Killer Crab Cakes (19 page)

“That’s probably true,” Phyllis said with a nod. “I just wondered what the connection was between Mr. McKenna and Charles Jefferson.”

“You mean Mrs. Forrest’s papa? The rich guy who was here earlier?”

“And he’s Leo Blaine’s employer, too,” Phyllis pointed out.

Consuela’s face hardened again at the mention of Leo’s name. “I wouldn’t know. I never saw Mr. Jefferson before today.”

“You don’t recall ever hearing Mr. McKenna mention him?”

Consuela thought about it, then shook her head. “No. But it’s kind of funny, isn’t it, the way all those people seem to be tied up to each other somehow?”

Phyllis nodded. “Yes,” she said. “Funny.”

But not in a ha-ha way, she thought. It wasn’t that sort of funny at all, whenever murder was involved.

 

Oliver and Oscar McKenna and their sister, Frances Heaton, had to be staying somewhere in the area. Chief Clifton had asked them to keep themselves available, and Phyllis didn’t think they would leave as long as the question of their father’s murder was still up in the air, anyway. So she set out that afternoon to find out where they were.

In the old days she would have had to hunt up a phone book and start calling all the places to stay around Rockport and Fulton. Now she used the computer in Dorothy’s office to search for upper-end resorts in the area, figuring that the McKenna siblings wouldn’t be staying in run-down tourist cabins that had been built in the forties, or even in some of the newer motels.

Once she had done that, though, and compiled a list of numbers, she still had to call each one. Each time she asked to be connected to Oliver McKenna’s room. At the first half-dozen places, she was told that no one by that name was registered there, and asking for Frances Heaton turned up blanks, too.

But on the seventh call, which was to a very new-looking resort Phyllis recalled seeing on Fulton Beach Road near the boat basin, the operator said, “One moment, please,” when she asked for Oliver McKenna.

The phone rang a couple of times before it was picked up and Phyllis heard Oliver McKenna’s somewhat surly tones on the other end. “Yes, what is it?”

“Mr. McKenna?”

“That’s right. Who’s this?”

“Phyllis Newsom, Mr. McKenna. From the Oak Knoll Bed-’n’-Breakfast.”

“I know who you are, Mrs. Newsom,” Oliver said. “It hasn’t been that long since my brother and sister and I were there. What do you want?”

He wasn’t going to be pleasant about this, Phyllis thought, which came as no surprise.

“I was wondering if I could come by there and see you for a few minutes,” she said.

“What for? How’d you know where we’re staying, anyway?”

“I heard your sister mention it,” Phyllis said. That wasn’t true, of course, but she had gotten used to stretching the truth a little in a good cause. Right now she couldn’t think of a better cause than finding out who killed Ed McKenna and saving the bed-and-breakfast from ruin. “You were lucky. Most places are booked up. They must have had a cancellation.”

“I don’t know that I have anything to say to you. For all I know, you had something to do with my father’s death.”

“You don’t really believe that, Mr. McKenna. I never even met your father until a few days ago. I didn’t have any reason to harm him. I’m very sorry about what happened, and I want to do whatever I can to make things right.”

“You can’t. My father’s dead. You can’t fix that.”

“I know. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said it that way. I just want to know if there’s anything I can do to help.”

“I don’t know what it would be,” Oliver said in a hard, flat voice. “Good-bye, Mrs. Newsom.”

“Wait,” Phyllis said quickly. “I have something here that the police didn’t find during their search. Something I think your father would want you to have.”

Now that was an outright lie, not just a stretching of the truth.

But it kept Oliver from hanging up, and that was what Phyllis wanted. “What are you talking about?” he demanded.

Phyllis could only make a guess. “Some business documents,” she said. “I had them with me when the police showed up to execute their search warrant, and they never checked my purse.”

That was a plausible story, she thought, especially considering that she had just made it up off the top of her head. But her instincts had served her well, she realized when she thought about it for a second. All Ed McKenna and Charles Jefferson had in common was their connection to the electronics industry. It stood to reason that whatever their relationship—if indeed there
was
such a relationship—it would have something to do with the business both of them were in.

