Hang Down Your Head

by Janice Macdonald

  Steve asked if I wanted to come to his place for the night, but I had stuff to get from my apartment in the morning, so I regretfully decided to be mature and head for my own place. He dropped me off at the back door, kissing me on the forehead.

  “Sleep well, Randy. I don’t have to be on duty till five, but there’s stuff I’d like to see before then.”

  “Why don’t you bring your uniform down and I can lock it in the backstage locker at the Folkways stage? Then we could mosey around between my sessions? Woody’s responsible for the stage from two till five.”

  “That sounds good, as long as you’ll have room for the bike backstage. I’ll see you around one-thirty at your stage, dollface.”

  I don’t even remember opening the apartment door, but somehow I managed to get inside, drop my stuff in the entryway, and head for bed. If I was lucky, I’d be able to squeeze in seven hours of down time before I had to be up and lively.

  31

  ~

  I wasn’t born lucky.

  I bashed my alarm clock against my dresser, but it still wouldn’t stop ringing. Finally, just as I heard it make the sick noise of innards coming loose from the casings, I woke up enough to realize I was actually hearing the phone ringing.

  My eyes felt as if they were glued shut, and my fingers got stuck in my hair when I tried to comb it back out of my face. I stubbed my toe on the coffee table as I made my way to the desk to stop the ringing. I still wasn’t compos mentis enough to think about actually speaking to whoever had caused this state of affairs.

  I picked up the handset and stared at the buttons for a minute, trying to recall which one to push. Finally, I hit the left button and it lit up; blessedly, the ringing stopped.

  “Hello?” I barked, stupidly hoping the listener wouldn’t know I was still asleep. Why I should care about that, I’ll never know, but I would usually rehearse a hello or two before picking up, just to make sure I didn’t croak or give away my sloth at still being asleep at whatever time this was. I had broken my clock before registering the time. I reached over to turn on the light so I could see the kitchen clock, recoiling like a vampire from the sudden brightness.

  “Randy? Randy? Are you there?”

  I’d forgotten I had a phone in my hand. “Yeah? Who is this?”

  “Randy, this is Woody. I am so sorry to wake you up, but I really need you to help me out.”

  “Where are you?”

  “I’m about to be taken downtown for questioning. Can you call Dr. Fuller and maybe someone in Washington to let them know? I’m hoping they can fund some high-powered local lawyer for me.”

  “Say again? You’re being taken downtown for questioning? For what? The Finsters?”

  “Nope. It seems they found a body on the hill early this morning, when they were clearing up the leftover tarps. That’s all I know; these officers won’t tell me anything. They’ve only given me enough time to dress before we head downtown. Maybe you could call Steve and see what he knows?”

  “What time is it, anyway?”

  “I’ve got five a.m. by my wristwatch. They knocked on the door here around four-thirty. I’m calling from my cellphone, and it took forever for you to pick up.”

  “Yeah, well, it took a while to get to the phone. Okay, I can’t call Steve but I will get hold of Dr. Fuller and I’m sure she will call the Smithsonian for you. Do you want me to come downtown, or would I be of any use to you?”

  “Maybe you should call Nathan and just run things at the hillside for me, as long as you get hold of Dr. F.”

  “Okay, Woody. Hey, did you say they found a body on the hill?”

  “Yep, that’s what they tell me.”

  I stood there with the phone receiver in my hand, not sure what to do. No wonder people talk about shaking themselves. Some of these metaphors aren’t so far out. I actually tried a little shimmy to get myself in gear. I had to call Dr. Fuller, and then I figured I would call Steve to find out if he could actually tell me anything. Then I thought maybe I should call him first; that way if there was anything he could tell me, I could pass it on to Dr. F.

  Steve answered on the third ring, which made him a candidate for morning person in a way I would never be.

  “Did you know that Woody was arrested for a murder of someone on the folk hillside?” I demanded.

  “I’ve just heard something, but I’m not too clear on details. Iain called me and told me I was needed downtown. I’m heading there now. What did Woody tell you?”

