The Weekenders (47 page)

“‘I said in mine heart, God shall judge the righteous and the wicked: for there is a time there for every purpose and for every work.'”

Riley nodded in solemn agreement. Wendell's judgement might come in heaven, but down here on earth, she'd judged for herself, and her verdict would never win him a pass beyond the pearly gates.

“Wendell's daughter, Maggy, would like to say a few words.”

“Ready?” Riley asked, turning to her daughter.

“I think so,” Maggy whispered. “Could you hold Banks?” She unbuttoned Wendell's shirt and Riley saw that the puppy was sound asleep. She gently transferred the sleeping pug to her own lap.

When she reached the altar, Father Templeton helped her to the pulpit, then stepped aside.

Maggy extracted a sheet of lined notebook paper from the breast pocket of the shirt and slowly unfolded it. She took a deep breath and cleared her throat.

Her voice was low but the words clear. “My name is Margaret Evelyn Griggs. I am Wendell Griggs's daughter. And I know a lot of you think you know my dad, but I bet none of you know how special my dad was.

“My dad did a lot for this island. Even before he met my mom, Dad came to work here for my granddaddy, and he helped build a lot of houses on this island. He did a lot of good things that people don't know about, too. In Raleigh, where we live, he and I cleared a nature trail that runs through our neighborhood so that people in wheelchairs could be in nature. He and some other dads gave the money for a new soccer field at my school, and my dad drove the bulldozer when they were making the field okay for us to play on. He paid for the Big Belle lighthouse to be painted too, and hardly anybody knows that.”

Maggy looked down at her paper. She bit her lip and continued. “My dad taught me a lot. He told me to always go to the net in tennis. He taught me how to ride a bike and how to do fractions. And he let me drive the golf cart sitting on his lap starting when I was a really little kid. Almost every Saturday when he was home, he and I went to the Waffle House or the Mercantile for breakfast so my mom could sleep late, and he taught me that scrambled eggs always need hot sauce. And the most important thing he told me was that you can tell a lot about a person by the way they treat their dogs.

“This year…” Maggy's voice trailed off for a moment. “This year I got pretty sick and we found out that I have diabetes, and I had to go to the hospital and stuff and get shots and not have candy and Cokes anymore.” She sniffed and looked down, and then back up again. “My dad wanted to surprise me, so one day he came to the hospital, and he brought me a puppy for my very own. And the nurses yelled at him, but Dad told them to back off, so they did. And then my dad crawled into the hospital bed with me, and I decided to name the puppy Mr. Banks, because Mr. Banks was the dad in
Mary Poppins,
which is my favorite movie, except for
Star Wars,
which my dad took me to when the new one came out because his dad took him when he was a kid.”

Maggy gripped the lectern with shaking hands. “My dad had to work a lot, so lately he wasn't home that much, but almost every night, he called me to tell me good night, and say that he loved me.”

She seemed to be staring directly at Riley. “I know some people are saying bad things about my dad. But they're not true. My dad loved me, and he loved my mom, and he loved Belle Isle. And I wish he weren't dead.”

She folded her paper and put it back in her pocket. “That's all I wanted to say.”

Father Templeton put a kindly arm around the child's shoulder. “Thank you, Maggy, for such a beautiful, heartfelt tribute.”

Maggy nodded wordlessly and left the altar, but instead of joining her family in their pew, she leaned in without a word and took the now-awake Banks from her mother, then continued down the main aisle and out the door of the chapel.

“I'll go get her,” Evelyn said, but Riley shook her head. “Let her go, Mama. She just needs a little more time to grieve.”

 

56

On Saturday morning, Riley sat up in bed and met the bemused eyes of her best friend. She looked around the room. “Why am I in your guest bedroom?”

“I certainly wasn't going to put you in my bed,” Parrish said. “I love you like a sister, but even I have certain limits.”

“No. Seriously.”

Parrish handed her a mug of coffee and grinned. “There are so many ways I'm tempted to answer that question.”

“You're really enjoying yourself at my expense, aren't you?”

“Hugely.”

“How about just telling me the truth?”

