Away with the Fishes

by Stephanie Siciarz

  “Order! Order!” he cried out, slamming his gavel. The court went deathly quiet. “In light of the unexpected arrival of the alleged victim,” the judge began, “we must modify our scheduled proceedings and postpone the reading of the verdict. I will instead ask both the Prosecution and the Defense to question the material witness introduced by the Office of Customs and Excise, Miss Rena Baker of Glutton Hill.” He ordered Rena to take the witness stand, and turned to Monday Jones. “Mr. Jones, your witness,” he said.

  Monday might be going down, but not without a fight. If this silly girl was to be the only blotch on his perfect record, he planned to give her a public talking-to that she wouldn’t soon forget.

  “State your name and domicile for the record, please, Miss.”

  “Rena Baker, Glutton Hill,” she replied hesitantly.

  “Are you aware, Miss Baker, of the trouble you have caused?”

  Rena looked at Raoul, who smiled at her reassuringly. She opened her mouth to try and deliver a response, but before she could, Monday interrupted.

  “I’ll take your silence as a ‘no,’” he said. “Allow me to enlighten you. Miss Baker, you have behaved very selfishly. You have brought a tremendous financial burden to the government of Oh, which spared no expense in its efforts to locate you and, failing that, to prosecute the man who murdered you.”

  “Objection, Your Honor!” Glynray called out. “Miss Baker has clearly not been murdered, nor did the authorities of Oh devote a dime to finding her. The Prosecution has labored under the assumption of her demise from the moment the case was officially opened.”

  “Sustained,” the judge reluctantly grumbled. “The court recognizes that Ms. Baker is very much alive.”

  “Very well,” Monday resumed. “Perhaps then you would like to enlighten me, Miss Baker. Please inform the court of the circumstances surrounding your disappearance.”

  “I didn’t disappear,” she said. “Not exactly. I flew out on a flight to Killig is all.”

  “And from there?”

  “From there, nothing. That’s where I’ve been all the time.”

  “What have you been doing there?” Monday asked her.

  “Walking around. Exploring the island. Floating in the sea.”

  “You expect this court to believe that you ran away from one island, where a fisherman had pledged his love to you, to ‘walk around’ another island all alone?”

  “I got itchy feet,” she explained. “It’s not as though all islands are alike, you know.”

  “What about Mr. Fuller?” Monday asked. “Don’t you love him?”

  “Yes. I do. That’s why I’m here. I happened to see a copy of Oh’s Morning Crier, and when I read that Madison was in trouble, I came right back.”

  The Morning Crier?! Bruce was tickled. He had gone international without even knowing!

  “If you love him as you claim, then why did you leave him in the first place?” Monday snapped. “You would value a pair of itchy feet over a fisherman’s loyal heart?”

  “I just wasn’t happy here. On Oh. I know it’s my home, but it’s never felt like home.” She paused before continuing, as if unsure whether she should speak her heart. “Mr. Jones,” she finally said, “have you ever heard of island magic?”

  The spectators stirred and conferred in hushed tones. Had Oh had something to do with Rena’s running away?

  “What nonsense is this?” Monday Jones rebutted. “Your Honor, I ask that you instruct the witness to stick to the facts of the case.”

  Before the judge could rule, Glynray was on his feet. “Objection, Your Honor! Magic on Oh is not nonsense!”

  “Sustained,” Judge Samuels grumbled again. “The witness may proceed with this line of questioning.”

  “Thank you, Your Honor,” Rena replied. She turned back to Monday and picked up where she had left off. “I’ll take that as a ‘no,’” she mocked him. “Allow me to enlighten you.” The crowd sniggered, and Raoul nearly fainted. What was she saying? How had her testimony got mixed up with island magic?

  “Oh is a very special place, Mr. Jones. A little too special for me, I’m afraid.”

  Monday looked at her like she was mad, but Rena kept talking.

  “The sun plays tricks on everyone here. The moon, too. The leaves laugh at you, the birds butt into your affairs. Everyone’s used to it. But with me, it’s different. The island doesn’t want me here, and Madison’s love wasn’t enough to make up for Oh’s torments.” She looked at Madison, begging his forgiveness with her eyes.

