CRIES FROM THE COLD: A bone-chilling mystery thriller. (Detective Calista Gates 1)

by Bernadette Calonego

  “But that’s . . . Really, Mother. If Becca had been one of your daughters, would you have called it an obsession?”

  “I drummed it into all of you: never to go with strangers!”

  “Maybe the murderer wasn’t a stranger, maybe he knew Becca very well. That happens more that you think.”

  “We don’t know that; the police never caught him, after all.”

  “Exactly.”

  I leave it hanging and unsaid. Because you didn’t believe me, he got away. And Becca lost her life, brutally.

  “You had so many talents. Oh, how you could dance! You used to dance for us in the living room. And such a head for figures. You found math so easy.”

  “You’re saying I should have become an accountant?”

  “The RCMP has only brought you misfortune, you have to admit it. That’s no way to live.”

  Mom keeps talking, but my ears are shut. She refuses to acknowledge that I’ve found my vocation with the police. That I like the work. That I got ahead, moved up. Everything went well. Until I was attacked. But I recovered. I’ve made some more progress. So says my doctor. Incredible progress. One day everything will be just the way it was before. I have to believe in it. I won’t give up. And Becca’s murderer—one day I’ll find him. I’ll find him!

  “I hope you will be coming back to Vancouver soon, my darling.”

  “I hope so, too.”

  “You’re a stranger there, and I know how strangers are looked at in small villages. It was like that in Sophita, too.”

  Sophita is my mother’s native village. It would have surprised me if it hadn’t come up in our conversation. Unlike my father, my mother has never cut her ties to Greece.

  “Were there no foreigners at all in Sophita?”

  “Of course there were, my darling, not many, maybe two or three, who stayed for a few months. Mostly artists from Northern Europe. They didn’t come anymore afterward.”

  “Afterward?”

  “After the catastrophe with Ioannis, the fisherman. Have I never told you the story? He lost his boat because he couldn’t pay off his debts. It was confiscated. A Swede who came to Sophita every year heard about it. He lent Ioannis his motorboat. A really nice man. But then Ioannis went out in bad weather, the boat tipped over, and he drowned. And do you know what happened? The people in the village said that it was the Swede’s fault. That he’d lent him a faulty boat. But it was Ioannis’s mistake. He shouldn’t have taken it out.”

  A Greek tragedy. Why is she telling me this? My mother is not naïve. She’ll deliver an explanation right away.

  And so it is this time, too.

  “There are dogs that bite the hand that feeds them.”

  As always, I can’t hold back when mother tosses out bait.

  “Mom, only if a dog has been badly treated and is afraid.”

  “That might be the case,” my mother replies, “but they bite the wrong person.”

  34

  Gerald Hynes rides his Ski-Doo to where the shooting contest will take place. He’s one of the judges. The fresh air is good for him after working in Dr. Perrell’s house, where his thoughts had been racing around in circles. Terrible thoughts. The sky is overcast, which isn’t bad. The shooters won’t have to squint when looking into the sun. Luckily the wind has died down somewhat, after raging during the night. He can see the large crowd of spectators from some distance away. The shooting contest always attracts a lot of people. Everybody wants to win, and the Hengstridet Corporation has donated the prize money for the hospital. At least twenty thousand. The higher the shooters’ scores, the more money is added. To top it off, Hengstridet will double the final amount. The transport company generously stepped in as the sponsor after Bakie’s murder. Probably helps its image. So now there won’t be a seven-course dinner but a shooting contest instead. Gerald doesn’t see the irony of it—that’s just the way Labrador is. He’s convinced that the contest will bring in more money for the clinic than a banquet would.

