Between the dock and the emporium’s parking lot was the hotel’s old garage, a sturdy structure that had survived every storm the Atlantic threw at it. Adrenaline hit and she broke into a run. The side door was open. She stepped inside and flipped the light switch. Dust motes filtered down from the windows on the far side of the large space. At one time the building could house twenty cars. And not just any cars, but big cars like Studebakers and old-school limos. Now it held lawn equipment and a mammoth workbench littered with an assortment of tools. In the past, Pierre did most of the small maintenance jobs around the hotel and emporium, but since moving into the caretaker’s cottage Ryan had taken over.
When the Indialantic was under hurricane warnings, the center of the garage was left empty and used to store the hotel’s outdoor furniture. She searched the perimeter of the garage, looking for the box of license plates Grand-Pierre had mentioned. On the northeast corner she spied a plastic milk crate on a wooden bench next to a couple of rakes. She went up to it and found a stack of license plates dating from the 1930s, even a New York World’s fair plate featuring the World of Tomorrow’s Unisphere. She thought of snatching it to give to Kate for her shop but knew better than to touch anything; because next to the crate on the bench was a rectangular dust free impression of where a container had once stood. A can of antifreeze as Grand-Pierre had said?
She was disappointed but not surprised. No wonder the CSI’s couldn’t find anything. Whoever poisoned Julian, had taken it. Her money was on Wren, especially after Grand-Pierre just told her that Wren had been inside. She supposed the crime scene team could check for Wren’s prints inside the garage. But what would that prove? She’d been asked to go inside and get the leather cleaner for Pierre’s motorbike. Thinking of Wren, something else was bugging her. If she had left the Indialantic yesterday, how likely would it be that she would leave the opal ring behind? It would make sense to at least ask Greta or Susannah if they’d seen it. Why did she have to leave in such a hurry, especially after telling Branson she planned on staying?
Last night before bed, she’d gone over all the photos Ashley had sent from Saturday’s Merfest in the emporium’s parking lot. Nothing stood out. She did see who she thought was the man in the black cap standing next to Dorian’s tent. But she couldn’t be one hundred percent sure it was him. She’d also spied Wren talking to Phoebe and Branson and had sent both photos to Ryan, along with a selfie of her lips kissing her phone screen. Hehe.
* * * *
A few minutes later she was standing outside the glass door to the orchid house. It was the only entrance or exit to the structure. Now that they knew Dorian had ingested oleander leaves, Liz wanted to see why Wren had been wearing an orchid that came from inside a locked building that only Liz, Pierre, and Aunt Amelia had a key for.
Looking at the shattered pane of glass next to the doorknob, she got her answer. She didn’t know if it was a concrete clue but whoever reached through the hole in the glass had a much smaller hand than Liz. She used her key to unlock the padlock and walked into the temperature controlled room. The sides of the narrow room had three bleacher type benches with potted orchids. Above the benches were rows upon rows of hanging orchids whose roots were too long to keep in pots. She took in a deep breath, inhaling the familiar scent of earth and flower and marched toward the far wall with the sink and potting bench. Obviously, this was where Wren had performed her decapitation of the Nieve Blanca orchid. Liz didn’t believe Wren would break into the orchid house just to get a flower to wear in her hair.
Even though they called the space the orchid house, it also doubled as a greenhouse/garden shed. Next to the sink was a marble mortar and pestle used by Liz and her great-aunt to gently release fragrance from dried lavender, gardenia, or rose petals. Had someone used it to make a powder or oil from the oleander? Then they added it to Julian’s water bottle that Dorian drank from?
Before leaving, Liz pulled out the small trash can beneath the sink and noticed a crumpled paper towel with a residue of dried brown leaves. Grand-Pierre said Wren had knowledge of flowers and herbs. If she had, it was important to find her.
Doing an analysis on the leaves on the paper towel and any residue on the mortar and pestle would take time. As Charlotte often told her, the instant results on DNA and other forensics didn’t happen as fast as shown on television. She left once again without touching anything except the doorknob.
