Cottage on Gooseberry Bay: Charmed Summer by Kathi Daley (big screen ebook reader txt) 📗

She slipped her glasses on, resting them on the edge of her nose. “So let’s take a look at this photo.”

I pulled it up on my phone and then handed the phone to her. Perhaps I should print out the photos when I got back to my office.

“This is a reading challenge charm,” she said.

“Reading challenge?” I asked.

“There was a span of maybe six or seven years where the bookstore issued a summer reading challenge. Residents and even a few summer visitors signed up, and each participant received a log to keep track of the books they read. There were spaces for the title and the author, the number of pages, a star rating, and a brief review. The bookkeeping for the challenge was strictly an honor system since we had no way to confirm such things, but in general, I think that most folks kept accurate records.”

“And the participants received a charm?”

“There were prizes for various levels. If you read a thousand pages over the course of the summer, you received a bookmark signed by a local author. For reading twenty-five hundred pages, you received your choice of a mug or t-shirt, plus the bookmark. For reading five thousand pages, you received your choice of charm or key ring, plus the mug or t-shirt and the bookmark. The prizes did vary somewhat from year to year, and the prizes differed slightly each year.”

“So you’d change up the design on the mug and t-shirt and maybe offer different charms,” I said.

“Exactly. The charm in this photo was from the challenge in nineteen ninety-six.” She pointed to the photo. “See, there’s a little nine and a little six on the spine of the book represented on the charm.”

I looked closely and did notice the numbers, which had been too small to really stand out amidst the design. “So, do you have records of the event?” I asked. “Would you be able to tell us who earned charms that year?”

She nodded. “I kept records of everything. They’re all digitized. If you want to leave me an email address, I can send you a list of names of those who earned charms in nineteen ninety-six.”

“I’d appreciate that.”

“I don’t suppose you remember anyone with a charm bracelet with items such as a shoe, a movie reel, and an ice cream cone?” I asked.

She shook her head. “No. I’m afraid I can’t help you with that. While we had quite a few women who worked hard to earn the charm, I can’t say that I remember seeing any of them actually wearing a charm bracelet.”

After sharing my email address with Kendra, we thanked the woman for her help and then headed out to have lunch. I’d mentioned that I planned to head over to the high school at three to speak to Greta Barber, and Jemma and Josie had volunteered to go with me since both women knew her from volunteer duties in the past.

“So have either of you heard any more about the missing teens?” I asked Jemma and Josie after we settled in at the restaurant.

“Not really,” Josie answered. “I do know that they haven’t been found, and I heard that the cops are stumped. No one claims to have seen anything, and the police were unable to find evidence of a motive when they searched their rooms and school lockers. The families have been interviewed, friends have been questioned, and the boy’s usual hangouts searched, but so far, it looks like the three missing boys simply vanished.”

“Have any of the parents have received a ransom demand or anything like that?” I asked.

“No,” Josie answered. “No one has heard a thing. I think everyone is getting pretty frustrated, but at least so far, no bodies have been found, which means the potential exists for them to be alive.”

“I wonder if there is anything we can do to help without stepping on Deputy Todd’s toes,” I said.

“I don’t know. Maybe we should check in with Parker. It’s her job to stay on top of things like this, and we all know that Parker is really good at her job.”

Jemma called Parker, who informed Jemma that she had a meeting with her boss in an hour, but wondered if we might want to meet after work. Jemma and Josie were free, so we arranged to meet Parker at Jemma and Josie’s cottage at five-thirty. Josie professed a craving for steak and salad, so the roommates made up a list and planned to stop at the store after we spoke to Greta.

By the time we made it over to the high school, classes were just letting out. The high school I had attended was pretty industrial looking with long buildings sprayed with tan-colored paint, but Gooseberry Bay High, with its location up on a hill overlooking the bay, was actually quite charming.

“Josie, Jemma. What brings you to the high school today?” the woman in the theater asked.

“Greta, this is our friend, Ainsley, and she’s helping a woman track down the owner of a charm bracelet,” Josie explained. “One of the charms is a movie reel, and we thought that might represent the Movies on the Beach event we have here every summer.”

“So you think the charms on the bracelet are clues to solving your little mystery,” Greta stated, looking in my direction.

“We aren’t sure, but we hope that by putting together the clues provided by the charms, we’ll be able to figure this out,” I answered.

“Even if the movie reel is meant to commemorate the Movies on the Beach event, we aren’t sure what that tells us,” Josie said.

“It occurred to Ainsley that perhaps the woman who owned the bracelet was a volunteer,” Jemma added.

“If this woman would have been a volunteer, when would she have volunteered?” Greta asked.

“We think it would have been the summer