A Colder Kind of Death

by Gail Bowen

  When Taylor and I pulled up in front of our house, Jess Stephens was standing at the front door. He handed me the worm-cake recipe.

  “That’s from my mum,” he said.

  There was no note with the recipe, but at least Sylvie had let him come over. That was a start.

  “Can he stay for lunch?” Taylor asked.

  “It’s okay with me,” I said, “but he’d better check at home.”

  Taylor stepped closer to Jess. She was looking at his face appraisingly. “Great planes,” she said.

  Jess looked baffled.

  “Taylor’s learning how to draw faces in her art class,” I said.

  “You’d be good to draw, Jess,” Taylor said.

  “No, thanks,” he said.

  I looked at him. Taylor was right. Jess would be good to draw. His cheekbones were high and well defined, and his eyes had the slightly upward tilt you sometimes see in Slovenes. Somewhere along the line, an ancestor of the O’Keefes or the Stephenses must have spent some quality time in Eastern Europe.

  Taylor grabbed Jess’s hand. “Go call your mum. Then we can look at Jack.”

  I followed them down the hall and watched through the kitchen window as they went out on the deck. Taylor immediately pressed her face against the pumpkin, peering into his right eye hole. Then she moved back to let Jess look. As I turned from the window, I thought that November had been kinder to Jack than it had to me. His rate of disintegration had slowed in the chill.

  When Hilda came in, she gave me a sharp look. “I’d say ‘Penny for your thoughts,’ but from the look on your face, I don’t think I’d be pleased with my purchase.”

  “I’m thinking about death and decay,” I said.

  Hilda picked up a knife and began buttering bread. “Not elegiacally, I take it.”

  “I had a lousy morning,” I said. I went to the fridge and took out a block of cheddar. Everybody liked grilled cheese. As I sliced the cheddar, I told Hilda about the funeral tape. When I finished, her face was grim.

  “What are you going to do?” she said.

  “Take the tape to the police,” I said.

  “Wouldn’t they have seen it already?”

  “I don’t think so, Hilda. It was a private taping of a family event. Old Mrs. Heinbecker had it until last year when she gave it to Jill, and Jill put it straight in the archives.”

  Hilda looked thoughtful. “The police have to see it, of course. That’s the only ethical option you have, but, Joanne, that tape isn’t going to help your case.”

  I shuddered. The resonance of the phrase “your case” was not pleasant.

  “I don’t seem to know how to help my case,” I said.

  “Follow the strands back to the place where they meet,” Hilda said. “Find out everything you can about Kevin Tarpley and Maureen Gault.” Her voice dropped. “And, Joanne, I think you’re going to have to scrutinize your husband’s life as well.”

  I could feel the rush of anger. “You’re not suggesting there was a relationship between Ian and Maureen Gault, are you?”

  Hilda’s voice was patient, but firm. “There was a relationship. You saw it yourself on that tape. In all likelihood, the relationship was that of stalker and victim, but, if that was the case, you still need to know what it was about Ian that made Maureen hunt him down. And you need to know how long she pursued him and whether he knew about the pursuit. There are a dozen questions, Joanne.”

  As I plugged the parking meter outside police headquarters, I was heavy with discouragement. A dozen questions. I looked at the tape in my handbag. When Inspector Alex Kequahtooway saw it, a dozen questions would be just the beginning.

  As I opened his office door, the first thing I noticed was that there was a Beethoven violin sonata playing softly on the CD player in the corner; the second was that Alex Kequahtooway had had his hair cut. His brother, Perry, wore his hair traditionally, in braids, but Alex’s hair was very short. A “cop-cut” Angus would have called it. The night of the murder Inspector Kequahtooway had been dressed casually, but today he was wearing a navy suit, a striped shirt, and a floral silk tie.

  “I like your tie,” I said.

  “Thanks,” he said. “I was in court all morning. What can I do for you, Mrs. Kilbourn?”

  He listened to my account of the tape carefully, and as I finished, he smiled thinly.

  “I have to hand it to you for bringing the tape in. I can’t say for certain until I see it, but it sounds as if that tape may be helpful.”

