One Way Ticket (A Smith and Hughes Mystery Book 1)

by Jay Forman

  “Yeah.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Positive. He wanted me to go to England with him to look at the dorms over the May 2-4 weekend. We were going to get an apartment together if they sucked.”

  “Okay, thanks.” I turned around and looked at the new exit door. “Where does that go to?”

  “Up to the door to the gym on the main floor, and then near the art studio on the second floor. Is that all you wanted?”

  “Yup!” I was beginning to stack up the bricks of evidence. If I was right.

  I had to move fast. Getting lost in the tunnels had wasted what little time I had. I knew that neither Jack nor Will had bought my line about going to get my backpack. By now they were probably prowling the hallways looking for me. The first flight was longer than normal because the tunnels were so far underground. Lord and Lady Berkshire wouldn’t have wanted to hear the underclass underneath them. I was literally leaping up the stairs, my legs reaching out to take three steps at a time. It was a great workout, but I was out of breath by the time I opened the door to the second floor hallway. I would have ripped Auntie Em’s sweater off if I’d had to do a third flight.

  I walked into the art studio right on cue – Jack’s voice started broadcasting throughout the school via the intercom, requesting my presence in Dr. Campbell’s office. I closed the door behind me, but his voice followed me into the studio. There was a speaker on the wall just inside the room.

  I heard you, Jack! And I’m ignoring you. Trust me, it’s worth it.

  Blaze was working on a new painting. It was of the ice that was breaking up on Lake Joseph right in front of him on the other side of the glass wall. White melting slabs, in all sorts of shapes and sizes, where floating beside each other. They looked like the pieces of a puzzle that had just been pulled apart. Looking down the lake I could see an island-sized thick slab still holding together in the middle of the lake. A few slabs had bumped up against the shore, stacking on top of each other like a knocked over deck of cards. But there wasn’t any ice near Berkshire’s boathouse. Old Pete’s bubblers were keeping it at bay, or rather out of the bay.

  Blaze was so engrossed in his painting, adding a stroke of grey-white to the sky, dabbing some ripples to the dark channels of open water, that he didn’t hear me come in so I spoke softly. “Sorry to interrupt you, Blaze.”

  He finished some ripples in a channel and only then turned his head to look at me. “What’s up? Somebody’s looking for you. They just announced it.”

  “I know, but they can wait. I just wanted to double check something with you.”

  “Shoot.”

  “When did you talk to Mem C about OCAD?”

  He wrinkled his brow. “Why?”

  “Because. Sorry, that’s all I can tell you right now. Was it the day that Ethan went missing?”

  “Yeah, it was. He must have gone kayaking right after we talked. I wish I’d...,”

  “Don’t!” First Grace, now Blaze. Too many people were blaming themselves for something they had absolutely no control over. “You aren’t to blame for what happened to Ethan.” I only had one more brick to get. “And you were coming back from Mem C’s when you bumped into him, right?”

  Blaze nodded.

  “Thanks!” I ran out of the room, but then ran right back in. “I’ve got a sponsor for you if you go to OCAD. I’ll fill you in later.”

  The pathway that led from the side of the pool addition to the boathouse was paved, and the thin layer of melting snow and rain water that had run over it had started to freeze into a crinkly layer from the drop in temperature. It wasn’t slippery, though. It hadn’t had enough time to build up thickness or strength and my shoes just crunched on through all the way to the boathouse. My heart rate had returned to normal and I was, once again, thankful of the warmth that Auntie Em’s thick sweater provided.

  The side door to the boathouse was open and I could smell gas and oil before I even got close to the building. I heard Old Pete’s cursing, too.

  He was inside, kneeling on the dock beside the first slip, mopping up something with a bunch of rags.

  “Stupid bloody little fuckers...,”

  “Hi, Pete.”

  He looked up at me, but only long enough to see who’d come into the boathouse. “Watch where you step, lass! Somebody’s been messing around in here and they knocked over a can of my Epifanes. Probably high-tailed it out of here when they saw what they done, like the bloody little poltroons they all are!”

  “Poltroons?” It was a word I’d never heard before.

