The Swallowtail Legacy 2, page 23
“Do you understand your rights?” Pawlowski asks.
She opens her mouth to respond, but stops momentarily when she sees me standing between Nate and Nadine. “You’re first on my list, Lana. Why don’t you go someplace and…be tall, you circus freak.”
“What does that even mean?” I say. “And it’s Lark. Not Lana, or Lucy, or Lebron. You know, you almost had me fooled. When I heard all the stories about how terrible you were to Howard Allam and Wendy Eppinger—”
“Don’t forget your pal Jordie Holloway,” she says, smiling horribly. “I ruined his career, too.”
“It made perfect sense that they would try to kill you,” I say. “Every one of them had the motive. They had the means—those boxes from Keke’s are everywhere. It’s even possible that they could have figured out a way to switch the chocolates and get them into your room. But in the end, it was all about greed, and maybe a little jealousy. You couldn’t stand that Didi wrote a book that’s better than anything you could ever even hope to write, so you just had to do something about it.”
While all this is going on, Jack and Nate kick a soccer ball back and forth, but one of Jack’s passes sails over Nate’s head and rolls straight toward Pawlowski. When he bends over to pick it up, Keyheart grabs the gun from his holster and starts waving it around.
“Everybody back up!” Keyheart says, snarling and spitting like a rabid dog. “Irwin! Get that sad excuse for an airplane ready to go. Maybe this time you can actually get it in the air.”
“Here we go again,” says Les, oddly calm for somebody in the presence of a gun-waving maniac.
“I don’t think so,” I say.
Pawlowski, still holding the soccer ball, says, “Everybody, just do as she says. Give her plenty of room.”
“That’s right,” Keyheart snaps. “Nice and easy. Back up, everybody.”
I stand my ground and mentally measure the distance between Keyheart and me. Twelve yards, give or take a couple of feet. Penalty kick distance.
“Give Nate his ball,” I say.
“What? Oh, yeah,” says Pawlowski.
Here’s the thing: when it comes to soccer, Nate and I have a real connection. We always seem to know exactly where the other is on the field and have an uncanny ability to anticipate the next move without a word being spoken. So, at the moment Pawlowski releases the ball, Nate and I make eye contact. The slightest nod from me sets things in motion.
I take a small step toward him as he taps the ball in my direction.
One more quick glance at Keyheart to calculate the angle and distance, and then one, two, and…my right foot swings backward and then, with every brain cell focused and every atom of my body behind it, flies forward, striking the ball cleanly, imparting the perfect amount of “bend.”
It rises, spinning and curling toward the upper left-hand target on my practice goal. This time, though, the target is the venom-spitting head of my once-upon-a-time-favorite author.
In perfect unison, everyone sucks in their breath, and time slows as every rotation bends the ball harder and harder to the left. Like a goalkeeper who’s been caught off guard and knows she’s beaten, Keyheart’s eyes widen as she realizes there’s no escape from four hundred and fifty grams of whirling rubber about to tattoo the name “Wilson” on her forehead.
Ironically, if it had been a penalty shot, I would have been denied the goal because the ball hits her squarely in the face and rebounds, flying over my head and landing in Les’s boat.
Keyheart, meanwhile, does a perfect imitation of a tree falling in the forest.
Timberrrr!
CHAPTER
19
it’s past midnight when i finally collapse onto my bed. Pogo acknowledges me by briefly lifting her nose from the pillow and then placing one paw against my side. Across the room, Pip sleeps soundly, her face glowing in the pale blue moonlight. A westerly breeze lifts the curtains at the sides of the French doors, setting the carved-bird mobile above me spinning. I reach over to Bedlam’s cage and lift the sheet.
“G’night, Bedlam.”
“Sweet dreams,” he whispers in Mom’s voice.
There’s a quiet knock on the doorframe and I turn to find Suzy standing there. “Hey. You’re still awake,” she says.
“Yeah. I’m still a little wound up.”
