The Chocolate Frog Frame-Up (21 page)

“Ready?” Joe said.

The searchlight’s beam bounced off the boat. “Ready,” I said. I took a deep breath, did a surface dive, and pulled hard in the direction of the shore.

I came up about twenty-five feet away. Now my feet couldn’t touch the bottom.

“Lee! Lee!” Joe’s voice sounded frantic.

“Come on!” I said. “I’m heading for shore!”

I struck off, using the breast stroke with some idea of not splashing. Joe caught up with me shortly. “You said you could swim,” he said. “You didn’t mention diving.”

After that we didn’t talk a lot. We stayed close together, and once Joe suggested that I stop and float for a minute. I must have been panting. He was panting, I remember that. He turned onto his back and pulled me over, so that I was lying on my back on top of him. We both concentrated on floating and breathing easily for a few minutes. Funny how hard something like breathing can get. Swimming may be like riding a bicycle, in the sense that you never forget how, but I was way out of condition. And a quarter of a mile is several laps of an Olympic-sized pool.

About half the time we were swimming that big boat was circling around behind us, but it didn’t move closer to shore, so I thought it was staying out beyond the sandbar. Once the searchlight cut the water quite close to us, and light seemed to be headed in our direction.

“Sink,” Joe said.

I held my nose and sank. I stayed under as long as my lungs held out, and when I popped to the surface again the light was nowhere to be seen.

I’d stopped looking toward the shore because it seemed so far away. But finally I peeked, and this time the tree line was looming almost over my head. I put my feet down and felt the rounded stones of Lake Michigan.

“Maybe I’ll walk the rest of the way,” I said.

“It’s gonna be mighty cold when we get out,” Joe said.

The water was up to my armpits. We waded across ten feet of stones, then sand began. We came out of the water on a narrow beach about thirty feet from a creek. Trees grew up the bank, which towered above us. I would have sunk down and rested, but Joe yanked me along, toward a set of stairs that led up the bank.

“I don’t want to stop while we’re in the moonlight,” he said. “Besides, we’re going to get even colder when we quit moving.”

I knew he was right, though I was about played out. We kept going, across the beach and up the stairway. When we got to the top, I did stop.

“Joe! This is somebody’s backyard.”

“Right. Maybe they left a beach towel on the porch.”

“Maybe they’ll call Aunt Nettie to come and get us.”

Joe nodded.

But the house was dark, and there was no beach towel on the porch.

My teeth were chattering. “Sh-sh-should we b-b-break in?”

“I’m not sure I can manage to burgle a house barefoot and in my skivvies. Let’s go around in front, see if we can spot a light somewhere. We may even know somebody in this neighborhood. Once we figure out where we are.”

I checked my watch and discovered it was still running. “You’d think some of these people would want to stay up to watch the eleven o’clock news,” I said. “There ought to be a light someplace.”

We made our way around the house—trampling a flower bed in the process—and found ourselves out on what had to be Lake Shore Drive. Suddenly I recognized a landmark. “Joe! That big tree! The one almost out in the middle of the road. I know that tree!”

“Yeah. We’re at the back of Clem’s place.”

“I don’t suppose there’s a security guard there.”

“No, but I can get in.”

Hand in hand, almost naked, soaking wet, and shivering in the fifty-degree temperature, we headed toward the Ripley place, the one that was giving Joe such fits as he tried to settle Clementine Ripley’s estate. I’d become acutely aware that my wet T-shirt didn’t cover my underwear. I wasn’t willing for everybody in Warner Pier to be sure I was a natural blond, so I wrapped my scarf around my waist like a pareo, and it clung to me like a sheet of ice. But the hardest part of the deal was my feet. I kept stumbling over rocks, and I’ll swear there was more gravel than blacktop on that road.

“I think I’m leaving bloody footprints,” I said.

“Just keep leaving them.”

We persevered, though I cast longing glances as we passed a couple of houses with lights. But Joe seemed eager for us to reach the Ripley place before we asked for help. After about five minutes of pussyfooting down the road we came to the big gate that marked the entrance to the estate.

Joe went to the key pad next to the gate. I shivered and my teeth chattered. Down the road, I saw lights reflected off the trees.

“Here comes a car,” I said. “Maybe they’ll help us.” I stepped toward the street.

