First Light (13 page)

“Thanks for your time. You've been helpful.”

“I don't see how.”

My smile was at least as real as his. “I know more than I did before,” I said.

I had time for one more stop before heading home so Zee could go to work. I drove to Oak Bluffs and parked off Kennebeck Street behind the Fireside Bar. I knocked on the back door, and Bonzo opened it. He was holding a push broom, and he smiled his wide vacant smile when he saw me. “J.W.! What a nice surprise!”

Long before I knew him, Bonzo had been a very promising young man. Unfortunately, he had gotten hold of some bad acid and thereafter had become a
kind, mindless, cheerful fellow whose greatest pleasures were fishing and watching birds, and whose dim thoughts prevented him from doing work more complicated than sweeping floors and wiping tables. He lived with his adoring mother, who had taught forever in the island schools and who cared for him like the large child that he was. Still, though Bonzo was missing some of his original parts, you could never be sure what he'd remember and what he wouldn't. For instance, he remembered every bird he'd ever photographed and every fish he ever caught.

“I'd like to talk to you, Bonzo.”

Bonzo leaned on his broom, smiled, and considered this proposition. Then he frowned and said, “I'm working right now, J.W. Won't be long before we open for lunch, and the place has to be clean, and I have to do it.” He blinked at me.

“It'll only take a minute, Bonzo.”

“Oh, okay. Let's talk. It's been a while since you been in for a beer, J.W.”

“I'm a married man, Bonzo. I stay at home these days, instead of going out on the town.”

He nodded. “I know. You're married to Zee. It's good that you got married, J.W. Especially to Zee. Zee is a nice lady.”

I showed him the photograph of Kathy Banner-man. “Last year this woman was on the island. You ever see her in the Fireside?”

He studied the picture, then nodded. “Gee,” he said. “Last year. That was a long time ago, J.W, but yeah, I seen her here a few times.”

“Did you ever see her with Shrink Williams?”

He smiled his biggest smile. “Sure I did. They was here, and then afterward she was here with the man that the doctor didn't like her to be with. She's pretty, J.W., and nice, too. She gave me a dollar every time she was here.”

“Who was the other man?”

He gave an elaborate shrug. “Gosh, I don't know everybody, you know. Especially in the summer when this place is full of those tourists and college kids. He's a man I don't know is all I can tell you.”

“Has he been back since you saw him with her?”

Bonzo stared through a fog toward his memories, then nodded. “Yeah, he comes in sometimes. I seen him this summer sometimes. In the evening, after dinner.”

“But you don't know his name?”

“His name?” Bonzo shook his head. “I don't know his name. We get a lot of people that come in here, and I don't know the names of most of them. Only the people who are here year-round. I know some of their names. The regulars, you know what I mean?”

“I know what you mean, Bonzo. What does this man look like? Can you describe him?”

But that was too much for him. “He's just ordinary, like everybody else.”

I tried for some details but didn't get any. The man wasn't tall, short, dark, blond, clean-shaven, or bearded. His hair wasn't long or short, his eyes could have been blue or brown, and there was nothing unusual about his clothes, his behavior, or his spending habits.

He was ordinary.

But he was still around. Not a regular, but still around. “When does he come in, Bonzo? Any particular time?”

“In the evening sometimes, like I told you, J.W. Don't you remember me telling you that?”

“I remember now, Bonzo. If he comes in again, will you telephone me? I'd like to meet him.”

“Telephone you? Sure. Your number's in the book. I can do that. You want me to tell him to wait for you?”

“No, just phone me. What did you mean when you said that Dr. Williams didn't like Kathy to be with the man?”

“Well, he didn't like it. I'm not dumb. I can tell things.”

“How do you know? Did they have an argument?”

He drew himself up. “No, they didn't do anything like that. Dr. Williams never does that. What he does is, he comes in after the women and the other men and watches them from across the room. That's what I mean. He watches and he watches and he looks funny and almost never drinks his beer, and when they leave he waits and leaves too. He always does that. He did that with this lady in the picture, and he always does it.”

Stop. Rewind. “What do you mean, Bonzo? You mean Shrink Williams has done that other times? Not just with this woman?”

