Frank Bennett Adirondack Mountain Mystery Box Set

by S. W. Hubbard

  He reached out and picked up a large green vase that caught his eye. Turning it over, he held it at arm’s length to make out the tiny writing on the discreet price tag. Twelve dollars? No, one hundred and twenty! Good grief, she couldn’t sell many of those around–

  “Why hello, Frank. What brings you here?”

  The sound of Beth’s low, mellow voice surprised him so much that he nearly dropped the vase, which would have been a real catastrophe.

  “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to startle you. I heard the bells chime but I had a pot on the wheel and couldn’t come right out.” Beth smiled. She radiated a placid stillness, as if the atmosphere of the shop emanated directly from her.

  Her calmness inspired an equal level of nervousness in Frank. He felt like she’d caught him shoplifting and for a moment his tongue stayed glued to the roof of his mouth as surely as if he’d just taken a big bite of peanut butter sandwich.

  “Hi, Beth,” he finally managed to stammer. “I, uh, I’m looking for a birthday gift for my daughter. Thought she might like something from your store.”

  “Aren’t you a sweet dad! Is she a college girl? She might like some earrings, or a shawl.”

  “Oh, no,” Frank answered. “She’s out of school. She’s going to be twenty-six.”

  “Twenty-six!” Beth put her hand on his forearm. “You can’t have a daughter who’s twenty-six! You must’ve been twelve when she was born.”

  Frank felt a silly rush of pleasure at her joke. Did she really think he only looked thirty-eight? That was about how old she was, he guessed. “No, I was twenty-one when Caroline was born,” he admitted. “But sometimes I felt like I was twelve.”

  “Yes, having children knocks the know-it-all right out of you, doesn’t it?” Her green eyes, flecked with gold like a cat’s, looked directly into his. Frank’s mind went blank as he felt his heart quicken and his throat go dry. Good lord, he hadn’t had this reaction to a woman since Bettina Albert had paralyzed him with her presence in eighth grade French.

  “Do you have children?” he finally managed to choke out, keeping up his end of the conversation. He’d picked up from someone that Beth was divorced, but he hadn’t noticed any sign of children.

  “Yes, two boys. Gregory’s at the University of Oregon and Theo’s a junior at Oberlin.”

  “Now it’s my turn to be surprised. I would’ve expected grade school kids.” Perhaps she was a little closer to his age than he thought.

  “No, they’re out of the nest.” A wistful look crossed her face as she gazed out the window. “I miss them, but I never expected they would stay around Trout Run.” Beth brought her attention back to him with a little shake. “Enough about that—let’s find a gift for your daughter. You were interested in that vase?”

  Frank coughed. “Actually, I’m thinking a bowl might be better—more practical.” He gestured toward a medium-sized bowl glazed the same rich green color as the vase, but with less detail-work. Hopefully this one was a bit cheaper; he didn’t have the nerve to turn it over and look.

  “You have a good eye.”

  Again, that ridiculous flutter of satisfaction. As she reached out for the bowl he noticed that her hands were stained with the clay she had been working. Somehow, that made them more attractive.

  “She can use this to serve food, or it would look nice with a seasonal arrangement. Some gourds, or pine cones and berries,” Beth said as she held the bowl up for his inspection.

  Frank nodded in agreement, although what he knew about seasonal arrangements wouldn’t fill a matchbook. “I’ll take it. Could you pack it up? I have to ship it to Chappaqua.”

  “I can take care of all that for you. The UPS man stops here every day.”

  They moved to the cash register and Frank handed over his credit card. As he filled out the shipping form he said, “I guess you heard about the shooting over on Giant this morning?”

  “Shooting? Who would be hunting over there?”

  His heart sank as he realized he was going to be breaking the news of Golding’s death to her. He’d just assumed that news this big would have reached her by now, but of course no one from town shopped here, and if she’d been working all morning without the radio on she wouldn’t have heard. “It wasn’t an accident. And I’m afraid the victim was someone you know.”

  Beth looked up from wrapping the bowl.

  “Nathan Golding.”

  She took a step back and plopped onto a stool behind the counter. “Is he badly hurt?”

