The Blue Moon

by Lorena McCourtney

What now? Keep trying, she told herself determinedly. Sooner or later, something helpful had to turn up.

  In the meantime, Henry and Gordon Siebert had rescheduled the inspection of the diamond to verify whether or not it was the Blue Moon and discovered that indeed, it was.

  Now all Abby had to figure out was who the rightful owner was and how to get the necklace back to them.

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  ABBY HAD SPENT THE first two days of the week at home. She hadn't really wanted to stay away from work this long, but Hugo had joined Mary in insisting on it. She slept late, read, strolled down to the beach and surfed the Internet. Mary, making them both feel like kids again, experimented with a new hairdo for Abby that had them both laughing.

  But by Wednesday morning, Abby had had enough of recuperating. Her arm still ached occasionally, but she wanted to get back to work. A life of leisure was not for her! Mary wanted to drive her to the museum, but Abby was determined to start doing her own driving again. “My fingers work fine.” She illustrated, wiggling them at Mary.

  “Okay,” Mary agreed reluctantly, “but you call me if you need me. I may lie down for a nap after a while. I didn't sleep very well last night. But I’ll keep the phone right beside me so I’ll hear it in case you call.”

  As Abby drove through Green Harbor, she made a quick detour at The Birdcall.

  At the front desk, she asked if she could look at old issues from a year or so back. The Birdcall was cutting-edge modern in some ways. They were hooked into the LexisNexis system, and their computers had sleek flat screens, rather than the bulky kind. But they had never updated to a modern computerized archives system, and if you wanted to see something in a back issue you had to plow through old copies of the newspaper. The woman led her to a back room. She’d rather hoped to avoid editor William Jansen, but less than ten minutes later his inquisitive brown eyes peered into the room.

  “Della said you were back here. Looking for something?”

  Abby's tart thought was, No, I just like to wallow in dusty old newspapers. But what she said was more congenial, but uninformative. “Lots of interesting things here.”

  William was not to be put off that easily. “Maybe I can help you find what you’re looking for.”

  Abby sighed inwardly. It was all going to get out sooner or later. What she didn't like were the connections that would inevitably follow. The Washingtons had had the necklace in their home; Norbert Washington had soon died of a heart attack. Van Horn probably owned the necklace; he died in a hang gliding accident. The curse at work again, the nervous Nellie types would think. Along with the thought, The island is doomed.

  But William was probably going to hang around until she found what she wanted, so she may as well tell him.

  “I’m interested in a hang gliding accident on Mount Ortiz, but I haven't found anything yet. I’m not sure of the date.”

  “I remember that.” As William spoke, he was shuffling through earlier editions. “I think it may have been farther back than you’re looking …Yes, here it is. Information on what happened was sketchy, too, though I did interview a man who witnessed the crash.”

  “Norbert Washington?”

  William ran his finger down through the article until he came to the name. “Right. How did you know?”

  “I’ve been checking into some things.”

  William smiled, as if that didn't surprise him. “The victim, let's see, what was his name?”

  “Nelson Van Horn.”

  “Right again. He was a guest of the Washingtons, but apparently they didn't know him very well.”

  The article had a large headline. “Man Dies in Hang Gliding Crash,” with a relatively short article below. It said no more than what Abby already knew.

  “You didn't come up with more information about Van Horn for a follow-up article?”

  “He seemed to be something of a mystery man. I was curious, of course, but since he wasn't a Sparrow Islander, I didn't go into any deep investigation.”

  “I’m also interested in Norbert Washington's death. He had a heart attack a month or so after the hang gliding accident.”

  William looked alert. “There's some connection?”

  “Just checking.”

  That article, when they found it, also didn't tell Abby anything more than she already knew. William put the papers back on the shelf for her.

  “I take it all this has something to do with the necklace you found?” William asked.

  When in doubt, Abby's theory was, answer a question with another question. “What makes you think that?”