  “He didn’t tell me anything, just that he was being escorted downtown, and there’d been a body found on the hillside, and that I was to tell Dr. F and then co-ordinate things with Nathan today in case Woody wasn’t let go in time.”

  “That sounds like a plan, Randy.”

  “Do you know who was killed?”

  “I don’t know anything yet, sorry. Call Dr. Fuller. She’ll have some contingency number or other. Besides, she’s the one to report to. Then get down to the hillside as soon as you can. If it’s something to do with Woody, you can bet the forensic people and detectives in charge will be wanting to crawl all over your backstage area.”

  Oh lord, that hadn’t even occurred to me. Steve said goodbye, and I hung up the phone, trying to think of what to do first. I dialled Dr. Fuller’s home number, which I had on an emergency card she’d given me after Paul’s attack, and then with the phone tucked between my ear and my shoulder, I went into the kitchen to pour some water and coffee grounds into the dripolater. Dr. F picked up just as I was hitting the On button, so I walked back toward my bedroom as I conveyed the gist of what Woody had told me.

  We decided to divide the work along the lines that Steve had suggested. I would get over to the Festival site; she would head to the Centre to call the Smithsonian, and then go down to the police station with one of the university lawyers in tow.

  “Be careful down at the stage, Randy. We don’t know why they’ve arrested Woody, and we have no idea what they’re thinking. We don’t even know who was killed. But if this has anything to do with folkwaysAlive!, you could also be a target.”

  That was just what I needed to hear. I assured her I’d be careful. There I was, hardly awake, not even showered, and already I had agreed with three people that I should watch out for murderers. Boy, it was looking to be a banner day.

  I was out of the shower, dressed and braided in seven minutes flat. It was imperative that I get to the hillside, and the quickest way I could think of was to bike, so I tucked my jeans into my socks and tossed my backpack over my shoulder. My helmet was hanging from the coat tree by my door, and I grabbed it on the way out. It still had the silly ladybug cozy on it that Woody bought me, but I had no time to remove it. With the access to the river valley trails right behind the High Level Diner, I ­figured I’d make it to the Festival site before Dr. F got to the Centre. Just to be on the safe side, I hooked two separate coffee travel mugs into my bike basket. I had a feeling I was going to need to be wide awake.

  The Festival had a bike lock-up area that wass supervised, but I had a lock anyhow, even though I suspected more people would laugh at my particular bicycle than attempt to steal it. A kicked-about ladies’ one-speed, with a white wire basket on the front and mismatched tire, it claimed to be a Triumph, but the only thing triumphant about it would be its longevity. Still, it got me places and held quite enough groceries in the basket and hanging from the handlebars to suit me.

  It was early enough that I didn’t meet many people en route. Most of the diehard folkies would have been lined up at the hillside for a couple of hours by now, and the rest of the city had the sense to sleep in on a lazy Saturday morning. I zipped around Kinsmen Park, under the Walterdale Bridge, up through Skunk Hollow—which had got increasingly upscale since I’d last been through—and along the hill behind the Old Timers’ Cabin. I could see the Festival site, but I was still a whole cloverleaf of roadways away. I opted to head for the Edmonton Queen paddle wheeler dock, and used the pedestrian ov
erbridge to get toward the Muttart Conservatory. By now, I was only two blocks from the main gate, and I could hear the hum of people already patiently waiting in line. The policy was to let a hundred people in at a time so there was no mad stampede for the best tarp places on the hill. By the time I navigated through the crowd—which snaked through a cattlepen and continued across the road, along the sidewalk, around the corner and down the next block—it occurred to me that no one at all was moving yet. No wonder I could hear the crowd muttering. I was betting they weren’t letting anyone in till the crime scene investigators were done with the hillside. The entire hillside, I wondered? Lord help them.

  I locked my bike, got a ticket to prove I had reason to go back into the compound to retrieve it later, and headed back past the crowds. I could walk down the other street to the performers’ and volunteers’ gate, flash my pass, and with any luck would get through without a hitch. Steve’s comments about investigators picking apart my tidy backstage area had me spooked.

