Elaine Orr - Jolie Gentil 04 - Any Port in a Storm (3 page)

The door to the store opened.
“Avast, ye beauties!”

“Put a cork in it,” I said to Scoobie.

“Is me lady offering wine?” he asked. “Hi Ramona.” He grinned at her and turned to me. “I figured you were here. I haven’t seen George run that fast since tenth grade.”

“I’ll be a laughingstock!”
I shouted.

“Shh,” Ramona said.

I looked around. “There aren’t any customers.”

A voice came from the stock room.
“But the owner is here.”

I rolled my eyes at Ramona and Scoobie.
“Sorry, Roland.” I looked back at the two of them. “How can I show my face around town after everybody sees that?”

“I think George mostly did it to fry Jennifer,” Ramona said as she walked back to the cash register.

“You know what Jennifer has, don’t you?” Scoobie asked.

“You mean the big
HMS Stenner
bean-bag board game in her office?” I asked.

“Yeah,” Scoobie said.
“Look closer at the poster.”

The poster was above my head, so I narrowed my eyes.
“I don’t see what you mean.”

“The ship,” they both said.

It said
HMS Steele.
I grinned at both of them. “You’re forgiven.”

“What about George?” Scoobie asked.

“Depends on what he does with the picture he just took,” I said.

GEORGE’S EDITOR exercises more discretion than he does, according to Ramona, who called after George stopped back by the store to glumly tell her he couldn’t use the photo of me about to yell at him.

“So, George doesn’t need to stay away from you?” Scoobie asked.
We were in Harvest for All unpacking several boxes of canned goods that Mr. Markle had sent over from the grocery store.

“He should if I have any sharp objects,” I grumbled.
“How does he even think of that stuff?”

“I don’t think it takes much thought,” Scoobie said, examining a can of succotash and making a face.
He had his knapsack on the counter and I was going to drop him at the community college when we were done.

The bell above the door that leads to the street jingled and Megan, my favorite volunteer, walked in.
She turned and shook out her umbrella on the sidewalk, closed it, and shut the door against the blowing rain.

“Hi, you two,” she said.
She looked pale, and she was wearing sunglasses, which I thought was odd on a rainy day.

I looked at Scoobie and back to Megan.
“Are you okay? You seem…tired or something.”

“I’m good.
I just couldn’t get to sleep last night.” She busied herself with taking the can of pencils and the sign-in sheet from under the counter and didn’t volunteer any other comments.

I turned back to Scoobie, and I could tell he kind of thought something was off with Megan, too.
I snuck a couple of looks at her as she started looking through the sacks on the counter. Megan is probably mid-thirties. She and Alicia live in an apartment not far from the church. While it is a safe area, it’s the kind of older, frame apartment that you only live in if you don’t have a lot of money. There’s no parking, but she doesn’t have a car.

“So,” I said to Scoobie, “did Mr.
Markle give us a donation for Talk Like a Pirate Day?”

Scoobie nodded to the boxes we were unpacking.
“This is it. Lance told me last week he thinks business isn’t so good for Mr. Markle.”

“Oh, dear,” Megan said, and we turned to look at her.
She flushed. “It’s the only grocery store you can walk to if you live in town.”

She had taken off her sunglasses and I could see she had been crying.
“What is it, Megan?” I asked.

She turned away.
“Nothing I can’t handle. Alicia is just…” She put her hands over her face and started to cry.

Scoobie got to her first.
“Hey, hey. We’re here.”

Megan pulled back and fished a tissue from her pocket.
“She didn’t come home right after school yesterday and stayed out until after supper.”

I exchanged a look with Scoobie and took Megan’s elbow to guide her to the small chair at the other end of the counter.
“How is she when she gets back home?” I asked.

“How is she?” Megan looked confused.

Scoobie squatted in front of her. “Does she act as if she was drinking, maybe?”

“Oh!
I don’t think so. I mean, I don’t smell anything,” she said.

He nodded.
“That’s good,” he said gently. “But you still want her home when you say. You aren’t telling her to stay in after dinner, are you?” He said this with a smile, and got half of one from Megan in return.

“No, of course not.
She’s not supposed to go out on school nights, but on weekends I tell her nine o’clock if they stay on the boardwalk near home.”

“Any new friends?” I asked.

“She’s a freshman, you know?” she said. “Since school started back she has so many new friends. I don’t know
any
of their parents.”

“You mean because kids at Ocean Alley High come from a couple of middle schools?” Scoobie asked.

