A Timely Vision

I walked along Duck Road, glad for the early morning quiet. The bushes and shrubs dripped with the heavy fog. It was like being wrapped in gooey, wet cotton candy. I remember when I was a kid and hid outside under the bushes to keep from being seen. It’s much harder as an adult to hide or even get away for a few minutes to think things through.

But what to think? If there was a ghost at the Blue Whale last night, he or she didn’t give me any answers I could use to help Miss Mildred. We still had no clue who really killed Miss Elizabeth, let alone who killed Wild Johnny thirty years ago. I wondered, as I listened to some birds chirping from inside a thicket, if the two crimes were related. It seemed likely to me. What were the chances that we’d find Wild Johnny’s body right after Miss Elizabeth was killed? On the other hand, no one could guess when Johnny’s body would be found. The whole thing was giving me a headache.

The Duck Shoppes and the boardwalk were hazy in the fog, with seagulls folding their wings beneath the clapboard eaves, waiting for the sun. I headed to town hall first to surprise Nancy before she got there. I thought if I returned the note she’d lost to her desk, she’d think it had been misplaced. She could call the chief and tell him what he needed to know.

I slipped my key in the lock, glancing around now since I’d had my purse stolen. I was trying to be more aware of my surroundings, as Chief Michaels always advised. It appeared to be only the seagulls and me. None of the shops were open. I pushed open the door and closed it quickly, locking it behind me.

The Post-it wasn’t hard to find. Of course it helped that I knew exactly where to look. I reached my fingers along the floor beside the file cabinet and snatched it out along with a few dust bunnies. With a flourish, I spread it out flat on Nancy’s desk. She’d be surprised when she came in.

As I flattened the rounded edges and the part that wouldn’t stick anymore, I read the note. It was brief—“I need to talk to you about Millie. Silas Butler. 252- 411-9750.”

I stopped flattening for a moment and looked at the note in disbelief. Silas Butler? Everyone knew about Silas Butler. He was Elizabeth and Mildred’s younger brother. A ne’er-do-well who was thrown out of the army. He’d come home to Duck in disgrace only to take up gambling and any other illegal activity he could find. He was legendary for stealing a poor box from the Duck Presbyterian Church in 1964.

The unthinkable had happened after that. He was killed in the 1970s running some kind of scheme or selling drugs. I’d seen his grave marker in Duck Cemetery a hundred times. My mother told me once that there was a song written about the Bad Butler.

This couldn’t be the same person. There were probably plenty of Silas Butlers in the world. But how many who wanted to talk to the chief about Millie?

I glanced at the clock on the wall. It was one of those standard round clocks, black and white with hands that crawl from one number to the next when you’re bored. I had at least an hour before Nancy came in. I dialed the number on the Post-it and waited for someone to pick up.

“Sea Oats Senior Care.” The voice at the other end of the line was cheerful for this hour of the morning.

At first I couldn’t think what to say, and she repeated her opening line. I gave myself a hard mental slap and said, “I’m sorry. Where are you located?”

“We’re in Kitty Hawk.” She gave me the address. “Do you need directions?”

“No, thanks. I was thinking about visiting Silas Butler later today. I hope he’s feeling all right.”

“As far as I know. He’s been popular here lately. Lots of visitors. That’s a good thing, though.”

I thanked her again and hung up. Silas Butler. It couldn’t be coincidence. But what could it be?

I went and sat down in my office and considered the possibilities. Silas Butler was dead. Nancy probably wouldn’t have realized the importance of this when she took the message because she had only lived in Duck for a few years. The Bad Butler was mostly forgotten now. Even we can’t recall all our folklore. But Chief Michaels would know.

I turned on my computer and looked through the old files. Most of them had been slowly but surely put into the computer database. I typed in “Silas Butler” and his file came up. Silas had been shot and killed on Monday, June 8, 1978. The day after Wild Johnny Simpson’s arrival at the Blue Whale!

I looked at the notes on his death. Silas was suspected of “illegal trafficking,” which I’d learned from Gramps could mean anything from smuggled drugs to cigarettes. It was kind of a catch-all phrase used by the sheriff’s department. I read further into the file: