To Track a Traitor, page 4
The cake making could finally settle in and get started. Cake tins were prepared with butter and flour, and flour was sifted with baking powder and cocoa. Lane mixed the sugar and butter as directed with a wooden spoon until it was fluffy. The state of the mixture defied her understanding of “fluffy,” but she carried on gamely, mixing in two eggs and beating until the whole thing appeared smooth and creamy and her arm ached.
“I hope all married couples need not expect one of them to run off,” suggested Lane, resting her arm.
“Dear me, what a dreadful thing to say to a newly married bride! Of course not. And, in fact, my parents were perfectly happily married, though Daddy did die before it was convenient for anyone.”
“No offence taken. In fact, I’m rather afraid I myself will be running off in a short time, leaving the poor inspector on his own. My grandfather has been ill, and I think I’m going to have to go off to Scotland.”
“I’m sorry to hear it. Is it quite serious?”
“Heart. My patient grandmother is tasked with keeping him on the straight and narrow, in the matter of diet and exercise.”
Mabel shook her head. “That’s what killed Daddy, only no one knew anything was wrong with his heart.”
“That must have been dreadful. You were in your teens?”
“That’s right. Fifteen. Mother, of course, was a trooper. Chin up, have to soldier on, that sort of thing.”
Mabel went to their tiny fridge, pulled out a bottle of milk, and poured it into the tin measuring cup. “All right. We are going to add the milk and the flour alternately in three goes, and we are going to fold it in carefully so as not to toughen the cake.”
Lane, unaware that cake could be toughened, or of what folding was outside of the contents of her laundry basket, watched and imitated.
“Right. Into the tins, give them a good rap to knock out the air bubbles, and into the oven. We’ll give them twenty minutes before we have a look. You can’t open and close the oven door every five minutes to peek, and you definitely can’t slam the oven door because your cakes will fall. Now, I suggest we go outside and make sure Gwen did an adequate job on the pigpen gate.”
* * *
kootenay feed store was located on Front Street, an easy walk from the station, so Ames and Darling made their way there while Terrell went out on a noise complaint. A slat-sided truck parked by the front steps was being loaded up with sacks by two men. One of them saw Ames and Darling hovering at the bottom of the steps.
“Be right with you. Go on in.”
Inside, the barrels and sacks of feed made the store smell pleasantly grainy, and Ames wondered at the way of life that would require bags of grain. Maybe if he moved out to the country he would buy something like this for, what, a cow? Some chickens? But, of course, Tina, with whom he was on a longish spell of getting along, did not keep animals. And neither did the inspector, as far as he knew, so it obviously wasn’t a requirement of living outside of town.
“You don’t keep any animals out there at King’s Cove, do you, sir?” Ames asked, wandering up and down looking at the shelves with his hands in his pockets.
“I do not. Why, are you thinking of it?”
“Don’t make me laugh. Can you imagine me with chickens?” He patted a bag of something just as the front door slammed.
“Now, what can I do for you?” The man they assumed to be Barnes had come in and was brushing his hands on the back of his overalls. “Bit short-handed today. Sorry about the wait.”
Darling pulled out his warrant card. “Inspector Darling, and this is Sergeant Ames. Are you Owen Barnes?”
“I am. This is about Ben, I’m guessing. The wife phoned here earlier.” Barnes removed his peaked cap, wiped his forehead with a grubby handkerchief, and set his cap back on his head.
“That’s right,” Darling said.
“I heard he got in a rowboat and disappeared. Is that right? My wife said Ben’s wife, Maude, is pretty upset.”
“What can you tell us about him?” Darling countered.
“Not much to tell. He’s worked here for twenty years, been pretty reliable, honest, hard-working. Got lucky and has two little kids and a wife who came with a bit of money, so I would say he doesn’t need to worry.”
Ames took notes. Barnes had folded his arms and looked at them from under the brim of his cap.
“Did he seem troubled about anything lately?”
