“I promise I will not go looking for trouble.”
—Amelia Peabody, Lion in the Valley (1986)
I hoped to see Daniel in the break room after my shift ended, but he wasn’t there. After wasting as much time as I could without people in the break room starting to question why I was hanging around, I headed back to the lobby and made small talk with the incoming desk clerk about tasks that needed to be done. Daniel was still nowhere to be seen, and the clerk asked me to take some spare uniforms to housekeeping that had been stashed under the registration desk, so I went downstairs to the laundry room. They were still in the middle of shift change, so I sat at the end of a big folding table and waited for someone to log in what I’d brought. I waited so long, I dozed off.
For a while. A housekeeper woke me up, which was embarrassing.
It probably had nothing to do with narcolepsy. I was just exhausted, getting used to working nights; it could have happened to anyone. So I told myself not to obsess about it.
But because I’d fallen asleep, I missed both Daniel and the first ferry and was forced to wait for another. By the time I got back to the island and walked home from the terminal, it was well past seven a.m.
As I headed down the steps toward our front door, I spotted Grandpa in the greenhouse . . . and someone else. He waved me inside, a blurry figure behind rain-spattered glass. I hesitated before changing course. Humid air and compost filled my lungs as the rickety door slammed shut behind me.
Grandpa cradled a small tomato plant connected to a clump of dark soil. Next to him was his longtime friend, a retired Seattle police officer named Roger Cassidy, known simply as Cass. He was tall and willowy, and a good decade older than Grandpa, his once bright ginger hair now pale. He also had a prosthetic hand, after losing his before I was born—he was shot in the line of duty.
“Birdie,” he said, smiling broadly.
“Hi, Cass. Didn’t expect to see you here so early.” He lived alone on the other side of the island in a small house that faced Bremerton. He’d never married or owned any pets. I sometimes wondered if he was lonely. Ever since my grandmother passed, Grandpa and Cass had been spending more time together. It was as if her death had broken an invisible barrier around our house, and now half the town was knocking on our door, checking in to see if we were managing.
“I was picking up coffee downtown and thought I’d drop some off for Hugo, found him out here a few minutes ago.” He raised a paper coffee cup. “Just back from your new job?”
“Indeed, I am.” I moved Grandpa’s metal walking cane a few inches so that he wouldn’t knock it over. I’d texted him earlier this morning from the hotel, so that he wouldn’t worry, but he never answered. “Sorry I’m late. I missed the first ferry.”
“And you’re mizzled,” he said, using his own slang for the misting of rain clinging to my hair and clothes.
“I’m always mizzled. What are you doing out here?”
“Staking the Marnero tomatoes,” he said, brushing dirt off his gardening gloves. “Your grandmother would have a fit if she knew I’d neglected her plants.”
My grandmother had loved to cook and had spent half her days out here, growing herbs and vegetables and a few orchids. Before she’d married my grandfather and had my mother, she’d done missionary work in East Africa and Bolivia, and she’d said those trips awakened her interest in cooking new things. Curries. Fried breads. Fragrant rice dishes.
When she was alive, especially over the last couple of years, all we did was fight. But now that she was gone, all I could remember were good things. It was as if my mind were intent on making me regret not appreciating her more when she was alive. The same thing happened when my mom died. Anyway, I guess that’s why I’d avoided coming out here the last few months, to avoid thinking about it too much. And I guess Grandpa had too. A lot of her plants were dead. At least the orchids were blooming.
“Any reason why you were late?” Grandpa asked.
“I just . . . lost track of time.”
He didn’t ask why, so I didn’t elaborate.
“Anything interesting happen at work?” Cass asked. “That’s the hotel where that starlet died. What was her name?”
“Tippie Talbot,” I said.
“She was only twenty,” Grandpa added. “Did one picture with Cary Grant, I think. Birdie says her room was torn down. Any other animal rights protests?” he asked, briefly filling Cass in on the octopus and goldfish scandal.
“No protests. No sewage main breaks. It was super boring tonight. I’m not even sure why they need an auditor, to be honest. It’s pretty much all automated. A monkey could run the program.”
“Those are the best jobs,” Grandpa said, eyes crinkling at the corners. “No stress. No responsibility. Enjoy it while you can. One day you’ll be wishing you were back there, doing monkey work.”
“Ooo-ooo, ahh-ahh,” I hooted, doing my best monkey imitation.
