A Tine to Live, a Tine to Die Page 14

  She filled her plate and began to eat, as did Lucinda. A seagull landed on the blanket next to theirs, vacated a minute earlier by a woman and a little girl who had headed hand in hand toward the boardwalk along the river’s edge. The bird tugged at an open bag of chips with its beak until a chip fell out. It pecked at it and then flew off, chip secured. Lucinda reached over and flipped a corner of the blanket over the bag.

  “You see why seagulls are so fat around here,” a male voice said.

  Cam twisted her head to look up. Wes Ames stood there. “Hey, Wes.” Cam looked around. “Where’s Felicity?”

  He pointed to the other side of the crowd. “Her sister is visiting, and they’re chatting up a storm. I’m just stretching my legs before the music starts. Hi, Lucinda.” Wes squatted down. “The band is supposed to be good.”

  Lucinda nodded with her mouth full. She chewed and swallowed before she spoke. “They’re fabuloso. You know, really good.”

  Wes stood. “I’ll let you ladies eat in peace. Enjoy the concert.”

  “Hang on a minute, Wes.” Cam drained her cup and set her plate down. “I’ll walk with you. I need to go find the facilities before the music gets going. Back in a flash, Lucinda.”

  Lucinda, taking another bite, waved them on.

  As they walked, Cam said to Wes, “Can you tell me any more about what Detective Pappas asked you this morning, Wes?” The question came out way more bluntly than she’d intended, but it was too late to take it back. She despaired of ever learning the smooth dance of communication, which everyone else seemed to have mastered.

  Wes looked straight ahead. Furrows creased his brow. “He asked us if we’d seen Lucinda leave. He wanted to know if she’d come back to the festival later or if she’d called us.” He walked a few more paces, then burst out, “I hate it when the pigs come to the house. The cops lost my respect in the sixties and never earned it back.”

  Cam raised her eyebrows but kept her mouth shut. He was just an old hippie like her parents. Except then they’d become itinerant academics. She realized she didn’t know Wes’s profession, but now wasn’t the time to ask. She strolled in silence next to him. They walked slowly, weaving through locals out for a summer evening, dads pushing strollers, teenagers hanging on each other.

  “I told him we hadn’t seen her. I barely know Lucinda, you realize.” Wes looked over at Cam. “Was she involved with the murder? Pappas seemed pretty suspicious of her.”

  “She wouldn’t kill someone. I’m sure of that.” Cam shook her head, then caught a wave of dizziness from having chugged her cup of wine. She took a deep breath to steady herself.

  Wes kept his silence.

  “Lucinda has been acting a little strange lately,” Cam said, hoping to draw him out.

  “I heard an interesting tidbit. Our neighbor saw a story about the murder on the news, and he said Mike was tight with that anti-immigrant group.”

  “I know. Lucinda actually told me that. Think that’s why Pappas suspects her? That the militia was going to turn her in?”

  Wes shrugged. “I couldn’t say. Why don’t you just ask the detective?”

  Cam laughed. “Oh, that’s way too obvious. But, anyway, I doubt he’s going to tell me about his thought process.”

  Wes agreed. The walkway split, and Cam said good-bye as she followed the left branch to the portable johns the city had set up.

  “See you next week,” Wes called.

  Cam answered with a wave. She stood in line for the toilets behind two teenage girls who must have bought out the makeup aisle at the drugstore. Cam glanced to her left. The setting sun lit up the river so it looked like God had poured rose-colored dye into it. Cam’s thoughts were not on the natural beauty of the Merrimack, though. Somewhere in the universe was the person who had slammed Cam’s pitchfork into Mike’s neck. Cam wondered if she was deluding herself, thinking she could find a murderer. Maybe she should just let the police do their work.

  Cam and Lucinda joined the rest of the audience on their feet during the last of several encore tunes. It was toe-tapping music, and lots of people danced. But the concert had been too loud for Cam to get a chance to ask Lucinda about the night before. When the song was over, Cam packed up the corkscrew and the now-empty bottle and cups.

  As Lucinda stuffed the bedspread into her bag, she said, “I’m gonna go meet Jorge, the drummer. Want to come out with us for a drink?”