As she walked past the summerhouse on the way back to Ryan’s she mused that instead of trying to find Julian Rhodes’s murderer, she should be planning a midnight rendezvous under the stars with the man of her dreams. Soon, she thought. Things must come to a head soon. Perhaps Wren’s leaving was a good thing? It solidified her guilt. Now the others could leave and then they could get on with their lives. The dress rehearsal for The Sea Witch was Friday and she and her father had tried to convince Aunt Amelia to postpone. A consummate actress, she wouldn’t hear of it. The show must go on, she’d told them.
She took out her phone and sent a group text to Charlotte and her father, telling them what she’d discovered in the garage and orchid house. She continued past the cutting garden, then made a left and followed a path west toward the caretaker’s cottage. Ryan said he wouldn’t tell her where they were going until she got in the car. Wherever they were going, she hoped they’d find the missing pieces they were looking for.
Rosy, the Indialantic’s semi tame rosette spoonbill tern greeted her on the grass bordering the rear parking lot near the lagoon. “How’s it going, Rosy? What ya doing on the grass—no minnows for breakfast?” Liz must have reminded her. She stretched her rosy wings and took off for her favorite piling on the dock. Looking to her right Liz saw her father’s cabin cruiser Serendipity bobbing in the gentle waves of the lagoon. Had it only been two days ago that they’d sat watching the Mystical Merfest Boat Regatta pass by?
At the end of the dock, Liz spied Captain Netherton on the top deck of Queen of the Seas. Her watch read nine forty-five. She had at least fifteen minutes until she needed to meet Ryan. The past couple of days, Liz and the captain kept missing each other. She’d never talked to him personally about what happened the night Julian was poisoned. She knew he would have shared everything with Charlotte, but still, he might remember something two days later with a clearer vision of the events. And now with the news that Wren had left town, it seemed even more important than ever to glean any kind of clue as to where she might have gone.
A few minutes later, Captain Netherton said to her with a weak smile, “So that’s everything. I’m sorry I don’t have much to add. Susannah and Ashley prepared and then served Ms. Starwood and Mr. Rhodes food at their table. Ashley even helped with the cleanup when she wasn’t taking photos.”
He’d basically reiterated the same thing Susannah and Ashley had told them.
Captain Netherton put his pipe in his mouth and gnawed on the stem as he gazed out across the lagoon. Betty had talked him out of smoking it, but old habits were hard to break. After a few moments of silence, he said, “I did notice poor Ashley had a hard time of it when she tried to get any shot with Mr. Rhodes in it. He always turned away or told her there’d been enough photo taking for a lifetime. I overheard Ashley ask Dorian if she wanted to video portions of the rehearsal dinner. Mr. Rhodes got really angry. You know what? Now that I think about it, that might be the time he went down to the stateroom. He did stomp off somewhere before dinner was served, but I had to return to my post, so I have no idea where he went.”
“Do you mind showing me the stateroom where the uh…body”—technically he’d been alive at the time—“Julian was found?”
“Of course not. The police are done. I was just about to tidy it up. Come with me.” He put a kind hand on her shoulder. Like Betty, Greta, Pierre, and Susannah, the Indialantic’s permanent guests, Captain Netherton had become family. He and Betty were an item, even though Betty wouldn’t admit it. Just like Betty’s cat Caroline Keene and Captain Netherton’s dog Killer were best buds, so were Betty and the captain. With his lean, erect posture, white goatee and mustache, the retired coast guard captain reminded Liz of a nautical man from another age, or as Aunt Amelia said, “He’s the spitting image of Captain Daniel Gregg from the 1960’s TV sitcom, The Ghost and Mrs. Muir.” Liz had viewed the old show many times and had to agree.
As they walked to the stairs leading down to the stateroom, she asked, “Doesn’t it make sense that Branson should have been the one prepping and serving Dorian and Julian’s food?”
Captain Netherton turned and looked at her. “I specifically remember him saying he would look over the buffet, but he didn’t seem concerned about his mother’s and Mr. Rhodes’s plates.”
“Do you know if he prepared the meal himself at his restaurant?”
“No, we specifically talked about that. Mr. Arnaud is no chef. He said the chef de cuisine at The Soulful Sea prepared everything ahead of time.”
