By Book or by Crook (15 page)

“Let’s take my car. I can drop you back here for yours later. It should be perfectly safe outside the police station.”

Connor placed a quick call to the chief, saying
he’d been delayed and could they reschedule the meeting. Then he drove us to the restaurant at the Nags Head fishing pier, one of the few spots along this stretch of the coast that sits directly on the beach. This early on a Monday evening, the place was largely empty and we were able to snag two brightly painted chairs outside, and sit up at the railing overlooking the sand and the sea. I had a white wine, and Connor ordered a local beer. He didn’t ask what had been bothering me, and I was glad of it. Hard to tell a man you think you’ve been accused of murder.

“Thank you,” I said as the waitress placed our drinks on the railing, “for letting Bertie hire Louise Jane. We’ve been so run off our feet, we don’t know if we’re coming or going. Charlene was over the moon to be allowed back to her real job.”

He shook his head. “I’ve never seen anything like it. Sure, the town gets busy, crazy busy, in tourist season, and some of the festivals attract crowds from all over. But the success of this library exhibit was totally unexpected.”

“Bertie and the staff, particularly Ronald, went to a lot of trouble to promote it. In their own time, and at their own expense, too.”

“You don’t have to persuade me, Lucy. I know the value of Bertie and the library to this town.”

“I wish Detective Watson did.”

“He’s doing a tough job. The chief is not happy at how long this case is taking. As the mayor, I’m not happy, either.”

“It hasn’t slowed down the tourist trade, though.”

“Not at all. It doesn’t appear to be a random killing, so people aren’t afraid they’re going to be
murdered in their guesthouse beds. The killing didn’t get much press outside the immediate area, thank heavens. Not with those shenanigans in Washington sucking up all the air.”

I decided to keep mum about Mrs. Peterson and her friend wondering if the library was safe. That sort of talk would spread fast enough without me helping it along. “Do you have any ideas? About who might have done it, I mean.”

“Not a clue. Jonathan could be opinionated, stubborn, full of himself. But he was like that his entire life, and I see no reason for someone to suddenly do him in because of it.”

I shifted uncomfortably in my seat.

Nothing changed in Jonathan’s life except a bitter divorce. And a new employee at the library.

Connor coughed, shifted in his chair, and looked out to sea. “Lucy. I’ve thought of you many times over the years. Since that summer.”

I couldn’t hide my surprise. “You have?”

“Wondering what you were up to in Boston. I’ll confess that I was home one summer when I was a senior at Duke and heard you were at Ellen and Amos’s. I thought of dropping by, saying hi.”

I’d thought of Connor, too, sometimes when I should have been thinking about Ricky and our future. Wondering why the thought of Ricky didn’t make my heart race. “Why didn’t you?”

“It was no secret your family had . . . has . . . a lot of money. You seemed like a down-to-earth girl, but those brothers of yours . . .”

“Tell me about it.”

“I was just a boy from an Outer Banks fishing
family, struggling to get through college. I had no money for nice dinners or renting charter boats for a day on the water.”

“We didn’t live like that here. Which is probably why my bothers stopped coming as soon as they were old enough. I was always treated like Aunt Ellen and Uncle Amos’s kid.” My voice trailed off. How much I’d loved it. No county-club set, no cocktail parties with up-and-coming politicians or titans of business to impress, no social expectations.

“I guess I figured you’d have changed as you grew up.” He gave me a big smile. “I’m glad you didn’t.”

I smiled back.

“I also heard some talk that summer about a fiancé. Maybe that was part of the reason I stayed away. That didn’t work out?”

“Let’s say the relationship was stronger in our mothers’ minds than in ours.”

Much stronger. It had been more than two weeks since that scene in the restaurant and my flight from Boston. Other than the initial text from Ricky saying he understood if I needed time, I’d heard not a thing from him. And, I now realized, only because we were talking about it, I’d scarcely spared a thought for him, either. If the library job didn’t work out and
I did decide to go back to Boston, not that I could see that happening, I would not be going back to Ricky.

W
e had only one drink at the pier, and then Connor drove me back to the police station to get my car.

