by Bill Noel
“Until I croak,” said Melinda with a mischievous smile.
Brian started to speak, shut his mouth, and glanced at Charles, who found the napkin beside his plate quite fascinating. Brian then started to push up from the table. “Well, then I hope you’re here for many years.” He grinned at Melinda and then turned to Charles. “Gotta go,” he said. “Nice meeting you, Ms. Beale.”
Melinda grinned again. “And you as well.”
Brian stood beside the table. I didn’t recall ever seeing him as uncomfortable. It was if he wanted to either interrogate the sweet lady who had made a fatalistic comment or run.
He didn’t have to choose. Officer Cindy LaMond pushed her way through a group of college students who had gathered near the entrance. She looked around, spotted her boss standing at our table, and headed our way.
Cindy LaMond had been Cindy Ash until a couple of years ago, when Larry, the owner of Folly’s only hardware store and a retired cat burglar, swept her off her feet and proposed holy matrimony. She was also a friend and had helped me out of potentially disastrous jams more than once.
She moved beside Brian and looked around to see who could hear. The closest table was occupied by a couple with three kids under the age of two. The parents had their hands full and paid no attention to us. The chief leaned in Cindy’s direction, but Charles had already stood and moved between the two of them to introduce Melinda to Cindy. The new arrival smiled in the direction of Melinda and said she was glad to meet her. I hoped she wouldn’t ask how long Melinda would be staying. She didn’t; Cindy clearly wasn’t at the table on a social call. She moved closer to Brian and began to whisper.
Charles, surprisingly, took the hint and returned to his seat. Cindy said something. The chief asked her a question, and she responded. I couldn’t hear everything but caught, “body … coast guard station … freaked-out beach bum …”
Brian turned to Melinda, reiterated that it was nice to meet her, and said that he had to go. He put his arm on Cindy’s shoulder and turned her toward the door, and they both headed for the exit. When they got to the door, Cindy turned and wiggled her hand by her ear to signal that she would call me. The chief was already on the sidewalk headed toward the police station.
Melinda asked Charles to order her another Mexican cocktail. Then she leaned across the table and whispered, “Did that mean they found another body?”
Before I answered, she added, “Where’s a coast guard station around here? I don’t remember seeing any cute boys in those adorable uniforms, especially those tight, white dress uniform jackets.”
Melinda may have things wrong with her, but her hearing and eyesight were better than mine.
The question involved trivia, so Charles jumped in and explained that there was no longer a coast guard outpost on Folly but that there had been a thriving station on the east end of the island. My mind wandered to what Cindy had said, and I wasn’t paying attention to Charles’s explanation of which years the coast guard station was operational, how many men had been stationed there, and why it was shut down.
My ears perked up when he began telling her that the far end of the property was where I had found the body of the Charleston developer whom he had told her about. Charles loved telling the story, particularly since he took full credit for saving my life, catching the killer, and curing the common cold. Time had clouded reality. I occasionally think about the incident and shutter at the thought of how close I had come to being killed simply because I had taken an early-morning walk on the beach to photograph the historic Morris Island Lighthouse.
Now, if I accurately caught the gist of Cindy’s muted words, the deserted military station had been the site of another death. My mind then skipped from my ancient history at the desolate property to the possibility that the new victim might be Samuel’s abducted woman.
Charles tapped me on the arm with his cane. “Again, isn’t that right?” he asked.
I didn’t know what he’d said, but I figured if he asked me if something was right, it must be so. I said, “Yep.”
He smiled and turned to Melinda. “I told you so.”
I refocused on the conversation and was able to enjoy more of the back and forth between Charles and his long-lost relative. Only five times in the next half hour did I wonder when Cindy would call.
CHAPTER 18
WHAT TOOK YOU SO LONG TO CALL?” SAID LARRY.
I hated caller ID. “Huh?” I said.
“Cindy got home a half hour ago and told me she saw you, Charles, and his aunt, Mable.” I heard Cindy say something in the background. “Sorry, Melinda. She told you she’d call about the body,” said Larry. “I knew you wouldn’t be able to wait until we finished a wonderful pizza my loving wife brought home and enjoyed a refreshing beer. You’re as impatient as Charles.” He laughed, and I heard the phone clink down on a table.
“You had to prove him right, didn’t you?” said Cindy. She sounded exasperated, but a giggle gave away her mood. That must have been quite a pizza.
“Sorry to interrupt supper,” I said. “Want to call me later?”
“We’re actually done. Larry enjoys giving you a hard time.”
“So what happened?” I said.
“Don’t know a lot,” she said. She mumbled something to Larry, and I heard her say, “Hush” and then giggle again. There was a pause, and then she said, “There, I’m in the living room while my macho hubby wipes off two plates and throws the pizza box in the trash—he’s so talented. Where was I?”
“You made it to don’t know a lot,” I said.
