The Beach House Murders

By John A. Miller, Jr.

What could be more fun than a day at the beach? A month at the beach, perhaps? That’s what teenager Mary Ann Markham, her live-in writing coach Art Parker, and her best friend Jennifer Martin think when Mary Ann convinces her wealthy grandfather to rent a fancy beach house for the entire month of July near the small East Coast town of Shipwreck.

But then strange things begin to happen, especially with the appearance of several not very well preserved bodies, an unexpected shooting or two, and a murder with mob overtones. Meanwhile, Art becomes close friends with a local emergency room doctor named Marsha, and he and the girls become somewhat less than close friends with the local police chief, primarily because of the bodies they keep finding. Then Mary Ann and Jennifer disappear shortly before a major hurricane hits the area.

Could it be retired mobster “Little” Tony Gambolo, who lives a short distance down the beach, that’s behind all these deaths and the disappearance of the girls? Art, with Marsha’s help, is at his wits’ end trying to find Mary Ann, Jennifer, and the answer to who’s behind the killings.

• Language: English
• Publisher: John A. Miller, Jr.
• Release date: Dec 14, 2011
• ISBN: 9781466104686

John A. Miller, Jr.

John Miller, writing under his full name of John A. Miller, Jr., started writing novels back in late 1991 after working for many years in the mainframe computer and telecommunication fields. He had lived in southern Arizona so he knew the area well and set his first novel, Pima, in that area. Shortly after writing that novel he moved back to southern Arizona where he wrote five more novels in the Pima Series. He returned to his home area near Allentown, Pennsylvania in 1999 and continued to write, launching the Victorian Mansion Series with its nine novels.Since retiring from their day jobs John and his wife have enjoyed visiting Cape Cod and The Bayside Resort in West Yarmouth, Massachusetts at least once every year, so with their permission he partially set there a standalone novel, The Bayside Murders.Recently, after reading a number of cozy mysteries, John decided to launch a new series in that genre and named it Three-Zee for its main character, Zelanie Zephora Zook.

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The Beach House Murders

John A. Miller, Jr.

Copyright 2010 by John A. Miller, Jr.

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What could be more fun than a day at the beach? A month at the beach, perhaps? That’s what teenager Mary Ann Markham, her live-in writing coach Art Parker, and her best friend Jennifer Martin think when Mary Ann convinces her wealthy grandfather to rent a fancy beach house for the entire month of July near the small East Coast town of Shipwreck.

But then strange things begin to happen, especially with the appearance of several not very well preserved bodies, an unexpected shooting or two, and a murder with mob overtones. Meanwhile, Art becomes close friends with a local emergency room doctor named Marsha, and he and the girls become somewhat less than close friends with the local police chief, primarily because of the bodies they keep finding. Then Mary Ann and Jennifer disappear shortly before a major hurricane hits the area.

Could it be retired mobster Little Tony Gambolo, who lives a short distance down the beach, that’s behind all these deaths and the disappearance of the girls? Art, with Marsha’s help, is at his wits’ end trying to find Mary Ann, Jennifer, and the answer to who’s behind the killings.

** ** **

This is a work of fiction. Except for actual historical figures, any resemblance between any character in this story and any person living or dead is purely coincidental.

This book is not intended for children. It contains some inappropriate language and sexual situations.

Look for more books in the Victorian Mansion series and other books by John A. Miller, Jr., either available now or soon to be available at SmashWords.com.

(1) The Victorian Mansion Murders

(2) The Lakeside Murders

(3) The Beach House Murders

(4) The Pirates’ Hill Murders

Table of Contents

Prologue

Day 1 Sunday

Day 12 Thursday

Day 113 Sunday

Day 114 Monday

Day 116 Wednesday

Day 117 Thursday

Day 118 Friday

Day 119 Saturday

Day 120 Sunday

Day 123 Wednesday

Day 124 Thursday

Day 125 Friday

Day 126 Saturday

Day 127 Sunday

Days 128-130 Monday through Wednesday

Day 131 Thursday

Day 132 Friday

Day 133 Saturday

Day 134 Sunday

Day 135 Monday

Day 136 Tuesday

Day 140 Saturday

Day 145 Thursday

Day 147 Saturday

Day 149 Monday

Day 216 Friday

About the Author

Prologue

Happy birthday to you;

Happy birthday to you;

Happy birthday dear Mary Ann;

Happy birthday to you.

And so sang all of us, mostly off key, but our intentions were good.

Okay, you’re probably wondering two things by now. First, who in blue blazes are all of us? Second, why should you care?