  I had no trouble getting in, although there was a police officer there to write down my name, affiliation, and where I intended to be for the next few hours. I pitied his notes when it came to listing the environment crew or the 50/50 draw folks, who traversed the entire site several times a day.

  I stared up at the hillside as I went past, along with all the other rubber-necking volunteers and two excited zydeco musicians who seemed to think it was all just as entertaining as a TV drama. The investigators appeared to be concentrated on an area straight up from the sound booth, about four or five tarps back from the height I’d been sitting at, but in the geographical centre of the crowd, whereas I had been on the periphery. It was a fitting place for me, all in all. I felt like a pinball being slammed about from unrelated bumper to bumper. Nothing about this summer was making sense, this least of all.

  “They’ve taken the body away,” I overheard a Hospitality crew member say to an Instrument Lock-Up worker. “They told the Gate crew that it would be about another hour till we could let people in.”

  “Wish I had a hot chocolate and coffee truck out selling to that crowd,” replied her friend. “You’d make a killing catering to them right now.”

  I moved on toward the folkwaysAlive! stage. Somebody had already made a killing in this crowd, as I saw it.

  32

  ~

  I undid the combination lock on the side of the tent. It was a formality, of course; anyone with a box cutter could slice right through the tent wall and waltz in. The point was, no one had. Nothing seemed to have been moved at all. That calmed me down a bit. Maybe the police were on the wrong track with Woody; maybe this murder had nothing at all to do with the Folkways collection.

  Yeah, and maybe the rural vote would swing to the NDP in Alberta. This latest crime had to be connected with what we’d been going through. In fact, I was pretty sure I would be more relieved to know it was connected than to find out there were random killings happening all over the city, impinging on my personal space.

  I figured I’d better get busy setting things up while I had the time. If the police really were going to swarm the place, there’d be no time later to get ready for the performers. As far as I knew there would still be performers. The old saw about the show having to go on must apply to folksingers as well as tap ­dancers. The ice in the coolers had puddled to liquid but the bottled water bobbing around was still cold. I hauled out the bottles, tipped the coolers away from the cables on the grassy floor, and replaced all the bottles but one, which I opened and took a long drink from. I checked my watch. It was barely ten o’clock. and already looking to be a scorcher of a day. I hoped the golf cart guy with the bags of ice would be along soon. I set out some sun-hat disks and taped up the players’ timetables, complete with their submitted playlists, in front of Nathan’s table.

  Nathan himself appeared just then, hauling in silver suitcases full of his recording equipment.

  “Need some help?” I asked, hoping he would be chauvinist enough to assume I couldn’t heft the soundboards.

  “Sure,” he said in an irritatingly enlightened way, “there are three more on the cart outside, along with your ice bags. They told me I had to haul them too if I wanted the ride.”

  “Great,” I sighed. Yesterday I had managed to get the driver to bring the ice bags right in to the cooler corner. Today, it looked like I was going to have to tote my own barge, and lift Nathan’s bales as well.

  I was hauling a suitcase soundboard with very sharp corners into the tent when the Centre’s cellphone began to ring. Woody had set the ring tone to “In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida,” which I had thoughtwhile wildly inappropriate for a folk music phone, but at least it was easy to hear. I was almost late answering it, though, because I’d left it in the locker that I hadn’t yet opened. Nathan kindly brought in the ice while I scrambled for the phone and answered breathlessly.

  It was Dr. Fuller. “How are things down on the hill?”

  “They let us come in to set up, but we haven’t seen any of the performers here yet. Of course, we’re not recording the first workshop of the day anyhow, so no worries there. Ferron is on here at noon, though, and we’ve got to be prepped for that. Are you downtown with Woody?”

  “I’ve just come out of the police station. Woody is still there, assisting them with the investigation, if you can hear my quotation marks. The Folkways lawyer is also down there now, so there’s not all that much I can do at this point. I’m going to be at the hill as soon as I can. Is there anything I need to pick up?”

