A Palette for Murder Page 20

  “Well, Vaughan, I was, but it’s over. I’m glad it is.”

  I’d called Chief Cramer before leaving Scott’s Inn to meet Vaughan, and made an appointment to see him that morning.

  “Mind if I tag along?” Vaughan asked.

  “Not at all.”

  The chief was in an expansive mood when we arrived. He told us he’d been investigating the forged art ring for almost a year, and had recruited Wally Peckham after she came to him with what she knew of the St. James—Muller—Blaine Dorsey—Chris Turi—Carlton Wells enterprise. She was an insider in the group house, which made her invaluable.

  He took us into a conference room where more than two hundred paintings confiscated from Maurice St. James’s gallery the night before were propped against the walls. I recognized some from having been shown them in St. James’s framing room.

  One immediately caught Vaughan’s eye. It was the painting Hans Muller had taken from his house the night of the dinner party. “He had it all along,” he said, holding up the painting for us to see, and explaining to Cramer that the work belonged to him.

  “I’ll have to keep it for a while, Vaughan. It’s evidence.”

  “I understand,” Vaughan said.

  “There’s one piece I won’t have to keep, however,” said the chief.

  “Which is?” I asked.

  “This.”

  He pulled from behind a framed canvas my missing sketch of the nude male model. “I believe this belongs to you, Mrs. Fletcher,” he said, handing it to me.

  “Yes. It’s my sketch.”

  “Let me see,” Vaughan said, reaching.

  I withheld it from him. “No,” I said. “No one sees this except me.” I told Cramer of having had Waldine Peckham put out the word that someone wanted to buy the sketch, no questions asked. “Where did you find it?” I asked.

  “In St. James’s gallery, along with everything else. Carlton Wells said it was his. Looks like your teacher stole your work.”

  “I’m just glad to have it back without any more people seeing it.”

  “By the way, Mrs. Fletcher, I told you there was an influential person pressing behind the scenes for me to cooperate with you and your theories.”

  “That’s right. You did.”

  “Go ahead and shake his hand,” he said, nodding at Vaughan Buckley.

  “You? I thought you didn’t like my getting involved.”

  “I don’t. Then again, I knew there’s no way to dissuade you once you’ve set your mind to it. Besides, it will make a good plot for your next best-seller.”

  The next morning I stood next to my luggage on the porch of Scott’s Inn. With me were Vaughan and Olga Buckley. A cadre of press was kept at a distance by two patrolmen assigned the task by their chief. Fred Mayer leaned against his taxi, the rear door open.

  “Sure we can’t convince you to stay longer?” Olga asked.

  “I’d love to, Olga, but it’s time for me to get back home.”

  “Any more art lessons on the horizon?” Vaughan asked.

  “No. It’s back to my word processor, not my easel. I’m a writer, not a painter.”

  “Can’t say that I’m disappointed to hear that, Jess,” said Vaughan. “That’s where you belong, in front of a word processor. Leave the painting to Michelangelo and Renoir and Caravaggio.”

  “I will. Thanks for everything. I’ll be in touch.”

  I got into Mayer’s aging taxi. Once the doors were closed, I said, “All set?”

  “Certainly am. The missus is thrilled. Calls it a second honeymoon.”

  I smiled. “Make it whatever you want it to be. Are you sure I’ll like Gurney’s Inn?”

  “Never heard anybody say they didn’t, Mrs. Fletcher.” We picked up Mayer’s wife, Carol, a lovely, kind woman, and headed east to Montauk, Long Island. My deal with her husband was simple: I wanted three days of total and secluded relaxation in some luxurious resort in the Hamptons. In return for his silence about my destination and for driving me there, I would foot the bill for a three-day vacation for him and his wife. He chose Gurney’s Inn, and I didn’t debate his choice. He hadn’t steered me wrong yet.

  I spent the three days in a cottage overlooking the Atlantic Ocean. The resort offered a dazzling array of spa services—aerobic beach walks, a daily cardiovascular fitness class, and such exotic therapies as “marinotherapeutic” treatments (using seawater and seaweed), “thalasso” therapy in which powerful underwater jets massage the body, and “Dead Sea Salt Glow,” dead skin cells washed away in salt baths. I avoided the spa meals, opting instead to take all my meals in a lovely on-site restaurant, the Sea Grill, right on the beach.

  Most of the time I painted. I set up the easel just outside my door and tried to capture the stunning beauty of the ocean. Fred Mayer had stopped in an art supply shop on the way to Gurney’s, where I stocked up on everything I needed. The only thing I couldn’t buy, of course, was artistic talent. But I wasn’t about to be deterred by that. I would do my best.

