Gravely Dead: A Midcoast Maine Mystery

by Lawrence Rotch

  She looked up as Oliver appeared and pulled out one of the arch-back chairs.

  “Thanks for rescuing me,” she said. “I really appreciate you coming to pick me up.”

  He eased his long legs under the table. "I never say no to a free lunch.”

  They were allowed just under a minute to read the menu before the waitress arrived. At six feet and 180 pounds, Lulu Pelligrini didn’t look like a woman to be trifled with, and she loomed over the table intimidatingly, the stub of a pencil poised. "Whaddya want?" she demanded.

  "I'll have the number three," Sarah replied.

  Lulu turned to Oliver. "What about you, stringbean?"

  "I'll try the number five," Oliver said.

  "You can try all you want, but you'll get the number eight." Lulu snatched up the menus. "Who's paying?"

  "I am," Sarah said.

  "Then I'll get you something better than the number three, dearie." Lulu turned on her heel and marched off.

  "Why does she bother to ask what you want if she isn't going to give it to you?" Sarah asked, more loudly than was strictly necessary.

  "Lulu comes from New York."

  Sarah wondered what that meant. "At least you know what your getting. What’s a number eight?"

  "Not what it says on the menu," Oliver replied fatalistically.

  "And you eat here often?"

  "It's cheap, and good. You just have to trust Lulu." He looked at Sarah with concern. “Are you okay?”

  “Just some bumps and bruises on top of the ones I already had,” she said.

  “You were lucky. How about the car?”

  “You mean ‘the big, ugly black SUV?’ It’s not too bad. The air bags didn’t even go off, and I was able to drive home, once the tow truck got me out of the woods. There’s a broken headlight, a few dents, and a lot of scraped paint from all those saplings. It’s over at Dinger’s, getting the headlight fixed. They said it would be ready this afternoon, except for the bodywork. I’ll worry about that later.”

  Lulu arrived and placed a huge chef’s salad in front of Sarah. Oliver got a large bowl of what looked and smelled like beef stew. The aroma made Sarah’s mouth water.

  “Do I look like a chef’s salad type?” she asked when Lulu was safely out of earshot.

  “Who knows what you look like to Lulu?”

  “You want to trade?”

  “No way. Lulu would kill us.”

  “Someone is already trying to kill me,” Sarah pointed out.

  “Have you talked to the police?”

  “Not yet, but I’ll have to report being run off the road.”

  Oliver looked at her thoughtfully, and Sarah noticed that his eyes were a bright blue in the morning light. “So you think it was intentional?” he said.

  “What else could it be? It was someone in a red pickup truck, both times.”

  Oliver busied himself with the stew. “Maine is full of red pickups. Was it the same one each time?”

  “How would I know? I was kind of busy both times trying not to get killed,” she snapped.

  Oliver’s spoon hovered over the bowl, his eyebrows lifting slightly. “I’m only asking the kinds of questions the police will ask.”

  Sarah would have preferred sympathy, but his question gave her pause. It could have been two trucks, in which case the accident theory made more sense. Perhaps she was overreacting. The thought irritated her even more. “The truck that sideswiped me sure as hell looked like Eldon’s.”

  “You’ve met him,” Oliver said. “Does he seem like the type to do that kind of thing?”

  “You tell me,” she retorted.

  “He’s been going around town, playing detective, pestering everyone about when they last saw Cathy, and he beat up three guys doing it, but nobody filed charges,” Oliver said. “And he did have some minor scrapes with the law as a kid.”

  “What kind of scrapes?”

  “Kid stuff. He got drunk one night when he was in high school, stole a dozen lobsters for a party some of his pals were planning, and dumped them loose on the seat next to him in his truck. It would have been okay except the bands came off some of their claws, and they started crawling onto his lap while he was driving. A cop saw him ‘operating a vehicle erratically’ and pulled him over.”

  “Sounds more like a kid’s prank.”

  “Yes, though stealing lobsters is taken pretty seriously around here. Did Ziggy say anything about the first truck?”

