“I thought Jamie and Ronnie would enjoy some time together,” I said to Tracy. “But Jamie seems…”
“Jamie and her mother don’t see eye to eye on much.”
“We can’t choose our parents.”
Tracy smiled. “Or our children, Mom.”
I gave her arm a playful punch. “Kids have a way of getting on with their lives, don’t they?”
She held up her hands in mock surrender.
Over dinner, Laura related the previous night’s drama with Yvonne. Tracy and Jamie stared at her, apparently at a loss for words.
“She does have a point, dear,” Ronnie said to Laura. “You’re expecting a baby so you should get married. Do you love this fellow?”
“Mom.” Jamie gave Ronnie a stern look. “It’s none of our business.”
“It’s always better for a child to have two parents,” Ronnie went on. “And the Shinglers sound like nice people. Not every boy’s parents would be so accepting.”
I escaped to the kitchen to dish up the strawberry shortcake. When I returned to the porch, the conversation had moved on from marriage and babies.
“It’s Canada Day,” Laura was saying, “and there’s a fireworks show in Braeloch tonight. We should all go.”
Jamie’s eyes met mine, and I nodded. “It’s an annual event at the fairgrounds,” Jamie said. “Might be fun.”
“A great idea,” I said.
We arrived at the fairgrounds at dusk. A crowd had gathered. People were sitting on lawn chairs and blankets in front of the bandstand where Mara Nowak stood in front of a microphone.
“Over here.” Jamie led us to a low bench at the edge of the clearing.
I took a seat, pulled up the top of my hoodie and tucked my hands in my sleeves. I’d forgotten to bring insect repellant. Beside me, Ronnie pulled her skirt over her knees, and her jacket sleeves over her hands.
“Something to drink?” Jamie asked us. “The choice is coffee or soft drinks.”
We gave her our orders, and she headed for the food and drink concessions.
On stage, Mara took off her Stetson, and waved it over her head. “Think small towns are slow towns? Not ours, and especially not on Canada Day. We had loads of fun out here this morning and afternoon, didn’t we? C’mon, people, make some noise.”
The crowd whooped and clapped in response.
“Now before we light up the sky with the Highland Firefighters’ show, I’d like you to welcome some friends of mine. The High Lonesome Wailers. Take it away, guys.”
The crowed gave a noisy welcome, and Soupy and three other band members trooped out on stage. They waved at the audience, took their places beside their instruments, and struck up the opening chords of Bachman Turner Overdrive’s “You Ain’t Seen Nothing Yet.” Soupy played lead guitar, and a fellow with a shaven head did the vocals.
“Soupy’s band’s not bad,” Laura yelled.
“Let’s hear it,” Mara cried, prompting cheers and whistles from the crowd.
“And now Braeloch’s annual fireworks extravaganza,” she said, “thanks to the Highland Firefighters. Our brave firefighters are making sure it all goes off safely. Let’s hear it for them!”
The crowd applauded.
“First up, the spectacular Spider formation.” Mara gestured toward the night sky.
A bang that sounded like a gunshot rang out, and a burst of radial lines, like the legs of a spider, lit up the sky. The audience hooted its approval.
“Tommy would love this,” Tracy shouted.
Ronnie sat rocking on the bench beside me, her arms wrapped around her waist.
“You okay, Ronnie?” I raised my voice so she could hear me.
“I’m fine.” But she cringed when a whistle pierced the air.
“You must have seen a few fireworks shows here,” I said when the noise had died down.
“It’s my first time here in years. Herb and I brought the girls every Canada Day when they were small. But when they got older, they wanted to go with their friends.”
“They can’t wait to leave us when they’re teenagers.”
“Some of them leave and never come back.” She pulled her jacket tightly around her.
A sparkling Catherine Wheel was spinning through the sky when Jamie returned with a cardboard tray of drinks. “Sorry, I took so long. I talked to a few people I knew.” She turned to her mother. “And I saw two of Frank’s relatives. I couldn’t remember their names, so I didn’t approach them.”
Ronnie shrugged. “Ella has a huge family—sisters, nieces, nephews, cousins,” she said to me. “I never could keep track of them all.”
Jamie handed us our drinks. “And I saw Crystal, Frank’s friend.”
“Crystal,” I said.
“She’s over there.” Jamie waved at the crowd of people who were lined up in front of the food concessions.
I jumped up. “I won’t be long.” I wanted to find out more about Frank’s furniture.
“Now the Chrysanthemum,” Mara announced from the bandstand. Colored stars floated through the sky, followed by a crackling sound.
I scanned the faces in the crowd as I approached the concessions. I couldn’t see Crystal, but I spotted Lainey and Burt walking hand in hand. I felt a tap on my shoulder, and turned to see Bruce and a heavy, dark-haired man who was holding a serious-looking camera with a zoom lens.
“I thought you’d be having a quiet evening at home,” I said to Bruce.