When they entered the stateroom, Liz noticed black fingerprint powder on every smooth surface. There wasn’t a chalk outline on the wood floor to tell her where Julian had fallen. Just as well, she thought. Ashley had said Wren and Phoebe had come down the stairs to the room the night of the poisoning. Susannah had found him, but what no one knew was why Julian was down there in the first place?
Up until last fall, the Queen of the Sea’s stateroom had been used for storage. With Aunt Amelia’s permission, Captain Netherton tackled cleaning it out, discovering a vintage jewel of a room buried under decades of junk. Two forties style sofas flanked a table big enough for eight. On the teak walls were framed nautical maps and vintage photos yellowed with age. In one of the teak cabinets, the captain had found photographs proving that at one time the room had been used by VIPs for clandestine meetings when they needed a private place to discuss the politics of the time, which included the turbulent time period during WWII and the Cold War. Liz smiled. That was one of the things she loved about growing up at the Indialantic; there were so many stories and so much history attached to it. They were still discovering things and it had been almost a hundred years from when the hotel first opened its doors.
While Captain Netherton looked on, she went to work checking the cushions in the sofa, then got on her hands and knees near the chair where Ryan said he found the SWS water bottle and looked underneath. Nothing. She even riffled through the cupboards. Again, nothing.
When she glanced up at the captain, he had his hands on his hips, a smile on his face. “I’ve checked everything a hundred times myself. I’ve had a chat with Amelia. I promised her we would find out what happened to her friend’s fiancé.”
“I made the same promise.”
“Hey, don’t look so glum. With Charlotte on the case, along with you, Ryan, and Betty, I’m sure there will be an answer soon.”
“I hope so,” she said, standing up. “Can I see the galley where the food came from before being served?”
“Sure.”
They went back up the narrow steps. The galley was a half level below the main deck and a half level up from the stateroom. The galley and stateroom were the only cabins below deck. The galley was small but efficient; the same fingerprint powder was on all the surfaces. She looked in the refrigerator. As she thought. It was empty. On the table was a wrinkled copy of the rehearsal dinner menu. She picked it up and asked, “So everything on this menu was served at the rehearsal dinner, correct?”
The captain leaned over her shoulder. “Yes.”
“Along with the blue bottles of the Sunshine Wiccan Society’s water, right?”
Yes. Only the water wasn’t in here. It was in a tub of ice next to where the tables were set up.”
“So, if a bottle of water was found in the stateroom, Julian must have brought it with him.” She glanced at the menu again. “That’s it!” She pointed at the paper.
“What’s it?”
“The mango mermaid margarita intermezzo!”
“The inter-what-zzo?”
“Intermezzo is a term used for a palate cleanser. Usually it’s a sorbet, but in this case a margarita. It would be the perfect place to hide the poison. Was it served by Susannah or Ashley?” She didn’t let it slip that the poison had been antifreeze, but she did remember Charlotte’s words that the antifreeze had a sweet taste. Now that she thought about it, the SWS water had just a hint of orange, not enough to mask the antifreeze Charlotte described, only oleander, she thought sadly.
“No. There wasn’t room in this refrigerator for the margaritas and glasses, so Mr. Arnaud used the one up on deck, off the main cabin. He brought the tray out himself and served everyone at their seats. I remember because he came down here to the galley to cut some lime slices.”
“Did he have the drinks with him?”
“I don’t believe he did. The girls were getting the dinner course ready to bring up to Ms. Starwood and Mr. Rhodes. There really wasn’t room.”
Captain Netherton’s account of the dinner matched Susannah’s and Ashley’s, with one exception, the fact Branson had left a tray of margaritas on deck when he went down to get slices of lime. “That means when he came down to the galley, the margaritas were just sitting there…unattended!” Excitement made her words come out in spurts.
The captain looked at her. “I suppose…It was a hectic time, seeing I was the only member of the boat crew. I didn’t even have time to taste the food, even though Mr. Arnaud offered.”
“Looks like that might have been a good thing,” she said.