“I don’t know. He isn’t a laugh a minute at the best of times, but no. We both served in the Great War, and it took him harder than it took me. I gave him the job because he couldn’t get anything else. Are you suggesting he did himself in? ’Cause I don’t think that would be like him at all.”
“He disappeared last night around ten and took a pistol with him. His boat was found empty. Did he mention anything that might explain this?”
Barnes sat heavily on the counter. “A pistol?” He shook his head. “I don’t believe it. I just can’t see him going off like that to kill himself.”
“So, he didn’t seem to you to be unhappy?” Darling asked again.
“Like I said, not more than usual. He’s been a bit moody since, oh, early winter. In fact, I’d say he was in a better mood than usual. Almost chatty. Doesn’t like the winter much, so I figured he was cheering up with the longer days. Is his wife all right? My Cynthia is pretty close with her. Thanks for taking her out there, by the way. I’ll pick her up at the end of my day.”
Chapter Four
gladys was finding this obligatory visit to her friend Adele Robinson unsettling, and so she was feeling testy. Adele lived in a cottage perched up on a hill about three miles north of Nelson, with a driveway that was rutted and narrow and difficult to negotiate. Gwen stalling the car on the hill had not helped Gladys’s mood, and she was cross by the time they arrived. Adele, who in every way was Gladys’s opposite—plump and short where Gladys was lean and tall, and querulous where Gladys was decisive—stood anxiously at the front door as they alighted. The distraught woman appeared at first to still be in her night things, but in fact was wearing her dressing gown over a green flowered dress.
“What’s happened, then?” demanded Gladys by way of greeting.
“Thank you for coming,” Adele said, clutching Gladys’s hand and nodding at Gwen. “I’m beside myself! I don’t know where to turn.”
“Never mind all that. Let’s get inside and get Gwen to rustle up some tea. Have you had anything to eat today?” Gladys pushed Adele back into her house, gently enough, but with the air of someone putting an animal firmly back into its pen.
“Well, no . . . I . . . I can’t seem to . . .”
“Right. Gwen. Get that tea on, see what she’s got in the larder. Toast if you can manage it.” Gladys got her friend seated in the little sitting room and sat down opposite her. “Now then.”
Adele picked at the faded knobbly green material that upholstered her armchair. Finally, she spoke. “Maude phoned this morning, after the police had been. She said Ben went off last night in one of their rowboats. Boat washed up on the neighbour’s beach, only Ben wasn’t there.” She began to cry, sniffing into the sleeve of her gown. “I don’t know what to do.”
Gladys whipped a handkerchief out of her pocket and handed it to her friend with a shake of the head. “I don’t know what you imagine you can do. You can hardly dash off up and down the lake looking for him. I’m sure the police have it well in hand. They’ll find him, you’ll see. He’ll have gone off and camped across the lake and lost his boat.”
Adele fell silent, plucking at the upholstery, and wiped her nose with the handkerchief. “But he went off at ten o’clock at night.” She hesitated, looking imploringly at Gladys. “And he took his gun.”
This caused Gladys a moment of surprise. “Perhaps he was planning an early morning hunt.”
“No, but you see, not his rifle. His revolver. I’m . . . I’m so afraid he might have done something foolish.”
Thinking that rowing onto the lake at night with a revolver was already quite foolish enough, Gladys shook her head. “Now then. You mustn’t fill your mind with nonsense. The man has a wife and children. He’s hardly going to do away with himself.”
This bald stating of Adele’s secret fears made her squeak in dismay. “Oh, you don’t think he’d—”
“No, I jolly well don’t,” Gladys said firmly. The two women fell into an uneasy silence until Gwen came in with a tray holding a teapot, three cups, and a plate of buttered toast. She put the plate beside Adele. “Here. You must eat. You need your strength,” she said as kindly as she could manage. She found Mrs. Robinson tiresome in her helplessness. “What do you take in your tea?”
“How can I sit here eating and drinking while my boy might be drowned, or worse!” Adele wailed, with a sudden burst of energy.
