CHAPTER SEVEN
“IF ONLY WE COULD figure out which night Martha sent the note,” Benno said as he turned onto Three Capes Loop and headed for the beach town of Oceanside the next morning.
They hadn’t given up speculating about the damned thing. Sydney swore Martha had been elsewhere the previous two midnights. Had she returned from the rendevous while they’d been conducting their search? Or had the meeting been set up for the night before that, when Kenneth had died? Rather after Sydney had the dream? The police had not yet confirmed the time of Kenneth’s death. Sydney claimed Martha had come home around one that night. She was certain of the time because she’d checked the clock when he’d returned her call from the pub.
“If only we knew who Martha sent the message to.” Sidney sighed. “She would avoid identifying the person. The way she’s been hanging onto Officer Brickman... wouldn’t it be ironic if the two of them were having secret trysts and she’s been with the ‘law’ instead of breaking it.”
“Martha with Brickman?” Benno couldn’t fathom that one, but he never had been able to figure out why Poppy had married the man, either. Mick Brickman must hold some mysterious power over women. “And what about our imposter. Maybe she was meeting him.”
“I don’t know. I only hope we’re about to find out.”
Almost forty miles south of Stone Beach, they passed Cape Meares, the first of three state parks with world-class seascape views. Not that Benno would enjoy them. He was worrying that someone might have seen them leave town. He hoped not. He wanted to have some answers and Sydney back to the Lord house before anyone missed her. Her bags were packed and she had already reserved a room at a local motel.
“Did you by any chance use up the milk?” Sydney asked, the change of topic startling him.
“Milk?”
“You know, the stuff I warmed up and drank the first evening.”
“No. I’m not a milk drinker myself.”
“Someone did. Or threw away half a carton. It was gone when I went to fix myself another glass the next night.”
Recognizing the speculation in her tone, Benno flashed her a glance. “What are you getting at?”
“I’ve been thinking about your assuming I’d taken sedatives or sleeping pills. I hadn’t. No one could have drugged the milk in the glass because it was never out of sight, but what if someone drugged the carton, then got rid of the evidence?”
“Someone who knew about your night time habit?”
“Kenneth... the imposter... did.”
Benno hadn’t considered the possibility that someone else had drugged her. Why should he have? But now he had to admit the idea had some merit if his speculation about her being a pawn had been correct.
“That would account for your being so confused and unsteady.”
“And for that overwhelming feeling of unreality.”
Benno hoped they were going to get some answers, and soon, as they entered the breezy hamlet of Oceanside.
“We took pictures here after...” Sydney’s voice trailed off.
She was staring out at the ocean toward Three Arch Rocks National Wildlife Refuge, home to a large sea lion community. The rocks were also swarming with seabirds – gulls, cormorants, puffins and guillemots.
“If only I had those photographs,” she murmured. “How did he get hold of them?”
Figuring she meant the imposter, Benno didn’t respond. He had his own speculations about the photograph switch. Donald Norridge was Parnell Anderson’s second cousin.
Benno was withholding the information from Sydney. He didn’t feel comfortable dredging up the past, not unless he found some reason to believe Kenneth was murdered for it. Meanwhile, he had to keep an open mind. He wasn’t absolutely certain about Sydney’s credibility. For as much as he wanted to believe her, he still had his doubts.
“Turn up ahead,” she told him.
She guided him to a modest house set back from town on a gravel road in the midst of a stand of Sitka spruce and western red cedar. The undergrowth was a tangle of salal and pacific waxmyrtle with clumps of wildflowers where the sun streamed in. The place looked comfortable if well-weathered and in need of repair as were many of the wooden structures along the coast.
The first thing Sydney said when she left the car was, “The sign is gone. There was a sign over the mailbox – ‘Thomas Suchet, Justice of the Peace.’”
Benno heard the panic in her voice, saw it in her eyes as she turned her stricken gaze to him. Despite his self-warnings to be cautious, he took her hand and gave it a reassuring squeeze. He sensed her apprehension subside a bit, yet she clasped his hand like a lifeline when they stopped before the door. A small tag on the mailbox identified the occupant as T. Suchet. That was encouraging, Benno thought as he knocked.
When no immediate answer came, he could feel the anxiety well in Sydney once more.
“Oh, God... no sign... he’s probably not even here.”
Positive he heard movement inside, Benno knocked again, louder this time. “Anyone home?” he called.
“Yeah, yeah, coming.”
