LOWCOUNTRY BOUGHS OF HOLLY

by Susan M. Boyer

  Dwight had played the role of folksy hired help/sidekick with a checkered past quite well. Apparently, that wasn’t all there was to Dwight. This roused my natural curiosity.

  “He studied history,” said Grace. “And he has a minor in philosophy. Graduated summa cum laude.”

  What a coincidence. Grace majored in philosophy. The two of them could probably talk for hours about metaphysical matters and all such as that. Dwight was getting more interesting by the moment. I would most definitely be verifying every single thing he told Grace.

  “Is that a fact?” I tilted my head, offered Dwight my sunniest smile.

  “It is, yes. C. C. considered it part of my job to be educated,” said Dwight. “I always did my best at whatever he asked me to do.” He sobered a bit at the mention of his friend.

  “I have no doubt.” I took a bite of cucumber sandwich, wondered what all C. C. Bounetheau had asked him to do over the years.

  “Have you learned anything?” he asked. “About what happened to C. C.?”

  “As a matter of fact, I’m making progress,” I said. “That’s why I came by. I have a few more questions for you.”

  “Perhaps you’d like to go someplace more private to speak to Dwight?” asked Grace. “Maybe after you finish your tea.”

  “I don’t mind if we talk here if you don’t,” said Dwight. “I’m eager to hear what she’s found out, to tell you the truth. But it would be a shame to rush through such a delicious spread.”

  “Aren’t you the sweetest thing?” Grace positively beamed.

  When was the last time she’d shown an interest in a man? It’d been a while. Grace hadn’t been lucky at love. She’d lost a fiancé when she was in her late twenties and like to never’ve gotten over it. Then a no-account cheating lowlife had broken her heart a few years back. I needed to have a chat with her about how Dwight was a suspect in a murder investigation and had ties to a notoriously shady family, which maybe made him not the safest romantic bet.

  Janet Batrouny and her family seemed engrossed in a discussion regarding dinner, and the merits of local seafood at The Pirates’ Den versus going over to Sullivan’s Island to The Obstinate Daughter. They paid us no attention whatsoever.

  I shrugged, gestured to Dwight. “Tell me what you know about Tallulah Hartley.”

  Dwight’s face froze. His eyes took on a cornered look. “Well, ah—”

  I said, “And don’t you even think about leaving a single thing out this time.”

  A worried look passed across Grace’s face.

  Dwight sighed, gave his head a little shake. “You have to understand. C. C. was my best friend. We kept each other’s confidences. This was something personal he told me. I didn’t see how it could possibly be related to his death.”

  I took another bite of cucumber sandwich and waited.

  “Okay, fine,” he said. “C. C. was a big fan of the performing arts.”

  I shot him a look telegraphing my utter lack of patience.

  He patted the air gently with his palms. “Now just hold on. Back in October, there was a big grand opening gala for the Galliard Center. Yo-Yo Ma was there, along with the Charleston Symphony Orchestra. So, of course, C. C. was in attendance. He and Abigail. I went too, actually. Not with them—a friend and I attended separately. It was quite something. Anyway, during the champagne and social hour, C. C. ran into a young woman he swore looked identical to his sister, Vivian. Vivian, she’s been dead for sixty years. Leukemia.

  “But C. C., he was obsessed with this young woman,” said Dwight. “He asked a couple a people if they knew who she was, and no one had any idea. Someone did know the guy she was with. An attorney, guy named Oliver Flynn. C. C. had me hire a private investigator to find out who she was, who her people were.” Dwight inhaled a long breath, rubbed his eyebrow.

  “And?” I asked.

  He spread his hands. “Well, uh, it turned out this young woman—Tallulah—was C. C.’s daughter he never knew he had.”

  “How did the investigator prove that?” I asked.

  “DNA,” said Dwight.

  “And how did he get a sample of Tallulah’s DNA?” I asked. “Did she consent to that test? Does she know about all this?”

