Anders’s mind clicked into overdrive then, sorting out the sentences he had overheard; a few words, really, that kept replaying over and over.
Piper.
Tom.
Then memories began colliding in Anders’s brain so fast, like keys fitting into locks, that he had trouble holding all of his thoughts in his head at once: Jess’s newspaper article about the missing waterman, Tom Parrish. Parrish. That was the name that sounded so familiar when he read the article, not Tom. He remembered Jeffrey’s words: You’re not the first to strike out with Piper Parrish. He wondered if the two were siblings, and then remembered Jeffrey’s other strange words: She tell you she was married? . . . Depends on who you ask.
That must have been what he had meant. If Piper and Tom were married, and they never found Tom’s body, then it wasn’t all that unusual for a wife to hold out hope that her husband was still alive—to want to believe that he was still out there somewhere, and not at the bottom of the ocean, or eaten by sharks, as Jess had so plainly put it.
He turned his attention back to the watermen, as another man chimed in: “That’s not even the worst of it. You know what people are saying.” He paused, and Anders subtly moved his body closer, hanging on to every word. When he spoke again, his voice was lower and Anders had to strain to hear. “That it wuddn’t no accident, what happened to Tom.”
Anders’s entire world stopped then, as if someone had hit a pause button on a remote. The hair on his arms stood up.
You came all the way to Frick Island and missed the biggest story out here.
The narrowing of his world suddenly widened once again as he eagerly retrained his focus on the watermen, only to find that they were all staring directly at him, and not in a welcoming, kind way.
Face reddening for the second time in this restaurant, Anders quickly swiveled back forward in his stool and began reinspecting one of the many raised bumps on his arm, itching it intently with a stubby fingernail. After a beat the man began speaking again, but too low for Anders to hear.
The red plastic basket of chicken fingers appeared in front of Anders on the bar top, and he looked up at Jeffrey. “Uh, thanks,” he said.
“Need anything else?”
“Nope,” Anders said, wanting Jeffrey to leave so he could continue eavesdropping. But as Jeffrey made his way back to the kitchen entrance, Anders heard the unmistakable squeak of chairs being pushed backward, the familiar rustling up of belongings. The men were leaving.
Anders stared at the deep-fried food, ignoring the déjà vu moment from just a few weeks earlier. It wuddn’t no accident. If there were four more enticing words to a reporter, Anders wasn’t sure what they might be. Were they saying Tom was killed? Were the police investigating it? Jess hadn’t mentioned anything about that in her article.
“Hey,” Jeffrey said, startling him out of his reverie.
“Yeah?”
“You know who you should talk to.”
“Who?”
“Piper Parrish.”
Anders just stared at him, wondering if he, too, had overheard the watermen. Or if he could somehow hear what Anders had been thinking.
“Remember the girl who was in here? The one you hit on—”
“I did not— I was not—” Anders stuttered indignantly.
“Yeah, OK. Whatever.” Jeffrey grinned, with that same devilish edge to it. “Anyway, she’s into all that stuff.”
“What stuff?”
“Science. The earth. She’d probably help you.”
“Huh,” Anders said noncommittally. He had approached her once, to his spectacular regret. He wasn’t eager to make the same mistake twice, especially now knowing that she was a woman deep in grief over her missing, likely dead husband. But . . . the fact that her missing, likely dead husband could possibly be her missing, likely dead, possibly murdered husband gave Anders a certain level of motivation to seek her out. If anyone would know about Tom’s disappearance—and if there was anything nefarious about it—it would most likely be his wife.
Jeffrey motioned to Anders’s uneaten chicken fingers. “You sure you don’t need anything else?”
“Actually, I do,” Anders said. “Is there anywhere else to stay out here besides that motel?”
Chapter 8
Pearl Olecki stood at her kitchen counter whisking the waffle batter in her smallest mixing bowl with more vigor than necessary. She hadn’t slept more than two hours last night—or any night since the town gathering on Wednesday— tossing and turning in her heated irritation. A cell tower. A cell tower! How could anyone think a Lord-knows-how-tall metal contraption would be a good idea on their tiny island? Talk about an eyesore. Not to mention the radiation. Was everyone suddenly OK with getting cancer? If she wasn’t a good Christian woman, she might have hoped that cancer would befall Steve Parrish for even bringing up the idea. Bad enough he brought that developer over here months ago who suggested they open a bar for the tourists—a bar!—and now this. Who needed a cell phone? Her landline had worked perfectly well for the past sixty years, thank you very much. And Internet? Well, anyone could just go down to the Blue Point market anytime they wanted to send an email (though what the point of that was, when one had pen, paper, and a post office, was beyond her). Mailing a letter never killed anybody. But cancer did. It sure enough did. She yawned, the action momentarily cutting into her thoughts, and she realized just how tired she was.
Fortunately, she only had three guests this Sunday morning— a couple from the mainland celebrating their twenty-sixth wedding anniversary, and the Mormon boy who dropped in unexpectedly late yesterday afternoon inquiring about a room. Thank goodness BobDan told Shirlene, who told Lady Judy, who called Pearl to warn her that he was in town. She also thought, in general, it was quite considerate of them to wear those short-sleeved white shirts, so they were immediately recognizable.
Proselytizers rarely made the trip out to Frick Island, mostly because, Pearl thought, ninety-nine percent of the island was already Christian, belonging to the Methodist church, even if they didn’t all make it to the Sunday service as often as Pearl thought they should. In fact, Pearl couldn’t remember ever meeting one, but she did open the door to a World Book Encyclopedia seller years ago, and that was three hours of her life and nine hundred dollars she would never get back. That was why she made Harold check the boy in and give him the short welcome spiel and tour of the house, just to be on the safe side. She didn’t know how much he was selling those Books of Mormon for, but she knew she couldn’t afford them.
The one thing she did know about Mormons was that they didn’t drink coffee. She couldn’t remember where she had read that—probably in one of those expensive encyclopedias. Either way, she was proud to show her sensitivity to his religion by not even offering it that morning when she was pouring for the anniversary couple.