For starters, my name is Arthur Parker, a hack journalist/writer who just happens to have fallen into the sweetest job on the face of the earth. Mary Ann Markham, the birthday girl, is more or less my employer. The birthday in question was her fifteenth. She’s a published author, and I’m her writing coach and tame, in-house editor. Did I mention I’m also her legally designated surrogate father? No? Well, more about that minor detail later.

Mary Ann’s real legal guardian is a man named Charles Drummond, her grandfather. However, after a series of bad strokes last fall he had his lawyer, a guy named Ethan Frome—I kid you not—activate some mysterious paperwork Drummond had ordered earlier that made me the kid’s daddy. Currently, I share that responsibility with Grandpa Drummond, but I’m already in place if something really rotten were to happen to the old man. Drummond is right up there with the richest of the rich, having sold his manufacturing business several years ago for more money than I can ever begin to imagine, and the aforementioned Miss Markham is his only relative and sole heir, except for a few paltry sums for the staff.

Others at the birthday party: Jennifer Martin, Mary Ann’s schoolmate and best friend; Adele Martin, Jen’s mother; J.J. McClure, Jen’s uncle and local deputy sheriff; Frome (he watches over Mary Ann’s legal affairs so, what the heck, why not invite him?); Mrs. Rachel Peabody, our cook (cooks are always given the appellation of Mrs. even if, as in Mrs. Peabody’s case, they were never married); our housemaid, Bridget O’Donnell; and our chauffer and gardener, Hiram Blasko. We were still short a butler—our last one had had to leave us on short notice—but as he had done with Blasko, who also was a recent acquisition, Drummond was checking references very carefully before hiring another.

We live way out in the country, twelve miles from the little town of Bearford, in a Victorian mansion big enough to board a small army although at the time of the birthday party it housed only six people. Before Mary Ann’s parents were killed in an automobile accident when the girl was four, they also had spent some of their time in the house. Drummond had been driving, and he had never forgiven himself. It was shortly after that he sold the business and became a recluse although he always showered love and affection on his only granddaughter. Now he propelled his weakened body around the house in an electric wheelchair. Fortunately, one of the advantages of being rich is you can afford a full-sized elevator in your house as well as any support staff you need to get around, regardless of your disabilities.

Mrs. Peabody is a holdover from the pre-recluse days and a marvelous cook who loves to bake fattening desserts. I should know. My pants keep shrinking and shrinking.

We held the birthday bash in the main dining room although the house is equipped with a ballroom at the rear, a wee area of forty by fifty feet or so and just a bit spacious for a crowd of ten, especially because we had a hell of a time convincing Mrs. Peabody, Bridget, and Blasko to emerge from the kitchen and join us in the non-staff area of the house for the cake ceremony. The only time the ballroom had actually been used for anything since the accident was last fall when Mary Ann and Jennifer hosted a Halloween party for nearly thirty schoolmates.

After the mandatory mangling of the happy birthday song followed by the mandatory blowing out of the candles on the cake—that cake could have fed half of China—I wandered into the glass breakfast nook that protruded from one end of the dining room and stared outside at the early February rain. I was deep in contemplation of my good fortune at having been living here now for nearly a year with relatively little work and lots of delicious food when somebody smallish lifted my right arm and snuggled against my side, placing the arm around her shoulders.

Hi, Sweetheart, I said. How does it feel to be an old lady?

I haven’t really given it a lot of thought, I guess. How does it feel to be a really old man?

Touché. I admit to being fortyish, but that’s all.

She turned toward me and began running her fingers through my red, somewhat kinky hair. Oh yeah, did I mention I’m not exactly centerfold material unless there’s a magazine out there named Totally Unexciting Men?

What are you doing, child?

Just looking for gray. Your hair color makes it tough to find.

I put on a rinse.

You probably would.

I love the little demon, but I have come to understand why some animals eat their young.

Jennifer came up behind me and poked me in the ribs. She had celebrated her fifteenth birthday just two weeks earlier. Mary Ann and I had made the trek to her house where Jennifer had made a point of rubbing in the fact she was older and, consequently, wiser.

Jennifer Martin is an interesting human being. She’s smart as a whip—Why are whips thought to be smart?—and has the body of a stick. Her face suffices as a face, but nobody, not even a legally blind person, would ever call her attractive. Still, she’s fun to be around when she’s not puking her guts out over some gruesomely mutilated dead body in the woods or running for the bathroom to relieve her bladder when she gets to laughing too hard. When I first took on the job as Mary Ann’s writing coach she and Jennifer were a bit on the outs, but I managed to reconcile their minor problems, and since then they’ve been practically inseparable.

