by H. P. Bayne
Dez tore his eyes from the hole to stare at the side of Sully’s head. “Which means what, exactly?”
“I don’t know for sure, but I can guess. Marc said the Ice Man is only seen in the winter. He’s covered in ice. Could be he’s connected to the ice because of how he died. Once it melts, he goes with it—until next winter anyway.”
“Not to be an asshole, but can I say good riddance?” Dez said.
Sully continued to peer at the hole, eyes narrowed in an expression of obvious thought. “I don’t know. It makes me think he wasn’t trying to hurt me on purpose. You told me once one of your police colleagues had to punch someone out while he was trying to rescue them from the river. The person was drowning and terrified. They weren’t hearing anything your colleague was saying.”
Dez remembered the incident. His colleague, Phil, had taken some unfair flak over the whole thing on social media until a psychologist with knowledge of panic response spoke to reporters about the situation. “The guy would have pulled Phil down with him if Phil didn’t react immediately to get control of him. Yeah, I remember. You’re saying that’s what’s going on with the Ice Man?”
“If he needs help, he must know he’s running out of time for another year. He seems to get some strength from the ice, and it’s melting. He won’t disappear with it; he’ll just have no way to escape.” Sully shuddered. “I think he must end up trapped down there, underwater, all summer. No way out.”
Dez hated water. The idea of being trapped below with no chance of rescue, for months, was horrific. If the Ice Man had died this way, it would be even worse for him.
With everyone safely off the lake for the rest of the season, Dez had hoped he and Sully could leave the Ice Man in the rearview. However, judging by Sully’s horror-filled face, that was no longer a possibility.
“We don’t even know who he is,” Dez said.
“But we do know he took an interest in Greg when he was digging around in the cabin. What if the reason no one reported the Ice Man missing is because no one knew him? Maybe he lived out here alone, Dez. Maybe the cabin belonged to him.”
Dez held up a hand for pause. “Don’t get ahead of yourself. Maybes can get you into all sorts of problems in an investigation. Tell you what. You go talk to the reporter, see where it gets you. I’ll see if I can track down a manager or a maintenance person for the lake. If anyone knows about the cabin and what happened to it, it would be them.”
Sully gave him a grin with lifted brows—an expression of hope. “I’d rather do things the other way around.”
To which Dez had only one answer. “Tough.”
13
By the time they got Adam’s ice fishing shack and trailer locked away safely at his storage facility, Dez was running short on time before he had to take his shift surveilling Greg.
Adam sighed when they pulled into his driveway.
“You’re never fishing there again, are you?” Dez asked him.
Adam shook his head and met Dez’s smile with his own. “You got that right, my friend. Plenty of other lakes out there don’t have a ghost attached.”
“I’m working on getting him the help he needs to cross over,” Sully said. “If all goes to plan, the lake will be short one ghost by the next fishing season.”
“As great as that sounds, I’ll never stop picturing the guy next to my shack or that shred of cloth—let alone what’s got to be lying down at the bottom of the lake. I had some nice trout in the freezer left over from past trips there this winter. I tossed it all out. The idea of eating something that might have been nibbling on …” Adam trailed off and shuddered while making a disgusted noise.
“If it helps, there’s not likely anything left of the guy to nibble on,” Dez said. “And I can’t imagine fish swimming in the lake now would have been alive when there was something to chew on.”
Adam shivered again. “Still. Ugh. I can’t get it out of my head.”
Due to his own views on the matter, Dez couldn’t argue the point.
Dez called Lachlan en route to Greg’s.
“Given what we’re in the middle of, maybe we could ease off the surveillance,” Dez suggested. “I mean, we’ve got some pretty good leads to follow now, right? Maybe our time is better spent working those.”
“Quit trying to worm your way out of this,” Lachlan said. “Need I remind you surveillance is exactly the reason we’re aware of Greg’s visit to both the reporter and the cabin? Could be we can catch him in the middle of something else, something that might explain what he’s up to.”