She cleared her throat. “About eleven hundred this morning, Stanley Learner, one of our homeless beachcombers, was out on the east end of the old coast guard property waving his metal detector around like he actually expected to find buried treasure. He was by the dunes line. Instead of a treasure chest full of gold, frankincense, and myrrh—whatever the hell that is—old Stanley used his army surplus folding shovel and dug down about a foot and found himself a left hand with bright red fingernail polish. Unfortunately for Stanley, it was still attached to an arm and the rest of a body. Old Stanley let out a scream that probably could have been heard in downtown Charleston. It was heard by a vacationing firefighter from Mississippi who had the misfortune of being near Stanley. The vacationer took one look at the exposed arm and knew CPR would have been a waste. He threw up and then called the cops.”
“Did she wash up on shore?” I asked.
“No way,” said Cindy. “It was past the high tide line, and most of her body was buried under a foot of sand. She was fully clothed. Her shirt had metal buttons; that’s what got Stanley’s metal detector all excited. She wasn’t supposed to be found.”
“How long had she been there?” I asked.
“Won’t know for a few days,” said Cindy. “The coroner said that it hadn’t been too long. Said it was probably not over a couple of weeks.”
That would fit with when Samuel’s story. “Anything else? Race? Hair color?”
“Just a minute, Larry,” she said. “Maybe he can’t handle the two plates after all. Where was I?”
“Details,” I said.
“Caucasian, dark hair, no tats, good figure I guess, trim … that’s about it.”
“Age?”
“I’d guess under thirty—maybe twenty-five or so.”
“Cause of death?”
“There was blood in her hair, but they couldn’t tell. I’ll call if I learn anything.”
I poured a glass of Chardonnay and moved to the living room. My first thought was that Cindy and Larry’s pizza sounded good, but I was too lazy to go get one and felt guilty about ordering a delivery for one person. Oreos, raisins, and wine surely cover all the food groups and were within a few feet of my chair. With supper plans taken care of, my second thought was to call Samuel and tell him about the body. But school had start
ed, so I didn’t want to disturb him. Besides, I didn’t know anything more than I had earlier other than the latest body fit the general description he had given.
I flicked on the television and flipped through five channels. Each had a game show on—low on my watch list—so I turned it off. I refilled my glass, grabbed the box of Oreos and a small box of raisins, and returned to the chair. I was sitting in my paid-for cottage two blocks from the Atlantic Ocean, was blessed with a handful of close friends, was retired, and was putting my feet on the ottoman ready to kick back and enjoy the rest of my days on this earth. So why did my mind keep drifting back to dead bodies, the last conversation I had with my ex-wife before her tragic death, and Samuel’s real, or imagined, sighting? I couldn’t turn the clock back to what might have been with Joan, but what could I do to help Samuel get answers that were making his young life miserable?
It’s not an everyday occurrence that a body drifts up on the beach, but it does happen, especially during the summer when more people migrate to the beaches than can comfortably be watched. Finding the corpse of the late Ms. Nicole Sallee on the beach was not that terribly strange. It was horrible, but it wasn’t strange.
The discovery of two bodies in such a short period—the latest clearly not an accidental death—pushed the limits of coincidence. They were relatively young, both had dark hair, and both were trim. Does that connect the two? On the other hand, they were found on opposite ends of the island, one was African American, and one had most likely been murdered while the other one could have drowned accidentally.
I didn’t know more than what Samuel had said, but I knew that he was convinced that what he had seen was serious. I had learned to put faith and trust in my friends. They could be quirky, odd, a bit idiosyncratic, and in Dude’s case, possibly not from planet earth. I barely knew Samuel, but he trusted me. He had turned to me in his time of fear and confusion, wanting to do the right thing.
One thing was certain after a third glass of Chardonnay, a half box of Oreos, and the second box of raisins—Samuel considered me someone he could turn to. I couldn’t let him down.
CHAPTER 19
A COLD WAVE SWEPT THROUGH THE LOW COUNTRY overnight and brought the temperatures down to the mideighties, the seasonal average. Where the weather gurus came up with the phrase “cold front” was beyond me. It wouldn’t bake cookies on the sidewalk, but I didn’t know anyone who considered eighty-five degrees cold. Regardless, it felt better, and I took advantage of it. The island was bordered on one side by the Folly River and the ever-changing marsh and on the other side by the Atlantic. There had been some mansion-creep over the last decade, but much of the peaceful island was still covered by vegetation. A small combined food mart, gas station, and Subway was the only retail chain presence.
I spent much of the day walking around some of the lesser-travelled streets photographing the details that give Folly Beach an abundant amount of its charm. Yard art ranging from the traditional bottle tree to creative ways of hanging computer monitors in large oaks kept my camera busy and my mind off the two bodies. Charles usually accompanied me on these photo safaris, but he was spending the morning with Melinda. They needed time together, so I didn’t tell him what I was doing.
I found myself in front of the Oceanfront Villas and smiled as I thought of Samuel hanging around hoping to see the girl of his dreams. I walked a block farther on Arctic Avenue to where it took a ninety-degree turn away from the beach. I stood in the curve of the lightly travelled road and gazed at the public beach access walkway where Samuel said he had seen the abduction. There were only two lights on the small restroom building, but they were enough to provide some illumination. I was surprised to see a row of vegetation between me and the walk from the beach, and the building blocked most of the parking area. I needed to return at the time of day that Samuel was here to see what it looked like. I tried to think of anything else I could learn by standing here. Little came to mind. The phone rang, and Karen distracted me from my futile efforts.