As I got out of the BMW, I found myself looking anxiously around, as if expecting Detective Watson to leap out from behind the bushes, waving handcuffs at me. If Connor noticed, he said nothing.

He told me he’d love to take me to dinner, but he had a meeting with the commissioners he couldn’t get out of. He was going to break the news to them that he’d approved a substantial, although temporary, increase in the library budget.

He was expecting, Connor said, with a shake of his head, that the strongest objection would be from the commissioner who was also a member of the library board. Why anyone would volunteer to be on a library board who didn’t think there was value in reading, Connor never understood.

Dinner another time, perhaps?

I’d agreed.

Back home in my lighthouse aerie, I prepared my chicken salad dinner and ate it with a book propped up on the sugar bowl in front of me. Charles finished
his own dinner and paced the kitchen, wondering what I’d done with the rest of it.

I pulled the curtains against the light of the full white moon, and Charles and I were curled up in bed by ten.

When I woke, Charles was no longer beside me. I like to sleep in total darkness, without even the soft glow of a night-light or crack under the bathroom door. I opened my eyes, but that made no difference. I stared up into a void.

A floorboard creaked.

I rolled over. This was an old building, tall and facing out to sea. It made a great many noises in the night.

A crash.

I sat up and switched on the bedside light. Charles was at the door, his ears back, his face forward, his back arched, and the darker hair along his tail standing erect. My heart accelerated.

One of the iron steps leading up from the main floor squeaked, and I choked back a scream. I was a woman alone in an old lighthouse in the middle of the night. Charles might be large and fierce and loyal, but he was still a cat. I clutched the bedclothes tighter. My iPhone was on the bedside table, under my book. I reached for it, pushed the button to activate it. One bar. Hoping that would be enough, my finger hesitated over the Emergency Call button.

Strange, isn’t it, how sometimes in the face of danger, we’re more afraid of being embarrassed at unnecessarily calling for help than being murdered in our beds?

My ears strained, but I heard nothing more. The
small bedside light threw dark shadows into the rounded corners of my room. Something moved, and this time I did scream.

Frances. The Lady. The woman confined in this room, trapped in a loveless marriage, from which the only escape was a desperate leap from the very window close to where I lay.

Another creak of the stairs, but this time it sounded farther away, heading down. Then all fell silent.

My eyes were gradually becoming accustomed to the dark and, with an enormous amount of relief, I saw that the shape that had moved was nothing but my jacket. I’d been too lazy to hang it in the closet when I got in, and had simply tossed it over the open door. As was my custom (as well as a childish so-there gesture to Louise Jane), I’d left the window slightly open to let in the fresh sea air. A gust must have slipped in and ruffled the jacket.

Wow! Was I imaging things, or what?

Something touched my leg and I screamed again. I dropped the phone and scrambled through the tussled bedclothes for it.

“Meow,” said Charles.

I looked into his little face. He stuck his pink tongue out at me and rubbed himself against my leg, hoping for a scratch.

I obliged. Whoever—whatever—had been at my
door, a mouse, probably, was gone. If Charles wasn’t frightened, I wouldn’t be, either.

I straightened the blankets around me and settled back to sleep, grateful for the cat’s warm bulk.

But I slipped the phone under my pillow and I didn’t turn off the light.

I
woke when Charles sat on my chest and scratched my nose, reminding me that it was breakfast time.

It was daylight, but a storm had moved in while I slept. Wind and rain pounded the windows, but the old lighthouse stood firm against the elements. I remembered the noises in the night and what I’d thought was a floorboard creaking, right outside my door, then footsteps on the stairs. In the light of day—albeit a cold, gray light—common sense returned and I told myself it had been a mouse. A mouse would account for Charles’s rapt attention. Although . . . it would have to have been a mighty big mouse. No, it was nothing but the lighthouse settling itself deeper into the rock bed against the tempest, as it had done countless times over the years.

I rolled out of bed, fed Charles (first things first), and switched the kettle on for coffee. I showered, washed my hair, and dressed for the day in a knee-length white skirt and a sheer, flowing green shirt with a matching camisole beneath. A scarf the color of sea foam completed the outfit.

