Chapter 9
The pancakes looked to be everything the blackboard at the restaurant’s front door described: buttery, sweet, fresh. Sinfully delicious.
“That last description is for Father Northcutt. He likes straying every now and again,” Annabelle said, leading them through the restaurant to their usual table out on the deck.
The Brewsters and Cass were already there, enjoying a second cup of coffee.
“She’s amazing, no?” Ben asked, pointing to the platters of warm crepes passing them by. He wrapped an arm around the owner and cook.
“Who would have thought that you, Annabelle Palazola, would be perfecting Swedish pancakes?” Ham said.
Annabelle laughed. When her husband had died at sea years before, the fisherman’s wife did what she knew how to do best—cook—and opened a restaurant that would provide for herself and her children, sending each to college. And she had succeeded beyond her expectations. The Sweet Petunia was beloved by all of them.
Before they’d finished the freshly squeezed orange juice, Annabelle was back with the special, plates piled high and smelling of fruit, butter, and cream.
Rolled around fresh lingonberries, the crepes were lightly browned and sprinkled with powdered sugar, then topped with dollops of sour cream and Annabelle’s promise that there were more in the kitchen.
“More fruit, too,” she said, nodding toward the mint-lined bowl heaped full of melon balls, berries, pineapple, and bananas. Then she was off, back to her more comfortable place behind the cast-iron stove that Birdie had loaned her the money to buy all those years ago.
“This is it for the week,” Nell warned Ben. “I swear. No more food.”
“That’s what I told Sam when we got home last night,” Izzy said. She checked her watch and frowned. “Maybe he took me seriously.”
“He’ll be here. He’s such a perfectionist with that camera—and underwater photography can be tricky,” Ham said.
His wife agreed. “Sam’s a true artist and he treats his photos with great care. But what’s up with this dive? I only heard snatches last night.”
“The dive club that Andy Risso heads up is organizing it,” Izzy said. “Gus McClucken offered to take care of the equipment for folks who didn’t have their own. It’s a great deal if you like that sort of thing. And then, of course, Sam needed a buddy and someone to write down people’s names—so Danny got roped into going along. Sam wasn’t sure I’d make it down the rocky slope.”
“Sam is wise.” Nell added a bit a maple syrup to her pancake.
“He asked me to go along, too,” Jane said around a bite of pineapple. “But I told him the truth—if God wanted me to be at the bottom of the sea, he’d have made me a dolphin.”
Soon the talk turned away from scuba diving and focused on summer concerts, gardens being planted, the upcoming shower for Izzy and Sam, beach cleanups, and other easy and pleasant Sunday-morning topics.
When the waitress refreshed their coffee cups for the third time, Ham and Jane pushed their chairs back.
“Ham would eat another plate of those,” Jane said. “But he’d also fall asleep in the hammock outside the gallery as soon as we hit home.”
“Who, me?” Ham joked. He stood and helped Jane tug her enormous cloth tote from beneath the table. “But she’s right. Canary Cove is hopping on summer Sundays—and that’s just the way we like it.”
Nell watched her dear friends make their way down the porch, greeting the Sunday-morning crowd, waving, hugging. Jane’s long peasant skirt swished around her legs as she walked. Minutes later they disappeared down the hilly path on their way to the art colony below.
Father Northcutt caught Nell’s eye and waved. The priest was sitting with Cass’ mother, Mary, just as he did most Sundays. The truth was that it wasn’t the pastor but Mary Halloran who really ran Our Lady of Safe Seas Church, and she used their Sunday brunches to outline for Father Larry the events of the week, telling him where to be and when—and to watch his cholesterol. Farther down Nell spotted Lily Virgilio, not looking like a doctor today in a summery blouse and pants, her high cheekbones pinked by the sun, large sunglasses shading her eyes. She was eating alone, with a plate of pancakes in front of her and a book propped up against a vase.
She looked peaceful in her aloneness, Nell thought. Most often Nell would catch sight of Lily in restaurants with Martin Seltzer. But today he was nowhere in sight and for some inexplicable reason, Nell was happy for Lily that she had some time alone. Without wanting to be a matchmaker, she hoped for a more lively companion in Lily Virgilio’s life. She couldn’t figure Martin out, and for unknown reasons, that fact bothered her. There was a bit of mystery about him.
The day before, she had seen him walking down Harbor Road, his white coat flapping against his long legs, his shoulders slightly stooped. He stopped at the scuba equipment display in McClucken’s window, peering through the glass for a long time, as if choosing his gear of choice. He disappeared inside. But when he reappeared a few minutes later, all he carried was a bag of mulch.
A gardener? Where would one garden at a clinic with no yard? she’d wondered at the time.
At the end of the porch, Annabelle’s restaurant was shadowed by a thick stand of evergreens climbing up the hillside like sentinels, and that was where Henrietta O’Neal always sat. Henrietta was of some undetermined age—some said eighty, some thought older, and Henrietta thought they were all crazy for caring. Although she lived alone, the wealthy widow rarely ended up alone in public places. She loved to talk, loved to argue, and loved people of all shapes and sizes—even those, she was proud to say, who were dead wrong in their political leanings.
The ringing of Ben’s cell pulled Nell away from her people watching, and she looked over at the offending phone as if to remind it that they were eating.
Ben glanced at the caller’s name, scratched the side of his head, then stood and stepped away from the table to take the call. He moved out of earshot, over to the service area, but the others at the table watched and saw the concerned look that fell over his face. “That was Sam,” he said to the table of expectant faces. He motioned for the waitress and handed her his credit card.
“Sam?” Izzy pushed herself back from the table. A flash of fear lit her brown eyes. “What’s wrong? Is Sam all right?”
“He’s fine, Izzy. But he and Danny won’t make it for breakfast. There’s been a delay. They asked us to meet them back at the house.” Ben took a deep breath, then cleared his throat, an uncomfortable sound in the expectant silence.
“Our house?” Nell said finally, though her question was rhetorical. She began gathering her things, trying to convince herself it was a normal request. Danny and Sam were too late for breakfast at Annabelle’s—they wouldn’t want to tie up the table any longer. So they’d have coffee with all of them back at the house. And then they’d all be off and about their Sunday. It made sense.
And yet it didn’t.
“Why?” she asked quietly.
“There’s been an accident,” Ben said, starting toward the door.
Izzy, Cass, and Nell stood at the table, refusing to move.
“Speak to me, Ben Endicott,” Nell demanded. “What kind of accident?”
Ben paused and turned back to the table. His voice was low.
“Justin Dorsey is dead,” he said.