Die a Stranger (22 page)

“I know it’s been a long time since I’ve been here,” he said, “but damn.”

“They call it Michigan’s Gold Coast now.”

“You’re kidding, right?”

“I am not kidding.”

We kept following the shoreline until we got to Charlevoix. That’s where you can find the
other
half of the rich people from Detroit during the summertime. There’s a drawbridge that separates Lake Michigan from the little Round Lake, which leads into Lake Charlevoix, one of the biggest inland lakes in the state. On a day like this you could sit on the shore and watch so many powerboats and sailboats and jet skis you’d probably lose count. The ferry to Beaver Island comes in and out of Round Lake when the drawbridge is raised. I’d never been on the boat before, but I knew it was big enough for a good three hundred people and a couple dozen vehicles in the hold.

“It’s gonna take you forever to park,” Lou said. “Just let me out here and I’ll get the tickets.”

I let him out when I stopped at the light, then I kept crawling along with the other traffic. There’s one main street running through town, and it gets backed up all to hell even when the drawbridge isn’t up. If you live in the UP, like I do, all you have to do is drive a couple of hours down to Petoskey and Charlevoix and you’ll feel like you’re in the middle of Times Square.

There’s a little ticket booth on the promenade overlooking Round Lake. A bandstand, a few dozen little boutiques up and down the street, a good hundred boats parked down in the marina. The sun beating down on everything, never too hot with the breeze coming off Lake Michigan. It’s one version of perfect, I grant you that. An overcrowded version, though, and definitely not for me.

I circled the block and came back to find Lou waiting at the same traffic light. He got into the car and told me to keep going.

“Wait,” I said, “aren’t we parking?”

“No, we’re going to the airport.”

“What are you talking about?”

“You know how long the ferry ride is?”

“It’s like an hour, right?”

“Try two hours,” he said. “If we go to the airport, we can catch a little plane and be over there in twenty minutes. The next flight leaves at two. We’ll just make it.”

He didn’t have to do any more convincing. A two-o’clock flight would get us to the island before the ferry was even pushing off from the dock, and right now a two-hour head start sounded like twenty-four-karat gold.

Assuming that they were actually out there on that island. I kept coming back to our plan and telling myself it was the craziest long shot of all time. But at this point we didn’t have anything else.

The Charlevoix airport was on the south side of town, just past all of the midday summer madness. I parked in the lot and we went inside. The whole airport was a one-room affair, with separate check-in desks for the two airlines that flew to Beaver Island. We went to the desk that had the two-o’clock flight, and that’s when Lou stopped dead.

“What’s the matter?” I said.

“Metal detector,” he said, pointing to the door that led outside to the airstrip. “I wasn’t thinking they’d have one here.”

I put my hand on the small of his back and felt the gun. How the hell he’d gotten it out of the glove compartment, I had no idea. No doubt it was loaded.

“Go put it back,” I said. “Hurry up.”

He hesitated. “What if we need it?”

“Then we use a big stick instead. I’m pretty sure they have big sticks on the island.”

“I’m serious. This is no time to be unarmed.”

“You don’t have a choice, so just go back and—”

“You get on the plane,” he said. “I’ll take the ferry.”

“What?”

“You go and check things out. I’ll take the ferry and meet up with you. That way, we’ll have some heat and we’ll have wheels, too.”

The woman behind the desk told us we’d have to get on the plane if we were going. In the end, it was the car business that tipped the scales for me. It was a big enough island, after all, and it wasn’t like Mackinac. You could actually take your car over and drive there. You didn’t have to rely on horses or bikes.

“All right,” I said. “I’ll go start looking around. Or asking around. Or whatever the hell it is we’re gonna do there. You bring the car over and I’ll meet you at the ferry dock. If I’m not there, give me a call on my cell phone. Do you have my number?”

