she folded the wire behind the gate post. She took this precaution whenever she left the island for long kayak trips or departed for the mainland. Her grandmother had taught her that trick, as well as other ways of keeping herself safe on the island, and it was her grandmother who had given her Lydia after Carla’s murder.
She unlatched the gate with its dangling cowbell, whistled for Lydia who dashed ahead as Jennifer snapped the redwood gate shut behind them. The cowbell’s deep clang echoed above the island’s lush foliage and sent a raven cawing skyward. The wire mesh fencing around the site was laden with elderberry bushes that her great grandfather had planted as a windbreak. Every autumn, these needed hard pruning. She’d already hacked back much of the dense growth but had yet to haul the branches down to the beach to burn.
Under the cabin in an outdoor shower, Jennifer wiggled out of her spray skirt. After unstrapping her sheathed knife from her thigh, she shed her booties and wetsuit. She pulled the rope connected to a small storage tank above. As the cold water pummeled her long slim body, Lydia pushed forward to share the shower. “Okay,” Jennifer said. “Let’s get the salt and sand off you.” After letting water soak through the dog’s thick fur, Jennifer shoved her out.
What would her grandfather think of a Newfoundland enjoying the flow from the water tower he’d installed? He’d also constructed the septic tank, but it was her grandmother who’d developed the filtered water system. Water from a small well plus rainfall were the sole sources of fresh water, a precious commodity on the two mile long island. Grabbing a towel from a nearby hook, she dried off, and slung her wetsuit over her arm. Wearing only a bikini, she ran up the stairs to the porch where Lydia sprawled.
She placed her booties and the knife on a bench. After laying her wetsuit and spray skirt over the railing to dry, she fed Lydia a biscuit from the large covered tin by the front door. “You’re happy, wet, and very grungy,” she told Lydia, who eyed her mistress as if waiting for another biscuit. “Quite enough for you.”
Once inside the expansive room that served as the living, dining, and kitchen area, she climbed the spiral staircase to the loft and changed into jeans, a long sleeved flannel shirt, and sneakers. There was another bedroom downstairs, but the loft is where she and Carla had slept, and the warm memories of late night chats with her younger sister remained embedded in her psyche. A toilet and basin were off the downstairs bedroom. Tucked under the spiral stairs was a cedar closet with extra warm clothing for foul weather. It was the only place Jennifer hadn’t cleaned out since she’d inherited the island from her grandmother.
After running a comb through her cinnamon-colored hair, she pulled it into a ponytail and slipped on a green hair band. She glanced into the small mirror hung on the roughhewn wall. Her tan emphasized the freckles that laced across her nose and cheeks. She rubbed on lotion that had a nondescript fresh smell, unlike the perfume Alex had given her. She hesitated, unable to recall the name. “Oh yes, L‘air du Temps,” she mumbled. The perfume went down the drain shortly after he’d left.
Back downstairs she heated clam chowder on the propane burner. Through the window, she saw the sloop still moored in the cove. She mulled over how snippy she’d been. In fact, she’d been rude and normally she was friendly and outgoing. How much she’d changed.
Since her grandmother’s death four months earlier, she’d only been to the island a few times. The last time Joe had come with her. He seemed to understand that the island was her sanctuary where she could grieve and remember the good as well as the bad that had occurred on Beastly.
Her parents were furious that the island had been left to her and not to them, but her grandmother knew they would sell it. After Carla’s murder, they never returned to the island. Her grandmother understood that Jennifer would maintain Beastly Manor and the land as long as she lived.
The loss of her grandmother made her more appreciative of her surroundings. The cabin’s homey interior contained so many memories. Her mother had sewn the cranberry red canvas curtains; her grandmother had made the olive green denim slipcovers on the couch and the two overstuffed chairs; Carla contributed the flowery cushions to the décor, and Jennifer, not prone to sewing, had made the coffee table from the island’s pine trees. Her father and grandfather had worked on the outside and surrounding area. “Decorating is women’s work,” they’d declared as they’d gone off together. When her grandfather died ten years ago, her dad continued his outdoor chores, accepting Jennifer’s help now and then. When Jennifer’s fiancé, Alex, came to the island, her father had accepted his help grudgingly.
After her sister’s murder, Jennifer and her parents had fallen into a state of confused alienation. A psychologist friend told her this was a phase that would pass, but the chasm remained. They blamed Alex for Carla’s murder; the police blamed Jennifer and Alex. She blamed her parents for her breakup with Alex. The circle of unhappiness continued.
She paused as she was about to cut a slab of Havarti cheese, thinking how the past haunted her and froze the present into an all-consuming drive to find the murderer. Sighing, she put the cheese and a slice of rye bread onto her plate with the bowl of hot soup. She took her lunch out to the porch and sat in her grandmother’s wicker rocking chair. Lydia’s snoring throbbed in counterpoint to the pine needles brushing against the cabin walls. A golden-eyed oystercatcher, black as a crow, darted overhead. She heard the sloop’s engine and watched the man weigh anchor. The sloop glided out of the cove like a sleek black swan.
“So much for that interloper,” she said, rubbing the nape of her neck. She could have been more diplomatic. Until the murder and the media attention, her family had welcomed strangers. Afterward, everything changed. Like poked sea anemones, her family had pulled into themselves. Was it time for her to stop being so defensive toward every stranger who approached the island? If Joe had been with her, it would have been different, but he couldn’t get off duty, so she’d come alone.
After finishing lunch, she set her dishes on the porch’s cedar planks and rocked. She had four more days on the island before she returned to Books & Tea. Aunt Emma Mae had been the sole owner of the bookstore until Jennifer bought in a year and half ago. Jennifer’s research to locate and appraise rare and old books for clients was not only an endeavor essential to the store’s dwindling bottom line, but also allowed her to learn about vintage books circa 1900s. The book, The Big Sleep by Raymond Chandler, taken from Carla was the only clue to the murderer. It was all Jennifer had to go on.
“Enough dawdling,” she said out loud. “Time for chores.” Jennifer picked up her empty bowl and went back inside. The cabin’s windows needed caulking, the hewn dead brush waited to be dragged to the beach and burned, and a few roof shingles had to be installed where a raccoon had clawed through to the plywood.
As she washed her dishes, she thought of how she and her grandmother had worked side-by-side making repairs to the cabin. The work had been filled with fun. Once, her grandmother had accidentally nailed her shirt to the side of the house. When she’d quickly descended the ladder, she ended up topless. Or the time the two of them caulked the bathroom window only to find that they’d sealed off the vent. Jennifer smiled, remembering the shared work and laughter.
The afternoon spun by as Jennifer tackled one chore after another. Toward early evening, she dragged the last elderberry branch to the beach. Tomorrow she’d burn them. The air had cooled as the sun dipped behind the island’s tree line. It was then she heard the muffled sound of an engine. The same black-hulled sloop entered the cove, its sails furled.
“Damn!” She shoved the last branches into the large pit she’d dug and wiped her forehead with the back of her gloved hand.
The man dropped anchor and put his dinghy over the side. Lydia bolted toward the water, barking and splashing in the shallows. Shrugging off her irritation, Jennifer resumed breaking branches into smaller
