First-Degree Fudge: A Fudge Shop Mystery (19 page)

I
piloted
Sophie’s Journey
northwesterly, unfortunately into stiff winds this Wednesday afternoon. I looked for my grandpa’s anemometer—a foot-tall windmill contraption—which usually sat secured outside the windshield on the boat, but it was gone, probably broken off in his mishap on Sunday.

Pauline was already worried. She was good only in calm water. Wrapped in a wool blanket, she was standing huddled behind my captain’s chair inside the small cabin.

“We’re going the wrong way,” she said, her teeth chattering. “Doesn’t this thing have a heater?”

I flipped the knob for the heat, but the knob fell off. Since I had to keep my good hand on the wheel, I tossed the knob back at her and returned to concentrating on piloting. Spray came up over the front deck and smacked the windshield. Pauline screamed into my ear and ducked beside me.

“P.M., it’s just foam off the waves. Now, go sit down.”

“Big foam off big waves that are getting bigger.” She scrambled into the cocaptain’s seat to my right. “It’s too windy. We shouldn’t be out here. It’s calmer along the shore. Go back there.”

We were only a hundred yards out. She was right about the calmer waters, though I suspected her real reason for wanting to go in that other direction was to catch up with John Schultz. The
Super Catch I
was off to the east, following the shoreline, where they typically caught coho salmon, steelheads, and brown trout at this time of year. It burned me that John was such a liar. Pauline didn’t deserve the same fate I’d suffered with Dillon Rivers.

The wind bashed our boat, tipping us toward the water on Pauline’s side. She screamed again. She’s been a screamer ever since our childhood. Swings and slides terrorized her. She was tall but hated heights; she was agile on a basketball court but hated feeling her body out of control. Like on a boat. But maybe she was right to be scared. I needed to check the wind and wave conditions before we chugged too far. Lake Michigan was unforgiving to small craft if you didn’t play it smart.

“Pauline, take the helm. I’m checking on the weather.”

“Thank goodness. Want me to turn back now?”

“Just head us straight on.”

“Straight on what?”

“Toward Chambers Island.” We couldn’t see the land yet, but we’d been there a couple of times before, so we knew the way along a watery path strewn with orange buoys of commercial fishermen.

“That’s seven miles away! You really think Cody’s out there?”

“Yes.”

The boat rocked again. Spray splashed across the windows. Pauline ducked needlessly, but to her credit, she didn’t let go of the wheel. “How the heck would he get out there? Okay, a boat. But what boat? He doesn’t own one, and nobody would rent to him.”

“Maybe they should begin to trust him and treat him like a man.” His tongue-lashing for me on that score still made me ache with shame. “I think he stole Moose’s skiff a couple of days ago. Moose didn’t notice it until today, when somebody on his tours probably pointed it out.”

“But that’s just a tiny motorized rowboat. Cody couldn’t possibly make it all the way in these choppy waters to Chambers Island.”

“Let’s hope he did, Pauline. He’s likely stranded without his cell or he would have called by now. That small boat motor likely ran out of juice, too.”

“Let’s call the Coast Guard.”

“We will if we have to, but let’s let Cody save face. My rescuing him is better than it being broadcast over public airwaves.”

“I suppose. He’d never live it down at school.”

“Worse than that, he’d hate disappointing Bethany,” I said, calling up the Lake Michigan weather on my cell phone.

We could get wind speeds right off the buoys and other devices planted in the water and from the massive cargo ships passing through. My cell showed wind velocity at around nineteen knots, or maybe twenty-two miles per hour, enough to whip up white-crested waves and aggravating spray. The forecast said cumulus-nimbus clouds were hanging around to the west, but no lightning. Yet.

Gilpa’s boat coughed, spewing smoke. It took us almost an hour to bring Chambers Island fully within view.

We didn’t see Moose’s skiff or any boat along the two miles of east shore and the occasional pebbly beach. We kept motoring north to go around the northeast thumb of the island. The lighthouse was about a mile southwest of the thumb tip on another jutting piece of land.

