Gobble, Gobble Murder

by Leslie Meier

  “Thanks, Lucy. I had to speak up. We simply can’t tolerate this sort of intolerance in our town.”

  “I couldn’t agree more.”

  Franny bent closer, whispering, “Have you seen his wife? She’s young enough to be his daughter!” Her eyes widened. “And she’s pregnant!”

  “They’ve suffered a terrible tragedy,” Lucy reminded her.

  “The wages of sin, no doubt,” said Franny with a knowing nod. “Have a nice evening,” she added, making her serene way out of the meeting room.

  Intolerance was a funny thing, thought Lucy as she gathered up her things. People rarely seemed to recognize their own prejudices, even when they were quick to condemn another’s failings.

  When she climbed the cement steps to the parking area, she was yawning, looking forward to a hot bath and bed. Hearing raised voices, she paused at the top of the stairs where she saw Matt angrily confronting Ed Franklin. The two were clearly illuminated by a street light, and a few bystanders were watching.

  “We’re not Mexicans,” he yelled, face-to-face with Ed. “We’re Americans. My father, his father, and his father going back for hundreds of years. They were all born in California.”

  “Get out of my way,” growled Ed, attempting to edge around him. “I don’t care who you are.”

  “Well, you better care,” snarled Matt, blocking his way, “and you better call off your racist buddies . . . Becker and ProServe and Curtis Cleaners.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” insisted Ed, attempting once again to make his way to his huge Navigator SUV.

  “You know, and it’s gotta stop!” yelled Matt, raising his arm.

  “That’s enough,” said Rey, stepping between them. “Go home, Matt.”

  Matt stayed in place for a long moment, glaring at Ed, then marched across the parking lot to his Corvette. The car roared into life and he sped across the parking lot, swerving widely at the exit and zooming off down the road.

  “I must apologize for my son,” said Rey. “He’s young and hotheaded.”

  “Like all you Mexicans, I guess,” said Ed. “What do they call it? Latin blood?”

  Rey looked like a man who’d been slapped in the face. He stepped back, shook his head, and walked slowly to his car.

  “I have a feeling this isn’t over,” said Joe Marzetti, who had climbed the stairs and paused beside Lucy. “And it’s not going to be pretty.”

  “I think you’re right.” She had noted the names Matt had mentioned, presumably outfits that had refused to do business with the Rodriguezes, and was jotting them down in her notebook.

  * * *

  Next morning at the office, she put in calls to ProServe and Curtis Cleaners, but both went straight to voice mail. She dutifully left messages, but doubted very much they would bother to return her call. Walt Becker, a local trash hauler, answered the phone himself.

  “Hi, Lucy.” His voice came booming through the phone. “What can I do for you?”

  She had recently interviewed him for a story on recycling and he’d been extremely helpful, even taking her to the regional single-stream recycling facility for a tour. She didn’t want to offend him by accusing him of racism, so she proceeded carefully. “Funny thing, Walt. I was at the selectmen’s meeting last night.”

  “I’m sorry,” he joked. “Nobody should have to go through that.”

  “I know,” laughed Lucy. “It was pretty awful. But the reason I’m calling is that, well, Matt Rodriguez accused Ed Franklin of pressuring local businesses to refuse to contract with them and your name came up.”

  “Look, I know full well that it’s against the law to refuse service because of race, color, religion, sexual preference, age . . . you name it. You call Becker Hauling and we’ll haul it, as long as it’s not toxic or radioactive or something like that.”

  “But did Ed Franklin pressure you in any way?”

  “Sure. That’s what Ed Franklin does. Thinks he’s king of the universe. Said he’d fire me if I contracted with Rodriguez and wouldn’t use my trucks anymore.”

  “What are you going to do?” asked Lucy.

  “Look, nobody tells me how to run my business. If Franklin’s unhappy with me, well, that’s too bad. I’ve got plenty of happy customers.”

  “I’m sure you do,” said Lucy.

