Eulalie laughed. She enjoyed his take on life and relationships.
“Me too,” she said. “Except I don’t have the doubts in between.”
“It’s just that there are so few people I don’t mind touching, that I can count them on one hand.” He demonstrated on his fingers. “My mother, my sister, her two children, and you.”
“What about your father?”
“Him too – most of the time.”
“I hope you will continue to not mind touching me for a while to come.”
There was a silence as he examined her face.
“You’re joking,” he decided at last. “And I forgot to mention animals. I like animals.”
“Really? I never knew that.”
“It’s true. It started when I was a child. And they like me.” He opened Eulalie’s office door and made a clucking sound in his throat. The cat, which had been lying on its side, fiercely kicking the catnip mouse, bounded to its feet and ran into the little office. Chief Macgregor sat down and patted his knee. The cat jumped onto his lap and settled down, purring loudly.
Eulalie watched with interest. This was a side to the chief of police she had never seen before.
“So, down to business?” she said.
He nodded. “I came here to consult you in your capacity as liaison between the Queen’s Town Police Department and the village in the deep forest. There has been a murder…”
She shot to her feet. “A murder? Who? Who is it? Tell me at once.”
He looked at her in mild surprise. “Oh, it’s not a villager who was murdered. It was someone else. Possibly a tourist. Someone who strayed too deeply into the forest. Unfortunately, suspicion is falling on the village. This has the potential to turn ugly, so we need your services as liaison officer. In fact, your uncle specifically asked for you.”
Eulalie sank back into her chair. “A tourist? That’s bad. Is there any suggestion that this person had a companion? Or that they were robbed?”
“It is possible that he was robbed. There was nothing of value on his person. But the part that is significant is how he died. He was shot through the abdomen with an arrow at close range. It went straight through him.”
A cold sensation trickled down Eulalie’s spine. A bow and arrow was the traditional hunting weapon of her village. If it turned out that someone from the village had shot and killed a lost tourist, it would undo much of the tolerance that had built up in recent years between the village and the rest of Prince William Island.
A few years earlier, there had been calls from the governor’s office to bring the village more firmly under the umbrella of island government. There had been talk of forcing the children to go to school and even of relocating the village to a more convenient spot closer to Queen’s Town. Fortunately, those initiatives had been recognized as the invasions of personal liberty that they were, but tensions continued to simmer.
There were always those who mistrusted any community that wanted to keep to itself. The villagers rejected all modern technology, including electricity and running water. They lived close to nature and according to the old ways that had remained unchanged for hundreds of years.
Eulalie had grown up in that community until the age of twelve when she and her grandmother had moved to Queen’s Town and she had been enrolled at Queen’s Town Middle School. The move had been a shock, but she had slotted happily into formal education because she had a curious mind. Now that she was an adult and able to choose for herself, she had remained in Queen’s Town, but she and her grandmother kept close ties to the village in the forest.
“This needs to be handled delicately,” she said. “This is a potential powder keg. We don’t want to do anything to set it off.”
“Agreed. That’s why I came to you. This year is the first time there has been cooperation between the village elders and the Queen’s Town police department. You are the reason for that cooperation, and I want you to take the lead in this investigation. You have already been deputized as a liaison officer in our department and now you’re on the payroll for this case.”
“Okay, that takes the pressure off. I can focus on this and not worry about the fees I am passing up. Especially now that I apparently have a dependent to support.” She nodded at the cat on Chief Macgregor’s lap. “What’s the next step?”
“There’s a meeting at eleven with the medical examiner and someone from the tourist board. I’d appreciate it if you could attend, and if you could persuade your grandmother to attend as well. She does still sit on the Council of Elders, right?”
“She’s an ex officio member because she doesn’t live there anymore. I’ll do my best to get her to attend.”
Chief Macgregor stood up, depositing the cat carefully onto the floor.
“Then I’ll see you there.”
He left the office, inclining his head to Mrs. Belfast as he passed her desk.
“Such a gentleman,” she said. “So polite.”
Eulalie managed not to roll her eyes at the goofy expression on her secretary’s face.
“I’m going to be helping the police department for a while, Mrs. B. Can you handle the background checks for that insurance company that we were working on?”
Mrs. Belfast focused on her face. “What’s that? Oh, the background checks. Of course, I can. I’ll have them on your desk each morning to read and sign. Will you be working with Chief Macgregor?”
“It looks like it. There’s been a murder in the forest. A tourist. There are suspicions that the village might be involved. I need to handle this one carefully.”
“I thought the villagers were peace-loving.”
“They are, but you get bad eggs in every basket. I need to find out what happened here.”
She went back into her office, leaving the door open. The cat had followed Chief Macgregor out the door and was sitting on the wide, brick doorstep, enjoying the sunshine.
Eulalie took out her phone to text her grandmother.
Angel de la Cour owned a restaurant and bar in downtown Queen’s Town. It was called Angel’s Place and she was often to be found there. But it was also possible that she was at a charity brunch for women business leaders, or meeting with one of her underworld cronies, or reading someone’s Tarot cards. She could be anywhere.