  “Why on earth would Oh not want you on Oh?” a skeptical Monday Jones inquired.

  Rena bowed her head and spoke so softly, she almost couldn’t be heard. “I think it has something to do with my father.”

  “Your father? It was my understanding you were raised in an island orphanage.”

  “Yes, that’s true. I was raised in an orphanage—where I never wanted for anything—but I discovered, recently, that my father was Dagmore Bowles.” The crowd gasped in amazement and commented loudly. Branson Bowles’s jaw dropped open and he turned to Trevor, whose jaw had dropped open in turn. Monday Jones thought perhaps the whole island was mad, and he didn’t know what else to say.

  “Order! Order in the court!” the judge shouted, banging his gavel.

  “Your Honor,” Glynray interjected. “In light of the fact that Mr. Jones is not familiar with the history of our citizenry, the Defense requests permission to take up the questioning.”

  “Permission granted,” the judge ruled.

  “Thank you, Your Honor.” Glynray approached the witness stand as a puzzled Monday took his seat. “Miss Baker, you were saying? The island was tormenting you because you were Dagmore Bowles’s daughter?”

  “I think that might be the reason. It’s legend on Oh that Captain Dagmore…my father…had lots of problems here. They say he never quite fit in, that the island drove him mad. That’s why he jumped to his death from the rocky perch where he built his house.”

  “And you believe the island feels for you the same animosity it felt for Dagmore Bowles,” Glynray deduced.

  “Exactly.”

  “May I ask, Miss Baker, what the basis is for your conviction that Dagmore Bowles is—was—your biological father?”

  “I received a letter a few months ago. Unsigned. Whoever wrote it said that he (or she, I don’t know) had information proving I was Dagmore’s daughter. He (or she) said that I must come forward and take back my birthright, the Captain’s house on the hill.”

  Branson and Trevor looked at each other again, horrified by what they were hearing.

  “Take it back?” Glynray asked. He had spent enough time in the bakery to know that Branson was Dagmore’s son. “To my knowledge, the house is inhabited by Dagmore Bowles’s only known offspring, Branson Bowles.”

  Rena covered her face with her hands. When she had collected herself, she let them fall and said, “The letter said something about that, too. The sender also had information proving Branson was not Dagmore Bowles’s son.”

  The crowd was out of control. Branson was on his feet, as was Trevor, protesting loudly. “How dare she make up such lies?” Branson cried out.

  “Wait! Wait!” Rena shouted over the din, waving her hands wildly. “I don’t want anything! I can’t stay here! I won’t!”

  The judge required the assistance of Raoul and his megaphone to get the court to quiet down. Branson and Trevor had all but jumped onto the dais to consult with Glynray about Branson’s rights. Could he sue this imposter? Branson had the will! He could prove the Captain’s house had been bequeathed to him. And what about his mother, Verissa, long dead? What had she done to deserve such slandering? When Branson finally calmed down and returned to his seat, he began to wonder if the island might not have a bit of animosity for him, too! With Madison exonerated, Branson could have finally declared his love to May, and now this pretender had come along to steal their house of wedded bliss from underneath them?!

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sp; “Miss Baker,” the judge addressed her. “You are making some serious accusations, without any proof whatsoever. May I remind you that you are under oath.”

  “Your Honor, I don’t want the house. I don’t want to live on Oh. The Captain’s son, Branson, he can keep it. Up until the time the Captain died, he raised Branson. I never even knew the man. If anyone has claim to the Captain’s property, it’s Branson, not me.”

  “Objection, Your Honor!” Monday jumped up and shouted. “Then why trouble us with all this needless information?”

  “Miss Baker?” the judge said, inviting her to respond.

  “Because once the letter came, that’s when the island really turned on me. I knew all my life it didn’t want me here, but it was as if putting in writing my relationship to Dagmore, suggesting I might lay claim to his home, had somehow aggravated the island in a way my existence never had before. I couldn’t tell Madison or anyone about it. They would have thought I was crazy, or insisted that I stay, and, too, I didn’t want to cause any problems for Dagmore’s son…for Branson.”

