by K. J. Emrick
“James, I never…” But then I read the next few sentences and realized that yes, I had. Without meaning to I had given this entire story to Gladys Austin.
A close friend of Alfonse Calico stated to this reporter that Alfonse may be perpetrating a scam. One that she herself was aware of ahead of time.
“I did not say that!” I knew these walls weren’t exactly soundproof, and I knew I should keep my voice down, but how dare this woman lie about me like this! That was not… well, it was sort of what… that’s not what I meant!
James snatched his phone back, bouncing it in his hand. “Dell, I really thought… I mean, I know I made a complete fruit loop of meself when we were down in Port Arthur, but I really thought if ya gave information on this case to anyone it’d be me. Didn’t we use to mean something to each other?”
“Yes. James, yes, we did. Don’t you remember me saying exactly that the day you left me?”
“I’m not talking about the past, Dell. I’m talking about right now. Today. Here, in Lakeshore.”
“It’s the same thing!” I reached out for him, only to find I was still holding that stupid book with the picture of the Palawa woman in it and the photo of Dan and Alfonse with the Chalice. Both of those things have proven exactly nothing. Useless, all of it. Dropping the book on the center kitchen island I crossed my arms instead. “James, it’s the same bloody thing. You left me then, and you won’t come back to me now. Why won’t you just come back to me?”
“How can I, when ya won’t take my job seriously?” Taking a heavy breath, he shook his head. “How can I be with someone who thinks what I do doesn’t matter?”
Over in the corner of the room, I saw Jess step out of the shadows. She looked at me, silently asking if I’m okay. I couldn’t really answer her, with James watching me, waiting for an answer.
There’s another reason why I couldn’t answer her, too. I really didn’t know if I was okay.
“James, listen to me,” I said, keeping my voice down this time. “I’ve always respected you. It took me forever to open my heart to a man again and when I did, that man was you. I made you a part of my life. You were my rock. My support. If I ever made you feel less than that I’m sorry. I’ve waited for you to come back to me, and now that you have it’s all business. All you’ve cared about since you got here was this story. If you want to try to make that my fault go ahead but you’re the one standing here upset because someone else twisted my words into a story first!”
For the longest time, he just stood there. Jess cringed at the emotion in my words, her hand reached up to tug at her long blonde ponytail. She was worried for me. So was I. I’d waited for James to come back to me, and then settled on the notion that he wouldn’t, and now here we were on the edge of a moment that might pull us apart forever.
Next to Jess, another figure appeared. Tall, darkly handsome. Even in death I could read my hubby Richard’s expressions. He smiled just so, and tilted his head just so, and then folded his arms casually across his chest.
Don’t let this opportunity slip past you, he was saying to me. He wanted me to be happy. He wanted me to be with a man I could love as much as I had loved him.
As much as I loved him still.
Seeing my attention keep slipping over to that corner, James turned to look that way. There was nothing for him to see, of course. Nobody in Lakeshore can see ghosts but me.
“James, let’s talk about this mystery,” I offered. “I know a few things that might be of interest. There’s a section in this book here, and a photo of the Chalice…”
“That’s really what ya think, isn’t it?”
“What I…? I don’t understand.”
Forcefully, he shoved his phone away in his pocket. “That’s all ya think I’m here for. Think I came back to Lakeshore just for the story?”
“Well, let’s see,” I told him. “You came back to the Inn, barely said two words to me. Now you’ve dragged me back into my own kitchen to accuse me of not taking your job seriously and talking to other reporters besides you. Sounds like your job’s plenty important to you!”
Jess covered her face with her hand, and disappeared back into the shadows. Richard’s face was sad as he did the same.
Yeah, I may have gone a bit too far with that last bit.
Quickly I picked up the book and flipped through the pages to find the section on the Van Diemen’s Land Chalice. I didn’t know what his journalistic mind would make of it all, but I could tell him my theory of the Chalice being stolen to return to the aborigines. Maybe he could even help me figure out who the woman in the picture was. I found the spot, and turned it around to show him.