  It was one of the nicest three-day respites I’d ever experienced.

  Four days later I was home in Cabot Cove. My friends, Dr. Seth Hazlitt and Sheriff Mort Metzger, threw me a welcome-home party at my home a week later. One of the guests was a local artist, John Leito, who was developing a solid reputation in galleries beyond Cabot Cove.

  “Interesting work,” he said, referring to a seascape I’d just had framed, and had hung the day of the party. “It’s not signed.”

  “Just one of many unsung artists,” I said. “I think it’s a view of the ocean from a resort in Montauk. That’s on Long Island, on the far eastern end. It appealed to me.”

  “The best reason for buying art,” he said.

  He also paused at the other new painting hanging in my home.

  “Now, that really interests me,” he said. “So bold, so free. It reminds me of—” He clicked his fingers as he tried to come up with the name. “Ah, Leopold. Joshua Leopold. Died young.”

  “I wouldn’t know,” I said. “I bought it at a garage sale in the Hamptons for five dollars. Probably worth exactly that.”

  “Unless it’s a Leopold.”

  “Unlikely. But if it is, I won’t sell it. It has a certain nostalgic value to me. More lasagna, John? Better get it before Mort and Seth finish it off.”

  VOYAGE TO MYSTERIOUS SCOTLAND!

  Murder, She Wrote:

  The Highland Fling Murders

  by Jessica Fletcher

  and Donald Bain

  Now available from Signet.

  “I’ll take you to a special place where I know you’ll catch fish,” Rufus Innes, our gillie, Scottish for fishing guide, said. “Wouldn’t want to return you to George Sutherland without a few fat trout in your creel.”

  We got back in the truck and headed west, I think, entering a low range of hills that gradually rose in elevation until we were granted a stunning view of Wick, the surrounding countryside and coastline, and Sutherland Castle standing lonely and forbidding. Innes stopped to allow us to drink in the view.

  “It’s so beautiful,” I said.

  “Of God’s making,” Innes said.

  “Is there a stream up here?” Ken asked.

  “Oh, yes, there certainly is. A gem. I don’t take many clients up here. None of the guides do. We try to keep it to ourselves.”

  “That sounds wise,” I said.

  “But for two ’a George’s guests, I’ll make an exception.”

  “Much appreciated,” Ken said. “Where’s this stream? Looks like we might get rained out before long.”

  We looked up into what had been a pristine blue sky, with more of the same in the forecast. An ominous line of black clouds, twisting thousands of feet into the air, approached from the west.

  “Weather here is changeable,” said Innes. “Very changeable.”

  “So we’ve noticed,” Ken said.

  After another fifteen minutes of driving along a road so narrow the bushes on both sides s
craped the truck, we came to the bank of a raging river about twenty feet wide, cascading down from the hills and picking up speed as it roared through the brush-laden gully. The wind had now picked up; sudden gusts sent my hair flying.

  “Running pretty fast,” Ken observed. “Tough wading.”

  “Maybe we can do what Mr. Innes does, Ken, fish from the bank.”

  “No,” Ken said, getting ready to enter the stream. “See that pool over there? I can smell fish in there.”

  “Might be,” Innes said, “but too far to reach from here in this wind.”

  “Game?” Ken asked me.

  “Sure,” I said.

  Ken entered the fast-moving water. As I was about to join him, the guide suggested I fish farther upstream. “Might be easier wading there,” he said. “I’ve pulled some nice fish from that pool.”

  I took his professional advice and followed the riverbank upstream to what appeared to be a gentler access to the water. As I walked, I took in my surroundings. Despite the now overcast skies, and the wind which seemed to increase in velocity with each step, I was supremely happy. The world had disappeared, as it always did for me when I was in, or near, a fishing stream. It would be nice to land a trout or two, but it certainly wasn’t necessary to assure my continued happiness. Just being there was enough.

  I’d almost reached the spot I’d selected to enter the stream when I noticed a wooden bridge spanning the river. I hadn’t seen it before because its weathered wood had turned ash gray, almost invisible against the pewter sky.

  I’d learned years ago that the water beneath bridges was often a prime spot for fish to congregate. I looked back; Ken was waist-deep in the water and casting to his pool downstream. I smiled; this was his favorite way to spend a day despite working as a Maine guide for others. If Ken Sassi were a shoe-maker, he’d be making shoes for his children on his day off, no matter what the fable says.

  I reached my spot and surveyed the water. I’d made a good choice. The riverbed sloped gradually into the deeper water, which would allow me to get farther out, hopefully within casting distance of a dark pool of water that spread from the shadow of the bridge into more open water.

