First Light (11 page)

Katherine Bannerman's only motive, as near as I could tell, was boredom with her husband and her life.

Of course not all missing people disappear intentionally. In some cases some hunter's dog, years later, brings his master a bone that the hunter recognizes as human and which, after the authorities finish their investigations, finally answers the question of what happened to so-and-so.

Martha's Vineyard, with its wealthy and famous Summer People, has the same percentage of criminals as any other place, as the local cops, nurses, social workers, and lawyers can tell you. If you doubt it, just show up at the courthouse in Edgartown on a Thursday. Yeah, slimy things do crawl with legs on the Blessed Isle as well as upon the slimy sea.

The existence of snakes in Eden notwithstanding, murder is rare on the island, so it seemed unlikely to me that Katherine Bannerman had met with foul play. An accident, possibly, or some unexpected call back to the mainland that left her no time to inform friends or fellow workers, or some combination of both. Kathy hadn't been brought to the hospital, and if she'd been killed in an accident, her body would probably have been discovered long since. There are a hundred thousand people on the island during the summer, and it was hard to imagine all of them failing to see a body if there was one to be seen. Still, you never know. I once talked to a guy who'd been to Africa, and he'd said you could be ten feet from a pride of lions and never see them.

I drove to the police station, once the finest on the island but recently challenged for that honor by the new station in Vineyard Haven. The Chief was in his office.

He looked relaxed for a change, another sign that most of the tourists had gone home for the winter. As soon as he saw Joshua and Diana, he opened a drawer in his desk and brought out a package of Farley's gummy worms, the world's finest. He had
grandchildren about the same age as my children, and he knew how to be a kid's best friend.

Joshua and Diana both accepted his offer and said thank you.

“How about me?” I asked.

“Oh, all right.” He held out the package and I took a half dozen lovely, bright-colored gummies.

“Easy there!” The Chief yanked his gummies back, took a handful, and put the rest back in the drawer.

“Thank you, Chief.”

“You're welcome. What do you want? I know you want something, because you always do when you come in here. Say, would you kids like to have a tour of the building? Kit! Come in here a second.”

Kit Goulart, all six feet and 275 pounds of her, came in from the front desk. Kit and her husband were about the same size and looked like matched Percherons when they walked down the street together.

“What is it, Chief?”

“How'd you like to take these two tykes for a tour of the premises while I fend off their father, here.”

“Sounds like a deal.” She looked down at them and smiled a smile that would melt a tax collector's heart. “I'm Kit. I work here. Do you want to see the police station?”

They did, and the three of them went off. The Chief looked at me. “Well?”

“A woman named Katherine Bannerman disappeared from the island last year about this time. Her husband has hired me to try to find her. I wonder if you remember the case.”

He nodded. “Yeah. Some agents from some big PI outfit in Boston were down here looking for her. As far as I know they never found her. You should be talking with the Chilmark PD, because she lived up there.”

“I've read the report that Thornberry Security gave to the husband. There wasn't much in it that helps, but they seem to have done a pretty thorough job.”

“I'm not big on private eyes nosing around, but you're right. They seemed pretty good. The Chilmark PD put out a GBC, but nothing came of it.”

I nodded. A General Broadcast Call would have alerted all of the island police forces to be on the lookout for the missing woman.

“Later,” said the Chief, “they put out Kathy Bannerman's physical description on NCIC, in case she was on the mainland. Another zero. It's a big country, and if she wanted to disappear, she could be anywhere.” He tapped a finger on the papers he'd been working on when I'd come in. “You were a cop, so you know people go missing more often than most folks would think.”

I did know that. In the United States, thousands of people disappear every year, for one reason or another.

The Chief went on: “Usually the missing people turn up safe and sound, but we don't always learn that. During the last few years we've had a half dozen or so disappear off the island into thin air about Labor Day. I imagine most of them just went home and didn't tell whoever it was that got worried about them, and then we didn't get told, either. Unless
they've committed a crime or are suspected of being victims of a crime, the authorities don't really have a lot of reason to look for missing people.”

“And you don't have any ideas about where I might look for this one?”

He shrugged. “Try back home with her husband.”

“He says she's not there.”

Kit and the kids reappeared.

I got up. “Well, Chief, if you hear anything, let me know.”

“I will. You do the same. And don't do anything that might hamper an investigation.”

“You can trust me, Chief.”

“Sure I can.”

After we left the station, the kids and I had ice cream cones, and as we walked back to the truck, we passed a shop that had expensive-looking soaps and lotions in its windows. Feeling serendipitous, I took the kids inside and asked the woman behind the counter if she had Enchanté.

She not only had it, but she let me have a sniff. “Would you like to buy some?”

“I don't think it's my fragrance. Do you sell much of this?”

“Usually to women who are buying it for men.”

“Do the men use it?”

She smiled. “You'll have to ask the women.”

At home, filled to the brim, the tots were ready for naps. So was I, but I had a phone call to make first. So while they fell into those sweet swoons that the innocent enter so quickly, I got directory assistance for Storrs, Connecticut, and asked for the number of
Frances Bannerman. No problem, since it's a rare college freshman who doesn't have her own phone these days.

A feminine voice answered on the second ring, and I asked for Frankie.

“Who's calling, please?”

I told her my name and that I was calling from Martha's Vineyard. That got me a “just a minute” and, in less than that, another feminine voice. “This is Frankie Bannerman. Have you found my mother?”

“No, but we're looking. Maybe you can help.”

“Me? How? I haven't seen Mom for over a year.”

“Your father told me that he hasn't heard from her since she sent you a postcard from New York.”

There was a hint of a pause before she said, “That's right.”