Joe grabbed my arm and pulled me back into the bushes. “Let’s make sure they’re not looking for us,” he said.

We waited until the car had gone slowly by. I hated to see it go; it had represented help. I sighed. “I guess I probably wouldn’t stop if I were driving down a lonely street and a couple of naked people jumped out of the bushes at me.”

Joe didn’t answer. He just pushed buttons on the key pad, and the gate to the Ripley estate slid open. Then we had another long walk up a blacktop driveway. This one was completely shaded by trees, so we had only intermittent patches of moonlight to see by. Gravel had been scattered on it, too, and had landed in the most unlikely places. My feet hurt so bad I almost forgot how cold I was.

We had to go clear around the house to reach the key pad that opened the back door. Once we were inside Joe hit the light switch, and I saw that we were in the back hall, with the kitchen beyond.

“Whew!” I found a kitchen stool, sat on it and rubbed my feet. Joe went straight to the telephone. He found the directory on a shelf under the phone, searched for a number and punched it in. “Mike? Is Mom there? It’s important.”

A pause. “Hi, Mom. Lee and I were out in the sedan, and we had a little excitement. We wound up having to abandon ship and swim ashore.”

I heard squawking noises from the telephone.

“We’re okay! We’re okay! Lee’s a good swimmer.” Joe turned and grinned at me. “We came ashore not far from Clem’s place, so we came in there. But we need clothes and shoes. Can you get something from my place and bring it out here? There’s a key behind the downspout.”

More squawking. Then Joe looked at me. “What size shoe do you wear?”

“Nobody’s feet are as big as mine. Tell her not to worry about shoes. My feet are beyond help already.”

Joe repeated what I’d said. “But hurry, Mom. Okay? I left the sedan aground, and I want to go get it.”

Joe hung up, then immediately looked for another number. “Harry? Hope I didn’t get you up.”

I realized he was calling Harry Barnes. Harry ran a marina in Warner Pier.

Joe quickly sketched our problem—but I noticed he hadn’t told either his mother or Harry how we got in this fix.

“I left the Shepherd Sedan aground,” Joe said. “I want to get it off quick.”

He listened, then spoke. “I was trying to hit the little channel that runs out from North Creek. But it’s too narrow this year.”

He paused. “Harry, you can laugh all you want later. Right now I need two favors.”

Harry’s voice echoed on the phone. “Yeah, yeah. I’ll tell you about it later. But I need you to give me a tow. And on your way, see if that Tiara 5200 of Jack Sheldon’s is docked.”

He was silent. “Just see if it’s in its slot! I’ll meet you at the Ripley boathouse, okay?”

He hung up.

“Joe, I hadn’t thought about the sedan. I do hope it’s not damaged.”

“It’s not as likely to be damaged as it would have been if we hadn’t abandoned ship.” He put his arms around me. “You’re not damaged. That’s the main thing.”

We hugged each other, but it didn’t help us warm up much. Joe said the heating system had been turned off, but he found an electric heater in the pantry and plugged it in. I looked through the kitchen drawers, and all I found were some dishtowels. Joe draped one around his fanny like a sarong, and it hit me that he was feeling as naked as I was. Wet boxers are pretty revealing.

One other thing had me puzzled. “Joe,” I said, “I assume you think that this boat you mentioned is the one that chased us.”

“I’m not sure. It looked like a Tiara 5200, and Sheldon’s the only guy who docks a boat like that in Warner Pier. It could have come up from Saugatuck or down from Holland.”

“Or South Haven or Chicago or Onekema or Milwaukee or Sheboygan. But you didn’t tell either your mom or Harry that it chased us.”

Joe frowned. “I don’t want to get held up making statements. I want to look at Sheldon’s Tiara and get the sedan off the sand bar. Then I’ll tell Hogan Jones what happened.”

We were just beginning to get warm when a buzzer rang.

“That’ll be Mom,” Joe said.

He went to a control panel and spoke into it. “Yes?”

“Let us in.” It was Mike Hererra’s voice.

“Come around to the kitchen.” Joe punched a button.

“I guess I should have known Mike would come with her,” I said.

When Mike’s car came around the side of the house a second car followed. And this one had lights on top.

“Damn,” Joe muttered. “The chief’s with them, too.”

