The Woodpecker Always Pecks Twice Read online

  Mom took a seat and said calmly, “Tell us what you found, Jerry.”

  Jerry huffed. “The place is a hostel of some sort.”

  “Hostile?” I jumped in. “You see? I told you there was something nefarious going on over there.”

  “I didn’t say they were hostile.” The chief growled. “I said they’re running a hostel. H-O-S-T-E-L. All sorts of foreigners and such running around over there.”

  “You mean like a bed and breakfast?” Mom inquired.

  Jerry shrugged. “Young fellow at the door called it a hostel, so hostel it is. Guster McKutcheon is running it. He wasn’t home.”

  “Guster McKutcheon,” Mom said thoughtfully. “I’m not sure I remember him. Who were his folks?”

  “I’ve no idea,” answered Chief Kennedy. “Apparently he works out at the diner. Nobody at the house knew anything about a murder. And there was no body!”

  “But—”

  Jerry’s hand chopped through the air between us. “Not on the ground, not in the house, not in the air circling the property like a freaking pigeon! Do you have any idea how big a fool you made me look, Amy?”

  I was pretty sure Jerry didn’t need my help in that department but knew better than to say so. Mom shot me a warning look just in case. “I know what I saw, Jerry.”

  “Maybe you were hallucinating.” He stuck his nose in my face. “Your eyes are red. Are you hungover?”

  “Of course not!” I backed away. I may have had the teeniest bit too much to drink last night and I may have had a teeny bit too little sleep, but still, I knew what I saw.

  Jerry leaned across the table toward me. “Explain to me how you happened to see anything at all.” He shook his arm at the window. “The McKutcheon place must be a mile away from here.”

  I looked at my mother for support. “We were bird-watching,” Mom said.

  “Bird-watching!” Jerry chuckled. “Lord, I had no idea what this town was getting into when you came back and opened that silly store of yours.” I refrained from protesting because no good could come of it.

  He thumped his fist and the table jumped an inch. “Sorry, Mrs. Simms,” the chief said, grabbing a paper napkin from the vintage brass holder on the table and wiping up the few drops of coffee that had spilled from his cup. He squinted at my mother. “Do you mean you saw this so-called murder, too?”

  Oh, sure, if my mother, his former history teacher, says she saw a murder, he’d be all over that.

  “Actually, no,” admitted Mom. “You see, Amy was holding the binoculars.” Oh, well. She tried.

  Jerry nodded as if everything was now clear as day, though not this rainy morning.

  “Then what was that I saw being tossed down, if not a man?”

  “Junk,” replied Jerry Kennedy. “Plain and simple. Nothing but junk. At the time of your so-called fight, a couple of the youngsters were cleaning out that upstairs room the fastest way possible—tossing garbage out the window. The roof’s got a leak and water was getting in. Same thing in the barn. Several others were out there in the barn covering some boxes of supplies with plastic.

  “There was a whole pile of trash on the ground outside the window when I arrived. Bits of furniture, piles of newspapers, clothes, and”—he screwed up his eyes at me—“even an old dressmaker dummy.”

  “But I saw—”

  Jerry interrupted. “The kid at the house explained that the room had been used to store all kinds of stuff. They’re turning the room back into a bedroom so one of the boys doesn’t have to keep sleeping on the sofa.”

  He turned to my mother as if she was the only one even worth trying to explain anything to. “You should see the place, Mrs. Simms. There are a bunch of young foreigners staying there. Some of them barely speak English.”

  Mom rose and started a fresh pot of coffee. “I had no idea one of the McKutcheons had come back to town. It will be nice to see the house come alive again.”

  “Come alive?” I couldn’t help quipping. “Mom, somebody only this morning got defenestrated there.”

  Jerry looked nonplussed.

  “It means thrown out a window, Jerry,” I filled in.

  Jerry’s only reply was an eye roll.

  “Look, I don’t know what you saw.” Jerry stood and shoved a couple packs of breakfast cookies in his trousers. I waited eagerly for Mom to berate him, but she didn’t. She’s way too nice to the man.

