A Dark and Stormy Murder (A Writer's Apprentice Mystery)

by Julia Buckley

  Despite my fascination with hypothetical murder and suspense novels, I was seeing death for the very first time. I stood over the dead man like a sentry until the first police officer moved toward us, creating a dark shadow on the sand.

  * * *

  SOON THE QUIET beach was filled with official-looking people, one of whom was a nervous young officer who kept telling Camilla and me to move farther away; every few minutes he pushed us back a few more inches, perhaps with the intention of having us off the beach by evening. Camilla had provided two black umbrellas, and we stood under them like women in an Edward Gorey drawing, watching the ghastly proceedings.

  The emergency personnel all wore yellow slickers and rain hats, but they had also quickly erected a canvas lean-to over their crime scene; the people underneath it were relatively dry.

  The person on the sand was indeed dead, and thanks to the excellent eavesdropping skills I’d honed as a teenager (when I was always convinced my parents were talking about me, and in fact they rarely were), I learned that he had been shot twice, and that Camilla was right, it was Martin Jonas, the waiter that had never showed up for work at Wheat Grass—the one who had left Adam Rayburn in the lurch, and the one I had seen in Bick’s Hardware. I assumed Rayburn would forgive him now, since he had sacrificed far more than a paycheck and found himself facing Blue Lake and eternity.

  “Such a shame,” said Camilla, who had retained her equanimity throughout the proceedings, but who wore a sad expression nonetheless. “And such a mystery. We’ll ask Doug what happened.”

  “Doug? Is he that trembly officer who keeps watching us like a nervous Chihuahua?”

  “Oh, no. Doug is the detective in charge. He’s the pride of Blue Lake—they drafted him right out of college, but word was he was also being courted by the FBI. Still, he chose this place because his father was sick at the time. Doug wanted to be nearby. I daresay he made the right decision.”

  “Why? Did his father die?”

  “He’s quite alive, I’m happy to report. And now Doug likes his job; people rarely leave Blue Lake. But why would they?” she asked, looking almost mournfully at the horizon, which shimmered with midday light filtered through filmy clouds. “It’s so unrelentingly beautiful.”

  She had her arm tucked into mine. For a time I had told myself I was offering her support, but I soon realized that it was the other way around. “Are there places like this in England? Places you’d want to visit again?”

  “Oh, of course. There are always the dreams of ‘someday.’ Those lovely images one has of spectral landscapes, decorating the imagination and glittering like gold.”

  I stared at her, my mouth open. She had said that without really thinking, distracted as she was by the people milling around like worker ants tending to a dead body. That was the sort of sentence Camilla Graham tossed off as a matter of course. That was why her books were all bestsellers.

  “Lena, you’re making that worshipful face again. Be careful, or I shall become addicted to it, the way some people crave money.”

  “Did you have a Camilla Graham, when you were a young woman?”

  She nodded. “Charlotte Brontë, I suppose. I must have read Jane Eyre more than any other book. And I’m sure I borrowed from her again and again. Oh, here’s Doug now.”

  A man in a green rain poncho walked toward us, holding an iPhone with its own little umbrella attachment. He gave us a strange look—both solemn and slightly wry. “Good morning, Milla.”

  “Hello, Doug. Oh, I suppose I should say—Detective Douglas Heller, this is my new assistant, Lena London.”

  He and I exchanged a glance. “Is that so?” he asked, glancing down at his phone, then up again. His eyes were twinkling, but his face remained solemn. “Miss London and I have actually met.”

  “Oh, really? Why didn’t you say so, Lena?”

  I shook my head. “We didn’t exchange names. It was just a quick interaction on the side of the road.” For some reason that sounded obscene, and my face grew hot. I studied my shoes and listened to the rain pattering on my umbrella.

  “Yeah. But now I know your name is Lena,” said Doug Heller. His voice was gentle but firm when he said, “I need to ask you both some questions.”

  “Of course,” Camilla said.

