“We, ah, had houseguests. They left this morning.”
“Did they take the ferry?”
“No, they came and left by boat; they’re cruising the coast and just stopped in for the night.”
“May I ask their names?”
“Bill and Julie Robertson.”
“And the name of their boat?”
“I don’t really know the boat’s name,” Caleb replied. “It’s a sailing boat, pretty good size, but I don’t know its name.”
“How can I contact the Robertsons?”
“Why do you want to contact them?”
“I need to verify their presence here last night.”
“Well, I suppose you’ll have to wait until they return to Boston in the fall. They’re cruising all summer.”
“Mr. Stone, would you mind if I had a look around your house?”
“What for?”
“I’d like to see for myself if your sons are here.”
“All right. Go ahead,” Caleb said, standing aside and holding the door open.
Sergeant Young stepped inside the house, and he heard the door close firmly behind him.
Chapter 53
STONE FINISHED HIS LUNCH and pushed back from the table. “I’m going to look for Sergeant Young,” he said.
“Take it easy, Stone,” Lance said. “He’s only been gone for an hour, and we know where he went. Relax and have some dessert.”
Stone tried to relax. “Ginny, how are you coming with Esme’s diary?”
“Slowly,” she replied. “I can go faster, if you don’t care if I destroy it.”
“Please do it as you see fit, Ginny.”
“It’s just that it’s all these thin sheets, and they’ve been mashed together by water and the pressure of the cover. If I use the heat from the hair dryer too much, they dry too fast and crumble.”
Lance spoke up. “Ginny, if it’s too difficult, I can send it back to Langley and let the experts have a go at it.”
“We don’t have time for that,” Stone said.
“You mean Holly doesn’t have time for that,” Ham said. It was the first time he had spoken during lunch.
“I can do it, Lance,” Ginny said, “but it has to be done slowly, and I don’t think your people at Langley could do it any faster. I know it would be nice to do this in a lab, to better preserve the diary as evidence, but we have a different priority here, and that’s to get Holly back as quickly as possible.”
Stone stood up. “I’m going to go call Tom Young and see if he’s all right.” He left the room.
Ham watched him go. “I think Stone is almost as tightly wound as I am.”
Stone came back. “I got his voice mail. I’m going to wait another half an hour, and then I’m going over to Caleb’s house.” He sat down and tried to eat the apple pie in front of him.