  “Maybe you saw a big old bird,” Jerry said. “Maybe you saw the wind shaking the branches.” He wiggled his arms for effect. “It was storming out pretty good. Hell, maybe you saw the widow in the lake!”

  Everyone in town knew the story of the widow in the lake. The story goes that she’d drowned herself after her husband was murdered by marauders around the time of the Civil War. She’d laid a curse on the men and they had died one by one, each death more hideous than the previous.

  After the last man died, she walked into the lake and disappeared. Some say she still rises from the center of the lake once a year, on the anniversary of her husband’s death. Today was not that day. I pursed my lips. At least, I didn’t think today was the day.

  “All I do know is that you did not see one man throw another man out that window.” Chief Kennedy was pointing across Ruby Lake at the McKutcheon house. He headed for the apartment door and threw it open. “Nice jammies, by the way!”

  My cheeks burned as I slammed the door and turned the lock in case Jerry decided to come back. Mom offered me a third cup of coffee and I didn’t refuse it. I carried my steaming mug to the kitchen window and looked out. The sky was brightening now. In a couple of hours, we might actually get some sunshine.

  “Maybe Jerry’s right,” Mom said, coming up behind me. “Maybe your eyes were playing tricks on you. It was early. You were tired. The storm.”

  I exhaled deeply, turned and smiled. “You know, I hate it when you’re right.”

  “I know.”

  “And I doubly hate to even think that Jerry Kennedy could be right.”

  Mom chuckled. “You don’t have to tell me that, Amy. How was your date last night?”

  “Great.” I couldn’t resist smiling at the memory. “How was yours?” I knew she’d had a date of her own with Ben Harlan last night. It was a little funny and maybe a little weird that she happened to be dating Ben and I happened to be dating his son.

  Mom deftly evaded the question and fingered my lapel. “Shouldn’t you be getting dressed and down to the store? I hate to think of Esther being stuck down there opening up all alone.”

  I handed Mom my mug. Thoughts of Esther running around the store unsupervised took precedence over nearly everything else, including dating gossip. “Me too.” Who knew what trouble the Pester might get into?

  I took a quick shower, then brushed my teeth and hair—puzzling at the frazzled brown-haired, blue-eyed woman in the mirror as I did so. Were Jerry and Mom right? Had my imagination run away with me? I threw on a comfortable pair of slacks and a red Birds & Bees–logoed polo shirt.

  Before leaving the bedroom, I picked up the binoculars from the bed, where I’d dropped them in my hurry to telephone the police. I retrained them on the house across the lake. There was nothing out of the ordinary going on. A couple of lights were on upstairs and down. The rain had diminished to nothing more than a fine drizzle that created a gloomy pall over the lake.

  Somewhere deep in those waters, the bones of the widow in the lake were said to be stirring restlessly. I could picture her white skeleton rolling along the lake floor in search of a peace that would never come.

  The storm had quieted, the wind had died. As I laid the binocs back atop the dresser, I couldn’t help wondering if someone else had died this morning, too.

  3

  “A my, dear, before you go, I was hoping we could have a little talk.” Mom sat in the big chair next to the sofa, a copy of the Ruby Lake Weekender, our town’s small local paper, in her lap. She was yet in her robe. Mom had been letting her unnaturally blond
hair grow out. Soon it would be a similar shade of chestnut to my own hair. I could see a lot of myself in her as she reverted to her natural color.

  “Can it wait, Mom?” I said. “Esther’s probably opened by now. Plus, there’s a delivery truck due.”

  Mom opened her mouth, tapped the thin newspaper against her leg. There’s not a lot of news in Ruby Lake—not that that’s a bad thing. “Of course, dear. I’ll be down a little later myself.”

  “Tell me, do you believe in this whole widow-in-the-lake thing that Jerry was blathering about?”

  Mom shook her head. “A town like Ruby Lake has a lot of local stories. I’m not that familiar with this one, though the story has cropped up now and again.” She pointed a finger at me. “I’m a historian, remember, so I believe in facts, not fairy tales. If I’m remembering correctly, anecdotal evidence does suggest that a crime was committed, a woman’s husband brutally murdered.