She was off duty, a rare occurrence in the summer. She once told me that scientists had determined that violent crimes occurred more frequently in the summer. It was partially because people were out more but was also related to the temperature, which peaked during the hot months. Around seven in the evening was the most crime-ridden hour because that was when the human body was at its highest temperature. Charles would have savored that nugget of trivia.
She asked if I had plans for the evening. I said no, and she said that she meant all evening. I asked if that meant tomorrow morning as well. She said that I was catching on. If I’d had plans to dine with the pope, I would have cancelled them. I didn’t have to make that call, though, and readily agreed that I was ready, willing, and able. She giggled and said she would be over for supper.
Karen’s unmarked, black Crown Vic pulled in my drive at six. I had been watching for her and walked out to meet her.
“So, where are we going to eat?” she said before even a hello. “I’m starved.”
She wore light blue shorts and a blue-and-white striped polo shirt and carried a small red and white travel bag.
I took the bag from her hand and kissed her cheek. “Enough mush,” she said. “Supper, food, where?”
I admired her athletic build but resented her ability to eat like a hungry sumo wrestler without gaining an ounce. I suggested Loggerhead’s Beach Grill. She said that if they were quick with the food, she was all for it. I had chosen Loggerheads because the food was good and service quick but also because it was directly across the street from the Oceanfront Villas and a block from where Samuel had seen the alleged abduction.
We walked hand in hand five blocks to the popular restaurant. Several locals were already taking advantage of the “cold front” and sipping beer on the elevated deck that overlooked the Villas, and if a patron cocked his head just right, the Atlantic. We agreed that it was cooler than recent days but still hot, so we chose a booth inside. It was a wise choice; all the outdoor seating on the large wooden deck was full, and there were three couples waiting for tables.
Fortunately for Karen, and especially me, service was quick, and Karen was already eating conch fritters by the time the couples waiting on the patio had been seated. A half-empty bottle of Budweiser sat in front of her, and a glass of Chardonnay was in my right hand. Karen playfully slapped my left hand as I reached for one of the fritters. “Get your own food,” she said.
I gave a macho whimper, and she grinned and generously shared one fritter. Her stomach was beginning to feel hope and she changed her focus from food to a less appetizing subject. “Saw the prelim from the coroner this afternoon.” She plopped another fritter in her mouth.
“Oh,” I said. I wanted to grab another fritter, but better judgment and the knowledge that our entrees would soon appear stopped me.
“Cause of death was blunt force trauma to the back of the head.”
“That’s no surprise,” I said. “Cindy said there was blood in her hair.”
“There was no evidence of a sexual assault,” continued Karen. “And from what you told me about your young friend’s sighting, it could be the same person. Time of death was two to three days after he saw the abduction. Interestingly, her clothes appeared new; a price tag was still on her blouse.”
“Think the abductor had her change out of the bikini?” I asked.
“Yeah, or changed them himself after her death.”
Her plate was empty, and she looked around for the waitress.
A scene was averted when Karen’s scallops and my fried flounder arrived before she could remind the waitress that she was starved and armed.
“Any idea who she was?”
“Afraid not. No ID on the body, and no one with that description has been reported missing. They were able to get good dental imprints, but unless there’s something to compare them to, they’re worthless.”
; “Did the price tag say where the blouse came from?”
“Good question,” said Karen. “But no, it was generic, with only the price on it.”
“Then all you can do is wait until someone turns up missing?”
“That’s about it,” she said. “And speaking of missing, they confirmed that the body of the floater was Nicole Sallee.”
“Did she drown?”
Karen took a bite of coleslaw and slowly nodded. “Yes. There was water in her lungs, but there was also a gash on the back of her head. That may or not mean anything. It could have happened after she was in the water.”
“But it could be the same as the second girl?”
“Probably.”
“So they were murdered the same way?”
“Not necessarily,” said Karen. “Ms. Sallee’s death still could have been accidental. She could have fallen on a boat, hit her head, and then slipped into the water.”
“How likely is that?” I asked.
“Not very,” said Karen. “If it were accidental, there probably would have been someone else around to see what happened or at least know that she was missing and report it.”
“Sounds like two murders—two similar murders,” I said as she finished her beer. “Who’s working the cases?”
When I had first met Karen, she was the lead detective on suspicious deaths that occurred on Folly Beach. She had the respect of local law enforcement, and even though not many people had known that her dad was the chief, she would use his contacts when local knowledge was needed. When Chief Newman had a near-fatal heart attack three years ago, an acting chief was named, politics reared its ugly head, and battle lines were drawn between the Charleston County sheriff’s office and Folly Beach, both in the local government and the local police force. After that, Karen was brusquely told that it would be better if she didn’t work any of the beach murders. She wasn’t told why and was a good enough officer not to ask. That didn’t mean she liked it.
