Death of a Blueberry Tart

by Lee Hollis

  “Should we go out for a romantic dinner?” Bruce suggested.

  Hayley shook her head. “No, why go on one of those excursions with the rest of the passengers when we can stay on board the ship and have it all to ourselves?”

  “I like the way you think, Mrs. Linney,” he said, kissing her softly on the lips.

  “And I like the way you kiss, Mr. Linney.”

  “Does this mean you’re going to take my name?”

  “And have to get a new passport and change all my accounts and credit cards? Not on your life.”

  “Okay, I’m good with it as long as you let me keep doing this,” he said, winking at her and stealing another kiss.

  After lighting a few scented candles and polishing off the bottle of wine and a quick dinner of leftover rosemary chicken, Hayley and Bruce found themselves on the couch making out like two teenagers while playing their favorite bands from the 1990s, like Pearl Jam, Green Day, and Blink 182.

  Hayley pulled away and looked into Bruce’s eyes. “I feel like I’m back in high school, with a boy over at the house, hoping my mother doesn’t come home too early and catch us fooling around.”

  “We can always take this upstairs to the bedroom and lock the door so she can’t walk in on us,” Bruce said, grinning. Actually it was more like leering.

  They stood up, holding hands, and turned to head up the staircase when Hayley’s cell phone buzzed.

  Bruce sighed. “Please, whoever it is, let it go to voicemail.”

  Hayley glanced at the screen. “Bar Harbor Police Department . . .”

  They were both too curious to ignore it.

  Hayley answered the call and held the phone to her ear. “Hello?”

  “Hayley, it’s Mom!” Sheila said.

  “Mom, what are you doing at—?”

  “Listen carefully because they’re only allowing me to make one call—”

  “Who? The police?”

  “Yes, I’ve been arrested,” Sheila said, trying not to panic but failing miserably.

  “Arrested? Did something happen at the Criterion?”

  Bruce’s eyes widened. “Your mother’s been arrested?”

  Hayley held up a finger to silence him so that she could hear.

  “No, we never made it to the Criterion . . .”

  “Why not?”

  There was a long pause on the other end of the phone.

  “Mom . . .”

  “I met up with Celeste and Jane and after talking, we knew we could not just stand by and let people think we were somehow involved with what happened to Caskie Lemon-Hogg, and so we made the decision to continue with our investigation . . .”

  “Your investigation? Mom, please tell me this is some kind of joke!”

  “I’m afraid not . . .” Sheila muttered before talking to someone nearby. “Don’t rush me! I’m talking to my daughter! Is there a law limiting the time I have for my one phone call?” There was a brief muffled discussion and then Sheila was back on the line. “Apparently there is some time limit on how long I can talk! That Officer Earl is just like his grandfather. Impatient and pigheaded!”

  “Mom, what did you three do?”

  Another pause.

  Sheila was clearly not eager to confess her apparent crime.

  “Mom . . .”

  “We were frustrated that Owen Meyers refused to speak with us about why he had been arguing with Caskie on the same day I found her body . . .”

  Hayley’s stomach started churning as she sensed what was coming. “Oh no . . .”

  “So we decided to break into his restaurant and see if we could find any evidence that might link him to the murder . . .”

  “You didn’t . . .”

  “Jane picked the lock. I had no idea how good she was at it. It’s such a valuable skill set. Anyway, Celeste stood outside to keep watch in case anyone showed up. But unfortunately we tripped some kind of silent alarm because before we even had a chance to jimmy open the file cabinet in his office, the whole place was crawling with cops.”

  Hayley sighed. “So basically you’ve been charged with breaking and entering?”

  “That’s about the gist of it, dear, yes,” Sheila said. “Any chance you can bail me out?”

