She followed him into the kitchen with wobbly knees. “I’ve got to have something to eat. That soup I had for supper didn’t do the trick.”
As she warmed up some leftovers and sat down, she told her father in a muted voice about her encounter with Telford Reed and the grizzly. Suddenly a thought popped into her brain. She reached into the pocket of the jacket she hadn’t taken off because she was still cold.
She didn’t hear her father’s reply, because her head had begun to play tricks on her.
The pistol wasn’t there.
20
“I’ll be right back. I have to get something from the car,” Tessa said hastily and ran outside.
She searched the Pathfinder, using her flashlight to look into every corner, but she couldn’t find the pistol. Only reluctantly, she gave up her search. She really didn’t have the energy to go back to the park in the dark.
“Lionel just called,” her father told her when she came into the house. “Tomorrow at eight o’clock in the morning, he’ll be here. Before the search begins, he wants to talk with you.”
She nodded, exhausted. “It’s better if I just go to sleep now.” She kissed him on the cheek. “You should also get some sleep, Dad.”
He held tightly to the banister. “I feel like if I sleep I’m betraying Fran. How can I sleep when she’s in danger? “ His eyes teared up.
“Oh, Dad.” She put her arms around him. “I get it.” She struggled for words, for something to give them some strength. She couldn’t think of anything. Silently they climbed the stairs, the dogs behind them. When Tessa went into her room, the cats jumped anxiously off the bed, where they had made themselves comfortable. She talked to them gently. Later, half-asleep, her hand felt soft fur on the bed cover.
Although she had taken a sleeping pill, Tessa woke up early after a fitful sleep. At dawn she left the dogs, that were happily wagging their tails, in the quiet house, and drove to Tennigan Park. She stopped the Pathfinder at the same spot where she and Telford had stood the previous evening, and searched the ground around it carefully. Nothing. She kept glancing around so she wouldn’t miss any movement in the bush. The bear couldn’t be far from the bait.
With all her strength, she tried to concentrate. She couldn’t have lost the pistol on the trail because she had kept her hand on the weapon in her pocket the whole time, afraid that the bear would show up again. She remembered that clearly. The only time she had used both her hands was when she got the dogs back into the car.
She took a deep breath.
What about when Telford Reed held her tightly? When she was shivering so much. Could the pistol have fallen out? She had to ask him. Somehow she had to get his telephone number.
Savannah! She had let the dogs out of the Pathfinder the night before. But if Savannah had found the pistol in the car, she would have certainly been dramatic about it. She was a gossip, not someone who could keep a secret.
Tessa walked again around the parking area. A couple of surprised birds flew over her. She looked at her watch. Time to go back. Almost as soon as she left Tennigan Park, she ran into the park ranger’s pickup. Telford Reed must have told the ranger what had happened with the bear. In the rearview mirror, she saw him turn into the park. She should inform him about the lost pistol. If he found it, he would of course inform the police. It was her responsibility to do that before he did. She slowed down in order to turn the car around. But then she changed her mind. If she told the police about the lost pistol, she would have to fill out a bunch of forms. She already could imagine herself at the police station, waiting in a long line. The police could even take away her license because she had been careless with the weapon. She would miss the search for Fran—something she absolutely didn’t want.
So far nobody knew she had lost her pistol. Maybe that was good thing: later she could claim that she hadn’t yet noticed the weapon was missing. She had to hurry: Lionel Miller was certainly waiting for her. Her parents had no idea where she was. She stepped on the gas. As she drove up the hill to her parents’ home, she saw a bunch of cars in front of the house, also a police car. She found the whole crowd in the kitchen: her parents, Savannah, Lionel Miller, and the policewoman Tessa recognized from her previous visit. The two dogs kept them company. There was a map of the area lying on the table.
“It’s good that you’re here,” Lionel called out. “We’re just talking about how we’re going to organize the groups for the search.”
Tessa took a look at the map on which somebody had drawn circles. Nobody asked where she had been.
“Are you also going to take part?” the policewoman asked.
