Gin Palace 01 - The Poisoned Rose

Flanders Road. There was nothing to see but darkness. I listened carefully and heard only the lapping of waves on the shore of the bay behind me. I turned on the light to test it. The beam was weak, but it would have to do. I switched the light off again and started up toward the cottage. I walked on the grass, not wanting to leave the imprint of my sneakers in the dirt.
    The cottage was set maybe a hundred feet back from the road and fifty feet from the bay. It was in an open lot surrounded on three sides by rows of trees. I walked close to the shore, close to the tall reeds that grew along it. I waited till I was directly in front of the cottage before I cut to my right and climbed the inclining lawn toward the front door.
    There were wraparound windows on three sides of the cottage. As I approached it I could see the reflection of the smoky night sky in the wide panes. I moved quietly to the front door, then stopped and listened hard. I heard nothing but my own breathing.
    I started up the short steps to the front door. I noticed at once that it was ajar by a few inches. I eased the door open with the back of my hand, moving it just enough so I could pass through. I took one last look behind me and slipped inside.
    It was dark but I didn’t take out my flashlight. I stood there inside the door for a while, trying to make out what I could. The front half of the cottage was an open room, part living room, part office. The back half was divided into two rooms, a kitchen and a bedroom. The bedroom door was open. Eventually, when my eyes adjusted, I made out an unmade bed in that room and a bare wall beyond it.
    I took a few steps into that front room. The planks beneath my feet were wide and sturdy, but still they creaked. The entire cottage seemed well built, tight like a ship. The wraparound windows offered a nice view of the bay. But they gave me the feeling of being exposed, a feeling even all this dark around me couldn’t quell.
    Eventually I made my way deeper into the cottage. I went to the bedroom door and peered in to make certain no one was there. Then I looked into the kitchen. It was empty. There were dirty dishes in the sink, though, and the lingering smell of recent cooking.
    There was a back door in the kitchen. I went to it and opened it a few inches, just in case I needed to go through it quickly.
    I went back into the front room. Since there was no one around for me to ask the whereabouts of the Welles woman, I decided not to waste the trip and take a look around and see what I could find. Maybe I could get lucky and come across an address or phone number or something and get out of there. That would be enough to get Frank off my back for good.
    On the office side of the front room was a desk. I went to it and took out my flashlight and carefully searched through the drawers. I stayed down low, under the windows, out of sight. I found bank statements and bills and notices of payment overdue from the Bank of the Hamptons. I found a payment book with the tear slips for April, May, and June still attached.
    On top of the desk was an electric typewriter with a piece of paper in the roller. I aimed my dying light at it and saw what looked like prose, part of a story of some kind. I read a few lines. It was a first-person narrative that seemed concerned with the look of a rose in a vase on a window sill at first light. I didn’t read anymore.
    I opened the desk drawer directly under the typewriter and searched through it. There was nothing but paper clips and disposable pens and tubes of correcting fluid. There was a filing cabinet near the desk, but its drawers were locked. I took a look around the room, making a sweep with my dull light, searching for something, anything that might help me. In the other half of the room, the living room half, was a bookcase with a few dozen paperback books spread out on the shelves. I started to cross toward it, passing a door I hadn’t seen before, a door set between the kitchen and the bedroom. It was cut into the wall panels, invisible except for its black hinges and small handle. It must have been a closet door. I stopped at it and waited a moment and listened, then reached for the handle. But before I could touch it the door flung suddenly open. I jumped back, the swinging door missing me by an inch, the rush of air its motion created brushing past my face.
    Suddenly there was movement, footsteps and a lot of rushing around. A man with a chrome-plated .357