I sat at the table with a bowl of muesli and yogurt, coffee, and my computer. I read the morning’s news, sipped coffee, and munched on cereal. The storm
raged outside, but my lovely lighthouse aerie was warm, cozy, and safe.

I convinced myself that I’d had nothing but a bad dream in the night. Most certainly no ghostly lady had been flittering about my room, intent on saving me. I glanced guiltily at the bedside lamp, still switched on, which reminded me that I’d left my phone under the pillow.

As for Detective Watson and his nasty insinuations, I hadn’t killed anyone, nor had I stolen any books; thus I had absolutely nothing to worry about.

Nothing of interest had happened in the world overnight, and I switched off the computer, put my cup and bowl in the sink, rinsed the French press, and headed downstairs to work.

The first thing I saw when I reached the main level was Bertie’s white face. She sat on the floor, beside the red velvet rope guarding the Austen alcove, her shoulders slumped, her legs stretched out in front of her. For one horrible moment I thought she’d had a heart attack. She lifted her head, looked at me, and blinked. “Lucy.”

I ran toward her.

I stopped short.

The cabinet was locked, but another book was missing. Only three volumes remained, as well as the notebook.
Mansfield Park
wasn’t there.

No need to ask Bertie if she’d taken it. Her face reflected her shock.

Sense and Sensibility
first, then
Pride and Prejudice
. Now
Mansfield Park.

The books were being stolen in the order in which
they’d been written. I wondered if the thief knew that.

“Morning, all!” Ronald’s cheerful voice sounded so out of place. He came in, and then Charlene and Louise Jane. Andrew followed, carrying a tray of coffees and a bulging paper bag from Josie’s.

“I’m treating this morning,” Louise Jane trilled. “A little something to help you welcome me here.”

“It was my idea,” Andrew said.

“What’s wrong?” Charlene asked.

They approached us, and as one sucked in a breath.

“Not again,” said Charlene.

“Again.” Bertie got to her feet in a quick, fluid motion. “Ronald, go upstairs and check nothing’s missing from the children’s library. Charlene, you do the same in the reference room. Then meet me in my office. Lucy and Louise Jane, come with me. I’m phoning the police right away. Good-bye, Andrew, please turn the sign to Closed on your way out. We will not be opening the library this morning.”

Louise Jane grabbed the bag and coffees. “Good thing I thought to bring breakfast.”

“You don’t sound at all concerned,” I said as Ronald, Charlene, and Bertie rushed off and Poor Andrew headed for the door. The look on his face indicated he wanted to stay, but he knew better to argue with Bertie.

Louise Jane walked down the hallway beside me. She smiled that smile. “Of course I’m concerned, Lucy honey. I don’t know how you and Bertie will be able to explain this away. That’s the problem with
qualified
librarians. Heads in the clouds.” She sighed heavily.

I stood stock-still as a thought came to me.
Is it possible Louise Jane has stolen the books?

The first two thefts had worked to her advantage, adding to the chaos at the library so that Bertie realized she needed extra help. But I couldn’t say the same for
Mansfield Park
. Louise Jane had the job. If anything, another theft might well cause the town or the board to close the library entirely.

For the first time, I wondered where Louise Jane had been at the time of Mr. Uppiton’s murder. I’d seen her downstairs, mingling with the guests, but I couldn’t say exactly where she had been the moment before we all heard Bertie’s scream.

Almost everyone. Bertie, I reminded myself, had gone upstairs. Alone.

We all gathered in the office, while Bertie made the call. She hung up, her face grim. “Detective Watson will be here shortly. You are all to remain here, in my office, until the police arrive. Good thing we have muffins.”

Louise Jane chose one.

Ronald said, “Don’t you want us to search the rest of the library?”

“What good would it do? We can’t hope, this time, that it’s been mislaid. No, this is nothing but a planned series of thefts. I simply don’t know how I’m going to explain to the board. Or the mayor.” She picked up the phone again. “Connor, it’s Bertie. I’m afraid I have some very bad news.”