He looked pleased. “You got it, J.W. You're smart, just like me. He does it all the time. He brings them ladies here himself, then later when they come in with other men, he follows them in and he follows
them out, but he never says nothing to them at all. He just watches them. You want to know something else?”

“Sure.”

“He never leaves a tip. He's a doctor, and doctors make lots of money, but he never leaves a tip. Never at all. That's why I always remember him. Otherwise, he's just ordinary. You know what I mean?” Then he brightened. “Say, J.W., I bet you're looking for the woman in that picture!”

“That's right, Bonzo.”

He clapped his hands. “I knew it when I saw you with that man.”

“What man?”

“That man you was talking with here the other morning. I remember him from before. He's been looking for her, too.”

“Yes. She's his wife. He said he'd been on the island several times this summer, trying to find her.”

Bonzo nodded. “That's right. And last year, too, just before Labor Day. I remember, because it was right when the bluefish came back. He was looking for her then, too.”

That was news I hadn't gotten from either Banner-man or Thornberry's report.

I drove home thinking about the implications.

I
was awakened by a hand on my shoulder. I blinked my eyes open. It was Eliza. She was wearing sunglasses and a slinky belted lavender wrap that stopped around mid-thigh. She held a mug of coffee in her hand.

“What's with the shades?” I said.

“Part of the ensemble,” she said. “What do you think?” She posed for me with a hand on her hip.

“Yeah,” I said. “It works for me. But you didn't knock and inquire if I was decent.”

“I already know that you're altogether too decent,” she said. “And I did knock. You didn't answer.”

“A bit sleep-deprived,” I said. “Fishing and whatnot.”

“If you ask me,” she said, “too much fishing and nowhere near enough whatnot.” She put the coffee mug on the table beside the bed.

I hitched myself into a sitting position and picked up the mug. I took a sip and felt the life force begin to surge through my arteries. “Thank you,” I said.

She sat at the foot of my bed. “So how's it going?”

“No keepers,” I said. “I hooked something big a couple nights ago out to Cape Pogue Gut, but he bit me off. Got a nice striper at Squibnocket, but it was a few inches short. Couple small bluefish.”

She smiled. “I didn't mean the fishing.”

“If you meant the disposal of your mother's property, I've told you. Don't ask.”

“Today's Tuesday. You're meeting with the nature freaks today, right?”

I smiled. “Yes. The Marshall Lea Foundation.”

“They don't have any money.”

“Eliza—”

She squeezed my foot through the blanket. “I'm sorry. I'll stay out of it.”

I took another sip of coffee. “So how's Sarah doing?”

Eliza shook her head. “She's sleeping more and more. When she's awake, she's in pain. It's getting worse. And to top it off, her beloved nurse didn't show up yesterday.”

I stopped my coffee mug halfway to my mouth. “Molly Wood? She didn't?”

Eliza smirked. “So you noticed Mrs. Wood, huh?”

I shrugged. “I met her on her way out a couple days ago. What do you mean, she didn't show up?”

“Another nurse came. An older woman. Mother didn't like her, refused to let her give her a sponge bath, insisted I get the Wood woman back. I called the Visiting Nurse office. They wouldn't tell me much, but I inferred that she just didn't check in that morning. I asked them what was wrong, and they hemmed and
hawed, which led me to believe that they didn't know. I suppose she's sick. They assured me they'd have her back today.”

I tried to make a chronology out of it. On Sunday afternoon, I'd met Molly Wood on her way out from tending Sarah. That evening, Molly had eaten supper with me at the Jacksons' house. We'd parted around eight. Sometime later that evening she'd called the Navigator Room and reserved a table for two for the following evening. The next morning, Monday, she didn't check in for work at the Visiting Nurse office, and she'd failed to keep her appointment with Sarah that day. Monday evening she did not show up at the Navigator Room. Now it was Tuesday.

Maybe Zee was right. Maybe she should be worried.

If something had happened to Molly, as Zee suspected, it had happened Sunday night or early Monday morning, sometime between the time she and I parted at the Jacksons' house and the time she was supposed to check in for work.