  “He just babbled on about me being ‘incompatible with the space-time continuum,’ whatever that means.”

  Oliver nodded. “It means he thinks it was somebody with a grudge against out-of-staters.”

  “I didn’t know you could speak nutcase.”

  “Ziggy is a lot shrewder than he seems, and he spends most of the day traveling around town, so he knows what’s going on.”

  Oliver paused. “Do you have any enemies that might have followed you up from Massachusetts?”

  Sarah thought about Claude’s jealous fits, that struck like lightning out of a blue sky. Like the time Sarah was having lunch with her brother at Panera’s, and Claude had run up behind her unsuspecting sibling and started hitting him over the head with a tray. But that was a case of mistaken identity. It was Claude’s bad luck that a pair of cops happened to be there—not to mention the blood and stitches.

  No, he might be upset about her coming to Maine, but running someone down with a truck wasn’t his style. Getting her in trouble with the IRS would be his way.

  Besides, he seemed to be looking for reconciliation, not revenge.

  “No, I don’t. Maybe it really was just mistaken identity,” she said reluctantly.

  “Somebody mistaking you for Cathy Leduc? I suppose it’s possible. That lets Eldon off the hook, though. He’s met you.”

  “I did walk around Myra’s place and visit her grave, but I don’t see why someone would try to run me down just for that,” Sarah commented.

  “Why did you visit her grave and prowl around her place?”

  “Why shouldn’t I? I used to know her. Why shouldn’t I pay my respects? I’d have walked around the campgrounds too if everything wasn’t covered with MacMansions.”

  “Yes, but if someone murdered Myra, assuming she was murdered, then he might be nervous about having a stranger poking around. Especially a stranger who knew her from the old days.”

  “We’ll see what the cops say.”

  “They’ll probably say that it looks a couple of accidents. Or maybe some guys with one too many beers who don’t like SUV’s with Massachusetts plates.”

  Sarah ate in stony silence.

  * * *

  It had clouded over by afternoon and a stiff southeast wind blew up Kwiguigam Sound, lashing the water to a surly, whitecap-speckled gray under steely clouds that threatened rain. The cove containing Pearly’s boatyard sheltered his dock from the southeast, so the water here was calm and smooth, except for a few patches of ruffled water that rushed across the surface. A handful of boats lay serenely at their moorings in the cove as though savoring the peace and quiet.

  Pearly lay in the bottom of Cathy’s boat as it sat tied up to the float. As a result, he couldn’t see the whitecaps rolling up the sound, but he could hear the wind whistling through the trees that shaded a pair of nearby cottages.

  Even on a Saturday afternoon, the boatyard was a quiet spot this early in the season, at least when Eldon wasn’t blasting the air with his country music. Nonetheless, a visitor was often wandering around, like the first robin of spring, though a few were more like the first black fly. Pearly looked forward to the metaphorical robins—some being close friends—and he tolerated the black flies. In any case, he tried to be patient with all of them, in hopes of gaining a customer.

  Cathy’s boat floated level now, thanks to some judiciously placed lead bars. Pearly lay on his back in the bilge with his head jammed under the boat’s center console, trying to assemble the throttle controls. Eldon had built the boat
and by rights he should be under here, Pearly figured. On the other hand, working on Cathy’s boat reminded Eldon of his missing girlfriend and turned him morbid and irritable.

  The situation was made worse by the fact that Cathy’s parents were still frantic over the girl’s disappearance and were constantly prodding the police, who responded by questioning poor Eldon some more.

  Pearly didn’t blame the cops. After all, Eldon was Cathy’s boyfriend and therefore their most likely suspect. Hell, he was their only suspect. Nor did he blame Eldon for playing Sam Spade, trying to find Cathy on his own, though his bull-in-a-china-shop approach didn’t ingratiate him with the law, or the people he interrogated.

  There’s nothing like a brand-new boat sitting in the water to attract sightseers. The present rubbernecker came from New Jersey, was in “Marketing,” talked too much, and had been here for the past twenty minutes by Pearly’s reckoning.