“Spoilsport. Okay, the truth isn't all that exciting. You managed to make it through the service all right, although Billy did have to shake you awake at one point. And then afterward, when everybody came back here for supper, you fixed yourself a plate of food and guzzled down approximately three glasses of white wine like a pro.”

“Oh, no.” Riley flopped back onto the bed. “It was those damn pills of yours. Mama started in on me about my dress, and I just couldn't take it. I popped two pills right before we left for church … and as soon as we sat down I started feeling kind of weird. You know, like my give-a-shit had up and gone…”

“Good God, Riles. You took two Xanax followed by about a quart of pinot grigio? No wonder you were zonked out of your gourd.”

“What exactly did I do? Or do I even want to know?”

“You didn't attempt a pole dance or pick a fight with your mom, if that's what you're worried about. Mostly, you just got really, really mellow and went around telling everybody how much you loved them. Including Andrea Payne and what's-her-name.”

“Belle Isle Barbie and Melody Zimmerman? Who invited those two?”

“You did. Along with Father Templeton and the organist, who nobody'd ever met before, and various other random funeral-goers. Fortunately most of them had the good sense not to show up. Except, of course, for Andrea and Melody, who waltzed right in here like they were your long-lost cousins.”

“Oh, no. I'm so, so sorry.”

“Don't be. It was excellent comic relief.”

Riley took another sip of coffee. “I didn't … say anything about Wendell, did I? Anything bad?”

“Not that I heard,” Parrish said. “You definitely didn't say anything the two of us were thinking.”

“That's a relief. But wait. Oh God! Did Maggy notice how strangely I was acting?”

“Relax. She wasn't here. As soon as we got out of church, Ed tracked her down.”

“Where'd she go after she left the chapel?”

“Ed said she was sitting on the seawall, near the marina. Just sitting there, staring out at the water.”

“Where they found Wendell's body,” Riley said. “I'm afraid she's obsessed with that.”

“Yeah. They sat and talked for a while. She was pretty emphatic about not coming back over here afterward, so Ed took her over to the Mercantile and got her an early supper, then took her back to the Shutters. We didn't think you'd mind.”

“Mind? I'm incredibly grateful to Ed for being so sensitive to Maggy's mood. I'm so grateful to both of you. I don't know if we could have survived yesterday without the two of you.”

Parrish said, “We didn't do anything you wouldn't have done for us.” Changing the subject, she asked, “So what are you going to do with the rest of the day?”

Riley looked around the room and spotted her clothes, neatly folded on an armchair near the bed. “I feel like doing something useful. Now that I'm starting a new job, we only have a couple of weeks to figure out how we prove Melody Zimmerman killed Wendell.”

Parrish sighed. “You've got another screwball plan, don't you?”

“What would it hurt if we just took a ride over to Melody's cottage and took a look around?”

“Oh, no,” Parrish said. “I am not breaking into that woman's house. At least we had a key to get into Wendell's office, and he was your husband. This is an entirely different crime. It's called breaking and entering.”

“Who said anything about breaking in? We could just cruise over there and maybe peek in a window or something. You'll have to loan me some clothes, though. I can't go snooping around in my funeral outfit.”

“What if she catches us? What if a nosy neighbor sees us? What if Ed finds out? He was not happy when I told him we'd been stalking Melody.”

“If she's home, we'll leave. We won't get caught. I swear. And since when do you have to ask for your husband's permission to do something? Geez, Parrish, talk about growing a set!”

*   *   *

Melody Zimmerman's cottage was a modest seventies-era, single-story redwood cottage, in an enclave of half a dozen homes from the same era, each nestled into its own thicket of live oaks, palmettos, and bay laurels.

“Nice and private,” Riley said approvingly, as Parrish steered the cart down the cul-de-sac. She pointed to a small green fenced-off public space with a sign designating it as a dog park. “Park over there.”

“This is crazy,” Parrish muttered as they tried to act nonchalant, walking through the steady drizzle toward Melody Zimmerman's cottage. “We can't see anything here,” Parrish said, pointing at two large picture windows covered with closed plantation shutters. “She's probably got the same thing on every window.”

