$15.95 265 pages softcover
The Dam Committee
A Humorous Maine Murder Mystery
by Earl H. Smith
Earl Smith is a natural-born storyteller and his first mystery novel, THE DAM COMMITTEE, is a charming, funny, and gripping tale of the life and crime of small-town Maine. His Belfry, Maine has wonderfully drawn small-town characters, nefarious bad guys, and a suitcase full of cold cash—THE DAM COMMITTEE is a delight. My hope is that Smith, with his understated wit and eye for detail, has another book in the hopper just like this one.
—Gerry Boyle, crime novelist and author of PORT CITY BLACK AND WHITE
Snuggled between two fine lakes, the quaint Maine village of Belfry gets by on its own good looks and the free-flapping wallets of annoying summer tourists. Here, locals struggle to learn far more about each other than is necessary and face all things new with great caution. The formula works fine for everyday life, but not for a murder under their very noses, and certainly not for a sudden deluge of folding money.
A marvelous mechanical gate has replaced the ancient timber crib dam in the center of town, but repairs are not complete. A crumbling shore wall still lists into the spillway, threatening to collapse in any coming storm. Stingy voters are fed up with the whole dam business, and changing their minds is the job of the much-maligned Belfry Dam Committee: Harry, the fretful safety officer at the Gammon Sawmill; Nibber, Harry’s carefree alter ego and local handyman; and Nibber’s girlfriend Debbie, a comely waitress at the Sunrise Grill.
In a town that cares a great deal about its water levels, the Committee has its hands full, but the challenges multiply on a March night when Harry and Nibber trudge over the ridge to make a final check on Salome O’Neil, a woman who lives by herself while waiting for her drug-dealing husband Doc to get out of jail. Harry and Nibber arrive to discover that Doc got home a day early, and Salome met him with a gun. As they turn to leave, Harry’s talkative dog Winston digs up a suitcase, buried in the snow. It holds a half-million dollars or more, all in old tens and twenties. They hide it in the rafters of Harry’s garage.
The murder seems a cut and dried affair. Salome says she and Doc fought over a suitcase she never saw, and he came at her with a knife. She sticks to her tale at a revealing trial, and most everyone believes her, except doubting Harry, who sets out to find the true killer.
The suitcase is trouble from the beginning. After a rollicking night of karaoke at the Sunrise Grille, the Committee, joined by Harry’s sensible wife Diane, agrees to keep the dirty money and spread it around where it is needed. The noble plan fails to reckon with either Belfry’s great thirst for gossip or the zeal of two men – Parker Meehan, a dogged federal agent, and a ruthless mobster called the Nurse. Both are soon snooping around, turning heaven and earth to find the suitcase.
The tale carries into the spring, beginning with a raucous Town Meeting and on to Memorial Day, when flatlanders begin to clog the narrow Main Street. Along the way, an infusion of cash from the suitcase saves the decrepit village church and foils the plans of the divine sign-reading Pastor Peppard and his loyal acolytes. Soon after, a mysterious gift of precious land and a spate of incidental donations lead to a firestorm of speculation (and an overflow of donation cans placed by eager supplicants at Knight’s General Store). Across the street, the right-wing postmaster plays Rush Limbaugh on the radio while holding daily suitcase briefings: and Malvine Grandbush, Belfry’s venomous librarian and Grand Dame of Gossip, issues a stream of wild rumors that Harry fears will eventually settle on the truth.
Labor Day arrives along with Hurricane Clara. Rampaging high water raises havoc at the dam, and as Harry watches the torrent, the portly deputy sheriff, Kelly Hallowell, unwittingly provides him with the cinching clue to the murder of Doc O’Neil. The killer is nabbed before the storm is over. Later, at the Sunrise, Harry spells out murder evidence that has been there all along, and Nibber goes one better with a most astonishing revelation of his own.
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