“Yes, indeed.” Tessa studied the map. All of the circles were in the area around Whatou Lake. None were near Fran’s house. “What were your criteria when you made these circles, corporal?” she asked.
“Those are the areas of special interest for us,” the officer answered.
Tessa wrinkled her nose. “You think Fran is somewhere around Whatou Lake?”
“We‘re not eliminating any options.” The police officer looked directly at Tessa. “We think that in the circled areas, searching will be very useful.”
“More than a hundred people will be on this search,” her mother called out from the other end of the table. “People really want to help us.”
“That’s fine, Mom. I’m just asking myself whether all of them know how to act in the bush.”
Her objection was directed at the RCMP officer, but Lionel immediately had something to say. “We have a dozen people in every group. At least two per group are carrying a weapon for emergencies. Every group has a leader who knows his way around in the bush. Or her way.”
Tessa looked at her father. So far he hadn’t said a thing. Savannah, too, had been suspiciously quiet. In order to protect her mother, Tessa didn’t ask the question she had on the tip of her tongue: What are we really looking for? A corpse? Or a missing person? Is there anything in particular we should be looking for?
The RCMP officer got up. “Mayor Miller is organizing the local volunteers at town hall. All of them should be there by nine o’clock. I’m taking off right now.” She patted the husky’s back and pushed him away from her pants.
Suddenly Kenneth Griffins spoke up. “I hope that Harrison Miller knows who he can send off with a weapon and who he can’t. We have no idea who the murderer is, and my grandchildren and their father were shot dead. It could well be that the murderer is among us.”
It was quiet for several seconds. Then Savannah said: “Or the murderers.”
“Now you have all gone crazy!” Martha Griffins shook her head. “You really don’t want to call off the search now. You can’t look at everybody as a suspect.”
Savannah, who sat next to her, calmly stroked her hand. “It wasn’t meant that way, Mom.”
Kenneth Griffins crossed his arms and fell silent.
Tessa knew that it was time for her to step in and try to defuse the situation. But she didn’t want to oppose her father’s statement. He wasn’t wrong.
Lionel stepped in. “This is no time to dredge up your differences with my father, Ken. We all have to pull together now. We want to find Fran as fast as we can. That must be our priority.”
The police officer piped up again. “Our people are working around the clock, and we are very pleased to get your help. We know that we can count on you, right?”
“On me for sure,” Savannah called out.
Tessa looked the police officer straight in the eye. “Absolutely, corporal,” she replied.
As soon as the policewoman had left the house, Martha Griffins began to protest: “Savannah, you can’t leave me alone today. I need you here. They have enough people, so it doesn’t matter if—”
“We’ve already discussed that, dear,” Kenneth Griffins interrupted. “It’s important that Savannah goes on the search. Otherwise she would be very uneasy.”
“But I . . .”
Lionel noisily pulled his chair back
and got up. “Martha, Ken is right: every person counts. This is our chance. Time is of the essence.”
“I’m just going to take the dogs out quickly,” Savannah muttered, apparently wanting to get out of the discussion.
Tessa stretched out her arm to her mother; she had gotten up and tried to push her way past her. “Mom, you’ll be well taken care of here, and we’ll be back this evening.”
Her mother touched her hand only briefly and left the kitchen.
“Just let it go. I’ll talk to her,” her father said reassuringly, and then followed his wife.
Tessa looked at Lionel. “My poor parents. It’s tearing them up.” She quickly added: “You must be having a tough time, too.”
What she said must have broken down his protective wall, since a tortured look appeared on his face. As if he was about to break out into tears. Then, just as quickly, he put up the wall again. Neither of them could afford to lose it.
He turned around and folded up the map.
“Wait,” she said, and he spread out the map again. She looked at the circles. Suddenly she started sweating. One of the circles included Tennigan Park.
“Why do you want to search the campground at Tennigan Park?”
“Why not?” Lionel started folding up the map again, until she managed to stop him.
“I’ve heard that an aggressive bear has been seen at Tennigan Park.”
“In any case, that’s not where we’re going to be searching for the time being,” he answered without looking up, as he put his cell phone and the map away. “So we’ll be seeing you in an hour?”
