“Well, if we don’t go looking for trouble, I can’t see that it’s going to come looking for us,” Brad said.
“Can’t you?” Whalen replied. “Better ask around, Randall. What about Horton here? He and his brother came and trouble found them in a few hours. With the Shellings it took fifteen years, but trouble found them too. And there’s your friends the Palmers. They damned near had a peck of trouble just about an hour ago. Well, nothing I can say will convince you.” He glanced at his watch. “Better be getting back to town. There isn’t any more I can do here. The place is all yours. Rent’s due on the first of every month.”
Then he was gone.
“That bastard,” Elaine said almost under her breath.
“Is that any way to talk about your landlord?” Brad asked. Then he chuckled. “I think he enjoys playing the voice of doom.”
Jeff Horton shook his head. “I agree with your wife,” he said. “He’s a bastard.”
Before the discussion could go any farther, a burly form appeared in the kitchen door.
“You people want this stuff unloaded, or do we take it back to Seattle?”
* * *
From their hiding place in the woods, Robby and Missy watched Brad leave the house. They had been watching everything, watching the movers haul carton after carton into the old house, watching them leave. Now Brad was leaving too.
“I thought he was going to live here,” Missy said plaintively. “That’s what you said.”
“Well, who says he’s not?” Robby asked. “He’s probably just going into town for something. Why don’t we go say hello to Mrs. Randall?”
“I don’t want to,” Missy complained. “I don’t like that house.”
“You always say that,” Robby pointed out. “What’s wrong with it?”
“I don’t know. Bad things happen there. They happen all over this beach. I want to go home.”
“So go home.”
“Come with me.”
“I don’t want to. I like the beach.”
“It’s late,” Missy pointed out. “Mommy’s going to be mad at us.”
“Oh, she isn’t either,” Robby replied. But despite his brave words, he wasn’t sure that Missy wasn’t right; his mother had been acting very strange lately and Robby couldn’t figure out why. Ever since that woman had killed herself, his mother had seemed worried. He gave in to his sister.
“All right,” he said. “Come on.”
He started out of the woods but again Missy stopped him.
“Let’s go through the woods for a while.”
“Why?”
“This is the part of the beach where that man washed up,” Missy said.
“How do you know?”
“I just know, that’s all!”
“You don’t either,” Robby said angrily.
“I do too!” Missy insisted. She began walking away from her brother. “You can go that way if you want, but I’m going through the forest.”
Robby decided his sister was a royal pain, but he followed her anyway, obeying his mother’s edict that the two of them should stick together. A few minutes later Missy clutched his hand.
“What’s wrong?” Robby asked wearily.
“I’m scared. Let’s run.” She tugged at Robby’s arm and almost involuntarily he began running with Missy. When they were near the cabin Missy suddenly stopped.
“It’s all right now,” she said. “I’m not scared anymore.”
“That’s because we’re almost home,” Robby pointed out. Missy looked up, and sure enough, there was the cabin, just visible through the trees. As they walked the last few yards to the house, Missy took Robby’s hand and squeezed it hard.
“Let’s not go on the beach anymore,” she pleaded softly.
Robby looked at her curiously, but said nothing.
Brad pulled up in front of the gallery and made sure he wasn’t parked on the pavement, remembering the ticket Harney Whalen had written him the last time be bad been here. Then he went to the gallery door and stuck his head in.
“Glen? You here?”
“In back,” Glen called.
As he made his way to the rear of the building Brad looked around, surprised at the progress that had been made. He was even more surprised to find that Glen wasn’t alone in the back room.
“You mean you finally got some help?” he asked.
Glen straightened up from the drafting table where he was working on some sketches and grinned.
“Did you meet Chip Connor when you were out here?” he asked.
The deputy put aside the saw he was holding and extended his hand to Brad. “Glad to meet you,” he said with a smile. “You must be Dr. Randall.”
“Brad,” Brad corrected him. He gazed quizzically at Chip. “Are you on duty?”