Pauline still had both hands frozen on the wheel, but she’d done a decent job of steering. She screamed less when I kept her busy like that.

Through the binoculars, I didn’t see anybody on the island walking around or signaling us. My heart went into my stomach. What if Cody hadn’t made it? Plenty of boaters hit hidden rocks and capsized in these areas. The museum in Sturgeon Bay was full of history about shipwrecks here, and the Coast Guard was stationed here for good reason. Fear slithered up my spine. Cody Fjelstad had run away because of me. I couldn’t bear the thought of harm coming to him because of my stupidity—no, my lack of trust in him. The realization hit hard that Sam was right about me not being able to trust anyone fully. I had to get over that somehow.

Pauline said, “Maybe he ended up in the marina.”

She was just trying to cheer me up, but I said, “Good idea. Cut back on the engines and we’ll take the tour.”

“I don’t think there’s anything to cut back on.”

I wanted to laugh, but it was sad that Gilpa wouldn’t give up this decrepit boat.

We managed to slow, though, which made the engine grind even louder. The floor underfoot shook. If Cody were nearby on Chambers Island, he’d have to hear us. But as we headed up the east coast past the area of the Catholic Holy Name Retreat House and then came in close to the small, private marina, we saw nobody. The island was thirty-two hundred acres of dense forest and a small inland lake; I hoped he hadn’t wandered far. But had he been hurt? If Cody had made it to any of the fifty or so cottages scattered here and somebody was about, we’d have heard about that. The island had a cell phone tower. There was also a tiny airstrip behind the lighthouse, which accommodated the Coast Guard plane, but we hadn’t heard from them. My stomach sloshed like the lake with its worry. Was Cody a pile of broken bones among the shoreline rocks?

After passing by the marina and going around the thumb of land, the lighthouse came fully into view, a mile west of us. Being the ranger of this small, historical spot was Cody’s dream.

I took over piloting us closer to the shoreline in front of the lighthouse. Grandpa had taught me how to pilot when I was a kid. A warm feeling sprang up inside of me as I sat now in his captain’s chair and heard his voice telling me to ease up on the throttle and reverse the engines to keep us from getting hung up in the shallows. I veered the boat to place us parallel to shore. Beyond the rocks and sandy shoreline, the Chambers Island Lighthouse sat atop a grassy knoll with pine trees behind it. Maples were still trying to leaf out.

Pauline said, “I don’t see anybody.”

“We’ll go back to the marina and tie up, then walk over.”

I could have anchored here if we were willing to swim to shore, but at this time of year the water felt like ice cubes against your body. Minutes later, we’d tied up at the marina, then hiked the mile or so down a lake path to the forty-acre site of the lighthouse.

“Cody?” I called out, then caught myself. “Ranger?”

Only the lap of the water and a blue jay cawing answered me.

The house and tower were built in 1868 and named after Talbot Chambers, a colonel who passed by the area on his way to build a military presence in Green Bay. The small house was a story and a half high with the three-story lighthouse tower on its northeast corner, all built of Cream City brick from Milwaukee. An octagonal room atop the tower had a light run by solar panels. Nobody appeared to be around. A lighthouse caretaker—a volunteer from Fishers’ Harbor usually—would come here some days June through Labor Day, when it was open for tours.

When Pauline and I approached the door, we found it open.

“He has to be here,” I said. “I’m sure they lock this up.” I called out again, “Ranger?”

There was no response, but we smelled fried fish and eggs. My hopes rose. The first floor had only a few small, sparse rooms, including a closet and a pantry. We saw no evidence of anybody sleeping here, though. The pantry was stocked with only a handful of canned goods.

Following the smells, we ventured into the kitchen, which was in an attached room built at a lower level than the rest of the house. I gave a pan a good whiff. “Fresh. He cooked today.”