  “Oh, no. The uh…investigator, I gave him explicit instructions not to tell her anything. I’m relatively confident he didn’t. He’s proven to be trustworthy in the past. He maybe got a little creative…” He held his hand out, palm down, and, wiggled it back and forth. “…with getting a hair sample.”

  “He broke into her home?” I asked, like maybe I was horrified a private investigator would do such a thing.

  “Well, between you and me, yeah, he did.” Dwight glanced at Grace a bit sheepishly.

  For her part, Grace raised an eyebrow at me, gave me a look that said, Seriously? Don’t act like that’s something you’ve never done before.

  In a perfect world, and I suffer no illusions regarding the state of humanity, private investigators would have no need to cross the line into such grey areas. As it was, sometimes to prevent grave miscarriages of justice, I did occasionally indulge in a little harmless snooping. But I was on the side of the angels. I questioned whether the same could be said for whoever Dwight had hired.

  “So, coming over to the boat parade,” I said, “that’s something C. C. did with two very specific children in mind. How did he know they’d be here?”

  “Right.” Dwight nodded. “The investigator, he found out somehow what their plans were. I don’t know anything about his methods. You’d have to ask him about that.”

  “I’ll need his name and contact information,” I said.

  Dwight grimaced. “Let’s hold off on that, why don’t we?”

  Any investigator worth his license wouldn’t tell me anything, certainly not something that might incriminate him or his client. I decide not to press the point unless I needed to later. “Did C. C. plan to speak to Tallulah? Tell her she was his daughter?”

  “He was going to play it by ear,” said Dwight. “Said he might. Then it all went to hell. Some of Tallulah’s family thought maybe he was a child snatcher or something. Chased him out of the park. It’s a miracle he didn’t have a heart attack. I told him he was way too old for such foolishness. That’s how we got separated. C. C. just wanted to see his daughter and his grandkids. He didn’t mean anyone any harm.”

  “But you saw him at the boat, right before the fireworks, and he was alive? You told me everything there is to tell about that?” I asked.

  “Everything,” said Dwight. “Well, except about the snow globes.”

  “Snow globes?” I asked.

  “C. C. had bought each of the little girls a snow globe. They were something special, I tell you what. Collectors’ items. Probably not something he should’ve bought for kids that age, but anyhow.” Dwight shook his head. “Remember when I said he was getting something from the little teak boat?”

  “Um-hmm.” I nodded, sipped my tea.

  “He had those snow globes there, in a red sack,” said Dwight. “He reached in and got the sack out. Said he was going to talk to Tallulah, tell her the truth, and give the little girls their snow globes. I told him I thought that was a spectacularly bad idea, all things considered, and we should both head on home. But when C. C. got something in his head, there was no use talking him out of it. I went aboard the Chris-Craft, like I told you. That’s the last I saw of C. C.”

  “The snow globes weren’t in the boat when C. C.’s body was found,” I said.

  “I guess he gave them to the girls, like he planned,” said Dwight.

  “That’s not possible,” I said. “Not given that he must’ve been killed between the last time you spoke to him and when you pulled out of the marina. From what you told me, that’s a ten to fifteen-minute window, between nine o’clock and nine-fifteen, based on when the firewor
ks started.” I caught myself before adding that was the only possible way C. C.’s body could’ve been in that boat Dwight was towing.

  Dwight squinted at me, like he knew I wasn’t telling him everything. “I guess someone stole them then.”

  “How valuable were they?” I asked.

  “Oh, a few hundred dollars—not anything someone would’ve killed for,” said Dwight. “Just not what you typically buy for young kids. Besides, they were wrapped up in pretty packages. Whoever took them didn’t have any idea what they were.”

  “Excuse me?” Janet Batrouny leaned in from my left, spoke quietly.

  I’d been so focused on Dwight, I hadn’t noticed her approach. I smiled. “Hey. Did y’all decide on dinner?”

  “We’re headed to The Pirates’ Den later,” she said. “I wondered if I might speak with you privately.”

