Mariner's Compass (36 page)

“This one’s going to be auctioned off at the benefit next month for Corrie’s House,” Dove said. Corrie’s House was a local shelter for abused and neglected children. Dove’s quilt guild, the Churn Dash Quilters, made quilts regularly for the kids at the shelter and often for fund-raisers the shelter was always hosting.

“It’s gorgeous,” I said, working my needle through the three layers. “Are you sure you want me working on it, though? I’m kinda rusty.” I didn’t have much time to quilt these days, and my stitches didn’t come close to the quality of theirs.

“That’s okay, honeybun, ” Dove said. “We’ll rip out and do over what doesn’t look good.”

“What else do we have to do?” Melva, the mayor’s mother, asked cheerfully.

I looked at her curiously. “Isn’t this upsetting you at all?”

“Not a bit,” she said. “That boy always was too big for his britches. It was his daddy and his grandmother who spoiled him, not me. I always thought he needed to be brought down a peg or two.”

“And she’s the woman to do it,” Dove said, beaming at her. The rest of the women echoed Dove’s look. It appeared they had a new and very welcomed member to their guild and historical society.

“So, what’s the secret weapon you’re going to unleash tomorrow?” I asked.

The women looked at each other, their faces smug.

“Sorry,” Dove said. “Classified information.”

“Well, considering who I’m married to, I had to at least try to find out.”

“We wouldn’t have respected you if you hadn’t,” Goldie said.

“So, what’s going on in your life?” Edna asked. “We need a little distraction from each other. Spare no details.”

As we worked, I told them about my inheritance, the wood carving instructions Jacob Chandler had left me, the convoluted trail he’d led me on, the people who felt they should have inherited his money and possessions, and my frustration that the trail seemed to have come to a dead end. Once they got me talking, I even told them about my suspicions that he might have been murdered. Everything except the connection to my mother.

“Why, you do seem to land yourself in some interesting situations,” Goldie said. “Pass me the thread, sweetie.”

“Those people mad about being shut out of his inheritance worry me,” Dove said. “I agree with Gabe. This man’s a kook and didn’t seem to care one hoot about your safety. Why in the world did he pick you, anyway? That’s got me all stirred up. Seems kinda perverted, if you ask me.” The other women murmured in agreement.

I shrugged, looked back down at the quilt and concentrated on my stitches, avoiding Dove’s penetrating eyes. She knew I hadn’t told her the whole story and also knew if I looked at her too long, I’d spill my guts. This time, for her sake, I was determined not to give in.

“So, what’re you going to do now?” Edna asked.

“Frankly, I have no idea,” I said.

“What about secret compartments?” Goldie asked.

“What?”

“You know, like on TV. There’s always a secret compartment somewhere and there’s always a clue in it. Have you discovered any secret compartments yet? Seems like a man so interested in wood might have a secret compartment somewhere.”

“Sounds a little Nancy Drew to me. Gabe knocked around on some of the walls but didn’t find anything.”

“No, I mean in his carvings. Did you look for a secret compartment in any of them?” she persisted.

“It never occurred to me.” I didn’t want to say it sounded downright silly, too obvious and predictable, like ... something Nancy would have discovered before George and Ned.

“Well, Jessica Fletcher would’ve looked for a secret compartment the first fifteen minutes. She’s a sharp one, but then, she grew up during the Depression.” The other women nodded.

I stuck my needle in the large, tomato-shaped pincushion on the table next to me and stood up. “When I get back to the house I’ll check out your theory,” I said, humoring them. “Right now, though, I’d better get going. I want to talk to that Beau Franklin again and see if I can get him to reveal what he invested in with Mr. Chandler. Maybe he knows more than he’s telling.”

“Be careful,” Edna said, the others echoing her. “Good luck.”

“Back at you,” I replied, and they laughed.

“Oh, don’t you worry any about us,” Melva said. “We’re on the side of right, no matter what my loony son says.”

Dove walked me to the front door.

“Do you need anything?” I asked.

She reached up and took my face in her soft, warm hands. “I need you to tell me you’re safe. That this thing with this strange man is not hurting you.”

I swallowed hard. “I’m okay, Gramma. I’ll be back home with Gabe soon.”

“See that you are,” she said, pulling me into a hug. I rested my head against her shoulder for a moment, wishing I was a little girl again. Wishing I had never heard of Jacob Chandler. Wishing my memories of my mother had never been tampered with.

