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When I returned to the store, Rita was surprised to see me back so soon.

“I thought you might be gone all day,” she said.

“I wasn’t sure.

It turned out to be a shorter trip than I anticipated.

Things aren’t making much sense to me, and I need answers to some complex questions.”

“Anything I can help with?”

“Maybe.”

I gave her a rundown of the case Flanders had hired me for.

“I need information on the currents around here.

Do you know if any of your books from the old store might have that kind of information?”

Rita frowned and tucked one of a dozen stray white hairs into the messy bun atop her head.

“Not that I can think of, but I know a fellow who studied the currents in these parts.

He knows the area waters like the back of his hand.”

“Perfect! Can you put me in touch with him?”

She bit her lower lip, looking doubtful.

“Now, that’s a good question,”

she said.

“He’s a bit .

.

.

curmudgeonly and doesn’t like people much, so I don’t know if he’ll talk to you.”

She shrugged.

“I suppose it can’t hurt to try.”

“I can be quite charming when I want to be,”

I told her.

“Give me his number and let me see what I can do.”

Rita gave me a look of amused tolerance, one that said, It’s so cute how naive you young’uns can be.

“Oh, Marty doesn’t have a phone,”

she said.

“You’ll have to go around to his place and knock, and then wait to see if he answers.”

I didn’t like the sound of that.

“How is it he knows about local currents?”

I asked, second-guessing whether this Marty person would be worth the trouble.

“He mapped them,”

Rita said.

“He spent forty-plus years working for the USGS producing maps and hydrological studies of the waters in and around Door County.”

“USGS?”

“The United States Geological Survey.

It’s a subagency of the Department of the Interior.

They’re tasked with studying the landscape of the country, its natural resources, and any natural hazards that threaten it.

Marty was part of some specially funded study that focused on this area.”

“And you know this Marty fellow how, exactly?”

“He used to come into our bookstore a lot.

He and George would get to nattering like men can, you know, and Marty would talk about his work.

He told George that he felt lucky, because his job was supposed to last for only five years, but it kept getting funded every year after that, so he was able to continue doing it.”

She paused, looking thoughtful.

“I imagine it was kind of a lonely job, though I don’t think Marty had any family to speak of.

If he did, he never mentioned them.

I think that’s why he doesn’t take well to people.”

“He lives alone, then?”

Rita nodded and looked up toward the ceiling, her eyes narrowing.

“Though he did have a dog at one time, a big old mutt named Moose.”

She chuckled, shaking her head.

“That dog humped anyone and anything he could.

Marty would bring him into the store sometimes and damn if Moose wouldn’t run straight over to George first thing, climb onto his leg, and start going to town.

George would shake him off and then the dog would go find a chair or a rug or anything else he could use.”

Rita smiled fondly at the memory for a few seconds before reality reared its ugly head and sobered her.

“You still miss George a lot, don’t you?”

She nodded, her eyes moist.

“We were married for forty-two years but some days it seems like it was a mere speck in time.”

I stood by quietly and let her have her thoughts, wondering what it must have been like to be married to someone for that long.

Two years ago, I’d had a close call when I discovered that the man who was my fiancé at the time was more interested in my money than in me.

As a result, I have some trust issues.

While I could easily imagine spending a lifetime with Newt, I didn’t know anymore if I could do that with a person.

It’s one of nature’s cruelest tricks that dogs have such short life spans.

The mere thought of losing Newt made me tear up. The vet told me he was around a year old when he came to me last year, so hopefully we’ll have at least ten to twelve more years together. But beyond that . . . I didn’t want to think about it.

“It’s been slow today.

I can take you around to Marty’s place now if you want,”

Rita offered, apparently finished with her trip down memory lane.

“It’s just down the road near Fish Creek.

We can leave Devon in charge.”

I thought about it for a nanosecond.

“Yeah, let’s do it.

Let me give Devon the news and then I’ll meet you out back by my car.”

Rita looked delighted with the idea of escaping from the store for a while.

She was a dedicated and knowledgeable employee, but I think the contents of my store sometimes gave her pause.

She and her husband, George, had owned their rare-books store for over thirty years so she was no stranger to things old, dirty, and unique.

And she was fine with things like the Victorian death photos and the antique medical instruments that were basically thinly disguised implements of torture.

She was even okay with Henry.

But I think stuff like the sculpture we had once that was made from pig intestines or the various insects and critters preserved in Lucite or resin gave her the heebie-jeebies.

Devon was behind the counter ringing up a balding, middle-aged man who had purchased an antique Ouija board, circa 1910.

I thanked the customer warmly—that Ouija board was a pricey item—and watched as he exited the store, looking quite pleased with himself.