“Not surprising. I, uh, just found this,” she says, showing me the copy of Little Dorrit that I’d found with Owen’s help.
I jump from the bed. “Omigosh! I forgot that I put it in your room. I meant to tell you, but there was so much going on. Did you look inside?”
She nods. “It’s…incredible. Where did you—”
“It was still there, in the house on Buckeye Street. Didi’s grandma’s house. I had a little help. Owen Cheever’s family owns the house, and he got us inside.”
“You have to keep it, you know,” Suzy says.
“I-I don’t know. It’s not like a sweatshirt.”
“It belongs here—on the island, I mean. Didi finally brought it home. Look, I talked to her mom about her stuff—she’s all about what Didi would have wanted, who she would have wanted to have things. She said it was all up to me. Her parents are getting the rights to her book, and that’s enough. They’re not exactly the most sentimental people you’ll meet.”
“But the nightingale came from her grandmother.”
Suzy hands me the book. “And now it’s yours. Whatever the story is with those two birds and the books, you’re the right person to decide what to do with them. But I think they belong on Swallowtail Island. Now, go to bed. I don’t know about you, but I’m gonna dream about my last breakfast with you guys. Thomas promised waffles with real maple syrup and I can’t stop thinking about it. Who knows when I’ll get to eat like this again.”
* * *
Thomas must have started cooking at five in the morning, and goes all-out for breakfast. I follow Suzy into the kitchen. Platters of food cover every horizontal surface. Waffles, pancakes, bacon, sausage, scrambled eggs, hash browns, and bowls of fruit. On the stove, still more is cooking on the griddle that covers two burners.
“Geez, Thomas. Did you invite the whole island for breakfast?” I ask.
“Nobody goes away hungry this morning,” he says. “Even Nate, our own little Evel Knievel.”
“So, how much trouble is he in?” I ask. “ ’Cause, I mean, he kind of saved the day. Keyheart would have gotten away if we hadn’t been there.”
“I’m still not sure where she thought she was going,” Thomas says. “Canada? They’d turn her over in a second. I still haven’t decided on the punishment yet. Lucky for you both, Officer Pawlowski is willing to forget the whole thing—Boys! Breakfast!—provided he never sees that scooter on the road again.” He sets a pitcher of maple syrup on the table and motions to us to sit.
“This is even better than my dream,” says Suzy. “And my dream was pretty spectacular.”
“I told him he had to make an extra-special breakfast,” Pip says, hugging Suzy, “to make sure you come back.”
Suzy guides Pip into her seat. “You can count on it, kiddo.”
“Sit, everyone. Eat!” Thomas commands.
We do as we’re told and stuff ourselves until we can eat no more.
When we have pushed back from the table a few inches, Jack gives Suzy a box containing a small wooden swallow, carved by a local artist. “It’s from all of us,” he says. “But Pip and Thomas picked it out.”
“It’s perfect! I love it. Thank you guys,” she says.
“We thought about a box of chocolates from Keke’s,” Blake says, “but, you know…”
“Yeah, probably not,” Suzy says.
“Consider yourself an honorary Heron-Finch-Emmery,” Thomas says. “You’re always welcome. We’ll keep your room ready.”
“You guys are too nice. I mooch meals and a place to stay for a week and you give me a gift…and invite me back.”
“That’s what friends are for,” Jack says.
Suzy musses his hair. “You know, for somebody so young, you’re very wise.” She plants a kiss on his cheek, turning it bright red. Then she turns to me and says, “And, speaking of friends, when is your big date with that cute kid? The one with the hair?”
I try to shush her before she finishes, but the blood is already rushing to my face and the damage is done.
“What?! Lark!” Pip cries. “You’re not. Owen Cheever? Ewww.”
“That’s gross,” says Nate. “He’s such a loser.”
“Sorry. I forgot it was a secret,” Suzy says as I press my warm, red forehead onto the kitchen table.
“It’s not a date,” I say. “I’m not allowed to date. Thomas said so. “We’re gonna watch a stupid movie. At a campground. Outdoors.”