  “How did you happen to notice the body?” Heller asked, focusing on me. His eyes looked gold, even in the gray light.

  “I had seen him earlier. I was walking the dogs in town, and I stopped at Bick’s Hardware for some stamps. He was in there, talking to another man.”

  “What time?”

  “Oh—about three?”

  “And who was this other man?”

  “I have no idea. I got to town today,” I said. “I can tell you he had sandy-colored hair and looked like he worked at a ski resort.”

  Doug Heller paused for a moment, his eyebrows raised. “Okay. And did you see the dead man at any other point before finding him on the beach?”

  “Yes. When I was coming home on the shore, I saw him again, by Camilla’s stairs, but near the dock. He walked right past me, moved down the dock, and got in the white boat there.” I pointed at the boat.

  Heller nodded, his eyes on the floating craft. “How much later was this?”

  “Maybe half an hour. And half an hour before I saw him out here.”

  “And did you speak to him?”

  “No. We barely even looked at each other. The storm was about to come. And he wasn’t—very friendly. I had already determined—well, anyway.”

  “Determined what?” His gaze lasered in on me.

  “Just—none of the men in Blue Lake seemed very friendly. Not him, not the man in the ski sweater, and certainly not—” I was regretting starting the sentence at all.

  “Yes? Who else?”

  “Sam West, one of our neighbors.”

  He stiffened, but made no comment about West. “And what about gunshots? Did you hear anything like that?”

  I shrugged and looked at Camilla. We both shook our heads. Camilla said, “It’s so loud here, Doug, with the sounds of the waves, and that darn thunder booming every two minutes.”

  The thunder. “I did notice that one of the thunder claps—it seemed different from the other. Smaller and less—thundery,” I offered.

  “What time?”

  I hesitated. “Camilla, do you know what time I returned? Because I went upstairs to change, and then I was going to take a shower, and I heard it just before I got in. So maybe—”

  “About four thirty, then,” Camilla said.

  He typed her response, using his thumbs as though he were writing a text message. “Okay,” he said again, his digits working. “And when was the last time you spoke with Martin Jonas, Camilla?”

  “I suppose it was last week, when I dined at Wheat Grass. Martin waited on me.”

  “Did he seem preoccupied?”

  “Not at all. He was polite.”

  “Do you know of anyone who had a grudge against Martin?”

  Camilla shook her head. “I can’t think of anyone, no.”

  “And you, Lena?” He switched his gaze to me, and I was surprised again by the attractiveness of his face: square-jawed, almond-eyed, capped by that thatch of blond hair, now smooshed under his rain hat. He didn’t look tough and weathered like Sam West; his features bore a fair amount of sensitivity, though I had the sense he could handle the ne’er-do-wells of Blue Lake. “Did the conversation with Jonas and the other man seem heated?”

  “Not exactly. But it was sort of an argument. The ski sweater man said that Jonas had to do something, and he better do it soon. He was going to check in by tonight, he said.”

  He frowned. “Is that so?” He looked up at me, assessing, and then back down at his phone.

  “Anyway, I looked out my window at the storm and happened to recognize the man�
��s shirt. Then we called the police. You.”

  “Okay.” He looked thoughtfully at his phone, then out at the tossing lake. I could see what Camilla meant about him being the pride of Blue Lake. He had a star quality about him, as though he were playing a cop in a movie. Perhaps that was how he saw himself. A mixture of admiration and annoyance jolted through me.

  “Why is that officer so nervous?” I asked, pointing at the man who kept moving us back. “He’s like a cross between Barney Fife and a hunted rabbit.”

  A smile flitted across Detective Doug Heller’s face and disappeared. “Chip? He just has a high metabolism.”

  “What? That doesn’t even make—”

  Camilla said, “Doug, how much longer will this take? Lena and I both have work to do.”

  “We’re done. For now.” That smile again, like a quick fish, and then he met my eyes with his solemn gold ones and said, “It was nice to see you again, Lena. I’m sorry it had to be under these circumstances. We’ll be in touch if we have any more questions.” He turned to Camilla. “Same for you, Milla.”

