Triple Witch (34 page)

“But,” Sam said, “you didn’t shoot me off that boat.”

“I didn’t?”

“Mom,” Sam said patiently. “I’ve been on boats before, you know? I like, kind of know my way around them.”

Which, for Sam, was like saying that monkeys know their way around trees.

“I knew,” he went on, “where I was. Out on the bow, there. And I couldn’t hear you, but I heard him yelling at you, so I knew you were nearby. Boy, was I glad about that.”

I swallowed hard. “So?”

“So when I finally did hear you and smelled water beneath me, I jumped. I knew,” Sam finished, “that you would save me.”

“What about the rope?” I asked quietly, wanting suddenly to change the subject. “The one around your hands?”

“Hey,” Sam replied scornfully. “That jerk, I saw him fumbling with the line. He couldn’t tie a decent knot to save his life. I was never worried about that.”

And then it hit him. “Hey. You mean you
shot
at me?”

“Never mind,” I said, thinking about my son jumping blindly into the water with his hands tied behind his back, confident that he could get out of a landlubber’s knot.

And that I would save him. “Do you want mayonnaise on your sandwich, or mustard?”

And he said both, so I phoned Leighton’s to ask if they could put one together for me, and then asked
George if he could go pick it up, and he agreed to, remarking that he was feeling a little peckish, himself, and should he also pick up a bag of doughnuts and some Coca-Colas while he was there?

“And then—” Ellie’s voice came from the kitchen—“
then
we all landed in the water!”

Ned Montague reacted with amusement, as she had intended. After all, driving a truck wasn’t an awful crime; especially if, as he insisted, he hadn’t known till near the end what was in it. We couldn’t prove Ned had sold any heroin, either; it was his word against ours. And even Mulligan hadn’t been sure it was Ned on the seawall, the night Hallie died.

It was Willoughby who’d tried to kill Sam, Mulligan who’d as good as confessed to killing Hallie, and the dreaded Ike Forepaugh—according to Ned, anyway—who was responsible for the Mumfords’ deaths.

So that Ned, despite our earlier anger at him, was feeling good again. Arnold had jollied Ned along while we were out on the water, too, assuring Ned once more that nothing he’d admitted to—if, that is, he cooperated now—would be used too harshly against him.

“Haw-haw,” Ned said. “You girls must’ve been fit to be tied.”

He pulled the pop-top on another beer can and guzzled. “Good thing that Coast Guard boat was on its way. Hate to have to drag a couple pretty things like you outta that cold water, drowned.”

The porch door opened: Arnold, returning from talking to the
Triple Witch
’s young crew. When she heard him, Ellie took the beer can from Ned. “No, you wouldn’t hate it,” she said.

She emptied the can into the sink. “In fact, Ned, I think that’s exactly what you would like. After all,” she went on, “you have already tried killing Jacobia, once.”

Ned blinked, puzzled by her tone, and by the sudden change in the atmosphere. “What? Hey, what’re you saying?”

Arnold stepped into the kitchen.

“You shot at her,” Ellie said, “with your hunting rifle. The one Peter Mulligan found right here in this house, while you were in the cellar. But whose was it? Not Wade’s, or Jacobia’s. And it had to come from somewhere.”

“Wade,” I remembered aloud, “told me you once had an old deer rifle.”

The gun was now in Arnold’s office, locked up as evidence until he could decide who was going to get charged with what.

Ellie aimed a steady finger at Ned. “
Which
you had brought to use on us, if you couldn’t talk your way out of the mess you were in, and if you could, you’d say you brought it for Wade to check it out for you. That’s why you left it upstairs, so you didn’t have to commit yourself until you knew which way the conversation would go. Isn’t that right?”

Ned flushed, realizing suddenly that he had been in Arnold’s custody—or ours—since we found out he’d warned Willoughby.

“The same rifle,” Ellie went on, “you probably used to kill Ike Forepaugh, because if no one ever found Ike he’d keep getting blamed for everything, wouldn’t he? Suspicion wouldn’t turn,” she finished meaningfully, “to you.”

“Gossip was true, for once,” Arnold said. “There’s a body been dug up on Crow Island and it sure looks like Forepaugh.”

Arnold turned slowly. “Met him after he got away from us, did you, Ned? Maybe he even called you for help. You tell him you would drive him somewhere, get him out of town? Want to bet we match a bullet?”

