Ghost Shadow

Katie rushed up to David, grabbing him by the arm. “David! Stop it, stop! You’re going to be nabbed for assault. What the hell are you doing?”

The man beneath him wasn’t fighting. A crowd was gathering. David let her drag him up, but he stared down at the man below him, then extended his hand. The actor took it slowly. He rose. David reached out, ripping the straw mask from the actor’s face.

“Katie, I don’t think you ever met Mike Sanderson. Mike was the fellow Tanya fell in love with while I was gone. He was supposedly in Ohio when she was murdered. But he wasn’t. He was in St. Augustine, we know, the day after, which means he could have easily been down here when the deed was done. And how very, very odd. Here he is-back again. Playing with history, dressed up like Robert the Doll. Maybe he likes to play at being Carl Tanzler, Count von Cosel, too. Maybe he needs a new dead bride every decade.”

The man was big; as big as David, and even bulkier. The sailor suit had hidden some of his muscle.

But it didn’t look as if he wanted to fight anyone.

It looked as if he suddenly wanted to do anything but entertain the crowd.

There was a sudden spurt of applause. Katie turned around to see that they had garnered a loud crowd-and they seemed to think it was all being done for entertainment.

“Oh, good Lord! Go watch the cats,” Katie cried out.

Mike Sanderson hadn’t uttered a word. David was staring at him as if he could manifest daggers and press them into the man’s heart.

“Let’s get out of here!” she said.

She grabbed both men by the elbows, hating the fact that to get out of the crowd, she was going to have to get through the busy streets.

Walking arm in arm with Robert the Doll.

But Clarinda had reached them by then, and Jonas was right behind her. Neither of them had the least idea of what was going on, but Clarinda was always intuitive in any situation. “We can go right down Front Street, past the Old Customs House and the Westin, and then duck into Jonas’s place. Follow me.”

Katie felt absurdly like a college professor, struggling with fighting young adults. But after the first few seconds, there was no resistance from either man. When Mike Sanderson did stop suddenly, he explained himself quickly. “I have a boxful of money back there-I need it.” He blushed. “I’m supposed to be on a sales trip.”

“I’ll get it,” Jonas told them.

“You pretend to be on a sales trip-and you come here to pretend to be Robert the Doll?” David demanded.

“Fantasy Fest, every year,” Mike Sanderson admitted sheepishly.

“How long have you been doing this?” David asked.

“Since I left. Well, not exactly. I finished college, and then, since then…”

“Why?” Katie asked.

“I love it. I love Fantasy Fest. I always have. My wife hates it. So I pretend I’m on a sales trip.”

“How can you love this place-when Tanya died here?” David demanded.

Mike Sanderson stopped walking. He was rock-solid; Katie almost tripped when as she had been leading him along, he then pulled her back.

“I didn’t kill Tanya!” Sanderson said angrily. “And don’t kid yourself-I know exactly who you are, and I know that she stayed here just because she wanted to talk to you. I don’t think she was ever coming with me. Not once you had come back. But I didn’t kill her.”

“I really think we should get inside for this discussion,” Clarinda said. “That’s Jonas’s place, there.”

“It’s an i

“Yes, yes, but go up the stairs, he keeps the whole second floor of the main house for himself.”

As she spoke, Jonas came ru

No one answered him. He cleared his throat. “Okay, let’s get upstairs,” he said.

The outer door was open; it led to hallways with signs that indicated room numbers and pointed to cottages outside. They hurried up the stairs; the door in the hallway was locked and Jonas quickly opened it for them. They piled in.

Mike Sanderson moved first, striding across the room, tearing off the Velcro that held his Robert the Doll sailor outfit together in the back. He was wearing the costume over a pair of cutoff jeans and a simple white T-shirt. He folded it and put it at his feet. Katie realized that David was still holding the man’s cloth mask and sailor hat when Sanderson reached out to him. “Do you mind? I don’t intend to press charges, but I do make good money at this gig.”

“You make good money, standing in Mallory Square, pretending to be Robert the Doll?” Clarinda said incredulously.

“Four hundred bucks already tonight,” Sanderson said. “Beats selling vacuums, which I do to keep the family going.”

“But-you were supposed to be a big-shot football player at Ohio State!” Katie said.

“Knee injury. They loved me before it-I was yesterday’s news afterward,” Sanderson said.

She studied him. He was a big fellow with sandy-blond hair, light brown eyes and a pretty-boy face that seemed to be getting just a little fleshy at the edges now, as if he were a man who liked his booze.

“The police down here want to talk to you,” David told him.

“Yeah, I know, my wife called me,” he said.

“So why didn’t you come into the police station?” David asked him.

“I’m not supposed to be here,” Sanderson said with a sigh of impatience. “Don’t you get it? No one knows I do this. Hell, what, everyone’s life turns out to be what they want? I come down here. I see all the naked painted boobs for Fantasy Fest. I don’t go with any lowlifes, I don’t pick up any sexual diseases, I just do a lot of looking and drinking, and I make money to bring home by putting on a Robert the Doll costume and scaring people in the square. It’s a personal thing. What the hell is wrong with you, and what the hell business is it of yours that I do this?”

“It’s police business because you lied when they questioned you a decade ago,” David said. “And it’s police business because another woman was murdered.”

“Look-I do this for the money! I’m not hung up on Key West legend,” Sanderson said. “I loved Tanya! I wouldn’t have hurt her for the world. I was young. I waited for her-then I figured that she’d chosen you over me. When I heard about the murder, I panicked, and I got the hell out!”

“You will have to tell that story to the police,” David said.

Sanderson straightened where he sat. “Sure. I’ll be happy to do so.”

“When did you get here?” he asked.

Sanderson shook his head and winced. “Last Friday,” he said.

“Before Stella Martin was murdered,” David pointed out.

Sanderson stood, pointing hard at David. “Look, you bastard, you were the jilted lover. You owned the damned museum. You’re a fucking conch, for God’s sake-you’re the one all into the history and legend of Key West. They would have locked your ass up if you weren’t David Beckett!”

To David’s credit, he completely controlled his temper. He stood dead still without speaking for long seconds.

Sanderson took a step back from him. “Look, maybe you didn’t do it. But I know this much-I didn’t do it and you can haul me down to the station anytime you want.”

David looked over at Jonas. “Want to take a ride?”

“I-uh-sure,” Jonas said.

“What the hell? The sun has been down a long time now,” Clarinda said. “What a lovely evening out with friends!”