Eulalie’s text was brief and to the point.
Eulalie: Have you heard?
The reply came back fast.
Angel: I heard early this morning. Tourist killed by arrow. This could be bad for us.
Eulalie: Chief Macgregor has asked for my help. He says Uncle Virgil requested me personally. There’s a meeting at the police station at 11. Can you make it?
Angel: Does Chief Macgregor want me there?
Eulalie: He does. He is super stressed about this.
Angel: Then I will be there, chérie. What does one wear to a meeting at a police station?
Eulalie: I don’t know. Clothes, I guess. I’m wearing my normal work outfit, and I’m not changing.
Angel: Put on lipstick.
Eulalie held out for nearly an hour before she did what her grandmother had said and went upstairs to put on some lipstick.
Chapter 2
Eulalie parked her Vespa in front of the police station.
She noticed that Chief Macgregor’s E-Type Jaguar was in its usual slot. He had bought it cheaply in junkyard condition and was busy restoring it. She didn’t bother looking for her grandmother’s car, because Angel would have taken a cab.
Eulalie walked into the police station and found her grandmother already there chatting to the desk sergeant. As always, she was the most elegant woman in the room, in a charcoal skirt suit that was admirably tailored to show off her excellent figure. A poppy red shirt under the jacket supplied eye-catching color, while a pair of skinny heels provided the elegance. Her hair was swept up into a chignon, and her makeup had been carefully applied.
She had the same olive skin as Eulalie and had aged well. She was fifty-six but could have passed for ten
years younger. The only time Eulalie wasn’t deeply and admiringly envious of her grandmother’s style was when she was wearing the shawls, turbans and rings of her fortuneteller persona.
Judging by the laughs she was getting from the desk sergeant, she was full of wit and liveliness this morning.
“How’s it going, Manny?”
“Hey, Eulalie. I was just telling Angel here that she was right about my lumbago. It cleared right up when I started doing her stretches every morning.”
“But of course, chéri. We will get you into yoga class yet. When one gets to be our age, stretching becomes most important. Flexibility is the mot juste.”
Manny ducked his head. “Oh, I don’t know about yoga class…”
“Lorelei and I would love the company of a gentleman of our generation,” Angel said with a wink at Eulalie.
Manny looked thoughtful. “Mrs. Belfast goes to those classes, does she?”
“She does indeed. Tuesdays and Thursdays, seven o’clock at the Scout Hall. We’d love to see you there.”
“Maybe. Yes, maybe.”
“We had better go in now, Grandmère,” Eulalie said as it edged closer to eleven.
“Alors! Behold! The child harasses me continually. Au revoir, Manny. See you on Thursday, I hope.”
She glided off with Eulalie towards the conference room where the meeting would be held.
“Morning yoga class, is it?” Eulalie switched to French. “So that’s when you and Mrs. B. have been plotting to land me with a cat.”
“Now, chérie. It was only after Lorelei found the animal that I told her I thought it would be a good companion for you. And so it would. That subject is finished. Let us now concentrate on what lies ahead. If there is a murderer in the village, he must be weeded out and brought to justice. Village justice is a lifetime expulsion, and island justice is prison. I would be happy with either of those. Merely, I am upset because I had no idea there was someone like this currently in the village. I do not relish being taken by surprise, my love, as you know.”
Eulalie did know, and she felt the same. The news had left her reeling, and she was just as keen as her grandmother to identify the culprit and get him removed from the community.
The two of them were the last to arrive for the meeting at exactly eleven. It put a slight hitch in Eulalie’s stride to see Detective Wesley Wright sitting at the conference table next to Chief Macgregor. He was the one person in the department that she really disliked. But as the head of Missing Persons, it made sense for him to be trying to identify the John Doe tourist. Also present was Dr. Stephanie Autry, Prince William Island’s chief medical examiner. Next to her sat the head of the tourism board, Victory Merriweather. Eulalie had encountered her a few months earlier when she had investigated the murder of a local businessman. It was not generally known that Victory moonlighted as a dominatrix at an S&M club called Trixie’s Bar in a part of downtown Queen’s Town that catered for alternative subcultures. Angel knew, and Eulalie knew, but she didn’t think any of the others knew. They wouldn’t hear about it from her. Victory liked to keep the two sides of her life separate.
Chief Macgregor got to his feet as they walked in.
“Ms. de la Cour, Ms. Park. Thank you for coming. You know everyone, don’t you?”
Angel gave a gracious smile. “Certainement.”
Dr. Autry half rose from her seat and offered her hand to Eulalie.
“I don’t believe we’ve met. Stephanie Autry, medical examiner.”
Eulalie managed to keep her face neutral as she shook hands with a woman she had been to high school with and had encountered professionally many times since.
Dr. Autry looked up at Angel. You could almost see her contemplating the wisdom of trying the same trick on her. She didn’t quite have the nerve.
Angel smiled at her.
“Stephanie! Why, of course. You were the little girl who ate too much candy on your eighth-grade school trip and was sick in the bus.”