“I love you,” I whispered.

“Oh, honeybun, you’re my sweet little baby girl and you always will be.”

Back in Morro Bay, I dropped the truck off and then walked over to Beau Franklin’s house. His wife informed me he was down on the Embarcadero playing chess at the giant chessboard.

“Please don’t upset him,” she said, her voice trembling. “He has high blood pressure.” Her pale face pleaded with me. “Things are . . . hard, Miss Harper.”

“Thank you,” I said and made no promises, picturing her husband’s angry face when he confronted me in my yard last week. High blood pressure, hard times or not, he was acting like a jerk and had possibly invested in something illegal. I was determined to find out just exactly what he knew about Mr. Chandler.

Down at the chessboard, about a dozen people watched Beau and a somewhat younger man move around three-foot-high chess pieces. Beau glanced up when he saw me join the crowd, but turned his attention back to the game, his face neutral.

The game took another twenty minutes to finish. Beau lost and took quite a bit of ribbing for it. Apparently he was a regular player, and losing was something out of the ordinary.

“Mr. Franklin,” I said when the crowd around him had broken up, “can we talk?”

“Unless you plan on writing me out a check, there’s nothing to talk about.”

“I might consider it if you’d tell me what you’d invested in with Mr. Chandler. If you have some written—”

“Young woman,” he snapped, “what I invest in is none of your business.”

His tone caused Scout to rumble low in his throat. I grabbed Scout’s leash close to the collar and pulled him next to me, saying coolly, “It is if you want your ten thousand dollars back.”

“Oh, I’ll get my money. One way or another.”

“Is that a threat, Mr. Franklin? Because if it is—”

“Miss Harper, you don’t know who you’re dealing with.”

“Is it something illegal, Mr. Franklin? Is that why you can’t show me any proof? Does it have something to do with the trips Mr. Chandler made to Mexico? Are drugs involved?”

His face drained of color, and instantly I knew I’d hit on the truth. I felt sick to my stomach having it verified that this man who could possibly be my father was a drug dealer.

He pointed a thick finger at me. “You’d better watch your mouth.” He moved toward me, and Scout bared his teeth, pulling against the leash. Abruptly Mr. Franklin stepped back, then turned and walked away without another word. A few people looked at me curiously, then went back to their conversations.

My legs were shaky the whole walk back to the house. For at least the hundredth time in the last week and a half, I gave thanks to God for Scout. There would be no way I could sleep in this house without his protective and alert presence.

“Looks like we’ve got yet another person royally pissed at us,” I said when we reached the house. When I opened the gate and went through, Scout started growling again, and I stopped dead.

Beau Franklin stood by the front door waiting for me. I started to turn away, to head over to Rich’s to call the police, when Beau’s choked voice stopped me.

“Wait, please, Miss Harper. I’m not going to hurt you.”

I turned slowly around to face him, Scout rumbling low in his throat.

“What do you want?” I asked.

“I need to talk to you. I need to explain.”

“As far as I can tell, there’s nothing to talk about.” I’d found out what I needed to know, though he hadn’t actually said it. One of my fears had been verified. This man who might be my father was something that, especially since I’d known Gabe, I’d come to despise—a drug dealer. Until Gabe had told me some of what he’d seen as an undercover narcotics officer, I hadn’t completely realized the havoc and pain those cruel people perpetuated on our society, how far their devastation reached.

“It’s not what you think,” he said, his florid face sad. “I’m not a bad person, Miss Harper. I just needed money and I needed it fast. Jake was a good man, a good friend, and he was trying to help me. He knew how to make money fast.”

“He dealt drugs,” I said, “and you were going to join him. There’s
nothing
good about that.”

“It was just that one time! I needed the money really bad. My wife . . .” His voice caught. “She’s got colon cancer. Our insurance cut us off. The insurance my company promised after twenty-seven years of working. We got caught up in red tape and can’t qualify for Medicare for months. She needs those shots, and they cost a thousand bucks apiece.” Tears started rolling down his cheeks. “Miss Harper, she’ll die without them. She’ll die in a lot of pain. I can’t let that happen.”

Shocked at this sudden reversal, my mouth went dry, and I couldn’t answer. Was his story true? Even if it was, did it excuse his actions?

“Ten thousand dollars was the rest of our savings,” he said. “All her medicine and doctors took the rest. Jake knew that. If he hadn’t had a heart attack, this never would have happened. I’d have had the money he promised.”

