Little Ghost Lost (Destiny Bay Cozy Mysteries Book 5)

by J. D. Winters

  She stared at me, then rolled her eyes. “Now you’re making things up,” she said.

  I admitted it. “Sure. But I’m just trying to give chaos a sense of order.”

  “I’ll take the chaos.” She stared at the notations Tom had written in straight, neat columns with dates and times attached. “What are we looking for here?”

  “I don’t know. But probably what was going on the night Jerry was killed.”

  “Okay.” She turned to the right date. “Here we go. 12:03 am. Jerry arrived, parked and went inside.”

  “Wait a minute,” I said. “Go back a page. Let’s look at who showed up before midnight.”

  “Okay. Oh look! It’s you.”

  It was me alright, but long before midnight. The notation was for arrival at 3:30 pm. Then he saw me walk over to the Moore house with Celinda at 4:20. I came out again at 4:45, got in my car and drove off. He didn’t mention how he’d been chasing me at the time. And luckily he didn’t see Mandy in the back seat.

  I looked further down the page. Richard left at 5:00. Astrid came up to the main house, said something to Celinda, then went back to the cottage again. Celinda drove off for Cambria. And then, nothing for a long time. About 9 pm, Astrid came out and drove away. At eleven, Richard was back.

  Richard was back? Whatever for? Jerry was still on the road from Santa Barbara, Celinda was in Cambria and Astrid had gone off, probably to meet with her surfer boyfriend. What was Richard doing there?

  The next notation had some clues. Tom had written “packed car and left”. Was that what had happened to the silver bowl and other pieces that were missing?

  But if he left at 11:25, he left before Jerry arrived.

  I scanned down the page. There were no other arrivals. Just Jerry, and then Celinda at 3:10. So did Celinda kill Jerry after all? And was that why she stole the notebook from Tom’s house—after she killed him, too?

  “I just don’t believe it,” Bebe said after I showed her the notations and told her my latest theory. “Celinda isn’t a particularly nice person, but she isn’t a murderer.”

  “You never know what a person is capable of until they are under stress,” I told her.

  “How do you know that?” she challenged.

  “It’s part of the detective creed,” I made up on the spot.

  “Hah!”

  “You can scoff all you like, you’ve got to admit it’s got some truth to it.”

  Later when I told Jill, she was just as skeptical.

  “Here’s a thought,” she offered. “Maybe Richard parked down the road, knowing Tom would be watching, then snuck back, waiting for Jerry to show up, then killed him. How about that?”

  I shook my head. “I don’t think so. Old eagle-eye Tom would have seen him.”

  “The man can’t be awake all the time. He had to sleep.”

  I leafed back into the previous pages, scanning the entries. There were a lot of them, too many to understand in the limited time I had. But one thing caught my eye. Tom was watching the Pennington House along with everything else, and he saw something I didn’t expect. A light on inside the house at odd times. In fact, from the notations, he said he called the police twice. They came, but they didn’t find any sign of life. His mark for those times was a red x, nothing more.

  That was odd. Ghosts didn’t usually turn on lights. But then, I had seen some indications of someone using the house, hadn’t I? I scanned a few more pages, trying to see what Tom had made of it all.

  And then I found it—just a little note squeezed into a corner of a page. “Is x amp? Or Alexander back again to taunt me?”

  Amp? Alexander must be Mr. Pennington who had died a couple of years ago. But who—or what—was amp? Maybe I would find out more once I had the old papers.

  Jill had come over early and I was glad about it. I wanted to run into work to look for that folder about the Pennington House but I didn’t want to leave Bebe alone with Mandy and whatever else might show up. So Jill very graciously gave up another morning run with Ginny Genera and stayed at our house instead. I’d told her about Mandy by now, and she was full of compassion for Bebe.

  “Maybe she should marry Captain Stone and have a baby of her own,” she whispered at an opportune moment.

  “Bite your tongue,” I countered, making a face at her. “Think only good thoughts and your effort will be rewarded.”

  “More of the detective’s creed?” Bebe said with just a touch of sarcasm as she brought us out mugs of hot, steaming coffee.

  “No. Just common sense.”