  Nevertheless, at ten o’clock, he met Dr. Perrell, who was in a bad mood. Although the doctor had the day off and Dr. Cameron had to work this Sunday. Gerald actually intended to hash out details of the renovation, but the doctor was too busy venting his anger over the two Mounties who came to his place to grill him. In the course of the conversation, Gerald found out that it was Delgado and Sullivan, not Calista Gates. They evidently wanted to know who’d been in the Viking house and when, or who’d planned to go there. Dr. Perrell thought they were completely off track. The murder, he said, has nothing to do with Port Brendan. In Perrell’s opinion, they should be rooting around in Happy Valley-Goose Bay. The policemen assured him that the local RCMP were doing just that right this minute. But Perrell’s mood didn’t improve. He kept lamenting: Bakie’s restaurant is in Happy Valley-Goose Bay, and Bakie had many contacts there. By “contacts,” Perrell probably meant possible enemies as well.

  The doctor considers the constables to be amateurs; that’s as clear to Gerald as the glass he’s installed in the doctor’s kitchen cupboards. Perrell claimed many cases haven’t been solved because the separate RCMP detachments didn’t cooperate. Gerald didn’t reveal that the police also had him in their sights and that they were rechecking his alibi yet again. He’d learned this from his foreman. And now he was to undergo a lie-detector test as well. In Corner Brook, of all places. Yeah, they probably don’t have all their marbles.

  But he still has a grace period. In his opinion, the police can’t do anything during the Winter Games. He’s fully engaged as a volunteer. He rules on the hits on the targets for the shooting competition. He also arranged to assist the traditional Inuit games of strength; he finds them the most exciting. He’s the referee for the seal crawl, the owl hop, and the high jump.

  He stops at the tent where the shooters register and pay a small fee.

  “How many?” he asks the woman in charge of the paperwork.

  “Eleven teams, one hundred and ten shooters total; we’ve processed about a third of them so far. The best are still to come.”

  He makes a face. So many participants. That means he’ll need to be there for hours.

  “Well, then, let’s go.”

  He turns around and discovers Calista Gates a few steps behind the crowd gathered next to the shooting stand. She’s observing people. What’s she looking for? Or whom? He’s got no time for her, which is too bad. He quickly puts on his ear protection.

  The banging begins. The fourteenth shooter, a man from Port Hope Simpson, has such a high score that the twenty thousand dollars for the clinic are already secure. It’s not only about money but about ego. Gerald runs back and forth, examines the target sheets, enters the results, talks with the shooters who are whining about something or other. After an hour and a half, a young woman from Happy Valley-Goose Bay beats the man from Port Hope Simpson. Almost twenty-one thousand dollars. The spectators’ mood is heating up.

  Dennis Richards appears. Gerald can’t find him on the list of registered shooters.

  “Why should I pay a fee when I’m making money for the clinic?” Richards complains.

  Gerald scowls and shakes his head.

  “It won’t kill you. All this costs money. The target sheets and all the administration.”

  Dennis is irritated.

  “Sure, and it’s going right into your pocket,” he rails.

  “Are you with the skinflints or the sponsors?” an onlooker shouts.

  “The government should pay for the equipment in the clinic, not us,” Richards responds. “That’s the last thing we need.”

  Gerald sees Dr. Perrell in the crowd; he’s too far away to hear them arguing, but somebody is sure to report to Perrell what Richards said. Hopefully the doctors will let the idiot wait in the clinic for hours next time when he’s caught something.

  A cluster of young women shooters hear the quarrel.

  “You people always want money from the government,” one of them shouts, “but you don’t want
to pay taxes. Where’s the money supposed to come from?”

  “So shoot better than me, you goddamn bitches,” Richards yells, throwing a bill down on the registration table and picking up his rifle. “I’m on Team Port Brendan.”

  He demonstrates on this day, too, that he’s an excellent shot. His score goes unchallenged for almost an hour, although the young women’s scores are hot on his heels. Gerald picks up on the fact that they’re in Monday’s biathlon.

  He’s lost sight of Calista Gates, but Perrell materializes beside him and hands him a steaming coffee.

  “I hope we make as much as the coffee cart over there,” he jokes.

  Gerald can imagine the doctor’s fingers twitching.

  “I can count about five people who can beat Richards,” he assures him.

  At that moment, he rediscovers Gates. The young women start talking to her at once and drag her over to the shooting stand. Gates goes along with it and laughs. He’d never seen her laugh. He can’t tear himself away from watching her face. What a picture!