  Cam checked her watch and groaned. “It’s already ten thirty, Lucinda. I’m a farmer, remember? I need to get home. But I wanted to ask you a question before you go.”

  Lucinda gazed at the stage. She twiddled one long silver earring between her fingers in a fast little movement. “What is it?”

  “Why did you cut out so suddenly during the dance last night? It looked like David Kosloski spoke to you and then you split. What did he say?”

  “Oh, nothing. It was just about working for him.” Lucinda didn’t look at Cam.

  “Really? It looked like you were upset by what he said.”

  Lucinda turned to Cam. Her eyes flashed. “Listen. You’re very nice. But you’ve never been in trouble. You don’t understand. Just leave it alone. Okay?” She gestured into the air with one hand.

  “Did it have anything to do with Mike’s murder? I need to know, Lucinda. It’s been a week since he died. The police don’t seem to be doing anything.”

  “Oh, they’re doing something. Harassing me is what they’re doing. I think they’re following me. And you know why I was late this morning?” Lucinda stuck her hands on her hips and glared at Cam. “They came and searched my apartment. Had a warrant and everything. I told them they wouldn’t find nothing. In fact, I left them there, told them I had to get to the farm.”

  “Lucinda. You could have told me.”

  “Ellie was there this morning. I didn’t want to get into it. I don’t know what they were looking for, but I know I’m clean. I didn’t kill Mike Montgomery, Cam. But they’d rather blame it on an immigrant than find out the truth.”

  “Pappas did say last night he thought they might be getting close. But every day that goes by, the killer is still out there. It’s starting to spook my customers, and, well, funny stuff has been happening on the farm. It makes me uneasy.”

  “What kind of funny stuff?” Lucinda’s angry look dropped away, and the glare was replaced by a look of intense curiosity.

  Cam told her about the rhubarb and the arugula. “And I found this weird flashlight thing in the woods. Actually, Ellie found it. It turned out to be an infrared flashlight. You can only see the light from it if you’re wearing night goggles. Who would be wearing night goggles on my property? And why?”

  “Has to be that militia. Isn’t that the kind of thing they do? They go around pretending they’re at war. Mike could have dropped it.”

  “On my farm? But why? He worked there. He didn’t have to skulk around at night.” Cam took a deep breath. “It all makes my head swirl. Listen, I’d better get going. Go find your friend. I’ll see you in a couple of days.”

  Lucinda nodded. “I’ll come help you harvest for the market Tuesday.”

  “Sounds good.” She watched Lucinda make her way toward the stage. Cam headed along the paved path toward her truck. The crowd had already thinned out, with parents taking tired children home and senior citizens boarding the van back to their assisted living residence. The younger adults wandered in the direction of the several bars in town.

  As Cam rounded the corner of the Firehouse, she heard raised voices. She stopped still. Two figures faced each other under a tree. The direct illumination from the streetlight didn’t reach under the canopy of leaves, so Cam couldn’t see who they were, but she thought she recognized one of the voices. It sounded like Frank Jackson. She stepped quickly behind an enclosure that had to house a trash Dumpster. Cam was fine with the smell of rotting vegetables, but the acrid tang of a chemical cleaning solution made her feel sick.

  She pressed her back against the r
ough pickets of the stockade-fence enclosure and stuck her head out only far enough to be able to hear.

  “Hush. You can’t go around shouting like a crazy person,” one of them whispered in a harsh tone.

  Cam’s arms grew a crop of goose bumps. Her eyes, adjusting to the dark, could now make out the other person’s shape. It was tall and thin. Her eyes widened. A ponytail was silhouetted against a bit of light from across the street. It could belong only to Frank Jackson. What was Ruth’s husband doing out here arguing with a woman?

  “I just think it’s time to take action,” the man returned. “Why are we still messing around with plans, with surveillance?”

  Yup, Frank’s voice. He spoke with the kind of heavy local accent the mayor of Boston had. But who was he talking to?

  “We have to be careful, Frank,” the whispered voice said. “We have a plan everybody agreed on. Now, let’s stick to it.”