And more addicts would have had drugs to sniff, smoke, or shoot in their arms, I wanted to say. More children would be born on crack and be neglected, more robberies and rapes and killings would happen, more lives would be wasted. But even with those truths on the tip of my tongue, I couldn’t lecture him right now. All he could see was that his wife was dying, and he would do anything to stop it. Would I do that for someone I loved? Hurt someone else so their suffering would lessen? I’d like to think I wouldn’t, but I didn’t know the desperation born of watching someone I love suffer and die before my eyes.

“I’ll see what I can do, Mr. Franklin,” I said softly. “Please, just go home to your wife now. She needs you.”

He looked at me for a long moment, then nodded slowly. As he brushed past me and Scout, I could smell the sharp, tangy scent of fear.

A few minutes later, after I’d gone into the house and drank a glass of water to calm myself, there was a knock on the door. Rich’s voice bellowed out, “It’s me!”

I opened the door. “Come on in. A friendly face is more than welcome.”

“What’s wrong?” he asked.

His face grew sober as I explained what had just happened between Mr. Franklin and me.

“Poor guy. I know how he feels. Watching someone you love suffer is a living hell.” He looked down at his hands. “My wife struggled with lupus for seven years. When it got bad, when she was in the most pain, I think I would have done anything, cut off my own arm, kill myself, to give her some relief.”

“Oh, Rich, I’m so sorry.”

“I think it was pretty good of Jake to help Mr. Franklin.”

I thought about what he said for a moment before answering. “No, loaning him or giving him the money would have been good. Helping him earn more money by dealing drugs that will hurt other people is . . .” I hunted for the right words. “Selfish and evil. A truly good and kind person would not have put a desperate person in that position. Jacob Chandler had this house. He could have taken a loan out on it and given the money to Beau Franklin.
That
would have been kind.”

Rich nodded. “You’re right, but all I’m saying is don’t be too hard on Mr. Franklin. Sometimes when you’re desperate, your morality gets skewed.”

“It’s not Mr. Franklin I’m blaming.” Then I told him about my unfruitful day at the library. “I seem to be at an impasse.”

“I wish I could help, kid, but the whole thing’s got me stymied. But I did make chilies rellenos for dinner. Want to join me?”

“You have to ask?”

I spent the rest of the evening looking through his photo albums and hearing stories about his three daughters and their dating disasters. We purposely stayed away from any topic concerning my inheritance or Mr. Chandler. It was a much-needed break for me. At nine p.m., while I was trying to hide my third yawn, he ordered me to go home and go to bed.

At home I called Gabe, and like two teenagers, we talked for an hour about everything and nothing. I didn’t mention what had happened between me and Beau Franklin. There would be time enough to discuss it later. When my time in this house was up, I’d asked Gabe’s opinion about what I should do about Beau’s ten thousand dollars.

Not wanting to say good-bye, I said, “This reminds me of when we were dating. Remember, you used to call me every night at eleven p.m. to tell me to dream sweet.”

“What I remember is going to bed horny.”

I made a sympathetic noise. “Only four more nights, then relief is yours, Sergeant Friday.”

“Better get rested up because you’re going to need it.”

“I like the sound of that.”

After we hung up, I went out on the balcony and stared out at the ocean. It was a moonless night, and a thick halo of clouds shrouded Morro Rock. A damp wind whipped my hair around my face, causing my cheeks to tingle. I stood looking at the water for a long time, wondering for the first time where my mother actually was, what I really believed about an afterlife, feeling sadder and more alone than I’d ever remembered feeling.

When the feelings became overwhelming, I went back inside and decided to test Goldie’s theory and look for a secret compartment in Mr. Chandler’s wood carvings. With the radio playing a blues and jazz station to remind me of Gabe, I started with the wooden plaque hanging on the wall. It did, after all, say, “Cleave the wood.” Maybe he meant there was a thin, secret compartment. I pushed and prodded and shook the plaque. It was a good theory, just not the right one. Then I started with the duck decoys and methodically inspected each carved piece carefully, pulling and pushing, trying to find a secret compartment. Two hours later, with a bored Scout stretched out in front of the fireplace, I gave up. There was not a secret compartment to be found in any of his carvings. I flopped down on the sofa, headachy and cranky, deciding that I was going to just lay there for the next four days, wait out my time, then go home. I was so tired of this game I no longer cared who he was, what he’d done, or how he’d been connected to my mother.