Читать книгу Jewels On Tiger Island - Catherine Pickren - Страница 14

The Sheriff’s Office and detectives found out the identity of the young deceased woman. Her name was Joanne Marie Jones. She was twenty-three, a graduate student at the University of North Florida in Jacksonville, Florida studying to be an actress, and living in Callahan, Florida, which is still in Nassau County, Florida. She still lived with her parents, James and Sarah Jones, so she could save on tuition costs and commute to school. Her dad had just retired from the Rayonier Paper Mill where one-third of the men in Nassau County, Florida worked. She had a brother, Gabe, younger by five years, who also lived at home. The family and Callahan community were devastated by the loss of Joanne. She was a talented actress who was very ambitious. Her goal was to get a job acting at the Alhambra Dinner Theatre in Jacksonville, Florida, and later possibly teach drama in a college.

Her funeral took place on a rainy Sunday afternoon at the Callahan Presbyterian Church. Nothing, however, had been mentioned in the newspaper or on T.V. for that matter, about the cause of death. It was as if Joanne’s case had been forgotten by the Nassau County Sheriff’s Office.

John and Mary continued meeting frequently with Lucy and Logan. It was as if they shared a secret pact together. They would often take short weekend excursions together on John’s yacht down the southern coast of Florida to Port St. Lucy or Fort Lauderdale. The four of them even travelled on John’s yacht northward to Beaufort, North Carolina, a small historic and tourist town, during the Thanksgiving holiday. By this time, most everyone on Amelia Island, Florida knew the four of them had discovered the body on Tiger Island, Florida. However, “stepping on eggshells,” no one ever brought up the subject around them.

Sitting at the bar at Bret’s Restaurant on Friday night of the second week of December, John, Mary, Lucy and Logan saw Sergeant Haddock, Sheriff Benson, and two deputies they didn’t know come in for dinner. The sheriff and his entourage sat in the north corner of the restaurant where they could see the boats come and go on the waterway.

John was the first to speak, “Hey, Matt! Who are the other two guys that are sitting in the corner with the sheriff and sergeant?”

Matt replied: “The shorter one with the bald head is Deputy Simon Cox. He’s about fifty and has been at the department about two years. The taller one holding up his menu is Deputy Ben Benson. He is the sheriff’s son and is in his early thirties. Ben has been at the department about five years. They eat here together a lot for lunch, and occasionally for dinner, depending on their shifts. Rumor has it that they often go over to the sheriff’s garage behind his house on Saturday nights and play poker for mid to high stakes. They are still friendly towards each other so they must ‘break even’.”

John looked pensively at the four lawmen and said, “I have a negative feeling about the Sheriff’s Department in general. I don’t know about the deputies because I haven’t met them. However, I’m pretty perspicacious. Doesn’t it seem odd to anyone that the cause of death was ‘undetermined’ for the girl who was found on Tiger Island? You know that they must have found some DNA evidence, and results should have already been disclosed. The Sheriff’s Office was supposed to have gotten back with us for any follow-up information or evidence. Did anyone here get a call from the Sheriff’s Office?”

Mary, Lucy and Logan looked at each other quizzically and shook their heads, “no”.