  Frank shook his head. As Cam saw him turn toward her, she was horrified to feel a sneeze coming on. She made a quick decision. Stepping out from around the enclosure, she sneezed out loud and kept walking toward them as if she’d never stopped. She would never know what their plan was, but it was better than being caught snooping. She struggled to keep the surprise from her face when she saw the whisperer was Bev Montgomery.

  “Hey, Frank. How’s it going?” Cam kept her voice calm, level. “Hey, Bev.”

  “What are you doing here, Cam?” Frank’s voice wasn’t so calm.

  Cam was about to respond when the Bev spoke.

  “I’ll bet she likes Cajun music, right, Cameron?” Bev mustered a smile.

  “Wasn’t it a great concert?”

  Bev nodded. “If you like that kind of music,” she added.

  “You don’t?” Cam asked.

  “Not to speak of. I was just passing by.” Bev looked at her wrist. “Getting late. I’m surprised you’re not home, getting your beauty sleep, Cam. Or figuring out what to plant next. Say, do you succession plant greens? You know, like arugula?” She cocked her head at Cam.

  Cam returned her gaze. Was this a message or an innocent question from a colleague? “I replant every two weeks. You?”

  Bev turned away. “You think I grow those fancy greens?” She shook her head and made a sound like “sshhee.” “I grow the traditional New England crops,” she said, facing Cam again. “My customers don’t want anything else.”

  Cam shot a glance at Frank. His hands stuffed in his pockets, he jiggled his right leg, looking away at the street.

  “Well, have a nice night. See you at the market, Bev.” Cam squeezed past them on the path, since neither had moved. “Say hi to Ruthie, Frank.”

  Bev kept her silence. Frank grunted.

  After she’d walked a few yards, Cam glanced back. The two seemed to have resumed their quarrel. When Frank looked her way, Cam continued her brisk walk, hoping she’d played the innocent in a convincing fashion. So Bev thought growing varied greens was a fashion trend. Fine. Let her. Cam’s customers loved her mesclun salad mix. But Frank? Cam worried for Ruth’s and her daughters’ safety.

  Chapter 13

  Cam was up with the birds the next morning. She took a moment to trim fresh ends on the carnations and top up the water. That ladybug on the side was a clever touch, dressing up the metal bucket into a vase. She still couldn’t figure out who had left them. She stood with hands on hips for a moment, wondering if she should worry about random flowers being delivered to her house, and then snorted at her own paranoia. How dangerous could a bunch of dianthuses be? It was probably just a misdelivered gift meant for some lucky recipient down the road, although she thought florists usually affixed their own card to a delivery.

  She downed toast and coffee and strode out to the barn. A quick storm had blasted through the stalled front overnight and had shoved it out to sea. The air smelled fresh, and objects stood out with a clarity that seemed to match Cam’s brain. The heavy thoughts of suspicion and worry from the week had lifted with the barometric pressure.

  “It’s probably temporary,” Cam told Preston as he trotted along beside her. “The murder isn’t solved, after all. But I’m glad to feel a little lighter this morning.”

  Preston stopped, sniffed the air with perked ears, and sped off into the middle of the flower garden.

  Cam spent the next several hours weeding, planting, raking, doing the work of a farmer. She purposely did not think about anything except her labors.

  Glancing at the angle of the sun, Cam pulled her cell phone out of her back pocket. Yup, eleven o’clock. Replacing it, she paused for a moment at the now wilting memorial to Mike. Rain had streaked Alexandra’s drawing despite its clear plastic cover, and the flowers were past their prime. Cam’s mood darkened again as she turned on the hose next to the hoop house and spent half an hour watering and tending the trays of starts. The lettuces, a tray each of red looseleaf, pale green butterhead, variegated summer crisp, deep green romaine, and rusty oakleaf, looked healthy for the most part, their fourth pair of true leaves already forming. Cam frowned at the tray of broccoli for the fall crop. The leaves looked too pale, and most of the seedlings weren’t as big as they should be. There must be an imbalance in the starting mix, which occasionally happened. She measured nitrogen-rich fish emulsion into a watering can, filled it with water, and hand-fed the seedlings.