“I guess these new kids are from the other school. One boy who walked her home last night looked older, but it was dusk and he didn’t walk her to the door.” Her eyes grew teary again. “And even if she’s with kids her own age, they hang out on the boardwalk, near the arcade, but I don’t know where they go after the arcade closes.”

I sat cross-legged in front of Megan.
“Scoobie and I used to do that,” I said.

At this she smiled, in spite of a tear rolling down her cheek.
“I know. Your Aunt Madge said she had everybody watching for you when you stayed out late.”

I grimaced.
Until just last year I thought she was asleep before I went out.

“Those were different times, though,” Scoobie said.
“Ocean Alley is pretty safe, but a fourteen-year-old shouldn’t be out late. Not enough other people on the streets after dark.”

Megan nodded.
“I talked to Reverend Jamison. He said maybe I should invite her to bring her friends home, but our apartment is so small…”

I said nothing.
I could tell she was talking to Scoobie, who had not been a model child when we were in high school. Of course his parents were horrible, and Megan isn’t.

“Are you worried about her being embarrassed, or you think she doesn’t want you so close?” Scoobie asked.

Megan shrugged. “Both, I guess.” She hesitated. “And I really can’t afford to feed them all.”

She looked at me and I nodded.
“I get all that. But maybe if you just had popcorn or something cheap, you’d at least be meeting her friends.”

“It makes it harder for the guys to tell her to ignore you,” Scoobie said.

She looked at Scoobie, almost timidly.
“Could you talk to her? She likes you.”

Should I be offended?
“Sure he can,” I said.

Scoobie gave me a look and turned to Megan.
“I’ll look for her and talk to her when it makes sense. Soon,” he added, as Megan looked less hopeful. “It won’t help if I hunt for her, or show up at your house. I see her some.”

“Wasn’t she on the beach, at the sand castle?” I asked Scoobie.

He nodded and explained to Megan when we had seen her. “They looked like they were just having fun,” he said.

I suddenly remembered the jean-clad person who had rushed out of the house I was appraising.
It really could be high school kids in the vacant houses.
I had a sudden idea. “Tell her we need Alicia and her friends to run one of the games for Talk Like a Pirate Day.”

“By themselves?” she asked.
“I don’t think…”

“That’s the point,” Scoobie said, quickly.
“It’ll be theirs, no adults telling them what to do.”

She still looked dubious, but nodded, and stood.
“Okay, I’ll ask. Get to work.” She made a shooing gesture to Scoobie, and he gave me a hand to pull me up from the floor.

I wiped my hands on my pants and started back to the shelves. “I was a real smart ass.
But my mom was the only parent who said kids could hang out at our house anytime.”

Megan looked up from where she had begun taking cans from one of the paper bags on the counter.

“We didn’t always hang out there, but she did get to meet my friends,” I continued.

“And did she like them?” Megan asked.

“I wouldn’t go that far.”

WEDNESDAY MORNING the streets were rain-soaked and there were piles of branches in front of a few houses, but Tropical Storm LeAnn had lost her wallop before she got to Ocean Alley. This was one of those years when it seemed the hurricanes were standing in line in the Atlantic and Caribbean Oceans, and another one was supposed to head up the coast by the end of the week. One weather forecaster said it looked as if the next one would stay more than fifty miles offshore, but the Weather Channel said it might be uncomfortably close by the end of the weekend.
Our pirate ships could get tossed around
.

As I drove by the in-town grocery store I saw Mr. Markle supervising a clerk who was sweeping up soil and the remnants of a couple of his large pots of flowers.
Even as I figured they must have tumbled over in the storm I realized they were awfully heavy to have been blown over.

Almost on a whim I turned into the grocery store parking lot.
Apparently too much of a whim because the car behind me honked long enough to knock a lifeguard off his perch. I gave him the universal sign of peace and love and parked not far from where the store clerk was sweeping.

“I should have known it was you,” Mr. Markle said, his dour expression in place.

“And you’re so glad to see me.”
I pointed to the smashed pots. “This is all from the storm?”

“No.” His response was terse.
“I drove over about midnight to make sure the power for the freezers had not gone out, and none of this was here.” He gestured to the now almost clean area near his feet.

“Why would anyone do this?” I asked.

He shrugged. “Been having trouble with more than the usual number of shoplifters. I chased a couple of younger ones out of the store a couple days ago.” He turned to walk back into the store. “My security cameras should show who did it.”

I looked around, and seeing no signs of cameras called after him.
“Where are they?”

He half turned to look at me.
“And I would tell you why?” He opened the door to the store and walked in.