  She nodded, and he sauntered away.

  “Let’s get off this beach. It feels dreadful now, with violence lingering over it,” Camilla said.

  We walked toward the bluff; at the foot of the red staircase we met Sam West, still looking like an adventurer in his leather jacket and jeans, his acorn-colored hair tousled by the lake breeze and dampened by the now-dwindling rain. He nodded to Camilla, his face solemn, and then turned to me. “What’s going on? I heard the sirens. . . .” His eyes went past me then, to the place where the attendants were lifting the stretcher that bore the unfortunate Martin Jonas. “What happened? Are you all right?”

  Camilla put a gentle hand on his arm. “Thank you, Sam. We’re all right, but Lena had the misfortune of seeing a dead man on the beach. It’s Martin Jonas, a waiter from Wheat Grass. He was shot to death—a terrible thing.”

  West’s face looked pale in the late-day sun. “Shot? Have they caught whoever did it?”

  “No,” Camilla said. “Doug Heller is investigating.”

  West looked about as happy to hear Heller’s name as Heller had looked to hear West’s. It seemed as though he was about to say something regarding the policeman, but then he bit it back. Instead, he said, “It’s a shame. I’m sorry to hear it.” He directed a look at me that seemed to have special significance, but I couldn’t imagine why.

  “In any case, we’re hoping to put this terrible thing behind us. Have a good evening, Sam.”

  “You, too.” West lifted a hand in a brief wave as Camilla and I made our way to the red staircase. I looked back to see that he had wandered closer to the scene and was watching the crime scene team do their rapid work before they lost the light of the sun.

  Camilla led the way up, and I was surprised by her agility; I wondered how many times a day she walked up or down the bluff.

  Reaching the top of the stairs for the second time that day, I felt as though my legs had turned to wet noodles. “How do you make this climb every day?” I panted as we moved inside and shut the door. “Adaptation,” she said. “Wonderful exercise for a senior citizen.” She was gazing out the window with a rather melancholy expression. I followed her gaze and saw a little figure on the sand, wearing a brown jacket. It was Sam West, standing alone in the rain.

  “That poor man,” she said. “There’s something about him you should know, Lena, before the town gossips try to bend your ear.”

  “Oh?”

  She turned to me and sighed. “Apparently, about a year ago, Sam’s wife went missing. The police are presuming foul play and perhaps murder. Sam, for the longest time, was their prime suspect, but they had no body and no evidence. So they let him go. He was in New York then, but he left soon after, and came here.”

  “Oh my gosh. And his wife was never found?”

  “No. Neither alive nor dead. The more obnoxious people in Blue Lake have taken to calling him ‘the murderer.’ I don’t believe it for a second.”

  “No, of course not.” But I was remembering the way Sam West had looked at me when he thought I was an intruder—how he had scowled and seemed ready to strike at me.

  I had been vaguely afraid of him, and perhaps for good reason. If Sam West were indeed a murderer, could he have killed Martin Jonas? This thought troubled me until it was replaced with a more sinister one.

  If Sam West had killed his wife but had not killed Jonas, then there were two murderers in Blue Lake.

  4

  She was introduced to Frau Albrecht when she arrived at the inn; the older woman was not particularly warm, and yet Johanna longed for her affection as one yearns for sunshine, and when the Frau indulged in a brief smile, Johanna’s spirit lightened and flew of its own accord around the high-ceilinged room.

  —from The Salzburg Train

  INSIDE THE HOUSE Camilla murmured that she had some correspondence to see to, and she blended quickly into the gloom of Graham House. I ascended the stairs alone and took another quick, hot shower, then changed into some sweats. I really would have to ask Camilla about how to do laundry for myself, I mused as I hung my second wet outfit over the shower rail.

  I found Lestrade sitting in the same large window, watching the leaves fall from a big elm in the backyard. I sat on the bed and felt a burst of exhaustion. Lestrade jumped off the ledge and onto my pillow. He meowed at me, clearly annoyed by my absence, but he allowed me to pet him, and, after I provided a good massage, he settled down.

