Mystery on Shell Road

There is always something exciting about the first warm day of the spring season. Amy woke up knowing today would be that day. She mentally planned her entire day around making sure she could take a walk on the beach, before even getting out of bed. ‘Time for myself? Tall order these days. Gramps has become almost a full time job’ she thought to herself as her feet touched the tile floor, still damp and cool from the morning. Stretching, she reached over and pet her dog, Lubo. “Lets do it bud”, she half yawned as she made her way to the closet.

Amy let Lubo outside and headed to the kitchen, where she was sure she would find Gramps The Grump, as she affectionately called him, waiting for her to start the coffee maker. Favorite green mug already in hand, “I’d do it myself ya know, if it wasn’t so hi-tech”, he grumbled at her as she shuffled around in slippers too big. “Good morning to you too, old man. How’d you sleep?” Amy and Gramps made small talk while sipping their coffee together, her favorite part of everyday. As the kitchen warmed from the morning light, Amy knew it was time to get herself moving if she had any hope of making it to the beach.

Loading up the car for the days errands, Amy waived at Gramps and Lubo and promised she wouldn’t be gone too long. She decided to head to the beach first, to be sure she would get there. As she pulled away, the roar of the engine of Gramps’ truck by her feet, Amy knew that she needed this time alone. She needed to feel like a human, like the ‘young spry 23 year old girl’ her grandfather says has been missing these last few months.

Amy found it hard to act young, spry, or 23 anymore. Gramps is the last living relative of the family she barely knew, and his health had been declining in recent months. Without hesitation, she gave up her little one bedroom apartment in the city and happily moved back into the old rundown bungalow on the marsh that Gramps owned. Her room hadn’t been changed in the years since she left, hadn’t been cleaned either. But even with the leaks in the roof, cracked tiles in almost every room, and warped wood paneling, she had really missed home.

Gramps took Amy in when she was only 3 and it had been just the 2 of them on this quaint island these last 20 years. Minus the 2 she was in the city trying her best to make a buck and find herself. She didn’t really remember her parents. They died in a house fire along with her older brother who was only 6 at the time. She knew it should be tragic for her, but her memories didn’t go back that far so she didn’t feel like she missed them. She just felt grateful for the life and love Gramps has always given her.

Pulling into an open space at her favorite beach access, Amy left her beat up sandals in the car, grabbed her small bag, and went in search of treasure. She loved to find unique shells and challenged herself to 20 before she could head back to her busy day. Walking the long, sandy path to the beach, she could smell the salt in the thick morning air. There was a hint of warmth on the breeze that touched her face but she kept her jacket on, knowing it was still too early to leave it. The blues of the sky and the water still impressed her, even after all these years of living here. ‘The city just isn’t this blue’, she thought.

18 shells later, the sun was high in the sky and Amy had tied her jacked around her waist. Up ahead, she spotted something dark sticking up out of the sand. As she walked closer she wondered, ‘Oh gosh, is this going to be my lucky day, a huge shark’s tooth?’.

‘Oh. that’s my luck. Just a notebook.’ Amy picked up the little black book, half buried and damp, and wiped off as much sand as she could. “M.S.” was the only identifier on the binding. ‘M.S… Initials? Of a name? Place? What is this?’ Amy was intrigued and decided she had to remove the band holding the book closed to get more information.

“Lucky $20,000” was the only visible scribbling inside the entire notebook. Amy knew this meant nothing at all to her but might mean everything to someone else. As she headed back to the car, irritated she was still 2 shells short of her own challenge, she didn’t see a single soul to ask if they recognized the book. ‘Well, I sure don’t have time to hunt anyone down’, she thought, as she decided in that moment to drop it off at the local town hall. Some busybody there would surely know what to do with it.

Sheriff Little was sitting behind the enormous desk that was much too large for the small town hall. He looked his name behind that thing, but smiled and tipped his hat when Amy walked in. Standing, “What can I do for you on this fine day, Amy? How’s Gramps?” “Oh Gramps is his usual grumpy self”, she replied. “Figured that” Sheriff chuckled, interrupting. Amy smiled and said “I need some help. I found this little black book on the beach and I have no way of knowing who it belongs to. I thought maybe you could stick it in the lost and found.”

“Well I’ll be!” he shouted! “Max Shepherd was in here looking for this a few days ago, left his number here for me to call him if it turned up. I can’t wait to tell him you found it!”