  “That’s not to say that I’ve got to like everybody. Personally, I don’t get that transgender thing at all, but I don’t really care what bathroom anybody uses as long as they don’t leave a nasty mess. And I’m not crazy about these Latinos or whatever they are. Did you see the news? Those three guys? The drug dealers?”

  “Actually, I covered the arraignment,” said Lucy.

  “Well, then I don’t have to tell you that those guys are bad guys. They’re trouble and we don’t need any more trouble. We’ve got enough of our own. But that said, business is business and I’m in the business of hauling trash from anybody and everybody who asks, just as long as they pay their bills.”

  “Then why did Matt Rodriguez name you as one of Franklin’s buddies?” asked Lucy, determined to keep Walt wriggling on the hook. “It sure sounded like you refused their business.”

  “Well,” said Becker, speaking slowly, “that was my girl here, Abby. She overheard Franklin threatening me and when Rodriguez called she said she wasn’t sure if we could take on more business. I’ll, uh, I’ll give them a call and straighten it out.”

  “So it was just a misunderstanding?” persisted Lucy, suspecting it was nothing of the kind. She figured Walt had done a quick calculation and concluded that the bad publicity from a mention in the Pennysaver would be worse for his business than Ed Franklin’s threats.

  “Yeah,” he said, quick to agree. “That’s all it was. It was a misunderstanding.”

  There sure seemed to be a lot of misunderstanding going on these days, thought Lucy.

  CHAPTER 6

  The next morning, Lucy was dismayed to see, was a beautiful sunshiny day. A classic New England autumn morning with clear skies, golden-leaved trees, and crisp air. A perfect day for running and resuming her training program for the Turkey Trot, which she’d been neglecting.

  She knew full well that she’d been avoiding running, using every excuse she could come up with—too rainy, too windy, she got a late start and didn’t want to be late for work or for meeting the girls for breakfast. The truth was that Zoe wasn’t the only one who was haunted by Alison’s death. Lucy hadn’t wanted to go back on the old logging road. The last time she ran there she’d discovered Alison’s body and didn’t want to relive that experience.

  But she knew that she needed to train if she was going to be a serious competitor in the Turkey Trot and today was the perfect opportunity. It was early so she had plenty of time, and the weather was absolutely perfect. She had run out of excuses. It was time to lace up and face her ghosts.

  When Libby saw her come into the kitchen in her running clothes, she leaped out of her doggy bed and began prancing around, tail wagging, eager to get going. The dog’s enthusiasm was contagious and Lucy was smiling as she grabbed the leash and opened the door. She paused on the back porch and took a few deep breaths, then began her stretches.

  Libby didn’t approve of stretches. She was halfway across the yard when she stopped, realizing she was alone. She turned and barked a few times, as if to say “What’s the holdup?”

  “I’m coming,” yelled Lucy, smiling to herself when she realized she was making excuses to her dog.

  Then they were off, Lucy moving at an easy jog and Libby running just ahead, her tail up and ears flapping, her mouth spread open in a doggy smile. Lucy felt nicely loose and warmed up by the time the trail entered the woods, and she began to run harder along a flat stretch of dirt road that extended for a mile or so. She was panting and had worked up a sweat by the time the road began its uneven descent to the pond.

  Her thoughts inevitably turned to Alison. What was she doing, going out on the ice? It was such a fo
olish thing to do and she must have known the danger. Was she on drugs, like everybody thought? Or had there been a reason, like a dog or other animal in trouble?

  Lucy hadn’t seen any sign of a struggling animal but that didn’t mean it hadn’t been there and either managed to get free or succumbed and sank below the surface of the icy water.

  The other possibility, which nobody said out loud but which she was sure a lot of people were thinking, was that Alison committed suicide. A lot of young people encountered emotional difficulties in their early twenties, which was also the age at which mental illnesses like depression and schizophrenia manifested themselves. Suicide, sadly, was not uncommon at that age.