  “I hope it is,” I said.

  He nodded. “Me too,” he said. Then he leaned towards me. “Mrs. Kilbourn, what were you looking for at Nationtv?”

  “Answers,” I said.

  “Leave that to us, Mrs. Kilbourn. Don’t involve yourself in this.”

  “I am involved. Haven’t you read the papers or turned on your TV? I’m the number-one suspect.”

  He raised his eyebrows. “Do you believe everything you hear from the media?”

  For the first time since Maureen Gault’s murder, I felt a glimmer of hope.

  “If you don’t think I killed her, why aren’t you telling the press?”

  Unexpectedly, he smiled. “First, because, at least to my knowledge, there has been no flat-out assertion that you’re guilty. The press has been very careful to imply rather than state. And second, because, at the moment, there are certain advantages to having the focus on you.”

  “Because the real killer might relax and make himself vulnerable?”

  “Him or her self, Mrs. Kilbourn. And yes, that’s what I’m hoping for. A lot of police work is just waiting around, you know. When I was a kid, I owned an old retriever – best squirrel dog on the reserve. He never seemed to do anything but lie in the sun. All the other dogs, soon as they spotted a squirrel, they’d start running around, yapping, going crazy till they got that squirrel into a tree. Nine times out of ten that was the end of it. The dogs would get tired and bugger off, and the squirrel would go on about his business. But that old retriever of mine would just sit and wait, and as soon as the squirrel thought it was a lovely day for a walk … bingo!” He smiled. “That old dog would have made a good cop.”

  “So you’re just waiting?”

  He shook his head. “No,” he said.

  “Then what are you doing?”

  “Checking and re-checking stories,” he said.

  “To see if someone’s lying?”

  “No, just to see how everybody within earshot of the head table remembers the evening’s events. People see things differently, Mrs. Kilbourn.”

  “Depending on where they were sitting,” I said.

  “Yeah, and depending on what happened to them in their lives before they walked into that room. What I’m trying to do right now is find out everything I can about the people who were sitting at the head table that night.”

  “Know the truth about the teller and you’ll know the truth about his tale,” I said.

  Inspector Alex Kequahtooway’s dark eyes widened with interest. “Something an elder told you?” he asked.

  “Something my grandmother told me,” I said.

  His round face creased in a grin. “She must have been an Ojibway.”

  We both laughed.

  “Finding the truth about the tellers and the tales is what I’m trying to do now,” he said.

  “Are you getting anywhere?” I asked.

  “At the moment, no. All I’m doing is mouse work.” He gestured towards the medicine wheel on the wall behind him. “The other day you mentioned the Four Great Ways of Seeking Understanding. You know how Brother Mouse understands his world?”

  “By sniffing things out with his nose, seeing what’s up close, touching what he can with his whiskers.”

  He smiled. “Did your grandmother teach you that, Mrs. Kilbourn?”

  “No,” I said, “I learned that from my instructor in Indian Studies 232.”

  “Then you know that when I’ve got my treasure trove of facts a
nd information, I’ll try to stop seeing like a mouse and start seeing like an eagle. The big picture, Mrs. Kilbourn. That’s what I’m going for.”

  He extended his hand to me. “Thank you for coming, Mrs. Kilbourn.”

  I took his hand. “You’re welcome,” I said. “And, Inspector, I enjoyed the Beethoven.”

  When I got home, Hilda was sitting at the kitchen table with the morning paper spread out in front of her and a pad and pencil beside her.

  She gestured to the window when she saw me. “The children are building a snow fort. They’ve been remarkably persistent. It’s quite impressive.”

  I looked into the back yard. Taylor and Jess were installing the jack-o’-lantern in a place of honour at the top of the snow fort. I watched as they packed snow around his base to secure him. Shrivelled but menacing, Jack surveyed the back yard. The fort and those within it were safe.

  “Any word from Angus?” I asked Hilda.

  “He came by with a group of friends. They admired my earrings, I admired theirs, and they left. He says he’ll be home at the regular time for supper.”