“The book was there when we closed yesterday,” I said. “Gone this morning when Bertie arrived.”

“What did you do after we left, Lucy?” Charlene asked.

“I went into town. To the police station to tell them . . . something I’d overheard. And then, well, I went to the bar at the fishing pier for about an hour, and got back here around seven. I glanced at the cabinet as I passed. I would have noticed if another book was missing. I didn’t go out again.”

“Did you leave the door unlocked?”

“Of course not!”

“Just asking.”

Had I locked the door behind me when I came home? I must have. I might be a bit forgetful sometimes, but since the books had started disappearing we were all hyperconscious of security. What limited amount of security was to be found at a small public library, that is.

“Well, someone let himself in,” Bertie said. “And out again. The door was locked when I got here.”

Ronald said, “The police will be able to tell us more, but I didn’t see any sign of the lock being tampered with.”

“What about the cabinet?” Charlene asked. “Did you check it?”

Bertie nodded. “Locked tight.”

“So our thief,” Charlene said, “has a set of keys.”

We all looked at each other while trying not to.

“Who has keys to the building?” I asked.

Ronald and Charlene slowly put up their hands. As did Bertie and I. Louise Jane smirked. “I’m in the clear. You neglected to give me my own set yesterday, Bertie. I was going to remind you this morning.”

“That’s not entirely true, Louise Jane,” I said. “There’s a spare key hidden outside, under a rock. You let yourself in with it the other day.”

Her eyes blazed. “I hope you’re not accusing me of breaking in, Lucy. I used that key so you wouldn’t have to come all the way downstairs. I was doing you a favor.”

“I’d forgotten all about that blasted spare key,” Bertie said. “For heaven’s sake, with all that’s going on, there’s a key tucked under a rock outside! We might as well leave a sign on the door asking people to come on in.

“Do you remember Alice, Ronald?” He rolled his eyes and nodded. “She was the reference librarian before we got Charlene. The woman was a brilliant librarian but didn’t have a lick of common sense. After about the tenth time I had to drive out here to let her in because she was opening but had forgotten her key, I finally had a spare made and hid it. I’ll get it later.”

“Was she the woman who killed herself? Back in the nineties?” I asked. “Jumping from the window in my room?”

“What? Who told you that?”

“Louise Jane.”

Bertie glared at our newest employee. “That’s ridiculous. The library wasn’t even here in the nineties. The lighthouse was in bad repair and locked tight.”

Louise Jane didn’t look at all bothered at having being caught out. “My grandmother told me the incident was hushed up.”

“Your grandmother . . .” Bertie began. “Never
mind. How did you know about this spare key, anyway?”

Louise Jane glanced away. “I forget.”

“The day Louise Jane visited me and let herself into the library with that hidden key was the same day that I found Theodore lurking around outside,” I said.

“Not him again,” Bertie said.

“Did you return the key to the hiding place when you left, Louise Jane?” I asked.

“Of course I did. I wasn’t planning to sneak in after hours and steal anything. Oops. Bad choice of words.”

“So it’s possible Theodore saw you replace it.”

Bertie groaned.

“Jonathan Uppiton had a key,” Charlene interrupted. “Does anyone know what happened to it?”

Bertie shook her head. “I never thought to ask.”

“Sounds like there are keys to this building all over the place,” Ronald said. “But there’s only one key to the cabinet—isn’t that right? You have that, don’t you, Bertie?”

She rummaged through her bag, pulling out a ring crowded with keys of all shapes and sizes. She lifted a small bronze one. “Here.”

“Then the lock was forced,” Ronald said. “The police will be able to see that.”

“It’s locked now,” Bertie said. “I tried the handle myself. It must have been locked again after
Mansfield Park
was removed.”

“I suppose it’s possible the lock was jimmied open, and replaced when the thief had what he
wanted,” Ronald said. “It wasn’t a particularly secure lock.”

“All this talk of keys.” Louise Jane threw her hands up. “You people are obviously trying to avoid considering another possibility.”

“What’s that?” Charlene asked.

