A Case of Vineyard Poison

by Philip R. Craig

  I thought about all the things I didn’t know.

  “Okay,” I said. “Tomorrow you can make some calls.”

  Quinn looked happy. “Good. Now sit down and join me in a snort of this brandy while you sample that blue and Brie. Perfectly smoked bluefish, if I say so myself.” He waved an airy hand at Dave. “Maestro, a little drinking and digesting music, if you please.”

  Dave grinned, sipped his beer, then set the glass aside and touched the keys. Music filled the room. I sat down. Cognac, hors d’oeuvres, and David Greenstein at the keyboard. Not bad.

  The next morning, early, I wrote down what I knew about the case, then went to Beth Goodwin’s house before she could escape again. She wiped the sleep from her eyes and gave me a photograph of a girl and a young man. I recognized the girl as being Kathy Ellis. I recognized the young man, too. Glen Gordon. He looked just like the guy in the picture I’d gotten yesterday from Maple Appleyard.

  “I hope that helps,” said Beth Goodwin, yawning and holding her robe together at her throat.

  “It does,” I said. “Now I know that this Glen Gordon is the same Glen Gordon as the one who works over at Frazier Information Systems. It’s not much, but it’s something I couldn’t be sure of before.”

  At home, I found Quinn and Dave having coffee and eating smoked bluefish, red onion, and cream cheese on bagels. A world-class breakfast. I joined them. Delish.

  “All right,” said Quinn, when he finally pushed himself back from the table. “I’m ready to roll. What do you want to know?”

  “I want you to dig up whatever you can about Glen Gordon, Cecil Jones, and the New Bedford, Woods Hole and Nantucket Salvage Company. While you’re at it, you might try to find out where Denise Vale is, and the tie-in between her and Kathy Ellis and Glen Gordon and Cecil Jones.”

  “You don’t want much,” said Quinn. “Have you ever considered becoming a city editor? You have the gall for it. I take it that you want to see how all this stuff hooks together.”

  “Correct.” I gave him the notes I’d written. “Here’s what I have to get you started. Events, names, addresses, and telephone numbers. Helen Fine will help you out with the money part, and I think Matt Jung and Maple Appleyard will, too, although they may be shy about talking to a reporter.”

  “I know the type. What I’ll do is get as much background stuff as I can, then I’ll start looking to see where the money comes from and goes. The old silver trail is always a good one to follow.”

  “Even though I’m already a dedicated professional in another field, I’d be glad to help you out,” said Dave. “Unfortunately, J.W only has one phone, so I guess I’ll just have to get back to the old keyboard, then go out into the yard for a final sun-bronzing before tomorrow’s return to reality.”

  “In your spare time,” I said, “you can come up with some winning information about staying in good with a Portuguese mother-in-law. I know I’d do fine if you were always on hand to soothe her with song, but tomorrow you’ll be gone and I’ll be here all alone. Give it some thought. I clearly need help.”

  “Maybe not so much as you think,” said Dave, getting up and carrying dishes to the kitchen.

  I looked after him. Maybe he was right. One thing for sure: although marrying Zee didn’t mean I had to marry her family, too, things would be a 4ot better if I was also on good terms with her kin, if that was possible. I hadn’t met Dad or the brothers yet, so I couldn’t do much about them; but Maria was right here. Round one with her hadn’t been a good one for me, but round two had been a lot better—thanks, admittedly, to Quinn’s and Dave’s collective charms. Round three was coming up soon, somewhere, sometime. Better to take the bull by the horns, I decided. I put a rod on the roof rack, got into the Land Cruiser, and drove up to Zee’s house.

  Zee answered her door. She looked terrific in shorts and tee shirt, her long blue-black hair knotted in a kerchief on her head. She held some gauzy-looking blue material in her hand. Behind her, I could see Maria, glasses on her nose, looking at me over some sewing.

  “You’re ravishing,” I said, loudly.

  “Thank you,” said Zee.

  “Oh,” I said, looking down at her. “You too. Like mother, like daughter.”

  Zee patted my cheek pretty hard and kissed me. “I don’t think you should really woo Mom. What if you won her?”