“Don’t forget, you’re getting pizza, too,” says Blake, earning a death-stare from me.
“Hmm. I’m no expert, but pizza and a movie sounds like a date to me,” Thomas observes, enjoying every second of me being uncomfortable.
“Yeah, it kinda does,” Suzy agrees.
* * *
—
“Aaagh! It’s not a date!” Desperate to change the subject, I point to the clock on the kitchen wall. “We’re gonna be late, Suzy. We have to get to the ferry.”
“Afraid you’re right,” she says. “I’m gonna miss you guys. Come here. Hugs!”
She gets a hug from everybody—even Blake, who’s not usually much of a hugger.
While Thomas loads her bag and guitar into the back of an Islander Hotel golf cart, which they kindly let us borrow one last time, I say, “Be right back. Have to grab something from my room.” I run up the stairs, peek inside my backpack, and throw it over my shoulder.
Suzy says, “Bye, guys!” and waves as I toss the pack in the cart and we rumble down the drive.
On the road between the little harbor and town is the Duck & Drake, which is advertised as a bait shop but also sells a wide assortment of snacks, drinks, and mystery novels, especially the kind that are a series of ten or twenty (or more) books. The owner is a retired English teacher and avid reader, and in front of the shop she recently installed a Little Free Library, one of those “take a book, share a book” boxes that looks like a tiny house.
“I need to stop here for a second,” I tell Suzy. I pull the cart into the grass parking lot, reach behind my seat for my backpack, and dig out my once-prized copy of The Somewhere Girls. “Don’t think I’ll be needing this anymore. The crazy thing is that it is a good book. She’s a really good writer. Why did she have to…”
“You and your friend Les nailed it. Greed. Jealousy. Fame and fortune. Powerful stuff. Forget about her. Thanks to you, people are going to remember Didi Ferrer. And they’re going to get to read A Drowsy Numbness… with her name on the cover.”
I open the tiny door and place the book on the bottom shelf of the box, squeezing it between A Year in Provence and Night Train to Lisbon. There’s a book I haven’t seen before about taking care of horses on the top shelf, so I snag it for Pip, who believes that there’s no such thing as too many books about horses.
“Feel better?” Suzy asks when we’re back underway.
I nod. “Yeah. I do.”
“I’ll bet you’re ready for a nice, quiet week. You don’t have much time before school starts, do you?”
“Don’t remind me. New school. New team. New friends. New everything.”
“Don’t sweat it. You’re practically a celebrity. Everybody on the island already knows you. The rest of the country is going to when all this really hits the news.”
“You really think people care about this?”
“Are you kidding? A famous writer kills her assistant and steals her book—a book that publishers are now fighting over—and then gets caught by a one-armed, really tall, twelve-year-old girl and her adorable motorcycle-riding brother, who somehow—and, by the way, I definitely don’t believe a word of that fairy tale you told Thomas—ties a rope to the getaway seaplane while they’re going fifty miles an hour in a boat driven by a Vietnam vet? And then, when the murderer grabs the cop’s gun, you flatten her with a soccer ball to the head. Yeah, nobody’s gonna like that story.” She grins, and then I see her eyes get really big when she looks toward the ferry dock. “Whoa. What the heck is going on there? Stop here. Seriously. I’ll walk the rest of the way.”
All around the ferry terminal, packs of reporters and producers are setting up cameras in an absolute frenzy.
“Are all those—”
“Reporters,” Suzy says. “If I were you, I’d turn around and vamoose. Go home and don’t answer the door or the phone. Let them talk to the cops, and Nadine. She used to be a reporter, right? She’ll know how to handle it. I’m gonna sneak around the side and hope nobody has a picture of me.” She climbs out of the cart and grabs her bag and guitar. Then she throws her arms around me and squeezes. “Thank you. For everything you did for Didi.”
“Text me, or, uh, call me, okay?” I say, fighting back tears. “Geez. It has been one crazy week.”