“I hope if there was any residue of poison in the margarita glasses the authorities will find it,” he said. “The man was poisoned, and we’ve now calculated that it could have been anyone.”
Liz grinned, “We’ve? Wow. Betty’s wearing off on you Captain Netherton. I see your point but if it’s found that the margaritas were the conduit to the poison, we can ask more questions on where and what people were doing when they were served. It would still be good to find out how many glasses the sheriff’s department collected. If it’s six, there you go.”
“Do you know how easy it would be to dump Mr. Rhodes’s glass into the lagoon?”
“True.” Liz glanced at her watch. She had to leave in a few minutes but had one last thing she wanted to ask. “Captain, how about Dorian’s daughter, Phoebe? A witness said she and Wren had gone down the steps, either to the galley or the stateroom. Did you notice her?”
“No, sorry. I never talked to Ms. Starwood’s daughter that night or Wren. I did have a conversation with Ms. Starwood’s friend, Garrett. Seemed a nice man. He was very interested in the course the boat was taking, and how long we’d be anchored at the inlet for dinner.”
“Anything else that seemed strange or out of the ordinary with Garrett?” So far, she’d been forgetting about Garrett and his possible motives or lack of motives for murdering Julian Rhodes. She knew one thing; he sure had a crush on Dorian. And then there was the little detail that Julian had threatened Garret, saying soon he would be taking over Garrett’s job as financial advisor and agent.
“I don’t know if it was out of the ordinary, and I told Agent Pearson about it, but Garrett had asked me if there was a private place he could have a word with Ms. Starwood before dinner was served.”
“And…”
He raised an eyebrow. “I told him my small office that doubles as a storage closet would be adequate for a private talk.”
“Do you mind showing me your office?”
“Liz, are you sure you should be snooping around? Look what happened last January.” He finally said it. She was surprised he hadn’t said it earlier.
“Don’t worry. This time there’s no one after me. It’s just you and me, right? No stranger danger.” Except the man in the black cap, she thought.
He arched a white brow, then said reluctantly, “Come with me.” Before continuing up the steps, he grabbed his cane. After being injured in a Coast Guard rescue mission in his active days, he occasionally relied on his ornate headed cane. It wasn’t just any cane. Aunt Amelia had given it to him last Christmas. It had been gifted to her from the prop department after the last episode of Dark Shadows aired in 1971 and had been one of the canes used by the show’s main character, Barnabas Collins played by actor Jonathan Frid. The handle of the cane resembled a silver wolf’s head. Liz never understood the logic of a vampire needing a cane. If he was eternal, as most vampires were, didn’t that mean he never aged? Why the cane? And why a wolf head? Wouldn’t a werewolf sport a wolf’s head cane?
She remembered voicing her concerns to Aunt Amelia who’d sighed, then told her, “Oh Lizzy, that’s what’s interesting. The wolf’s head on the cane was made from pure silver. Barnabas used it to fend off the show’s werewolf, Quentin, or any other werewolves who came his way. There’s no love lost between werewolves and silver. And Barnabas might have been eternal but he’d been alive or one of the living-dead for 175 years. As I can attest, life has a way of wearing you down when you get on in your later years. It’s not easy for us oldies.”
Liz didn’t remember her exact words, but knew it was something along the lines of, “You’re not old, Auntie!”
She and Captain Netherton went up the stairs to the main deck. The sky, which had started out as a clear blue when she’d driven over to the Indialantic, was now covered with gray, ashy clouds. She’d had so many good memories of riding on the Queen of the Seas over the years that she hoped this one tragic incident wouldn’t mar those memories. The boat was a must-do with tourists visiting the island. She knew that Charlotte hadn’t mentioned the name of the boat in her news conference last night, but with all the reporters lurking around, it was sure to get out.
They walked through the seating area of the main cabin where cushioned benches lined both the port and starboard sides of the boat. There were ten rows of seating with a wide center aisle, enough to accommodate sixty guests. The pilot house was open and during his eco-history tours of the Treasure Coast, the captain would point out interesting facts; the location of sunken treasure, famous pirates, while identifying the large assortment of seabirds roosting nearby or at the Pelican Island Nature Preserve, not to mention all the sea life, including manatees, sharks, and dolphins.