  “It’s all right, dear,” said Maria, getting up and coming to meet me. “Let him talk. I love it.” She gave me a kiss that was not entirely maternal.

  “You can take turns caring for me as I grow old,” I said. “It’ll be great.” I went in and looked around the room. It was tumbled with what seemed to be yards of lace and cloth the color of the sky just where it touches the sea—a sort of pale violet. “I take it that the wedding is still on go. Is this all something I’m not supposed to see until the magic day?”

  “No secrets here,” said Zee. “If you could sew, we’d ask you to sit down and pitch in.”

  “Oh, dear,” said Maria. “You mean you can’t sew, Jefferson? Zeolinda will have to teach you after you’re married.” She looked at Zee. “Married men always have a lot to learn.”

  I also looked at Zee. “What do you mean, “If you could sew’? I can sew.” I glanced at Maria. “I even have a sewing machine. I salvaged it at the Edgartown dump years ago. Almost as good as new. All it needed was a little TLC and new switch. Runs like a charm.”

  “All true,” said Zee to her mother. “The only thing missing from that picture is sewing skill.”

  “I can sew things together,” I said.

  “If you don’t mind how they look,” said Zee. “But if you do mind, it’s another story. Except for sails. For some reason, Mom, he can sew a good seam on a sail, I’ll give him that.” She gestured at the piles of cloth. “I don’t think this is your sort of game, Jeff.”

  “Oh, you mean it’s woman’s work, I suppose? A sexist attitude if ever I heard one.”

  Zee tossed her head and smiled. Certain of my glands began to dance.

  “Why don’t you ladies abandon this project, and let me take you for a ride out to Cape Pogue? Do you good to get some fresh air.” I looked at Maria. “Have you ever been on the four-wheel-drive tour on the Chappy beaches? No? Tsk, tsk. Your daughter hasn’t been entertaining you properly. Put away that needle and grab your shades and your camera, and we’ll be off.”

  Zee and her mother exchanged looks, and Zee put her sewing down. “I’ll get my rod and tackle box!”

  Most of the hundred thousand or so summer people who come to the Vineyard each year never see the faraway parts of the island that can be reached only with a four-wheel-drive vehicle. Principal among these wild and lovely distant places are the beaches of Chappaquiddick, where the fishermen roam in pursuit of the fruits of the sea.

  We drove down to Katama, took a left onto the sands flattened by Hurricane Bob, and drove along the barrier beach between the blue Atlantic and Katama Bay. The beach was just beginning to fill with that day’s June People anxious to improve their tans, but out in the bay the pro quahoggers and clammers were already at work on the flats.

  The first land to the south of the beach was probably the Dominican Republic, but north of the clammers, through the narrows, we could see Edgartown. Along the beach were birds: terns, gulls, and two pairs of oyster catchers who had a nest in what remained of the beach grass.

  We reached Chappaquiddick, that sometimes island that was then, as it usually is, hooked to the rest of the Vineyard by the barrier beach, and drove along the road through the dunes, climbing the wooden road, crossing the boardwalk, and passing Swan Lake. No otters in the lake today, but plenty of ducks and cormorants, and two pairs of swans. We came out onto the beach where the Jeeps were lined up between Leland’s and Wasque points. The rods were mostly vertical and the fishermen were standing around drinking coffee and talking, so it was clear that the bluefish were not there in the famous Wasque Rip.

  “Alas,” said Zee. “But good luck for
you, Mom, because if the fish were in, this might be the end of your tour.”

  I cut inside to Pocha Pond and took the sandy road through some of the world-champion poison ivy that grows on the dunes, toward the Dike Bridge where, more than a score of years before, America’s most famous automobile accident had taken place. As we approached it, Zee pointed it out to Maria.

  “You know about the supposed pieces of the true cross that were so popular with Christians in medieval times? Some wag said that if they actually were all pieces of the cross, it would have had to have been two miles high. Anyway, we call this the True Bridge, because there actually are people who have come and cut pieces off it as relics.”

  “You don’t say.”

  “We can get you one, if you want.”

  “No thank you, dear. I’m a Republican, but I’m not a sick Republican.”

