by Rickie Blair
What if I made an appointment with Noah to talk about “investment opportunities?” I could pose my questions about Oskar at the same time.
Pulling over to the side of the road, I reached for my phone and dialed his office.
Rebecca answered. “What can I do for you, Verity?”
“Could I speak to Noah?”
“I’m afraid not.”
“Is he in?”
“No.”
“Will he be back soon?”
I could hear the fish tank gurgling in the background while I waited for an answer.
“What did you want to see him about?”
“Oh—investment opportunities. Mostly.”
“Verity. Noah cannot speak to you about his clients.”
“So, Oskar York was a client?”
“I didn’t say that.”
“But you knew him?”
“No comment. I’ll tell Noah you called.”
“Wait, please. Has Noah been in the office since I visited the other day?”
“Why do you want to know?”
With her ability to keep a secret, Rebecca could work for MI-6. “I was hoping… that he’s not ill.”
The fish tank gurgled again.
“I’m sure he’ll be back soon. Thanks for calling.”
Click. Dial tone.
I could cross Noah Butterfield off my list of informants, unless I found a way to talk to him without Rebecca listening in. But since I didn’t even know where he was, that was unlikely.
Which was another weird thing. According to Thérèse, Noah was a real workhorse, always on the job. She claimed he once came in to work with a ruptured appendix. I suspected that was a village myth, but—
My hands gripped the steering wheel. As a bookkeeper in Vancouver, I’d seen a few fraud cases. The one thing those crooks had in common was an inability to stay away from the office—even when they should have been in the hospital, like Noah. Embezzlers couldn’t leave their books unattended, even for a day, for fear their crimes would be discovered.
Was Noah Butterfield stealing from clients? Clients like Oskar York?
Shaking my head, I put that idea out of my mind. It was ridiculous. Noah was a respected member of the community. Plus, he wasn’t in the office. Not today, anyway. Obviously, he wasn’t worried about clients checking the books.
But Oskar was dead and not able to check anything.
Stop it. Stick to the crossword puzzle, Verity. Oskar’s death was an accident and none of your business. Still—what had that workman said? Check with the lawyer. Aunt Adeline had been one of Wilfred Mullin’s clients for years, and I was, too. In fact, I considered the diminutive councilor a personal friend. Hopefully, he’d forgotten that unpleasant encounter with a roasted chicken. Yes. I should call Wilf. I pulled back out onto the road.
Beside me, Boomer caught sight of the conservation area, whimpered excitedly, and tried to climb over my lap to get to the driver’s door. Which reminded me that he’d probably been here with Mickey, and I hadn’t given Henri that shoebox of photos yet.
And I wouldn’t, until I had a chance to ask Mickey about the photograph that was currently burning a hole in my parka. I’d like to find out what he knew about it. If nothing else, it was a strange coincidence. After that, I would definitely stop thinking about Oskar York’s mysterious—make that accidental—death.
I turned into the conservation area, joining the only other vehicle in the parking lot, a battered white van. Talk about coincidences. The proprietor of Mickey’s Dog Care was walking his charges. I could show him Oskar’s photo without even leaving the neighborhood.
There were no dogs in sight. Mickey must have taken them out on the trail. Boomer and I could follow or wait in the truck. But with the way the terrier was drumming his front paws on the dashboard, I figured waiting around would be a tough sell.
I opened the driver’s door, intending to let him out the passenger side. But the instant I opened the door, Boomer—yipping excitedly—dove over me and hit the ground at a run.
“Wait,” I called, getting out of the truck and pointing to the sign that said—All dogs must be on leash. “Get back here.”
Boomer bounded like a rabbit toward me, then stopped just out of arm’s reach with his front legs bent, tail wagging and black eyes shining.
“Come here,” I said solemnly, pointing to the ground at my feet.
Boomer bounced a few more times, then darted in my direction.
I reached for his collar.
He darted away.
We performed this pas de deux several times. The more I tried to grab him, the more excited he became. How had Mickey managed to corral this dog?
