that there was something buried in the sand. It was no more than a slight rise in the flatness of the beach that she dismissed as a natural contour caused by the surf. But the more she stared at it, the more conscious she became that except for that single spot the beach was pancake flat. She found a stick and began walking toward the slight hump in the sand.
It was about midway between the driftwood barrier and the surf line, and as she approached it, it almost disappeared. Had the sun been any higher, the bright light would have effectively flattened the bulge — a small mound two or three feet across — and she never would have seen it. She stared down at it for a moment, hesitating, then jabbed at it with her stick.
The stick went easily into the sand for an inch or two, then stopped. She pushed, and the stick sunk in a little deeper, then sprang back when she released the pressure. Whatever it was, it wasn’t hard.
She began scraping the sand away, first with the stick, then with her hands. Her fingers touched something. Something soft, like fur. A seal, she told herself, I’ve found a dead seal. She picked up the stick again, and began digging in earnest.
It wasn’t until the tail emerged that Elaine knew what she had found. A dog, not a seal. Her first impulse was to leave it alone. If it had been a seal, she probably would have. Her curiosity would have been satisfied and she would have been content to leave it where it lay, for nature to take its course. But a dog was something else. A dog was someone’s pet. Somewhere, someone was going to miss this animal. Perhaps, she told herself, it isn’t quite dead. She continued digging.
Minutes later the corpse was exposed. Elaine stared down at it, afraid she was going to be sick. It looked so pitiful, lying limply in the sand, its coat matted with slime. She knew immediately that it had been dead for several hours, but still she felt impelled to make sure. With the stick, she prodded at the dead animal. The body moved, but the head did not. She prodded at the head, then, and it moved around at an unnatural angle. With a shudder Elaine realized that its neck was broken. She dropped the stick and glanced wildly around, looking for help. The beach was still deserted. She looked back to the dog, and wished she hadn’t. Its eyes were open, and the dead eyes stared up at her as if pleading for her to do something. But all she could do was rebury it. Using the stick, she did the job as quickly as she could. Then she began running blindly back down the beach, hoping that the image of the dead creature would leave her as she left the place where she had found it.
Brad was standing at the desk chatting with the manager when Elaine burst through the door of the Harbor Inn. His smile disappeared when he saw his wife’s strained look. He followed her up the stairs to their room.
“What happened?” he asked. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”
“I found something on the beach,” Elaine said tightly. “I think I’m going to be sick.” She sat heavily on the bed and her hands moved instinctively to her stomach, as if trying to stop the heaving there. Looking at her ashen face, Brad felt his own stomach tighten. He sat down beside her, slipping his arm around her.
“What was it?” he asked softly.
“A dog,” Elaine said, choking. “A poor little dog. It was buried in the sand.”
Brad’s brow knotted in puzzlement. “Buried? What do you mean?”
Elaine leaped to her feet and stared furiously down at her husband. “Buried! I mean it was dead and it was buried! Its neck was broken and whoever did it buried the poor thing in the sand! Brad, let’s get out of here. I hate this place. I want to go home.”
Brad took her hand and pulled her back down on the bed beside him. “Now calm down,” he said, “and tell me what happened. And don’t dramatize it. Just tell me what you found.”
Elaine breathed deeply, composing herself, then told him what had happened. When she was finished, Brad shrugged. “That doesn’t sound so horrible,” he commented.
“Well, it
“No, I wasn’t,” Brad said reasonably. “But how can you be so sure that someone killed it, then buried it in the sand?”
“What else could have happened?” Elaine demanded.
“There was a storm last night, right?”
Elaine nodded mutely.
“Well, didn’t it occur to you that the dog could have been playing on the beach and been hit by a chunk of driftwood? That could certainly break its neck. And then the surf does the rest, burying it in the sand. It seems to me that if someone maliciously killed a dog the beach is the last place he would have buried it. The surf could easily have exposed it. If you’re going to bury a dog you bury it where it will stay buried, don’t you?”
Suddenly Elaine felt foolish. She smiled sheepishly at Brad. “Why did you marry me?” she asked. “Don’t you get sick of me overreacting to everything?”
“Not really. It makes a nice balance, since I tend to underreact.” He smiled mischievously. “Maybe that’s what makes me a good shrink. I hear the most incredible tales from my patients and never react to them at all. Want to hear some?”
“I certainly don’t,” Elaine said, blushing deeply. “Didn’t you ever hear about the confidentiality between doctors and patients?”
“That’s for courts, not for wives,” Brad said easily. “Come on, let’s go get some breakfast.”
A few minutes later, as they passed through the lobby, the manager asked them if they’d be checking out that morning. Elaine started to tell him that they would, but Brad squeezed her hand.
“We’ll be here a few more days,” he said. He avoided Elaine’s eyes as she stared at him accusingly. “I want to take a look at Robby Palmer,” he muttered. But Elaine was sure it was more than that.
An hour later, after she had eaten, Elaine began to feel better. The sun still shone brightly and Clark’s Harbor, basking in the brilliance, once more seemed as charming as it had when they had discovered it the day before. The images of the dead fisherman and the broken corpse of the dog faded from her mind, and Elaine began to wonder if it might not be fun to spend a year here. After all, she told herself, fishermen do drown, but they don’t drown every day. It was just a coincidence.
Rebecca Palmer parked the battered minibus in front of the building her husband was remodeling and hurried inside. For a second she thought the place was deserted, but then a pounding from the back room told her that Glen was there, and working. She called out to him.
“I’m back here.” His voice suggested that he wasn’t going to come out, so she moved quickly around the half-finished display case, and stepped into an alcove that would eventually be an office.
“This son-of-a-bitch doesn’t want to fit,” Glen said with a grin. He struck the offending shelf once more, then tossed the hammer aside.
“If you’d measure before you cut, it might help,” Rebecca pointed out. She picked up the hammer, knocked the shelf loose, measured first the board, and then the space it was supposed to fit in, then the board once more. She set the board on a pair of sawhorses, picked up a skillsaw, and neatly removed an eighth of an inch from one end of the plank. Seconds later it sat securely and steadily in place. Glen gazed at his wife admiringly.
“I didn’t know you could do that.”
“You never asked. Maybe from now on you should take care of the house and I’ll do the remodeling.”
“That would give Clark’s Harbor something to talk about, wouldn’t it? Want some coffee?” Without waiting for a reply, Glen poured them each a cup, then winked at Rebecca. “Perked with genuine electricity,” he teased. “By the way, your latest batch of pottery came out without a single crack. One of these days, with a little luck, I’ll get this place in shape to start selling some of it.”
“You’d better. I have a whole new batch in the van. Give me a hand with it, will you?”
They transferred the unfired pottery to the shelves around the kiln, then put the finished pieces from the night before carefully aside.
“Now all I have to do is collect Snooker and I can get back home to work,” Rebecca said when they were done.
“Snooker?”
“Didn’t you bring him in with you this morning?” Rebecca asked.
“I didn’t see him at all this morning,” Glen replied.
“That’s funny. When he didn’t show up for his breakfast I assumed you’d brought him with you.”
“Did you try calling him?”
“Of course. Not that it ever does any good. Well, I suppose he’ll show up when he’s good and ready. But I hope he’s ready by this afternoon or the kids are going to be upset. I told them you had him.” Rebecca shrugged. “It