Mercy jumped right out and ran to Joe, making mother noises. Joe assured her he was all right, but his eyes didn’t leave the chief’s car.

Chief Jones unfolded himself and got out of his car, then walked over to us. He shook his head slowly, almost sorrowfully. “Well, Joe,” he said, “I never had a heck of a lot of success with women back in my young days, but I will say I never had to run a boat aground to get one to go skinny-dipping with me.”

J
oe’s prediction came true, of course. The chief wanted to hear the whole story. Harry’s boat was honking down at the Ripley place’s boathouse and Joe was still wrapped in a dishtowel and arguing with the chief.

“Joe!” I said finally. “Take the chief with you!”

My suggestion apparently had merit, because the two of them ran off toward the boat. Joe carried an armful of clothes, and he had stuffed his feet into a pair of sneakers. He looked so weird that Mercy, Mike, and I stood there and laughed until after he and the chief were out of sight.

Mercy had brought me some sweatpants and a sweatshirt of Joe’s. Plus, bless her heart, a pair of his white socks and some sandals.

“Not very glamorous,” she said, “but they’ll get you home without freezing. I didn’t want to take time to go by my place and try to figure out something better.”

“They look gorgeous,” I said. “I doubt you own anything that would reach past my knees. Not being able to borrow clothes is one of the problems of being nearly six feet tall. On the other hand, none of my high school friends ever wanted to bolster—I mean, borrow!—they never wanted to borrow my clothes.”

Mercy turned her back and spoke very casually. “I looked for some underwear for you, but I couldn’t find anything.”

Gee. Even my boyfriend’s mother thought I might be keeping clothes at his place. I answered in what I hoped was the same casual tone. “My underpants are nearly dry, and with this sweatshirt I can go braless.”

I put on the sweatpants and shirt in the powder room off the back hall. When I came out Mercy made some efforts at asking me just what had happened, and I told her, in a general way. I didn’t understand everything, of course. I wouldn’t have recognized the boat that chased us, for example. I could only describe it as having one of those chrome railings all around the front, the kind that look as if they’re designed for people to walk around on the prow when the boat is traveling a hundred miles an hour.

“Tall,” I said. “It loomed up over us. And fast. A lot faster than the sedan.”

I guess I shuddered, because Mike Herrera gave me a one-armed hug. “Mercy,” he said. “Let’s get this young lady home.”

They took me back to TenHuis Chocolade, where I picked up my van, and for the second night in a row, I was followed home by someone worried about my safety. Mike and Mercy even insisted on coming inside to make sure no one was lying in wait for me. Naturally, Aunt Nettie heard our whispers and got up, so Mike wound up searching the entire house before we could persuade him to leave. He even called the police dispatcher and, using his authority as mayor, directed her to have the patrol officer on duty drive by the house periodically. He seemed a little let down to learn that Chief Jones had already given that instruction.

He did pick up one piece of information. Jack Sheldon’s Tiara 5200 had been found tied up at one of the public docks in the Dock Street Park. The night patrol officer had gotten Sheldon out of bed, and Sheldon had denied having the boat out that evening. He also admitted he kept a key to the boat on a nail in his garage. When he checked, the key was gone.

Oddly enough, Sheldon lived across the street from Frank and Patsy Waterloo. Hmmm. I wondered if that was significant, or simply another of the interconnecting circles of small town life.

Aunt Nettie was twittering, but I was so tired I couldn’t make sense of what she was twittering about. I crawled up to bed and slept until eleven a.m. There’s nothing like vigorous exercise to ensure a good night’s sleep.

I woke up sore in every muscle—another effect of vigorous exercise. I lay in my bed, a mahogany number once occupied by my grandparents, and stared at the ceiling. As soon as I remembered the reason I hurt all over, I began to try to figure out why I’d been forced to go swimming in a cold lake and to walk down gravel-strewn roads in even colder night air, barefoot and in my underwear.

Someone had chased Joe and me in a boat—much the same way they had chased us in a truck the night before. Who? Why?

It kept coming back to the Root Beer Barrel property. Hershel had argued with Joe about it, had become so angry he actually tried to hit Joe. The next thing we knew, Hershel was dead, and somebody was trying to make it look as if Joe had killed him.