The silence on the other end of the phone told her that Oliver wasn’t dismissing her claim out of hand, another indication that there might be something to it. Finally he asked in a tense voice, “What do you want?”

“Just to talk to you for a few minutes, face-to-face.”

“By God, this smacks of blackmail.”

Phyllis’s anger was real as she said, “I never blackmailed anyone in my life, and I don’t appreciate being accused of it.”

“All right, all right, calm down.” Now it was Oliver trying to keep her on the phone instead of the other way around, which told Phyllis yet again that she was on the right trail, even though getting there had been something of an accident. He sighed and went on, “I’ll talk to you, but I don’t want my brother and sister to know about it. They’re not aware of everything that’s going on. I’ll meet you somewhere privately.”

Phyllis felt a tingle of apprehension. At this point she had no real reason to suspect that Oliver McKenna was to blame for his father’s death, but as far as she was concerned he was a suspect. The last thing she wanted to do was meet somewhere in private with a possible murderer, especially after hinting to him that she might have some evidence against him.

“I think it would be better if we spoke somewhere in public,” she said, hoping that wouldn’t scare him off. “But your brother and sister don’t have to know anything about it.”

He seemed to be thinking it over. Then he said, “Where?”

“What about the fishing pier at the Copano Bay Causeway?”

“Where’s that?”

“Go north up Fulton Beach Road,” she told him. “When you come to the end of it, turn right on the highway, and that will take you to the causeway. They’ve turned the old causeway into a fishing pier, right beside the one that crosses the bay now.” She had read up on the area before coming down here and recalled that bit of history. Although the old causeway no longer completely spanned the bay, it ran a long way out into the water on each side and now operated as a private fishing pier. There would be plenty of people around, so that Oliver couldn’t try to throw her in the bay, and yet the pier was long enough so that they could get out of earshot of the nearest fishermen and have some privacy.

“I don’t much like the idea, but I suppose it’ll do,” Oliver said. “Half an hour from now?”

“That’s fine,” Phyllis said as she checked her watch. She hoped she could get Sam to go with her, but if not, she wasn’t worried about meeting Oliver in broad daylight on a public fishing pier.

Well, not
too
worried, anyway . . .

He said a curt “good-bye” and hung up. Phyllis hung up as well and went to find Sam.

He was sitting in one of the rocking chairs on the front porch, rocking slightly as he looked out at the water. Phyllis took the chair beside him, and for a moment they sat there in a familiar, comfortable silence, the only sound the faint squeaking of their chairs. Across the road, a pelican swooped over the water in a stately glide. No fish made the fatal mistake of venturing too close to the surface, so the pelican flew on in search of a snack elsewhere.

“Another exciting day in paradise,” Sam observed dryly.

“I don’t want any excitement,” Phyllis said. “I’d just as soon it had left us alone.”

“Life’s not in the habit of doin’ that.”

“I know.” Phyllis paused, then went on, “I’m supposed to meet Oliver McKenna on the causeway fishing pier in a little less than half an hour.”

Sam looked over at her, frowning in surprise. “Say again?”

“I’m meeting Oliver at the causeway. We’re going to discuss the connection between his father and Charles Jefferson.”

“How in the world did you get him to agree to that?”

“I made him think that I had some sort of secret documents belonging to Ed McKenna that the police didn’t find.”

A grin began to stretch across Sam’s rugged face. “In other words, you told him a bald-faced lie.”

Phyllis didn’t see any point in denying it. She nodded and said, “That’s right.”

Sam chuckled. “And now you want me to go with you so Oliver won’t try to pitch you into the drink.”

“Something like that.” Phyllis smiled. “You know me too well, Sam Fletcher.”

“I know that you’re the brains in this partnership and I’m the brawn.”

His choice of words took her aback. “Are we a partnership now, Sam?”

“Well . . . when it comes to crime-solvin’, anyway. We’ll have to talk about the other, one of these days.”

“All right. So you’ll come with me?”

