“And he didn’t mention this dealer to you later? Maybe he made an offhand comment that struck you as strange.”
“No, but…”
“Go ahead.”
“I had the oddest sense he might have bought something from the man. He kept putting his hand in the pocket of his jacket.”
“Could it have been a gift for you?”
“That was what I’d suspected, but he was awfully quiet and serious when we got home. After supper, he asked my permission to go out to the boathouse to tinker on his plane. I was asleep when he finally came to bed. And then, as I said, he woke me at four o’clock, putting on his clothes in the dark. That’s early even for that bantam rooster.”
By now, I was deeply worried about my old friend. I was also conscious that I couldn’t disclose my fears to Ora when I was so far from home and in no position to take action.
“My flight to Portland leaves in five hours,” I had said. “If you hear anything from Charley or he comes home before I take off, call me. I’m pretty sure the plane doesn’t have Wi-Fi, but you can send me emails to read during my layover or when I return to Maine. In the meantime, I need you to make some calls and see if you can find the name of the junk dealer Charley spoke with at the Dike. I’ll need to stop at my house on the way north, but with luck, I can be at your place by midafternoon.”
“I’ll call around town. And, Mike,” she’d said. “Please don’t tell Stacey about her father being missing.”
7
When I landed in Maine, the flight attendant gave us the local time and temperature over the intercom. Somehow, it was hotter in Portland than it had been in Miami.
While we taxied, I turned my phone back on to receive cell signals and to submit the report I’d written on Wheelwright.
Dani had called to say she couldn’t wait to hear about my encounter with the python. She asked if Stacey had seemed happy. She added that she was going to be spending the day at the firearms qualification course at the Maine Criminal Justice Academy with the rest of her troop. Dani had always been a crack shot.
Stacey had sent me a text:
You bum! I was looking forward to catching up over breakfast. I was hoping to hear about you and Dani. She seems good for you. You seem good.
Ora had left me an email. While I had been en route, she’d been busy querying the other vendors who sold their wares along the Dike and had learned that the stranger hadn’t given his name. The City of Machias didn’t require sellers to obtain permits to set up their tables.
I called her now from the terminal.
She sounded brighter now that the sun was up. “Carol Boyce, who sells her paintings right next to where this man set up shop, overheard Charley arguing with him over some trinket he had for sale.”
I remembered Carol: a big, flowing woman. “Did Mrs. Boyce say what it was?”
“She couldn’t hear, unfortunately, but she said the argument got heated.”
“I guess I’ll be stopping in Machias before I head to your place. Did you happen to speak with Nick Francis?”
“He said he didn’t know where Charley might be, but he didn’t seem worried. He said I should be patient before I put out a Silver Alert on the best woodsman in Maine.”
“That’s an odd thing to say.”
“You have to know Nick’s sense of humor,” Ora said. “But I feel better knowing that you’re back in Maine. If anyone can track down that man of mine, it’s you, Mike.”
I appreciated her confidence, but I felt the task I’d taken on was weightier than I’d at first realized. Charley’s disappearance wasn’t just another investigation. It was far more important than that: potentially a matter of life and death.
I was waiting for my luggage in baggage claim when I noticed a tall, sandy-haired woman at the next carousel. She had her back to me, but I recognized her broad shoulders and the service dog sitting with preternatural stillness at her side, a tawny Belgian Malinois. The breed is a high-energy cousin to the German shepherd, and this one was wearing a red SEARCH DOG IN TRAINING vest. I happened to know this animal was well past the training stage, but the vest probably helped keep off handsy strangers.
“Kathy!”
My former sergeant, Kathy Frost, turned to me, as did Maple, her canine partner. “Grasshopper! What’s shaking?”
“My world, as usual.”
“I’m the last person you need to tell that to.”
Kathy had one of those expressive faces that is attractive because you can see the goodness of her character in it.
She had been my field training officer, assigned to hold my hand during my rookie year, and then she had become one of my closest friends. The first woman in the history of the Maine Warden Service and its first female sergeant, she’d had her promising career cut short when she’d been ambushed outside her house by an enemy she’d never known she had. The attempted murderer fired a burst of shotgun pellets into her abdomen, and it still struck me as proof of God’s existence that she had survived.
The Malinois, recognizing me as a friend and fellow pack mate, whipped her black-tipped tail back and forth. I fell down upon one knee to receive her dog kisses.
“Hey, Maple! How are you doing, girl? Have you been digging up bodies?”
“Not this time,” said Kathy. “We were at Quantico teaching a program for first responders from around the country.”
That explained her dappled complexion. Kathy’s freckles tended to multiply the tanner she got.
Before her forced retirement, she had headed up the Warden Service’s K-9 team. She now worked as a consultant for law enforcement agencies around the country and even abroad, teaching officers how to train dogs to recover corpses.
“What about you?” she asked. “Where are you coming from in your fancy linen suit?”
“Doing a background check in Florida.”
“Florida! Really?” The intensity of her curiosity was such that Maple heard the excitement in her voice and pricked up her ears. “Anywhere near where a certain wildlife biologist is living?”
Kathy had been present for the beginning, middle, and end of my relationship with Stacey, including the latter’s decampment for a new life in the Everglades. They had been friendly if not friends. Dani, on the other hand, was one of Kathy’s beloved trainees.
I spotted my bag coming around the S-shaped conveyor belt. Considering it contained my locked sidearm, I made a dash for it, glad for the interruption.
When I returned, Kathy said, “I don’t suppose you have time to grab lunch?”
“I wish I could, but I’ve left Shadow alone too long.”
“Dani, too.”
“Come on, Kathy.”
“All I’m saying is you’ve got a good thing going for once in your life.”
“I’m not unaware.”
“Hey, there’s my bag. We should get together soon, the three of us.”
“Absolutely.”
We said our goodbyes, and I began the long march to the parking lot. Almost at once, I regretted not having clued Kathy in on the mystery around Charley’s disappearance. The two former wardens had worked together for years. Maybe she had an insight. But I hadn’t wanted to betray Ora’s confidence until I had a better sense of the situation.