I had lost my glasses in the ordeal and everything was blurry. All I could see were the trees. It was still dark and the flashing red and blue lights had turned the woods into a devilish disco.

  “You’re okay,” a man said. “You’re all good. Keep coughing. Get it all out.”

  I coughed until I emptied my lungs and then my knight in red flannel rolled me back toward him. He was stooping over me and combing my wet, tangled hair with his fingers. Behind him, the lighthouse had gone dark.

  “Did you give me mouth to mouth?” I said.

  He nodded and helped me sit up. “I hope that was okay. Do I have your consent?”

  “You can’t ask for consent after the fact.”

  He wiped the edge of my mouth with a handkerchief. Without my glasses, he was only a broad-shouldered blob of red.

  A white grin spread through the blob. “You were passed out. I had to act. I may be suspended, but I’m legally protected by the good Samaritan law.”

  “So our first kiss was full of seawater and bile?”

  “Our first?”

  I was feeling vulnerable and should have chosen my words more carefully. I reached out to touch his chest, pawing his muscles to make sure it was Matt Mettle, but I stopped, realizing his lapels were dry. Like perfectly dry.

  “Why are you so dry?”

  “I wish I could take credit for saving you because I’d be a hero, but it wasn’t me.”

  “Who then?”

  Mettle pointed to the base of the lighthouse. A team of blue blobs was rushing a stretcher toward an ambulance, the white sheet flashing red. From between the chaos, I caught a brief glimpse of the shape under the sheet. It was as skinny as if they were transporting a skeleton.

  “Is that Eldritch?”

  “He came down from the tower, dove off the cliff, and saved your life.”

  “But I never—“

  “That’s what he does, Rosie. He’s the keeper. He saves people.”

  My eyes stung. They filled with tears and Mettle blurred into a big stain on the side of the lighthouse. A pressure filled my chest, far worse than inhaling saltwater.

  Stanley Eldritch had saved my life.

  “I got your call and came as soon as I could. Phyllis was at the inn and said you had marched into the woods.”

  That couldn’t be right. My brain hurt. It had sponged up all the dirty harbor water. Phyllis hadn’t been at the inn when I got back. I was certain of it. I had panicked and gone looking for her. She must have been sound asleep. But no, I had checked her bedroom. She definitely hadn’t been there.

  The ambulance blipped and backed out of the driveway. “Is-is Eldritch going to be okay?”

  “I don’t know,” Mettle said. “It looks like his heart gave out.”

  I swallowed hard. Mine too. The old kook had saved me—after I did nothing except ruin his life.

  Mettle leaned toward me. “Now about that first kiss—shall we make it official?”

  I ignored him. “The lawyers are down in the cave. All of them.”

  “A team is already heading down,” Mettle said. He put a hand on my shoulder and looked me directly in the eyes. “Who did this to you, Rosie? Who dragged you all down there?”

  I remembered the Strawberry Shortcake mask and swallowed hard. “It depends.”

  “On what?”

  “If you believe in phantoms.”

  Mettle pulled into the driveway. Phyllis’s pickup truck was parked ahead of us, blocking the shed.

  “Was that truck there when you got to the house?”

  “Yes,” Mettle said. “Why?”

  I said nothing. She must have gone to the law office to get it. My head was swimming—and not just because my ears were full of water. Even without a box for reference, the puzzle pieces were starting to fit together—but I didn’t like the way the big picture was turning out.

  Mettle had carried me over to the cruiser as effortlessly as an infant and lowered me into the cup of the passenger seat. Now I was sitting there so heavily wrapped in shock blankets I felt as if he could drop me out the window on the side of the highway, physics-class egg-drop experiment style, and I wouldn’t crack open.

  Yet despite the insulation, I was still shivering from my heart to my fingernails and I doubted all the chowder in the world would ever get me warm again.

  At my house, the downstairs lights were off, but the light in the tower was on, projecting a square of yellow onto the brambles in the front yard. Even without my glasses, I could discern the silhouette standing between the panes.