  “Was it hard to build this?” Rubberneck asked.

  Pearly squirmed further under the control console, trying to worm his hand up through the collection of cables and wire. “Depends on what you mean by hard,” he said.

  “I’m thinking about getting out of the rat-race. Retire up here, and built boats. How hard can it be to learn?”

  The small nut Pearly had been trying to fit onto its almost inaccessible bolt in the upper corner of the console slipped from his fingertips and rattled into the bilge.

  “I’m thinking of getting into marketing,” Pearly muttered under his breath. “How hard can that be?” He rolled onto his side in the cramped space and groped around the bilge.

  Pearly’s visitor was on a roll. “All I’d need is a piece of waterfront land and a shed,” he mused. “Do you know of any cheap waterfront around here?”

  Pearly retrieved the nut and wriggled around for another try. It was like working with his head in a bucket.

  “There’s no such thing as cheap waterfront any more,” he said. Who could afford to start a new boatyard on the water, Pearly thought, considering the cost of land? It was hard enough just paying the taxes on this place.

  “That’s what the Realtors tell you,” Rubberneck said, “but I’ll bet if you knew the right locals you could get a good buy.”

  “Let me know if you find any of the right locals.”

  Rubberneck leaned on the rail, rocking the boat just as Pearly was about to fit the nut in place. “This doesn’t look all that hard to make. I’ve done some woodworking—you know, bookcases and lawn furniture.”

  Pearly’s fingers scrabbled with the nut. If he dropped the fool thing now, it would probably end up in his left eye. “That’s a start,” he said, mentally placing his visitor in the black fly category.

  “You just screw the deck on, right? That’s easy.”

  Rubberneck leaned further into the boat. “What’s this?” he said, tapping on the panel that sealed off the bow.

  “Flotation tank. Keeps the boat from sinking if it fills with water.”

  “You mean a watertight bulkhead, like on a ship or a submarine to seal off part of the hull,” Rubberneck explained, already playing the role of an expert. Tap, tap, tap. He rapped on the bulkhead like a starving woodpecker. “What’s it made of, plywood?”

  “Yeah. Covered with fiberglass.” Pearly’s uninvited guest was sprawled over the rail now, half in and half out of the boat, and his efforts to keep from falling made it feel like they were off Monhegan in a full gale.

  Tap, tap went the woodpecker. “How did you get it so smooth?” Tap, tap, thud.

  Parlin Gaites, overwhelmed by an awful realization, didn’t reply. Instead, he lay paralyzed by the ghastly image that filled his mind and raised bile in his throat. How could he have missed it? Christ almighty, it was hard to believe how quickly a nice spring afternoon could go to hell. He owed Oliver Wendell an apology.

  And that was the least of his problems.

  Chapter 11

  The sky cleared and the wind dropped by dark, leaving a cool stillness in the air when Oliver parked his ancient Honda in Pearly’s lot. The moon hadn’t risen yet, and the sky was bright with a blizzard of stars, like tiny snowflakes frozen in space. Around him, the sharp salt air was almost palpable as it caressed his skin and filled his lungs. He stood in the darkness, breathing deeply and listening to the water lap softly against the pier’s pilings. Oliver lingered a while longer, reluctant to leave, soaking up the tranquility of the place. He had an uncomfortable feeling that tranquility was about to become scarce.

  The boat shed’s big front doors were closed, but light spilling from the windows guided Oliver to the side entrance. Inside, Cathy’s boat sat on its trailer beside a nearly completed Alden sloop.

  “You’re late,” Pearly said, looking tense.

  “May I ask why you dragged me down here in the middle of the night?” Oliver inquired, less disgruntled than he was trying to sound. He had never been here after dark. The overhead fluorescents bathed Cathy’s boat in an antiseptic pool of light, as though it was a surgical patient on the operating table.

  Pearly locked the door. “It’s only nine o’clock, and you’re here because I’m going to make a modification to Cathy’s boat, and I want your advice.”

  “This couldn’t wait until tomorrow?”