“Thanks Sheriff! Have a good one, now”, she yelled back over her shoulder as she was already headed out to the truck in a hurry. She’d left it running in the lot, knowing better than to turn it off and try to start it back up too soon, and no one would ever be accused of trying to steal this thing. She didn’t bother to ask who Max Shepherd is, since he’s most likely was a tourist who will be gone as fast as he came. Folks around here are either tourists or lifers. No one new hardly ever moves onto the island and it’s not exactly on your way anywhere else.

The local hardware store was just around the corner and Amy’s next stop. The leaks in the roof have to be repaired before next week’s rain and surely someone in the shop will offer to help her if she provides supplies. That’s probably her favorite thing about this small town. Everybody knows everybody by first name and is always willing to pitch in and help anyone they can. Of course it’s sometimes her least favorite thing, too. Nosey neighbors who love to ask her when she’ll settle down. ‘There’s no time for that and my life has plenty enough men in it’, she chuckled, picturing Gramps and Lubo sitting on the porch rockers waiting for her to come back.

Standing in line with her full shopping cart and nearly empty bank account, Amy had Mr. Hinkly standing with her, chatting away as he told her all about how to fix the roof. She took in about half of what he was saying but she knew she wouldn’t need to retain even that much, since he had just offered to head over after work and help her patch things up. Amy grimaced at the total the cashier had muttered and just prayed this wouldn’t be the time her card was declined. Much to her pleasure, the card was accepted and off she went, waving her goodbye and see ya laters to Mr. Hinkly.

Amy needed to stop in the pet store too and grab Lubo some food and a few treats, to soothe over her guilt of leaving him home this morning. She turned the truck over and let it idle while she opened her phone to check her bank account. A picture of her, Gramps, and Lubo smiled back at her and she knew that the number didn’t matter as long as she had these two. The app opened on her phone and her account was much worse than she expected, $20, 000 worse to be exact. Somehow her account showed a deposit of $20, 000 which made no sense! Amy checked to make sure she logged in correctly, then logged out and back in, looked through deposits and withdraws. “This doesn’t make sense” she shouted at the steering wheel!

She took off and headed to the bank. Half running and panting, Amy burst through the bank doors and was grateful to see an open teller. She was sure she was leaving burn marks in the ugly matted carpet she tore through on her way to the sweet-faced young lady waving her over. “How can I help you today, Amy”, Diana asked. Amy hadn’t even realized it was her former classmate until this moment. “Diana, there is something seriously wrong with my account and I need your help to fix it”, Amy said quickly but not exactly quietly. She watched as Diana’s eyes widened, squinted, and widened again. “Mmhmm, exactly. How did this happen?” Amy asked.

Diana pulled a page off the printer and highlighted a $20,000 cash deposit that had been made directly into the account, just this morning. As Amy studied the print out, she could feel her blood start to boil. The name on the deposit read ‘Max Shepherd’. She spun around, whipping her long dark hair with enough force to ruffle some loose papers and stormed out of the lobby. Hopping into the truck, she tried to turn it over. Nothing. Tried again, nothing. “Dammit!” she shouted, sure this time someone heard her yelling since there was no roaring engine to cover her loud mouth. ‘Okay, this is a good thing because now I have time to calm down before I drive over to the town hall again’ she thought. But she wasn’t calming down, quite the opposite.

“Who gives a stranger this kind of money?! What could he possibly be thinking? Why on earth would he do that?” Amy was practically yelling at nobody. Finally the truck started on her 5th try and she peeled out of the lot. She probably ran a red light or 2, but she didn’t care. She was in search of this lunatic and some answers. Pulling into the town hall lot, she jumped from the truck and slammed the door, hard.

“You must be Amy” she heard from an unfamiliar voice behind her. Turning around she found herself face to face with a tall dark but not at all handsome stranger. “Max?” she exclaimed. “That’s me”, he said with a twang, and she sensed a faint hint of laughter in his voice. “What is the meaning of all this?” she shouted, enraged all over again by his attitude. “Give me a few minutes to explain” he requested. Amy replied with venom in her voice, “You’ve got one”.

“I left my book intentionally, 2 nights ago. I wanted to see who from this small town might take time out of their busy lives to locate the owner of something that seemed so inconsequential and then reward them. Turns out that person was you. People can always use a little help so I planned on giving you $10,000 and the town $10,000. But then Sheriff here told me your name is Amy, so I doubled it for both.”

“That doesn’t make sense. Why would you double it just because my name is Amy?”

“Seemed like a sign. My baby sister was named Amy. But she died in a house fire with our parents when I was only 6.”