Murder Most Maine

by Karen MacInerney

  I washed down a bite of pancake with some coffee, thinking of the skeleton and the legend of the flashing light. I’d had a brush with the supernatural at the Gray Whale Inn last fall, and now there was this story of the mysterious lighthouse. I loved living in a place where the buildings were steeped in history, but why did so many of the stories have to be tragedies?

  ___

  When the mail boat chugged into view at 2 p.m., I was at the dock, waiting for the retreat participants to arrive. The Little Marian was tied up nearby, next to Mooncatcher and Eleazer’s skiff Windward. The van hadn’t shown any sign of moving, and I couldn’t get a mechanic out to look at it in time, so I’d wrangled John and Eleazer into helping transport my guests over to the inn.

  “Thanks so much for coming to help,” I told John as the wind buffeted us at the town pier, blowing my brown hair into my eyes. The Island Princess was chugging slowly over the water, pitching to and fro on the choppy waves.

  “No problem,” he said, eyeing the sky, which had turned ominously gray. “Hope we get everyone to the inn before it starts raining.” A strong wind buffeted the dock. “It’ll be a rough ride there, looks like.”

  “I just hope the power doesn’t go out. Hard to cook with no oven.” I glanced at the sky nervously; I’d been meaning to install a generator to deal with the island’s frequent outages, but after spending so much money on the van, it would be awhile before I could scrape up enough cash for a generator.

  “That’s all right. They’re here to lose weight, right? Just feed them salads.”

  I laughed.

  “Why did they pick Cranberry Island for the retreat, anyway?” John asked.

  “Apparently the woman who runs it used to summer here,” I said.

  “What’s her name?”

  “Vanessa something.” John’s eyebrow twitched up a little. “I can’t remember her last name,” I continued. “It was unusual, though.”

  “And don’t forget that hunky trainer you were telling me about,” said Charlene, who had just trotted up to the dock wearing a fresh coat of lipstick and a green jacket that hugged her generous curves. Her dark blond hair gleamed in the watery light.

  John flashed her a smile. “Hi there, Charlene. Here to check out the offerings?”

  She smiled fondly at my neighbor. “There’s supposed to be a cute physical fitness expert on board, and I thought I might just need a bit of personal training.”

  I rolled my eyes at John, but Charlene didn’t notice; she was squinting at the boat.

  “Ooh,” she said a moment later, pointing to a burly man on the boat’s stern. “Would you look at that.” She bit her lip. “Let’s hope he doesn’t have a girlfriend.”

  “Or a boyfriend,” I said.

  “He can’t be gay,” Charlene said, raising her field glasses for a better look. “He just can’t.”

  “We’ll find out soon enough,” I said as the Island Princess docked, pitching heavily in the waves. I was happy to see boxes of groceries strapped to the top; it might take a few runs over in Charlene’s truck, but at least I’d have something to feed my guests.

  “Welcome to Cranberry Island!” I said as the retreat participants stepped off the boat a minute later, looking cheerful despite the rough weather. I hoped they remained that way after the skiff ride to the inn. I needn’t have worried about the average tonnage; more than a few of them, I was chagrined to notice, were actually thinner than I was. Maybe my doctor was right about me dropping a few pounds after all.

  It wasn’t hard to spot Vanessa, a slender super-model type with a high-wattage smile and shiny black hair cut in a pert wedge. My own slightly gray-streaked bob didn’t hold a candle to it, I knew. “You must be Natalie,” she said as she stepped gracefully off the heaving boat. With her sleek black coat and matching hair, she looked out of place on the weather-beaten dock.

  “And you must be Vanessa,” I said, smiling. “It’s so nice to finally meet you.”

  From behind me, John said, “Vanessa?”

  “John?” Vanessa’s dark eyes darted past me and lit up. “I can’t believe it! I had no idea you were still here!”

  I glanced from John to Vanessa, both of whom were inspecting each other with intense interest. Charlene was looking on with raised eyebrows, the hunky trainer temporarily forgotten.

  “You two know each other?” I asked.

  “Of course,” Vanessa said. “We spent summers here together. But it’s been so long …” She beamed at my neighbor. “Remember those nights, out by the lighthouse?”