  “Cowards, every last one of ‘em.” He continued to rub at the spill on the floor. “And it was my last can, too. Now I’m going to have to go to the office, get a requisition slip signed, drive into town, buy another can, then drive all the way back here. And I was hoping to get the Shepherd finished today.”

  The Shepherd was in front of me, hanging from canvas slings that were attached to the ceiling. Wooden planks had been laid across the open water in the slip below it. There was a paintbrush and some rags lying on the middle plank. On the plank right beside it three life rings had been laid out and I knew why. I’d seen Old Pete lie on them when he had to work on the bottom of the Shepherd before. It was a classic wooden launch, an antique by now. Unlike so many of the mahogany launches that the rich cottagers bought to go with their McMansions, it hadn’t been modified or modernized. It had been lovingly maintained by Pete. It was the only Shepherd I’d ever seen with a permanent roof. It made the boat look like a flattened and stretched out old Cadillac.

  I walked around the slip, being careful not to step in the spill, and saw that Old Pete had yet to finish varnishing the other side of the boat. “It really stinks in here.”

  “Yeah, I been workin’ on the engines, too. What can I do for you, lass?”

  “Can you tell me which kayak was Ethan’s?” I walked to the far side of the boathouse, past all four slips, and stood in front of the wall of kayaks sitting in their braces. The bottom on the front rack was empty.

  “The OPP have it. But his was the same as the yellow one, on the top of the front rack.”

  It looked very familiar, but I looked up to see the small plate on the bow to make sure. “It’s a Walden Naturalist. I have a blue one just like it.” I’d bought my Walden because it was so light. I could easily lift it up and put it on the roof rack of my car when I wanted to take it over to Jack’s.

  “They last forever, much better made than some of the newer ones. I’ll be moving them racks outside soon.” Old Pete made an old man groan as he stood up. “That’s as good as it’s going to get. I’ll clean myself up a bit and then I’ll be off. Don’t be touching the Shepherd.” He walked into the little bathroom at the back of the boathouse and closed the door.

  I had a game plan all worked out when I bolted from Dr. Campbell’s office, but now? I wasn’t so sure. Was I doing what Jack had accused me of? “...you just went ahead and did what you always do - whatever you want to do, consequences be damned.” I could hear his voice in my head as clearly as if he’d been standing right in front of me. Was that what I was doing?

  I was right, though. I was sure of it. All the pieces fit into place, mostly. And Jack had just pooh-poohed me when I’d wondered if Mem C could be the killer. Just like he’d done when I tried to tell him that Greg’s Allamanda project was bunk. I didn’t have any solid proof, and he was really big on solid proof! I only had what I’d seen and heard, and what I’d learned about people from having met so many of them.

  Like Trudi on Tasman Island. Mem C had understood exactly what Trudi had been feeling when I took the photograph of her as she looked at what had once been her home – “I could feel the sadness she must have experienced when she and her family were forced to leave”. But would I ever be able to get Jack or Will to understand that Mem C’s motive had been to protect the home she loved? It was the only thing that made sense. That, or, as Liloe had said, she was just plain “bat shit crazy”. Maybe it
was a combination of both? Marcy wasn’t bat shit crazy, though. Even she had been worried about the future of Berkshire if there was too much of a scandal over Kayla’s death. And the school and the parents had worked really hard to keep the boathouse assault quiet.

  I walked over to the door to the storage room and took a quick peek inside. Everything, the ropes, lifejackets, buoys, portable gas cans, plastic bottles of engine oil, everything was neatly organized on the floor to ceiling shelving. Old Pete’s tools were just as organized in the workroom next to it. The Shepherd was the only boat still hanging in slings. The other three powerboats had already been lowered into the water. They were made of fibreglass and their hulls didn’t need as much spring maintenance as the Shepherd. The inboard engine compartments at the stern of two of them were open. Pete must have been working on them, too.