Suspecting we’d found him, I eagerly tromped in my loud work shoes up the cast-iron, circular steps to the second floor. He wasn’t there, so I hiked up the tight staircase to the top of the tower. Where he wasn’t, either. I sagged against the railing, peering about the terrain of water, trees, and a narrow inland road. When I returned my gaze to the shoreline, I spotted the skiff half-hidden west of us among berry brambles and rocks.

We rushed from the lighthouse. After we got to the area near the skiff, we stopped to get our bearings. A trail from the lake led us to what looked like a modest, ranch-style log cabin.

The front door was locked. I rapped my knuckles several times on the wood. “Ranger, answer this door right now or I’m calling the Coast Guard to haul you out.”

For a minute, we didn’t hear anything. My knuckles were on the door again when it opened fast. I didn’t recognize Cody at first. He sported a buzz cut. He’d shaved off his red hair. Lacerations on his face and arms looked wicked and raw. He wore a torn T-shirt that had a Harley motorcycle slogan on it; I suspected it wasn’t his. His pants looked borrowed, too. They were baggy and held up by a belt notched so far in that a foot of leather hung off the front.

“Ranger? Is that you?” I didn’t know if I should hug him or what.

He grabbed me, though, into both his arms and squeezed. “I’m so sorry, Miss Oosterling.”

“Ouch.” He’d crimped my bad arm in the hug.

“Miss Oosterling, you’re hurt. What happened?”

His innocent concern appeared genuine, which confirmed that he hadn’t been the one to toss me down the stairs at the mansion.

“A sprain. I fell down.”

“Maybe I should wrap that for you. They have all kinds of good first-aid stuff here in the bathroom. Just like at school.”

He led us down a short hallway to a bathroom, where one of those shelving units that hangs over the back of the stool was filled with first-aid stuff, including ACE bandages. I spotted a pet hair clippers sitting next to the sink; he’d obviously used that to shave his head. Which meant he knew how to run a generator—the only way to get electricity on the island. I sat on the stool lid while he wrapped my left wrist. He told us he’d taken off at night after stealing Moose’s small rowboat.

“The light in the tower really works at night, Miss Oosterling. I found my way.”

I suspected the lake current was more responsible for his landing than he was, but said instead, “You did find your way, thank goodness. And I apologize for treating you like a kid. I need you back at the fudge shop, Ranger Fjelstad.”

Pauline said, “We need you to help us figure out who stole the diamonds.”

His face soured.

“I know you didn’t do it,” I said in a hurry. “You were in Rainetta Johnson’s room on Sunday trying to figure out the mystery, too, weren’t you?”

“Not really. I was there to steal stuff.”

That took me aback. Pauline winced, too, speechless for once.

He led us back down the hallway and through a lovely living room with black leather furniture and braided rag rugs on maple wood floors—a nice hideout. I smelled coffee perking. I asked, “Is somebody else here?”

“Just me. May I get you a cup of coffee, Miss Oosterling?” He smiled at us as if he owned the place. “There wasn’t any coffee at the lighthouse, so after I ate my noon meal there, I came back here to make the coffee like your grandfather likes. Two extra scoops no matter what, he says.”

Now I knew why the coffee always tasted so good when Gilpa made it instead of me. “Where’d you get the fish?”

“I used one of the fishing poles I found in the garage. It was a small brown trout. I cooked him at the lighthouse so the house didn’t get stunk up.”

“That was nice of you.”

Pauline asked, “So you’ve been living at both places?”

“Just like La-La Land. I’m rich enough to have two houses.” He laughed like the old Cody with loud, quirky guffaws. He was a John Schultz in the making.

He retrieved cups off a cup tree on the counter. In the stainless-steel dream of a kitchen, he poured us coffee. He wore a huge smile, as if every little thing he did tickled him. This was his nirvana. Pauline could see it, too; she grinned at me. I still couldn’t get over his haircut, though. He looked grown-up. Adult.

Pauline and I sat down on stools at a kitchen island bar that separated the room from the living room. Cody settled on a stool opposite us on the kitchen side.

I asked, “Why did you shave off your hair?”

“It was too curly, like a baby. And it was red. I don’t think Bethany likes red hair.”