  Someone was in my bedroom.

  Mettle looked over. “What would your sister have to gain by kidnapping her own father?”

  “I don’t know, but Phyllis knows more than she’s letting on. I’m certain of it.”

  “Maybe we should talk to the other lawyers first. You know, to be sure.”

  “Are you doubting me?”

  He feigned innocence. “Of course not.”

  “Matt, our kidnapper was wearing a Strawberry Shortcake mask. It was the same one that was hanging in my sister’s bedroom. What else do you need?”

  “I’m still suspended,” Mettle said. “I’m gonna refer to your judgement on this one.”

  “Thank you. All I need you to do is stand beside me while I ask the questions and make sure she doesn’t run away.”

  “Roger wilco.”

  We got out. I was wrapped up as tight as a cocoon and moving as slow as an inchworm. Mettle, on the other hand, practically bounded for the front walk. Ten paces behind him, as I passed Phyllis’s pickup truck, the shock blanket on my shoulders snagged on a rusty protrusion.

  “Hold up, Matt.”

  I stopped to yank it free. As I did so, the yellow light from the upstairs window slid over the bed.

  Without my glasses, it was all a blur, colors only. But that was the thing. Had I been wearing my glasses, I never would have seen it. I would have seen all the details and never stopped for a closer look.

  On the rusty bed, among the yellow light, there was a tiny black triangle. I squinted and leaned over the wheel well for a closer look.

  I still couldn’t tell what it was. I pulled it out and held it an inch from my face. It was a shred of fabric. It had been caught on the jagged rust.

  I froze.

  The puzzle slammed together. In an instant, I saw the whole picture.

  In the cave, I had seen a hole in the knee of Robert’s pants. Ever since I had known him, he had taken appearances seriously. Before I went to my first Teach For America interview, one of the screening counselors had asked me a hypothetical: if I spilled coffee on my shirt one morning, should I go into work looking like a mess, or should I stop, go home, change, and risk being late?

  I had said I should go to work on time. Good leaders set the example for their students.

  The counselor had said no, no, no, good teachers set an example through their appearance.

  I had barely survived the first round.

  The point is, my foster father would have answered that question exactly the way the counselor had hoped I would answer it. Never in a million years would Robert Slate have gone to work with a hole in his knee.

  Mettle was still waiting at the bottom of the porch. He turned toward me. “You coming or what?”

  I glanced at the upstairs window. The silhouette was still there, but slowly sinking, slowly sliding down the window.

  The mask. It had been attached to the glass.

  Behind Mettle, the front door opened. Something shiny and pointy emerged from the crack.

  Suddenly, I remembered how Mettle’s inappropriate comment after visiting Robert and Bearing had completely disarmed me. Thank you, soggy brain.

  “Matt, kiss me!” I screamed.

  His eyes popped open. “What?”

  There was a BANG and a whoosh and a twang as a metal rod whizzed past me and struck the side of the truck. Inches from my uterus, sticking out of the paneling, the harpoon vibrated like a tuning fork, the rope behind it still attached to the gun.

  Mettle sprang into action. He grabbed the line and yanked it hard, dragging both the weapon and its shooter out the door. Then he, superhero, cop-extraordinaire, leapt onto the porch, spun the shooter around, and twisted her arms behind her back.

  “Phyllis Martin, you are under arrest for attempted murder.”

  “I ain’t done nothin wrong,” Phyllis said. “You came bangin on my porch like the world was gonna end and I thought you were an intruder.”

  “You shot at me. You nearly killed us.”

  “I didn’t know who it was. I swear. I thought you was Eldritch come to kill me.”

  “It was never Eldritch,” I said grimly. “And you know it. Not only did you try to frame him, but you made me think it was my own sister.”

  “I ain’t done nothin of the sort,” Phyllis said.

  Mettle dragged her down to the cruiser. “Need I remind you of your rights, Ms. Martin?”

  “Yes,” she said.