  I couldn’t think of anything in particular besides a big cup of coffee for myself, and I could likely slip away to the kitchen tent for one of those once Dr. F was here. I quizzed Nathan, but he too was fine.

  “Nope, we’re okay, just awaiting the onslaught. By the way, have they let anyone know who the victim was yet?”

  “That’s the reason why they’re tying it to our troubles, I guess. It seems it was a woman who managed one of the Barbara Shoppes. A Pia Renshaw. Any connection to those damned Finsters makes us part of the picture.”

  “Pia Renshaw? Is that the woman who runs the west end shop?”

  It had to be the Grace Kelly woman who had been so instrumental in me getting the middy blouse. I had more trouble imagining her sitting on the Folk Festival hillside than I did imagining her dead, for some reason.

  “Yes, that’s the one. Apparently, she was a real folk music fan, although I doubt that it was something she discussed with her boss,” Dr. Fuller chuckled ruefully.

  No, I couldn’t imagine Barbara Finster being overly happy to know that one of her employees harboured a fondness for guitars and harmonicas. Of course, it would be one place where you’d know for sure you wouldn’t be running into your boss. Maybe that was part of Pia’s reason for attending festivals. But none of that explained why she would be leaving the hillside in a body bag.

  Dr. Fuller hung up, and I returned to the ice task. I had just refilled both coolers and crumpled the empty plastic bags into a larger black plastic refuse bag when the police finally showed up. I checked my watch. They were twenty minutes ahead of the workshop start. The two police officers came in at the same time as the sound guy and the stage hands. I hadn’t met either of them before, but most of the cops I was familiar with came from the south side division. I had a feeling these guys were from downtown. I introduced everyone, and then made an executive decision. Since the stage hands were needed immediately to set up for Tim Hus, Mike Stack and John Wort Hannam, the southern Alberta boys who were going to head the first workshop, I suggested the police get what information they required from the stage crew first. Nathan wasn’t required till noon, but he was busy setting things up for recording the hour of Ferron we’d be hosting. I’d be around all day. It only made sense to have the police wait and talk to me after they dealt with everyone who had to be in other places with more urgency. They agreed, which surprised me, considering that my experience with police officers other than Steve had been that they
rarely enjoy being told what to do. Maybe they were just happy to come across someone on the site able to prioritize. There was something about folk festivals that tended to bring out the lackadaisical hippie even in otherwise button-down personalities.

  They were done questioning the stage crew in very little time, and soon the music started up. There were fewer people at our little hill than I’d have liked, but I had a feeling people were still being let in through the gates due to the holdup of the investigation and that the area in front of the stage would fill up throughout the workshop. I had whispered as much to the musicians before they stepped on the stage.

  Tim patted my shoulder. “Don’t worry, I’ve played to crowds that would have made a Volkswagen feel spacious. This looks good to me.”

  After tossing out some sun-hat flying saucers to the crowd, I disappeared back into the tented area backstage to see what was happening with the interviewing. The officers were talking with Nathan and trying to get a bead on what our whole project was.

  “So, you’re recording everything?”

  “Technically, yes. We’ve got the rights to use only certain aspects for pressing and distribution, but we have the archival rights to record everything that’s produced on the

  folkwaysAlive! stage this weekend, and Dr. Fuller has asked that we get as much of it as possible. I’m just ramping up now for the present workshop since it took so long to get in on-site this morning what with everything, but,” he paused to tweak a dial as he listened to one of the headset pots he held against his ear, “as of this minute, we’re recording the complete ambience of the hillside as well as the stage.”

  “Did you say you were recording the hillside?” said a familiar voice behind me. I turned to see Iain McCorquodale striding into the tent. The other officers nodded to him with the deference given to plain-clothed detectives. I just smiled at him. Nathan gave him a quizzical look, but I quickly made introductions and Nathan deigned to answer his question.