  Frank’s hesitation answered her question.

  “He’s dead? But I just saw him the other day!”

  “I’m sorry, Beth. Was he a good friend?”

  “Well, not exactly. I mean, he used to be, but I hadn’t seen him for years until he showed up on Thursday here at the shop.” Frank’s curiosity must have been apparent, because she kept explaining. “I met him when I was in college at Cornell. He was a grad student there when I was a freshman and sophomore.”

  Beth stopped talking and her eyes got that same faraway look they’d had when she was talking about her sons. Frank waited.

  “Nathan was so, so...vibrant. People just flocked to him.” Beth smiled at Frank. “You remember what college was like in the early seventies. We were all so idealistic, so passionate. And Nathan was at the center of it all. Leading every protest, organizing marches, circulating petitions—all for the environment.”

  Frank forced his lips up a little in response. That might’ve been what college had been like for Beth and Golding, but he had worked his way through UMKC at night when he was already married, a father and a cop. It’d taken eight years and there certainly hadn’t been any time for waving banners and marching on the dean’s office. He imagined Beth as an eighteen-year-old hippie-chick—he probably wouldn’t have given her a second glance in those days.

  Beth didn’t seem to notice that Frank wasn’t agreeing. She continued down memory lane. “When I was nineteen I would’ve walked across hot coals for Nathan Golding. But then he dropped out of grad school, I finished college, got married, and came here. Of course I knew what became of him—I followed all the news about Green Tomorrow. I even sent the organization a few donations. He said that’s how he tracked me down.”

  “Why did he suddenly want to track you down after all these years?” Frank asked.

  Beth began fussing with the packaging of the bowl again. “He was in the area, uh, conducting some research. He said he always likes to look up local supporters when he’s working in the field. It was wonderful to see him. Even with the gray hair and a few wrinkles he was just the same. Still so intense, so committed. I just can’t believe he’s dead.”

  “What kind of research?” Frank persisted.

  Beth looked up from her wrapping and her eyes locked with Frank’s. “Are you investigating his death? Is that why you came in today?”

  Frank felt a wave of heat rise through his body. He wondered if he was blushing noticeably. “No, it’s the State Police’s case. I came in to buy a gift. But I saw you talking to Golding at Malone’s, and now he’s turned up dead. I can’t help but wonder—” Frank broke off. Why did he feel the need to explain to her?

  “The State Police are going to need to know why Golding was here,” he continued. “If you can help them, you should come forward.”

  A furrow of worry appeared above Beth’s eyes. “Nathan’s been active in protesting the commercialization of wilderness areas. New ski resorts in the Sierras. Golf courses in the desert. He was here looking into Raging Rapids.”

  “Raging Rapids? That’s just a dinky little tourist attraction.” Frank had taken his grandsons there last summer to walk across the catwalks that crossed Stony Brook as it plunged into a deep gorge. “Why would Golding care about that?”

  Beth shrugged. “Nathan was involved in far more controversial things, and he certainly had enemies. That must be why he was killed—I doubt it has anything to do with Raging Rapids.”

  The sound of gra
vel crunching outside made them both look up. The UPS truck was pulling into the parking area. Beth put the last piece of tape on the box containing Caroline’s gift.

  “Just in time,” she said. “Let me know how your daughter likes the bowl.”

  “I will.” In a rush he added, “Maybe we could have lunch sometime.”

  “I’d like that.”

  Then, before she could say anything else, he left as fast as a mouse that has nabbed a piece of kibble straight from the cat’s bowl.

  Chapter 10

  Debbie Flint lived in a trailer parked on a long, narrow lot that fronted the main road out of Trout Run. Now that it was past five, Frank was sure Debbie would be home from her shift at the Stop ‘n' Buy.

  The trailer, which looked to be about fifteen or twenty years old, had been set up with the least amount of effort, barely a car’s length back from the road. There was no driveway, only hard packed earth where Debbie’s ancient Crown Victoria was parked. A tangle of trikes and trucks and dolls lay in the weedy grass, and out back a row of tiny shirts and pants flapped on the clothesline. Frank climbed up the unstable pile of concrete blocks that passed for a front stoop. Knocking on the door was like rapping on tin foil.

