The Maine Mutiny

by Jessica Fletcher

  “Did you take notes?”

  “No. I’m relying on my memory. There’s just no way to write on a rocking boat. I knew if I tried, the salt spray would smear the ink and curl the pages, assuming I could even read my handwriting once I’d gotten home. I typed up a first draft last night, but I was too tired to work on it in earnest.”

  “Think you’ll remember everything you need?”

  “Enough to finish the article, I’m sure. And Levi isn’t moving away, so if I have any questions, I can call him up and ask.”

  “Tough business, lobstering,” Mort said, reaching into the box for his third doughnut. “Those guys work long hours for not a lot.”

  “Maureen is not going to be happy with me if you finish that whole box,” I said. Maureen, Mort’s second wife, was always putting him on a diet. “Why don’t you save some for tomorrow?”

  “The deputies will finish whatever I don’t eat right now. Are you sure you don’t want another?”

  “I’m fine,” I said. “One’s my limit.”

  “I’ve been thinking about joining a gym or taking an exercise class,” Mort said, licking the sugar off his fingers and wiping them on a napkin. He closed the box, carried it across the room, and put it on the top of a file cabinet. “Out of reach, out of mind,” he said. “For now anyway.”

  “Where are your shoes?” I asked, noticing he was in socks.

  “Under the desk. They’re new. Don’t want to scuff them up.”

  “If you’re interested in exercise, they’re starting yoga classes at the hospital,” I said. “I just saw the flyer hanging up in Sassi’s.”

  “Can you see me standing on one foot and humming?”

  “I’m sure there’s more to it than that.”

  “Maybe, but I want something more active, like weight lifting.”

  “I like to jog myself. I’ve gotten out of the habit with all the traveling I’ve done recently. But yesterday convinced me to start again.”

  “Yesterday? What happened?”

  “Nothing, really. I spent the day sitting on a stool and holding on to keep from falling off. But even with a long bath last night, I woke up pretty sore today. It’s too easy to get out of shape and hard to get back into it. Those men did all the work, and I got the charley horse.”

  “Maybe you should look into the yoga classes.”

  “Maybe I should,” I said, thinking that wasn’t a bad idea. “But tell me, what’s new? Any more cases of rotten bait being spilled on a boat?”

  “You’re talking about the Done For. I know who did it, but Durkee won’t press charges.”

  “Brady Holland and his friends, I’m guessing.”

  “How did you—”

  “I was at the lobstermen’s association meeting the other night. They’re still giving Spencer a hard time.”

  Mort shook his head. “It took me two days of investigation to track down that information. I should just have waited and asked you.”

  The phone rang and Mort picked it up. “Sheriff’s office. Metzger here.” There was a long silence. I started to rise, thinking it was time to get over to the high school gym, where the pageant rehearsals were scheduled to start in another half hour, but Mort waved me back into my seat. “Where are you now?” he said. He picked up a pencil and hunted for a clean sheet of paper on his desk, which was covered with stacks of folders and forms left from the change of shift. He finally settled on writing in the margins of the morning newspaper. “And where is he? Okay, we’ll be right over. Stay where you are.”

  He hung up, pushed his feet into his shoes, and plucked his cap from the coatrack behind his desk. “Coming, Mrs. F?” he said.

  “Where are we going?”

  “Down to the harbor. There’s been another incident.”

  “What happened?”

  “Someone chopped a hole in Ike Bower’s boat.”

  Chapter Eight

  Mort paused on his way out of the office to cast a final look at the doughnuts on top of the file cabinet. For a moment I thought he was going to grab one for the road. He exercised admirable restraint and led me out of the building to his patrol car with SHERIFF emblazoned on its sides. We climbed in and headed in the direction of the docks.

  “Care to fill me in on who called?” I asked. “Was it Ike?”

  “No, Mrs. F. It was Evelyn Phillips from the Gazette.”

  “Oh? She said someone made a hole in Ike’s boat?”

  “ ‘Chopped’ is the word she used.”

  “How terrible.”

  “If it’s true. Remains to be seen.”