“You ever register that old rifle, Ned?” Wade asked.

“Y-yes,” Ned replied, too scared suddenly to lie. “But—”

“When you saw Jacobia heading for Dennysville that morning,” Ellie pressed on, “when
you
were on your
way back to Eastport, you jumped to the conclusion that her trip must have something to do with Ken’s death, because
you
had a guilty conscience. And you got scared, so you decided to take her out of the picture.”

“You didn’t go all the way back to town. Instead you hid in the brush on Carlow Island and waited for me to come back,” I said, recalling now having seen his car that day.

“But,” Ellie finished, “you’re not a great shot. You missed.”

Montague stared. “That’s—that’s not true!”

“You’d already started insinuating yourself into Ken’s life,” Ellie said, “when he started paying his bills with the proceeds of the drug trips. Ken was keeping his head down pretty well, but you smelled money and wanted to know where it was coming from.”

Ned made a disparaging sound. “Nickels and dimes, from that little blonde’s dope deals. She’d met some guy in Portland, he wanted her to distribute. She’d lined Ken up for the boat work. They were the criminals,” he protested, “not me.”

So I’d been right. It was Hallie behind the drug smuggling.

“Nickels and dimes were more than you were earning,” Ellie pointed out. “But then Ken made his mistake. He let you in on his bigger deal, didn’t he? Because Ken didn’t have a driver’s license and Willoughby couldn’t tolerate that.”

Ned’s soft lips pouted sullenly. This was all too accurate for his comfort.

“There you were, having to share this great racket with your loser cousin. Who’d miss him? And you needed the money. So Ken had to go,” Ellie said, “because you wanted the whole thing for yourself. Then Tim started talking about Ken’s ‘big deal,’ the only one Tim knew about. He meant drug runs for Hallie, but
you were afraid he meant the money runs and you couldn’t risk that.”

She took a deep breath. “On Willoughby’s orders, you took his money stash out to Crow Island and hid it in plain sight, ready for the next leg of the journey, using the dog food sacks Tim had saved up so carefully. That must have been when you killed Tim.”

But Tim’s dying, I thought, hadn’t been on Willoughby’s order. Why hide money at a death scene? No, the old man’s “suicide” had been all Ned’s idea. The guy was as bluntly purposeful—and as blindly stupid—as a tunneling grub.

The old man might know something. Besides, Ned wanted the island. Case closed.

“You even used Ken’s boat to get out there,” Arnold said, “didn’t you?”

Ellie and Arnold had figured it out long before me. It was why Arnold had kept Ned calm all evening; so Ned wouldn’t run.

“That trip was a way to get the money away from Willoughby’s place, where it was making him nervous, out into a convenient spot,” Ellie went on, “
and
it was a dry run with the boat, for you. A short run before you had to attempt the big project.”

Ned had begun to sweat, his eyes darting anxiously around the room. But Arnold blocked his only escape route.

“What you didn’t realize,” Ellie added, “was that anyone would try to take care of Tim’s dogs, because it wasn’t something you’d have bothered doing. They weren’t valuable dogs like Cosmo. You didn’t think anyone would find the money or Tim’s body so fast.”

“But I
told
you, if anyone did all that, it must’ve been Ike. This—this is libel! Or slander! Isn’t it?” Ned turned, his eyes appealing to Bob Arnold.

“Right, Ned,” Ellie said scathingly. “I guess Ike Forepaugh probably kidnapped the Lindbergh baby,
too. And after that, he shot himself, and buried himself. Quite a guy.”

“Crow Island,” Arnold added, “makes a better place to start from, if you’re smuggling something. Set out from the cove at the north end of it, nobody on shore here sees your heading.”

“Tim wouldn’t have suspected you,” Ellie said, resuming her attack. “With his crippled leg, he must have been an easy victim. And I guess you’re the only guy besides Willoughby in fifty miles, can’t tie a decent slipknot. And then there was Hallie.”

Her eyes shone with anger. “First you sweet-talked her, gave her gifts, probably. Made promises. She was too young to know that a guy like you couldn’t really do anything for her. To her, you probably looked like her ticket out. Didn’t you?”

Ned squirmed at her tone. “Then you started blackmailing her for those nickels and dimes, I suppose,” Ellie went on. “If she didn’t pay, you’d tell Arnold. That’s why she kept meeting you.”

“But after Ken died,” I put in, “you took it all. You found her stash in Ken’s car and appropriated it, just the way you did his boat.”