  Cam turned off the hose. She sniffed. Fire. There was a fire somewhere. A chill ran through her. She scanned the horizon. Sure enough, smoke arose toward the south. Her throat thickened with the old panic. A vision of her ever-absent mother sprang into her mind. She worried the hem of her shorts with her right hand as she had her rag of a blanket when she was six.

  A resident of the semirural community could be burning brush in their back field. Or maybe a house had caught on fire. Maybe a house with a small girl in it. She shuddered. No sirens kicked in, though. No flashing lights sped by on the road.

  Cam took a deep breath. She told herself once again to get a grip. She headed toward the house for lunch and had her hand on the back door when her cell rang. She checked the display. Pressing SEND, Cam said, “Hey, Ruthie. What’s up?”

  “How about that walk on the beach this afternoon? I’m off, and Frank’s taking the girls to the new Muppet movie.”

  “Love to,” Cam said. “Plum Island? Want me to pick you up on the way?”

  They agreed on meeting at two o’clock, and Cam disconnected. She had just enough time to pick Sunday strawberries for Jake. She scarfed down a quick peanut-butter sandwich. Ten minutes later she was kneeling in the strawberry patch. Luckily, the season was turning out to be a good one, with the sizable patch yielding early and often. She knew Albert and Marie had had years when either the temperatures or the weather left them with pitiful picking.

  The call from Ruth brought Frank to mind. The vision of him, both last night and at the festival, kept rerunning on the screen of her mind. He unsettled Cam. He had to be in the militia. And now it looked like Bev might be, too. They had talked about a plan. Frank wanted to move forward, to take action. Bev wanted to stick to what they had apparently agreed on as a group. Cam resolved to get the story from Ruth. If she even knew about it.

  Waves crashed against the steep cant of the beach. Ruth and Cam trudged barefoot along the water’s edge. Cam’s knit skirt blew around her knees in the ocean breeze, and Ruth had rolled her pants up. Two children ran screaming with delight across their path, and a football soared overhead and then splashed in the water. On a sunny Sunday in June, after the long New England winter and cool spring, everyone wanted to be on the beach, although the water temperature was still frigid by Cam’s standards.

  “Sit for a minute?” Ruth said after they’d walked for half an hour.

  “Sure.” Cam trudged up the dry sand until she stood next to the bluff with its scrawny sea grass that looked like an old man’s hair. She plopped down, her eyes on the Atlantic. A tern circled and then dive-bombed its prey, coming up with a fish wriggling
for its life clamped in the narrow beak. Cam leaned back on her elbows and sighed.

  Ruth sat a couple feet away from Cam, pulling up her knees and wrapping her arms around them. “Sounds like the world’s on your shoulders.” She peered at Cam’s face under her blue hat.

  “Wouldn’t you feel burdened if a man had been killed on your property and the killer was still out there walking around?”

  “I’m in the business, remember? Some murders get solved. Some don’t.”

  “Can you at least tell me what’s happening? Is Pappas getting anywhere?” Cam cleared her throat when she heard how whiny her voice sounded.

  “They’re not really telling me much. I’m back to the work of Westbury’s finest. You know, speed traps, checking lapsed inspection stickers, doing the D.A.R.E. program at the Page School. Really exciting police work.” Ruth removed her sun visor, wiped her forehead, and replaced it.

  “I guess I’ll have to give our esteemed detective a call and see if he’ll tell me anything.” Cam shoved her toes into the dry sand and wiggled them in the warmth, soaking up the summery feeling. “So I saw Frank last night.”

  “Yeah, he was out.” Ruth watched a seagull trying to drag lunch out of an abandoned knapsack. “Where’d you see him?”

  “Near the Firehouse. I went to the outdoor concert with Lucinda. Frank was talking with Bev Montgomery. It sounded like they were arguing about some plan. Why would they be arguing?”

  It was Ruth’s turn to sigh. “You don’t really want to know.”

  “I do. Does it have to do with the tattoo on his arm?”

  Ruth nodded without meeting Cam’s eyes. “He’s gotten deeper and deeper into the Patriotic Militia. I think it’s awful.” She turned to Cam. “They’re nut jobs, all of them. But it’s not illegal.” She spread her hands. “Until they carry out an illegal action, that is.”