“You can say that again,” she says, letting go of my hand. “I’m gonna miss you, kid.”
She takes a few steps and then, still walking, looks back over her shoulder at me. “One more thing: Give that Owen kid a chance. He seems okay.”
Suzy is now the second person to tell me that. A couple of weeks earlier, when I compared Owen to Steerforth, David Copperfield’s troubled, ill-fated friend, Dinah suggested that maybe Owen is not a lost cause and that maybe I’m just the person to help him find the right path.
You want the GHT? I’m not so sure. I just don’t see myself in the “saving Owen Cheever” business. Yeah, I’ll watch the movie and get a pizza with him because I promised, and I don’t break my promises, but once that’s over, I’m done.
* * *
With a river of reporters streaming toward the Islander Hotel, I can’t very well drive past them in a golf cart with the hotel name in big letters across the hood. Instead, I turn around and head back toward the Roost. I can return the cart later, or even better, I’ll get Blake to do it.
On my way home, I’m cutting through town when I see a woman stopped at an intersection, straddling a bicycle and staring at a map of the island. I’d guess that she’s fifty-five or so and dressed in jeans and a crisp white blouse. She’s also obviously lost, because she’s spinning the map in circles and squinting to read street signs. When she sees me approaching, she waves and smiles broadly.
“Good morning,” she says, waving. “Beautiful day, isn’t it?”
“Hi. Uh, yeah. It’s nice.”
“Can you help me? I’m looking for Buckeye Street, and according to this really awful map, it should be right here. But the sign says Hickory Street.”
“Buckeye’s that way,” I say, pointing behind me. “It’s really this street, but it’s kind of tricky, because this part is called Hickory. Don’t ask me why. C’mon, I’ll show you.”
I wheel my bike around and she follows me until I stop at another intersection and point up at the sign.
“Buckeye Street,” she reads. “Thank you. This is all a stroll—or a ride, I suppose—down memory lane for me. It’s my first time on the island in…forever. I lived on this street when I was a little girl, but only for a few years. That’s the house, I think.”
This time I’m the one doing the following as she pedals slowly down the street, stopping in front of what is now a very familiar house to me.
“Oh, yes. This is it. Number twenty-two,” she says. “It was yellow when I lived in it.”
The hair on the back of my neck comes to attention and I’m speechless as she drops her bike in the grass and stares up at the house.
“You…lived here? Number twenty-two Buckeye Street?”
“I did, indeed. A long, long time ago.” She steps toward me and holds out her hand. “Hi, I’m Barrie Francis.”
For a few seconds, I’m struck completely dumb, and I must look like a complete idiot to her.
“Are you…okay?” she asks when it becomes clear that I have lost the ability to speak. “I’ve never said this to anyone in my life, but you literally look like you’ve seen a ghost.”
I nod to let her know that I’m okay. I swallow, and stare. And finally, I remember how my tongue works. “Barrie. Francis. Really?”
“Okay, you’re officially freaking me out a little right now,” she says. “But yes, that’s me.”
“You wrote a letter,” I start.
Her hand flies to her mouth. “Omigosh. You must be…Lark?”
“How do you know that?” I say. I can feel my pulse pounding at my temples.
“I got an email from a friend of yours, an Owen…Cheever. I’m not sure how he found me, but he did. He told me who he was, and where he was, and said that you had found something that belongs to me. I swear, I’ve never done anything like this, but I got in the car at four o’clock this morning and drove all the way from Williamsfield, the other side of the state. Came over on the first ferry this morning. I was intending to email Owen, but I just had to see the old house first.”
“Owen Cheever found you,” I say quietly.
Okay, universe, I get it already.
“And from the look on your face, I take it he didn’t tell you,” Barrie says.
I shake my head. “No clue. It’s all right. I mean, I’m glad he did. I’m just…surprised. It’s been a really weird week.”
“I heard little bits and pieces from people on the ferry on the way over. There was some kind of book festival, and a girl was murdered? Is that true? It seems hard to believe. It’s so peaceful here.”