  My predominant thought, even after discovering a murder in the backyard, was that I was sitting in Camilla Graham’s house. A memory came back to me in a sudden, random flash. I was thirteen again and had finished my first Graham novel. I was in that state of detachment where a part of me was still inside the book and another part of me was returning—reluctantly—to reality. I walked into my kitchen, where my mother was preparing dinner. I often think of her there, at the stove or the sink, cooking or cleaning and never receiving a word of thanks from me. “Mom,” I said, almost accusingly. “Have you ever read a book by Camilla Graham?”

  My mother turned, surprised, and said, “Oh, yes. Isn’t she great? I read a lot of her stuff back in the seventies and eighties. I didn’t know you liked romantic suspense, or I would have told you about her long ago.”

  After that we were like a club, my mother and me. She reread all the books with me, and we would exchange them and talk about the characters. Nothing bonds two people so well as loving the same books. I smiled at the memory—that special time of discovering the wonderful Graham novels and spending precious moments with my mother. I couldn’t have known that we had few years left together.

  Now new thoughts forced their way into my mind, and my head began spinning with what felt like millions of details about the day—just one day!—that I had spent in Blue Lake. Despite the demise of poor Martin Jonas, I felt that my best bet was to put everything out of my mind. I looked out of my large window and saw that the dark clouds had lifted and a trace of pink stretched across the sky just above the lake. What I needed was a distraction, and I had a wonderful one sitting across the room.

  I went over to the desk and sat in the wooden chair. There was a pencil holder sitting in one corner; it held a variety of writing utensils. I grabbed a soft-lead green pencil and sat down, pulling The Salzburg Train toward me. Later, I was sure, I would look back at this as one of the most triumphant moments of my life.

  I pushed aside the title page and found myself looking at Chapter One. The first sentence said, “When Johanna Garamond boarded the Salzburg train in the autumn of her twenty-eighth year, she bade farewell to her lovely mountain town and its splendid, rushing river, and rode through the night to face murder on the other side.”

  “Oh, boy. Lestrade, this is going to be one heck of a ride,” I said. Lestrade said nothing; I peered over my shoulder to see that h
e had dozed off on the pillow.

  I went back to the book and smiled down at the page.

  I got through five wonderful chapters before outside thoughts began to intrude into Camilla Graham’s plot. I thought of Allison telling me that Camilla Graham was in her knitting group—and yet I had seen no knitting needles in her sitting room, nor any sort of bag with yarn in it. Interrupting that thought was an image of Sam West, smoking his cigarettes and looking angry at the foot of his long driveway. Why did Douglas Heller dislike him, and vice versa? And why was West convinced that people were spying on him? Was he paranoid after his wife’s disappearance? Meanwhile, there was a dead man on the sand, shot by an unknown assailant. A dead body that I had found on my very first day in town.

  I shook my head. I would not let the terrible event ruin my experience. It had happened, and I felt bad for the family of Martin Jonas, but I would have to put that aside and concentrate on my job.

  I looked at my watch and saw that it was seven o’clock. Camilla had said dinner would be ready then, and I was hungry.

  I left my green pencil sitting on the beginning of Chapter Six and went down the creaking stairs to the shadowy landing.

  * * *

  AT A GRAND oak table in Camilla Graham’s dining room, we dined on fresh spinach salad with chunks of feta cheese, chopped walnuts, and an herb vinaigrette dressing. After that came a delicious casserole that Camilla’s chef had left for us to bake and serve, filled with chicken, fresh vegetables, and a hint of sherry. Camilla looked tired, but she proved to be a gracious conversationalist. While I polished off the last of my salad (I found that I was famished after the day’s events), she asked me about Allison—how we had met, how long we had been friends.

  I took a sip of water. “Allison and I were in the same homeroom in high school. She was one of those theater kids who was always in a show, always full of energy and outrageously happy and dramatic.”