  But Debbie’s trailer was clean and cheerful inside. Dinner was cooking in the galley kitchen, and the children were working on a jigsaw puzzle on the living room floor. A flowered curtain separated the main room from the bedroom. If Mary Pat had given birth here, she had certainly had very little privacy.

  “Hi Debbie, I need to talk to you about Mary Pat Sheehan for a minute,” Frank said as the young woman let him in. “Was Mary Pat over here on the evening of September 17th? That’s the Wednesday the week before she died.”

  “Here at my house? Of course not–why would she be?”

  “Her parents said she babysat for you that night and slept over. That she babysat for you all the time. Is that true?”

  “Babysat? For me? The only person who watches my kids is Sue Estes, while I’m at work.”

  “So Mary Pat never babysat for you?” Frank confirmed.

  “Well, I take that back. Once, about a year ago, I had a court date in Elizabethtown about my support payments, and Sue got sick and I was upset about it at work and Mary Pat volunteered to watch them and so she did stay with them for a couple of hours that one time.” Debbie gulped a breath. “Now, what’s this all about?”

  “Mary Pat’s death was not quite what it seemed,” he began, and then listened to the now familiar chorus of disbelief as he told about the concealed pregnancy, the birth, and the sale of the baby through Sheltering Arms. “So,” Frank concluded, “it would appear that Mary Pat was using you for a cover when she would meet her boyfriend. And, I’m pretty sure she gave birth that night when she told her folks she was babysitting for you. Now I have to figure out where she really went, and who she was with, and who put her in touch with Sheltering Arms. Any ideas?”

  Debbie shook her head, her dirty-blond hair swinging back and forth with the vehemence of her denial. “Wow, and I thought my life was screwed up!”

  “Can you remember if there was anyone she talked about a lot? A man she went out of her way to talk to, or flirted with–”

  “Flirted!” Debbie interrupted. “Mary Pat didn’t even know how to flirt. She was just the same nice Mary Pat to everyone, young, old, ugly, handsome. It didn’t matter to her.”

  “Well, she treated someone different, and the Stop’N’Buy’s gotta be the link,” Frank said. “Where else would she meet anyone? She spent all her free time with her parents or at church.”

  “Mommee?? I’m hungry!” a little voice piped from the sofa.

  “I’m coming sweetie.” Debbie opened the door for Frank. “I guess the guy must’ve been someone who came in later in her shift, when she was alone. Maybe Anita would know something. She comes in three nights a week to clean.”

  “Anita who?”

  “Anita Veech.”

  ON THE SHORT RIDE INTO town, Frank thought about Mary Pat’s lover.

  Was the guy grief-stricken now or relieved? Had he known how sick Mary Pat was in the days before she died? Had he urged her to see a doctor, or had they both been so anxious to keep the pregnancy quiet that he'd done just the opposite–prevented her from getting the help that could've saved her? Or could he have just been a one-night stand, someone passing through that Mary Pat had gone with out of sheer loneliness?

  Such a waste. Such a terrible, terrible waste, and nothing Frank did could change that. He'd spent the whole day getting bad news and giving bad news. He hadn't accomplished jack shit. Now he felt an overwhelming need to fix something. To just use his hands and head to make one thing, one stupid little thing, come out right. And then he got an idea.

  Driving back to the office, he switched the patrol car for his own pick-up, checking to see that his toolbox was in there. Then he headed out to the Iron Eagle Inn.

  Edwin and Lucy Bates owned Trout Run’s one entry in the charming country bed and breakfast category. They'd escaped the high-pressured life in Manhattan, and now spent their days catering to the whims of the type of people they used to be.

  The Inn was one perpetual repair project, as Frank had discovered when Caroline had booked him into the Iron Eagle for a restorative fishing trip after Estelle’s death. During his stay he’d walked in on a contractor giving Edwin some hare-brained advice on porch repair. Unable to stand by quietly as a catastrophe unfolded, he’d replaced the rotting floorboards himself, and an unlikely friendship was born.

