LONG
GONE
MAN
PRAISE FOR PHYLLIS SMALLMAN
“Smallman, winner of the Unhanged Arthur Ellis, is at the top of her game.” —The Globe and Mail
“Sure to join the ranks of our national talent, finding acclaim on the international crime scene.” —Zoomer Magazine
“Smallman knows how to crank up the reader’s tension. The dialogue is often sharp and funny.” —National Post
“Phyllis Smallman is a gifted writer.” —The Sherbrooke Record
“Solid entertainment.” —The Hamilton Spectator
“Reading . . . Phyllis Smallman is like sitting down at a bar for a drink with an old friend and knowing the beer is going to be cold, the peanuts fresh, and the stories spicy!” —Allene Reynolds, Mystery & Me blog
“I have always been partial to the style of writing in this series: it is sharp, funny, and the plot keeps a steady pace with plenty of suspenseful moments throughout.” —Toni Osborne, reader review
A Singer Brown Mystery
LONG
GONE
MAN
Phyllis Smallman
Copyright © 2013 Phyllis Smallman
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—electronic, mechanical, recording, or otherwise without the prior written consent of the publisher or a licence from The Canadian Copyright Licensing Agency (access Copyright). For a copyright licence, visit accesscopyright.ca.
Phyllis Smallman Publishing
www.phyllissmallman.com
LIBRARY AND ARCHIVES CANADA CATALOGUING IN PUBLICATION
Smallman, Phyllis
Long Gone Man / Phyllis Smallman.
(A Singer Brown mystery)
ISBN 978-1-771510-30-1 [print]
ISBN 978-0-987803-38-2 [eBook]
I. Title. II. Series: Smallman, Phyllis. Singer Brown mystery.
PS8637.M36H54 2012 C813’.6 C2012-904826-7
Editor: Frances Thorsen
Proofreader: Cailey Cavallin
Cover and interior design: Pete Kohut
Author photo: Linda Matteson-Reynolds
eBook development: WildElement.ca
ALSO BY PHYLLIS SMALLMAN
Sherri Travis Mysteries
Margarita Nights
Sex in a Sidecar
A Brewski for the Old Man
Champagne for Buzzards
Highball Exit
Sherri Travis Short Mysteries
Bitty And The Naked Ladies
Jack Daniels And Tea
An Accidental Death
For Gordon Kilborn Cunningham
“. . . Love is a durable fire,
In the mind ever burning,
Never sick, never old, never dead,
From itself never turning.”
—Sir Walter Raleigh
Table of Contents
One
Two
Three
Four
Five
Six
Seven
Eight
Nine
Ten
Eleven
Twelve
Thirteen
Fourteen
Fifteen
Sixteen
Seventeen
Eighteen
Nineteen
Twenty
Twenty-one
Twenty-two
Twenty-three
Twenty-four
Twenty-five
Twenty-six
Twenty-seven
Twenty-eight
Twenty-nine
Thirty
Thirty-one
Thirty-two
Thirty-three
Thirty-four
Thirty-five
Thirty-six
Thirty-seven
Thirty-eight
Thirty-nine
Forty
Forty-one
Forty-two
Forty-three
Forty-four
Forty-five
Forty-six
Forty-seven
Forty-eight
Forty-nine
Fifty
Fifty-one
Fifty-two
Fifty-three
Fifty-four
Fifty-five
Fifty-six
Fifty-seven
Fifty-eight
Fifty-nine
Sixty
Sixty-one
Sixty-two
Sixty-three
Sixty-four
Acknowledgments
About the Author
One
The singer leaned towards the dash, straining to see the road. The fog, which had hovered just above the road at the bottom of the mountain, now obscured everything beyond the six feet of pavement directly in front of the van. The swirling veil lifted for a brief moment to reveal a sharp curve to the left and the tips of evergreens growing a hundred feet below the roadway.
“Jesus!”
She pulled hard to the left, away from the edge, as the fog closed in again.
A loud screeching of metal on rock filled the cab as the van reached the curve and scraped the jagged rock face. She jerked the wheel to the right.
She edged a little farther to the right, to where she thought the road should be. Had she moved over far enough? Impossible to tell how close she was to the rim, and if she made a mistake the trees growing below the road were the only thing that would slow the van’s plummet down the face of Mount Skeena.
A soft mewling sound alarmed the singer until she realized it came from her. She forced herself to breathe deeper, to relax her locked fingers and fight the panic that would make her overreact and cause a disaster. She eased farther left, terrified to be in the path of downward traffic but more afraid to lose the road.
She cursed. The hate that brought her to Glenphiddie Island had driven her beyond caution. You waited twenty years; one more night would have been nothing, she thought. But hatred is an emotion that ignores prudence.