  “She absolutely must take part,” one of the biathletes shouts at him. “Cops are good shots.”

  Gates shakes her head.

  “These people are billeted at my place,” she explains to him with a wink. “They’re going to turn my whole house upside down.”

  The young women won’t give up.

  “C’mon, Constable, it’s worth a try, it’s for the clinic.”

  Perrell intervenes, and Gerald keeps checking scores but pricks up his ears.

  Gates begs off. “It’s a shame, but I sprained my right hand shoveling snow, and it’s hopeless. I would disappoint you all.”

  Dennis Richards comes up and exclaims: “Constable, you can’t hide behind that excuse.”

  “Shut your big trap, Richards!” the same onlooker as before shouts. This time Gerald studies him more closely.

  Look at that. Rick Stout. He’s usually not this rude. Maybe he wants to impress his neighbor.

  Suddenly he hears a clear voice.

  “I’ll take your place, Constable. If you don’t mind. You shouldn’t have to shoot with an injury.”

  Ann Smith is standing next to them. Everyone looks at her in astonishment. She’s so stylishly dressed up that she could have jumped out of the pages of a fashion magazine. Gerald often wondered what this exotic bloom was doing here in Port Brendan. She’s a bit too exotic for his taste; he’s heard she’s a vegan and doesn’t eat meat or fish—out of respect for animals. She’d head for the hills if she saw his stuffed freezer. And now this lady wishes to shoot. Several of the onlookers grin. Gerald won’t stop Ann from shooting. As long as she registers with a team and pays the fee, she’s free to enter the competition. She does it in seconds, deciding on Team Port Brendan.

  Only Dennis Richards is bad mannered. “Yeah, let the good lady have a gun; we need women who can’t shoot.”

  He laughs, and a few of his friends laugh along with him.

  Gerald indicates to Ann her place on the shooting stand. She lies down on her stomach, in her white parka, and takes aim. He realizes at once she’s not handling a gun for the first time. She fires speedily, and with concentration.

  Those with binoculars react at once, shouting, “Wow!” and “Holy shit!” Their stunned looks say it all. The score leaves no doubt: Ann Smith hit a bull’s-eye with every shot. The young women howl ecstatically as if they were in a hockey arena. Masterful—he can’t rate it any other way. Ann has clearly left Dennis Richards in her dust.

  Dennis stares at the score sheet and doesn’t know what to make of it.

  “What the hell . . . Is there cheating going on or what?”

  “Not with me here,” Gerald warns him. “I know what I’m doing.”

  But he’s amazed as well.

  Ann has stood up, her rifle still in her hand. Her eyes are shining. She raises the gun higher and higher. The barrel is aimed straight at the doctor standing two meters away.

  Gerald is too surprised to step in.

  “Dr. Perrell, the money goes to your clinic,” she says.

  Twenty-six thousand dollars. Doubled, that comes to fifty-two thousand for the hospital. The blood drains from the doctor’s face. A barely audible word of thanks escapes his lips; then he turns on his heel and strides off. The rifle barrel still points in his direction. Calista Gates comes over to Ann and takes the gun out of her hands.

  “Sorry,” says Ann, as if in a trance.

  Gerald can’t explain how she pulled off a score that certainly no one will beat. But he doesn’t doubt for a second that he’s witnessed a scene whose significance is known only to Ann Smith and Dr. Perrell. He’d like to see the look on Calista Gates’s face to guess what she thinks of it all, but as he turns toward her she’s already running after the doctor, trying to catch up with him. People crowd around Gerald, commenting on the perfect result and wanting his opinion. He’d rather have known what the Mountie intends to do with Perrell. He’s got no choice but to continue the competition, even if the participants’ chances are now zero.

  Before he announces the next round, he glances over the crowd, hoping to find Gates and Perrell. All he spots is Shannon Wilkey’s face. She looks as if she’d swallowed a dozen hot chili peppers.

  35

  It’s Shannon. I’m in my car. I had to call you immediately. There was an incident today.