  “How could you be so certain that the letter-writer was telling the truth?” Glynray questioned. “It’s careless to put stock in anonymous communication.”

  “Yes, that may be,” she said. “But inside the letter there was a picture of Dagmore Bowles from when he was about the age I am now. I look exactly like him. There’s no denying I’m his daughter.”

  “Do you have any idea who sent you these letters, or what kind of proof the sender is in possession of?”

  “No. The letter said when I was ready to pursue my claim to Dagmore’s estate, I should put an ad in the paper.”

  “What kind of ad?” Glynray asked.

  “Any kind. For a gardener or a housekeeper. As long as it said ‘Call Rena Baker,’ the sender of the letter would know to contact me. But I wasn’t interested in staying on Oh, and especially not in the Captain’s villa, so I never placed the ad. It was enough for me to know, after all these years, who my father was, and to understand why I’ve been so miserable here my whole life.”

  “Did the letter, by chance, say who your mother was, or if the sender was in possession of this information as well?”

  “No.”

  Glynray could think of nothing else to ask Rena. It seemed to him that whatever else was left to say, was better said in private. Between Rena and Madison, between Rena and Branson, between Rena and an anonymous writer of letters.

  “No further questions, Your Honor,” Glynray stated.

  He returned to his seat, and all eyes went to Judge Samuels. The outdoor court was completely silent, except for the hiss of the island wind and the chirp of some birds, who had taken advantage of a pause in the rain to make their voices heard.

  Judge Samuels cleared his throat and adjusted his microphone. He complimented the efforts of both Glynray Justice and Monday Jones, thanked the jurors for their time, and thanked Raoul Orlean of Customs and Excise for his material witness. May thought she would burst before the judge at last declared: “The case is dismissed without prejudice.”

  Madison Fuller was a free man.

  51

  “Raoul!” Bruce called jovially, making his way through the animated and still-lingering crowd. “You did it, man!” He clapped Raoul on the back.

  “I didn’t do anything,” Raoul said. “She showed up this morning on the early flight and they called me. It was you and your paper that did it.”

  “Maybe,” he conceded, “but you knew from the start she wasn’t really dead. And the way you delivered her to court? ‘Might I first present Exhibit R,’” he mimicked Raoul good-naturedly.

  Raoul shrugged. Bruce offered to buy him a drink at the Belly to celebrate, but Raoul declined. He had to attend to the dismantling of the makeshift court, and he wanted to meet up with Ms. Lila. Besides which, Raoul was too distracted to drink. Though Rena’s return had saved the day, for Raoul it was far from satisfactory. He still didn’t know who had painted on his walls, or why, and the fact that he had made the connection between Rena, Dagmore, and Abigail had nothing whatsoever to do with Madison. Not exactly. The truth had come out, and that was a good thing, he supposed, but he couldn’t shake the feeling that there was still a piece of the puzzle he wasn’t seeing.

  For one thing, he never got to hear the details of Dagmore’s death from Mrs. Jaymes. Someday he might go and ask her, but if magic was the cause—and Rena had suggested it was—then Raoul was no longer all that interested. A once-questing captain who lets an island bewitch him and kills himself, is a far cry from mathematician-musician Stan Kalpi, piano or no! Raoul had been a fool to think otherwise.

  “Stan Kalpi would never have fallen for Abigail Davies!” Raoul said, louder than he meant to.

  “What are you carrying on about?” Ms. Lila asked. She had elbowed her way through the crowd and gave him a peck on the cheek. “Congratulations,” she said. “I bet you make the front page.”

  “Ha!” Raoul said, with a little chuckle. It would be satisfying indeed to read in the newspaper that he had one-upped the Chief of Police. A smile managed to creep across his face. Ms. Lila wore a smile as well, for now nothing would keep her husband from his paints. She would see to that herself.

  As the trial crowd thinned, and the rain returned with renewed vigor, there were indeed quite a number of smiles to note.