  “Good,” I said. I poured a cup of coffee and sat down opposite her. The paper was open to a story about Maureen Gault. “Anything new?” I asked.

  “There might be,” Hilda said. “I decided to read through all the stories about Maureen and note the significant points.”

  “Mouse work,” I said.

  She looked puzzled. When I explained, she laughed. “I like that,” she said. She picked up her notepad. “Now, here’s my pile of nuts and berries: Maureen Gault was born on Valentine’s Day, 1968, in Chaplin.”

  “Kevin Tarpley was from there, too,” I said. “And that’s where Ian died. Funny, isn’t it? For years, Chaplin was just a place I drove past on the highway, but it always gave me the creeps. It wasn’t the town so much as the sodium sulphate plant on the outskirts. There were always these huge mounds of salt on the ground there. They made me think of the Valley of Ashes in The Great Gatsby.”

  Hilda raised her eyebrows. “That’s certainly an ominous association.”

  I nodded. “It’s lucky we don’t know what’s ahead of us, isn’t it?” I said.

  “Very lucky,” Hilda said. She picked up her notepad again. “Maureen’s father was killed in a farming accident five months after she was born. Now this next is a quotation from an interview with Maureen’s mother, Shirley. ‘When my husband died, I decided to devote my life to my girl. She had it all: tap, jazz, ballet, ringette. Little Mo always knew exactly what she wanted, and she knew how to get it from me. I don’t know how things could have turned out so bad for her.’ ”

  “Poor woman,” I said. “Maureen was her life. I remember Shirley Gault from the time after the arrest. I think she was on the news every night, If there was a cabinet minister coming to town, she’d be at the airport, demanding justice. If there was a public meeting, she was at it, handing out leaflets, trying to get herself in front of the cameras.”

  “She sounds unbalanced,” Hilda said.

  “I thought so,” I said, “but I was pretty unbalanced myself at the time, so I was no judge.”

  Hilda looked at me sharply. “Are you sure you want to pursue this, Joanne?”

  “In for a penny, in for a pound, as my grandmother used to say.”

  Hilda smiled. “My grandmother used to say that, too.” She took a deep breath. “Now, for Maureen’s career, which to put it charitably seems somewhat chequered. She never finished high school, but in 1989 Maureen graduated from Vogue Beauty School with a degree in Cosmetology and Depilatory Esthetics. I presume that means she was licensed to apply makeup and remove body hair. At any rate, according to the paper, at the time of her death she was working at a beauty salon called Ray-elle’s.”

  “That’s not far from here,” I said. “It’s in the basement of that strip mall on Montague. I’ve seen their sign, but I’ve never been in there.”

  Hilda raised an eyebrow. “Ray-elle’s may be worth looking into,” she said. Then she closed her notepad. “Joanne, the most promising information I gathered isn’t written down anywhere. It’s just a feeling. The paper printed a number of comments about Maureen from girls she knew at school. Not much there, except a certain agreement about the fact that Maureen was a loner who always seemed to know how to get what she wanted. But the reporter from the paper also called the principal of Maureen’s old high school in Chaplin for a comment.”

  “And …?” I said.

  “And the woman refused to talk to him.”

  “That is interesting,” I said.

  “There’s more,” Hilda said. “They printed the woman’s name; it’s Carolyn Atcheson. I know her. Not well, but, before she was a principal, Carolyn was an English teacher. We served on a curriculum committee together. So I called her this morning. And … and it was very puzzling. She was delighted to hear from me, very welcoming, full of questions about what I was doing now. But as soon as I mentioned Maureen Gault’s name, there was a chill.”

  “Maybe she thought you were just satisfying your curiosity,” I said.

  Hilda shook her head. “No, I explained at the outset that my interest in Maureen Gault was not whimsical, and that a dear friend’s life had been thrown into turmoil because of Maureen. Carolyn reacted oddly to that. She laughed, not a nice laugh. Then she said, ‘I wonder how many lives were thrown into turmoil by that girl?’