“No mail ever came from her to the house again?”

“No.”

It was not too great a “no.” In fact it was too small.

“Here's what I know,” I said. “Your mom was writing to somebody, because she bought stamps here on the island. And she was getting mail from somebody because she had letters among the possessions that her landlady sent back to your father last fall. I also know that she loved you even if she had stopped loving your father, because she talked about you all the time.”

I paused and I heard her inhale sharply. But she didn't say anything, so I went on. “And here's what I think. I think she was writing to you last summer and that she probably sent the letters to you in care of your best friend. I don't know who the friend is, but I can find out if I need to, so don't deny anything if
I'm right. I think you wrote back to her, and that those were the letters that were among her possessions when they were sent back to your father. I think that you were home when the package arrived and that you opened it and took out the letters before your father got home.”

Her voice was faint. “How did you know that?”

“Because he would have mentioned the letters if he'd seen them, and he didn't. So you were writing to each other.”

“Yes. Mom didn't want Dad to know anything about where she was or what she was doing. She was deciding whether to leave him. My dad is a nerd. All he does is work.”

There are worse faults in a man, I thought, and soon enough she'd surely find out about them.

“But the letters stopped coming last August,” I said.

“Yes. She wrote the last one just before Labor Day. She used to write every week. When her letters stopped, I wrote to her, but I didn't hear from her anymore. I didn't know what to think. I didn't know what happened to her. Do you know? Tell me, if you do.”

“I don't know, but I'm trying to find out. I need information from you. Was she seeing anyone here on the island? A man, maybe? Someone she might have gone off with.”

“She said she was dating, but I can't remember any names. She wanted me to burn her letters so Dad wouldn't find them. I'm sorry now that I did.”

“Was there anybody in particular? Especially toward the end of the summer.”

“She never said anything that made me think she was going away with anybody, if that's what you mean.”

“Maybe just some guy she was dating and liked.”

“Well, in one of her last letters she said she was playing tennis with a guy. She must have liked him if she'd do that, because she'd never played tennis in her life and always said it was boring. I guess she really was playing, because there was a tennis racket in the box we got from that lady.”

“Elsie Cohen?”

“Maybe that was her name. I don't remember.”

“What did your mother say about this guy?”

“Just that she liked him and he was good-looking and he made her feel young. She got married right out of high school and never got a chance to be a single woman for a while first. She always told me not to make that mistake, and her letters made me think she was trying to make up for things that she missed because she married my clunky dad.”

“Think hard. Can you remember the man's name?”

“No. I don't think she ever told it to me.”

“Can you remember anything more she said about him? Looks or habits? Where they went, where they played tennis? Did they go dancing? Did they have a favorite place to eat? Anything.”

“I don't remember anything like that. They played tennis and had dinner and went to his beach, but I don't think she ever said where. I wish I'd never burned those letters.”

Amen to that, but it was spilled milk. “Did this man live on the island year-round?”

She paused for a minute. “I don't know. I don't think she ever said.”

“Does your father know about the letters?”

“No! She didn't want him to know. I've never told anyone. Oh, my gosh! Are you going to tell him?”

“I don't know yet, but I think you probably should. You may think he's a nerd, and he may be just that, but he loves you and he loves your mother as best he can.”

“He doesn't love anything but his work.”

“Does your father use a cologne called Enchanté?”

“Good grief, no. He only uses Old Spice. I should know. It's the only thing he ever wants for Christmas.”

She had given me a little, but I didn't think she had much more to offer. “I think you're wrong about your father only loving his work,” I said. “Let me give you my telephone number. I want you to call me if you think of anything that might help me.”

“Let me find a pen… . Okay.”

I gave her the number, promised to let her know if I learned anything, and rang off.

I was glad I wasn't eighteen anymore. Once was enough.

O
n Monday morning I drove Sarah's Range Rover to my meeting with the Isle of Dreams Development Corporation's lawyer in Oak Bluffs to hear their pitch for building a golf course on the Fairchild property. We were scheduled for ten o'clock, which was the precise time that I got there. His name was Lawrence McKenney, and he had a suite of offices on the second floor over a souvenir store.

I presented myself to McKenney's secretary, a roundish woman with white hair and a dark scowl. “They've been waiting for you, Mr. Coyne,” she said in the same tone of voice she might've used if she'd caught me stealing magazines from her reception area.

“They?” I said.

“Mr. McKenney and the Isle of Dreams people, of course.”

“Of course,” I said, although my understanding had been that this first, preliminary discussion would be just between us lawyers.

The secretary ushered me into a conference room. There was a big rectangular oak table with a dozen
chairs around it, and five of the chairs were occupied. Four men, one woman.

One of the occupants was Luis Martinez, the guy with the black mustache whom Eliza had been rubbing herself against the previous day.

I pointed at Martinez. “Get him out of here,” I said to no one in particular. If Phil Fredrickson, the other guy who Eliza had brought around to lobby me, had been there, I'd have kicked him out, too.

One of the other men stood up. “Mr. Martinez is—”

“Out of here,” I repeated. “Him or me.”

The man who had spoken had thinning reddish hair, pale skin, and large round glasses. I assumed he was Lawrence McKenney. He blinked at me for a moment, then nodded and turned to Martinez. “You better go,” he said.

Martinez looked at the others sitting around the table. All of them shrugged.

So he stood up, shoved his chair back so hard that it cracked against the wall, and came toward the door. When he got to me, he stopped, pushed his face close to mine, and whispered, “Bastard.”

Then he went through the door and slammed it behind him.

I looked around the room. “Gentlemen,” I said. “And lady,” I added, nodding at the woman, who was having trouble concealing her smile. “Let's talk.”