Finally, I gave up. “Okay, no leash. This time. But if I get a ticket”—I waggled a finger at the sign—“it’s coming out of your dinner money.”
Boomer didn’t look worried. I slammed the truck door, then started around the back to avoid the thigh-high snowbank that surrounded the lot.
Mickey’s van was parked beside the cleared path that led to the conservation area trails. But the spot he’d picked to park in was deep in snow. It reached almost to the top of the wheels.
As I passed by, something caught my eye. I swiveled my head toward the window on the driver’s side, then drew back, startled.
Mickey was slumped against the seat with his eyes closed. His head was bare. For an instant, I wondered why he wasn’t wearing his tasseled wool hat. Maybe he kept it for special occasions.
Since it was way too cold to be napping in an unheated car, I tapped on the driver’s window to wake him. He didn’t move. “Mickey,” I called, rapping again. “Wake up.”
No response.
Turning the handle, I wrenched the door open. Mickey’s body leaned—very, very slowly—until his head and one arm flopped out of the van. His eyes were shut and his face had turned a peculiar pink, as if he’d been basking under a sunlamp.
“Mickey?” My throat tightened as I poked his motionless form. “Are you all right?”
Whipping off a glove, I pressed my thumb under his chin and waited, trying to gauge his pulse. I felt nothing. Repositioned my thumb. Waited again.
Still nothing. His non-pulsing neck was as cold as the ice under my feet.
Boomer stood beside me, his forepaws on the running board, staring intently at Mickey. He lifted a foot to paw at Mickey’s coat. Nothing happened.
I slumped to my knees on the ground, feeling queasy. After a moment, I got to my feet and sprinted back to the truck.
Boomer followed.
I opened the driver’s door. “Get in. Please?” I expected him to dart away, in a resumption of our game, but he obeyed at once. If a terrier could look solemn, Boomer was pulling it off.
After getting in and closing the door, I reached for my phone to call 9-1-1. After that, I called Jeff. Then I leaned over the steering wheel, head in my hands, with tears in my eyes.
Boomer nuzzled my side. I brushed him away. He nuzzled me again. With a sudden pang of fear, I bolted to an upright position.
Mickey wouldn’t be here unless he had dogs to walk. Where were they?
I jumped out of the truck, followed by Boomer. After a quick jog to the path that led to Pine Hill Peak, I bent to study the ground. Trampled marks in the freshly fallen snow showed the passage of multiple canine feet. There was no way to tell how old those tracks were.
Standing upright, I scanned the surrounding trees and fields. Overhead, a hawk swooped and soared. But on the ground, Boomer and I were alone. What happened to Mickey’s charges?
Where were the dogs?
Chapter Eighteen
For the next ten minutes, I sat in the truck cab with Boomer, with the engine on and warm air blasting out of the heater, listening to soothing classical music on the radio and trying not to think about Mickey’s body a few yards away. Briefly, I consider covering him with a blanket, but I knew enough about suspicious deaths not to tamper with evidence.
Ther
e was that word again—evidence. Which implied murder. Why couldn’t I put that out of my mind? There was nothing to suggest Mickey’s death was anything other than natural. It could have been a heart attack, or an aneurysm, or even—I shivered and turned up the heat—hypothermia.
Jeff arrived, parking his cruiser beside my truck. By the time I opened my door and got out, another cruiser had pulled into the parking lot beside him. Jeff made his way over to the constable, and they talked briefly. The only word I heard was “perimeter.” The constable opened his trunk. When he closed it, there was a roll of yellow caution tape in his hand.
He began stringing tape between the fence posts on either side of the parking lot entrance.
When Jeff reached me, he gave me a hug. Then he held me at arm’s length, with his hands on my shoulders and a mock-serious expression on his face. “You’ve got to stop finding bodies, Verity.”
I grimaced. “Not funny.”