Dez’s heart sank, dragged down by dying hope. “Yeah, I guess. Did you pass any of this along to the client?”
“I didn’t reveal too much yet, no,” Lachlan said. “Brinks wants something to lord over Waterford. When I thought it was a simple workers’ comp issue, that wasn’t a problem. Things have gotten complicated. If it turns out there’s a criminal aspect to all of this, I want to tread very carefully. Means we’re playing our cards close until we know what we’ve got. If there is some criminality involved on Waterford’s part, our obligation is to more than Brinks—it’s to the law. We won’t have a choice but to report what we know to authorities.
“We also want to avoid suggesting Waterford’s involved in something really awful unless we find some definitive proof. So yes, I’m holding back some info from Brinks for now. What he doesn’t know won’t kill him. He’s getting his money’s worth in terms of the work we’re putting in. That’s good enough for me. I’ll deal with him. You just worry about doing the job.”
If it was good enough for Lachlan, it was good enough for Dez. It would have to be good enough for Peter Brinks too. One thing Dez was pleased about was the idea of Lachlan handling Brinks on his own. Lachlan was often brusque, though he could be plenty charming when it suited him. If anyone could worm their way around Brinks’s inevitable questions, it was him.
Dez arrived back on the block next to Greg’s in time to see Lachlan’s car pulling away.
Just Dez and Greg again. Dez shut off his SUV, zipped his coat up to his chin and settled in.
He busied himself with internet searches and phone calls, dividing his attention between his screen and Greg’s still-quiet house. An initial, mainly fruitless search for Dead Man’s Lake reminded him once again of the proper name—Crystal Lake. Typing in the proper name pulled up a longer list, beginning with news articles about the controversial development.
He ignored those for now and checked for a website. But after nearly twenty minutes of digging, the best he could do was a sport-fishing and angling site with information about the area’s lakes and rivers. Crystal Lake—one of the largest waterbodies in the province—stood out near the top thanks to its numerous bays and overall good fishing.
Failing to find a name or number for anyone directly connected with the lake, Dez scrolled to the bottom of the page and scanned for a contact link. Locating it, he clicked and was redirected to a new page.
“Want to pass along a fishing experience or a photo of your biggest catch?” asked the contact page, before inviting visitors to send a message through the website. Thankfully, the page’s creator had also included a phone number.
Dez dialled. After a couple of rings, a man’s voice came over the line. “Hello?”
“Hi, are you with the Big Fishing Guide page?” Dez asked.
“That’s me. Did you want to submit something?”
“No, I actually wanted to ask a question. Can I ask your name?”
“Is that the question?” The tone was joking.
“Just a starter. Guess I’ll have to ask for seconds.”
A chuckle. The man sounded like the pleasant, happy sort. With the amount of time he probably spent fishing for the good of the site, Dez didn’t doubt he came by his relaxed manner honestly. “The name’s Lou. How can I help you?”
“Thanks, Lou. I’m Dez. I’m trying to track someone down, and I’m having trouble. A friend of mine recently stumbled upon a b
urned-out cabin near the shores of Crystal Lake.”
“Dead Man’s Lake?” Lou said.
“Yeah, that’s what I usually call it. You called it by its proper name on your site, so—”
“I thought I should go with the proper name, but I get at least a dozen messages every year asking me where Crystal Lake is. Might be one of those occasions where popular vernacular will dictate a name change.”
“I hear you,” Dez said. “So about this cabin, I’m wondering if you know who I can call about it. I’m a bit worried it might be dangerous for hikers.” It was made up, no danger at all from what Dez could tell. Sully hadn’t tripped over anything in the dark, so no way a hiker was going to crack their head open by day. However, any excuse was a good one, and this was the best Dez could come up with without providing the true reason for asking. Revealing he was a private investigator checking into a potential crime might get tongues wagging, which was exactly what he didn’t want.