  He was right, of course. Our sheriff was not a man who jumped to conclusions. When it came to crime in Cabot Cove, Mort functioned under the old Missouri adage of “Show me!”

  The trip to the waterfront usually took only minutes from Mort’s office, but a knot of tourists blocked our way at the entrance to the parking area that abutted the docks. The visitors to Cabot Cove were gawking at a sight that was familiar to residents—my friend Tobé Wilson, who with her husband, Jack, ran the leading veterinarian practice in town, was walking her pet pig, Kiwi. When she wasn’t managing their office, Tobé occasionally exercised one or other member of the Wilsons’ sizable menagerie with a stroll downtown, to the amusement of onlookers. Tobé is petite, not quite five feet tall, and the pig is enormous. The combination of mistress and swine always attracts attention.

  Mort gently tapped his horn, and the crowd parted to allow us to pass. He pulled into an empty space near Nudd’s Bait & Tackle, not far from where Ike Bower’s lobster boat was tethered to the dock. We exited the car. Ike, who was on board, saw us approach but turned away, tugging down on the bill of his cap to mask his eyes from us.

  “I don’t see Evelyn,” I said.

  “Probably around somewhere,” Mort said. “We’ll catch up with her later.”

  “Hello, Ike,” Mort yelled.

  Ike tossed us an indifferent wave and returned to what he was doing.

  “Mind if we come aboard?” Mort asked, not waiting for an answer and jumping down onto the deck. He winced, then took my hand and helped me join him. In a shirtwaist, stockings, and pumps, I wasn’t exactly attired for boating. Bower, in stained, frayed tan coveralls and rubber boots, was dressed more appropriately for his task. He was in the process of rigging up a small table saw. Other carpentry tools were spread at his feet.

  “Heard you had a little problem,” Mort said.

  “Nope,” Ike said, not looking at us. “No problem.”

  “That’s good to hear,” Mort said, casually examining the boat’s hull from deckside. “Somebody called, said you’d sprung a leak.”

  “Happens with boats all the time.”

  “Well, this was maybe not expected?”

  “Had a little accident, is all,” Ike said as he plugged in the saw to a long orange cord that snaked across the boards from where he’d connected it to a power source on the dock. He switched on the tool and its loud drone filled the relative quiet of the harbor at that hour, the other fishermen long gone.

  “What sort of accident?” Mort asked, continuing his perusal of the craft.

  “Must have had some driftwood come in overnight on the current,” said Ike. “Nothin’ major.”

  Mort and I watched Ike lean over the side of the boat. We flanked him and did the same. A jagged hole the size of a football was slightly above the waterline.

  “Must’ve been one big piece of driftwood,” Mort said, “and traveling at quite a clip to pierce the side of the boat.”

  “Seems strange it made a hole above the waterline,” I added.

  Mort pulled out his notebook. “Of course, I don’t know a lot about boats, but it seems to me that—”

  Ike straightened and looked down at Mort, who was a good deal shorter than the strapping lobsterman. “Like you said, Sheriff, you don’t know a lot about boats. You can put your pad away.”

  “Don’t you want to file a report?” Mort asked. “For insurance
purposes?”

  “Insurance don’t pay for accidents like this. Now, I’ve got some work to do to get this here thing fixed before I lose another day’s work.” He looked at me and said, “Ma’am,” in such a way that it was obvious I was being dismissed, along with Mort.

  Mort and I climbed back up onto the dock and walked toward the parking lot.

  “He’s hiding something,” Mort said.

  “One thing is certain,” I said. “That was no accident.”

  “What’s he afraid of? Why won’t he file a complaint?”

  “Maybe he’s worried about reprisals.”

  “For what?”

  I thought back to the meeting of the lobstermen’s association at which Ike had spoken openly of not needing the association and Linc Williams if they weren’t going to support the lobstermen. Had someone chopped a hole in Ike’s boat in retribution for his stand, the way another someone had dumped rotting bait on the deck of Spencer Durkee’s boat? Were Ike’s fellow lobstermen so vindictive as to resort to such physical threats in order to keep everyone in line? Did the hole in Ike’s boat carry with it a message? That was a distinct possibility, although I reminded myself to adhere to Mort’s philosophy of not jumping to hasty conclusions.