Mary Ann has long, brown hair and is quite pretty, if very small and not particularly well-developed for a girl her age. She was fourteen when I met her, and I would have sworn she was only eleven; twelve at the most. Now she’s rounded out a bit, but she could still probably slip into movies for half price. Not that she needs to, of course. With grandpa’s money she could easily afford to buy the theater.

So when are we going to open up the lake for swimming? Jennifer asked. Last summer we had begun spending a pile of Drummond’s money to rehabilitate a small lake on the property so Mary Ann would be able to lie on the grassy bank in a long, white dress and dangle her toes in the water. We had a beach installed as well as a trail that completely encircled Rainbow Pond. We had decided to give it that name one morning after observing streaks of color threading the morning mist over the water. This spring’s plans included installation of a permanent dock, a Victorian boathouse, and an equally Victorian gazebo on the small island. Drummond liked his things Victorian.

Jen, you’re crazy in the head. It’s only February. There are polar bears and penguins swimming in that water, and they’re probably all hungry.

How about the swimming pool?

Equally daft.

You could put a roof over the pool and heat it.

I couldn’t. I’m poor. Mary Ann could probably convince her grandfather to do it, though.

Mary Ann pondered the idea for a moment. No, it would be okay if it were nearer the house, but it’s too far to walk in winter. Never once, I’m sure, did the potential cost of such a project enter her mind.

Don’t get me wrong. Mary Ann, for all her grandfather’s zillions, isn’t stuck-up or in any way nouveau riche about her financial assets. She merely never thinks about money. Actually, she doesn’t spend a great deal on herself. For Christmas with Drummond’s cash I bought her a good computer, her first. Prior to that she’d been doing her writing on an electric portable typewriter.

Okay, now you know the players, or at least some of them. Next, why should you care?

Well, for one thing some of these people, as well as a few you haven’t met yet, can be downright interesting. For some mysterious reason dead bodies have had a bad habit of hanging around Mary Ann and me ever since we met. Oh, I don’t mean in the zombie sense. The bodies are really dead and all that. None of this creeping out of the graveyard at night kind of stuff. However, we do seem to have a penchant for finding the darned things, so much so that the local sheriff, the Honorable William Robert Carswell, whom we have affectionately dubbed Billy Bob Asshole, actually threw me into the slammer a couple of times, convinced I really had done something to help the bodies into their unearthly state. He even locked up Drummond at one point. Considering the old man’s physical condition, that was a stretch even for Carswell.

For us, we had gone an amazingly long time with no unexplained deaths in the immediate neighborhood. I knew our luck wouldn’t hold. It just couldn’t.

Day 1

Sunday

Art, do you know I’ve never been to the beach? Mary Ann was nestled in one of the overstuffed chairs in my bedroom, clad in her warm bathrobe and the long tee shirt she usually wears to bed. I sat in the other chair and pulled my robe more tightly around me. For some reason the air felt chilly; Drummond has the thermostats on an automatic setback to save energy at night although it really wasn’t late enough for that to make a difference.

No, but if you hum a few bars I’ll try to follow along.

Thank heavens the only thing she had handy was a pillow. I’m sure she would have thrown a knife if she’d had one.

After fending off the flying, fluffy object, I continued, Of course you’ve been to the beach. There’s a nice, new one only a couple of hundred yards from here at the lake.

Not that beach, you dork. I mean the ocean.

Oh, the big one. The bounding main and all that.

Yeah, all that.

Why not?

I don’t know. Probably because I was only four when my parents died, and since then Grandfather hasn’t been especially into travel.

No. In fact he probably hasn’t been farther away than Bridgewater since then. Bridgewater was the county seat, a paper mill town about twenty miles away.

I think he had to travel a bit to close out his business dealings, but I was too small to go with him then.

Didn’t you ever bring up the subject?

I guess I’ve always been a bit afraid of annoying him, even though he’s always nice to me.

Yeah, well, you’re missing out on a great experience, you know.

Is it really all that neat?

I think so, but then I love sitting on the sand and scorching my body in the blazing sun until I resemble a boiled lobster.

Can you swim in the ocean?

Surfers do, but they have those big boards to hang onto. I do like going in and letting the waves push me in to shore, but I’ve never tried to stand up on a surfboard. Seems impossible to me.

I don’t know. I guess it would be fun to try. Do you think we could maybe afford to go to the beach for a few days this summer?

Girl, with your money you could afford to go around the world this summer.

I know, but I’m afraid Grandfather might not want me to go. After all, he did spend a lot fixing up the lake for me.