When I looked up, he was gone.
The doors to the kitchen were swinging back and forth behind him and he was just gone. I stared after him, and the book got heavier and heavier in my hands while I did, as my heart slowly got lodged up in my throat. That was my chance. Would I ever have another one with James?
Suddenly, I didn’t want this book in my hands anymore. I didn’t want to be the woman who saw ghosts and solved mysteries and went tearing off into one dangerous situation after another just because I could. I was good at helping people, I knew that. I’d made a difference in people’s lives when it mattered most. I wouldn’t change that for the world.
But just for today, couldn’t I be the woman who found love that was simple and easy?
Slapping the book closed and tucking it under my arm I pushed through the doors into the dining room and then into the lobby. James was already gone. So was everyone else, except Janus at the desk and Ikon talking with him. “I’m going out for a bit,” I told them both. “I’ll have my mobile with me if you need me.”
On my heel, I turned to the front doors. The night outside was dark but I didn’t bother grabbing a flashlight, or my light coat hanging off a hook on the rack in the corner. I just wanted to be out of there and away from everyone for a while. I wanted to drop this book back off at Ada’s and never see it again. I wanted a lot of things, but I’d settle for a walk to clear my head.
Ikon stopped me at the door. “Can we talk?”
“Not now,” I said to him abruptly. Were all men this blind? Could none of them see when a woman wanted attention, or when she wanted to be left alone?
I looked at Ikon, and he looked back at me. Then he shrugged. “I can take a hint. See ya tomorrow, Boss.”
Hands stuffed into his pockets he walked back to the front desk. I followed him with my eyes, and only then did I realized that it wasn’t him being blind. It was me. Carly had seen it. Jess had seen it, too. I suddenly knew what Ikon wanted to talk to me about. He thought he and I… That we…
Oh, snap. I suddenly remembered the text I sent to him earlier today. Let’s do lunch, I’d said to him. I meant we should make lunch for the guests, somehow, and when he stepped in to make that happen I thought that was the end of it.
He thought I was asking him on a date!
Now I hesitated, taking half a step back inside, wondering if I should talk to him after all. ‘Course, that hadn’t gone so well for me and James. If I got caught up in another round of explaining a woman’s emotions, then I might be here all night.
When Ikon came back, car keys in hand, he nodded to me in a very curt way and kept walking out into the night. I followed him.
“Ikon, wait.” He stopped, halfway to his car. “I’m sorry. I didn’t know… um. I didn’t know how you felt.”
“Really? Wow, Dell, I suppose I could’ve tattooed it on my forehead or some such. Everyone else could see it. Why couldn’t you?”
I shifted my weight on my feet. That was a very fair question. Looking back now, I could see all the clues I’d missed. Like the way he’d always called me “Boss” like it was a pet nickname. Like the way he always stayed late and showed up early and how he stepped in to take over the kitchen duties when he didn’t have to. All of that was to impress me, to let me know he was interested, and I missed it.
Guess I’m better at solving real mysteries, rather than the mysteries of my heart.
Although, obviously not. I haven’t found the Chalice thief yet.
The question was, why? I was usually very good at seeing what was right in front of my nose. What had stopped me from seeing it this time, with Ikon? It was almost like there’d been something standing in my way, something I couldn’t see my way past…
“James,” I said out loud.
In the glow of the outside lights here in the Inn’s carpark, Ikon nodded. “I thought as much. Soon as he came back to Lakeshore you started acting like you’d taken leave of your senses. Right. Well. No need to say more. G’night.”
He was in his car and gone before I’d realized what I’d just done. I’d admitted to myself that even after he’d left me, even after our squabble in the kitchen just now, I was still in love with James.
Well.
Frustrated and tired, hungry to boot, I stalked off into the night.