  “No.”

  “What kind of modification?” Oliver asked suspiciously.

  “I’m putting an access port in the forward flotation tank.”

  “May I ask why?”

  “To drain it if water gets in there, why else?”

  “The thing is sealed up with fiberglass and epoxy. How the hell would water get in there?”

  “Who knows what might get in there and need to be cleaned out. I’ll use one of these four-inch deck plates.” Pearly held up the circular device. “See? Clear plastic cover so you can see if everything is okay, and the cover unscrews so you can reach inside.”

  “I know what it is, for crying out loud. What I don’t know is where you got this crazy idea. Don’t do it. You put an opening in there and someone will fill it up with anchor chain, beer bottles, and who knows what else. It’ll turn into a storage locker instead of a flotation tank.”

  “I think I’ll put it right here.” Pearly announced, as though he hadn’t heard Oliver’s objections. He pointed to a mark near the bottom of the panel. “Pass the hole saw.”

  “Get it yourself.”

  Pearly sighed, picked the big drill off a bench, and climbed into the boat.

  “I’m going home,” Oliver announced.

  “Don’t go yet; I may need more advice.”

  “The only way you’d take advice is at gunpoint,” Oliver muttered, but he stayed put.

  Pearly kneeled in the bilge and went to work. It only took a moment to do the job, and he soon put the drill down, making faint sniffing noises as his nose passed by the freshly drilled hole.

  Oliver looked on in disgust.

  “See? That wasn’t so bad after all,” Pearly said cheerfully.

  Oliver shook his head in despair.

  “Let’s see what Eldon used for plywood.” Pearly reached into the hole.

  “Jesus!” He snatched his hand back, his face green.

  “Now what?”

  “There’s something feels like a plastic bag in there,” Pearly croaked. He held out a hand. “Pass the work light.”

  Oliver handed him the light, shaking the cord impatiently where it caught on a sawhorse. Pearly looked into the hole as though a rattlesnake was lurking inside.

  “What the hell?” He gingerly poked at what looked like a black plastic trash bag. “It feels like a big rock.”

  “You’re a piece of work, Gaites,” Oliver growled. “You dragged me down here because you thought someone had managed to stuff Cathy Leduc in there—”

  “Well, a chunk of her, anyhow.”

  “—and you wanted a witness when you opened it up.”

  “Better you than Eldon. Now I’ll have to cut the fool thing out of there.” />
  * * *

  “It’s part of a headstone,” Oliver said as they pulled the black trash bag away from the object on Pearly’s workbench.

  “Why would anybody hide a headstone in Cathy’s boat?” Pearly stopped short. “Jesus, you don’t suppose Eldon found old Gerhard Burndt’s grave?”

  “His grave disappeared more than a hundred years ago. And even if it is Gerhard’s, why would Eldon hide it in there, and how would he have found it in the first place?”

  “Myra might have known where to look,” Pearly suggested.

  Oliver examined the weathered surface, moving the work light around as he tried to read the inscription. “It’s just the top half, and the way it’s broken off at an angle, most of the dates are missing. Besides, it’s too worn to read the letters anyway,” he said at last.

  Pearly absentmindedly scrubbed the stubble on his chin with one hand. “Eldon put the bulkhead in last winter before Myra died. We’ve got to get that stone out of here.”

  “You’ve got to give it to the cops. It probably has something to do with what happened to Myra or Cathy.”

  “Hell with that. They’ll just run Eldon through the wringer again. Or throw him in jail on some trumped up charge.” Pearly began working the headstone back in its bag.

  Oliver watched in silence while his comfortable assumptions about Myra’s accidental death crumbled. Gerhard Burndt was Burnt Cove’s founding father, and it would be just like the old woman to stir up trouble with it, involve Eldon and Cathy, and get herself killed in the process. He thought about Sarah and the red pickup truck. Had she come across something that might incriminate the killer? Oliver had known Eldon for years. Could he have misjudged him? The young man did have a temper.

  “Maybe Eldon should be in jail,” Oliver said quietly.