Chapter 33
An air current swirled against Barnaby’s face, created by the silent flap of an owl. Had he disturbed the owl’s nest this deep in the woods?
“I’m just looking for Tamara,” he told the owl—just in case—even though he felt like a fool. Just because he didn’t have any way to communicate with the wild creatures around here didn’t mean Tamara didn’t. To hear her tell it, they spoke to her all the time.
If this owl was trying to tell him something, what would it be? Keep out? Or keep going? Weren’t owl usually active at night instead of in the daylight?
He decided to follow in the direction the owl had flown.
Why not? So far he hadn’t stumbled across anything that told him where Tamara might be.
Winding his way through the dense stands of old-growth spruce—one of the few places on the island where trees hadn’t been harvested for lumber or firewood—he noticed the smell of the ocean getting stronger.
He was headed for the shoreline, the same rocks he’d clambered up as an angry kid.
Maybe the owl was telling him to get off this property, even if he had to swim.
As he emerged from the woods, the brisk wind hit him like a shot of adrenaline.
But he saw no little white-haired elfin figure on the rocks, collecting mussels as she sometimes did.
The tide was coming in, with a few feet of slippery rocks still exposed.
Even though the wind was still high, this tiny cove was oriented in a way that kept it sheltered from the biggest waves.
Had Tamara taken her little blue rowboat out for a spin?
No—there it was, upside down on the eel grass, looking like it hadn’t gone anywhere in quite some time.
But there was something on the rocks. A flash of color that didn’t belong there.
He carefully climbed across the mounds of seaweed and colonies of mussels until he reached the item. It wasn’t much, just a scrap of wool that looked like it had been torn from a piece of clothing. The color—a deep royal purple—didn’t look like anything Tamara had ever worn.
Still, it was the only thing he’d seen so far that looked out of place. Had someone collected Tamara in a boat? Had she gone somewhere?
Frustrated and even more worried, he climbed back up the rocks and headed back to the cottage. He left a note for Tamara in case she’d simply gone to see a patient or something like that.
He was driving around the flagpole in the town center when someone yelled his name.
Heather was waving at him from a bicycle heading the other direction.
He pulled over and climbed out of the truck.
She veered across the road and slid her feet off the pedals of a rusty old cruiser with a pink basket.
“Nice wheels.”
Heather swung her ponytail off her shoulder and wiped sweat off her forehead. “Thanks, it’s a classic. Gabby has my truck. I didn’t have your number and she’s not answering her phone, but I wanted someone to see this. I found something.”
“What’s that?”
She reached into her basket and pulled out a folder. “Gabby asked me to go to the school and look for photos of Keith Garner. I think I might have found one, but I don’t know how helpful it will be.”
His pulse picked up. “Let’s see. You never know.”
She handed him the folder, which held a photocopy of an old newsletter, just like the ones he remembered from back in the day.
“They wouldn’t let me take the original, but they gave me this copy,” she explained. “It’s the graduating class of the year two thousand and six. That’s Keith, standing in the back. The photo was already black and white, sorry.”
So that was Keith. He looked perfectly ordinary, a good-looking enough kid with broad shoulders, light eyes, and a large frame.
A football player type of build, although the Sea Smoke Island school didn’t have any official team sports.
Most of the kids who grew up here had a similar physique because they spent so much time on boats. That kind of work built muscles.
“Is his hairline receding?”
“I think so. I noticed that too. So Keith Garner, if he’s alive, is missing some hair. Or he wears a toupee.”
“Great. Narrows it down nicely.”
She gave a laughing shrug. “Does anything else catch your eye?”
He put his fingers on the photo as if to zoom in, then laughed at himself. “I’m too used to my phone.”
“I tried the same thing, except actually on my phone. I was trying to see what his t-shirt says, but the resolution is too low. I was hoping someone else’s eyeballs could make something out.”
“The pattern is familiar,” he said slowly. “The way the letters arch. I have seen this before.”
“Can you think where?”
“It’s from when I was in high school myself.
” Pulling up the memory was like trying to see through fog.
“I hated boarding school, and thought about dropping out and doing something else with my life. I looked at other schools, other options. Trade school. Is it a trade school? No, no, that’s not it.
” It was right there, on the edge of his memory.
Finally it clicked into place. “It’s a police academy. There’s a program, kind of like ROTC, that recruits high school seniors and puts them on a fast track to a degree in criminal justice.”
Heather’s eyes widened. “So Keith Garner was planning to be a police officer?”