  William laughed. “Newspaperman's nose for news and a certain knowledge of you, Abby Stanton, and your sleuthing ways. By the way, I’m working now on the article about the necklace and your adventure at the bank. I hear your new name is Slugger.”

  Abby glowered at him.

  “But I won't put that in the article of course,” he added hastily.

  “What about that photo you took at the bank?”

  “Oh, I took several photos,” William said blandly. “They’ll all be in there.”

  Abby sighed inwardly. “Would you like to interview me for the article?”

  “Oh yes, indeed. I thought about asking, but I’ve heard you’re a little touchy about all the rumors going around.” He smiled. “As well as the nickname.”

  “Then this is an opportunity for both of us to set the record straight.”

  “Let me get my tape recorder.”

  LATER THAT DAY, Abby knew she wasn't at her most efficient at the museum, with the use of only one arm, but she got caught up on various things. Ida fussed over her solicitously, insisting on opening the mail for her and bringing her coffee—although Ida didn't hesitate to tease Abby a little bit too.

  “Anything more I can do for you, Slugger?” she inquired.

  Abby just sighed to herself. Slugger. How long would it take to live that down?

  Even Hugo stopped into her office twice to check up on her, although, thankfully, he bypassed the Slugger moniker. She used one of his visits to check up on him as well.

  “I’m wondering if you’ve heard any more from the specialists over in Seattle?”

  “I have. They’ve decided the medication isn't doing as much as they’d hoped. There are various other treatments these days, as you probably know. Radiation, implantation of radioactive seeds, even gene therapy. But for me they’ve decided on the good, old-fashioned knife.”

  “Oh, Hugo, I’m sorry to hear that.”

  “I understand it's a different type of surgery than what used to be done. Not quite as drastic, though I’m not exactly looking forward to it.”

  “When?”

  “Next week. I’ll probably be in the hospital for several days.” He hesitated, then, sounding apologetic, added, “I know it probably sounds, oh, antisocial, but I’d just as soon not have visitors.” He lifted his eyebrows questioningly.

  “I understand. But if there's anything I can do to help, anything at all…”

  “I’ll let you know.”

  “What about follow-up treatments?”

  “First, we see how the surgery goes.”

  “I’ll be praying.”

  “That's what I need most.”

  MARY HAD SAID ABBY SHOULD CALL if she needed anything, but it was not, however, Abby who called Mary that day. It was Mary who called Abby about 4:30, her voice frantic.

  “He's missing, Abby, Finnegan's missing! I let him outside to play for a while, and I fell asleep and now he's missing!” Mary's hoarse words tumbled over each other like rocks rolling down a hillside.

  “Mary, slow down—”

  “I know he wouldn't run away. I’m positive of it. But I’ve called till I can hardly talk. Abby, I’m so worried!”

  Abby was as positive as Mary was that Finnegan wouldn't run away. The backyard wasn't fenced, but a board fence ran along the property line with the McDonalds. There was nothing to keep Finnegan from going down to the shore and possibl
y circling around the end of the fence, but Abby had never known him to leave the area right around the house by himself. He was too well trained.

  “Have you talked to Henry?”

  “I called and he's coming over, but he's over on Lopez so it will take him a while.”

  “I’ll be home as soon as I can get there.”

  Abby grabbed her coat and ran out the front door, calling, “Finnegan's missing!” as she flew by Ida at the front desk. She had to dodge the black cat, Eclipse, on the front steps. What she didn't need was another fall! At 4:30, darkness was already approaching. Not a good time to be searching for a lost dog.

  At the house, Abby was out of her car and running into the house through the laundry room even before the garage door was fully shut behind her.

  The sliding glass doors to the deck stood open, the yard lights on. Even though it was difficult for Mary to get around in the heavy grass with her wheelchair, she was still out searching for her beloved dog.

  Abby ran to her sister and hugged her. “We’ll find him,” she promised. She realized Mary was shivering, her face lined with exhaustion and worry. “You go inside and warm up now, okay? I’ll do the looking.”

  “Abby, what if he's gone for good?” Mary's voice cracked with worry. “What if he got out on the road and a car hit him?”