Chapter 10
Halfway to Ada’s house, my mobile buzzed in my pocket. Not Rosie. She was at home with Josh probably unable to sleep for the joy of holding her new sons in her arms. Maybe Carly, or Janus at the front desk of the Inn.
No. Of course not.
The caller ID said Unknown Caller.
“All right. That’s it.” Cocking my arm back in a baseball player’s stance, the phone tight in my grip, I flung it just as hard and as far as I could.
It hit the pavement further on, and I heard the telltale sounds of plastic cracking and delicate electronic parts separating into even smaller pieces.
Um. Yeah. That probably wasn’t the smartest thing I could’ve done.
Well. That just meant I’d have to get back to the Inn quick after dropping the book off to Ada. She might even be in bed. If the lights were out I wouldn’t even bother knocking. I’d just drop the book through the mail slot in her door and head back.
If I did, that might give me time to talk to James again.
I’d been thinking about that for a dozen steps and more. I should go back and make him listen to me. If nothing else I should have my full say and let him do what he will with that. When he first left me I’d decided to let him come back to me on his own time. Maybe that was a mistake. Maybe I needed to take charge and not wait on the man to make the decision.
That felt right to me. That was the kind of woman I was. The kind of woman James had fallen in love with. It was time to stop being anyone but who I was.
Dell Powers.
Of course, the book was still in my hands. Fine, I decided. Bring the book back to Ada, then go talk to James. That would give us time to cool our heads before we had a final say with each other. Rosie had given birth today, after all. It was a day for new beginnings.
Sounded like a good enough reason to me.
The lights were on in Ada’s house, as it turned out. Well. Quick in and quick out, then. I didn’t even bother knocking. “Ada? Hello?” I closed the door behind me and was thinking of just putting the book on Ada’s big wooden desk for her to find later, when I heard her answer from inside the house. Her words were muffled and I couldn’t make out what she said.
So I set the book down, and waited. And waited. What seemed like an eternity was probably only two minutes, but that was all I had patience for. Now that I’d made my decision to confront James and tell him everything I was feeling I didn’t want to take the chance on losing my nerve by letting too much time go by.
There was a yellow pad of paper on the desk but no pen. I went searching for one in the drawers of the desk. Nothing in the center drawer except a box of paperclips and the start of a rubber band ball. The first drawer on the left was deeper and I was expecting file folders or maybe even a few books left to be put back on the shelf. Something like that.
I was not prepared for a towel with the picture of a blue kangaroo holding a beer in its paw, just sitting there. Under the picture was the tavern’s logo. The Thirsty Roo.
Wait. Didn’t Ada tell me she never went into the Roo? If that was true, then why’d she have this towel? Doubt they gave them out to anyone and everyone.
It was wrapped around something, and curiosity got the better of me.
Guess I wasn’t as done trying to figure out this mystery as I thought I was.
“Stop please.”
Ada’s voice caught me off guard. She was just coming into the library from her house. She was holding fast to the doorway, like a rabbit spotted by a hunter, not sure if it wanted to flee or sit still and hope it wasn’t what’s for dinner.
In other words, like she’d been caught.
“What’s under this towel, Ada?” I asked her. Seemed like such an innocent question but for the longest time she didn’t answer. When she did, it was no answer at all.
“Did you bring back the book?”
I glanced down at the towel again, then back at her. “What don’t you want me to see in this drawer, Ada?”
“Oh, I see the book’s on the table. Thanks for that.” She still hadn’t moved from that spot. Behind her thick glasses her eyes were focused wide. “Could you go, please? I’m tired. I’d like to get to sleep.”
“Long day tomorrow?” I asked.
“Yes. ‘Fraid so.” She took a step closer, her eyes going to that open drawer.
“Me too, I suppose.” This conversation was getting surreal. Neither of us was thinking of anything other than that drawer, that towel…
And what’s underneath it.