  Monday Jones and Glynray Justice had rushed to intervene in Branson’s family dispute and, for separate fees, had happily agreed to sort out the Bowleses’ affairs. Rena would gladly sign over her claim to the Captain’s villa, for which Branson agreed to send monthly rent checks to Killig, thus financing her itchy feet. Though Branson would never doubt Dagmore was his father, Rena’s eyes told him Dagmore was her father, too, and fair was fair (so the Captain had taught him). All that truly mattered to Branson was May, and she had agreed to marry him and live in his house on the hill.

  Even Trevor smiled when he heard they were engaged, delighted that his dearest friend, after mere decades, had finally landed the one fish he wanted. The rest of the Rouges, Randolph and Patience, were simply content that their biggest concern now was the baking of buns and bread.

  Eavesdropping, unassuming, on Trevor et al (and on Rena and Branson especially) was none other than Abigail Davies, who, like the rest of the island, had turned up to find out the verdict. She smiled, too, for it was right that young women got a share of their dead fathers’ money. Mothers sometimes couldn’t make ends meet.

  Only two people weren’t smiling the day the Bicycle Trial ended.

  One was Police Chief Lucas Davenport, who still had a Bicycle Mystery to solve. (Patience is all it would take, though of this he had no clue.)

  The other was Madison Fuller. Madison had discovered that his loyal, lonely heart wasn’t worth a bit of salve and a pair of shoes.

  Such was the magic of Oh: a fisherman cleared of murder the saddest man in Port-St. Luke.

  52

  You see? Oh got me again. I died—or rather the Dagmore I once was died—without knowing that Rena was my daughter. Without knowing that Rena was. Is that why the island did me in? Was Oh jealous that after all those years with an indifferent Verissa, I finally had a fling with true love? Did it blow me off my rocky perch to keep me away from my little girl?

  Because that’s what it did, you know. It swept me up, and hurled me straight into the sea! I remember light (that island sun!), and lift, and the sound of the wind. And then Captain Dagmore was gone.

  I certainly never jumped! Not with Branson in my life. I needed—and still need—Branson’s company, like I needed the air in my lungs or the breakfast in my belly. It kept me alive! (While Oh would let it.) Even in death, I’ve only ever left Branson’s side when he was in England. Oh doesn’t like that I should stray for too long.

  Rena, now she’s another story. She got away. Oh dragged her back to save Madison, it’s true, but she’s going off again, with an inheritance in tow. Leave it to Abigail to have sor
ted that out. She was always a practical thinker. Those jobs of hers, plumbing and painting and bookkeeping, they taught her about money, about settling accounts. The midwifing and the so-many pregnancies that so scandalized my Mrs. Jaymes, they taught Abigail the lengths to which mothers must go for the sake of their own. Don’t doubt it for a minute: were Branson unwilling to pay Rena rent, Abigail Davies would FIND A WAY to make things right.

  As for Raoul, if he had lined up his variables more carefully, he would not have judged Captain Dagmore so harshly. A ‘far cry from mathematician-musician Stan Kalpi,’ my itchy foot! Did Stan Kalpi have a son he adored? A son who would marry his true and dainty-handed love, under a jacaranda tree on a rocky perch overlooking the sea? (Hammer planted the jacaranda to mark the spot where I fell to my death.)

  Did Stan Kalpi have a daughter? A daughter who had challenged an island and won? A girl so strong-willed she had broken the spell of two lifetimes? And love! What about love? Did Stan Kalpi ever get a taste of that? Because Dagmore did, however briefly. (Time softens the hardest of coco shells, I assure you.)

  Dagmore Bowles was no ‘once-questing Captain’ who killed himself, no poor man’s Mr. Stan. He was merely the victim of island love. Fatal island love that the likes of a Raoul Orlean will never have to know. Ignoring what Dagmore-gnats still niggle, Raoul will simply carry on as he’s always done.

  He will wait for the rain to stop, will pack up his speakers and his borrowed tarpaulins, and will ship them home to Killig. He’ll collect his tins of paint from Higgins Hardware, Home, and Garden, and he’ll get two coats on his cottage, all the way round. He will even manage to finish the sills and shutters, I should think, before the rainy season rolls in for good.