“Sorry. Just trying to cheer you up. Why don’t you go home? We can get your statement later.” Jeff pointed to the truck, where a squirming Boomer was pressing his nose against the window, watching us intently. “Both of you.”
“No. I want to stay.”
“There’s no need,” Jeff said firmly. “Go home.” With that, he strode over to Mickey’s van and bent over the body leaning precariously out the open door. Jeff placed a practiced finger against Mickey’s neck, checking his pulse. He straightened up with a slight shake of his head.
Silently approaching him, I said, “He’s dead, isn’t he?”
Jeff, startled, whirled around. “Are you still here?”
“Obviously.”
“Verity, go home. Please. Let us deal with this. Don’t interfere.”
“I’m not interfering,” I said indignantly. “I’m just standing here.”
“Well, stand farther back.”
I took a few steps to the rear.
“Thank you.” After going over to his cruiser, he raised his handheld radio to his lips and mumbled something into it.
When he was done, I retraced my steps. “What do you think happened to him?”
Jeff narrowed one eye. “Is this your idea of not interfering?”
“I’m only asking a question. I did find the body, after all.” Crossing my arms and trying not to look at said corpse, I repeated my question. “What do you think happened?”
“The van smells of dope. Mickey probably fell asleep.”
“Mickey? You know him?”
“Let’s just say Mickey Doig and the local force are not strangers.”
“I don’t understand. Did he freeze to death?”
“Possibly. His skin is bright pink, which could be from hypothermia. But it’s more likely a symptom of carbon-monoxide poisoning.”
“People sit in their cars all the time with the engine running. They don’t die.”
“Mickey’s van is old, and the floor in the back is bare. It’s possible rust holes in the exhaust and the floor funneled carbon monoxide inside, particularly since snow is blocking the space under the car. The forensics crew will test the vehicle to determine if that’s what happened. But keep this to yourself, Verity. It’s equally possible he had an undetected health problem, which—” He stopped talking. “What are you doing? Don’t touch the van.”
I was bending over the tailpipe, where a tiny fragment of navy blue cloth poked out of the opening. Only a few strands, but— “That’s unusual, isn’t it?”
Jeff crouched beside me to take a closer look. He pulled a plastic evidence bag and a pair of tweezers from his pocket. Carefully, he removed the threads and placed them in the bag before standing up. “It’s probably nothing.”
“Someone could have stuffed the tailpipe with cloth while Mickey was asleep, then removed it after he was dead.”
Jeff rubbed a hand across the back of his neck. “You do have murder on the brain.”
“I didn’t say anything about murder.”
“The forensics crew would have found those strands when they went over the vehicle.”
“I’m not implying they wouldn’t. They’ll be extremely thorough, as always. It’s just that—”
A shout from the parking lot entrance caused us both to look up.
“You can’t stop me,” a familiar woman in a sheepskin coat shrieked as she raced past the officer on duty, then broke through the yellow tape. “Cranberry! Cranberry, where are you?” She sprinted off across the field.
“Oh, great,” Jeff said. “How did they find out?”
Two other women and a man halted in front of Jeff, wheezing for breath. “We have to”—gasp—“find our”—gasp—“dogs. Anything could have happened to them.”
Jeff held out a warning hand. “I’m sorry, but you can’t come through here.”
All four ignored his attempt to block them. They ducked around him and headed for the path that led to the lookout, jogging after Cranberry’s owner.
Alarmed, I clutched Jeff’s sleeve. “If the dogs went that way, they could fall off the Escarpment. It’s three hundred feet straight down.”
The dogs’ owners were yelling at the top of their lungs.
“Cranberry, where are you?”
“Pixi, get out here!”
“Ranger, co-m-e.”
“Those animals are not obedient,” I said, frowning.
Amused, Jeff only shook his head, fighting back a smile.
“Mickey used to walk Boomer, so he’s part of their pack,” I said. “I bet he can find them.”
“Yeah. That dog’s a regular bloodhound. Maybe we can conscript him into the force.”
I harrumphed. “Maybe you can.”