I’m sure the few extra bucks a trip to the beach would cost won’t put him in the poor house. Besides, you can’t just stay home all the time, lake or no lake. You’ve got to get out in the world and meet interesting people.

Like you?

Yeah, like me. Well, okay, maybe more sophisticated than me. Where would you want to go? There are the East Coast beaches like the rocky coast of Maine or the National Seashore of Cape Cod or the boardwalks of New Jersey or the Outer Banks of North Carolina or maybe Hilton Head Island or even Florida. Then there’s the west coast of Florida and the beaches of Texas. Or maybe you’d be interested in the surfers’ paradises along the California and Oregon coasts. Of course, there’s always Hawaii. Add to that the beaches along the Mediterranean like the French Riviera or Italy or, well, you get the idea.

Lots of choices.

Lots. When you have money the world’s your oyster.

Where did you go when you were a kid?

New Jersey and Long Island mostly. They were close, and I wasn’t exactly rich.

Mmm. You’d go with me, wouldn’t you?

Of course. You are my kid in a manner of speaking, so I’d be derelict in my duties if I didn’t go along to keep you out of trouble.

I wonder whether Grandfather would go.

Tough question. Probably if we found suitable lodgings where he could relax in comfort. It would certainly do him good to get away from here for a while if only for the psychological boost it would give him.

Jen?

If she knew you were even thinking about it, she’d be packed and over here in five minutes even if she had to run all the way.

I wonder…

You wonder what?

Perhaps we could rent a beach house somewhere for a few days. It would be you, me, Grandfather, Jen, and Mrs. Peabody. Jen and I could share a room so we’d only need four bedrooms.

Nice of you to think about economizing. Do you think our esteemed cook would go along? It doesn’t seem fair to take her on vacation and then make her work.

Oh, it wouldn’t really be her vacation. She’d still get that although she seldom takes much of it. However, we’d go out to eat sometimes, so she wouldn’t have to cook every night. Besides, in case you haven’t noticed, she really does like to cook.

I’ve noticed. Believe me, I’ve noticed. Also, my pants have noticed, and the diminishing numbers of spare holes in my belts have noticed.

Yeah, come to think of it you are getting a bit soft around the middle, sort of like Sheriff Billy Bob.

If it wouldn’t be like killing the goose who laid the golden eggs, I’d strangle you for that.

Probably not worth it. I hear prison food isn’t nearly as good as Mrs. Peabody’s.

I’ve been there. It isn’t.

And so it was that we approached Charles Drummond with our plans to spend a few thousand more of his hard-earned cash and rent a beach house for the month of July. Please notice how that few days at the beach had expanded a bit, but as I said earlier, money wasn’t exactly an issue. Also, we’d still have the rest of the summer to appreciate our own pool and lake.

Day 12

Thursday

It never ceases to amaze me how powerful money can be. Mary Ann and I cooked up our scheme for a beach visit Tuesday evening, got Drummond’s blessing Wednesday at dinner, and by Friday afternoon had completed arrangements to rent the beach house, pending a visit by yours truly and the kid to make sure the place was in satisfactory condition and would suit our needs. We had to wait another week for that visit because we had to get plane and car rental reservations as well as rooms for an overnight stay.

First class seats: no problem. I’d only flown first class once before, and that was on a lucky upgrade from coach. I opted for a compact car, not that I eschewed luxury, but a compact is much easier to maneuver and park. Also, because it would be too difficult to make the trip in one day, we opted for rooms in a nice motel in the town nearest to the beach house. In one of her strange obeisances to the gods of economy Mary Ann had suggested we share a motel room. However, I pointed out that a fortyish guy showing up with a fifteen-year-old girl, no matter how innocent our intentions, would be bound to raise some eyebrows among the hotel staff, let alone the local gendarmes, so she eventually relented and agreed to separate accommodations. I suspect our trip to inspect the beach house probably cost darned near as much as the rental for the beach house itself, but, what the heck, it was only money, and it wasn’t my money.

We sat in the rental car with the motor running, both to warm up the heater and to figure out the various controls and switches. I always try to do this with a rental because automobile designers seem to take a perverse delight in making things as different as possible between models, even those from the same manufacturer. Finally, after about ten minutes during which I managed to locate the radio controls—priority one: Mary Ann immediately began searching for a rock music station—the heater controls, and the headlights, we pulled our car out of the rental agency lot and headed toward the coast road. Prior to leaving home I had gone to Bridgewater and purchased a couple of maps of the area, plus the car rental agent had been very helpful with directions.