They laughed, and Grandpa began rolling up the chicken wire he’d been using around the tomato plants. “Actually,” I said, “something interesting did happen today. I heard some gossip about Raymond Darke.”
Cass perked up. “The writer? Doesn’t he write the stuff you read, Hugo? Thrillers?”
“What gossip?” Grandpa asked.
“Someone I work with claims Darke checks into our hotel every week for an hour.”
Grandpa pushed up his glasses, leaving a streak of dirt on his nose. “You’re joking.”
“I’m not. Hold still.” I used my thumb to wipe away the smudge. “I combed through the hotel’s records, and someone named Ivanov checks in every week. Same room.” I told them about the home address being the same as our sister hotel in San Francisco and about the man with the baseball cap in the elevator.
“Very odd,” Cass murmured. “But why does your coworker think it’s Darke? Every journalist in Seattle would sell their left foot for a chance to reveal the man behind the books.”
“Daniel says—”
“Daniel,” Grandpa repeated. “That’s the boy you mentioned before? You two are becoming fast friends, huh? Mona texted me last night. Said she met him . . .”
Ugh. “She did.”
Cass laughed. “I know that look. Hugo, stop pestering her.”
Grandpa held up his hands in surrender. “Not pestering. Continue, Birdie. Continue.”
“There isn’t much left to tell you. Daniel claims to have proof it’s Darke. He just can’t figure out why he’s checking into the hotel. He wants me to help him figure out why.”
Grandpa nodded. “I see. He knows you’re a mystery hound, then?”
“Yes.”
He shared a conspiratorial look with Cass that I ignored. Then he shoved the roll of chicken wire underneath a potting table. “You know, it’s strange you bring this up, because just last night they were talking about Darke on Rainier Time.”
His favorite local radio show, which ran late at night.
“A listener called in, talking about the detective in Darke’s books—”
“Paul Parker,” I said. “Stupidest detective name ever.”
“Like it or not, it’s a million-dollar name for Darke,” Grandpa said with a smile. “Anyway, the listener was talking about how Darke’s detective is a fan of opera music and that all the book titles are based on opera names. They say writers usually write what they know. I would be greatly surprised if Mr. Darke didn’t have a real-life obsession with opera. I think I even remember reading an interview with him—he almost never gives them, you know.”
I made air circles with my hand, hurrying him along. “And?”
“What’s that on your palm?”
“Looks like a phone number,” Cass said.
I scrubbed a thumb over the ink, feeling my cheeks warm.
“Wouldn’t be from your friend Daniel, would it?” Grandpa asked.
“It’s just the manager’s number,” I lied. “You were saying about this Darke interview?”
“Oh, right. I was going to call into the show about it, but I wasn’t a hundred percent sure, and before I could look for the magazine, they were already talking about something else. But I seem to remember Darke mentioning in this interview that he collects opera records. Actual records, like they used to make.”
They still did. Lots of people collected vinyl, and some records were worth a lot of money.
If Darke collected records, then it stood to reason he browsed vinyl shops in Seattle. I wondered how many of those there were. I knew of at least one in Pike Place, but I didn’t recall seeing any opera records there. Besides, if a man was trying to keep a low profile, he probably wasn’t browsing in a place that was so busy and filled with tourists. Maybe a smaller store with less foot traffic. A store that employed someone who shared his passion for music.
Inside my head, I couldn’t resist typing up a suspect profile for Darke:
Suspect: Raymond Darke
Age: Early fifties?
Occupation: Mystery author
Education: Graduated from the University of Washington (according to his public biography)
Physical description: Caucasian. Slightly overweight. Possible rosacea? (Red nose)
Personality traits: Wealthy. Famous. Desire to stay out of the public eye; values privacy. Wears blue baseball cap and sunglasses in public . . . to hide his identity?
Other details: Books show a familiarity with legal procedure. Opera fan. Vinyl record collector. (Further investigation required . . . with Daniel?)
“Does any of that help?” Grandpa asked.
“Possibly. I’ll do some snooping. But right now I’m going to get some sleep.”
“I’ll be curious to know what you find,” Cass added.
Grandpa gave me an approving nod. “This is an excellent summer mystery you’ve found, Birdie. Much better than the toxic leaking sewage pipe—and probably better for your health.”
Funny, but it felt twice as risky.