  Lucy ran carefully, watching her footing as the path became more challenging due to ruts and rocks, but part of her mind was back in the community church, replaying Alison’s funeral. She remembered Alison’s birth mother Eudora, who had been so emotional and dramatic. Lucy had never quite overcome her somewhat repressive Calvinist upbringing, and couldn’t help wondering if Eudora wasn’t a bit of a drama queen. Then she sternly reminded herself that you never knew what people really felt inside, and that everyone dealt with grief in their own unique way. But still, it did seem a bit odd that Alison had been living with her father and his new young wife instead of with her birth mother.

  Why did Alison choose to live with her father? Ed Franklin was a difficult man, to say the least, and Lucy suspected that Alison must have found him somewhat embarrassing. A young person of her generation was unlikely to share his bigotry, and even though she benefitted from his wealth, she would probably have been uncomfortable with the way he flaunted it. And then there was the young wife, Mireille, who was only a few years older than Alison and was pregnant. As Rachel had said, that must have been a difficult situation for Alison to deal with.

  The fragrant balsam fir trees that lined the path, giving it a sense of enclosure, thinned as she approached the pond, opening up to reveal an open expanse of sky. Libby, who had been running ahead, suddenly stopped and began to whine; Lucy remembered her doing the same thing after they’d encountered a black snake sunning itself on a rocky part of the path last spring.

  She must be remembering the dead girl, thought Lucy, bending down to grab the dog’s ears and smooth her raised hackles. “It’s okay, it’s okay,” she murmured. “Nobody here but us chickens.”

  She snapped on the leash and was about to resume her run. She knew a few tugs on the leash were all it would take to get Libby moving again. The old logging road circled the pond on one side, but there was a parking lot and swimming area on the other side that was accessed from a paved road. A narrow footpath also led from the old logging road to the parking area and Lucy decided to follow it and run along the paved road for another half mile or so before turning back.

  She expected the parking area to be empty now that the summer swimming season was over, but noticed a small black BMW idling near the exit. She ran through the lot on the pond side, keeping well away from the car, which was exactly what she had been instructed to do at the women’s personal safety workshop that Officer Barney Culpepper, Tinker’s Cove Police Department’s community outreach officer, offered from time to time. She was about halfway through the lot when a second car pulled in and then the two cars drove off together.

  Weird, she thought, heading for the exit at the far end of the parking lot. She felt uneasy after witnessing the incident and was relieved when she reached the paved road, which was fairly well-traveled. She got friendly waves and toots of the horn from several passing drivers.

  Reaching the rural mailbox that she used as a marker, she turned around and began the return route that would take her home. She considered continuing along the paved road, which met up with her own Red Top Road, but that would mean missing the uphill climb from the pond on the logging road, and she knew the Turkey Trot route had a similar incline. She really couldn’t avoid it. She needed the workout the hill provided, so she headed back to the parking lot. There was no danger, she told herself, because the cars had left.

  But as she drew closer to the lot Libby began barking, and sure enough, that little black BMW was back in the same spot, idling. Lucy picked up her pace, sprinting along the opposite side of the lot from the BMW and was almost through when an aged Caravan with a dented fender pulled up and stopped next to the BMW, driver’s side to driver’s side. She didn’t stay to watch. She yanked the dog’s leash and pounded across the remaining few yards of parking lot and entered the safety of the woods.

  What was that all about, she wondered as she slowed her pace to allow her ragged, uneven breathing to even out and her racing heart to settle down. What was going on? There was something odd about the whole thing that simply didn’t feel right. Was she paranoid? Maybe they were just bird watchers or nature lovers or something. Or maybe, she thought with a shock as she began the tough uphill climb, she had witnessed a couple drug deals. The parking lot was perfect for that sort of transaction. It was secluded from view, it was reliably deserted this time of year, and it had easy access to the paved town road. It was a no-brainer, she decided, wondering why she hadn’t realized what was going on sooner. Drug deals! At Blueberry Pond.

