Jenn McKinlay - Due Or Die

She stepped forward and pulled herself up the short ladder. Dale continued sweeping, completely ignoring her. At a loss, Lindsey saw a second broom propped in the corner, so she picked it up and began to sweep the snow off the side. Dale paused to watch her for a moment and then set back to work.

They worked silently for a while. There wasn’t much snow left to sweep, but the stuff she managed to push off the starboard side fell into the water with a satisfying splash. When they were done, she handed the broom back to Dale.

“You know, if you like Hemingway, there are other authors I could hook you up with,” she said. “Library cards are free.”

“Is that why you’re here?” he asked. “To drum up business for the library? Things must be slow.”

“No, actually, I came by to find out if you killed Markus Rushton,” she said.

Dale’s mouth opened in a small O and he blinked. “I didn’t see that coming.”

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to blurt it out like that,” she said. “Right now the police are focusing on his wife, but everyone knows you had an altercation with him a few weeks ago over a parking space.”

Dale’s brow lowered, bringing his knit cap with it so it rested just over his eyes. “So, naturally, because I am an ex-convict, you think I couldn’t control my anger and I went and shot him over a stupid parking space. You know, it’s assumptions like that that made Hemingway hate women.”

“No, I think it was more due to his domineering mother and a crushing heartbreak from his relationship with his nurse while he was recuperating after being injured in the war,” Lindsey said.

Dale grunted and looked out at the sea. “I should know better than to debate a librarian.”

Lindsey lowered her head and smiled. People were wrong about Dale. He had a certain grouchy charm.

“For your information, the police have already been by to question me. I don’t own a gun and I have an alibi. I was visiting my mother in Madison. She’s in an assisted-care facility over there, and the place has the sign-in log to prove how long I was there. Satisfied?”

Lindsey sighed. “I’ve offended you.”

“You think?” he asked. “You can’t accuse a guy of murder and not expect him to get a little testy.”

“Fair enough,” Lindsey said. “I’m sorry. I’m just trying to help out a friend.”

“I know,” Dale said. He glanced away, and Lindsey was surprised by the sudden softening of his features. “Carrie is a good woman. She was always nice to me even when we were kids. She never judged me because my family was poor. If I hadn’t gotten sent to jail…well, you can’t go back.”

“What do you mean?” Lindsey asked.

Dale shrugged. “It doesn’t matter. She deserved better than that mealymouthed whiner. I don’t know who shot him, but they did her a favor.”

His words were harsh, but Lindsey knew he was only saying what everyone else seemed to think of Markus Rushton. She glanced at her watch and realized she was pushing it if she was going to get back to the library with food within the hour.

“Thanks for talking to me,” she said. She held out her hand.

Dale hesitated and then clasped her gloved hand. His grip was firm but not punishing.

“Maybe I’ll stop by and see what you’ve got in that library of yours,” he said.

“I’d like that,” Lindsey said. She climbed down the ladder and waved as Dale stood and watched her go with a thoughtful expression on his face.

“So, I know that Mary’s clam chowder could cause a person to walk a mile on shards of glass sans shoes, but I have a sneaky suspicion that there was something else motivating you to go for soup,” Beth said.

Lindsey dipped her clam fritter into her chowder and took a bite. It was rude to talk with your mouth full, after all.

Beth thumped her spoon on the table. “Seriously? You’re not talking? But I’m your best friend!”

Lindsey swallowed. “There’s nothing to say.”

Truly, her conversation with Dale was a bust. He had a solid alibi and she had discovered that the man had layers. She didn’t really think he was as bad as people said. In fact, she wondered if he cultivated the bad-boy image just to keep people at a distance.

“Really?” Beth asked. “Are you trying to tell me that there is nothing going on between you and Sully? That you didn’t go over to the pier today to see him?”

Lindsey choked on a bit of clam and had to cough into her napkin before she could respond. “Are you saying I went over there to see Sully?”

“Yes!”

“Well, I didn’t, and as far as I know, there is nothing going on between us,” Lindsey said.

“Oh, please.” Beth scoffed. “Everyone knows you two like each other.”

Lindsey glanced around the small break room where they sat eating their lunch. Thankfully, no one else was on break right now.

She leaned over the table and whispered, “If you must know, I went to the pier to see Dale Wilcox.”

“The ex-convict?” Beth gasped. “Have you lost your mind?”

“Nancy said he had a road-rage incident with Markus Rushton just a few weeks ago.”

“And you questioned him about it?” Beth’s eyes went wide. “Lindsey! Don’t you know the amateur sleuth is never supposed to go off on her own? This isn’t an Agatha Christie novel and you’re not Miss Marple. You could have gotten yourself into a heap of trouble.”

“Well, given that I pretty much accused him of murdering Rushton,” she said, “I concede your point. But I didn’t go off alone. I happened to be going for lunch and saw Dale Wilcox on his boat. I was simply being neighborly.”

Beth slapped her hand to her forehead in exasperation. “You’re lucky you’re still alive!”

“Nah, I don’t think Dale is as bad as everyone says,” she said. “He reads Hemingway.”

“Didn’t Hemingway hate women?” Beth asked.

“I don’t know if I would say hate exactly,” Lindsey said. “But, yes, he had misogynistic tendencies.”

“So, Ernest had issues,” Beth said. “And you decided that it was a good idea to question a fan of his about committing murder. Yeah, this all makes perfect sense.”

“I did discover one thing,” Lindsey said. Then she paused, wondering if she should voice her speculation. “Don’t say anything, but I think Dale had feelings for Carrie when they were younger.”

“How so?”

“I think he only talked to me today because he knew I was asking questions to help out Carrie. And he got this look on his face, like, well, like he was very fond of her.”

“Interesting. You don’t think that fondness would have caused him to kill her husband, do you?”

“No, his alibi must be airtight or the police would have taken him in by now,” Lindsey said.

“So what’s next?” Beth asked.

“Well, Carrie has asked us all to meet her out by the storage shed this evening so we can try to move the Friends items to an undamaged shed. I imagine we’re going to have to toss a lot of the ruined books.”

“I’m in,” Beth said. “My house is already dug out, so I’m happy to pitch in.”

“Thanks,” Lindsey said. “The more hands the better.”

She did not mention that she planned to have a chat with the other two people Markus had offended recently, Clyde Perkins and Della Navarro. Since she didn’t know if it would lead to anything significant, she figured she’d keep it to herself. Unlike the warehouse, the fewer people involved in this the better.

“Last call for hot chocolate and donuts!” Mimi Seitler shouted as she headed into the storage facility office, where she had a huge pot of hot chocolate plugged into the wall. Carrie had brought a big orange and pink box full of donuts, which was in there as well.