“We solved it!” Gary shouted.
“Not exactly. All we know is that Charlotte was taken to the beach to die. Or she’d been killed already. We don’t know what actually happened.”
“Once we have that, we’ll be finished. We’ll be heroes!”
“We don’t know how it happened, either.”
“And then, a front page story!”
“Not quite. We also don’t know why it happened.”
Gary looked at the picture again, Charlotte still sitting in the swirl. He turned it over.
“Then how do you begin?”
“First, we have to find out Charlotte’s name.”
“You mean you think she has an alias?”
“I wish. I just realized I don’t know her last name.”
“Neither do I.” Gary frowned and silently picked up his cane. Febreeze and garlic wafted into the room. He came back and dropped the Yellow Pages on the table.
“We’ll call.”
“It’s not that easy. We can’t let anyone know that we’re looking into this case.”
“I know.” Gary winked. “I have a plan.”
He turned through the phone book and found the entry for “Sunset Cove.” He started dialing on a cordless phone.
“Gary, wait! We can’t do that.”
“No no. It’s cordless. It works without a wire. It’s amazing!”
“I mean we can’t call without knowing what we’ll say.”
“Jacob?”
“Yes Gary?”
“I forgot my plan.”
The phone was already ringing. Jake ripped the phone away from Gary and put it to his ear. It was Mel’s voice on the other end of the line.
“Hello, Sunset Cove. How may I help you?”
“Yes, hello.” He paused and made his voice deep, flattening any trace of a New York accent. He was Nebraska now. He looked at Gary, who shrugged and reached for the phone. Jake held on to it.
“I was calling about…my aunt Charlotte. I heard that there was bad news.”
“I’m sorry,” Mel said. Her professional voice sounded smoother. Colder. “She passed away two nights ago.”
“Do you know what happened?”
“I’m afraid I cannot release personal information over the phone, sir. But the designee is visiting sometime this week. She will be able to pass any information on to you.”
“I see.” He waited. “I…just want to make sure. I haven’t heard from my cousin in a while. I can’t believe that it’s the same Charlotte. My aunt Charlotte. She seemed so well when I last spoke with her.”
“I can’t release specifics, I’m afraid. Her medical condition has to remain private.”
He knew her medical condition: bad. Gary was pulling at his hair, trying to listen. Jake ignored him.
“Sir, is there anything else I can help you with?”
“I just can’t believe it’s really my aunt.”
“I know these are trying times.”
“I just don’t believe it’s her. That it’s Aunt Charlotte.” Then he got it. “It must be a different one. It can’t be my Charlotte.”
“Your aunt is Charlotte Ward, correct?”
He wrote it down in the notebook and circled her name.
“I’m just ashamed I didn’t know already.”
It was true.
“I understand.” Her voice got warmer.
“I have to go.” He hung up before she could reply. He handed Gary the phone and looked at the name in his notebook.
“We got it. We got her name.”
He breathed out and brushed back his hair. Gary laid the phone down on the table and looked at the notebook.
“Charlotte Ward is her name. Will that help you?”
“It should.” His heart was still beating quickly. Mel couldn’t have known. Gary arched his eyebrows.
“That made my nerves tingle.”
“Mine too.” This was what being aggressive was like.
“What will her name help with?”
“I don’t think it will give us a lot. I’ll search for her on the internet, but I didn’t even see a computer in Charlotte’s room.”
“Then what will it do?”
“Not much. I don’t think we can use it with her pharmacist. Or the hospital either. I’d like to find out why she died, or what medications she was on. But I don’t think a fake voice will work as well for more official matters.”
“You at least have it for your story.”
“And it’s something,” he said and sighed. “She deserves a starting point. It makes me realize what we need to do next.”
Gary closed the Yellow Pages and rested his hand on the cover.
“Jacob, do you think it matters?”
“That what matters? The name?”
“I just don’t know if anyone will think something happened. I know we discovered about her walker, that she couldn’t have gone out to the beach alone. But do you think that they will investigate?”
“Who? The police?”
“Anyone.”
“Well, we care about what happened, right?”
“Yes. I do.”
“Then we’ll investigate.”
Gary pushed up his glasses and coughed.
“So what do we do now?”
“Now? We make a trip to Sunset Cove and see what we can find. If we get anything good, we’ll be able to take it from there. That community may be large, but it’s tightly knit. We’ll be able to find out something. And I know just the person to ask first.”
Gary looked tired already, with bags under his eyes. His hair frizzed out and he reached up and patted it all down. Then he frowned.
“There’s one thing I want to ask you.”
“What?”
“Why didn’t you just call Melissa and ask her yourself? She would have told you Charlotte’s last name, wouldn’t she?”
“Part of the reason I didn’t ask is that you handed me the phone mid-call.”
“Jacob, that cannot be the real reason.”
He didn’t know, at first. He saw the pictures of Charlotte on the desk. He took his own camera and looked at the viewfinder. All those feet. All those steps. The prints on the beach were already gone. The prints in the picture had erased other prints, and there had been prints before them. On the small screen, they were just splotches of black. A code he couldn’t read.
“Really, that’s the only reason I didn’t ask Mel. I was caught off guard.”
“I don’t think so.”
“You don’t?”
“I don’t think that Charlotte Ward would say you are telling the truth.”
He sighed.
“I don’t think so either.”
They looked at each other. Jake put down the camera and picked up the photo. Charlotte, her dress shining purple. She’d been so afraid. She’d been right.
“The real reason,” Jake said, “is that I think we have to start believing Charlotte. Ms. Charlotte Ward. I thought that she was crazy. But she didn’t know who to trust.”
Gary finished the thought. It was obvious.
“We don’t know who to trust either.”