“Nice fellow.

He said the Ouija board was a birthday gift for his mother,”

Devon told me.

“He was quite excited about it and didn’t even blink at the price.

Apparently, his mother already has a crystal ball and holds séances on a regular basis.

For a fee, of course,”

he clarified, shooting me a cynical look.

“Interesting,”

I said.

“You’re sure the charge went through?”

“Of course,”

Devon said, sounding insulted that I’d asked.

He turned the store laptop toward me and showed me the transaction for one Mason Devereaux.

“Did he say where he was from?”

I asked.

“He might be a good repeat customer.”

“His address came up as Washington Island.

He said his mother lives in Mississippi, though he doesn’t talk like he’s from Mississippi,”

Devon said with a frown.

“Devereaux is a popular name in that part of the country, though.

Anyway, he seemed quite taken with the store and what we sell so, yeah, I think we’ll see him again.”

“That’s good.

Be sure and add his name to the mailing list.”

“Already did, boss.”

“You’re such a brownnoser, Devon,”

Rita teased.

“Devon, since you’re so efficient and all, would you mind watching the store for a bit? Rita and I need to go talk with someone about this case I’m working on with the police.”

“Of course.”

Devon grinned broadly.

He loved getting the place to himself.

“If things stay slow, maybe you could do some sleuthing for me,”

I suggested.

I grabbed a pen and notepad from the counter and wrote down the names of the two victims Flanders had brought to me.

“These guys both died while visiting up here, this one in June, this one a little over two weeks ago.

See what you can find out about them on the internet and social media.”

Devon rubbed his hands together.

“I love creeping on people’s pages.

Anything specific you’re looking for?”

“See if their paths crossed anywhere in any way.

They probably didn’t, but you never know.

Maybe we’ll get lucky.”

I looked over at Newt where he was stretched out on the floor alongside the counter, and I made a slight sideways motion with my head.

He understood immediately, got up, and padded over to the back door to wait for me.

When I got to him, I looked down at his big brown eyes apologetically.

“You’ll have to take the backseat for this one, buddy.

Rita is coming along, and she gets to ride shotgun.”

Newt let out a little doggy sigh, but when I opened the door, he went straight to the back door of my car.

Driver’s side, of course.

He always wanted to be as close to me as possible.

Rita, who knew my habits as well as any other human in my life, unclipped the short safety harness from the front passenger seat belt and handed it to me.

I switched it to the driver’s side backseat and clipped Newt into place.

“I should probably do the talking once we get there,”

Rita said, buckling herself in.

“Marty is pushing eighty and he can be a bit .

.

.

obstreperous at times.”

She shot me a sly sideways glance.

I smiled.

“Obstreperous.

Good one.”

Rita returned the smile, did a little head bow, and said, “Thank you.”

Rita and I both love words and we spend lots of our downtime at the store working crossword puzzles or playing Scrabble.

We often insert obscure words into our everyday conversations in a faintly competitive way, trying to outdo each other.

“Anyway,”

Rita went on, “Marty can be difficult at times and not just because he’s old.

He’s always had an odd personality.”

“We can play it by ear,”

I told her as I started the car, not convinced that I needed her to talk for me.

After Rita gave me directions, we rode in companionable silence for several minutes.

Then Rita said, “By the way, there’s something else about Marty I neglected to mention.”

I could tell from the tone in her voice that this revelation would be beyond obstreperousness.

“Marty collects things,”

Rita said.

“Lots of things.”

That last was said with heavy innuendo that, unfortunately, went right over my head.

“So do I,”

I said with a shrug.

“Yes, but you have a store and sell those things.

Marty keeps them all.

I delivered books to him several times over the years, and while I sometimes left them on his doorstep, I have seen the inside of his place a time or two.

Marty’s a hoarder.”

“How bad?”

“A single-narrow-path-through-all-the-piles kind of bad,”

Rita said, wincing.

“It’s a disaster waiting to happen, and it wouldn’t surprise me if Marty was found buried beneath one of his piles someday.”

“Okay,”

I said slowly, thinking.

“Maybe we can ask him to talk with us outside?”

“We can try.

But be prepared to hold your breath either way.

Based on the aromas that used to emanate from him when he came into our store and the way his place smelled .

.

.

let’s just say he tends to be quite . . . malodorous.”

She gave me a questioning look and said, “Too ordinary?”

“It is, rather, but I’ll give you an A for effort.”

As I turned onto the gravel drive leading to Marty’s place per Rita’s directions, I hoped the trip wouldn’t turn out to be a waste of time.

If nothing else, maybe Newt would get to enjoy the miasma of odors.

Foul odors were among some of his favorite things in life.

How I wished I could say the same for myself.