Page 37 of The Hotel Nantucket
Chad lowers his gaze to the floor. He can’t believe she’s going there.
“The scarf was missing from room one oh five,” Ms. English says. “That was your room to clean.”
“But they each have a master key,” Bibi says. “It’s not impossible that they took it and tried to make it look like it was us. They have some kind of weird grudge against me that you should be aware of.”
Ms. English is quiet. Chad is quiet. Bibi isn’t speaking but there’s a lot of disruption emanating from her. Or maybe Chad is projecting.
“I’ll let Mrs. Daley know that we haven’t found it but that we’ll keep looking,” Ms. English says. “Maybe it’s in Mr. Daley’s luggage or perhaps she took it off while she was out and left it somewhere. But I do hope nothing else goes missing.”
Chad and Bibi take their cart up to room 307 in silence. Bibi doesn’t touch anything in the room, and she offers to clean the bathroom and do the flowers, which, Chad realizes, is as close to an admission of guilt as he’s going to get.
9. The Cobblestone Telegraph
The summer season is under way on the island and most of us are too busy with our own lives—tracking down the window washer, mulching our gardens, pulling our beach chairs out of storage—to pay attention to the happenings at the Hotel Nantucket. But every once in a while, we’ll drive past and see Zeke English standing on the sidewalk in front of the hotel with a pit bull on a leash sniffing the dandelions, and we’ll wonder how things are going.
Blond Sharon is having dinner at the Deck one evening when JJ O’Malley himself pops out to say hello. Blond Sharon does the intrepid thing and asks if he’s heard how Lizbet likes her new job.
“No, I haven’t,” JJ says. “We don’t speak.”
“Well, I’m sure she’s busy,” Blond Sharon says. “Have you eaten at the Blue Bar yet? Everyone’s raving about it. They have a copper disco ball that drops—”
“Out of the ceiling at nine o’clock,” JJ says. “Yes, I know. But from what I’ve heard, you can’t have a proper dinner there, right? He isn’t serving a chop or a rib eye or even a pan roast.”
“Right,” Blond Sharon says. “It’s more like great cocktail-party food, heavy apps that you can share, and then after you’ve finished grazing, someone comes around with shot glasses of whipped cream in flavors like Kahlúa and passion fruit. It’s called the whipped cream concierge! Have you ever heard of anything so fabulous? And then everyone starts dancing. We went last week and, honestly, I’ve never had more fun in my life.”
JJ O’Malley squares up to his full height and gazes across the creeks, perhaps to remind Blond Sharon that although the Deck doesn’t have awhipped cream concierge,it does have a magnificent view. “The reviews of the hotel on TravelTattler have been underwhelming,” he says.
“Oh,” Blond Sharon says. “Have you been checking?”
Officer Dixon gets a call at four o’clock in the afternoon about a man asleep in his car at Dionis Beach.
“So what?” Dixon says to Sheila in dispatch.
“I guess he’s been sleeping in his car in the parking lot the past three days,” Sheila says. “Some mommy noticed him and thinks he’s a potential predator.”
Dixon takes a breath. A man sleeping in his car is what passes for crime on Nantucket; he supposes he should be glad. He climbs into his cruiser.
When he arrives at Dionis, he sees the man and the car in question—some guy in his early fifties in a 2010 Honda Pilot with Connecticut plates and aWHAT WOULD JIM CALHOUN DO?bumper sticker. The back window sports a decal that saysPARENT OF AN AVON MIDDLE SCHOOL HONOR STUDENT.
Threatening stuff. Dixon wonders if he’ll need to call for backup.
He approaches the open car window and sees the guy in the driver’s seat, head slumped back, snoring away. He’s wearing a white polo shirt and swim trunks; his bifocals have slid down to the end of his nose, and there’s a copy of Lee Child’sBlue Moonsplayed open in the console next to an open Red Bull. Dixon backs away because he feels like he’s intruding on the guy in his bedroom—and then he notices the open shaving kit on the passenger seat and a hand towel drying on the dashboard. A peek into the back seat reveals a gaping suitcase.
Is this guy…Dixon glances over at the public bathrooms. Dionis is the only beach on Nantucket that has showers. Is this guylivingin his car?
“Excuse me, sir,” Dixon says, jostling the guy’s shoulder. “May I see your license and registration, please?”
Richard Decameron, age fifty-four, of Avon, Connecticut, here on the island to work for the summer at the Hotel Nantucket.
“So you’re not…living in this car?” Dixon asks. “Because that’s what it looks like.”
Decameron tries to laugh this off, but it isn’t quite convincing. “No, no, I live at the hotel.”
“Why are you sleeping here in the parking lot? We’ve had reports that you’ve been here the past three days.”
“I’m enjoying the beach,” Decameron says. “I take an early swim, get a shower, read my book, and sometimes I conk out.” He offers Dixon a friendly smile. “Is that against the law?”
He’s “enjoying the beach” by sleeping in the parking lot? Something doesn’t add up. “What’s your position at the hotel?” Dixon asks.
