Written in Stone (A Books by the Bay Mystery)

friend. “I’m all out of sorts because of what happened yesterday, but I shouldn’t take it out on you. Did you hear about Willis Locklear?”
    Dixie perked up immediately. There was nothing she liked better than a fresh piece of gossip. “Don’t know the name. Should I?”
    Adding a splash of cream to her coffee, Olivia watched the white liquid spiral outward, lightening the deep brown to a warm shade of tan. She told Dixie everything and her friend listened without interrupting or paying the slightest heed to the couple in the
Tell Me on a Sunday
booth who had pushed their empty plates to the edge of the table, signaling their desire to pay for their meals and leave.
    “Ah, hon.” Dixie made a sympathetic face. “You can’t seem to catch a break. Maybe you and your man should take a little trip. Get out of here for a spell.”
    “Because death follows me?” Olivia asked. She’d meant to sound glib, but her near whisper betrayed her anxiety.
    Dixie swatted at her with the dishtowel she kept in her apron pocket. “No, ’Livia! Because once trouble comes around, you can’t walk away from it. I know you love this place—every buildin’ and dock and grain of sand, but enough already. Let go for a bit. You’re wound tighter than a fishin’ reel.”
    Olivia had to admit that the idea of driving to the mountains and holing up in a cabin with Sawyer had its appeal. She could imagine spending hours in a rocking chair with a good book. Or she and Sawyer could both work on their novels while Haviland pursued a host of woodland animals.
    “None of this mess happened in Oyster Bay, so there’s a limit to how much I can be involved.” She gave Dixie a reassuring smile. “But forget about all that, I’d do anything for a plate of Grumpy’s blueberry pancakes.”
    Dixie nodded. “I’ll put in two orders. Millay’s crossin’ the street and she looks as wrung out as you do.” She leaned down and whispered to Haviland, “And I won’t forget a tasty morsel for you, you handsome devil.”
    Haviland licked her hand in a show of gratitude.
    Olivia looked out the window and grinned. Millay was standing on the double yellow line, glaring at the oncoming motorists until they stopped and waved her across the lane. Dressed in a lime green miniskirt, a black AC/DC T-shirt, and her trademark patent leather knee-high boots, the black-haired bartender certainly stood out among the crowd of tourists and locals.
    Shoving the diner door open, Millay slid into the vacant seat in the window booth, grabbed Olivia’s coffee cup, and without waiting for permission, drank the entire contents in several gulps. Slamming the cup down, she looked around for Dixie.
    “Rough night?” Olivia asked, trying not to grin.
    “I didn’t sleep much.” Millay touched a strand of hair dyed the same lime green as her skirt. “But I know who wrote that poem we found in Willis’s bag.”
    Olivia caught Dixie’s eye and held up her empty coffee cup. Dixie winked and then handed the disgruntled
Tell Me on a Sunday
couple take-out boxes containing pecan pie and assured them she was terribly sorry for having kept them waiting. The couple walked out of the diner wearing satisfied smiles.
    Millay unfolded a piece of paper and pushed it across the table. “The poem’s called ‘My Lost Youth.’ It’s by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. Apparently, he was a master of metaphor and this piece is chock full of them. I read an analysis on this website for English geeks, and Longfellow was supposedly writing about this idyllic place near the sea, where a boy could be happy and totally carefree. So part of the poem is like this golden childhood memory. Longfellow is celebrating a boy’s ability to imagine and dream, and then the War of 1812 comes along and changes everything.”
    Scanning the first two stanzas, Olivia quickly became absorbed in Longfellow’s coastal imagery. As one who’d grown up alongside the sea, she admired the poet’s ability to evoke its beauty and mystery. “Anything else?”
    “At the end, the speaker or whatever he’s called, wants to go back in time and capture his lost youth, but of course he can’t. He hears this song he’s heard since he was a boy and it tells him that his childhood has passed him by. It feels sad to me, like he really misses who he once was.”
    “The verses Willis had in his bag described him well,” Olivia said, moving her gaze to the seventh stanza. “The line that says the song will