“That the book, the books, are being removed by someone . . . something . . . that doesn’t worry about locks and keys.”

“I did hear strange noises in the night. I put them down to the approaching storm,” I said.

“Noises? In the library?” Bertie asked.

“Yes. And on the stairs.”

“Did you investigate?” Charlene asked.

Louise Jane gasped. “That would be the worst thing she could do. Did it try to come into your room, Lucy? Did you sense a change in the temperature? Did the cat react?”

“Enough of that,” Bertie snapped. “Obviously someone was here last night, after closing and before I arrived. No need to start implying ghostly influences.”

“It would be foolish not to consider every possibility. I told you there are forces at work in this building we cannot comprehend. Did the cat do anything, Lucy? They’re very sensitive to the paranormal.”

“No,” I lied. “Charles didn’t hear a thing.”

Charles meowed his protest. He’d taken a position across the back of the visitor’s chair, the better to follow our conversation.

“He’s probably used to it,” Louise Jane said. “Spending all his time in here, wandering the tower
at night. I bet he’s even made friends with the lighthouse keeper’s little boy.”

“I said, enough, Louise Jane,” Bertie snapped. “We have plenty of problems without imagining ghosts haunting the hallways.”

Louise Jane shrugged. “I don’t see anyone offering a better explanation. Strange noises in the night. Things disappearing from behind locked doors. I’ll ask my grandmother about some charms Lucy can use to protect herself. Even if they don’t mean any harm, the spirits don’t know their own strength sometimes.”

Despite myself, I felt an icy chill crawl across my spine. I shuddered, and Charlene threw me a worried glance.

Fortunately, that line of conversation was interrupted by the ringing of the bell. Ronald left and came back with Detective Watson and three stern-faced uniformed officers, one of whom was Butch. They were all drenched. Butch gave me a smile, but I returned a grimace. I didn’t feel much like smiling.

“We’re going to search this building,” Watson said.

“We did that the first two times,” Bertie said. “Hoping the books had been misplaced. Nothing.”

“I am not,” Watson said, “looking for an incorrectly filed volume. Y’all remain in here. Officer Franklin, ensure no one leaves this room.” The policewoman nodded.

Watson held out his hand. “Can I have your keys, please, Ms. James. To closets, cabinets, all the rooms.” Bertie passed the bunch over. “You live here, don’t you, Miss Richardson? On site?”

“Yes. My room’s on the fourth floor. Off the main staircase.”

Watson held out his hand once again. “Key.”

“Surely you don’t intend to search Lucy’s apartment?” Bertie said.

“I intend to search this entire building. Keys, please.”

I pulled the chain out of my bag. The key to the library door, to the lighthouse apartment, my car, my parents’ house, one for my office at the university that I’d forgotten to hand in, two I didn’t recognize. All on a chain with a big red and white H for Harvard. I pointed out the one Watson would want, and glanced at Bertie as I gave the keys to the detective.

“I’m calling my lawyer,” Bertie said. “Do not go into Lucy’s apartment until he can accompany you.”

“I’ll go where I want, when I want.”

“You need a warrant for that.”

“I have one.”

“Oh.”

“As a courtesy to Miss Richardson, I’ll wait for Amos, if you think he’s necessary. Let’s go, people. You know what you’re looking for.”

Bertie picked up her phone and dialed. She related what had happened in a few short, clipped sentences, said, “Good,” and hung up. “He’s on his way.”

I glanced at my watch. Quarter after nine. Bertie’s phone rang. She checked the display and then ignored it.

Louise Jane pushed Charles off the back of the visitor’s chair and sat down. Charles gave her a vicious look but walked away, his tail high. Ronald found a
place on the floor and stretched his legs out in front of him. Bertie sat in her chair, closed her eyes, folded her hands over her chest, and took long, deep breaths. Charlene and I perched on the edge of the desk, and the cop leaned against a wall. She was young, probably in her mid-twenties, shorter and rounder than she probably liked. Charles rubbed up against her uniformed leg. She pushed him away. He wouldn’t be pushed. He purred and rubbed happily. Her eyes began to water, and she sniffed. She sneezed.