  I glanced at John. Summer nights out by the lighthouse? I’d heard all about John’s sailing trips with his grandfather, but somehow enchanted lighthouse evenings with Vanessa had never made it into our conversations. Evidently John recalled them quite well, though, because he smiled back warmly and said, “How could I forget?”

  As the two of them basked in the glow of shared memories and Charlene sidled over to the hunky blond guy, who was looking very manly in a leather bomber jacket, I shifted from foot to foot and pulled my jacket tight against the brisk wind. I was getting the feeling that hosting the weight-loss retreat might not be such a great idea after all.

  “Well, we’ll have to catch up on old times later,” Vanessa said as a big gust just about knocked her over. She gave John’s arm a squeeze and flashed him one of her mega-watt smiles. I couldn’t be sure—it could have been the wind—but it looked like a faint flush was creeping up his cheeks. Then Vanessa turned to face the women huddling on the dock. “Welcome to Cranberry Island. I’m sure you’ll love it every bit as much as I do. Now, Natalie,” Vanessa said, turning toward me, “how do we get to your wonderful inn?”

  “We thought it might be a nice change for the guests to arrive at the inn by boat,” I announced, pointing to the three skiffs bobbing in the waves. They say it’s all in the marketing, and it sure sounded better than, “The van broke, so we’re taking dinghies.”

  “How fun!” she said. Five minutes later, she had expertly directed most of the group onto the skiffs and escorted the remaining few into the pier restaurant to wait. Charlene, I noticed, had cut the trainer from the herd and was sparkling at him as they headed for the door of Spurrell’s Lobster Pound. Although her restaurant was usually closed until June, Evie Spurrell had kindly volunteered to provide my guests a place to wait for the boats—along with mugs of steaming hot coffee.

  By the time the first group reached the inn, fat droplets of rain had started falling, and the wind had picked up even more. From the quiet emanating from my huddled guests, I worried that the retreat was off to a bad start. But their faces lightened as they took in the gray-shingled Cape-style inn, windows glowing warmly, perched atop a green, rock-studded hill. When my niece greeted them with mugs of (sugar-free) hot chocolate, they cheered up immediately, chatting excitedly as John, Eleazer, and I headed back for the rest of the group.

  When we reached the pier, Vanessa divided the remaining group among the three boats. Charlene stood on the dock, looking remarkably chipper, as the trainer—she introduced him to me as Dirk—leaped into Eleazer’s skiff, just about swamping the little boat in the process.

  “He helped me load the groceries into the truck,” she murmured to me. “He’s just gorgeous—and sweet, too!” As she mooned over Dirk, Eleazer helped a young woman into the Little Marian. In the meantime, John helped Vanessa, with whom he appeared to be in deep reminiscence mode, into Mooncatcher. As I smiled up at the single, dark-haired woman in my skiff, Vanessa’s tinkly laugh reached me over the thrum of the engines. I glanced back to see John and Vanessa all cozied up in the back of Mooncatcher. I was beginning to understand how John felt when my former fiancé paid me a visit the previous fall.

  “Sorry about the weather,” I called to my passenger.

  “It’s not your fault,” she replied, hugging herself against the wind. “Cold rain comes with the territory this time of year.”

  “Are you kidding me? I’m a Texas girl. I don�
��t think I’ll ever adjust.”

  My passenger smiled back at me, and her serious face suddenly lightened. She had high cheekbones and piercing eyes, and like mine, her dark hair had a few strands of gray.

  “I’m Natalie,” I said. “The innkeeper.”

  “I’m Elizabeth,” she said, extending a chilly hand.

  “Ever been to Maine before?” I asked.

  “Actually, yes,” she called back over the thrum of the little boat. “I live in Portland. I’m a reporter for Maine Monthly Magazine.”

  “So this isn’t a big change for you then, I imagine.”

  She grinned and shook her head.

  As we headed toward the inn, I glanced back at John’s skiff. Vanessa was still right next to John.

  “What made you decide to host the retreat?” Elizabeth asked, tearing my attention away from the happy couple.

  “It seemed like a good opportunity, so I jumped on it,” I said. “It’s the first one I’ve hosted, and I’m hoping it will be the first of many.” I was about to ask her what kind of article she was writing, but the wake of a passing lobster boat threatened to swamp us, and I had to adjust my course. It was bad enough having to transport my guests to the inn on borrowed skiffs; the last thing I needed was to drown them along the way.