  I had one initial reservation about stepping into the river. Good fishing sense dictates you should always fish in pairs when in a strange stream, especially when conditions for wading are less than ideal. I would have preferred to be closer to Ken and the gillie, but the lure of that spot under the bridge, and the promise of the fish it held, were too compelling. I’d be careful, each step taken with care, my wading staff helping me remain upright, my eyes focused on the riverbed in search of rocks, or falloffs into which I might misstep.

  I entered the river and, slowly, methodically headed for where I wanted to cast. The force of the water was stronger than I’d anticipated. Still, with my wading staff counteracting the flow, I felt confident and secure.

  I reached the spot and made sure my wading boots were solidly planted in the silty soil. I tossed my hare’s-ear fly into the water, increasing the length of my cast with each forward motion of my arm. But at its maximum length, I fell short of my target, the relatively still water under the bridge.

  What to do?

  A rising trout caught my eye, breaking the water to gulp down an insect, leaving telltale circles on the surface. There was another fish rising. And another. A hatch of insects had formed on the river. I looked to my immediate left and right and saw what they were. They weren’t identical to my hare’s-ear fly, but close enough to fool a few trout. The trick was to get closer to the feeding fish.

  Because the water was incredibly clear, I could see the ground beneath it. There appeared to be a path of sorts leading between large, slippery rocks to the pool under the bridge. If I took my time and stepped with care, I could bring myself within striking distance of the hungry fish.

  I looked back to where Ken was still in the water, Innes on the bank observing him. They looked very small in the distance.

  I moved toward my next vantage point. I’d chosen a good path; I had little trouble navigating the current to get to where I wanted to be. I reached it and looked up. I was within twenty feet of the bridge, close enough to cast into the pool.

  I applied some floatant to my fly to help it stay on the surface of the water, and started to cast. I felt good, my backcast straightening out behind me in textbook fashion, then coming up and forward in a straight line despite the wind, the fly on the edge of the hair-thin tippet landing gently where I wanted it to.

  Pow!

  A fish broke the surface and clamped onto my fly, and the hook. The line straightened out and started to run from the reel as the fish sought the freedom of more open water. I gave him plenty of line. Judging from the pull he exerted, he was a good-sized fish, with plenty of energy and fight. I didn’t want to play him too long and exhaust him. Better to reel him in as soon as possible, and release him before he was dangerously tuckered out.

  I started to bring in line with my right hand, my left holding the bending rod and catching the loops of line as I gathered them. My entire focus was on this task, a liberating experience. I was so devoted to properly and effectively bringing in this fish that I never really saw the figure who suddenly appeared on the bridge. I mean, I saw him—or her—but only for a split second, just long enough to see a six-foot-long log, about six inches thick, come hurtling down at me from the bridge. I gasped, and twisted to avoid being hit by it. I was successful, but in the process I lost my footing. Simultaneously, the rod slipped from my hand. I didn’t know what was more important to me at that moment, keeping myself upright, or losing the rod, my favorite, given to me as a birthday gift many years ago by my deceased husband, Frank.

  There really wasn’t a choice to be made. I was powerless on both counts. The rod disappeared, and I tumbled into the water. My head went under, but I forced it to the surface, spitting water all the way. The current grabbed me and headed me downstream in the direction of Ken Sassi and Rufus Innes. I felt my waders begin to fill with water despite the belt cinched tightly around my waist.

  I fought against being swept away; I’d noticed a particularly deep section of the river between where I’d fallen, and where the others were. My mind raced. If I reached that deeper area, and my waders filled, I’d be dragged down for certain. Thoughts bombarded me.

  How many fly fishermen die in drowning accidents each year? A hundred? Two hundred?

  Where was my prized fishing rod? Would I ever see it again? Would I be alive to use it again?

  The water in my waders was sinking me fast. I grasped for rocks to keep from sliding down the river, but my fingers kept slipping from them, bruising my knuckles and elbows. My face hit a rock, sending a sharp pain from my cheekbone to my brain. I continued to fight to keep my head above water, but knew I was losing the battle.

  I tried to call for help; each time I did, water gurgled into my open mouth.

  What will they say in my obituary?

  Will I be missed back home in Cabot Cove?

  I’ll never see George Sutherland again! So much to have said, so much to say.

  I reached the deep center of the river, and started to sink. I flailed my arms, and managed a cry for help. I didn’t know whether anyone heard me. I closed my eyes, resigned to dying in this beautiful river in Northern Scotland.