31
AT 6:00 a.m. Wednesday morning on the third floor of the Harper Castle B&B, Violet knelt over the toilet in her suite, waiting for the nausea to pass. After fifteen minutes of dry heaves she went back to bed and slept until ten o’clock.
She felt much better when she woke again. Turning over onto her left side, she stared through the window at the bay around which the village of Ocracoke had been built. In the windless cloudy melancholy of the morning, Silver Lake Harbor maintained a veritable supernatural stillness.
As Vi rolled up her sheer black hose she noted the cheerful island décor of the tiny room—the pastel painting of a five-masted schooner in rough seas above the headboard, the coral wallpaper patterned with little white sand dollars. Max would love this place, she thought, placing a small tape recorder into her purse and fastening her shoulder rig: a holstered .45 Smith & Wesson with a twin magazine-carrier. Max had surprised her with the horsehide holster last February on Valentine’s Day.
Vi primped in the bathroom, dusting her cheeks with blush and adjusting a purple suede headband that matched her suit. Then she grabbed her purse and headed downstairs through the sprawling wood “castle,” across oak floors, between walls of cypress, into the dining room, lured by the promise of a complimentary continental breakfast.
The buffet had been heavily grazed. She chose one of the three remaining bran muffins and filled a glass with cranberry juice. Except for the snoozing old man (his mouth dropped wide open, an Ocracoke Observer still in his grasp), the dining room was empty.
Vi sat down at a table near the window so she could look out across the small harbor, lined with hoary docks. On the opposite shore the Swan Quarter ferry churned through the narrow outlet into the open waters of the Pamlico Sound, bound for the mainland with its cargo of departing tourists.
Vi glanced at her watch: 10:50. Max’s planning period. She took out her cell and called him. She got his voicemail, left a brief message: “Hey baby. Just wanted to check in. I’m getting ready to go interview the Kites now. Hope you’re having a good day. I’ll call you tonight. Love you.”
From the outside the Harper Castle B&B looks childish and fanciful with its gabled roofs, asymmetrical right wing, and imposing façade of seven dormers. Vi looked out the window of her Cherokee up to the fourth story cupola, the penthouse of the establishment, and wondered what a night up there might cost. Maybe she could convince Max to bring her back for their anniversary next June. There was so much she wanted to see—the lighthouse, the British Cemetery, the Banker ponies, Portsmouth Island.
She turned out onto Silver Lake Drive, the road that circumscribed the harbor. A guidebook to the island had warned of traffic jams in the village during the summer months but this bleak November morning it seemed every bit its reputation as the most sequestered outpost on the North Carolina coast.
At the corner of Silver Lake and Highway 12, a man was selling conch shells out of his truckbed for five dollars apiece. Vi would’ve pulled over and bought one but she already felt guilty for sleeping late and Sgt. Mullins would be expecting her full report this evening.
Though the island of Ocracoke is less than a mile and a half across at its widest point, it took Vi thirty-five minutes to find the mailbox of Rufus and Maxine Kite. She couldn’t see their house from the dead end of Kill Devil Road, their drive being a private overgrown affair that wound for a hundred yards through a stand of live oaks.
As she proceeded down the narrow drive, Spanish moss draped from the overhanging branches and swept across the windshield, its tuft of graygreen filaments a living curtain. Though only ten minutes from the harbor (tourist garrison of the village) it felt much farther, seeming to exist in its own timeless universe.
Driving through these sad old trees made something sink inside of Vi. This unpillaged tract of land radiated a sleepy southern gloom and it pervaded her soul.
The dirt road emerged from the thicket and there stood the sound and the gray of the sky and the deeper gray of the crumbling granite that comprised the prodigious home of Rufus and Maxine Kite, a gothic residence that looked as though it belonged on a dreary English moor.
There was no driveway. Wild beach grass had overrun the lawn and two ancient live oaks guarded the house, their gnarled branches nearly touching the disintegrating masonry of the third floor like arthritic fingers.
Remnants of a stone path, broken by roots, meandered between the trees to the front door.
The house was three stories of rock, as if God had cast off a gigantic block of stone, dropped it on the edge of the sound. Great chimneys spiked like horns from each end.
Vi thought the edifice resembled some alien skull, its teeming windows like hollowed eye sockets, portals into darkness.
32
VI parked under one of the oaks beside the only other vehicle on the premises, a rusting Dodge pickup truck that might’ve been sixty years old. As she followed the path toward the front door she gazed up at the tall black windows and the cupola.
The house oozed vacancy.
A twinge of fear and guilt shook her. She’d promised Sgt. Mullins she’d hook up with local law enforcement, get the sheriff, or at least a deputy to escort her on the Kite interview. But the last thing she wanted was some good old boy from down east tagging along, patronizing her.
She stopped at the door, smoothed herself, ran her fingers through her short blond hair, and knocked.
Something scurried through the grass behind her.
Turning, she saw an emaciated gray cat streak up the nearest oak. It settled on a disfigured limb and watched her through large yellow eyes. She’d seen another cat skulking the parking lot of the Harper Castle. According to the concierge, Ocracoke was rampant with feral felines.
When Vi turned back she started.
The door had been opened and in the threshold stood a tall old man, his kind face brimming with years and creases. Slightly hunched, he looked down at her through sunken black eyes, his white hair long but scarce.
“Who are you?” he asked.
Vi reached into her purse, withdrew her badge, and held it close so he could see.
“Sir, my name is Violet King. I’m a detective with the Davidson Police Department. May I speak with you?”
Rufus Kite looked up from the badge and beamed a toothless smile.
“Come in, young lady.”
As Vi entered the house of Rufus and Maxine Kite she reached into her Barbour coat and unsnapped the latchet on her holster.
After Rufus closed the front door it took a moment for Vi’s eyes to acclimate to the dimness. The effluvium of mildew permeated the home—a bouquet of age, neglect, rotting mahogany, wet stone. Her heels slid on the dusty floor.