  “Perhaps she even committed suicide afterward. I doubt we’ll ever know the entire story. There was no one around to tweet then or post the news on Facebook or in some blog.” Mom leaned forward. “Why? You didn’t see the widow in the lake, too, did you?”

  “No!” Thank heavens.

  “Then I’d worry about the lady running around downstairs in Birds and Bees and not the widow in the lake,” Mom said with a big grin.

  Esther. “Thanks.” I planted a kiss on her warm cheek and headed downstairs.

  In the shop there’s a small kitchenette and seating area where customers can have a drink or a snack and peruse some of the bird literature—books and magazines—I keep available on a built-in wooden bookshelf between a pair of rocking chairs. I found Esther hovering over the kitchen sink. She’d added a green Birds & Bees–logoed apron to her ensemble.

  “Trouble with the cops again?” Esther asked, her eyes flashing with delight. She had a pot of coffee going and was filling a jar with tap water for iced tea.

  I smothered a yawn. My stomach grumbled. I should have taken Mom up on the breakfast cookies. The only food on hand downstairs this morning was a plate of Danish butter cookies, the remains of a tin I’d bought a couple of days before at the Lakeside Market up the street. Hardly the breakfast of champions. Or shopkeepers. “Not exactly.” I helped myself to a small stack of cookies, then glanced at the front door. “Have you opened up?”

  “Five minutes ago.” She stared at me like a dog waiting for a juicy treat. “So what did Chief Kennedy want, busting in here all wet and covered in mud first thing in the morning?”

  I sighed. Esther was obviously not going to let go of this figurative bone. “Look, Esther,” I began, “you’ve lived here a long time—”

  “My whole life.”

  “Yes,” I said, “your whole life. What do you know about the McKutcheons? Do you remember them?”

  Her wispy white eyebrows formed a V above her nose. “Them from the farm on the other side of the lake?”

  “Yes,” I said, nibbling at my final cookie. After this, I’d look for some real nutrition. Maybe a candy bar.

  “What do you want to know about them for?”

  The corners of my mouth turned down. Why did she seem to answer every question with a question? “If you must know, I—” I hesitated. Did I really want to tell Esther the Pester what I’d seen? Or thought I saw. Finally, I began again. “If you must know,” I said quickly, before I could come to my senses and change my mind, “I saw a man throw another man out the window this morning.” I folded my arms across my chest and stared her down.

  “At the McKutcheon house?!” Esther hooted.

  “Yes,” I said sharply. “At the McKutcheon house.”

  Esther had finished filling the tea jar. She added a half dozen tea bags, sugar, and lemon, and set it in the window to warm in the sun. Not that I was certain we’d see any sun today. No matter. We could always warm the water in the microwave if it came to that.

  “What were you doing at the McKutcheon house?” demanded Esther.

  “I wasn’t at the McKutcheon house.”

  “Then how did you see what you say you saw?”

  I explained how I had been bird-watching and happened to glance across the lake.

  “And you just happened to see a murder?” Esther pulled the plate of cookies out of my reach as I extended my hand for a second helping. “These are for the customers.”

  As if waiting for their cue, a pair of women walked through the front door and Esther followed me as I went to greet them. I inquired if they were looking for something specific, but they said they wanted to take a look around. I retreated to the cash register and checked to make sure I had sufficient change to get through the day. If not, I’d need a trip to the bank.

  “Nobody has lived in the McKutcheon house for some years,” Esther said from the other side of the sales counter. “Last McKutcheon moved out before you were born.”

  “Well, according to Jerry Kennedy, there’s one living there now.”

  Esther was clearly surprised. She scratched at her ear. “You don’t say?”

  “Apparently a Guster McKutcheon has come back to Ruby Lake. He’s opened the house up as a hostel.”

  “You mean like a hotel?”

  “Something like that.” I gazed across the street to Ruby’s Diner. “Apparently Mr. McKutcheon also has a job over at the diner.”

  “I never thought we’d see a McKutcheon living in that old place again.” Esther cackled.

  “Why not?” I pushed the cash register closed. Esther was interrupted from answering by the approach of our two customers. One carried a birdhouse constructed of recycled material.

