Love Almost Lost by Irene B. Brand

Author:Irene B. Brand
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Barbour Publishing, Inc.
Published: 2013-03-06T05:00:00+00:00

Eight

A pale Carol greeted Ellen at the door of her cream-colored bungalow. She threw her arms around Ellen. “I might have known you would come. My sister is keeping Charlotte for a few days. I’m in no shape to look after her.”

Ellen sat beside Carol on the davenport and took her hand. “What happened?”

“This is Thursday, isn’t it?” Carol said with a dazed expression in her eyes. “Sid left Tuesday morning to go to work, and I haven’t seen him since. The sheriff said he sent him to Indian Island to work with the federal investigators, but he didn’t show up. The sheriff thinks the boat sunk, and he drowned.”

“Sid Pauley could swim like a fish.” Then Ellen remembered her narrow escape, and she said, “Unless he had an accident like mine.”

At Carol’s puzzled look, Ellen described the boat explosion that had almost taken her life.

“Is there a madman loose?” Carol whispered. “And who’s in that mass grave on the island?”

“Those Italian strikebreakers who disappeared several years ago. Everyone assumed they’d left on their own, but apparently not.”

“What does all of this have to do with Sid?”

“He knew something. He admitted as much the day Lane discovered those bodies. Do you know what it was?”

Carol shook her head. “For the past few months, he’s been worried, although he pretended to me that he wasn’t.”

“I might as well tell you, Carol, that there’s some question about the nature of Timothy’s death; and if he was murdered, then the sheriff’s office here didn’t report it at the time. Maybe Sid knew something about a cover-up in that investigation. Or perhaps he’d heard something from his father about the murder of those Italians.”

“It could be that Mr. Pauley had something to do with that, but surely Sid wouldn’t have known it.”

“Let me know if you hear anything,” Ellen told her, reluctant to leave Carol but knowing there wasn’t anything else she could do now.

Even at Arrowwood, Ellen couldn’t find peace of mind. On her return, Margaret and Bruce accosted her the moment she walked into the hallway.

“A word with you, please,” Margaret called from the drawing room. With an inward sigh, Ellen stopped.

“We want to know what’s going on. What’s this about a mass grave on the island?”

Ellen briefly explained, and Margaret lamented, “At least you could have told us. This place is creepy. We might be murdered in our beds.”

“Why don’t you leave?” Ellen pleaded. “With all that’s on my mind, I don’t feel like having guests.”

“You don’t seem to mind having John Warren sleeping next door to you,” Bruce said with a smirk.

“John Warren is a federal marshal who’s investigating Timothy’s death. His presence might keep all of us from being murdered in our sleep.” Bruce’s face blanched at her words, and he caught the side of a table for support. Ellen continued, “I want you to leave.”

“We’re afraid to—” Margaret broke off suddenly when Bruce flashed an angry glance in her direction.

“You come up with some dough, sweet stepmother, and I’ll leave quickly enough.

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