  “It gets worse. Did you know that some people have come here and dipped up water from beneath the bridge and taken it home in vials, like holy water?”

  “Don’t be blasphemous, sweetheart.”

  “I’m not the blasphemer, I’m just the reporter. There also used to be a guy who came down here on the anniversary of the accident and held prayer services in memory of it all. What do you think of that?”

  “I hope he wasn’t Catholic.”

  I had to laugh. “I don’t think he was. I think he was one of those fundamentalist Bible thumpers. Anyway, as you can see, there’s almost nothing left of the bridge, now. You can’t even walk across it. They say they’re going to build a new one. If they do, maybe the curiosity seekers will stop coming. That would make a lot of Chappy people happy, for sure. Their roads have been filled with bridge hunters for twenty years, and they’re tired of them.”

  We drove to Cape Pogue Pond, where the Vineyard’s largest quahogs live, and where we do some of the best scalloping in New England. There were Snowy egrets along the beach, and a great blue heron was wading in the shallow water. We drove on to the lighthouse, then down along the beach, past the gull nesting area, to the Cape Pogue Gut.

  To the north, across the blue water, were the Oak Bluffs bluffs. Beyond them and to the east, on the far side of the sound, and under a file of gray-white clouds, was the hazy line of land that was Cape Cod. To the west we could see the white houses of Edgartown. Sailboats, going before a gentle southwest wind, were heading out. Over everything, the blue summer sky arched from horizon to horizon.

  There were more fishermen at the gut, but again there were no fish.

  “Wrong time and tide,” explained Zee.

  “If you knew that,” said Maria, “why did you bring your fishing poles?”

  “Because,” said Zee, “you never really, absolutely know for sure. And can you imagine what it would be like to get down here without a rod and find out that the fish are blitzing? No, no, Mom. One never goes onto the beach without one’s rod. Jeff taught me that.”

  “It was a business deal,” I said. “I’d teach her how to fish, and she’d marry me.”

  “I see,” said Maria.

  When we got back to Cape Pogue, we took the outer beach to the Jetties, then hooked back inside. To complete the tour, we cut up onto Chappy and caught the On Time ferry back across to Edgartown.

  “Very lovely,” said Maria when we were back at Zee’s house. “I had no idea there were such beautiful, wild places on the island. But wouldn’t you know it? I didn’t take a single picture!”

  “We’ll make a special photography tour,” I said. “Whenever you want.”

  Zee walked me to the Land Cruiser.

  “You are a smoothie,” she said, squeezing my arm.

  “Endless flattery,” I said. “That’s the secret of winning women. That’s how I got you, after all.”

  “Consider yourself whacked with a stick,” said Zee, kissing me good-bye.

  I drove to Vineyard Haven and went to see Helen Fine. She beckoned me into her office.

  “I’ve been trying to call you, but your line’s been busy all morning. We have an interesting development on our hands. Matt Jung sent a tape across on an early boat, and I had Eddie set up the TV. I want you to see this.”

  A television set and a VCR were sitting on a table across from Helen’s desk. She picked up a remote control, and the TV screen lit up. A moment later, fuzzy shapes appeared. A time and a date were in the upper corner of the picture. The fuzzy shapes became people doing business at teller windows in a bank. After a bit, the movement stopped and a particular man at a window was highlighted. A voice on the tape identified the man as Cecil Jones. A moment later, there was a blowup of the man’s face.

  I must have made some sort of sound.

  “Indeed,” said Helen Fine. “Here.” She handed me her copy of the photograph Maple Appleyard had given us the day before. I looked at it and then at the TV screen and then at Helen.

  “No doubt about it,” I said.

  She” nodded. “Glen Gordon and Cecil Jones are the same person.” She put her palms together and smiled a humorless smile. “I think the pot has just begun to boil.”

  — 23 —

  Why was I not surprised? Because Miles the medic was also Miles the bully? Because all of us wear more than one face? Because this stew seemed to be in a small pot where there wasn’t much room for any ingredients but the essentials?

  I wondered what Quinn was finding out. The actors in the drama I was investigating were beginning to look like bugs in a web. One of them was the spider, but which one?