“Quit being such a pessimist,” Riley said. “Let's check in back.”

As they turned the corner they noted what looked like a set of double windows, covered again with closed plantation shutters.

Next, the two women darted around to the rear of the house. A set of sliding glass doors led onto a small brick-paved patio. “See, no more plantation shutters,” Riley said.

The two women plastered their faces to the sliders, which were partially obscured by a set of sheer curtains. “Ugh. Total granny city,” Parrish said. They were looking at a combined living/dining area. The living room featured a fussy faux French furniture suite with brocade sofa and two matching tufted armchairs. There was a dining room with a crystal chandelier centered over a reproduction Early American maple dining room table and chairs.

“Melody certainly has way better taste in clothes than in furniture,” Parrish said.

“Didn't you say the house actually belongs to a relative?” Riley asked. She pointed to a window to the right. It was located halfway up the wall, above an air-conditioning condenser, just high enough that they couldn't see in. Not to be deterred, Riley jumped onto the condenser and pressed her face to the glass.

“See anything?” Parrish asked.

“Wow, talk about stuck in the eighties,” Riley reported. “It's just a normal kitchen. For a home-wrecking slut, our Melody is a tidy little soul. Not even a coffee mug on the countertop.”

“Okay, let's go,” Parrish said anxiously.

“Oh, hello!” Riley said. “There's a doggie door over there, on the side of the house.” She clambered down from the condenser.

“Which means there's probably a dog,” Parrish said. “Now we really gotta go.”

“Don't be such a fraidy-cat,” Riley chided. “If there was a dog, it would have barked by now.”

She hurried around to the side of the house and stood looking at the dog door, a rectangular opening approximately eighteen inches high by fourteen inches wide. Riley dropped down onto her knees and looked up excitedly at Parrish. “I bet I could crawl through this, don't you?”

“Have you lost your mind? That's a big-ass doggie door. Which means there is a big-ass doggie somewhere inside that house, probably a Rottweiler or a Doberman, just waiting to rip your throat out,” Parrish said. “Now let's go.”

“I'm just gonna stick my head in and see what's what,” Riley said. “If there's a dog, he'll bark, and we'll boogie on down the road. Okay?”

“No! Absolutely not. I did not sign up for illegal entry,” Parrish said. But it was too late. Riley poked her head inside the door's outer rubber flap.

“Hellooo. Hellooo. Mr. Doggie, is anybody home? Mr. Doggie?”

She backed out of the door and grinned up at her best friend. “There's no dog in there that I can see. Any self-respecting Dobie would have clawed right through that door if he was home. I'm going in and taking a look around. Cover me, okay?”

“No!” Parrish tried to grab hold of the waist of Riley's shorts, but her friend was too fast. She'd already wriggled all the way through the door.

“I'm in,” Riley called, her voice muffled by the door. “Let me know if somebody comes, okay?”

“Get out of there,” Parrish said. “If somebody comes I am not making your bail.”

*   *   *

Parrish crept along the side of the house, watching to see if anybody approached the house from the cul-de-sac. The rain fell softly, and her sandal-clad feet sank into the sandy soil. Hours passed. Mosquitoes swarmed, and she slapped frantically at her bare legs and arms. She had to pee, and she was terrified.

“Hey!”

Startled, Parrish whirled around to see Riley standing beside her.

“You literally just scared the living piss out of me!” Parrish said. “What took you so long?”

“It was only five minutes,” Riley started. “And it was totally worth it…”

“Let's go.” Parrish started around the corner of the house but quickly darted backward. “Hide!” she whispered. “Somebody's coming. A cart just pulled up around front.”

They backed quickly away from the rear of the house, squatting behind a huge clump of palmettos. They heard keys jingling, and the front door opening. Five minutes passed. “I'm getting eaten alive by mosquitoes,” Riley whispered.

“Serves you right,” Parrish whispered back.

They heard the sound of the back door sliding open, and then a familiar woman's voice. “Come on Moosey. Come on boy, let's go make poopeys.”