“Not for the last hour,” Chip said. “But if anybody in town wants to charge me with neglecting my duties, they could probably make it stick.”
Now Brad’s gaze shifted to Glen, and when he spoke he sounded genuinely puzzled.
“I don’t quite understand,” he said. “When you called this morning you sounded horrible. I expected to find you huddled in a corner or worse, not happily at work with the deputy sheriff.” He glanced at Chip. “You are Whalen’s deputy, aren’t you?”
“Also his nephew, more or less,” Chip said. As Brad shifted uncomfortably Chip’s smile faded. “You want to talk to Glen alone?”
“That’s up to Glen,” Brad countered.
“It’s all right,” Glen said. “Chip knows what’s been going on. As a matter of fact, he’s been helping me out with more than just this.”
Brad looked at the nearly finished gallery. “It certainly seems to be coming along,” he said. “Now why don’t you fill me in on whatever else has been going on?”
Glen opened three cans of beer and they sat down, making themselves as comfortable as possible on the makeshift furniture. Brad listened quietly as Glen and Chip explained what had happened over the last few days, and Harney Whalen’s unreasonable insinuations that Glen was somehow involved in the death of Max Horton, and possibly even Miriam Shelling’s. When he was done Brad shook his head sadly.
“I don’t understand that man,” he said. “At first I thought he simply didn’t like strangers. But I’m beginning to think it’s something else. Something much more complicated—”
“More complicated?” Chip asked. “What do you mean?”
Brad didn’t answer, didn’t even seem to hear what Chip had asked. Instead he asked Glen an apparently irrelevant question.
“What about Robby?”
“Robby? What’s he got to do with all this?”
“I don’t know,” Brad said, trying to sound casual. “But we know something’s happened to him out here, and now things are happening to other people too.”
Glen’s eyes narrowed as he recognized the implication. “Are you trying to say you think Robby’s involved in whatever’s happening?”
“I’m not trying to say anything,” Brad replied. “But things that seem to be unrelated often aren’t. I think I better have a look at Robby.”
The three men fell silent. Suddenly there was nothing to say.
21
Chip Connor sat at the bar of the Harbor Inn that evening sipping slowly on a beer, trying to sort out his thoughts. He was confused and upset; things seemed to him to be getting far too complicated. He drained the beer, slammed the empty glass down on the bar, and called for another one. Merle Glind appeared next to him.
“You want a little company?” he asked, rubbing his hands together. Chip smiled at the little man.
“Sure. Let me buy you a beer.”
Glind scrambled onto the stool next to Chip. He carefully added a dash of salt to the beer he had drawn, tasted it, and nodded happily.
“Nothing finishes off the day like a good salty beer,” he chirped. Then he looked at Chip inquisitively. “You want to tell me what’s on your mind?”
“I’m n
ot sure anything is,” Chip replied evasively.
But Merle Glind was not to be put off. “It’s written all over your face. I know—I can tell. Now why don’t you tell me about it?”
“There’s not much to tell,” Chip said uncomfortably. “It’s just a bunch of things, all added together. I guess I’m worried about Harn.”
“Harn? Harn Whalen?” Merle Glind’s voice was filled with disbelief, as if it were incomprehensible to him that anyone could be worried about the police chief.
“That’s what I said,” Chip repeated sourly, but Glind seemed not to hear.
“Why, I just can’t imagine that,” he clucked. “There isn’t anything wrong with him, is there?”
Chip shrugged, almost indifferently. “Not that I know of,” he said slowly. “It’s just a lot of little things.”
“What kind of little things?” The innkeeper’s eyes glistened with anticipation, and Chip Connor suddenly decided he didn’t want to confide in Glind.
“Nothing I can put my finger on,” he said. He finished the beer that had just been put in front of him and stood up. “I think I’ll go for a walk. I’m probably just nervous.”
“It’s starting to rain out there,” Glind pointed out, his lips pursing and his brows knitting as he realized he wasn’t going to find out what was on Chip’s mind.