  He paused. “Wait a minute. For real?”

  “Yes. I want my rights. The entire spiel. Now.”

  Mettle groaned and pushed her up against the back door of the cruiser. “Hold on a second,” he said. With one hand on her back, he opened the passenger door, popped open the glove compartment, and pulled out a laminated card and a pair of handcuffs.

  While clicking her wrists in cuffs, he squinted to read the card in the dim light. “Phyllis Martin, you have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can and will be used against you in the court of law. You have the right to an attorney. If you cannot afford an attorney, one will be provided for you. Do you understand the rights I have just read to you? With these rights in mind, do you wish to speak to me?”

  “If you don’t mind, take the Devil a bowl of chowder, will you, my dear boy? He’s hungry.”

  Mettle opened the back door of the cruiser, pushed Phyllis inside and slammed the door. Then he pocketed the Miranda Warning and turned to me.

  “You really gotta stop teasin me with that kissing business, Casket. My heart’s a fragile thing.”

  “It distracted her. I saved you.”

  “Meh, she was a bad shot.”

  I put my face up to the glass like a kid at the zoo, frustrated that the animals weren’t doing anything. I desperately wanted to know that Phyllis had a valid reason for doing what she did, as if my faith in humanity rested on her motives.

  “Why did you do it, Phyllis? You drugged us all and planted those shackles and encouraged me to blame an innocent man, a man who turned out to be a hero. And you used me every step of the way. You broke into my sister’s room, didn’t you? You preyed on my weaknesses.”

  Phyllis recoiled, her face melting into fright. She had always seemed so confident, but now, in the darkness of the back of the cruiser, she looked small and frail.

  Mettle touched my shoulder and drew me back. “It’s her right to stay silent, Casket. We don’t know why she did it. If you care about her at all, don’t make her say anything.”

  I stepped back and wiped my eyes. Mettle tapped the roof of the cruiser and went around to the driver’s side. “You want a ride?”

  “To where?”

  “Wherever you’re going.”

  “Not really. I’m going inside.”

  “Then how about a ride up to the porch?”

  “It’s only a few steps away, Matt.”

  “I don’t mind.”

  “I’m fine.”

  “Do you want me to get the ambulance down here? I’ll get you more blankets.”

  “No.”

  “Are you going to stay here all by yourself?”

  “I think I’ll stay in my old room,” I said. “With my dad.”

  Mettle smiled. He was unwilling to go. “So about that kiss—”

  “Not a chance,” I said. “You already gave me mouth to mouth. I think that’s enough action for one night.”

  He smiled. “Okay then, Casket. Get warm.” He slid into the driver’s seat, backed out, and made a K-turn in the street.

  I turned and headed back to the inn to get my duffle bag and my other scant belongings, the blanket draped over my shoulders like a shawl.

  But I had barely passed Phyllis’s pickup truck when the gravel crunched behind me. For crying out loud. If Mettle really thought I was going to agree to go on a date with him after nearly drowning, getting shot at, and finding out that my only friend in Dark Haven was a total psycho, he was seriously delusional.

  Mettle rolled down his window.

  I didn’t stop walking. “We went over this, Matt.”

  “The prisoner wants to talk to you.”

  I paused.

  “She said she wants to tell you something. I’ll pretend I didn’t hear.”

  I stepped toward the cruiser’s back window, not sure what to feel. Phyllis leaned up to the glass and beckoned me to lean in. I complied, figuring there was a barrier between us and she couldn’t hurt me anymore.

  “I’m sorry, Dear,” she whispered. “It wasn’t my idea. I had no choice.”

  “Then whose?”

  She mimed zipping her lips, an awkward gesture in the cuffs that looked more like she was putting on lipstick in a desperate attempt to look pretty. Then she kicked the seat in front of her and said, “Let’s get on with it, pretty boy.”

  Mettle shrugged, gave me a two-fingered wave, and pulled out the driveway. I turned back to the inn, its facade red and blue as the ambulances left the lighthouse and roared past my driveway, the storm clouds parting behind the ornamental gables and the moon shimmering off the black water of the bay.