Montague looked trapped. “You can’t prove any of this. You just want somebody to blame for it. And with
you
here—”

He glared at Arnold. “I think I ought to have a lawyer.”

Arnold shook his head innocently. “Me? I just stopped by for a cup of coffee. Haven’t asked a single question.”

“Yeah, well, I’m not saying anything more.” Montague’s chin thrust out belligerently as he got to his feet again.

Ellie stepped up to him. “Ken Mumford,” she told him softly, “was a loser, like you thought.”

She stuck her finger in Ned’s chest. “But you know
what? He had dreams, and I remember them. He was worth ten of you.”

Before he could stop her she’d reached down into his jacket pocket, and I saw her fingers close on something there.

“Hallie argued with someone that night on the seawall,” she told Arnold, still staring at Ned. “But when Mulligan approached, that person faded into the shadows. After that, Hallie rejected Mulligan again. But Mulligan never really said he killed her, did he? She sent Mulligan away,” Ellie said. “And then …”

Her hand came out of Ned’s pocket, her fingers wrapped around the silver medallion.

“… someone else killed her, tipped her body over the seawall, rolled it to the water of the boat basin, and dumped it in the nearest bait bin. The question is, why? There was no reason to move that body.”

“Or,” she turned to Ned, “was there?”

His face had gone fishbelly white. “I wanted—” he began.

“Shut up, Ned,” Wade advised, his expression one of disgust mingled with pity.

I took the medallion from Ellie. “You know, this chain is just like the one I wear,” I said. “I noticed it when Hallie came over here. And it’s the very devil to open. Especially,” I added, “if you can’t see it. Say, in the darkness on the seawall. And the nearest light is under the big lamps, by the boat basin.”

“I only wanted it back,” Ned said sullenly. “It’s silver. She’d just end up shooting it in her arm. Only she wouldn’t give it to me.”

“Still, why risk being seen near her body afterwards just to get a piece of jewelry?” I asked.

His answering look at me was hateful.

“Because,” I theorized, “the risk of leaving it was even greater? As it would be, for instance—”

I turned the medallion over. “If your initials and Hallie’s were scratched on the back.”

And there they were. Good old Hallie: maybe she wasn’t the brightest bulb in the chandelier, but she was consistent: initials everywhere. And the way it turned out, she might as well have carved an “M” for
murderer
in Ned’s forehead.

“You’re related to two of the victims,” I said. “You couldn’t afford to be linked to a third. Once she was dead, you
had
to get the medallion.”

“You don’t …” he began hopelessly.

I tossed the thing at Arnold, who caught it without taking his gaze from Ned. Like I say, Arnold can be quick when he wants to be.

He hadn’t spooked Willoughby, even though I felt certain Clarissa had told Arnold all that I had reported to her. And although while Ned was here with us, Arnold had stayed away doing all the other things he had to do, he’d showed up double-fast when we’d called to say we were leaving Ned alone.

And he was here for the finish. “How’d
you
know?” I asked him, as he applied his handcuffs to a silent, subdued Ned Montague.

Arnold snapped the bracelets shut. “Wouldn’t say I
knew
. But it was the gash in Ken’s boat for starters. And the dinghy. Ken would never’ve had such a thing, but there it was, stowed up like it’d always been there. I kept asking how those things linked.”

“You can’t
prove
 …” Ned protested weakly, but Arnold just talked over him.

“Simple answer that covered everything was that somebody’d got out to the boat on the dinghy. Killed Ken, then grounded the boat by accident.”

He turned Ned around a little more roughly than was strictly necessary. “Somebody had to change his plan, jump off, walk home. Meant to use the dinghy to get away but he couldn’t, and he sure didn’t want to be seen dragging it. So he stowed it, make it look like it belonged.”

“It wasn’t my dinghy,” Ned objected. “I never had one. Never even saw it.”

“Really?” Arnold responded, and dropped his bombshell.

“So how come we found a receipt for it in the household trash you dumped, out at South End? Stuff with your name on it, receipt all torn in pieces, but we put it back together, me and Al Rollins.”

Arnold shook his head scornfully. “Your problem, Ned,” he finished, “is that you are a cheap bastard, and a greedy bastard. And also, you are a dumb bastard. Should’ve spent the money Willoughby paid you on something for your kids, ’stead of that dinghy.
Or
you should’ve burnt the receipt.”