  I left them both chatting and headed for the station, hoping to catch Roy and give the notebook to him. I didn’t want to have to explain how I got it, but I supposed that was going to be inevitable.

  Roy was on the phone as I walked in, but I waved the notebook at him, made sure he saw it and that it was important, and left it on his desk as I prepared to dash back out again.

  No such luck. Roy dropped his call without a word and jumped up to stop me. “Where did you get this?” he asked sharply. It looked like he’d quickly realized what it was.

  “Celinda,” I’d told him. “She stayed with us for a few hours last night, but vamoosed at about three. That’s getting to be a pattern with her, isn’t it?”

  I grinned at him and he shook his head, leafing through the notebook quickly before he looked back at me.

  “How did you get it? Did she give it up voluntarily?”

  “Uh, no.” I shrugged. “I took it. I figured since she must have stolen it from Tom, I would retake it in his name.” I added a question of my own, just to keep us on even footing. “So who killed Tom Hatchett? Any suspects?”

  “We’re working on it.”

  “I notice you didn’t hold Celinda.”

  “Maybe we should have. Do you know where she is now?”

  I shook my head. “I’ve got no clue. I think someone must have come by and picked her up. She took her carryall with her, but not her car, and she left clothes in the closet.”

  Now he was frowning. “We’ve got to talk,” he said, reaching out to put a hand on my shoulder. “You are playing fast and loose with danger and I don’t want to see you get hurt.”

  I pulled away from him. “I’ve got to get into work. She left her car in our barn, if you want to go take a look at it. I have no idea who came and picked her up. I was fast asleep.”

  He cocked an eyebrow at me. “With a possible murderer in your house?”

  “Yeah, well….” I shrugged again. “See you later.”

  When I left the room, he was still shaking his head.

  My office was in the town hall. I had a short write-up about the house to put on Vance’s desk, which turned out to be perfect timing. His desk was empty. I assumed he’d gone for his usual morning latte and I would have time to search for the file.

  And search I did—high and low. I didn’t find anything at all to do with the file or the Pennington House. But I did find one thing interesting—a nameplate. He had a regular plastic one that was like everyone else’s in the building. It said Vance Macon and that was it. The one I found was brass and looked like something someone had given him when he’d first got the job. But as far as I knew, he’d never used it. I’d certainly never seen it before. And the interesting thing was, it said, “Vance Keen Macon, Jr.”

  Jr. Junior. What had Tom said about Junior? “I don’t want to get Junior after me.” Wasn’t that it? That, or something close to it. Was it Vance he’d been talking about?

  The thing was, Tom was gone and I would probably never get that answer. That was frustrating. Could it be that “Junior” had been the one who killed him? But there were a lot of juniors in the world. Vance wasn’t the only one. So it probably meant absolutely nothing.

  I went back to my own desk, and there, right in front of my computer, was the Pennington House file. I gasped and looked up. There in the doorway was Aunty Jane.

  “Aunty,” I said in a low, hoarse whisper, completely t
hrilled. “Did you do this?”

  “Don’t ask.” She tapped her forehead with one finger. “See, it’s up here. I hear things. I see things. Just be happy. I wanted to do something for you. And Bebe.”

  She looked at me for just a few seconds, not smiling, but then, I wasn’t sure I’d ever seen her actually smile. And then she was gone. My heart melted. I got so impatient with her sometimes and when she disappeared, like she’d done for the last day or so, it was annoying. But she knew it and she was making up for it. Suddenly I had tears in my eyes.

  “Crying so early in the morning?” Vance said, swaggering by with his latte in a paper cup in his hand. “I haven’t even had time to find you an obnoxious assignment yet.”

  “Oh, I’m sure you’ll come up with something soon enough,” I said breezily, grabbing the Pennington file and heading for the door. “Send me a text message if you must.” I smiled and left and didn’t look back.

  Once back in my car, I got a call from Celinda. I stared at the screen on my cell for three rings before I finally decided to answer it.

  “Where are you?” I said without any pleasantries to start us off.

  “Never mind that. I want my notebook.”

  I didn’t waste time pretending I didn’t have it. What was the point? “As far as I could tell, it isn’t yours.”