Always a pleasure, Mr. Markle
. I left my car in the grocery store parking lot and headed for Java Jolt. From the boardwalk I could see that the waves were still choppier than normal. The owner of a small knick-knack shop was taking boards off of his windows, much to the amusement of the guy who owns the salt water taffy store.

“Hey, Jolie,” the salt water taffy guy called.

What is his name?

“No salt water in your taffy?” I called back.

“I told Sam it wasn’t goin’ to amount to anything,” he said, and ambled over to help the knick knack store owner take down the boards.

It was warm but there was enough of a breeze that I wasn’t hot in my business attire — not that it’s formal.
Capris and a shirt with a collar are about as formal as I get in the summer. I did have my light brown, shoulder length hair pulled back in a scrunchie. As breezy as it still was, I knew it would be hot and humid later.

“Morning, Jolie,” said Joe Regan as I entered the coffee shop.
“The usual?”

I stuck out my tongue.
“You know I’m trying to avoid the chocolate chip muffins.” I tossed money into the sugar bowl on the counter. “How about your house special, half that and half decaf?”

“That’s gross,” he said amiably, slightly shaking his head.

“I can’t do strong stuff all day anymore.” I gazed at the glass-covered case that has cookies and muffins, and stuck to my goal of not eating a muffin at Java Jolt if I’d had one at the Cozy Corner in the morning.

The door to the shop opened as Joe handed me my coffee and there was an ear-splitting whistle.
I jumped and swore as the mug hit the floor and splintered.

There were two seconds of total silence, and I turned toward the door.
I don’t think I’ve ever seen Lester Argrow look anything but confident, cocky even. Until now. With the other customers, Joe, and me glaring at him, he looked like a kid caught soaping a window on Halloween.

“Mop’s in the back closet, Lester,” Joe said.

“Jeez, Joe. I’m sorry. I’ll get it, all of it.”

I stooped
to pick up mug fragments. “Uh-uh, Jolie,” Joe said. “That’s for Lester.” He grinned at me, though I thought I saw a glint of Irish temper in the look he then tossed over his shoulder, toward Lester.

“Lester, you’re lucky I’m not wearing good shoes,” I said, looking at my sandals.

“Lucky the glass didn’t get your toes,” Joe said, handing me another mug of coffee.

I went over to one of the two open-access computers Joe keeps on the counter that runs along one wall of Java Jolt.
The stools are hard, but it beats the library, with four kids always in line behind me. Aunt Madge still doesn’t have Internet in the Cozy Corner. She says it’s so that people can “take a break from technology.” I say it’s so she doesn’t have people complain about problems getting on line.

“You missed some pieces,” Joe said.

I glanced up in time to see Lester scowl and start to reply, but then he looked at the elderly couple at a table in the middle of the room and apparently thought better of his choice of words. No email for me except ads and a note from my mother asking if the storm had been bad. I answered her and went to sit at a table near the front to wait for Lester.

“Coffee’s on the house, Lester.” Joe handed Lester a mug.
“Just hold on tight.”

“You really got the smart-ass stuff down good, Joe.”

Lester is about five-foot six and he often chews on an unlit cigar. His small office is above First Bank and he meets most of his customers in the Burger King, where he says there is better parking. I think it’s so he doesn’t have to tidy his office, which also reeks of cigars. Although he is Ramona’s uncle, he’s only about ten years older than we are.

“I heard you been in a couple of the houses where kids or somebody’s been hanging out,” Lester said, adding six packs of sugar to his coffee.

“Yep. You know how often it happens?” I asked.

“Couple times a week now.
Don’t make a lot of sense. There’s places kids can hang out.”

“There were a couple ash trays at the house on Seashore,” I said.
“They’re probably too young to be smoking.”

“
Humph. There’s a good spot behind the library.”

“And you know this how, Lester?” Joe asked.

Lester shrugged.
“I didn’t have an office in high school,” he said, not looking at Joe. Lester leaned across the table. “Listen, Jolie, I think this needs investigating.”

I swallowed a sip of coffee too fast and heard Joe turn his snort into a cough.
“How many times do I have to tell you? I don’t investigate things.” I said. “I just…check out things that don’t make sense.”

“You and me, we work good together.
Like after you found the skeleton.”

“Don’t remind me.
Anyway, Sgt. Morehouse said if all of us report it any time we see signs of someone being in a vacant place the police will have a better chance to catch them.”

Lester’s look said what he thought about Morehouse’s efforts.
“I can get a key to any of the houses,” Lester said. “We could make a list of where there’s been…”

“No Lester.
I’m minding my own business.”

He lowered his voice.
“Yeah, Ramona told me you’re learning to do that. And going to those meetings, too.”