  “I thought I would press my advantage then. I asked Carolyn straight out if she believed Maureen Gault was capable of murder. There was such a long silence on the line, I wondered if she’d hung up on me. But finally Carolyn said, ‘Maureen Gault was capable of anything. She was pathological.’ ”

  “It sounds as if Carolyn’s worth talking to,” I said.

  Hilda said, “It won’t be easy. Joanne. From the minute I mentioned Maureen’s name, Carolyn Atcheson sounded as if she was terrified.”

  “But Maureen’s dead,” I said. “What could Carolyn Atcheson be frightened of?”

  Hilda stood up. “That’s what I’m going to find out. First thing tomorrow morning, I’m driving down to Chaplin.”

  “What about church?” I asked. “I’ve never known you to miss.”

  Hilda folded the newspaper carefully. “I think sometimes God likes action from his foot soldiers.”

  I looked at my watch. “Speaking of action, I’d better get supper started. How does spaghetti sound to you?”

  “Splendid,” Hilda said.

  “Good,” I said. For the next hour, I chopped, sautéed, stirred, simmered, and thought about the best way of finding out the truth. “Follow the strands back to the place where they meet.” That’s what Hilda had said. Jill was looking into Kevin’s life; Hilda had taken on Maureen. That left Ian, and no one was going to follow that strand back but me.

  Just as I moved the spaghetti sauce to the back burner, Jess and Taylor came in from outdoors, cheeks rosy with cold and excitement.

  “It smells like Geno’s in here,” Taylor said.

  Jess turned to her. “Do you ever go there on Kids’ Night?”

  Taylor shook her head. “Jo says she’d rather be pecked to death by a duck. We just go regular nights.”

  Jess smiled at me. I could see the edge of a permanent tooth pushing through. I bent down and looked more closely.

  “Nice tooth, Jess.”

  “Thanks. Mrs. Kilbourn, do you have hot chocolate here?”

  “Yes,” I said, “I think we do.”

  Five minutes later, we were all sitting around the kitchen table, drinking hot chocolate and listening to Taylor talk about how, if she had a kitten, she would let it sleep on the pillow beside her so it wouldn’t bother me in the night. Life in the fast lane.

  When Hilda came down, she was dressed to go out.

  “Want to join us?” I asked.

  “Thank you, no,” she said. “I’m off to Ray-elle’s Beauty Salon.”

  “Thinking of getting a new ’do?” said Jess.

&n
bsp; Hilda patted her red hair with a degree of satisfaction. “Oh, I think my old ’do will suffice.”

  “I like it,” Taylor said. “In oil paints that colour is called ‘raw sienna.’ It’s one of my favourites.”

  “Mine too,” said Hilda.

  Gary Stephens was an hour late picking up Jess. He’d called in mid-afternoon to say he’d be at our house by 5:00, but it was close to 6:00 when he pulled into the driveway.

  “Sorry I’m late,” he said. “The skiing was just too good.” He was wearing cross-country ski clothes, and I saw his skis on the rack of his car, but he didn’t radiate the sense of physical well-being of someone who’d spent the afternoon outdoors. As he stood in the hall, his handsome face was pale, and he smelled, not of fresh air, but of liquor and cologne. I wondered who the lucky woman was this time.

  “It wasn’t a problem,” I said. “The kids had a great afternoon. They built a snow fort. Jess could have stayed for supper if he’d wanted.”

  “Thanks, babe, but Sylvie has something planned.” He smiled his slow, lazy, practised smile. “You know how she is,” he said.

  You and me against the little woman. It was an ugly tactic, but before I had a chance to respond, Jess was in the hall.

  “Dad, you’ve gotta see the fort we built. Come on. We made forty-six snowballs.”

  As Jess grabbed his father’s hand, Gary Stephens was transformed as he had been Hallowe’en night. There was such naked love in his eyes as he looked at his son that I felt a rush of feeling towards him. Five minutes before I’d wanted to come down on him like a fist on a grasshopper, but he was a complex man, and he evoked complex emotions.

  Angus and I were just finishing the salad when Hilda came in.

  I checked her hair. “No new ’do?” I asked.