  “Sure.” I set my tea on the coffee table and caught Grace’s eye. “I’ll be right back.” I led Janet across the entry hall to the dining room, which was deserted. “How can I help you?”

  “I’m sorry, I couldn’t help but overhear part of your conversation,” she said. “Are you with the local police?”

  “Sort of,” I said. “My brother is the chief of police. My husband and I are private investigators. Occasionally, we do contract work for the town.”

  “And you’re investigating the death of the Santa Claus in the rowboat?” she asked.

  “That’s right. Do you know something about that?”

  “Maybe.” She winced. “I’m not sure.”

  I gave her a questioning look. “Could you explain that?”

  She said, “I’ve been trying to decide whether to go into the police department to report this, so I guess you’ve saved me a trip. You can decide if this is important or not.”

  “Okay…”

  “I heard at The Cracked Pot that the Santa who was killed was in the boat parade, and his boat had been over at the marina afterwards.”

  “That’s right,” I said.

  “Listen…Saturday night, we were in the park for the singing. David had gone to do some Christmas shopping, and Jeff and Kayte and I were enjoying the music. I got cold and decided to head back here. Jeff made a fuss, said they’d come with me, but I insisted they stay. There was no sense in them missing the fun.

  “I took the trolley back to the stop at the marina. There weren’t very many people around. I guess most everybody was in the park or downtown. I started towards the B&B, but then the fireworks started. I stopped to watch them for a minute—they were so pretty. I was looking at the sky, not really anything else. But between fireworks, I heard running, like someone’s shoes on the wooden piers at the marina?”

  “Go on,” I said.

  “I looked, just casually, you know. It caught my attention.”

  “Did you see who was running?” I asked.

  “It was a woman in a black coat, thigh-length, possibly leather, with a hood. She had the hood up. I couldn’t really tell you much about what she looked like, to be honest. She was looking around like she was nervous. When she saw me, she took off in the other direction.”

  “Was she tall or short?” I asked.

  Janet winced. “About medium, I guess.”

  “Heavy or thin?”

  “Kinda medium, really. Like I said, she had on a coat.”

  “Close your eyes and visualize her. Recreate it in your mind,” I said.

  She nodded, closed her eyes.

  After a minute, I said, “Is there anything else about her that catches your eye?”

  She opened her eyes. “She was wearing a plaid scarf. I was a good distance away from her, but it looked like it was black and white. It may have had other colors in it.”

  “Was there anything about the way she moved that suggested her age at all?” I asked.

  “She was young enough to run pretty fast. I don’t guess that tells you all that much. I can move quick when I need to.”

  “Did you walk back here then?” I asked.

  “Not immediately. When I looked back at the dock, from where the woman had come? I’m not really sure why I did that. Someone else came down the same part of the dock—where she’d just run from.”

  “Oh?”

  “Yes, it was another woman in a black coat. But this one looked like wool—like a peacoat type thing. She wore a scarf over her head and big sunglasses, even though it was nine o’clock at night. She wasn’t running or anything. Whoever she was, she looked my way, but didn’t seem to take any notice of me. She was cool as a cucumber. But there’s a reason she had on big sunglasses. Even the scarf over her head—it wasn’t that cold. Anyway, she just walked over to the trolley stop, I guess to wait for the next one.”

  I had her close her eyes and repeat the visualization exercise. “Did anything else catch your eye with her?”

  “Not a thing. I wish I could be more help.”

  “Did you see anything else?” I asked. “Hear anything?”

  Apprehension stole over her face.

  “Ms. Batrouny?”

  “Listen…I need to tell you right now that I did have some Frangelico in my coffee, but I was most definitely not drunk. At least, I don’t think I was. And I’m sure this didn’t have anything to do with, well, the murder of Santa Claus.”

  “Noted.”

  “I looked back up towards the sky because I was expecting more fireworks. As I was looking up, I saw this…this…well, it was a reindeer.”

  “You mean in the sky?” I squinted at her.

  “Well, it was really low—not like Santa’s reindeer, where you see them fly in front of the moon in movies or whatever. It just…rose over that last row of boats at the marina and flew off towards town. It was just barely over the treetops.”

