Free Wyatt's Revenge: A Matt Royal Mystery by H. Terrell Griffin

up, and I saw two car carriers along the side of Gulf of Mexico Drive. They were bringing the snowbirds’ cars down while the owners came by plane. Pretty soon, traffic would be heavy. Our island swells from about 2,500 people in the summer to 25,000 in the winter. It’s a trial, but the cold weather in the North brings a lot of old friends back to paradise.
    Logan said, “I don’t get the connection between Sauer and Wyatt. You got any ideas?”
    “None. Donna didn’t know him, and I never heard of him, so he and Wyatt probably weren’t real friendly. Maybe just colleagues.”
    “But why would the same person kill Sauer and Wyatt, and on the same day?”
    “I’m guessing that the timing of both murders was so that one victim wouldn’t find out about the other and go to the police with whatever he knew. But who knows?”
    “These guys were both history professors,” said Logan. “Maybe the names on that list have some historical significance. Why don’t you call Austin Dwyer? He might recognize something.”
    Austin Dwyer was a retired history professor at a small college in Connecticut. Logan and I had met him in the Florida Keys earlier in the year and formed a friendship. If he didn’t know who the people on the list were, he might be able to tell us the name of somebody who would.
    “Good idea, Logan. I often underestimate you.”
    I e-mailed Austin, attaching the list, and asked him to see if any of it madesense to him. I gave him my cell phone number and asked him to call. Minutes later, I got an automatic response telling me that Austin would be away until Friday and that he would respond then.
    I searched the Internet for the names on the list, but what little information I found made no sense to me. I’d have to wait to hear from Austin.
    I was at loose ends. I paced my living room trying to put the puzzle together. The pieces didn’t fit. None of the information I had so far fit together in any coherent pattern.
    I gave up and turned to more mundane things. My Explorer had been hard to start the past couple of days. The starter would drag and almost die before catching. I probably needed a new battery. It was also time for an oil change and a brake job. I called the shop I used on Cortez Road and made an appointment for the work. The manager said he’d have one of his men pick the car up the next morning.
    I needed to clear my head. A jog on the beach, a shower, and a nap finished off my afternoon, and I drove down to the Hilton. There is always a gathering of locals on Thursday evening at the outside bar. Logan was on the mainland having dinner with Marie, and I needed a little company.
    Billy Brugger, the long-time bartender, poured me a Miller Lite, shook my hand, and said, “I understand you’ve been asking around about Dick LaPlante.”
    “Are there no secrets on this island?”
    “Nope.”
    “Where did you hear that?”
    “Dora Walters over at the paper told me you had an interest in LaPlante. Said Gwen Mooney told her you were asking about him.”
    “Not so much an interest as curiosity. His name showed up on a list I found in Wyatt’s stuff, and I wondered what the connection was.”
    “I know the guy. He’s an asshole.”
    “There seems to be a consensus on that.”
    “He’s been in here a couple of times. Always with a different woman. He treats the staff like they were his personal servants, and he doesn’t tip worth a damn. When the manager asked him to be nice, he threatened to buy the hotel and fire us all. A real asshole.”
    “Anything else?”
    “He speaks French. Last time he was here, he was talking to his date in French. A couple of our regular snowbirds from Quebec were here and said he was fluent.”
    “His dad’s French-Canadian.”
    “But the snowbirds said he was speaking with a Parisian accent.”

CHAPTER NINETEEN
    I was up early on Friday morning, sitting on the sunporch with my coffee and newspaper. Low dark clouds hung over the bay. The wind was