“It’s always starting to rain out here,” Chip replied. “Or if it isn’t starting, it’s stopping. See you later.” He tossed a couple of dollar bills on the bar and grinned as Merle scooped them up. Then he patted Glind on the shoulder and left.
It was a light rain, the misty kind of rain that makes the air smell fresh and doesn’t require an umbrella. It felt cold on Chip’s face, and he liked the feeling. It was almost like sea spray, but softer, gentler, almost caressing.
He started for the wharf, thinking he might check the moorings on the boats, but as he stepped out onto the pier he realized someone was already there: a small light bobbed in the darkness.
“Hello?” Chip called. The bobbing light swung around. Chip instinctively raised a hand to cover his eyes as the light blinded him.
“Chip? That you?” Chip recognized the reedy voice immediately.
“Granddad?”
“Well, it’s not the bogeyman, if that’s what you were expecting.”
Chip hurried out onto the wharf. “What are you doing out here in the rain? You’ll catch pneumonia.”
“If I were going to catch pneumonia I’d have caught it years ago,” Mac Riley groused. “I’m checking the boats.”
Chip chuckled. “That’s what I was going to do.”
“Well, it’s done. Everything’s secure, tight as a drum.” Then he frowned at Chip. “How come you were going to check? You don’t usually do that.”
“I was at the inn and I felt like taking a walk—”
“Something on your mind?” Riley interrupted.
“I’m not sure.”
“Of course you’re sure,” Riley snapped. “Give me a ride home and let’s talk about it. I’ve got some scotch that I’ve been saving just for a night like tonight.”
“What’s so special about tonight?” Chip asked.
“You. I don’t get to see you as much as I’d like. Well, that’s grandsons for you. Only come around when they have a problem. I can sit around jawing with Tad Corey and Clem Ledbetter all day and it doesn’t do me any good at all. They think I’m a senile old man.”
“You?” Chip laughed out loud. “The day you get senile will be the day you die.”
“Thanks a lot,” the old man said dryly. “You wanting to stand here in the rain all night, or do we get going?”
They returned to the inn, where Chip’s car was parked, and drove the few blocks to Mac Riley’s house in silence. “You ought to sell the house or buy a car,” Chip remarked as they went into the large Victorian house that Riley had built for his bride more than sixty years earlier.
“I’m too old,” Riley complained. “Can’t get a driver’s license, and can’t learn to live anyplace else. Besides, I don’t feel lonely here. Your grandmother’s in this house.”
As Chip’s brows rose in skepticism, Riley snorted at him.
“I don’t mean a ghost, or anything like that,” he said impatiently. “It’s just memories. When you get to be my age you’ll know what I’m talking about. Every room in this house has memories for me. Your grandmother, your mother, even you. But mostly your grandmother.”
They were in the tiny sitting room just off the entry hall, and Chip looked at the portrait of his grandmother that hung over the fireplace.
“She looks a lot like Harney Whalen,” he commented.
“Why shouldn’t she?” Riley countered. “She was his aunt.”
“I know. But for some reason I never think of it that way. I always think of Harn as kissing kin, rather than blood kin.”
“Around here there ain’t much difference,” Riley said. He found the bottle of scotch, poured two tumblers full—no ice, no water—and handed one of them to Chip.
“That who’s on your mind? Harn Whalen?”
Chip nodded and sipped at the scotch, feeling it burn as it trickled down his throat. “I’m worried about him,” he said. He was thoughtful for several minutes. Then he explained, “It’s a lot of little things. But mostly it’s the way he feels about strangers.”
“We all feel that way,” Riley said. “It goes back a long time.”
“But there doesn’t seem to be any reason for it.”
“Maybe not now,” Riley replied. “But there are reasons all right. Tell me what’s going on with Harney.”
“He’s been going after Glen Palmer.”
“Palmer? I didn’t know you even knew the man.”