  Mem C had been pointing me toward Jocelyn from the very beginning. She’d strongly hinted that maybe Jocelyn and Kayla had argued, that maybe Jocelyn had just given Kayla a shove out of anger without meaning to kill her. That’s probably what happened with Mem C and Kayla. Mem C said she didn’t know anything about computers, but if she’d been curious enough she might have seen one of the sex videos or maybe even one of the notes – she had a master key and Jocelyn sometimes left her work up on the screen in the editing suite. And she knew that Kayla was studying Shakespeare, but not which play. If she’d found out about what Kayla and Jocelyn were doing she would have done anything to stop them both, to stop them from damaging her home. If Jocelyn was arrested the whole thing could be blamed on a student who “wasn’t really Berkshire material”.

  She knew how to drive the old truck. She knew that Jack was coming to see her to talk about Kayla.

  She knew about my allergies. She’d offered me the sugar cubes.

  But why Ethan? She said he’d come to talk to her about his university choices, but he’d already accepted the offer from Cambridge. He told Jeff he was going to ask her if he should tell the police about the video of the boathouse assault on Kayla. Another threat to Berkshire. She was fit, for her age. She could have pulled his kayak out of the water and put it back on the rack. Auntie Em could lift my kayak with one hand. And if she knocked Ethan with the paddle when he was getting into the kayak he could have easily been knocked off balance. Even if he’d grabbed the paddle from her it wouldn’t have kept him afloat.

  I heard Old Pete coughing so hard in the bathroom that I half expected to hear one of his lungs hit the floor. The gas and oil fumes were getting to me, too. But I knew that wasn’t what was making Pete cough. He’d been smoking two packs a day for so long that he probably couldn’t smell or taste anything anymore.

  Yes, there were still cracks between the puzzle pieces I was trying to fit together, but those cracks weren’t big enough to make the leap between them impossible.

  So now what? Confront her? That had been the plan.

  It had been a dumb plan.

  Old Pete came out of the bathroom, shaking his wet hands off. “You still here?”

  “Just looking around. I have good memories of this place.”

  “I remember. You and Jack, always coming down to go paddling off on some great adventure. Can’t say as I blamed you, neither. What was that thing Jack always said?”

  “There is nothing – absolutely nothing – half so much worth doing as simply messing about in boats.” Our fathers had both read The Wind in the Willows to us at bedtime, many, many times. It made me smile to remember Jack, and his bloody awful imitation of a British accent, saying that line whenever we paddled away from Berkshire.

  I changed my plan. I’d find out if Mem C was there, in the boathouse, and then I’d go get Jack. “Is Mem C upstairs?”

  “She’s here, all right.” Old Pete lifted a flannel-lined jean jacket off of a hook near the door and slipped his arms into the sleeves. “Tell you the truth, I think she’s been drinking. Might even have been her who knocked over my varnish, but I’ll never know. She’s in a foul mood, that’s for sure. Can’t imagine Jack and Will are much enjoying their time with her.”

  “Jack and Will are here? Upstairs?” Why? And why hadn’t they included me?

  “They came in a couple of minutes before you. I’d best be going. The hardware store still closes early this time of year.”

  I watched Pete walking away along the pathway to the main buildings, then looked up at the ceiling. Damn you, Jack! You should have included me...oh...wait a minute. He’d tried to. That’s why he’d been paging me over the school intercom. And I’d ignored him. I’d done what I always did – whatever I wanted to. I hadn’t included Jack.

  I owed him one monster apology.

  I took a deep breath, walked over to the open wooden stairs that went up to Mem C’s apartment and started going up them, taking them one step at a time. As I got closer to the closed door at the top of the stairs I could faintly hear voices. One of them sounded like Jack’s angry voice.

  Without warning a blast of hot energy slammed into my chest, along with several pieces of the door to Mem C’s apartment, and I felt myself falling backwards. There was a roaring sound in my ears. I hit the wooden dockboards below. Heard and felt my head crack onto a plank. What the hell?

  I looked up and saw tongues of flames licking the doorframe at the top of the stairs. My eyes hurt, my nose hurt, I took a deep breath to cough, but it felt like I’d inhaled shards of broken glass.