He was obviously in a hurry, but she wanted to make use of the minutes alone with him. “What do you think happened to Fran? Who and what is behind these murders? Do you have a suspicion?”
He hesitated. For a moment he looked out into space. Then he let out a deep sigh. “Hank told me a couple of weeks ago that there were active poachers around. He said that grizzlies they could usually count on to appear for the tourists were no longer being spotted around the lodge. I said: Man, does the ranger know about this? And the police? He said he couldn’t tell them about it. I couldn’t understand why. And he didn’t want to tell me under any condition.”
Tessa was tempted to alert him to Telford Reed’s report, but she knew she didn’t have enough time.
“Do you think Hank and the kids were killed by poachers? And Fran? What did they do with Fran?”
“Goddammit, I don’t know, Tessa. It’s crazy. Absolutely crazy. How do you think we should proceed in order to make some progress on this?” She could hear the same desperation in his voice that she could feel within herself.
She looked out the open kitchen door. From upstairs she heard mumbling. Lowering her voice, she said: “Fran wanted to move away. With everyone—her, Hank, and the children. She wanted to move to a farm in Grouse Valley.”
Lionel looked at her in amazement. “Who . . . who told you that load of crap?”
“Two different people who are very credible told me that.”
“Who?”
“Maybe they just wanted to flee,” Tessa whispered quickly, because she heard noises from the open door.
Lionel kept staring at her when the dogs came running into the kitchen, followed by Savannah.
“If I didn’t look after the dogs, nobody would.” She shot a taunting look at Tessa. “Why didn’t you let them out this morning?”
Tessa was annoyed, even though she had to admit to herself that Savannah had a point. “Dad says Harrison wants to have the dogs,” she blurted out. “Has he told you that, Lionel?”
He had just gone out into the hall and turned around again. “He should really forget that,” he growled. “This is out of the question.” Without saying good-bye, he turned on his heel and slammed the door.
Tessa looked at Savannah and shrugged.
Savannah started the coffee machine. “We don’t have much time anymore. We have to be at the meeting place soon.”
“Which meeting place? And who is we?”
“Didn’t Lionel tell you anything?”
Tessa gave her an annoyed look. Savannah filled up a jug with hot milk and put it on the table. “You, me, Lionel, and Cliff Bight make up group nine.”
“That can’t be; each group consists of a dozen people. Lionel just said that.”
“Yes, eight groups of twelve. And we’re the extras. Don’t ask me why.” She slammed the lid of the coffee machine down. “Lionel explained that this morning. I think he had something special in mind for us and wanted to keep the group small. But you weren’t here yet. Where did you go off to?”
Tessa ignored the question. “So where are we going to meet?”
“At the trailhead.”
“Which trail?”
“The one to Whitesand Bay.”
21
An hour later, Tessa found herself with Savannah, Lionel, and Cliff Bight at the edge of the forest outside of Whatou Lake. They hadn’t run into the other groups Harrison Miller had assembled at town hall. Tessa had protested against the fact that she of all people had been sent out to search around Whitesand Bay. Lionel convinced her to stop her complaining, when he declared, “Don’t make it look as if you had something to hide.” Tessa felt she was a victim of a conspiracy. But in light of the murders and their fears about Fran, it would have seemed really coldhearted if she had refused to go.
Both Lionel and Cliff were carrying hunting rifles. Savannah threw a meaningful look over at Tessa. Probably she remembered their conversation on the car ride. Tessa had admitted to Savannah that she had lost her pistol.
“Did you see it in the car?” Tessa had asked.
“What, you were running around with a loaded pistol?” Savannah had yelled. “Maybe I should get a hold of one, too!”
When they passed by Whatou Lake, Tessa sent an SMS to Ron Halprin and reported to him the loss of her pistol and the circumstances that led to it. She gave him all the necessary information he needed to identify the weapon. She informed Boyd Shenkar as well, because her business partner had to know about such things.