  But if she—a middle-class, middle-aged woman whose only experience of illegal drugs was a few puffs of marijuana in college—could figure it out, she figured it was hardly a secret. Everybody must know. And if everybody knew, that meant the cops must also know. So why were they ignoring it? Didn’t they know there was an opioid epidemic? What was keeping them from making an easy arrest? Maybe even a lot of arrests, she thought, remembering one of the EMTs who’d responded to Alison’s drowning telling her there was a nearby shack frequented by drug users.

  * * *

  Back at the house, Lucy couldn’t stop thinking about the drug deals she’d witnessed. It was shocking to her that this was happening so close to home. Blueberry Pond wasn’t that far from their house, and the logging road was passable by car. Were they in danger from these criminals? Would they have to start locking the doors to the house, something they’d never done in all the years they’d lived on Red Top Road? And what about the stuff in their shed? It was chock full of Bill’s expensive power tools, which a desperate user could steal and sell, probably for pennies on the dollar, but enough to buy some cheap heroin. Maybe more. She had no idea how much heroin or oxy or whatever they were buying cost.

  Even worse than theft, what about the home invasions she’d heard about, she thought, as she stepped out of the shower and wrapped a towel around herself. Remembering she was alone in the house and feeling vulnerable, she turned the lock on the bathroom door. True, there’d never been a home invasion in Tinker’s Cove, and her fear was probably irrational, but it was there. She didn’t feel safe in her own home, and she was terrified for her girls. She couldn’t erase the memory of that terrible episode in New Hampshire that had dominated the news for so long, when two crazy men broke into a home and raped a mother in front of her two preteen daughters, who they’d tied to their beds. After strangling the mother they’d torched the house, and the girls died from smoke inhalation.

  The story went on for months as new details were revealed, the suspects caught, and the trial unfolded. A scratch and whine from the other side of the door, undoubtedly Libby looking for her breakfast, reminded Lucy that those particular criminals had even killed the family dog. Only the father, who’d been at work, was spared.

  “Okay, okay,” she said, opening the door cautiously and allowing Libby to stick her nose through the crack. Summoning her courage she opened the door and proceeded down the hall to her bedroom, accompanied by the dog, who jumped on the unmade bed and rolled around, legs in the air. Then she jumped off, ran to the door, and gave a sharp yip, reminding Lucy that Libby hadn’t had her breakfast yet.

  Lucy dressed quickly, throwing on her usual jeans and sweater. She combed and scrunched her damp hair, grabbed her shoes and socks, and hurried downstairs barefoot. In the kitchen, she
dumped some kibble into Libby’s bowl, poured some cereal into her own favorite bowl, and poured out the last of the morning coffee into a mug.

  The headline in the morning paper, the Press Herald, wasn’t encouraging. REGION TOPS IN OPIOID DEATHS. A quick read revealed that Massachusetts had the most overdoses, but Maine and the other New England states weren’t far behind. And no wonder, she thought, tossing the paper aside with a snort, since the cops were letting the dealers operate in broad daylight.

  When she arrived at the Pennysaver office, she wasted no time telling Ted what she had seen earlier that morning. “I couldn’t believe it, Ted,” she declared as she shrugged out of her barn coat and hung it on the coat rack. “There was a little BMW in the parking lot, idling there, and other cars came and went, stopping only for a minute. Sometimes they drove off together. It was creepy and scary. They’re dealing drugs practically in my backyard.”

  “Right out in the open, at the pond?” asked Phyllis, furrowing her brows over the harlequin reading glasses perched on her nose. Today she was wearing a brightly colored floral print jersey topped with a magenta cardigan that closely matched the color of her dyed hair.

  “Are you sure it was drug deals?” asked Ted in a doubtful tone. “Maybe they were sales reps, getting samples or price lists or something like that.”

  “No,” said Lucy, shaking her head. “It was all very fast and furtive. They hardly spoke a word to each other, not chatty like colleagues would be.”

  “I guess you better give Chief Kirwan a call. Ask him if he’s aware of the situation.”