! Her position must have been impossible. First her husband, then her lover, consumed by some ambitious scheme to obtain the seal of approval for their land development project. She knew snippets of what was going on, but she was too frightened to tell anyone. So what really happened that night? What hand did L play in the events leading to the murder? And what was the “ammo in the mail”?

  The following morning I rang Melissa Briggs, got no reply. Then I tried Del Brady. Again, no reply. So I went rou
nd to the Briggs’s, saw the curtain in the front window move. Definitely someone in. But no one answered the door. Why were they avoiding me?

  Del’s car was in the driveway, and I saw the TV on through his window. But the same thing happened: he just switched it off and sneaked out of sight, wouldn’t come near the door. What was I, a leper or something? Two of the most influential people in Windward, giving me the Ferris Bueller routine?

  Maybe it was something I’d baked.

  Exasperated, I drove down to the beach to try and clear my head. The sky was a little overcast, which suited me just fine. I wasn’t in the mood for a blazing hot day. A young couple strolled by toting raspberry smoothies. I immediately went and bought one, slurped it down a little too fast and got heavy duty brain freeze. Then I followed it up with a packet of smoky bacon flavoured potato chips and a sausage roll. When even they didn’t fill me up, I splashed out on a foot-long Subway Melt with extra toasted cheese and Southwest sauce.

  Now that I’d consumed my calories for the year, I had to walk them off. What started as a leisurely saunter along the beach quickly turned into a mammoth hike—or steely march—right up the coast to the Forestall lighthouse and back again.

  By the time I reached my car, I’d beaten the mystery into some sort of shape, or at least one fit to share with Billy Langdale. It might even be time to take it to Chief Mattson. If the mysterious L was still at large, coercing Town Selectmen—using his and Gordo’s “ammo” to ensure a favourable outcome in the Elysium vote—now was probably the time to step in and expose him. Alice’s diary, together with Gordo’s past history of shady real estate practises, ought to be proof enough to intrigue a police investigation.