“Oh, that’s interesting,” Lou said. “A burned cabin, you say? I wasn’t aware anyone actually lived on the lake.”
“It’s in the woods a bit,” Dez said. “It’s probably a hunting cabin, and it might well have been there for decades. I don’t even think the fire was recent, but then again, I’m no expert. Just thought my buddy or I should report it.”
“Sure thing. Probably a good idea. There isn’t much for staff. Same people who stock the government-run parks with fish also stock Dead Man’s Lake. It does have a caretaker who looks after the various structures—the bathrooms and the fish-cleaning shacks. Cleans sites and chops wood for campfires during the warmer months. I can put you in touch with him if you want. He’s been around there a while. Might be he knows the place you’re talking about.”
“Thanks, that would be great. What’s his name?”
“Marvin Poller. Got a number here for him somewhere. Give me a sec.”
Dez waited while, in the background, Lou rustled through papers. Old school, Dez thought with a smile. No computer-stored contacts lists for this guy.
“Here we go,” Lou said at last. “Marvin Poller. Got a pen?”
Dez already had Lou on speaker, so simply opened his notes app and readied his thumbs. Dez wasn’t old school. “All set. Go for it.”
Lou read off a series of numbers, and Dez repeated it back to make sure he’d entered the digits correctly.
“Thanks, Lou, this helps.”
“No problem. You spend a lot of time up at Dead Man’s Lake?”
“Not as much as I’d like,” Dez said—another half-truth. Much as he loved fishing, the less time he spent around haunted locations, the better.
“Ever see the ghost?” Lou asked.
Dez grimaced. A loaded question if ever one existed. “Not exactly. You?”
“Nah. Nothing exciting ever happens to me.” Lou chuckled and Dez joined in.
“I wouldn’t worry about it,” Dez said. “Sometimes exciting is overrated.”
After hanging up with Lou, Dez next dialled the number he’d been provided. He found himself batting two for two when someone again picked up.
“Marvin Poller,” came a gruff voice.
“Good afternoon,” Dez said. “I got your number from Lou over at the Big Fishing Guide site. I understand you’re caretaker over at Crystal Lake?”
“I am.” The tone came across as suspicious.
“I was hoping to report something to you.”
“If it’s about the ghost, I don’t want to hear it.”
“Not the ghost,” Dez said quickly. He was fast getting the feeling Marvin was one of those potential witnesses best spoken to in person. Phone conversations were convenient, but only with willing conversationalists. Some people you needed to look in the eye. “Could I meet you at the lake? I was hoping to show you something that might need looked after.”
A frustrated sigh. “Did you bust something?”
“No, nothing like that.”
“Why can’t you just tell me over the phone?”
Marvin was making this difficult. Dez decided he needed to come clean. “Okay, listen, I’m a private investigator, and I’m hoping you could help me with an inquiry. Can you meet me or not?”
He readied himself for disappointment and was already thinking through how he might cajole Lou into asking Marvin the questions for him.
“I’m at the lake now. If you come down within the next hour, I can meet you here.”
Dez raised a brow. Go figure. “Okay, yeah, sounds good. I’ll meet you over on the east side by the fish-cleaning shack.”
Marvin hung up without further ado.
Dez called Lachlan. “I’m sorry to do this, but I’ve got a lead I need to run down in person. Can you come back to Greg’s for a bit?”
Lachlan snorted. “You’ll do anything to get out of surveillance duty, won’t you?”
As relieved as Dez was to get out of surveillance duty for a while, he was pretty sure Sully was even happier about this new turn of events.
He all but bounced into the passenger seat when Dez stopped by to pick him up.
Dez asked the question despite needing no answer. “You really don’t want to talk to this reporter, do you?”
“I suck at the whole flirting thing.”
“No one’s asking you to flirt. Just be yourself.” Dez gave a mischievous grin. “Women like the whole shy, thoughtful vibe you give off. I can’t tell you how many female friends I had over the years who found you fascinating. Their word, not mine.”