This seemed to pique Joe’s interest, so I lowered my voice.
“Did Ramona mention those meetings are called anonymous for a reason?”

He waved a hand dismissively.
“You don’t have, like, a problem.”

“I go to the family group meetings,” I said.
“And it’s not about problems, it’s about finding your own solutions.” I was annoyed with Ramona for telling Lester that I went to All-Anon.

“Whatever.”
He pulled a wrinkled piece of paper from the pocket of his shirt. “Here, this is a list of all the places I’ve heard of.”

“Lester!”
It came out as a hiss. “Do I have to leave?”

“All right, all right.
But I gotta tell you, I’m disappointed in you, Jolie.”

I kept myself from telling him how little that mattered, and we talked about a couple houses he thought he was about to write sales contracts for.

As I stood to leave he tossed something about the size of a spool of thread, and I caught it.
The whistle had a tiny pirate hat and on it was written, “Argrow Realty - #1 in Ocean Alley.”

“Are you number one?” I asked, surprised.

“Like someone who gets a free whistle will care,” he said.

I HAD FINISHED THE THIRD OF THE four houses I had to appraise in three days. While that’s a manageable workload in a normal week it was not going to be easy to get it all done with Talk Like a Pirate Day coming up on Saturday. On top of that it was hot, probably the last real spate of summer weather, and vacant houses don’t have the air conditioning on.

The house I had just finished examining was in the popsicle district, a neighborhood with many bright-colored houses, and had been extensively remodeled.
I thought it was overpriced by a lot, and noted it was Lester’s sale. He advertises in some high-end magazines, so he gets Manhattanites who don’t recognize they are overpaying. I didn’t look forward to telling him the appraisal wouldn’t support his price.

My phone chirped and I glanced at caller ID.
George Winters. I pushed the speaker button.

“Shiver me timbers!
Is this the Jolie Gentil lass?”

“Do you want me to hang up, George?”

“I need to talk to you,” he said.

“I don’t think so,” I countered.

“I mean, like really. It’s about the houses.”

He knew he had me.
“What did you find out?” I had arrived at Harry Steele’s and put the car into park.

“I made a map of the locations that I know of.
Where can we meet?”

I looked at the clock on my dashboard.
It was two-thirty. “I need about an hour to enter some stuff in the computer at Harry’s. I’ll meet you at Newhart’s after that. You’re buying.” I hung up. It never hurts to let George know I have a lot more to do than talk to him.

You just told Lester no.
Why did you tell George yes? I ignored my own question.

I collected the folder that had my measurements of the house I’d just been to and walked into Harry’s house.

“Ahoy, Jolie.”

I dropped the folder.
Aunt Madge was sitting in one of Harry’s office chairs.

“Whoa.
Am I in the wrong house?” I looked for Harry as I picked up the folder, but he wasn’t in our joint office.

She smiled serenely.
“Harry and I have a date for a milkshake.” She knew this was the first time she had said the word ‘date’ in reference to Harry, and she was enjoying the look on my face too much.

“Did you want company on your date?” I asked.

“That’s a definite no thank you.” Harry had walked in.

Aunt Madge stood.
“We’re going to walk into Newhart’s holding hands.”

“That’ll be a scandal,” I said, and as soon as they left I called George and told him to meet me at Java Jolt instead.
There’s only so much I can deal with when it comes to Aunt Madge’s blossoming love life.

GEORGE HAD SPREAD one of the small tourist maps on the table in front of us and I was trying not to spill my iced tea on it. Joe Regan had made a point to bring me my iced tea instead of me fetching it from him, and George had covered the map with his hand. Joe was now half-sulking behind his counter.

George jabbed a spot on the map.
“A red X means a real estate agent found something left behind, like a beer can. A blue X means they think someone was there because the toilet paper is gone or a screen is torn, but nothing was left.”

“How could they be getting in so many places?” I mused.

George shrugged.
“If a house doesn’t have an alarm it’s not that hard, not for the beach cottages anyway. Most of them were built long before people thought much about security.”

I looked at the map again.
The locations were all within walking distance of the center of town. Some would be a longer walk than others, but none were in any of the neighborhoods just off the highway that leads into town. “Looks like they probably don’t have a car,” I said.

“Likely kids.
Could be some of the homeless group that sleeps on the beach on the far edge of town. I could ask Josh and Max. I think they’re still in town,” George said.

I nodded slowly.
Josh plays bongo drums on the boardwalk and Max is his sidekick. In truth, Josh is almost Max’s caregiver, and Max will tell anyone that Josh is an Army vet. I thought them more likely to talk to Scoobie than George, but held my tongue.