“I'm going to get up now,” I said to Eliza.

She smiled. “Go right ahead.”

“I'm not, um, decent.”

She shrugged, got off the bed, and started for the door.

“Eliza, wait,” I said.

She stopped. “What?”

“Come here.” I held out my hand. “Please.”

She smiled, came over beside me, and took my hand.

“Bend down here,” I said.

She leaned over until her mouth was nearly touching mine.

I reached up and plucked off her sunglasses.

“Hey!” she said.

The flesh surrounding her left eye was several shades of purple, green, and yellow.

“What happened?” I said.

She shook her head. “Nothing. I bumped into something.”

“What's his name?”

“It's personal, Brady. Okay?”

“Not if his name is Martinez or Fredrickson, it's not.”

“Please,” she said. “It's my problem. It's got nothing to do with you.”

“Somebody hits a woman,” I said, “it's got everything to do with me. I'm a lawyer, an officer of the court, and battering women is against the law.”

She laid the palm of her hand on my cheek, peered into my eyes for a moment, then bent and kissed me softly on the lips. “I'm okay,” she said. “Everything's under control. Okay?”

“You shouldn't let him get away with this.”

She stood up and tugged on the belt of her robe. “I can handle it,” she said. Then she turned and left the room.

When I got downstairs, I took my coffee out to the sunporch. Sarah was wrapped from chin to toe in a crocheted afghan. She was watching some talk show on the television.

I bent down, kissed her cheek, then pulled up a chair beside her. “Thought I'd fill you in,” I said.

She nodded and muted the TV with the remote in her lap.

I told her about my meeting with the golf-course developers, my impressions of their operation, how I'd conveyed her conditions to them, and what they'd offered for the property. I added that I had a meeting with the Marshall Lea Foundation later in the morning, where I expected to get a better handle on their intentions.

“That's just fine, Brady,” Sarah said. “You handle it.”

“I am,” I said, “but it's your decision.”

“Insofar as I am capable of a rational decision,” she said.

I slid my chair around in front of her so that I was looking into her face. Her mouth was tight and her forehead and eyes were pinched. “A lot of pain?” I said.

“It's tolerable,” she said. “I woke up with a headache, that's all.”

I stood up. “I'll leave you, then. You should sleep.”

She tried to smile. It was a poor effort. “Thank you, dear. I'll feel better when you get back. I promise.”

Patrick was coming into the sunporch as I was going out. I touched his arm. “I want to talk to you for a minute.”

He nodded. “Sure. What's up?”

I steered him back into the living room. “Your mother tells me that Sarah's regular nurse didn't show up yesterday. I was wondering how well you knew her.”

“Who? The nurse?”

“Yes. Molly Wood.”

Patrick shrugged. “She comes in, takes care of Grandmother, and leaves. I've said hello and thank-you-good-bye to her a few times. Grandmother loves her. She was depressed all day yesterday when that other nurse showed up.”

“Has Mrs. Wood been reliable?”

“Sure. Reliable and punctual and, as far as I can tell, very competent. Like I said, Grandmother's very fond of her.”

“Never missed an appointment?”

“Yesterday was the first time.” Patrick cocked his head and frowned at me. “Why are you asking about her, Brady?”

I saw no reason to tell Patrick that Sarah's nurse had stood me up the previous evening and that I suspected something had happened to her. “I'm concerned about your grandmother, that's all,” I said. “She seems a little down today.”

“She had a bad night,” he said. “I was on my way in to sit with her, see if I could cheer her up.”

“Good for you,” I said. I patted his shoulder. “Go for it.”

I gathered up my lawyer gear, climbed into Sarah's Range Rover, and headed for the bank in Edgartown where I was to meet with the representatives of the Marshall Lea Foundation.

The MLF, according to the research Julie had done for me, was a well-heeled local organization of preservationists that bought up choice island properties
and deeded them over as nature sanctuaries to the towns where they were located, with the stipulation that they, the MLF, would retain control over their uses and that the properties were never to be developed or commercialized. The organization depended entirely on private funds and engaged in no lobbying, thus giving it—and all who donated to it—tax-exempt status.