Gladys leaned forward. “Mustn’t get carried away. Gwen’s right. You’re no good to him if he is in trouble and you don’t eat.”
The next few minutes were spent coaxing Adele to eat some toast and watching her slurp tea, which she grimaced at because Gladys had added a good dose of sugar. Just as well, Gwen thought. Sweet tea would be just the thing for shock. She glanced at her mother, who had leaned back on the couch and was sipping her own tea.
“Right,” Gladys resumed. “Was he upset about anything? Money troubles, that sort of thing? Troubles with his wife?” She wondered if Ben Arden would even confide in his mother if he were in trouble.
Adele sniffed disapprovingly. “Maude was hardly the right woman, was she? I was against him marrying her right from the start. She’s much too bossy. A man needs to have the upper hand, doesn’t he? She’s always starting rows.”
If Ben were henpecked, that might be a reason for him to leave, Gladys thought. From what she remembered of Ben, it was quite easy to imagine any woman running rings around him. He had been, she felt, far too attached to his mother, and she to him. It wasn’t normal. The sudden memory came to her about how free Ben had been with girls during his teens. “Maybe there’s your answer. Perhaps he’s gone off just to get away.”
This idea seemed to take hold of Adele. Her face cleared slightly. “That will be it, of course!” She shook her head. “I remember him sending me letters from England, during the war, you know. He talked about a girl he’d met. She sounded so sweet and just doted on him. I assumed he was going to bring her back. I was so disappointed that he’d left her behind. Said she couldn’t leave her family. He waited almost fifteen years before he thought of marrying again, and he went and chose Maude. I tried to warn him.”
I bet you did, Gladys thought, pushing herself off the sofa. “Can’t do much about what our children choose to do with their lives,” she said decisively. “We’d best be off. You mark my words. He’ll turn up.” Thank God I had girls, she thought, settling into the passenger seat for the ride home.
* * *
“very nice,” darling said, surveying the cake. “I see you got a head start.” He reached for the knife that sat, gooey with chocolate icing, on the plate.
“I wouldn’t do that if I were you. You’ll ruin your dinner.”
“Will I? I can’t think of any dinner that could be ruined by chocolate cake. What are we having?”
“Chicken soup. Out of a tin, I’m afraid,” Lane said, smiling ruefully. “I’ve been busy making cake all day.”
“There, you make my point. In fact, on reflection, it might be the other way around. The soup might ruin the cake. Should we just go straight to the cake?”
“I would like nothing more,” Lane said. “However, I don’t think we should support each other in falling into a life of dissipation. I am going to heat up the soup, use that nice new toaster to make a nourishing piece of toast to go with it, and then we can have cake.”
“Thus speaks the woman who’s already had a piece,” Darling said, shaking his head. “Fine. I will fall in with your plans. I have had a busy day myself, and I will need my strength for tomorrow.”
“Why? What’s happened?” Lane asked, handing him a can of chicken noodle soup and a can opener.
“I actually like this stuff,” Darling said, holding the can up to read the label. “Mrs. Anderson used to make it, and my father did too, for that matter, after my mother died.” He applied himself to his task. “We got a call that a man got into his rowboat at ten o’clock last night and disappeared. Boat came back empty, sans man, and interestingly, sans outboard motor.” He handed the opened can back to Lane. “And he took a pistol with him. In fact, right up your alley. You found a dying man in a boat. Perhaps you can do something with this.”
Lane dumped the soup into the pot, added a can of water, and stirred. “Can you handle the toast? You’re getting quite good on that machine. As you know, I specialize in actual bodies. An empty rowboat can hold no interest for me. I’m afraid you’re on your own. Could you set the table?”
The soup served, they slurped companionably together for a few moments, then Lane rested her spoon in her nearly empty bowl. “What is the man’s name?”
“You say that in a tone that suggests it might be of interest after all. I sincerely hope not. I’ve been dying for a little private case of my own, with no interference from you. Arden. I shouldn’t be telling you, but the cake is exerting a powerful influence on me. Benjamin Arden. Chum of yours?”