  We stood alongside Mort’s marked vehicle and looked back to Ike Bower, who was engrossed in repairing the hole in his hull.

  “I wonder,” Mort said, squinting against the sun.

  “Wonder what?” I asked.

  “I wonder why Evelyn Phillips said that somebody chopped a hole in Ike’s boat. Maybe she knows something we don’t, and that Ike’s not willing to admit.”

  “I suggest we ask her,” I offered, pointing to the far end of the parking lot. Evelyn was walking toward us.

  “Good morning Jessica, Sheriff,” she said.

  “Morning, Ms. Phillips,” Mort said. He glanced in the direction of Ike’s boat before asking the newspaper editor, “So, what’s this about somebody chopping a hole in his boat?”

  “Why don’t you go on and see for yourself?” Evelyn said.

  “We just did,” I said. “Bower says it was an accident.”

  “That’s not what he told others,” she said.

  “What others?” Mort asked.

  “Other lobstermen. I was down here early, before the sun came up,” she said. “I don’t sleep well, and I like to come down the docks and watch the fishing boats get ready for the day. I was here when Ike Bower arrived and discovered what had happened to his boat.”

  “And you heard him say something about it to others?” I asked.

  “Yes. He didn’t see me. The docks are pretty busy at that time of day, what with the lobstermen and the fishing boats going out, and the party boats getting ready for the tourists.” She patted her tote bag. “I had my little stool with me, and I was sitting over there, near Spencer Durkee’s boat, over by a pile of lobster traps. I didn’t see when he found the hole, but I sure as heck heard him. He was furious, swearing up a storm; I wouldn’t dare repeat what he had to say, let alone write it in the paper. But I heard him yell that somebody’d taken an ax to his boat, and he swore he’d get even.”

  Mort and I looked back to where Ike continued making repairs. What had intervened between the time he expressed his anger at what someone had done to his boat and the time we arrived? Was this another case of lobstermen keeping their troubles to themselves? Or had someone convinced him he’d better accept what had happened, chalk it up to an accident, keep quiet, and not make waves?

  “Anything else you remember, Ms. Phillips?” Mort asked.

  “I don’t think so. After Mr. Bower vented his anger to his colleagues, he went back to his truck and took off. I didn’t see him again after that.”

  “Who were the others he told?” I asked.

  “Well, one of them was Linc Williams. And Levi Carver was there. I don’t know the names of the others. I think I’ve seen them around town, though.”

  “You’d know them if you saw them again?” Mort asked.

  “Oh, sure. But there must’ve been a lot of people who heard him. He was pretty loud.” She pulled a slim reporter’s pad and a pen from her canvas shoulder bag, opened the pad, and said to Mort, “Any statement, Sheriff?”

  “Statement? About what?”

  “About what happened here,” she replied. “Obviously a crime has been committed. You’re here investigating it. Aren’t you?”

  “I’m here because you called me,” said Mort. “According to you, based on what you claim you heard Ike Bower say, somebody cut a hole in his boat. Unless Bower chooses to file a criminal complaint, there’s nothing I can do.”

  “But I heard it,” Evelyn said.

  “Hearsay,” Mort responded. “You want to file a complaint?”

  “Of course not.”

  “I’m not sure there’s anything to base a story on for the paper,” I said to her. “If Ike claims it was an accident, it’ll have to stay that way.” But I had the feeling she wasn’t about to let it go that easily.

  She proved me right a moment later. “I write about car accidents all the time,” she said. “I can write about boat ‘accidents’ too.” She emphasized the word to make sure we knew she didn’t consider it an accident at all. “I’ll come back when the lobstermen come in with their catches and see if I can interview the men who talked to Ike Bower this morning. Then, if one of them confirms it, I—”

  “Suit yourself, Ms. Phillips,” Mort said. “Meantime, I’ve got to get back to my office.”

  “How’d your day on the lobster boat go?” she said to me.

  “Fine,” I said. “I’m hoping to have something to give you tomorrow.”

  “Can’t wait,” she said. “I’m sure it’ll be terrific.”