Jeff didn’t hear me. He was bending over Mickey’s body, conferring with the coroner who had just arrived.
Boomer eyed me intently from the truck’s back window. After a moment’s thought, I let him out. He sat obediently in front of me, but his front legs beat a staccato rhythm on the ground until his whole body shook. He was raring to go.
“Okay, boy.” I pointed to the field beside the parking lot. “Find your buddies.”
He took off like a shot.
Chapter Nineteen
Boomer charged along the trail, and I did my best to keep up. Four legs were better than two for jogging over rough terrain. It didn’t help when the storm that had been threatening all morning finally blew in. Sleet pelted down, digging tiny holes in the snow, making the footing even more treacherous.
We slogged on—Boomer oblivious to the fog rolling in, and me struggling and grumbling yards behind.
Up ahead, the dog owners continued to call, but their pleas were less frequent. Perhaps they were running out of breath. As we plunged into the woods, I turned for a last look at the parking lot, barely visible through the thickening mist. The vehicle that would take Mickey’s body to the morgue had arrived. I turned my attention back to the trail as Boomer raced ahead of me. Did this dog ever slow down?
The answer to that turned out to be yes, but only after a half hour of nonstop running. Gratefully, I staggered to a halt. Bent over with my hands on my knees, I gasped for breath. Maybe Aunt Adeline was right when she said I should step up my workouts.
The dog owners plodded past on their return to the parking lot, talking dejectedly among themselves.
“Did you see the dogs?” I asked.
Cranberry’s owner stopped beside me, close to tears. “They’ve disappeared. We’re going to get help.” She scurried to catch up to the others plodding along the path.
I looked down at Boomer. So much for your bloodhound ancestry, I thought as we followed the dog owners.
When Boomer and I reached the parking lot, the coroner was packing up his medical bag while the dog owners argued with Jeff. As I drew closer, I realized they expected the police to mount a search-and-rescue mission for their missing pets.
“We’ll keep an eye out. If they’re in the vicinity, someone will spot them,” Jeff said in the soothing tone that always calmed
me down.
It didn’t work.
“Keep an eye out?” the man asked indignantly. “Keep an eye out? What good will that do? What about the coyotes? We can’t leave our dogs outside all night. We have to find them.”
The others muttered in agreement, pressing in on Jeff.
He held his hands up. “I’m sorry. There’s not much I can do. We’ve radioed the dogs’ descriptions to the rest of the force. They’ll turn up. Or someone will find them.”
The man turned to the other owners, pulling a cell phone from his pocket. “Let’s ask for help. Get as many people up here as we can.”
“No. Don’t do that,” Jeff implored. “We can’t have lost-pet seekers swarming the area. This is a police scene—it’s a suspicious death.”
I raised an eyebrow. A suspicious death? A-ha.
Jeff watched forlornly as the dog owners huddled over their phones. “Don’t do that.”
No one listened.
“The lost-pet sites have picked it up,” a woman said. “Post more pictures. We’ll have hundreds of people out here before long.”
Jeff clapped a hand to his forehead, gazing over the abandoned field. His sigh was inaudible, but I heard it nonetheless. “Those dogs are not here,” he said, lowering his hand to make another attempt. “Your helpers should check elsewhere. Meanwhile—”
At my feet, Boomer started barking. Arf-arf-arf-arf-arf-arf…
“Stop it,” I hissed.
Jeff turned around, his irritation easy to see. “—can we at least get everybody out of the parking lot?”
“Stop it,” I repeated, grabbing for Boomer’s leash. Too late, I remembered he didn’t have one.
This time, he darted in the opposite direction, through the parking lot and across the road, headed for a farmer’s field.
Exasperated, Jeff pointed at the dog. “He’s trespassing.”
I knew what that meant. Farmers were allowed to shoot animals that harassed their livestock. I doubted somebody would shoot Boomer, but if, say, there was a prize bull in that field, I didn’t want to take any chances. Tightening the cord on my parka hood, I ran after him.
