Free Lizzie! by Maxine Kumin

morphed into the tight-lipped chief of police.
    While Mom was still chatting with Digger I rolled up to my computer and hit my emails. I had to let Trippy in on the latest events, but at the same time I was sworn to secrecy by Digger. I decided to tell her that “the goldfinches” turned out to be very valuable birds that had been stolen and now they were gone, but I left out the rest of the story about Digger and Julio and that he was being placed in protective custody. “I swore an oath to Digger that I wouldn’t tell anything about Julio yet,” I wrote. “More info tomorrow.”
    I could see Trippy practically hopping up and down not knowing what else was happening but I couldn’t help it. Once you raise your right hand and swear, an oath is an oath.
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    CHAPTER 12
    W ell, I know this sounds crazy with so much happening almost at once, but believe it or not, there wasa murderpractically in front of our cottage! Digger was the one who discovered it. It was the very next morning. He’d had insomnia again and he got up at four a.m. and puttered around and finally he pulled on a sweatshirt and went for a walk on the beach barefoot. Teresa is always after him to take walks. I remember the first day Mom and I met them on the beach, Digger wiggled his toes and said, “When I was a kid I never wore shoes except to school. And now after six months of going barefoot my feet are feeling young again.”
    It was just as Mom was starting to get supper ready that Digger and Teresa stopped by our cottage. Digger told us in great detail everything that had happened, starting at four o’clock that morning.
    â€œIt was still dark but you could see the horizon line,” he began. “The tide was coming in and I sort of splashed through it. I was feeling pretty good for an old retired chief of police with a bad heart, and I watched the sky show streaks of pink and yellow as I walked. You know about the jetty?”
    I said, “It’s practically in front of our cottage and I sometimes see people who come out to fish from it.” I was remembering when Mom first got me this neat little pair of binocs so I could watch the shorebirds, of which there are many, and try to match them up with the pictures in Birds of Florida. So far I’ve learned to tell an ibis from an egret and not a whole lot more. I use them to people-watch too. Sometimes I can see somebody—usually a man but sometimes a woman—catch a fish and haul it in and drop it into their pail. Once there was this enormous skate, like a black kite. I could see them holding it up for everyone to admire. Little speedboats zoom around the jetty too. And twice, just as it was getting really dark, I got to see a man walk a long way out on the jetty and then another man give him something. I couldn’t see exactly what it was.
    But I needed to listen to what Digger was saying. “The jetty is where I try to walk to every morning—it’s about half a mile away. You know, they made that jetty about thirty years ago. They dredged up those big rocks piled there to make the channel wide enough for all the cruise ships.”
    I said, “Mom and I always go outside just before dark whenever a cruise ship is starting out. ‘Setting sail’ is what they call it, though they don’t hoist any sails anymore because they have big engines.”
    I wanted to describe how each ship is about as long as a city block and every deck is all lit up like they’re having a permanent New Year’s Eve party. When they go through the channel they hoot their horns and that deep-throated sound always makes me shiver. Every cruise ship has to take a pilot along to navigate through the channel—it’s the law—and then when the water is deep enough, a tender comes alongside to bring the pilot back to the harbor. But this wasn’t the time. I had to pay attention to Digger.
    â€œWhen I got