A Dark and Stormy Murder (A Writer's Apprentice Mystery) (18 page)

“No, they don’t,” I agreed. “So who could have been their connection? Are you thinking there’s some kind of local mastermind? Or at least some friend or family member pulling the strings?”

“I don’t know that Martin had many friends or acquaintances in this town. His family is in Boone Lake—about an hour from here.”

“There’s the restaurant, though. He worked there, so he knows people there. Waiters, waitresses—”

“And Adam,” Camilla said.

The room was silent as we both thought about this.

I said, “Adam does come over here fairly often, doesn’t he?”

Camilla nodded. “And he wanted that special tour of the house. He even jokingly asked me if it had any secret passageways.”

“And yet—it couldn’t be Adam—could it?”

Camilla’s face looked briefly sad and vulnerable, then determined. “He invited me for dinner at the restaurant. I think I’ll go tonight. You shall be my guest, Lena. Let’s ask Adam Rayburn some questions.”

“I’m with you. Let me run upstairs and change.”

14

“Hans is coming with a car. He’ll leave it at the place with the twelve pines. Then you must run.”

“Not you?”

“I’ll take you to the border, and we’ll contact the police.”

“You won’t come with me?”

He studied her face as though memorizing its features. “If only I could, Johanna.”

—from
The Salzburg Train

G
REEN
G
LASS
H
IGHWAY
seemed to glitter in the last rays of the setting sun, and Wheat Grass stood like a stylized piece of driftwood on the shores of Blue Lake, its beige walls glowing artfully with landscaping lights, its tall windows glinting. Pots of purple mums sat in each window well, and as we walked through the large doorway, I spied a stone fireplace in the back of the large main room, flames crackling behind diners who were focusing on their plates and their generous glasses of wine.

“Nice place,” I murmured to Camilla.

“Yes. It’s been a Blue Lake staple for years. James and I used to come here once a week.”

“So you’ve known Adam a long time,” I said. A waiter appeared to claim Camilla’s attention.

“Two for dinner?” he asked smoothly.

Camilla nodded, and the white-shirted man led us to a table by a window, blue now with night and flickering with candles that sat on the ledge. “This is beautiful, Camilla. I don’t recall ever being in a restaurant like this.”

“It’s refined, but not so expensive that an average family can’t eat out here. I never know how Adam does it.” We settled into our chairs, and she said, “Or maybe I do. I don’t know anymore. Everyone in town seems sinister to me these days.”

“I was thinking that same thing this afternoon! Perhaps we are paranoid.” I looked around at the other diners. They were strangers; who knew what secrets lurked behind their doors? The idea cast a pall over my thoughts, and the room seemed to grow darker.

Camilla was clearly in a similar frame of mind. “And yet a man is dead, and his body was in our backyard. We didn’t imagine poor Martin lying out there in the rain.”

The waiter appeared again. “Good evening, ladies. I’m Grant, and I’ll be your waiter this evening. Here’s a pitcher of our famous cucumber water. Try it and you’ll be gasping for more.” He grinned at us with extremely white teeth, and I wondered if he were an aspiring actor.

“Thank you,” I said. “May I also have a Diet Coke?”

“Sure thing. And for you, Ms. Graham?”

“Oh, my, you know my name. Just the water is fine. Have I met you, Grant?”

“No, ma’am, but I’ve read all your books and I am a fan! I recognized you from the book jacket.”

I leaned toward him slightly, pleased to find another Graham fan. “What’s your favorite book?”

“Oh, it’s hard to choose. Maybe
Death at Seaside
. They’re all great.”

“You are too kind,” said Camilla, glancing at her menu.

Grant hovered. “I actually have one of them in back. I don’t suppose—would it be intruding if I—”

“I’ll be happy to sign it, dear, if that’s what you mean.”

“Thanks! That would be so great. I’ll wait until you’re finished with your meal and everything. Let me get those drinks!”

Camilla held up a hand. “Would you tell Adam Rayburn we’re here, please?”

“Mr. Rayburn? Uh—sure. Sure thing.” He darted away, and I studied my menu, suddenly hungry again.