Lionel stood next to his wife, Cindy, whose eyes were hidden behind large black sunglasses. Her elegant clothes signaled that she wanted to be fashionable even if she lived in a hole like Whatou Lake. Tessa knew she was being unfair to Lionel’s wife, since Cindy owned a high-end clothing boutique and had to dress well all the time. But Tessa never forgot that Cindy was a close friend of Lola Dole, Jenny’s mother. Would Cindy tell Lola that, of all people, Tessa would be searching the area where Jenny Dole was supposedly left behind to be torn apart by a grizzly’s deadly fangs?
There was no doubt that Cindy didn’t want to take part in the search for Fran: she was wearing high-heeled shoes. To Tessa’s surprise, Cindy came over, hugged her and whispered into her ear: “I really hope that we find Fran soon.” Tessa could smell her sweet perfume.
“Me, too,” she answered. In order to cover her unease, she added: “How’s Glenda doing?”
Glenda Miller, Hank’s mother and Breena, Kayley, and Clyde’s grandmother, had been against the marriage of her favorite son, Hank, to the former foster child Fran, even more than her husband. She was, on the other hand, happy to have Cindy, with her upper-middle-class parents, as a daughter-in-law. Fate took its revenge when Fran had one child after another, while Cindy and Lionel had none. But Glenda did not get to see the grandchildren very much because Fran preferred to bring them to Martha Griffins. She did this for some years, until Fran, during the last couple of months, didn’t show up at Martha’s, either. What had happened between her and Fran?
The expression on Cindy’s face turned sad. “Glenda doesn’t come out of her bedroom anymore. I do my best to help her. But Lionel also needs me, everything is on his shoulders.”
With these last words, she turned to her husband, who looked distraught as she hugged him.
Maybe it is love, Tessa thought, even if she didn’t want to admit it. Cindy could have left Lio
nel and Whatou Lake behind. She’d rather be a big fish in a small pond than a little fish in a big pond, Dana had once remarked sarcastically.
“She didn’t hug me,” Savannah complained to Tessa when Cindy drove away in her chic Mazda Miata. “As if Fran wasn’t my sister, too.”
I would never have called your relationship to Fran sisterly, Tessa thought.
Lionel and Cliff Bight were wearing hunting clothes and carrying backpacks. Cliff was one of Lionel’s workers, a young, sluggish guy with a large, almost bald head. Lionel stepped into his role as the leader of the group. “Tessa, you and Cliff will search the right side of the trail, and Savannah and I will take the left side.”
“Are we looking for something specific?” Savannah asked.
Lionel remained vague. “Whatever you find, take it with you. Or raise the alarm with the whistle. But don’t forget to put on rubber gloves before photographing or touching anything.”
He had equipped them with gloves, plastic bags, and whistles.
Tessa didn’t find his leadership convincing, but she held her tongue. Should they really remove evidence from the site that might help the investigators? She knew that the police had already searched the path with dogs, after Fran’s bloody jacket showed up in Whitesand Bay. What did the investigators, with the help of volunteer searchers, hope to find that hadn’t been found the first time they looked?
It’s quite possible that Fran was in Whitesand Bay. She wanted to find proof.
Tessa regretted not asking her mother what she meant by her remark. Proof of what?
“Hey, let’s go,” Lionel called out. “And don’t forget to talk loudly; we don’t want any problems with bears.”
He didn’t have to tell Savannah that twice. She cackled and followed Lionel into the rain forest.
Cliff Bight, on the other hand, remained quiet as they searched the area next to the trail. Roots, bushes, giant ferns, broken rocks, and turned-over tree stumps got in their way. They had to push low moss-covered branches out of their faces and watch out for deep holes in the ground. But even now, she couldn’t resist the magic of the rain forest. She loved the aroma of wet cedars and natural decay, the mix of living and dying vegetation. New tree trunks that grew on top of the old ones and drew nourishment from their wood. The gigantic ripped-out roots of fallen cedars or pines knocked down by storms. Their roots seemed to be as big as the paddlewheels of steamboats. But the chaos also took away Tessa’s confidence. How could they find anything in this enormous tangled wilderness? Give me a sign, Fran. Please give me a sign.
MURDEROUS MORNING: A heart-stopping crime novel with a stunning end. Page 12