  My hands felt frozen on the rudder by the time we tied up at the Gray Whale Inn’s dock. While Elizabeth and I clambered onto the dock, Eleazer bounded onto it like a mountain goat, despite the fact that the few hairs he had left under his tam were white. John, too, was remarkably limber, and paid special attention (or at least it seemed so to me) to Vanessa as she daintily stepped off onto the dock.

  As the women—except for Vanessa, who lingered with her old lighthouse buddy John—hurried up to the inn, I turned to the spry, gray-haired captain of the little wooden boat. “I can’t thank you enough, Eleazer; you and John really saved the day. Will you stay for some hot chocolate? No cookies, I’m afraid; this group is here to lose weight, not gain it.”

  “Hot chocolate?” he asked, eyes glinting.

  I laughed. “Even your wife would approve. It’s sugar-free.” Eleazer’s wife, Claudette, though far from slight herself, was perpetually lecturing her comparatively lean husband on the perils of sugar. And baking him her legendary sugarless cranberry pies. My mouth puckered just thinking about them.

  “Thank you kindly, but I think I’d better motor on home now. We’ve got the grandkids coming up tomorrow, and Claudie wants me to get the place ship-shape for them.”

  I smiled. Claudette had recently reconnected with the son she’d given up for adoption almost forty years earlier, and she was enjoying her new role as grandma to two young children. And since her son and his wife were renovating a house down by the island’s bog, the young family had been frequent visitors lately.

  “I owe you one,” I told him. “Tell Claudette and the kids hi—and I’ll take an extra batch of brownies down to the shop this week, just for you,” I said.

  “That’s more than payment enough,” he said as he hopped back into his skiff and revved the engine. “Thank you kindly!”

  “Thank you, Eli!” I called, and as he untied the skiff and headed toward home, I grabbed the one box of groceries I’d tossed into the skiff and turned to follow Vanessa and John, who were walking shoulder-to-shoulder up the path to the inn. John’s chivalrous instincts seemed to have evaporated when Vanessa appeared, I thought sourly as I trudged up the path behind them, my arms loaded with groceries.

  Charlene was waiting in the driveway with the rest of the groceries; it took us several trips to get everything to the inn while Gwen got the guests checked in and served hot chocolate. Charlene offered to help me put the groceries up, but when I saw her look longingly at the kitchen door, I took the eggs out of her hand.

  “Go talk to him,” I said.

  “Are you sure?”

  “Absolutely,” I said. A moment later, the kitchen door swung shut behind her, leaving me alone.

  As I peeled off my jacket and started to put away the cartons of low-fat ingredients—skim milk, fat-free yogurt, whole-wheat flour, and about twelve bushels of fresh fruits and veggies—I realized the flaw in my brownie plan.

  How was I going to bake a batch of brownies when I was hosting an inn full of half-starved, chocolate-deprived dieters?

  ___

  By the time I got the last celery stalk tucked into the crisper, the warmth of my buttery yellow kitchen—and a mug of coffee—had dispelled most of the chill, but the absence of John in my kitchen had not done anything to thaw my rather frosty-feeling heart.

  Evidently Dirk was taking his time unpacking, because after twenty minutes of loitering in the living room, Charlene had given up and headed back to the store to take over for her niece, Tania.

  “No luck?” I asked when she returned to the kitchen.

  “We didn’t get to talk much—but he did agree to go to dinner with me,” she said, eyes shining.

  “Quick work,” I said. Charlene practically danced to the door.

  As her ancient truck—which, like most vehicles on the island, was missing major parts, like windows, bumpers, and a passenger-side door—growled up the driveway, I checked my menu plan for the evening and poured another cup of coffee. I’d chosen an easy dinner of broiled citrus chicken and steamed veggies, for which I’d already thawed and prepped the chicken breasts. My hand strayed to the cookie jar, which I knew was stuffed with gingersnaps, and paused. I couldn’t eat them in the dining room, but surely there would be no harm in snagging one and munching it now?