“I think I’m going to start with soup. They have split pea. The weather is so unfriendly today, isn’t it?” I asked.

“Blue Lake wind chills break weather records every year. And we’re famous the world over for our record snowfalls.”

“Wow—something to look forward to.”

She laughed. “I’ll have soup, too. And maybe this cod sandwich.”

“And I’ll go with the Reuben.”

When Grant returned, we gave him our orders and handed him our menus. Seconds later Adam Rayburn almost burst out of the back, his eyes raking the room. He saw us and brightened, then immediately seemed to deflate. I was starting to think that Rayburn might be the weirdest person I’d met in Blue Lake—and that was saying a lot.

He made his way to our table and grinned. “You made it! Is Grant taking good care of you ladies?”

“Oh, yes. Would you like to join us for a moment, Adam?” Camilla said.

He glanced at his watch, then at the door to his kitchen. “Perhaps for a moment, yes. I—we had agreed on Thursday, and tonight I have a bit of a—”

“We won’t keep you long. It’s just that we’ve had some interesting things happening up at the house, as you know. First Lena received unexpected visitors. Then she was nearly mowed down in the night by an intruder in the darkness. Doug Heller came to investigate and found that we have been housing the equivalent of a drug lab in our home, and the only man we’ve linked to the crime so far has mysteriously gone silent and hired a lawyer. Doug says he’s hired someone expensive.”

“Unbelievable,” said Adam, shaking his head as he took a seat at our table.

“Martin Jonas was killed, perhaps by the very people running this lab. We’re wondering, Lena and I, if he had a crisis of conscience. Perhaps some members of his group didn’t want him to have a conscience. Or perhaps they had a conscience, too, but felt trapped by circumstances. Perhaps they made a mistake long ago, and have had to cover it up ever since.” Her look was searching, incisive.

Adam nodded. “That may well be. Poor Martin.”

“So we were trying to think of something that might connect it all. Who knew Martin Jonas? Who could provide Martin Jonas with a cover that might conceal his ‘real’ job? Who might be wealthy enough to pay for Dave Brill’s expensive lawyer so that Dave wouldn’t be tempted to share information with the police?”

“And what did you decide?” Rayburn asked, his eyes flicking to the kitchen as a waitress came out with a full tray.

“Well . . . you came up as a possibility.”

Rayburn’s eyes returned to us, wide with shock. We had all his attention now, and Camilla met his gaze. I admired the way she held her ground, although a red mark appeared on each of her cheekbones.

“I—?” He left his mouth open, as if uncertain what sounds should come out of it. “Are you suggesting that I had something to do with the death of poor Martin?”

“We’re trying to put together a puzzle,” I said.

He didn’t even look at me. His eyes were on Camilla. “And you think that I, the wealthy restaurateur, might spend a large sum to silence a low-life drug dealer?”

For the first time, Camilla seemed to falter. “I didn’t think it, until Lena and I were talking, and we realized how often you had been coming over. And how curious you seemed about the house, what Doug was doing—what the police were doing. How—present you were.”

Rayburn barked out a short laugh, but his eyes held something like despair. “Oh, yes. I’ve been present. I’ve been present for longer than you’ve even noticed, Camilla. I’ve used every possible excuse to get your attention, as a matter of fact.”

I saw it all then in a flash of insight. Rayburn bringing over a bottle of wine “so you can see if you like it.” Rayburn with a sheaf of flowers that he insisted were extras. Rayburn asking for a tour of Camilla’s house. Rayburn asking Camilla to dine with him at his restaurant.

Camilla saw it, too, and her cheeks flamed with embarrassment or some emotion I could not name. “Oh,” she said. “I see.”

He slumped back in his chair. “I thought enough time
had gone by. He’s been dead almost three years, Camilla. I thought that was—an appropriate period of mourning. I thought maybe you—might have room in your life.”

Suddenly I was a most uncomfortable third wheel. I slid to the edge of my chair, hoping to escape, but Camilla said, “Do stay there, Lena. Don’t be silly.” She had regained some of her composure, and now she flashed a gaze at Adam Rayburn. I wasn’t sure if it held disdain or pity or gratitude, or a mixture of them all.