  What happened?

  Ann Smith took part in a shooting competition, a fundraiser for the Port Brendan clinic.

  Wow. That’s . . . That’s not like her.

  I don’t know why she did it. I’d never have thought it possible. She had the top score with the rifle.

  Strange . . . that she’d take that risk. After all the effort she’s made until now.

  Isn’t it? How can she put herself in such a risky situation? She finished shooting, stood up, and threatened Carl Perrell.

  How’s that?

  She raised her rifle and aimed it at him. It’s the only way I can describe it.

  She aimed it at him?

  Yes. I think she wanted to scare him. That’s how I interpret it.

  Do you mean to say that she knows that Carl Perrell . . . ?

  I can’t explain it any other way. Maybe he didn’t keep his mouth shut.

  The man can’t be that stupid.

  I could say that about Ann. She can’t be that stupid.

  What alarm level are we at now?

  She’s got to learn the truth. I’ll let you know.

  36

  I run after Dr. Perrell as well as my boots permit on the trampled-down, icy snow. This is my chance to get something out of him. Several people stare at me, but I don’t care. Ann’s victory and Perrell’s reaction will be the hottest story of the day anyway. I speed up because the doctor is already opening his car door. The motor’s running when I knock on the window. He points to the passenger door, and I tear it open.

  “Can I have a word with you?” I gasp.

  He waves a hand.

  “Get in.”

  I hope Closs doesn’t see me, since I declared I don’t want to question my own doctor. Sullivan and Delgado would definitely not be thrilled with my butting in. I’ll think up an excuse.

  “Congratulations on the successful fundraiser,” I say, because I don’t want to rush things.

  Perrell looks at me. His face radiates the boldness of a globe-trotting adventurer. Which he is, of course, in his fashion. An Englishman who has given up his homeland to establish a clinic in a remote region of Canada’s north.

  Perrell wastes no time on polite formalities.

  “Why did you follow me?”

  “I’d like to know what was going on between you and Ann Smith just now.”

  “Constable, I don’t have to tell you that because you were there. Anything else?”

  “Why did Ann Smith aim that rifle at you?”

  “Ask Ann Smith.”

  “I will. How well do you know her?”

  “Do you wan
t to know as a policewoman or as a concerned citizen?”

  “Given there’s been a murder, I’m both.”

  The motor has been running all this time; the car is gradually warming up inside. Maybe Dr. Perrell wants it noisy to prevent anybody from listening in from outside. Though that would be difficult with the constant banging away from the shooting area.

  “What’s that got to do with Bakie’s death? I’m afraid you’re wasting your time here, Constable.”

  He’s impatient, and I wonder whether Ann’s behavior didn’t shake him up a little.

  “I’d be wasting my time if I did nothing to solve the murder. That’s the way you feel too, isn’t it? You must also be concerned about Bakie’s death.”

  He says nothing for a few seconds, looks straight ahead. His profile is impressive. Strangers would take him for a man of great decisiveness. He finally speaks.

  “Ann and I are both involved in fundraising. As you’ve just seen.”

  “How well do you know her?”

  “She’s a woman who doesn’t reveal much about herself.”

  “Is she your patient?”

  “No.”

  “Is there some reason why she’s not your patient?”

  More hesitation. I can almost physically feel his resistance. If we were outside, he’d definitely make some excuse to escape. Sitting in a car with somebody makes it hard to hide.

  “There was a time when I’d like to have known Ann better. She’s attractive, she’s mysterious. I’m single. It was only natural that I’d be interested in her. But it wouldn’t have gone anywhere if she’d been my patient.”

  My pulse beats faster. Perrell has opened himself up a bit, a small gap into his inner self.

  “Why did you emigrate to Canada?”

  “I wasn’t happy in England anymore; I was unfulfilled. Though I was perfectly busy. I almost never left the hospital. The constant pressure was destructive. My marriage ended in divorce because I worked so hard. My mother died sometime later, I was free to do whatever I wanted. An acquaintance of mine had emigrated to Canada, so I came here to take a look around.”