  “JACK!” I screamed with everything I had in me as I tried to get up, pushing myself off the boards with my hands. Something was wrong with my right hand, my right wrist. It was flopping at an odd angle. And it hurt like a bitch!

  “Get out of there. RUN!” I looked over at the open door and saw Old Pete standing outside, waving his arms madly as if he were trying to send a semaphore message at the speed of a helicopter’s rotary blades.

  I’d heard Uncle Doug’s firemen friends talk about the sound of a fire, but it wasn’t until that moment that I understood what they meant by the roar, the life of it. It was growing, spreading, growling. The boathouse was groaning. I heard the pop of an air pocket being released in one of the boards above my head. Like the sound of a log in the fireplace in Jack’s library.

  “Jack’s upstairs! We have to get him out!” I shouted back to Pete.

  “He’ll jump! Get out now!”

  But I wasn’t going to leave Jack. Not this time.

  I wanted to run up the stairs. The top three steps had been swallowed by the fire and it was tickling the next step down.

  “JACK!” I shouted to the ceiling. “JUMP OFF THE BALCONY!”

  I ran over to the Shepherd, grabbed the life rings off the plank underneath it, and tossed them out into the open water in front of the boat slip.

  There was a horrific cracking sound. A board over the Shepherd fell down, sending a shower of sparks all over Pete’s fresh varnish. I scrambled along the plank to get back on the dock.

  Something bright red fell through the hole left in the ceiling. Not all the way through. Just partially through.

  The smoke was getting thicker but the bright red walking cast was still easy to see.

  Pete kept yelling at me.

  But Jack’s walking cast, Jack’s leg was still stuck in the ceiling. Jack was stuck in the fire.

  The top of the sling straps holding the Shepherd underneath him were smouldering, turning orange.

  I took a flying leap and grabbed hold of the Shepherd’s gunwale. Oh God, my wrist hurt, but I wasn’t going to let go. I swung back and forth, building up momentum until there was enough power in my swing to hook my left leg over the gunwale. The rest of me tumbled into the boat after it.

  Flames were starting to roll across the ceiling in waves.

  “Get out, Lee!” I faintly heard Jack cry.

  Like I’d ever listened to him before! I sure as hell wasn’t going to now.

  I scrambled up onto the sedan roof of the Shepherd, reached up and grabbed Jack’s leg with both hands. And pul
led. Pulled with every drop of power I’d spent hours at the gym building up in every muscle in my body. When his other leg broke through the burning ceiling I grabbed it, too. And pulled. Pulled!

  I felt his body breaking through the expanding hole in the ceiling.

  I heard the thud of my back landing on the roof of the Shepherd and the air that was knocked out of Jack’s chest when he slipped off the roof and into the open stern of the boat.

  I heard something big splash into the water in front of one of the open slips.

  I could smell the acrid stench of the varnish on the boat melting.

  My mouth was dry and tasted like an ashtray.

  One of the slings snapped and the Shepherd started falling sideways.

  I saw Jack fall out of the boat into the open water as I slid off the roof of the boat.

  The shock of the cold water took my breath away. I gasped. Auntie Em’s sweater was weighing me down. Pulling me down.

  I saw the ceiling begin to collapse above us.

  He would have thrashed around to grab onto anything. That’s what Ethan would have done.

  Grab onto something, anything.

  Grab onto Jack first.

  *

  Something was beeping, double time, like it had the hiccups. I was thirsty. Really, really thirsty. I opened one eye, just a bit. I was in a hospital bed, in a room. A big room. Beside me a green line skimmed across a monitor, spiking up with every beat of my heart. There was that double beep again. The green line went up – beep, then another beep, just after the green line dropped. Had I had a heart attack? Is that what that was?

  My right arm felt heavy. They must have stuck a really big IV needle into it. I lifted it up...and saw the fresh cast that ran from just below my elbow and encased most of my hand. The tips of my fingers were sticking out, though. Two of my fingers were wrapped up in thick white gauze.

  The fire. I was in a fire. The green line beside me started to jump and beat erratically.

  “Jack!” I felt the oxygen mask on my face when my lips moved.

  “Right here,” I heard him say from somewhere close by.