  Island Food & Spirits BY HAYLEY POWELL

  I never realized how having my mother back in town would stir up so many childhood memories with my posse, Liddy and Mona, especially seeing her pal around with her own two besties from her childhood, Celeste and Jane. They were the original three musketeers, a whole generation before their daughters bonded for life. My mother has always kept mum about all the trouble she and her friends got into when they were kids running around the streets of Bar Harbor in the 1960s, and whenever I pressed her about their wild antics when they were in high school, which Jane would allude to every now and then, my mother would always demur and say in the sweetest voice, “Oh, Hayley, we were absolute angels.” I never bought that line for a minute, and I can tell you in no uncertain terms, that when it came to getting into trouble, their offspring took first prize a couple of decades later.

  Recently the girls and I were enjoying a sunset cocktail hour on Liddy’s porch with Blueberry Basil Vodka Martinis, which Liddy insisted we try after having had one at an upscale restaurant in Boston last month. Well, the vodka seemed to lubricate our memories, and we found ourselves reliving all the wild stories from our youth. One particular adventure stood out above the rest. It happened one late summer afternoon, just a couple of weeks before we were slated to return for our senior year in high school. We were all at that sweet-sixteen point, armed with driver’s licenses but with really nowhere to go.

  We were hanging out at Liddy’s house, scarfing down homemade blueberry bread that Liddy’s grandmother, who lived next door, had made, and whining about how boring it was in Bar Harbor and how there was nothing to do. We were desperate for some excitement.

  We were also very angry at our mothers. Earlier that morning, the three of them took off on what they described as “a girls’ getaway weekend” to Salmon Cove, a small fishing village down east where Mona’s family owned a rustic cabin. When we asked if we could go, we were given a quick and stern “No!” Our mothers wanted quality time together, and had no intention of spending their weekend chaperoning three rowdy, loud teenage girls.

  Mona was especially miffed because she had been going to Salmon Cove with her parents every summer starting when she was seven years old. Mona looked forward to the trip every year, mostly because she had met a local boy named Corey Guildford and they had become fast friends. A little crush had now blossomed into a teenage romance. The young couple would keep in touch throughout the year with letters and phone calls, and Mona had been looking forward to seeing her beau again this summer, but it was not to be. This would be the first summer she didn’t get to go to Salmon Cove and she was fuming about it.

  Liddy was also furious because her mother always took her clothes shopping at the Portland Mall at the end of the summer so she could begin the new school year in true high fashion. Her mother broke the news that because of her Salmon Cove trip, they would have to delay their shopping trip to Portland until late September. Liddy did not appreciate this in the least because it meant she would have to buy her first few fall debut outfits at the Bangor Mall, which had a fraction of the inventory found in Portland. There was a huge risk that she could actually show up for the first day of school in the same outfit as another girl, or, gasp, even two girls! Everyone in their class went school shopping at the Bangor Mall! In Liddy’s mind, this could potentially be worse than the Hindenburg disaster!

  I was enjoying the blueberry bread, not really paying much attention, wondering what kind of pizza my brother Randy and I would order for dinner, when I heard Liddy say, “Well, Hayley, are you in?”

  My mouth full of blueberry bread, I stared at them blankly and asked sheepishly, “In what?”

  Apparently while my mind wandered to food (as it reliably does), Liddy
and Mona had hatched a plan to “borrow” Mona’s mother’s Ford Taurus the next morning after her father left for work, drive the three hours to the Portland Mall to go school shopping, and be home that night before anyone was the wiser, with a trunk load of new school clothes!

  I was wary at first, knowing full well our mothers would be apoplectic (if I knew what that word meant at the time), especially since we were forbidden to drive anywhere beyond Ellsworth, which was only thirty minutes from town. But with the promise of a few stylish looks for the new school year dancing around in my head, I quickly succumbed to peer pressure and was totally on board.

  Bright and early the next morning we found ourselves heading down Interstate 95 South singing loudly along to Huey Lewis and the News on the radio on our way to the Portland Mall. And a little over three hours later, we were pulling into the huge expansive parking lot, cheering loudly and ready to shop till we dropped!