Sully raised his brows. “Seriously? You never told me. Any of them cute?”
“A few. And seriously, what would you have done with it, anyway? You were more likely to hide out in your room than make a play.”
Sully shrugged, a move acknowledging the truth in the statement. He ended with a smirk. “So who was asking?”
“Never mind. Do you want to talk about work now maybe?”
“Hey, you started it.”
“Yeah, okay, my fault.” Having acknowledged his own truth, Dez moved on and provided Sully with a rundown of the conversations he’d had with Lou and Marvin.
“Since I haven’t actually been to the cabin you found, I need you to lead us there—in case he has no idea what we’re talking about,” Dez finished.
“Got it. Happy to help.”
“Yeah, I know you are. About as happy as I am to get out of surveillance duty.”
Dez cranked up the radio en route to the lake, enjoying the music while Sully napped next to him. By hour’s end, they were pulling into the parking lot on the lake’s east side. Dez made a mental note of his odometer reading for the purposes of claiming mileage once the job was done. He’d been packing on the miles lately, and it was starting to feel like more of it than he’d expected might be claimable as work.
Dez and Sully stepped out of the vehicle, Dez coming down in a puddle of snowmelt. The temperature was perfect for April in this part of the country, the kind of warm that felt permanent rather than a taste of what was to come later on. Spring was Dez’s favourite season, bringing with it a sense of relief and hope following months of hard, cold winter. Considering the sometimes-painful paths his life had taken, the symbolism wasn’t lost on him.
The lot was empty except for a beat-up half-ton parked near the fish-cleaning shack, its box filled with bits of sloughed-off tree bark, a pair of axes—one large, one small—and various cleaning supplies. As Dez checked it out, movement from the shack had him turning.
A man somewhere in his sixties emerged, setting a purposeful pace toward them. “You’re Dez, I gather?”
Dez nodded and extended a hand. Marvin met the handshake with a grip almost painful in its strength. Though the guy likely had equipment to do some of the harder work for him, Dez bet he’d chopped wood by hand for years. In his experience, people who built muscle through a life spent doing hard, physical labour—maintained a strong, sinewy form even when they slowed down in their later years. Dez’s grandpa had been a farmer,
and the man had been solid until the day he died.
“I’m Dez. This is my brother, Sully. We work together with Fields Investigations.”
Marvin gave the sort of grunt that suggested the information registered low on his interest scale. “So what’s this you wanted to talk about?”
Sully fielded the question. “I was out here last night following someone—”
“Who?”
“We can’t really get into the details,” Dez said.
Marvin crossed his arms but said nothing more about it, so Sully continued.
“He headed into the woods on the hiking trail over there. He made his way off it at one point and into the woods. He eventually ended up at a burned-down cabin. Do you know the one?”
“Never been there.”
“But do you know what I’m talking about?” Sully asked.
Marvin studied him for a few seconds, then nodded. “Think so, yeah.”
“We can take you out there to show you, if you—”
“Don’t need to go out to it. I know the one.”
“Okay,” Dez said. “So maybe you can help us. We’re trying to figure out why the guy we were following took an interest in the place. Can you tell us something about it? Was it a hunting cabin? A home? Is it owned by someone connected with the lake, such as yourself?”
“That cabin, far as I know, was there for years, long before I ever came here for work. Former caretaker out here used it as a home. Year-round.”
This was interesting. “Do you know his name?”
“Sure, I do. He and I worked together. Walter, there, was my co-worker, guess you could say.”
Dez pulled out his phone. He’d downloaded a new app recently that recorded conversations and transcribed at the same time. He loved it—when he remembered to use it. He pressed the record button before asking the next question. “What was Walter’s last name?”
“McCrory.”
“Walter McCrory,” Dez repeated for the benefit of his recorder. “What was he like?”