  Edwin and Frank had nothing in common. Edwin, a former English professor who hadn’t made tenure, was particular about everything: the books he read, the clothes he wore, the food he ate. Frank was an omnivore: he read everything he got his hands on, ate anything that was put in front of him, often with disastrous consequences, and wore whatever was given to him for Christmas and his birthday.

  But one thing they shared–Edwin understood what it meant to lose a job you loved, and he had persuaded Frank to reject the new career in corporate security he’d been considering in favor of taking over the police chief’s job in Trout Run. It was the best advice Frank had ever received and he repaid Edwin by continuing to repair things at the Inn.

  Frank glanced at the dashboard clock. Almost seven—he could get some satisfaction from fixing Edwin's latest plumbing problem, and get a free meal in the bargain. He hoped it wasn’t anything too weird. The last time he’d eaten there, Edwin had fed him ratatat-something, full of eggplant and tomatoes and suspicious little flecks. It had tasted all right on the way down, but had roiled his digestive tract for hours afterward.

  Frank marched into the kitchen without knocking, encouraged by the comforting smell of garlic and roasting meat. Jen Verhoeff, who helped Edwin with the cooking, was flying around, muttering under her breath, “Seven minutes to cook a whole pot of green beans, my ass! Fine if you’re feeding beavers, but people like to be able to chew their vegetables.”

  “How’s it going?” Frank asked, sitting down at the long oak table, well away from the big six-burner stove.

  Jen let out a little shriek. “Geez! You scared me. Where did you come from, Frank?”

  “Sorry. I came to scrounge a meal.”

  “Well, get in there. You missed the appetizer, but I’ll set you a place for the main course.”

  Frank tugged at the khaki shirt of his uniform. “I'm not dressed for company. I thought I'd fix the toilet in the Blue Room, then just eat leftovers out here."

  “I guess that's all right, if you can finish before the guests are done with dinner. Go up the back stairs."

  Frank carried his toolbox up the narrow steps and crossed the hall to the Blue Room. He tapped on the door, and when no one answered, walked in. None of the Inn's locks worked–it catered to trusting souls.

  The guest's suitcase lay open on the floor. Instinctively, he checked out the contents as he stepped over it to get to the bathroom. He could hear the toilet gurgling
away.

  “I can’t believe people pay Edwin $125 a night to stay in a room with a little sign taped to the toilet telling you how to jiggle the handle to get it to flush,” he said to himself as he set to work installing a new ball and plunger. In just a few minutes, the toilet responded to his test with a gratifying whoosh. He pulled the sign off, but stopped short of throwing it away. Might as well save it for when the next one broke.

  Frank came down the back stairs just as Edwin entered the kitchen from the dining room. “Frank, what a nice surprise. What brings you here?"

  "Fixed your toilet." Frank took the half empty serving platter from Edwin's hands. "I'll take my payment in roast beef."

  "Lamb," Edwin corrected. "And don't wrinkle your nose like it's fried goat eyeballs. I’m just going to serve the guests dessert, then Lucy and I will come back and have coffee with you.”

  Frank watched as an impressive-looking chocolate cake rode out to the dining room on a serving cart. He hoped there would be enough left over. But his fears were groundless. Before long, Edwin and Lucy both were back in the kitchen, bearing nearly half the cake. “So many people on diets these days,” Edwin complained. “It’s hardly worth baking. I should just serve fresh fruit.”

  “Don’t be rash, Edwin. You can always count on me,” Frank said, slicing himself a large piece.

  “Ah, if only everyone had your metabolism, Frank,” Lucy said as she served herself a piece of cake so thin it dissolved into a pile of crumbs on her plate. Lucy complained constantly that Edwin’s cooking would soon push her from a size six to a size eight, a lament that didn’t earn her much sympathy from the other women she knew.

  Edwin poured coffee all around, as Jen loaded the dinner plates into the dishwasher. “Well, the talk at dinner was all about the shooting on Giant. I hope they’re all talked out, otherwise I don’t know what we’ll do at breakfast tomorrow.”