  We had never felt so grown-up, pretending to be supermodels as we tried on a variety of different looks, breaking only to have pizza slices at the food court, before making our way to more stores in a whole other section of the mall. We finally ended up at Lacey’s Lingerie, a racy boutique that only went out of business when a Victoria’s Secret opened up in the mall a few years later. Liddy and I decided that Mona needed to woo Corey on her next trip to Salmon Cove, and what better way to do that than with some sexy lingerie! Mona stubbornly refused to try anything on at first, but Liddy and I helped her along by throwing on baby doll nighties and sequin teddies, finally shaming Mona into trying on a floral plunge bustier! We all stood in front of the giant wall mirror checking ourselves out, thinking we were hilarious, when suddenly we heard a booming voice yell, “Girls!”

  We all froze in front of the mirror, our eyes wide. We knew that voice. It was Liddy’s mother. But it couldn’t be. She was in Salmon Cove. We all slowly turned around and our mouths dropped open at the sight of all our mothers—Sheila, Celeste and Jane—standing outside the other changing rooms on the other side of the store, decked out in their own sexy slips, bras, and corsets.

  Liddy, without missing a beat, blurted out, “Mother, what are you doing here dressed like that?”

  I remember Jane having to restrain Celeste from lunging at her daughter at that point. I was so scared to be caught that everything was a blur after that. There was a lot of yelling and screaming, the manager and salesclerks had to get involved, and there were a lot of gawking customers who were drawn to this circus of three angry mothers and three crying daughters, all dressed like—well, there really is no other word for it—hookers! We were ordered to get back into our street clothes, and after our mothers apologized profusely to the manager for causing such a scene, we were hustled out. I knew my mother was serious when she gripped my arm and hissed in my ear, “You’re grounded . . . for life!”

  Apparently our mothers had never intended to go to Salmon Cove. They had always secretly planned to have a relaxing weekend in the big city, in a nice hotel, with a little retail therapy, and NO kids! If we had known our mothers were going on a shopping spree in Portland without us, there would have been no living with us, and so in order for them to have a little break sans kids, they had come up with a little white lie. Only it had backfired on them big-time. Not to mention us too! We were all going to be spending a lot more time with our moms for the rest of the summer, confined to our houses, and no, we didn’t get to come home with any new school clothes!

  LIDDY’S FAVORITE BLUEBERRY BASIL COCKTAIL

  INGREDIENTS

  1 cup fresh blueberries

  6 basil leaves

  1 tablespoon fresh lime juice

  1 ounce St-Germain liqueur

  2 ounces vodka

  Splash of sparkling water

  In a cocktail shaker add your blueberries, bay leaves, and lime juice and muddle all those ingredients. Add the vodka, St-Germain liqueur and a little ice, cover, and shake well. Pour through a strainer into a martini glass with a splash of sparkling water. Garnish with a fresh basil leaf and a couple of blueberries if you desire, and enjoy!

  BLUEBERRY CREAM CHEESE BREAD

  INGREDIENTS

  2 cups fresh blueberries

  8 ounces softened cream cheese

  1 cup butter, softened

  1½ cups sugar

  2 teaspoons vanilla

  4 eggs

  2 cups all-purpose flour

  1½ teaspoons baking powder

  1 teaspoon salt

  2 tablespoons flour

  Preheat your oven to 350 degrees F.

  In a mixing bowl, toss the blueberries with two tablespoons flour, then set aside.

  In a stand mixer cream together butter, cream cheese, sugar, and vanilla. Add one egg at a time, beating well after each egg.

  In another bowl combine the flour, baking powder, and salt. Slowly mix it into the wet batter until combined. Fold in your blueberries with a spatula.

  Pour the batter into two greased 9 × 5 bread pans and bake for 45 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean. Let rest for ten minutes, then flip the bread out onto a wire cooling rack and let cool completely.

  This is always a wonderful treat in the morning with a good cup of piping-hot coffee.