We took another minute to get that straightened out. Then I bought my ticket and hurried through the metal detector and the door and then I was outside, back in the bright sunlight, looking at a little six-seat Piper Aztec with a prop on each wing. I couldn’t help thinking it was just like the plane I’d seen at the Newberry airport, back when this whole thing started. Only this plane wouldn’t be stuffed to the rafters with marijuana, and when I got on the ground I could only hope there wouldn’t be men with guns drawn, waiting for me.

*   *   *

It was a quick flight. I was one of three passengers. I sat directly behind the pilot, and as the little plane rattled down the runway I couldn’t help remembering how much I disliked flying in these things. You feel like every gust of wind is going to turn you right over. It was still a crystal-clear day so at least I got a good look at the lake and then at Beaver Island as we got closer to it. It was the largest island in Lake Michigan by a long shot, that much I remembered. It was flat and sandy, sort of oval-shaped, and it kind of looked a little out of place, like it should have been out in the ocean instead. There were trees as you got in close to the middle of the island, and there were even two fairly substantial interior lakes. Lakes within an island within a lake.

The island had some unusual history, what with this man named James Strang bringing over a group of Mormons in the nineteenth century and declaring himself king. He ended up getting killed by some of his subjects, but the one main town on the island is still called Saint James. There’s a lot more to the story, I’m sure, but that’s all I know about the place. As the plane coasted in, I thought about the smugglers’ plane again, and how the pilot was able to turn on the airfield lights automatically, even though it was the middle of the night and the place was deserted. I was about to ask the pilot just how that worked, but he was getting ready to actually land our plane, so I left him alone. He brought it in right on the grass, completely avoiding the paved runway for whatever reason. We bumped along on the grass for a few hundred feet, then he turned and brought it around to the airport, which wasn’t even half the size of the airport we’d taken off from.

I got out with the other two passengers and stood blinking in the sunlight. The airfield was surrounded by trees and I couldn’t have told you how close it was to the town of Saint James. The other passengers had cars waiting for them. I was about to ask one of them for a ride when the woman inside the terminal came out and told me she was going into town. I thanked her and got into her car.

“What brings you out here?” she said to me as she drove. She was young and attractive, and I couldn’t help wondering how she’d ended up here on this island, working in this tiny little airport.

“Just paying someone a visit,” I said. “They were supposed to pick me up, but I guess they must have lost track of time. I bet you even know them. You probably know everybody on this whole island.”

“I probably do.” She was driving maybe a little too fast on the narrow road, but I figured she knew this place so well, she could probably do it with her eyes closed. “I grew up here, after all. I tried moving to the mainland, but it just didn’t work. I had to come back. The pilot who flew you in is my husband.”

She was talking fast. I was waiting for my opportunity, and when she finally paused to take a breath I asked her the big question of the day.

“It’s the Kaisers,” I said. “The people who were going to pick me up. Do you know them?”

She frowned as she thought about it. “Are they summer people?”

“I believe so, yes.”

“Oh, well, if they’re summer people I might not know them. I’ve probably seen them at the airport, but I don’t recognize the name.”

“Harry and Josephine Kaiser,” I said. “They look like a couple of old hippies.”

“Okay, that sounds familiar. Yeah, I’m pretty sure I’ve seen them.”

I didn’t know if she was just being agreeable, or hell, how many couples look like old hippies, anyway? I had no way of knowing if these were the actual Kaisers she was talking about. The possibility that this was all just a wasted trip was still very much on the table.

“Where are you going, anyway? Main Street okay?”

“Yeah, that’s perfect. I really appreciate it.”

“No problem at all. I was heading to the grocery store, anyway. Are you wondering which one?”

I looked over at her, not sure what she meant.

“That was a joke,” she said. “We have one grocery store on the whole island.”

I couldn’t help wondering if everybody on the island was like her. Friendly and outgoing and just a little bit batty. Either way, she was taking me a good five miles north of the airport, running along the east side of the island until we got to the town. There was a natural inlet there, protected from the lake, and that’s where the ferry dock was, along with the grocery store, the post office, a couple of bars and restaurants, and pretty much everything else you’d ever need if you were lucky enough to live here.