  On the television screen, the enlarged picture of Cecil Jones/Glen Gordon went away and there was more fuzzy film of other customers at teller windows. Then the tape highlighted a male customer who used a cane and seemed to favor a stiff left leg. The film stopped, and there was another highlighted photo of that male customer, followed by a blowup of the face. The voice identified this man, too, as Cecil Jones. And having had the face identified, I could see that it was, indeed, the same man. But this face wore sideburns and a small moustache. The voice explained that this Cecil Jones always did business at the Sandwich branch office, where he was known. The film went on, and a third Cecil Jones was shown doing business at the Chatham branch office. This Cecil wore wire-rimmed glasses, had a neat beard, and parted his hair on the other side of his head. The Provincetown Cecil was the same as the Hyannis Cecil.

  Helen stopped the tape. “That’s all there is about Cecil Jones. Three Cecils for four banks. Why did he bother?”

  Why, indeed? I guessed. “Because if ID time ever arrives, in court, for example, it’ll be just that much harder to get witnesses to agree about who it was that took out the money. A good lawyer could make a lot out of that.”

  “Even though the prosecution would have this film?”

  “There was no way Cecil could keep from being filmed. All he could do was make things confusing. And even if he doesn’t fool anybody, there’s no law against changing the way you look when you make bank withdrawals, is there?”

  “None that I know of.”

  “Have you seen the rest of the film?”

  “Yes. There are pictures of Marilyn Grimes, the assistant treasurer, making withdrawals. The same person every time. Makes me wonder if maybe she was also being suckered by Cecil.”

  “Let’s have a look at her.”

  The film ran and a highlighted Marilyn Grimes appeared. She wore thick glasses and graying hair in a severe hairdo. Her blouse was buttoned to the neck, and her jacket and skirt were, even to my ignorant eyes, far out of fashion. She had prominent upper teeth that made her look weak in the chin. She never smiled, but attended to her work and departed.

  “How old?” I asked Helen.

  She shrugged. “Thirties? Forties? It’s hard to tell. Matt probably has her age in his records. You recognize her?”

  “No. Her face is a type you see, though.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I started noticing facial types when I was a kid. Later on, it paid off sometimes when I was a co
p. Anyway, start looking at faces, and you’ll see what I mean. There are some archetypal faces that appear over and over again. Certain movie actors and actresses have those faces, and you can see the same faces in ordinary people. There’s the Brando face, for example. The young Brando. The eyes, the shape of the skull and face, even the hairline. There’s the James Dean face. That forehead, those eyes and lips, that jawline. I’ve seen a lot of those faces in jail, incidentally. There’s the Katharine Hepburn face. You see it around the island in the summertime, but not often. There’s the Paul Newman face, and the Bette Davis face.

  “This woman, Marilyn Grimes, has a face I recognize, but don’t remember. The Wicked Witch of the West, maybe?”

  “Look some more. Maybe it’ll come to you.”

  There were three other films and close-ups of Marilyn Grimes, all taken at the Hyannis office. Marilyn apparently did not do business at the other branches. She also apparently didn’t own any other clothes.

  After I’d seen all of the pictures, I still didn’t know who she was.

  “I’ve started some wheels turning,” said Helen. “I’m trying to find out if any other of our customers have written checks that were deposited by the New Bedford, Woods Hole and Nantucket Salvage Company. I think I’m about to contact some people who investigate possible fraud.”

  “Good idea. Bring in the pros.”

  She had a concerned look on her face. “Your nose isn’t going to be out of joint, is it? I mean, you’re the one who got us going on this thing. Now, some other guys may go with it and maybe get the credit.”

  I almost laughed, but she looked so serious that I managed not to. “No,” I said. “My nose isn’t going to be out of joint. I’m not in the cop business any longer. What’s more, in a couple of weeks, I’m going to be a married man, and I plan on concentrating on that, not on Glen Gordon and his friends. Your investigators can have the job.”

  And I meant it, too. At least until I got home and heard what Quinn had to say.

  Dave was sleeping in the yard on the plastic lounger that I’d gotten for almost nothing in a yard sale. It’s amazing what some people will throw away or sell for peanuts. I have a lot of it around my place.