  Chapter 21

  Hayley couldn’t remember when she had last seen the Bar Harbor Police Station buzzing with so much activity. Officer Donnie had just hauled in a local punk who had tried stealing Betsy Dyer’s purse when she had set it down at the pharmacy to pay for her monthly prescriptions and wandered off to look for a new heating pad while the pharmacist fulfilled her order. Luckily the kid wasn’t looking where he was going while making his escape and walked right into a pantyhose display. He knocked it over and that got the attention of Officer Donnie, who was on his break and there to buy some cold medicine, which led to the juvenile delinquent’s arrest. The kid looked dazed as Officer Donnie escorted him to the booking room, a red-faced and furious Betsy Dyer right behind him, eager to press charges.

  According to Donnie, Betsy had whacked the kid over the head with her bag once she got it back. Crowded into the reception area was also a young couple from England who were there to file a police report about a stolen computer, along with Hayley, Liddy, and Mona, who were waiting to bail their mothers out of jail. Bruce had gone out to pick up some sub sandwiches in case it took a while and everybody got hungry.

  After what seemed like hours, the door to the police chief’s office banged open and Owen Meyers flew out, marching down the hallway into the reception area. He stopped short at the sight of Mona, who stepped in front of him and offered him a weak smile.

  “Hey there, Owen, how’s it going?”

  Owen glared at her and then muttered, with his fists clenched, “Out of my way, Mona.”

  Mona quickly stepped to the side. As he passed, Owen cranked his head in her direction and seethed, “And for the record, I won’t be placing any more orders for your lobsters. I’m taking my business elsewhere.”

  And then he scurried out of the police station.

  “What’s his problem?” Mona huffed.

  “I told him it was you who saw him arguing with Caskie Lemon-Hogg on the day she was killed, so he probably blames you for all of this,” Sergio said as he ambled out of his office and walked down the hall to the reception area to join them.

  “Well, did Owen finally explain what he and Caskie were fighting about?” Hayley asked.

  “He said Caskie was price gouging, doubling her price for her blueberries from three dollars to six dollars a basket. He felt he was being treated unfairly, especially as a longtime customer,” Sergio said.

  Mona thought about it and shook her head. “Nope, I’m not buying it. Owen just told me he was going to buy his lobsters from somebody else. He could easily have done the same thing with Caskie. A lot of people in town pick blueberries and I bet they are just as tasty as Caskie’s. Nobody was forcing him to buy from her. The way he looked, how upset he got,
I have the feeling it had to do with more than just getting ripped off.”

  “Unless you actually overheard what they were talking about, I’m going to have to take him at his word,” Sergio said with a shrug. “Especially since Caskie is no longer around to refute his story.”

  “What about our mothers?” Liddy asked. “When can we bail them out?”

  Sergio sighed. “You don’t have to. I talked to Owen, and although it took a bit of convincing, he’s decided not to press charges.”

  Hayley breathed a heavy sigh of relief. “Thank God!”

  “But they are banned from ever setting foot in The Shack ever again,” Sergio warned. “And they have to stop harassing Owen.”

  “I’m sure they will be happy to accept those terms,” Hayley said.

  Officer Earl, his big belly bouncing up and down, scurried down the hallway. “Chief, it’s those women again! They won’t leave poor Rupert Stiles alone. He’s in the cell next to them and they won’t let up questioning him about his involvement in the Lemon-Hogg murder, and now he’s threatening to hang himself with his bedsheet!”

  “You can release the ladies, Earl, they’re free to go,” Sergio said.

  Earl glanced at Hayley, Liddy, and Mona, and scowled. “I don’t know which mother belongs to which one of you, but one of them is really rude. She said if I didn’t take better care of myself and cut out a few carbs, I’d never find a nice girl and end up spending the rest of my life alone!”

  “That would be mine,” Hayley said guiltily.

  “You can have her!” Earl sniffed before spinning back around and marching down the hall to the back, where the jail cells were located.