It took a heroic effort, but Eulalie managed not to laugh.
Chief Macgregor’s eyes flicked between the three women as he tried to make sense of the hostility he felt in the room.
Eulalie and Angel sat down, and he relaxed. He used his computer to throw an image up on the screen. It was a diagram of a body with a hole in the upper abdomen. For a moment Eulalie wondered why he wasn’t using the crime scene photographs, but then she realized that he would consider Angel and Victory to be civilians who didn’t need to be exposed to those images.
“As you all know, a male Caucasian, late-forties, was found dead in the deep forest about a quarter of a mile from the village. Cause of death was an arrow, apparently formed in one of the traditional village styles, fired at close range. It went straight through the man’s body and lodged in a tree behind him. The crime scene technicians say the body was not moved after death. He was wearing hiking and climbing gear that had been bought recently from a high-end specialty shop. So, he was clearly there with intent. That intent may have been nothing more than a day-hike, but he was prepared for being in the forest.”
He clicked over to another slide. It was a head and shoulders picture. The man’s eyes were open. An experienced viewer would be able to tell that he was dead, but it wasn’t a disturbing image.
“We are working on identifying this man with the help of Ms. Merriweather here from the tourism board. I’m going to hand over to her now to explain her process.”
Victory stood up and thanked him.
“This man came to Prince William Island from somewhere else. He is definitely not a local. More importantly, he used some means of transport to get here. He didn’t just float in on the tide. Unless he arrived here illicitly, he either bought a plane ticket or arrived by boat. Either way, he must have cleared passport control. If he came here through the usual channels, even under an assumed name, we will be able to trace him. We have the full cooperation of the immigration authorities. If, however, he came here illegally, this moves out of my league. I don’t have the contacts to trace him in that case.” She glanced briefly at Eulalie. “Perhaps you can help out if that turns out to be true.”
“Sure. There are several lines I can tug.”
“Thank you, Ms. Park,” said Chief Macgregor. “Then there’s the accommodation issue, Ms. Merriweather?”
“Everything about this man screams tourist,” she went on. “Our first assumption is that he had accommodation booked somewhere. His clothes and shoes suggest a degree of affluence that doesn’t go along with roughing it. We’re looking at high-end hotels first, and then luxury guesthouses and B&Bs. Then we’ll make our way down to the middle-grade and budget accommodation. We are also considering the possibility that he was staying with someone. We’ll get his photograph and description out on PWIN television news, website, and social media. Someone must have seen him. Someone knows who he was and what he was doing here. My process might sound time-consuming, but it will happen quickly. We’ll have answers for you soon. We’re making this a priority.”
She sat down, and Chief Macgregor nodded to Detective Wesley Wright.
He stayed seated and said, “I’ll be following protocol for tracking down a foreign national. That’s really all that’s required here. I want to go on record as saying that I don’t know what all these civilians are doing here, and I don’t think their presence is necessary.” He shot a glance at Eulalie. “I see conflicts of interest. There is clearly a murderous psychopath on the loose in the village and I don’t see why his aunties and cousins should be involved in tracking him down. This is police work.”
Chief Macgregor listened with his usual air of courtesy.
“I must remind you that Ms. Park is a fully deputized police officer, Detective Wright. The governor appointed her as the liaison for village affairs. This situation is exactly why her post was created. The two civilians - Ms. de la Cour and Ms. Merriweather - are here at my invitation. They both have something to contribute to this investigation. Is t
here anything else you would like to place on record, Detective Wright?”
Wright scowled and shook his head.
“Then, Ms. Park, perhaps you could take us through your strategy for this case?”
“My grandmother and I are planning to leave for the village at first light tomorrow morning. That will put us there by nightfall. I want to see where the deceased was found and speak to the people who found him. My grandmother and I will attend a meeting of the Council of Elders and ask who they think might have been responsible for the murder. We will also let them know what the police department is doing in its investigations so that they feel consulted and included.”
There was an audible snort from Detective Wright.
“Problem, Detective?”
“Yes, there’s a problem. Any time we start consulting with a community of criminals, trying to make them feel ‘included.’” He made quote marks in the air. “That’s when I have a very real problem. Our job isn’t to handle these bastards with kid gloves. We should go in there hard and pull them out in batches – get them into the interrogation room and make them tell us what they know. Because you can be damn sure that every mother’s son in that village knows who did it. Hell, they probably held his drink while he committed murder. You don’t mess around with people like that.”
“A community of criminals?” said Eulalie. “What makes you say that, Detective Wright? What crimes have the villagers been involved in lately?”
“Well, there’s this right now. Or isn’t murder serious enough for you? And a few months ago, there was that kid that got kidnapped. Murder and kidnapping – charming.”
“The man who kidnapped that boy was a Queen’s Town businessman who had nothing to do with the village. The villagers were victims in that case, not perpetrators. Before that, the last recorded incident was five years ago. Please explain to us how that makes them a community of criminals?”
The Eulalie Park Mysteries Box Set 2 Page 2