  I looked at my watch and said, “I want to stop in on rehearsals for the beauty pageant. Any chance you can drop me off, Mort?”

  “Happy to.”

  Mort opened the passenger door for me and I got in. He came around to the driver’s side and was about to join me when he called after Evelyn, who’d started to walk away.

  “Ms. Phillips,” he said.

  “Yes?” she said, turning.

  “How about you making a statement for the record?” he said.

  She thought for a moment before saying, “I don’t think that would be appropriate, considering I’m a journalist.”

  “I don’t see what that has to do with anything,” Mort said. “You claim a crime has been committed. Seems to me being a good citizen is more important than being a journalist.”

  “I don’t think so, Sheriff,” she said. “But I’ll let you know if I uncover anything else.”

  “You were a little short with her,” I said when he climbed into the car.

  “Yeah? Didn’t mean to be. Must be feeling a little cranky today.”

  Mort fell silent as he drove me to the high school, where the pageant rehearsals were taking place. He pulled up in front of the school, reached across, and pushed open my door.

  “Thanks for the lift,” I said.

  “She’s right, you know,” he said.

  “That it wasn’t an accident?” I said. “I was thinking the same thing.”

  “First Spencer’s boat, now Ike Bower’s. I’ve got a bad feeling about what’s going on with the lobstermen.”

  “So do I,” I said. “Let’s hope they can resolve whatever differences they have before the festival.”

  Mort’s laugh was wry. “We can’t have a lobster festival without lobsters, now, can we?”

  “I’d hate to see us have to serve hot dogs and hamburgers; that’s for certain.” But it might come to that, I thought.

  Chapter Nine

  The high school gym was set up as if a game were to take place. There were bleachers on either side of the basketball court, with a sprinkling of onlookers lolling on the benches. It was warm inside, even with the ceiling fans on and the doors to the outside propped open. A group of teenage boys sat on the floor near the
exit, watching the girls and whispering to each other. I spotted Gwen Anissina sitting in the first row of the bleachers, with an open binder on her lap. Next to her was Matilda Watson, the Gazette’s publisher and Evelyn’s boss. Wheeled in for the occasion and sitting under one of the baskets was the upright piano the school used for assemblies. I couldn’t see over the top, but someone was pounding out a tune while the gym teacher shouted instructions.

  “One, two, three, four. Arms up, ladies. Don’t look at your feet. Big smile. That’s it. Turn, bow.” Lynda Peckham clapped her hands. “One more time. Mrs. Fricket, please take it from the top.”

  The eight young women who were contestants vying for the title of Miss Cabot Cove Lobsterfest arranged themselves in two rows and began their presentation. I recognized Abigail Brown right away from her picture in Charles Department Store. She was a stunning brunette with long straight hair and a twinkle in her green eyes. And I thought I picked out Katherine Corr, too, although she certainly had grown up from her days as one of my students. Charlene was right: She was a curvaceous beauty now.

  Lynda Peckham tapped out the rhythm with her toe and put the girls through their paces; the performance was not quite a dance but involved a large number of arm movements and poses. Miss Peckham had a lot of experience choreographing for the cheerleading squad, but perhaps her familiarity with dance was more limited. Or maybe it was the talent of the contestants that required more simplified steps.

  “We should have the costumes tomorrow, ladies, so remember to leave enough room between you for them. They tend to be quite full. Arm lengths apart, now. Follow the music.”

  I waved to Gwen, who motioned me to join her and Matilda.

  “Jessica, you’re just the one I wanted to see,” Matilda said when I sat down. “Would you mind proof-reading this for me?” She handed me a piece of paper headlined Pageant Rules. “I wrote it out this morning but I never can find mistakes in my own work. I need a fresh eye.”

  I scanned the sheet, my eyebrows rising as I took in the list of rules, which, along with demands for participation in all the events leading up to and following the coronation, included several paragraphs on morals, as well as a ban on piercing any part of the body other than ears, and instruction on how much jewelry was permissible. “I don’t see any errors,” I said, handing it back to Matilda. “But it’s quite stringent, don’t you think?”