  She was working hard at controlling her anger and her voice. “Mele, please. I need that notebook.”

  “You stole it from Tom, didn’t you? Before or after he died?”

  “Mele, you don’t understand how important this is. I have to have it.”

  “Sorry Celinda. The police have it now. You’ll have to talk to them.”

  She made a sound that wasn’t pleasant and hung up. I sighed. It wasn’t in my nature to be confrontational, but sometimes there was just no avoiding it.

  I sort of expected to see Roy’s car in front of Bebe’s when I got back home, but no such luck. Jill was gone too, but Bebe was doing fine.

  “You got the file!” she cried the moment she saw it.

  “I did. Brew us up some tea and we can go through it together.”

  “Gladly.” She started toward the kitchen, then turned back. “Oh, Roy was here with a couple of his officers. He said he’d talked to you. They went over Celinda’s car pretty thoroughly and then wanted to see where she slept last night. They were all done just before you got home.”

  “Good.” I told her about the call I got from our flaky guest and she looked worried.

  “She’s going to hold that against us, don’t you think? You don’t think she’ll do anything violent, do you?”

  I felt tired just thinking about it. “I doubt it. And who knows, maybe she’ll be in jail for a long, long time once they catch up with her.”

  Bebe frowned. “What about us? Will we get in trouble for having given her a place to hide for the night?”

  I hesitated. I really didn’t think so. After all, Captain Stone would have to sign off on anything like that, and I didn’t think he was going to risk putting Bebe in prison. But you never did know. Lover’s quarrels and all that.

  She went into the kitchen and came out with the tea and we started in on the information. The file was mostly a jumble of reports, old photos and clippings from newspapers of the past. We laid things out on the dining room table and tried to make sense of it all.

  The photographs of the house were faded but still preserved some of the elegance and beauty that had once been there. The photographs of people who had lived there looked like all old pictures did. The black and white photos from the twenties into the forties seemed like a window into another time, another place—another planet, even. Once color came in, everything changed and life seemed to explode with vibrant energy. Garish energy at times. Oh, the styles of the 70’s! Yikes.

  We looked through them all, turning them in hopes of finding notations as to who was who—sometimes with luck, sometimes not.

  “This is Mandy,” Bebe cried when she found a picture of an adorable little girl with a huge bow in her hair. “Am I right?”

  I nodded. “That’s her. Let’s see if we can find anything about her.”

  At first it was all too confusing, and since we didn’t really know anyone else from the Pennington family, it was hard to match the pictures with the information. Finally I found something—a yellowed clip from the paper.

  “Amanda Leigh Pennington, five year old daughter of Harold and Pamela Pennington, succumbed to Rheumatic fever on Saturday the eighteenth. Private services will be held in Harmon Hall at St. James Episcopal Church.”

  We both stared at the clipping, feeling the sadness like a heavy weight on the chest. What a shame. How tragic. Poor little Mandy—and her poor parents.

  Bebe rose, looking wretched, and went to look in on her. I stayed where I was and began to search for more. I wanted to find something about Alexander and his own ill-fated family. From the way I was piecing things together, it seemed he was born about eight years after Amanda died. Was she his sister? That wasn’t likely, because Pamela herself died about a year after Mandy. Alexander’s mother was listed as Penelope, though I didn’t see anything about a wedding. So Mandy was Alexander’s half sister? Maybe. His death notice was in the folder. He was almost 90 when he died.

  “And his wife?” Bebe wondered, back from cuddling a child she couldn’t fully see.

  I found that notice, too. “Penelope died in 1933, and she was only 38.”

  She shook her head. “You have to wonder about a man who had two young wives who both died early. Something not quite kosher there.”

  I picked up an official death certificate and said, “Hold the phone. Here’s another one. Make that three young wives.”

  The picture showed a very young, very pretty, worried looking woman standing beside Harold himself. The name Harriet was scrawled on the back of the photo. He looked rotund and pompous. Looking at her face, I felt a wave of sympathy for the poor thing. If that was a happy marriage, I would eat my hat. Except I didn’t have one. Which made it safe to threaten, didn’t it?