  I stared at her for a long minute. She seemed perfectly sane to me. Which left me with only one possible explanation.

  Colleen.

  Whenever impossible things had happened on our island—and they surely had— Colleen had been the explanation.

  I dashed through the hall and out to the front porch.

  Claude was no longer in the front yard.

  TWELVE

  Nate brought home all my favorites—Mongolian beef, orange chicken, vegetable lo mein, fried rice, crab wontons, and spring rolls. We always over-ordered Chinese food because we both liked to sample each dish and have leftovers for lunch the next day. We took our overfilled plates into the front room with a bottle of Emiliana red blend.

  When we’d settled into our customary spots on the sectional sofa, I asked, “Did you get everything taken care of? Are we really leaving on Sunday instead of Monday?”

  “All set.” Nate popped a bite of beef into his mouth. He was the very picture of serenity and calm.

  “Changing all those arrangements—airline reservations and such—that must’ve been exorbitant.”

  “You’d be surprised,” said Nate. “It didn’t cost an extra dime.”

  “Seriously?” I felt my face scrunch. “It’s hard to imagine Delta didn’t hit you with outrageous fees on eight tickets changed within a week of flying, this close to Christmas, no less.”

  “Who said I was dealing with Delta?” He grinned at me.

  I gave him my best Oh puh-leeze look. “You said we were going someplace warm. I know you’re smarter than to plan a road trip to Florida for this bunch. We’ve never flown any airline but Delta.”

  Nate shrugged, picked up a spring roll. “I guess folks are just filled with the Christmas spirit. How was your day?”

  I inhaled deeply, then told him all about seeing Blake and Poppy and Tammy Sue on the ferry, about my conversation with Blake. “It just makes me so angry. Our family has lived here for generations. And we have land—plenty of land. But that does us absolutely no good and my brother can’t affor
d to live here.”

  Nate was quiet, thoughtful. “I sure hate to hear that.”

  “I told him they should live with us,” I said.

  Nate nodded. “We’ve got plenty of room.”

  “Will you help me persuade him?” I asked. “I think he’ll be more likely to listen to you. It’d just be temporary. Sooner or later something will come on the market in their budget.”

  “I’ll do my best,” he said. “We’ll get this figured out. I give you my word.”

  I teared up. I had the best husband on the planet. Most guys probably wouldn’t agree quite so quickly to in-laws moving in, especially with a baby on the way.

  “Whoa now,” said Nate. “No need for tears. Everything’s going to be fine.”

  I hugged him over two plates of Chinese food. “Thank you, Sweetheart.”

  “Tell me about the rest of your day,” he said.

  “Here’s the headline: Tallulah Hartley is C. C. Bounetheau’s daughter.” I filled him in on my meetings with Virginia, Abigail, and Tess—and Tess’s bombshell—and my conversation with Dwight Goodnight. “Oh, and I’m pretty sure Colleen is riding Claude around the island, which explains a great many things, like Darius’s behavior during the parade—and Grace’s too, come to think it—and why Claude keeps showing up everywhere we go, but avoids his handler so reliably.”

  “What makes you suspect Colleen’s teamed up with your father’s rebellious reindeer?” asked Nate. “You think Grace could sense her?” Grace was a psychic—not the kind who charges money, but the kind who genuinely perceived things through another sense. More than once she’d detected Colleen’s presence. Grace hadn’t known who was there—just that someone was.

  “A woman who appears fully sane saw a reindeer fly over the marina during the fireworks Saturday night.” I told him about Janet Batrouny and what she’d seen.

  “I have to admit, that sounds like something straight out of Colleen’s playbook.” Nate closed his eyes, grinned, shook his head. “Do you suppose she’s just being Colleen, or is there something she’s trying to tell us?”

  I mulled that. “I think she’s calling attention to Tallulah. In the park? The first time we saw Claude after he escaped? He went over to Tallulah and her girls. Then later we saw him at Tallulah’s house.”