The singer hadn’t planned on being so late. She thought she had perfectly calculated the time needed to make the three ferries necessary for the trip from Vancouver to Glenphiddie Island, an island so small that it wasn’t even on the map of Canada that was mounted on the wall of the ferry terminal. Only a dotted red line out into the Pacific showed the Island Queen’s destination.
Stuck on the dock in Sidney, watching and worrying as fog rolled in, delay seemed like the worst possible thing that could happen. And then, for a brief space of time, she’d felt jubilant, as hers was the last vehicle loaded onto the car carrier before the red barrier went down.
As the Island Queen moved slowly through the fog, sounding its horn, she realized she would rather have been back on the dock waiting for morning and the next sailing. Her apprehension had sent her out into the fog to walk the deck, straining to see anything on the water, any obstacle waiting to ram them.
It was close to ten o’clock when they finally docked safely in the harbor. She joined the thin conga line of cars clattering down the ramp to begin the drive over the toe of Mount Skeena towards the small town of Kilborn ten miles north.
The fog had eased during the crossing. It seemed like a portent of good things to come. She counted three roads on her left before she turned. She’d never been on Glenphiddie Island before and was going on a stranger’s instructions on how
to find the shortcut up to the top of Mount Skeena. The guy had told her it would save her going into Kilborn and doubling back, cutting at least half an hour off her trip. He hadn’t told her that the gravel roads had no signs and it was impossible to tell farm lanes from public roadways.
Her old van rattled down narrow rutted tracks that ended in front of darkened houses. Inside the houses, a light would come on, or a curtain might open, as she made a cautious turn before driving back to the road to try another narrow, twisting path.
Well and truly lost and searching for a safe place to park for the night, she found, quite by accident, a narrow switchback road that led up the mountain. Arriving late at night would give her the added element of surprise. This time she knew she was going to triumph. That’s when the fog closed in and her terror began.
Two
Inch by terrifying inch, the singer crept higher, afraid to stop and afraid to go on. She’d made a terrible mistake. The headlights of the ten-year-old van were stuck on bright and pointing up into the sky. In the fog they were only a little better than driving in the dark. The clapped-out vehicle was being pushed beyond its ability to perform, and now the sound of the engine changed. It hesitated.
“C’mon, Beastie,” she whispered. Cautiously, she pressed her toe down on the gas as she patted the dash. “Don’t let me down now.” The Beast took her pleas to heart and settled into its usual growl. “That’s my boy.”
She searched the blackness for a driveway, any driveway, not just the one she’d set out to find. She had to find a place to stop—even a widening in the road would be welcome—a place she could wait out the night. The parking brake no longer worked, so she’d have to find something to block the wheels. On this steep grade it would have to be something a fair size. But there was nowhere to pull over. Would there be a place at the top of the mountain to wait out the night? How would she recognize the end of the road?
She gave the dash another pat. We’ll be fine, she thought, but she couldn’t block out the image of the old Dodge Caravan getting to the top and tipping over the pinnacle, falling two thousand feet to the valley below.
Was it better to drive off the mountain or park in the middle of the road and become a speed bump? She gave a small hic of laughter and tightened her grip on the wheel. Not now, she thought. I’m not going to die now. Not after all those years, not when she was so close.
It felt like she’d been spiraling upward for hours. A man’s watch hung from the rearview mirror. She pulled it close to her face, but in the dark she couldn’t make out the dial. She let the watch bounce back on its flex bracelet, useless, just like the bastard who left it behind.
The right side of the vehicle dipped dangerously, gravel crunching beneath the tires. She jerked the wheel to the left and backed off the gas. The rear end of the van shifted as the tire slipped off the asphalt. Terror, a giant hand squeezing the breath out of her, grabbed her. She fought to bring the Beast back onto the pavement, but the van was being dragged closer and closer to the drop-off by the soft shoulder.
She screamed into the night and stood on the brake. The Beast rocked, tilted wildly to the right, and stopped. Mewling with fear, she froze, afraid of what would happen if she shifted her weight or eased off the brake. The van seemed to settle. The worst was over.
And then the rear end slithered farther sideways.
Her heart crashing into her ribs, she clung to the wheel and took huge gulps of air. “Okay, okay,” she said softly. She cranked the wheel as far to the left as it would go. With her left foot on the brake, she gently pressed her right foot down on the gas before ever so gently releasing the brake. The back end fishtailed farther off the pavement. She stomped the brake pedal and shoved the gearshift into park. The headlights shone out into emptiness through the thin fog at the edge of the world.
Carefully she reached forward to turn off the ignition, afraid the least movement on her part would send the van diving into the void. The noise of the great engine died. The Beast seemed to sigh and settle at an even steeper angle as if it knew it was done, its life over.
Grabbing a huge canvas bag from beside her and shoving hard against the heavy door, she rolled off the seat. Gravity pulled the door closed on her leg before she hit the pavement.
