Well Read, Then Dead(42)
And she shuffled back to her own side of the hedge.
I scrolled through my cell phone to call Pastor John, but my call went immediately to voice mail.
“Do you think they’re at the Rest in Beech?” Bridgy always giggled when she used the old-time islanders’ colloquial name for the funeral home.
I shrugged. “They could be anywhere. Wait, I think I have Fern’s cell from when we worked on the library book sale together.”
Fern said Pastor John and Augusta had been there but she wasn’t sure where they were going when they left. I told her we had a necklace that we knew Augusta would want to add to the burial outfit. Fern promised to tell Mr. Beech before he did, what she called, “the finishing touches.”
We decided to sit on the porch swing and wait a bit, in case Pastor was driving Augusta home. The sleepy feeling induced by the gentle gliding of the swing was offset by the invigorating breeze coming in from the Gulf. I felt my mood shift from chaos to perfect harmony.
After a few minutes Bridgy asked, “What does Pastor’s car look like? Do you remember? We could ride around and see if we can catch up with them. I really want to find out what Augusta has to say about the locket.”
I vaguely remembered dark blue, but that was about it. Still Bridgy persisted, “The island’s only so big. They can only be in one of a few places.”
So we drove past the church and the florist. Then we rode aimlessly.
I was ready to give up, but Bridgy was still a bundle of energy, so I shouldn’t have been surprised when she said, “Let’s call off the search. I have a better idea. Drive on over to Bowditch.”
Best idea ever. It was a beautiful afternoon, perfect for a shoreside stroll in the park, which curved around the northernmost tip of the island.
When we pulled into the parking lot, Bridgy pointed away from the side where we usually left our car. “Over there, park over there.”
As I slid into the spot she indicated, Bridgy gave me a broad smile. “Gorgeous day, smooth water. Let’s grab a double kayak and look for Skully.”
Chapter Fourteen ||||||||||||||||||||
“You’re kidding, right?”
But she wasn’t. To hear her tell it, our taking a kayak out into the bay and scouring the canals and inlets looking for Skully was a logical next step.
“First Jocelyn tells you that Skully has been hanging around Delia’s house all the time. Now Blondie tells us the exact same thing. We know Skully. Decent guy. Wouldn’t squash a spider. But he may have seen something and he didn’t know he saw something important.”
Her emphasis on those last two words included a sharp look that said only a fool would refuse to see the common sense appeal of her idea.
This caper was sure to make driving around the island stalking Pastor John’s car seem reasonable by comparison; still, it was a lovely afternoon to be out on the water, no matter how crazy the reason.
We opened the back of the Heap-a-Jeep and I pulled out my ready-for-anything crate. When we first moved to the “land of sunshine,” Bridgy and I learned a lot of local rules. Keeping a stash of “hurricane food” along with gallons of water and assorted-sized batteries is the law of the land, as is keeping a container or gym bag in the car trunk to hold all outdoor essentials. I use a green plastic crate I’d bought at the Dollar Tree. It’s loaded with umbrellas, long- and short-sleeved sweatshirts and tee shirts, a worn pair of sneakers, assorted flip-flops, mismatched socks, sunscreen, bug spray, antibiotic ointment, binoculars, a bicycle horn and a half dozen hats and visors, some with long brims, some with short.
We slathered on the sunscreen and I stashed the bug spray and binoculars in my bag, along with the bicycle horn, which comes in handy whenever alligators swim too near low-slung watercraft or come up onshore to catch a few rays. Bridgy grabbed a long-sleeved tee and slipped it over her spaghetti strap top. We both snatched visors to wear front and back, to cover our faces and necks.