  The flame in the lighthouse had gone out too. Without Eldritch to look after the lamp, I wondered what would happen to the ships in the harbor. Without Phyllis to take care of my house, I wondered if I could keep it from falling apart. And without anyone to cook me chowder, I wondered how I’d get enough calories to survive.

  But those were worries for another night.

  I had no idea what Phyllis had meant when she had said she had no choice. Maybe, in Mettle’s botched analysis of that page from Moby-Dick, he was right all along.

  Maybe it was all about the clams.

  35

  The hospital room in Portland was painted yellow. I had read somewhere that the color of the room you stayed in affected the speed of your recovery. Blue was supposed to make you calm and relaxed and keep you nice and mellow through the course of your convalescence. Yellow was the color of nausea, or perhaps camouflage if you were suffering from a nasty bout of jaundice. And red—well, red made the heart pound, good for flushing a clot from your heart valves or jump-starting a broken ticker.

  Me, I didn’t buy into any of that psycho-babble. In my book, all you needed to promote well-being was, well, a good book. My hair was down, and under the fluorescent lights, it was casting a gentle flame on the pages of the brand new copy of Moby-Dick.

  I was sitting in a chair next to the hospital bed and reading to him. He was deep in a coma, but I was pretty sure he could hear me. Every few minutes, especially on the more poignant passages, his right index finger, just a few inches from mine, twitched.

  After coming by every morning for the past three weeks, we had finally gotten to my favorite scene in the book: Ishmael’s bosom buddy Queequeg, after suffering a horrible fever, had asked the crew to lay him in his coffin.

  I read the scene out loud:

  But now that he had apparently made every preparation for death; now that his coffin was proved a good fit, Queequeg suddenly rallied; soon there seemed no need of the carpenter’s box: and thereupon, when some expressed their delighted surprise, he, in substance, said, that the cause of his sudden convalescence was this:—at a critical moment, he had just recalled a little duty ashore, which he was leaving undone; and therefore had changed his mind about dying: he could not die yet, be averred. They asked him, then, whether to live or die was a matter of his own sovereign will and pleasure. He answered, certainly.

  I patted Eldritch on the knee. It was bony under the sheet, like touching a large bolt. “So what do you think, old man? Time to rally?”

  His eyeballs twitched as if he were reading something on the inside of his eyelids. He didn’t open his eyes, but I believed he was thinking about it, somewhere deep in that restless dream.

  “Come back when you’re ready. But don’t take too long. The lamp needs to be lit and there’s a lot I need to tell you—if you’ll listen.”

  There was a gentle knock. I looked up. My foster father was standing in the doorway.

  “I thought I might find you here.”

  I wiped my eyes. “I’ve got nowhere else to go.”

  “Hopefully that’s about to change,” he said.

  “Don’t worry, I’ll move out as soon as I can find a job. I promise.”

  “Take your time, Rosie. It’s nice having you around.”

  “Really?”

  “Yes, really. There’s no rush. Dinner at the house with you is a lot more fun than takeout at the office with William Bearing.”

  “I can’t imagine why.”

  “Some people never change. But others do,” he said. “Phyllis waived her right to a trial this morning. She’s pleading guilty.”

  “Guilty?”

  “She thinks she’s safer in prison. She said something about getting back to her roots.”

  “Safer than what?”

  “I don’t know,” Robert said.

  I laid the book on the bed next to Eldritch’s leg. “Did she say anything else?”

  “Not that I’m aware of.”

  “So we still don’t know who this private buyer is?”

  “No, but the other good news is that the judge listened to our plea and agreed to move forward. The house is yours—for now.”

  “It’s like a stay of execution.”

  “Sadly, that’s probably accurate. I met with the opposition team this morning. They’re all big wigs from New York. Whoever’s funding this shady acquisition has deep pockets. But we’ll do our best.”

 

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