Splayed on the tarmac, she stared at the tunnels Beastie’s headlights made in the sky. Her battery would wear down. She’d need to get it boosted. How much would that cost? It would be suicide to attempt to reach back into the van, teetering on nothing, to shut off the lights, and what difference would a dead battery make if the van fell over the side? The Beast would be gone forever. Too late to do anything about it now. Who knew what was keeping Beastie from slipping away; the least shift, the tiniest movement, could tip the balance. She sat up and took stock. The blacktop had sanded the skin from her left hand and knee but that was nothing. She got to her feet.
Only then did she realize that her long skirt was caught in the door. She yanked. It didn’t give. Putting all of her weight behind it, she tried to rip the material from the door, but the Beast wasn’t about to give up its prize. She was tied there on the edge of the abyss.
Three
The singer scrambled for the door handle. The Dodge was tilted well to the right, angled towards oblivion. She leaned against it to give herself purchase to lift the door. A cracking sound, the shriek of wood splintering, came from underneath the van.
Terror gave her strength. She lifted the door, jerked her skirt free, and catapulted herself to the pavement. Crablike, she scuttled backwards.
Spread-eagle on the pavement she could see under the body of the van, saw the small fir trees that held it on the brink of nothingness. She waited for the Beast to fall off the mountain but the trees held.
The singer’s pulse slowed and she assessed her situation. Her leg burned where the skin had been scraped off, but everything seemed to work. She searched about her for her backpack, its rough texture under her hands familiar and comforting. She pulled her pack to her chest and got gingerly to her feet.
Turning slowly in a circle, she listened for any sound to tell her there was some other living thing about. She heard only silence.
There was neither the sound nor any smell of humanity in the air. Only the moisture on her face and the scent of evergreens told her about her surroundings. She cocked her head, listening again for any sounds in this damp swirling netherworld. No night birds called, if there were such things. She didn’t know.
Maybe another car would come along. Only minutes before, that had been a terrifying thought, but now it would be her deliverance.
The fog clung. Droplets of moisture formed on her skin. She wiped them from her face. She shivered and rubbed the goose pimples on her arms, then she pulled a long-sleeved man’s shirt from her backpack. Could the headlights, shining up into the sky like beacons, be seen in the fog? Would they bring help? She considered this while she buttoned the shirt. She realized that any aid might be hours in arriving.
She had to start walking. Which way to go? She hadn’t seen any lights nor met another vehicle, but someone must live up here or why would there be a road? Down, she decided, was easiest, and she’d always been a girl who liked the easy thing so down she would go. But nothing was turning out to be easy.
Her skirt was stuck to the blood drying on her knee. Carefully, she pulled it loose and took her first hesitant steps. It seemed very dark beyond the lights of the Dodge. There was a flashlight in the back of the van but it was lost to her. And the gun, that was gone as well. She should have put both in her backpack before starting up the mountain. Too late to worry about that now; too late for lots of things.
Still she stood there, wary of leaving. She was forty-six years old and everything she owned hung on the edge of the mountain. She no longer had her guitar, which provided her livelihood, or the van that was her home. But she was alive. And her money, all forty-five dollars and chang
e, was in her backpack. The echo of her harsh laughter surprised her. Well, wasn’t it something to laugh at? Forty-six years old, in the year 1994, and all she had to show for all that living was a ragged backpack and under fifty bucks, not even a dollar for each year of her life.
She slung the bag over her shoulder, nodding into the dark and telling herself to get on with it.
But it wasn’t that simple. The road surface was covered in fine grit and small stones, which moved under her feet. Cautiously, she started down the road, staying well to the right, away from the drop off. She followed the edge of the deep ditch full of rubble that ran along the mountain wall. She’d never been a physical person. Walking was something to be avoided, necessary hard work if no other means of transport was available, but not something she chose to do.
And nature was not her thing. She felt safer in a back alley of any city than she did out here in the wilderness. Uncertain of what the risks were, her imagination quickly exaggerated them. She wished she had the gun.
A dozen yards down the curving road, Beastie’s lights grew fainter. She paused, not wanting to leave the comfort and safety the soft illumination offered. But the reassurance of the lights wouldn’t last long. She turned away from the faint glow and walked around a bend into deep blackness, where neither stars nor moon penetrated the night. She halted, trying to make out the road before her. Slowly her eyes adjusted.
At a walking speed, the fog didn’t seem as thick, or maybe it was lifting, but the solid mass had turned into clouds of wispy dampness. She stopped, wiped a hand across her face and listened. She could hear something . . . or someone. She concentrated. Nothing. It was gone. She told herself it was the wind and started forward. Loose stones on the pavement sent her sliding with arms windmilling.
She was breathing heavily when she got herself stopped. There it was again. She heard something over her own panting. Laughter maybe? Coming from above. She peeked back over her shoulder, telling herself it was nothing, was only her imagination. But she wished she could be certain she was alone.
Long Gone Man Page 1