It took only an hour to locate our motel. Maps can be perverse things at the best of times, and we didn’t have a GPS. We checked in, dropped our overnight bags in our rooms, and called the realty company. In a few minutes a woman driving a large, black SUV pulled up and we climbed aboard.

Hi. I’m Cynthia Price, our agent said. The woman appeared to be about my age. She was dressed in designer jeans, sweater, and down-filled jacket, but was wearing too much makeup and jewelry for my taste. Of course, when your business is dealing with people who can afford to rent beach houses, I guess you have to show a certain amount of sophistication. Cynthia gave me a funny look as if she thought she recognized me from somewhere. However, she didn’t look the least bit familiar to me, so when she didn’t say anything I figured it was merely a case of mistaken identity.

Mary Ann and I dutifully introduced ourselves. Then we settled back to enjoy the view while Cynthia began rattling off information about the town and its history. The community of Shipwreck was appropriately named because it was founded by the survivors of a wreck that had occurred in the late eighteenth century. It had never grown much beyond the size of a one-horse town—With a name like Shipwreck what chance did it have?—but it did quite well because in the nineteen-twenties it had become popular with a fairly wealthy set. They had built a number of impressive—in some cases ostentatious—beach houses, many of which were now rented out to summer folks every year. Although it wasn’t Newport—even Drummond probably couldn’t afford to rent one of those piles—it was quite nice.

I’ll never forget Mary Ann’s first sight of the ocean. I swear a five-year-old couldn’t have been more in awe. She made Cynthia stop the SUV and then crawled out, standing and staring at the broad expanse of sand, surf, and water that blended softly into the gray horizon. She walked slowly across the beach toward the high-water line, barely glancing downward every few steps to avoid stumbling. I followed a few feet behind, unwilling to break into her train of thought.

Art, it’s amazing, she said finally after she had reached the line of debris deposited by the waves that had rolled farthest up the beach. A breeze was blowing from somewhere in the general vicinity of Europe or maybe Africa—I’m not great at geography—and pushing the water pretty far even after the waves broke.

Yeah, I’ve always thought so, too. However, I first saw it when I was only a wee babe, so I guess I was too young to have the same reaction you’re having.

You were a wee babe?

Quiet, or I’ll throw you to the sharks.

Is it always like this?

No, even though it’s cloudy today the waves aren’t too bad because the tide is probably ebbing and the wind isn’t very strong.

Ebbing?

Yeah, going out or down or whatever. The surf is usually rougher when the tide is coming in and at high tide.

How would you know when that is?

Seaside newspapers always carry tide times because it’s important for boaters to know, and the time changes by a few minutes every day. In some of the back bays the water can be so shallow at low tide boats can run aground.

Mmm. I think I’m going to like it here. Let’s go see the house.

Okay. I hope it’s something we’ll like.

The house was another five miles south, separated from its nearest neighbors by at least a half mile of empty beach and sand dunes in each direction, and it turned out to be something we liked very much. The place wasn’t new but was in excellent condition. It had cedar siding aged to a medium gray by the continuing action of the weather and the salt air, lots of multi-paned windows with white trim, and a fake lighthouse attached to one end. I made a point of asking Cynthia whether the lighthouse had ever seen service; she said she had been asked the question many times and had researched the history of the place. The original owner had been a lighthouse aficionado. He had had the house constructed with the fake structure so he could sit up in the tower and have an unobstructed three-hundred-sixty degree view.

We entered the house, unoccupied at this season of the year, and got the grand tour. It was definitely a structure capable of handling our small party in comfort, even to the inclusion of a small elevator adequate to lift Drummond and his electric wheelchair to the bedroom level. With five bedrooms and three baths we decided we’d include Bridget in our roster so she could perform her housemaid duties, rather than hiring local help that might or might not do a good job. As in Mrs. Peabody’s case I knew Drummond wouldn’t count the time against Bridget’s official vacation. For a hard-nosed businessman he is incredibly generous to his personal employees.

All the inside trappings were understated but of the highest quality and well maintained. I was glad the décor wasn’t the heavy Victorian that Drummond preferred. That style can weigh on one after a while.

The toughest job was extricating Mary Ann from the lighthouse tower where she had parked herself after the tour. After discussing terms and conditions with Cynthia—Frome would iron out the details with her during the following week—I huffed and puffed up the spiral iron staircase to the glassed-in, circular room at the top. I found the kid staring out to sea.

Something on your mind?

I wonder if this is how it felt to a woman waiting for her sea captain husband to come home from a long voyage.

"Don’t know. I suppose it is. Were you planning to marry