A Timely Vision

“That’s not what I meant. We’ll have to wait for the ME to know for sure, but I’d be willing to guess he’s been up there since the Blue Whale closed thirty years ago. He was already almost mummified.”

Thankfully, our exit off the side street and onto Duck Road saved me from having to think about that last comment. We switched partners as we crossed the road and headed for the bar.

It had been a long day, beginning with the purse snatching and ending with yet another homicide for Chief Michaels to investigate. I yawned as we went up the stairs to the boardwalk that led to the bar. I wasn’t looking forward to a drink, instead wishing I were home in bed. It was only a few hours until my interview with Agent Walker. I wanted to be awake for it. I’m not much of a night person.

Someone must’ve heard me because Cody, one of Wild Stallions’ owners, was already closing up. “Sorry. I have to close early. My wife is in labor. Rain check?”

“Of course!” I hoped I didn’t sound as relieved as I felt. “Give Sally my love.”

“Thanks, Dae. We’ll let you know how it turns out.”

We seemed to be at a loss for something to do. We were close to Missing Pieces, so I offered to make coffee at the shop. Shayla wasn’t happy about being denied her rum (she seems to be part pirate), but Kevin and Tim were happy to accept.

Shayla made up for her disappointment by sitting between Kevin and Tim on the brocade sofa, leaving me to make the coffee and haul out the chair from behind the counter for myself. By that time, Tim had already told the story about Miss Elizabeth and Wild Johnny Simpson. I poured four cups of coffee and put cream and sugar on the table. It was almost anticlimactic for me to sit down.

“Wow! What a story!” Shayla laughed and rolled her eyes. “Do you think Miss Elizabeth or Miss Mildred killed Johnny and left him up there at the Blue Whale?”

Tim shrugged. “I guess it could’ve been either one of them if they did it with that little gun. Anybody could handle that.”

“First, one of them would have to have some connection with the owner,” Kevin said.

“If it’s only been thirty years,” I reminded them, “Johnny’s death happened well after the sisters fought over him. I can’t imagine either one of them going up there and killing him.”

“I don’t know,” Tim said. “Those two always had that between them. If Miss Mildred knew Johnny was here, I wouldn’t put it past her.”

Shayla put down her cup and yawned. “As interesting as all of this is, I have to go. I have a bikini wax at seven thirty. I’d hate to mess that up.”

Tim offered to take her home. “I’ve got the car out front. I have to go past your place anyway.”

“Okay.” Shayla glanced at Kevin, no doubt to see if he had any reaction to Tim’s proposal. “I guess I’ll see you two tomorrow.”

“I could take you too, Kevin,” Tim offered as an afterthought.

“No, that’s okay. I’d rather walk. See you later, Shayla.”

Shayla’s disappointment was written on her pretty face. “Yeah. Maybe tomorrow?”

“Maybe.” Kevin showed no sign of remorse at letting her go with Tim.

As Tim and Shayla called out their good-nights, I carried the coffee cups over to the small sink in the back of the shop and began washing them out. Kevin brought the coffeepot over to me. I thanked him, and then my mind immediately leapt to small talk. “I think the Blue Whale will be nice when you finish it.”

“Thanks. I won’t be able to do much until they get done with the investigation. It’s hard to believe that guy was up there all that time and nobody knew.”

“Except the killer.” I took the coffeepot from him.

“That’s true,” he agreed.

“I can’t believe there are two deaths being investigated in Duck at the same time. It will be on everybody’s blog and the topic of conversation for years. That’s the way we are.”

“I like it. I like Duck. I’m sorry I didn’t retire years ago.” He glanced around Missing Pieces. “Can I walk you home?”

“No. That’s okay. I might hang around a while and do some straightening up.” I was lying, of course. I could hardly keep my eyes open. All I wanted to do was lie down and not get up until morning. But I needed him for the interview with Agent Walker, and it didn’t seem right to impose on him anymore. We didn’t know each other that well. “Good night, Kevin. I’m glad we found your key, even if it did lead to something terrible.”

He smiled. “It was good that we found him. Someone probably misses him. I guess you are good at finding lost things. Good night, Dae.”

I locked the door behind him, stuck my hand in my pocket and remembered the key I’d found on the stairs. It was too late to call him back. I’d have to give it to him later. I took it out and looked at it again in the light. I was right about the size and shape of it. Someone had probably dropped it years ago before the Blue Whale was closed. I knew from the way I’d felt when I picked it up that the key was important. But right now I was tired and couldn’t think about it anymore. I opened the cash register and stashed the key inside.

It had been a very eventful day, too eventful. I still hadn’t recovered from finding Miss Elizabeth. I didn’t need the added anxiety of finding another dead person. I turned out the lights and sat down on the old brocade sofa.

I wondered what Johnny Simpson had been doing back in Duck after all those years. Had anyone known he was here? Obviously, someone knew. It was likely that person was the one who’d killed him. Could it have been one of the sisters?

I pulled my feet up on the sofa and closed my eyes. Shayla might feel that ghosts weren’t important, but they were more important to me than a lot of the tangible things that went on every day. I believed in the afterlife. I’d grown up on stories of ghostly visitations that predicted storms and of spectral lights that led people to safety during pirate raids.

There was one ghost in particular I wanted to see. My mother had died in a car accident as she was crossing the bridge to the mainland thirteen years ago. I was a rebellious twenty-three-year-old at the time who’d wanted to camp out on the beach with a group of hard-drinking bikers.

We’d argued fiercely about it, the end result being one of those not-while-you-live-under-my-roof kind of things. I promised to move out as quickly as possible. She didn’t back down.

She’d gone off without me that day. It was raining hard, and the bridge was wet and slippery. They said she had a blowout and lost control of the car. It pitched over the rail and into the sound. They never found her body, as so often happens in the waters off the Outer Banks.

For the first few months after she died, I hardly slept, waiting for her, torn apart by guilt. I quit college and spent most of my time staring out at the sound. There was unfinished business between us, the hallmark of most ghostly happenings. Every sigh in the eaves, every unusual creak in the old wood, sent me out into the hall looking for her.

I was desperate to apologize and try to make amends. But after six months, I realized it might take something more than waiting around. That’s how I met Shayla. She didn’t have a shop on the boardwalk then. She’d recently moved to Duck and was working out of her home. She tried to contact my mother during a seance. Shayla and I became friends, but there was no message for me from the other side.

Part of me gave up then and reasoned that one unresolved argument wasn’t a big deal. We knew we loved each other. We’d always been close. Talking to her one last time would’ve been great, but it wasn’t necessary.

Part of me still believed. Sometimes, in the deep night, when I thought I heard her voice in the wind, I’d sit up for hours, waiting for her. I’d learned most of those island ghost stories from her. She’d come back, if she could. How many times had I repeated those words to myself? She’d come back, if she could.

I pulled up the blue afghan she’d knitted for me and snuggled down under it, pretending I could still smell her perfume. She’d made this for me on my twelfth birthday. I had many things that she’d given me through the years, but none that I cherished more than this.

It was the death and despair that made me long for her again. Tears slid down my face. I told myself to get up and go home before it got any later. Gramps would be worried. Sitting here crying wasn’t going to make that interview in the morning any better.

I closed my eyes, just for a second, to clear them. I’d get up in a minute and drag myself home. It had been a