Moving my hand quickly inside I grabbed the cloth and pulled it up as Ada jumped forward to reach for me, too late. The towel in my hand dropped to the floor and revealed what it was hiding.
Not the Chalice.
Instead, there’s just a bundle of black and white photographs tied up with string. They looked old. And innocent.
Ada picked them up out of the drawer and set them on her desk next to the book I’d just returned. “Well? What were you expecting to find?” she asked me.
“Nothing, I suppose.” What else could I say? Was I really expecting someone to steal a priceless artifact and then keep it in an unlocked desk drawer?
I saw Ada visibly relax. She eased into her chair and picked up a wooden letter opener, carved with intricate aboriginal designs, to attack a stack of mail that must’ve been there all week. I supposed the whole town was a bit on edge, and me as well. I was just glad I didn’t have to accuse one more friend of something she didn’t do. There’d been enough trouble and discord in Lakeshore recently and I’d like not to be the cause of any more of it.
“Well.” The silence in the room had gotten heavy, and I still wanted to talk to James, and Carly, and I should maybe check on Rosie as well. “I should get going, Ada. Thanks again for the book.”
Not that it helped me much, I wanted to add. I remembered, just before I left, that I still had Dan’s photo inside. I opened up to the page it marked.
And stopped.
The photos in their bundle, right next to the book, caught my eye again. The one on top was obviously a reprint, and I hadn’t paid attention to it before. Now I stared down at a group of old women in plain dresses, some holding long walking sticks, all of them staring forlornly into the camera. The coloring was that even brown shade that old photos seemed to always have. That didn’t keep me from recognizing one of those women.
Long silver hair, skin wrinkled and creased from decades of exposure under the sun. Handsome, in the way that old women sometimes became in their twilight years.
Mahinna.
Ada could’ve had these for research. It could’ve been something to do with the library she’d created here out of her home. But I saw the notation at the bottom. Great, great, great, great grandmother Mahinna and her sisters.
It was Ada’s handwriting. This was her family.
She noticed me reading the photo, and shrugged. “I tried to turn your attention away from me, Dell. Really I did.”
The letter opener sliced through anoth
er envelope, and then another. Ada didn’t even bother reading what was inside each one.
“You couldn’t leave it alone,” she said. “Could you? I tried to tell you someone would steal the Chalice to give it back to the aboriginals. Wasn’t that a good reason to leave it alone? Wouldn’t that have been a good thing for someone to do? Why didn’t you just leave me be?”
Slice. Slice.
My hand was still on the book. It’d shown me the final clue after all, even if I hadn’t figured it out until this moment.
“You’re descended from the Palawa, aren’t you?” I’d said it before: everyone in town seemed to have relatives reaching back to the First Fleet. Even Ada. “You took the Chalice because… you wanted to have Tasmania be handed back to the original inhabitants?”
She laughed, and sliced the letter opener through one final envelope. “I only told you that to throw you off! You shoulda been out there chasing your tail around for weeks. Shouldn’t have thought of me, ever. But you did, didn’t you? I don’t know how you put it together but you did. I stole the Chalice, yes. I stole it, and I sold it. I know I can’t turn back time. Tasmania will never be like it was. Those days are gone.”
The letter opener quivered in her hand.
“I couldn’t just give it away. No. I wanted what my ancestors were owed,” she says. “I sold the Chalice to a collector in Sydney, and that money is mine now. My ancestors were displaced and never compensated for their land. I got what my family was owed, with interest! So now you know. I don’t know how you figured it out Dell but you always seem to know just where to stick your nose, don’t you? Well. Kudos to you, but no one else is going to know!”
The sharp wooden blade in her hand struck directly at me, aimed for my heart. I had time enough to realize she was going to kill me, and only that.
The book saved my life.
I don’t even remember picking it up. It was there resting against my hand on the desk one moment and in the next I was holding it up like a shield and the letter opener struck it point-on. That would’ve been me, I thought to myself. That would’ve been me…