“Oh,” Lane said, slightly deflated. “Only Gladys had to rush off to see a friend of hers who telephoned her in a panic because her son had left his wife and two kids. Her name wasn’t Arden, though. Robinson, I think. That was it. Adele Robinson. It’s funny, though—how many disappearing husbands can you have in one day? I can see how you might have several in a bustling metropolis like London, but how many people live up and down this lake?”
Darling put down his soup spoon, wiped his mouth with his napkin, and was about to speak.
“And that’s not all,” Lane interrupted. “According to Mabel, Lucy overheard a conversation about someone else running off—a woman. Something with a B.”
“I can see at once that my dream of a happy little case of my own is not to be realized. Already the jungle telegraph of King’s Cove has nosed out all the principal players and is no doubt well on the way to a solution. I would like to drown my sorrows in cake now, if you don’t mind.”
“You can laugh,” Lane said, getting up to fetch a couple of small plates, “But . . .”
“I’m not laughing, I assure you. I’m inconsolable. This had better help.” He held his fork upright like a pitchfork in readiness for his cake. “It is fully as good as that one we had on the train in Arizona,” he said after a few moments. “I congratulate you.”
When they had washed the dishes and tidied up after dinner, they took their whiskies into the sitting room. The air had chilled considerably, and they built a fire in the Franklin.
“Are you really going to do this?” he asked, reaching for her hand. “I don’t know how I shall bear it.”
Knowing he meant Scotland, she felt an acute pang of missing him already. “I don’t know what else to do, darling. If he were to die . . . but I will promise not to stay long. If I go now, soon, I can be back by the beginning of July, and we’ll have the whole summer.”
* * *
maude arden had dropped the children at school and was making her way into town. She had a vague feeling that she ought to put things in order somehow, though she quailed at it. But still. She had children, and they needed stability. She would start at the bank, organize the money. Ben had done all that sort of thing. Men did. She felt her heart contract and clutched the steering wheel with both hands to hold herself steady.
Should she have told the police officers about the telephone call? But there’d been nothing in it, and it had been almost six months before. Best not confuse things. Now, though, it seemed as though it might be useful. They’d been sitting at the kitchen table having a late breakfast when the phone had rung. He’d gotten up and gone into the hallway and said, “sm 229, Ben Arden speaking.” Her son had asked her if they could go out to the dock, and she’d been about to answer when she’d heard the receiver slammed down with unusual force.
Why did that strike her now? Because of the violent way he’d slammed the receiver. It had made her anxious at the time. When she’d asked him who it was, he’d shaken his head. “Wrong number.” But he’d looked drained of blood and had almost collapsed in his chair. And that invitation. Well, it was all pointing to his secret life, wasn’t it?
The sun danced along the ripples of the lake, and Maude had a moment of feeling elated by it, by the turn of the year toward summer, and in the next instant felt guilty. She pulled up at the ferry line and waited behind two other cars. Cigarette smoke poured from the open windows of both and wafted back toward her, reminding her of Ben. Thinking of him now, smoking in the living room of an evening, she reminded herself that she’d always felt uneasy about him. As if he was not what he seemed. Though he had never raised a hand to her, and he was gentler than many other fathers toward the children, she sensed a familiar dark current of unresolved feeling somewhere. Rage? Fear? She hardly knew, but she somehow was not terribly surprised by anything he did. If she’d known then what she knew now . . .
With a feeling of trepidation, as if she were trespassing in a place she didn’t belong, she asked the clerk at the first teller window if she could see the manager and then sat down on the wooden bench to wait. She looked at the polished wood and gleaming brass of the bank’s marble atrium. There were two men at one of the circular chest-high desks surrounding two of the pillars, signing cheques, and she was mildly surprised to see a woman at the second one. She crossly wondered why it should feel wrong for her to be in the bank. The bulk of the money they had was hers, after all. Well, obviously not “hers,” she corrected herself mentally. “Theirs.” They were a family, after all. Had been. Before that . . . and then her thoughts were interrupted.