She parked by the grocery store. I got out and thanked her again. Then I walked across the street to the dock. I looked at my watch. It was almost three o’clock. That meant the ferry was probably clear of the drawbridge, but still a good hour and a half away.

I sat down on a bench for a while, just getting the hang of the place. This was the main street in town on a perfect summer day, and there were people walking up and down the street, but it wasn’t anything like Mackinac Island, where there’d be ten times as many people. Not to mention a hundred horses, two hundred piles of horseshit, and five hundred bikes. There were cars on this island, and I sat there and watched a dozen different people park on the street and then go do whatever it was they were going to do, not bothering to lock their car doors. It kinda figured, because who’s gonna steal your car when there’s no place to go?

I watched the woman who had given me a ride come out of the grocery store, get into her car, and take off. She waved to me as she passed. I waved back and smiled.

That’s right, I told myself. Keep smiling. Try to look like you belong here, like you’re just another one of these people enjoying the beautiful summer day on the island. You’re not gonna get anywhere if you start grabbing people and interrogating them, asking them if they know where the Kaisers’ house is. Or the house they’re renting for the summer.

Damn, this is not gonna be easy, I thought. Once again, you fail to think things through before you act. Story of your life.

I got up and walked into the first restaurant on the street. I ordered a Coke and stood there watching the people sitting at the tables. Some of them were reading the paper. Most of them were talking. Every time someone new came in the door, there’d be someone else there to welcome him or her by name. Usually two or three people. That would get a new conversation started, and it didn’t take me long to realize that most everybody on this island seemed to know everybody, and that once again I was an outsider.

I kept the little smile on my face. I made myself walk slowly. I listened carefully to every conversation I could hear, waiting for a name to drop. I saw Harry today. I ran into Jo. That’s all I needed. Just one mention of one name. But I was coming up empty.

I spent about a half hour doing that. Just walking around, listening, acting like I was out for a stroll. Looking at my watch like a good friend would be meeting me for coffee any minute now. While actually I was counting down the minutes until the ferry got there, when Lou would get out with the car and we’d be able to cover more ground. Drive around and look at mailboxes, look for Kaiser or, hell, maybe they’ve got some cute pothead nickname for their cottage. Purple Haze or High Times or whatever the hell else.

And then what? Knock on the door? Ask if Vinnie and Buck are inside, hiding from killers?

One step at a time, Alex. Just figure out if they’re really here. Then you can decide what to do about it.

*   *   *

Another half hour passed. I noticed a lot of people were going into the post office. They’d leave with handfuls of mail and smiles on their faces. Even bigger smiles than when they went in, I mean.

That gave me an idea.

I went into the grocery store and picked out a big fruit basket, one of those things with the shrink wrap and ribbon wrapped all around it. Ten dollars’ worth of fruit and a ten-dollar basket, so of course the thing cost seventy bucks. But it was exactly what I needed. I went to the cashier and put the thing down on the counter.

“Somebody’s getting a nice present,” the woman said.

“Yeah, the Kaisers,” I said. “I’m on my way over there now.”

She smiled and nodded.

“You know, the Kaisers’ house. Over by the…”

I let that one drift off. I waited for her to pick it up, but she just looked at me and blinked a few times.

“Thanks,” I said, leaving with my big basket of fruit.

I walked down to the post office and maneuvered my way through the door, almost knocking a few people over with the basket. When I got inside, the operation was even smaller than I had imagined. One counter with a roll-up gate, a number of post office boxes taking up two of the other walls. One little desk for people to put packages on while they taped them closed and stuck on their stamps.

“Who’s the lucky duck?” the postmaster said. She was one of those old yet ageless ladies, with the perpetual twinkle in her eye.

“I’m a little lost,” I said, putting on my best slightly daft, totally innocent, completely trustworthy face. Looking like a true Michigander, in other words.

“You can’t get too lost around here,” she said. “You just keep walking until you hit water. Then you know to stop.”

I gave her a good laugh on that one.