“Adam, perhaps we can talk about this later. I intend to keep our date for Thursday, as we planned. I apologize that we—seem to have misinterpreted your actions.”

Rayburn had endured enough. He stood up, and his emotions, too, seemed a jumbled mixture. He was angry, but his eyes were still hopeful, I thought. “Yes, later. Good night, Camilla.” His voice was cool, and he walked away without looking back.

I stole a glance at Camilla, who sat in silence, processing the interaction. I gave her time. Our soup came, and I studied mine with great concentration, blowing on it and taking a first delicious sip out of my spoon. After a couple of minutes my eyes returned to Camilla, and she sent me an almost mischievous smile. “Do you know, Lena, that in my youth I had more than one man in love with me?”

“Apparently you have one now, as well.”

“Will wonders never cease,” she murmured. “How blind was I? I had briefly suspected, after he had dinner with me the other night—”

I remembered how she had looked almost dreamy and happy at our little cupcake date. That had been the night she’d had dinner with Rayburn.

“—and then I told myself I was being a fool.”

“Trust your instincts, Camilla.”

We grew silent again. Grant brought our sandwiches, and we tasted them and proclaimed them delicious. I finally said, “Do you feel anything for him?”

She shrugged. “I don’t know. We’ve always been friends—he and James and I. So we—have a certain intimacy that goes back many years. And he’s a good-looking man.”

I had never thought about this, but in many ways Rayburn was, in fact, attractive. “Yes,” I agreed.

“But, Lena, I’m sixty-nine years old. I think I’ve passed the expiration date on things like love and romance and all the drama they entail.”

“Have you? Because a man just walked angrily away from your table, holding his heart in his hand. You had just hinted that you thought he might have conspired in a murder. If that’s not drama, I don’t know what is.”

“Oh, my.”

“And if you have your mother’s longevity, then you have several more decades to contemplate the way Adam Rayburn seems to feel about you.”

She studied me for a moment with her intelligent eyes.

Then, finally, she said, “I will give that some serious thought. Now eat your sandwich. If Adam didn’t have something to do with the death of Martin Jonas—and I am most relieved to realize he did not—then we still need to know who did.”

“Yes. I wish all of this were over. Or that it had never happened at all.”

She nodded and waved to Grant, our waiter, who was standing near the kitchen doorway. Camilla made a motion to suggest she wanted to pay the bill, and Grant disappeared.

“Camilla, you must let me pay for dinner. You’ve treated me to everything since the moment I got here.”

Instead of arguing with me, she studied me again. I realized I was growing to love Camilla’s face, especially her shrewd eyes. “All right. Thank you, Lena. That is most generous of you.”

“Hardly generous, but a nice opportunity to thank you—for everything. Despite everything that’s happened in this town, I love it here, and I love Graham House, and I most especially love working with you. In some ways—I hope you don’t mind my saying it—you remind me of my mother.”

“Why would I mind? It’s a compliment, I’m sure. And where is your mother residing these days?”

“She died, years ago. Cancer. My father is remarried and lives in Florida.”

She put a hand on one of mine. “You must miss her very much.”

“I do, but the pain isn’t fresh anymore. Sometimes, now, I’m just happy to think of her. And that she’s with me all the time.”

“I know she is. Because if I were your mother, I would certainly want to visit you after I died. You are a very loveable young woman, Lena London.”

Grant appeared at our table to find me dabbing at my eyes with my cloth napkin. I held up my hand for the check, and he gave it to me. While I was signing the charge slip, he produced a worn paperback for Camilla, along with a pen that said “Wheat Grass” on the side. The book was, in fact,
Death at Seaside.
I hadn’t read that one in a while, and seeing the cover, with its tossing waves, made me want to rediscover it.

Grant was effusive in his gratitude. “Thank you so much, Ms. Graham! It is such an honor to meet you, and I’ll treasure this inscription. I wish I had brought one of my hardbacks.”