  This was the biggest danger, Abby knew. Even if Finnegan had uncharacteristically wandered to the rocky shore behind their property, he wouldn't be in any particular danger there. But the road was a different matter. She hadn't spotted him as she was coming home, but he could have gone in the other direction.

  “I’ll go drive along the road. You call the neighbors, okay?”

  To her relief, Abby found no sign of Finnegan anywhere along the road. So where was he?

  “No one's home at the McDonalds’,” Mary reported when Abby returned. “The Wetherbees have been gone all afternoon and haven't seen him, but Lars said he’d go out and take a look around their place. But I think if Finnegan was just over there, he’d have heard me calling and would’ve come to me.”

  “You stay by the phone, okay? If he did somehow wander off, surely someone will spot him and try to call. Almost everyone knows Finnegan. I’ll go out and search down to the shore.”

  Darkness had fallen by now. Abby took a flashlight and searched the property as best she could with the handicap of darkness and her cast, afraid she might find Finnegan injured or ill. She pushed shrubs aside so she could peer underneath and walked purposely through the tall grass they left unmowed to protect the habitat for the birds, flashlight swinging from side to side. No sign of him anywhere.

  She had just returned to the ramp going up to the back deck when the doors slid open. “Abby, are you out there?” Mary called. “I’ve found something.”

  From both words and tone, Abby knew it wasn't a good something. She ran up the ramp. Wordlessly, Mary handed her a scrap of paper. The edges were ragged and the paper stained, as if it had been torn from a notebook that had been wet at some time.

  I HAVE THE DOG. YOU GET THE NECKLACE. YOU’LL RECEIVE INSTRUCTIONS ABOUT WHERE TO MAKE THE EXCHANGE. I GET THE NECKLACE OR YOU NEVER SEE THE DOG AGAIN.

  “Somebody kidnapped Finnegan?” Abby said, aghast. “Where did you get this?”

  “I opened the front door to call for Finnegan again. I hadn't been out that way before. Somebody had stuck the note there.”

  This had to be Gamino, Abby thought. When he came to the house on the bicycle he’d been checking them out. And he’d learned enough to hit them where they were most vulnerable, through Finnegan.

  They were still in the living room, looking at the note they had placed on the coffee table in an effort to preserve any fingerprints on it, when Henry arrived with his cruiser lights blazing. Abby ran to the front door to let him in.

  Henry stopped short when he stepped inside and saw Mary's distraught face. “What's the matter?”

  “Someone left this on the front door.” Abby gestured to the note on the coffee table. “I guess you’d call it a ransom note. Fortunately, Mary only touched the note briefly so there may still be fingerprints on it belonging to the kidnapper.”

  Henry took another quick look at Mary as if to make certain she really was okay. Henry then touched the note by a corner only, careful not to add his own fingerprints.

  “If the guy's smart, he probably wore gloves. But we’ll dust it to be sure. Might get lucky.” After he’d read the note, he asked Mary, “No car in the driveway or commotion behind the house?”

  “Not a thing,” she said, her voice barely holding back her tears. “I should have brought Finnegan in before I fell asleep, but I didn’t. And now he's gone !”

  Abby squeezed her sister's shoulder reassuringly. “We’ll get him back.”

  “Yes,” Henry said, a note of grim determination in his voice. “We will.”

  He got an evidence bag from the car and carefully sealed the note inside. Abby knew he doubted it would provide any useful prints, but it was evidence. Abby told him her suspicion that the kidnapper was Gamino.

  “He must have had a car this time,” Mary said, her mind still functioning in spite of this shock. “He couldn't have carried Finnegan off on a bicycle.”

  “I suppose he could have led Finnegan alongside the bicycle,” Henry said, frowning. “Although that seems unlikely. Finnegan would surely have put up some resistance.”

  “But even if he somehow managed to lead Finnegan off, where would he go with him?” Abby asked. “He must realize someone would surely spot him.”