Captain Netherton stopped at a door, inserted a key, and opened it. Holding it open for Liz, he followed in from behind, then flipped on the light switch. It was a good sized room with shelves lining both sides of the rectangular space. His desk was on the far wall, neat and tidy, just like his suite at the Indialantic where he did his own housecleaning and laundry. There was a small loveseat next to the desk, a nice quiet place for Garrett and Dorian to talk without anyone overhearing them. In the corner was a table with a coffee maker on top and a single coffee mug. Written on the mug was: Rule #1 The Boat Captain is Always Right. Rule #2 if the Boat Captain is Wrong refer to Rule #1. Next to the table was a refrigerator.
They turned to each other with the realization that the refrigerator that held the mango margaritas was also in the same room Dorian and Garrett had met. She voiced the obvious. “Now it seems Garrett and Dorian had access, along with everyone else. Do you know if they were here before the margaritas were served?”
“That, I have no idea.”
“Do you know if Branson filled the glasses here or on deck?”
“I would assume here. He had a large serving tray with glasses that already had a salt rim. That’s why he needed the extra space in the fridge for the frosted glasses and the premade margarita mix.”
“I don’t see how Garrett or Dorian could have added the poison while here in your office,” she mused out loud. “How would they know which one would go to Julian? The best case scenario would be someone did it while Branson went down for the limes, or they sidled up to the table when no one was looking.”
“Or Branson did it here before he carried the tray upstairs and delivered it personally?” Captain Netherton added. “I have a feeling, Liz, you’re missing the forest for the trees, or the possible murderers for the margaritas. Knowing that it could have been the margarita that contained the poison doesn’t help now that we’ve realized everyone had motive and opportunity.”
“Wish it could have been videotaped.”
“Ashley took photos,” he said, “I would look for anything that shows the guests near the bride-and-groom-to-be’s table. As you know I’ve been spending a lot of time with super-sleuth Betty, I would talk to the ones who don’t admit talking to Julian that night.”
“You would, would you?” she said, smiling. He was right, though. Nothing could be proven, especially in court. Well, your Honor, I submit this photo showing where Ms. Wagner is talking to the deceased Julian Rhodes. Oh, and here’s one with…
“How did Dorian Starwood end up in the stateroom after Susannah found him?” Liz asked on her way out of the room.
“She heard Susannah’s screaming, I’m sure. I do know when Ms. Starwood came to the stateroom and saw her fiancé’s body, she kept repeating it was all her fault and she was sorry, over and over again.”
That wasn’t anything new. It was easy to feel responsible when someone dies and there are unresolved issues. Liz had had the same feelings, recently. “Did you tell Charlotte or anyone from the sheriff’s department that she said that?”
“Why, uh, no.”
“I’m sure Dorian didn’t kill him and I’m going to help Aunt Amelia prove her friend is innocent.” She didn’t want to say there was still a chance Julian had tried to kill Dorian and it backfired. “I know Dorian was getting threatening anonymous notes.”
“Notes, you say?” Captain Netherton asked. “Now that’s interesting. Saturday, before the Merfest Regatta I was in the lobby checking my mail slot. Mr. Rhodes was there peeling off an adhesive strip to a white envelope and sealing it. When he saw me, he startled. I winked at him and looked at the envelope. It had Dorian’s name on it. He shoved it in his pocket and murmured something about it being the flower bill for the wedding.”
“How was Dorian’s name written?” she asked, remembering what Aunt Amelia had told her. Also, there was the little fact that Aunt Amelia planned to supply all the flowers. They’d never hired a florist.
“Printed.” He looked puzzled.
“Don’t worry. I don’t have it figured out, but I think you’ve been a big help. And I’ll be sure to fill you in after meeting with Betty and Ryan. Speaking of which. I better vamoose. Ryan and I have an errand, then afterward, we’ll get Betty from the airport.”
“I know Caroline Keene will be happy to see her.”
“Not you, Captain?” she said, raising an eyebrow.
He blushed.
She kissed him on the cheek. “Don’t worry, you’ll see her soon.”