“Or at least he had the t-shirt.”
After saying goodbye to Heather, he took a moment to text that tidbit of information to Gabby, along with a photo of the newsletter.
When you see Chen, show her the pic of Keith Garner. Maybe she’ll recognize him.
He stared at it for a long moment himself, searching for anything familiar in that seventeen-year-old face.
If Fiona had been hanging out with him, had he ever come to the inn?
Would some of the older staff members remember him?
And if he had survived that plane crash and returned for some reason, would they recognize him now?
Which brought up another question. Why would he return?
Was he after revenge because Amelia bought his house and kicked his family into the guesthouse?
Did he want to reconnect with Fiona somehow?
And how did Tamara fit into this? Those hidden cameras at her house…
no police training would be needed to do that, but it might help.
Before continuing on to the inn, he decided to stop at the constable’s office and talk to Luke. He needed to let him know that Tamara was nowhere to be found. Surely that was breaking the terms of the “probationary bail” arrangement, but more importantly, she could be in danger.
He found both Luke and Detective Hooper in the office. Hooper’s big rear end was once again settled on the desk, a position that clearly irritated Luke, who had pushed his chair all the way back to avoid the hefty officer.
Luke jumped up gladly at the sight of Barnaby and came around the desk to give him a quick hug. “You’re back. How’s Tamara?”
“That’s why I’m here. I can’t find her.” He looked at Detective Hooper, who was heaving his body off the desk. “Did you take her home?”
“Yes, I dropped her off at two-oh-five pm. Noted it in the logs.”
“Did you take her all the way into the cottage or leave her at the head of the path?”
Hooper drew back with an offended stare, his eyes darkening to a hard brown. “Are you questioning my police work?”
“I’m checking on my grandmother.”
Hooper relaxed, but only a little. Touchy, thought Barnaby.
“I took her into her residence. She said she was tired but offered me tea. I told her I couldn’t accept any substance from her.
I reiterated the terms of her release and advised her to provide the bail money as soon as feasible. Then I left.”
“Did she say if she was going somewhere with anyone?”
“She better not. That would be against the terms of her release, which I made sure she understood. We don’t usually let people out on a provisional basis like this, but we didn’t think she was a flight risk so I personally signed off on it.”
Luke was frowning. “I hope she’s okay. I argued that she’d be safer here, with all the rumors and fears going around. But I got outvoted.”
“She was happy to be home.” Hooper hitched up his pants. “She told me she had some animals and so forth to check on. If anything, maybe she wandered into the woods, and I’m not going after her if she did. Those old southwest woods are a real jungle.”
“I’ll go check on her,” said Luke, just as the phone rang. He answered it, listened for a few minutes, then gestured to Hooper. “You might want to jump on this. Break-in at Amelia Burnhauser’s place.”
“On it.” Hooper loped out of the office, while Luke wrapped up the call.
“Was it the guesthouse?” Barnaby started to explain about Gabby searching it, but Luke shook his head.
“No, the house. The Highgroves reported it. They saw a door open and peeked inside. They think someone was looking for a safe because all the paintings were off the walls and the bookshelves emptied.”
A chill traveled through Barnaby’s body. Gabby had just been there. What if she’d crossed paths with the vandal?
“Do you think it could have been Tamara?” Luke was asking. “Amelia left the house to her for a reason, right?”
“If it was Tamara, she had every right to be there, like you just said.” Barnaby tensed, ready for battle, but Luke threw up his hands in surrender.
“I just want to make sure she isn’t in danger. I’m on your side, Barnaby. And Tamara’s.”
Barnaby heaved in a breath to collect himself.
No need to bite his brother’s head off. “Sorry. Hey, before you head over to Amelia’s, do you remember a kid named Keith Garner?
He would have been about Carson’s age, maybe a little younger.
He went to the island high school.” He dug out his phone and showed Luke the newsletter photo.
“Keith Garner…now that’s a name from the past. I think Fiona knew him. I remember hearing the staff talk about it. She kept sneaking off the property and no one could figure out how.”
“Did you ever meet him?”
“Not that I remember.” He squinted at the image on Barnaby’s phone. “I might have seen him around, I guess. He looks kind of familiar.”
“He does, right? There’s something about him, but I can’t pin it down. Let me know if anything rings a bell, would you?”
“Of course. You think he might be back?”
“It’s a theory. A far-fetched one, since it’s more likely that he died in a plane crash. But lately all sorts of unlikely things have been happening here on Sea Smoke.”
“Ain’t that the truth.”