  “Okay, let me get this straight,” Bebe said. “Harold and Pamela got married in the 1920’s and had Mandy.” She put the photo of the couple with baby Mandy in her mother’s arms at the top of the family tree she’d decided to build. “Mandy died a few years later, and Pamela died a year after that. We don’t know how?”

  I shook my head. “Probably of a broken heart.”

  “Could be.” She sighed sadly. “Okay. Then Harold married Penelope and they had Alexander Matthew Pennington, the fellow who left the city his house. Right? Penelope died and Harold married Harriet. We think. Right?”

  “Right.”

  I studied the photo a few minutes longer and a chill went down my spine. There was definitely something odd and scary about this family. After all, the three wives weren’t the only ones who died untimely deaths. What about Mandy, and Harold’s two grandchildren?

  Harold, and then his son Alexander, were the two beings who survived it all and lived out long lives. I searched for Alexander’s marital history and found he was just as hard on his wives as his father had been. He married Grace in 1955, Susan in 1975, and Naomi in 1999. Even she went before he did. Wow.

  My cell phone buzzed and I looked at it. Roy was calling. I was ready for a break. I clicked in and said, “Hi. What have you got?”

  He laughed. “What do you think I am, your eager assistant? Hey, you’re not even on this case! Not officially, anyway.”

  “Then why did you call me with the news?”

  “How do you know I’ve got news?”

  “I know you. You always have news.”

  He chuckled. “You’re right. And don’t you forget it.”

  “Come on Detective. Don’t tease.”

  “I won’t if you won’t.”

  “Roy!”

  “Okay. Here’s the latest. We found Celinda and we’re bringing her in for more questioning.”

  “Good. Did y
ou look at that notebook?”

  “Oh yeah. It’s full of tasty morsels.”

  “Like?”

  “Police business. Sorry.”

  “Hey! No fair. You wouldn’t have that notebook if it wasn’t for me.”

  “True. But you’re wasting time. I’ve got more.”

  “I’m all ears.”

  The laugh was back in his voice again. “I’ll bet you look cute that way.”

  “Roy, I’m warning you!” I got up and began walking through the house, a nervous habit I’d acquired lately—pacing while talking on the phone. “Just tell me who picked her up and drove her off this morning.”

  “Can’t you guess?”

  “I wouldn’t ask if I already knew.”

  “Okay. She’s been hiding out with her boyfriend.”

  “Vance?” I asked, ready to go into “I told you so,” mode. At first glance, that seemed to fit. After all, he was a Jr. and Tom had been wary of someone called Junior the last time I talked to him. Could Vance be our killer? That would certainly get him out of my way.

  “No, not Vance,” Roy said, dashing my hopes. “Whoever said Vance was her boyfriend?”

  “Oh. Uh…well who was it?”

  “Richard.”

  “Ahhhh.”

  “There’s more. It seems Richard and Celinda’s husband Jerry were in a partnership, buying and selling silver antiques. Lately, Jerry was beginning to go to other traders behind Richard’s back, and Richard didn’t like that.”

  “Ah hah.” I’d pretty much seen that coming. “A falling out among thieves?”

  “Something like that.” He paused, then said, “Who said they were thieves?”

  I had absolutely no evidence, just a feeling. An instinct. So I laughed it off. “Never mind. So have you charged Richard with murder yet?”

  Another pause. “Why would I do that?”

  “Because he’s the obvious choice. Don’t you see? Here’s how it probably went down. He was angry at Jerry and came to confront him about the dealing behind his back. But first he made sure he got the huge beautiful Tiffany Silver pitcher they had in the library out of there and into his car. He confronted Jerry. Jerry got nasty. Richard picked up the heavy fireplace shovel and beat him in the head with it. Jerry fell. Richard left. But Tom had seen him there and he knew it. So he came back once the police were gone and killed Tom to keep him quiet. Only he didn’t know that Tom had kept a record of his visit. Celinda knew, so she went through Tom’s house until she found it. She took it so you guys at the station would never see it. She went to Jill for help, Jill hooked her up with us, she hid her car in our barn and left at 3 am when Richard came and got her. Only trouble was, I’d swiped the notebook.” I thrust out my hands, palms up. “What else do you need?”