“Sure.” He got to his feet. “I’m ready when you are.”

She went inside and got her purse, then joined him at his pickup. They drove north on Fulton Beach Road, the same route she had told Oliver McKenna to take, and turned toward the causeway.

She didn’t know what vehicle he was driving, so she couldn’t tell from the cars and trucks and SUVs parked at the fishing pier if he was already there. Sam parked, and as they approached the booth at the beginning of the pier where an attendant collected the fees, Phyllis reached for her purse.

The man working there waved them on past. “I can tell you folks are just sight-seein’,” he said. “We charge accordin’ to the pole, and you don’t have any.”

“How’s the fishin’ here?” Sam asked. “I might want to come back and get my line wet.”

“Pretty good most of the time. Takes a good hand, though, to work a fish all the way up before it flops off the hook, since we’re sort of high off the water.”

Sam nodded. “I can see that it would.” He lifted a hand in farewell as he and Phyllis started out onto the pier.

“You fit right in down here,” Phyllis commented.

Sam shrugged. “How could a fella keep from fittin’ in? Folks are about as friendly as any I’ve ever run across, and you sure can’t complain about the weather. I’m not sure I’d want to live somewhere you’d have to worry about hurricanes, though.”

“There are barrier islands offshore that keep them from hitting full force along here. The storm surges aren’t as bad as they are in other places along the coast. That’s why there are quite a few houses around here that are a hundred years old or more, like the Fulton Mansion.”

“Been readin’ up, I see.”

She laughed. “I was a history teacher for a long time. Those things interest me.”

In spite of the pleasant conversation, she was keeping her eyes open for Oliver McKenna. They passed numerous fishermen as they strolled along the old causeway. Even though it made for a high fishing pier, Phyllis imagined that driving over it in the old days must have been a little nerve-racking. In a car it would have seemed like you were barely above the surface of the bay, which was at least a mile wide at this part. Phyllis had never cared much for bridges, especially long ones.

She hadn’t seen any sign of Oliver so far, but there were people along the edges of the old causeway all the way out to its end, so she and Sam had to keep going. She checked her watch. A little more than half an hour had passed since her conversation with Oliver. He should have been here by now.

“Quite a hike all the way out to the end,” Sam said.

“And back,” Phyllis said, because they were close enough now that she could see the rest of the people on the causeway and none of them was Oliver McKenna. “We can turn around now. He’s not out here.”

“Maybe we’ll run into him on the way back in.”

“Maybe,” Phyllis said.

She was beginning to think that Oliver had stood her up. They were almost back to the shore when she spotted him coming toward them. “There he is,” she told Sam, and they stopped and let Oliver come the rest of the way out to where they were. No fishermen were lined up along the railings at this point, so it would be a good place to talk. The constant humid wind pushed Phyllis’s hair in front of her face for a second. She pulled it back and wished she had thought to pin it down. You always had to take the wind into account down here.

“I didn’t know you were going to bring your boyfriend with you,” Oliver said with a frown as he came up to them.

“Anything you can discuss with me, you can talk about in front of Sam.”

“I don’t want to discuss anything.” Oliver thrust his hand out. “I want those papers. You don’t have any right to them. They belonged to my father.”

“So now they would belong to you and your brother and sister,” Phyllis said. “At least, that’s the way it seems to me.”

“They’re business documents, and I’m the CEO of McKenna Electronics. Hand them over.”

Sam moved forward a little and said, “Maybe you could be a little more polite, mister.”

“And maybe you could butt out,” Oliver said. “What I ought to do is call the police and have you and your girlfriend arrested for blackmail or extortion or whatever you want to call it. That’s exactly what I’m going to do if I don’t get those documents right now.”

The confrontation had turned tense in a hurry, and Phyllis was glad she had brought Sam along. The way Oliver McKenna looked, she wasn’t sure that he wouldn’t have tried to take those nonexistent documents by force if she had been alone.

“I think we should all just settle down,” she said. “I don’t know that the papers should go to you or not, Mr. McKenna. Maybe I should just hand them over to the police myself.”