  The blonde held the birdhouse aloft. “Will I get robins to nest with a birdhouse like this?”

  I took the birdhouse from her hands. “This house would be perfect for chickadees and wrens,” I explained. “See this opening?” I ran my fingers around the edges of the hole. “It’s an inch and a quarter. It’s designed for cavity nesters, like the wrens and black-capped chickadees, but too small for others like house sparrows and bluebirds.”

  The woman looked disappointed. “So, no robins?”

  I smiled to lessen the blow. “Sorry. In addition to using branches, robins build their nests on shelves and ledges. You can build them a nesting platform yourself.” The two women looked at each other dubiously.

  “We do sell a selection of nesting platforms. I can show you, if you like?”

  The women agreed and followed me over to a wall where I had different types of birdhouses and nesting boxes arranged by the bird species they were best suited for. I helped them select a simple cedar nesting platform. The platforms look like a typical birdhouse with the front removed, except for a low border along the front to keep the nesting material from spilling out.

  “I’ll take it,” the customer said.

  “And I’ll take the other birdhouse, Claire,” added her friend. “The one for wrens and such.”

  “Perfect, Eden.” The woman named Claire explained that the two were next-door neighbors. “We can share.”

  I gave them instructions on how to mount the birdhouses—they’d both opted for pole mounts rather than affixing them to trees—and rang up the sale.

  I caught up to Esther, who was ordering around the deliveryman as he rolled boxes of supplies in through the back door using his red hand truck. I pulled her aside. “About what you were saying before, Esther,” I said out of the side of my mouth.

  “About what?” Esther cocked her head. “Do you want the seed back here or out front?”

  “Out front, like always,” I said, struggling to maintain my calm. We always keep the twenty-five-pound bags of unshelled black oil sunflower seeds up front in the corner beside the bins. There was no point lugging them from back to front one at a time when there was such a nice, compliant worker who’d move them all at once for us.

  I chased after Esther as she directed Ralph, our young deliveryman, out to the sales side of Birds & Bees. Of course, he’d been delive
ring here for six weeks or more already, so he knew perfectly well where everything went.

  He was too nice to point that out to Esther. “Thank you, Ms. Pilaster,” he said with a nod of his head. “Anything else I can do for you, ma’am?”

  “Well”—Esther tapped her foot against the hardwood—“there is that pile of pallets in the storeroom doing nothing but collecting dust and cobwebs. An old lady like me can’t just pluck the lot of ’em up and toss ’em in the dumpster alone, can she?”

  Ralph grinned. “Yes, ma’am. I’ll get right on it.” Ralph has short red hair, green eyes, and an arc of light freckles running across his face. He looks all of eighteen, but I know for a fact he is twenty-four. I’d asked to see his driver’s license.

  “Ralph,” I said, “you’ll do no such thing. Kim and I can handle that.” I turned to my employee—though sometimes I felt it was the other way around and I was working for Esther. “I’m sure Ralph has a lot of other important deliveries to make today.” Ralph has a route running from Charlotte in the south to Asheville in the north and all points in between.

  “Harrumph,” snorted Esther.

  Ralph grinned. “It’s no problem at all, Miss Simms.” He rubbed his hands together. “I’ll get on those pallets and be on my way.”

  I thanked Ralph and held Esther in place by clamping my arms on her shoulders. The woman was harder to keep still than a nervous chicken. “Okay, Esther.” I resisted shaking the woman—just barely. “Tell me why you said what you said.”

  She squinted in puzzlement.

  “About the McKutcheon place.” I nudged her some more when an answer wasn’t forthcoming. “You said you didn’t think you would ever see a McKutcheon living there again. What did you mean by that?”

  The door chimed and Esther swiveled—a shark catching the scent of fresh blood in the water.

  “Oh, no you don’t,” I whispered. Over Esther’s shoulder, I called to the gentleman as he marched toward the book section. “Be with you in a minute!” I turned my attention back to Esther. “So?”

  Esther removed my hands from her shoulders. “The McKutcheons never had much luck on that homestead. The ground’s no good for growing. It’s evil. Haunted. Old Indian burial grounds, too.”