  Mary lifted a finger. “A boat,” she said suddenly. “You’ve already figured out that the man in the bank arrived by boat so why not this guy too?”

  “A boat?” Abby repeated, thinking the house was a long hike or bicycle ride from the marina. Then a sudden excitement hit her. “Yes, a boat! He came to shore right down there on the Wetherbees’ little dock. He knew about it from having been here on his bicycle before. Then he just walked up to the house . . .”

  “… grabbed Finnegan, left the note and walked back to his boat again,” Henry said grimly.

  Abby could only wonder why she hadn't already thought of this. Getting permission to put in a dock was extremely difficult these days, but the Wetherbees’ dock had been built years ago, and old Lars generously allowed anyone in the neighborhood to use it. The dock wasn't visible from other nearby houses, and Mary had already said the Wetherbees had been gone all afternoon.

  “A boat would explain a lot of things,” Abby said thoughtfully. “Why Gamino didn't contact me again as soon as he said he would. Because of the storm and the small-craft warnings, he and his boat were stuck over at Friday Harbor. Then when he did come, he brought the bicycle on his boat.”

  Henry nodded. “And I couldn't find where he was staying here on the island because he wasn’t staying on the island. He was sleeping on the boat.” Henry expanded on the idea. “He probably docked at the marina to begin with, then he rode out here on the bicycle. But I doubt he stayed there overnight. I’d guess he took the boat offshore, tossed out an anchor and spent the night out there somewhere.”

  Abby knew that the seats on many boats opened out to make a kind of bed. Not necessarily the most comfortable way to spend the night, but an effective way for Gamino to keep out of sight.

  “So how will we ever find him?” Mary asked. “We don't have a boat name or description, and his boat probably looks like hundreds of others.”

  “The water's shallow here, not like at the marina. Which means it can't be a very large boat, or he couldn't have gotten it into the Wetherbees’ dock,” Abby pointed out.

  But they all knew this deduction didn't narrow the possibilities much. There were how many hundreds of small boats in the San Juan Islands, even at this time of year?

  Now Abby also realized something else, what that odd noise she’d heard on the cell phone was. Gamino had called her from the boat, and that was the sound of the engine in the background
. Movement of the boat out of an area of good cell phone transmission was what had caused his voice on the phone to break up.

  “I’ll put the information out all over the islands. Every deputy will be on the lookout for a small boat with a golden retriever mix on board,” Henry said.

  “Oh, I almost forgot,” Abby said, “has Greg Wakefield said anything more about Van Horn?”

  “We brought that up, but now he's claiming he never called you and has no idea who Van Horn is. But we know the kidnapper is going to call again to make the arrangements about exchanging Finnegan for the necklace. I’m going to arrange for a tap on your phone.”

  But before the tap could be installed, Gamino called again.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  THE CALL WAS SHORT, SO short Abby doubted it could have been traced even if the tap had been in place. It came right after Abby got home from work the following day.

  “Abby?”

  Abby tensed. She recognized the voice now. “Yes.”

  “Sunday night. Seven o’clock. You have the necklace. I’ll have the dog. No cops. You don't even talk to the cops about this or the deal is off.”

  “Where do I meet you?”

  “Oh no. I tell you that now and you’ll have a trap all set up. This is just to let you know when, so you can be ready on short notice. You’ll receive instructions just beforehand about where. Good-bye, Abby,” he ended abruptly.

  “Wait! We’re worried about Finnegan. Is he okay?”

  “He's fine. Not too happy being away from his people, of course, but I’m taking good care of him. Oh, and another reminder. This is your only chance. If you don't show up, you never see the dog again.”

  Abby swallowed hard, but all she said was, “You’ll be coming by boat?”

  He hesitated, as if deciding whether or not he wanted to give even that small bit of information. Finally he said, “Yes, by boat.” Unexpectedly, she heard him laugh. “But that's not a big help, is it? The sheriff's office can't have every landing spot on the island covered. Talk to you later, Abby.”

  Abby repeated the contents of the call to Mary, including that Gamino had said Finnegan was in good shape.