The thin, stooped man who opened the door was elderly and grizzled. Suspenders over a white v-neck t-shirt held up a pair of trousers that had seen better days. He took in his visitors and Benno caught the flicker of recognition in his watery hazel eyes before he slipped on wire-rimmed glasses.
“What can I do for you folks?” he asked pleasantly.
”Let us in,” Benno said smoothly. “So we can talk in private.”
“I don’t think so.”
Suchet tried to slam the door in their faces, but Benno held out a staying hand that stopped him.
“Talk to us. Please, this is important.”
A moment’s indecision. The man shifted his gaze back to Sydney, then grunted. He turned his back on them and shuffled to an arm chair in the narrow living room.
“You do remember me, don’t you, Mr. Suchet?” Sydney asked as he sat.
“I remember. You two aren’t going to give me grief, are you?” He ran a hand through his mussed hair. “I don’t need the law on my back. I live a nice, quiet life here.”
“No police,” Benno bargained, “If you cooperate.”
“How do you know me, Mr. Suchet?” Sydney asked.
“Huh?”
“I want you to explain how we met.”
“You know perfectly well–”
”But I don’t,” Benno said, giving Sydney credit for having her wits about her. Rather than prompting the man with what she wanted everyone to believe, she was letting Suchet come up with the explanation.
The elderly man was silent for a moment, then seemed to make up his mind. “I met the young lady last week when I married her,” Suchet stated.
So that was the truth, Benno thought with relief. “To whom?”
“Some guy named Kenneth Lord.”
Sydney’s drawn breath was audible. She went practically limp with relief. Benno gave her an encouraging look before turning back to Suchet.
“Who was the man?” Benno asked.
“I just told you.”
“I mean his real name. He wasn’t Kenneth Lord.”
Suchet seemed neither surprised nor unnerved by the information. “Maybe not, but he didn’t give me no other name.”
He sounded as if he were telling the truth.
“So I am married to a man whose name I don’t even know,” Sydney said faintly.
Benno narrowed his gaze menacingly and loomed over the thin man. “Is she?”
Uncertainty flickered in the eyes behind the thick lenses. Suchet licked his lips. “Uh, not exactly.”
“What?”
“I’m not a justice of the peace any more. It’s been some years actually.” His frightened gaze met Benno’s. “I, uh, am no longer empowered to marry anyone. You’re not going to call the police on me, are you?”
Benno realized the old guy was afraid and seemed harmless for the most part. He figured they??
?d get the truth out of him with a little prompting.
“Depends,” he said.
“Look, I didn’t mean no harm. I thought of it like an acting job.”
“So you were hired to perform the ceremony. Why you?”
“Kenneth Lord or whatever his name is heard about me from someone in town. He came to me a few days before the wedding and asked me if I’d like to make a couple hundred bucks. I’m not a rich man. I didn’t see the harm,” he reiterated, worrying the arm of the chair with fingers that trembled.
“You didn’t see any harm in letting me think I was married?” Sydney indignantly demanded. “Didn’t you realize that man might have meant me harm?”
Shaking now, Suchet couldn’t meet her eyes. “I kind of felt sorry for you. I did. But I needed the money. And I thought it was some kind of joke.”
Benno wasn’t convinced of that, no matter how contrite the elderly man seemed now. Thomas Suchet had known performing the fake marriage was wrong, but he’d been tempted by the money. A couple of hundred bucks to ruin another person’s life – the idea boggled Benno’s mind.
Pulling a business card from his wallet, he held it out. “Here’s my number. If you remember anything else – or if you see the man who hired you around town – call me.” He couldn’t help adding, “You need money, I’ve got it. No joke.”
Suchet took the card but didn’t look up. Shame ripe in his voice, he said, “I don’t want your money. If I remember anything, I’ll call.”
Every last doubt about Sydney’s innocence burned away, Benno grasped her elbow and propelled her through the door. He didn’t speak as he led her to the car.
His mind was spinning.
Sydney set up. Kenneth dead. What was the motive?
Sydney suspected Martha was after her brother’s money, but then she didn’t know all the facts. She didn’t know about Parnell Anderson and his sick hatred.
But he knew. Parnell could have been waiting all those years for an opportunity to exact the revenge he’d sworn to get. Several months before, first Kenneth, then he had given Parnell the opportunity by moving back to the small community where they’d all grown up.
And now Kenneth was dead.
And, if his suspicions were correct, Sydney wasn’t the only one in trouble.