  With great effort, I replaced the lid and pulled my hand back. If I was going to take advantage of the health benefits of hosting a weight-loss retreat, I’d have to stay on the same regimen as my guests. Besides, Vanessa probably wouldn’t give in to temptation, I told myself. With one last, longing look at the ceramic jar, I pushed through the swinging door of the kitchen into the dining room.

  The retreat was already in full swing; while the guests sat at my antique maple tables sipping hot chocolate and munching the carrot and celery sticks Gwen had put out—the crunching reminded me of a field full of crickets—Vanessa stood at the front of the room, smiling brightly and revving the participants up for a week of weight-loss excitement. The tall windows looked out over the water toward the mainland, and for a moment, the sun peeked through a cloud to touch on the gray back of Cadillac Mountain. It glowed briefly, then disappeared, giving the mountain almost a brooding look.

  I turned from the window and scanned the room, my eyes seeking Elizabeth, whose angular frame didn’t look like it needed to lose an ounce. I couldn’t help wondering why Maine Monthly had chosen to send a skinny person to review a weight-loss retreat.

  “We’re going to give you a jump start over the next seven days,” Vanessa said, “and teach you some lifestyle habits you can practice at home.” Vanessa’s teeth were blindingly white, contrasting attractively with her dusky skin and shiny black hair. The look was exotic, and I wondered what her heritage was. Part Asian?

  She was dressed in formfitting jeans and an Aran sweater that somehow managed to accentuate her curvy figure. I loved my own Aran sweater, but was only too aware that it made my silhouette look rather like that of a sheep with an overgrazing problem. If following the Lose-It-All plan could make me look like that even under four pounds of wool, I decided—it might be worth paying attention. John certainly was. His eyes were trained on Vanessa like he was on the Titanic and she was showing him how to operate the lifeboats. I knew he wasn’t here for the slimming tips—my neighbor was plenty trim already—and since he wouldn’t touch sugar-free anything, it wasn’t the hot chocolate, either.

  I tore my eyes from the back of my neighbor’s sandy head and scanned the rest of the room. Vanessa had given me a quick run-down on the participants, and I was placing names with faces. I spotted the mother-daughter duo, Megan and Carissa, in the corner; they shared the same pale blond hair and rounded bodies. The three w
ell-dressed and slightly plump women by the window must be the sorority sisters, Boots, Sarah, and Caterina, who had chosen to prepare for their thirty-year reunion by attempting to return to their college weight. Elizabeth had pulled out a notebook, doubtless to take notes for the article she was writing. Up at the front, near Dirk, was another woman, pale and chubby, with curly brown hair. She must be Bethany. The sole man at the retreat sat by himself in a corner. Like John, he was paying rapt attention to Vanessa, but since he was taking copious notes in a little spiral-bound notebook, I was guessing at least part of his interest was in her list of “lifestyle tips.” He was an attractive man, with reddish-brown hair and a physique you could tell used to be muscular, but had collected a little padding around the middle over the years.

  In contrast, Dirk, the trainer, was looking bored and chiseled, but—based on the fact that his eyes kept straying toward the generous bosom of one of the sorority sisters—not gay. Which was good news for Charlene.

  As my eyes drifted back to John, who hadn’t yet noticed my presence, Vanessa said, “Ah, there you are, Natalie.” Several pairs of eyes turned to look at me, and I smiled welcomingly as Vanessa continued. “Natalie is our innkeeper this week. Not only is she the owner of this gorgeous place, but she’ll be cooking lots of delicious healthy meals that can help you stay on-plan.” Which, from what I had seen of the program, involved controlled portions of protein and vegetables, a few whole grains, virtually no fat, and enough exercise to fell an Olympic athlete. Vanessa looked at me with a big smile. “Dinner’s at six, right?”

  “Right,” I said. “Tonight’s menu is tangy citrus chicken and crisp-steamed Asian vegetables.” I’d read somewhere that lots of adjectives help ‘sell’ a dish. And with the paucity of butter and other delicious, sinful substances in this week’s menu, the dishes I’d be preparing needed all the help they could get.

  “Sounds scrumptious,” Vanessa said. “Especially those veggies. But before we eat, Dirk’s going to introduce you all to the weight-training component of the program. Then we’ll have some free time to unpack and get to know each other before dinner. So, if you’ll finish up your hot chocolate, we’ll get started, okay? No need for workout clothes … yet,” she said with a twinkle.