“I didn’t up until a few days ago,” Chip said. “The day after Miriam and Pete Shelling’s funeral.”
Riley nodded briefly. “I was there, with Corey and Ledbetter. Other than us and Harn Whalen, the Palmers were the only ones who came.”
“That’s what Harney said. He made me go out and talk to Palmer. He wanted to know why Glen was there.”
“That doesn’t seem unreasonable,” the old man said. “Did you find out?”
“Sure. It wasn’t any secret really, except Glen didn’t think it was any of our business.”
“In a town this size everything is everybody’s business,” Riley chuckled.
“Anyway,” Chip went on, “Glen told me why he and his family went to the funeral, and I told Harney. Then he did something I just can’t account for at all. He tried to wreck most of Glen’s work.”
“Wreck it? What do you mean?”
Chip told his grandfather what had happened. “I felt rotten about it,” he finished. “I stayed around and gave Glen a hand, and he’s really a nice guy. I’ve been spending quite a bit of time with him. It’s funny—he can draw anything, but put a saw in his hand and it’s all over.” He smiled at his grandfather. “Wait’ll you see that gallery. With him designing it and me building it, it’s really going to be something.”
“You getting paid for it?” Riley inquired.
Chip squirmed. “Not exactly,” he said. “Glen doesn’t have any money right now. But I’m still getting paid. I’m finding out a lot of things I never knew about before. Nothing terribly important, I guess, but it’s the first time in my life I’ve ever really gotten to know anyone who wasn’t born right here. And the more I get to know Glen, the less I understand Harney’s attitude. If he’d just take the time to get to know him too, I don’t think he’d be so down on him.”
“I wouldn’t bet on it,” Riley said.
“Well, I can understand him being suspicious of strangers, but it’s getting out of hand. He won’t do anything to find out what happened to that guy Horton, except that he seemed to think Glen had something to do with it—God only knows why—and the whole thing’s getting to me. I keep telling myself it’s only my imagination, but it seems to be getting worse. I’m thinking of quitting
my job.”
Riley frowned and studied his grandson. Finally he appeared to make up his mind about something.
“Maybe I’d better tell you a little about Harney,” he said. “Life hasn’t been too easy for him, and most of the rough times were caused by strangers. It was a long time ago, but things like what happened to Harney when he was a boy stay with a man. And sometimes the old memories are stronger than the new ones, if you know what I mean.” He leaned forward confidentially. “Don’t tell anybody, but sometimes I can remember things that happened sixty, seventy years ago better than I can recollect things that happened last month.”
He handed his glass to Chip and asked him to refill it. While the younger man did, Riley’s gaze drifted away, focused somewhere beyond the room and the rainy night. When Chip gave him the full glass, his eyes seemed to be almost closed. But as he took the glass, he began talking.
“When Harney was a boy he lived with his grandparents. His mother—your grandmother’s sister—died birthing Harn, and his father took off a little after that He came back, but he was never quite the same. So it wound up that Harn’s grandparents took care of them both. Anyway, Harn’s granddaddy owned a whole lot of land around here, most of it forest. He never did much with it, just sort of sat on it, but eventually some of the big lumbering boys from Seattle came out here and tried to buy it.
“Old Man Whalen wouldn’t sell, so then they tried to get him to lease the timber rights to them. That didn’t work either, and it looked for a while like that would be the end of it. But then something happened.”
The old man stopped talking and his eyes closed once more. For a few seconds Chip thought his grandfather had fallen asleep, but then Riley’s eyes blinked open and he stared at Chip.
“I’m not sure I ought to tell you the story—it happened a long time ago and it isn’t very pleasant. But it might help you to understand why Harn feels the way he does about strangers.”
“Go on,” Chip urged him.
“Well, it was a night very much like this one,” Riley began. There was a storm brewing, but when Harney—he was only seven or eight at the time—went to bed, it hadn’t really hit the coast yet. Then, late at night, it came in, blowing like crazy.