He held up a notepad. “On the job. It’s a big night in Braeloch. Fortunately, I was able to team up with Wilf here. He takes much better pictures than I do. I’ll write the copy and he’ll supply the art.”
He introduced me to Wilf Mathers, The Times’ reporter-photographer. At least I assumed that’s what he was. “Two-way man” was what Bruce called him, and I didn’t think he was referring to Wilf’s sexual preference.
Wilf patted his sizable paunch. “Need to do some running around tonight to burn up all the chili dogs I put away today.”
Bruce told Wilf to get some shots of the fireworks. When he had moved off, Bruce and I joined the lineup in front of one of the concessions. Mara announced the next display, and the sky erupted into a giant spray of light.
“I’m officially in residence at Raven Lake,” Bruce said when the noise had subsided. “Moved the last of my stuff this morning, then I went for a swim. Foster was waiting for me when I got back to the house.”
Foster had to ruin his first day in his new home. I waited for Bruce to continue.
“He had more of the same questions. What was the cardigan doing on my porch? I told him that if I’d killed my mother I wouldn’t have left her clothing out in plain sight. He didn’t see my point.”
“They know it was Vi’s cardigan? They had it analyzed?”
“I asked him that, but he wouldn’t give me an answer. I’ve read that it takes some time to test for DNA.”
“Have you asked your neighbors if they saw anyone at your place?”
“When Foster left, I went over and introduced myself. Nobody noticed anything out of the ordinary in the past few days, but there are a lot of trees between the houses.”
We gave our orders to the woman behind the counter. Bruce paid, and we walked over to a picnic table with our ice-cream cones.
He sat down across from me and shook his head. “I thought I’d bought a piece of paradise, then Foster arrived as soon as I moved in.”
Someone was trying to frame Bruce, and there wasn’t a thing we could do. Whoever left the cardigan had taken a bold step to implicate him. Vi’s killer was worried. And dangerous.
We finished our cones, and I gave Bruce’s hand a squeeze. “Get back to work,” I told him. His job at the newspaper was his lifeline.
As I made my way back to our group, I heard a series of popping noises, followed by a bang, and a bouquet of light filled the sky. When the noise subsided, someone called my first name.
Crystal was right behind me. “We met at the funeral,
” she said. “Crystal King. And you’re Pat… Sorry, I don’t remember your last name.”
“Tierney, Pat Tierney. What brings you back here, Crystal?”
“Some business I need to sort out.”
“To do with the storage locker? Have the contents been released?”
A shadow crossed her face. “Yes, but they’re disappointing. One of the reasons I’m in town is to talk to the guy who runs the newspaper. Bruce Stohl. Now that some time has passed, I thought he might want to write an article on me. About how I found the body in the locker. It would make a great human-interest story, don’t you think? Bruce wasn’t at work when I dropped by the newspaper building this afternoon.”
“It’s Saturday. He generally takes weekends off.” The last thing Bruce needed was to hear how Crystal had found his mother’s body.
“You said you’re a friend of his. Where does he live?”
I had to steer her away from Bruce. “Let me see if I can arrange something.”
“What are you, his keeper? Just tell me where I can find him.”
“He moved this week, and I haven’t been to his new home. Are you in town all weekend?”
“I drive back to Newmarket tomorrow. I’m staying at the Dominion Hotel tonight.”
“Let me see what I can do.” Another lie, but I wanted to talk to her about the locker. “I’ll meet you for breakfast in the hotel dining room. Nine o’clock.”
“You’ll take me to Bruce?”
“Nine o’clock in the hotel dining room.”
Crystal shrugged. “Nine o’clock.” She turned and walked away.
I hoped she wouldn’t bump into Bruce before she left the fairgrounds.
I was approaching our group when I realized that the banging and popping had stopped, and the Wailers were silent. I looked at the stage. Mara was huddled at the back of it with Foster and two OPP uniformed officers.
I went over to Laura and put an arm around her.
Mara picked up the microphone and cleared her throat. A murmur ran through the crowd.
Her voice floated over the fairgrounds. “Folks, I’m sorry but…there’s been…we have to end the fireworks.”
Groans greeted her announcement.
“What’s the matter?” a woman cried.
“There’s been…an accident and a man’s been hurt.” Mara’s voice shook a little.
Foster took the microphone from her. “Ladies and gentlemen, there’s been a shooting.”
The crowd gasped. I pulled Laura closer to me.
“That’s all we can say for the moment, but we’ll need to talk to everyone here,” Foster said. “Don’t leave the fairgrounds without speaking to a police officer. We’ll have more details for you shortly.”
Foster stopped in front of me on his way to the fairgrounds gate. “Well, Ms. Tierney, trouble seems to follow you. We know where to find you, but you’ll still need to have a word with one of the officers.” He turned and walked toward the gate.
“Stay with Laura,” I said to Tracy. “I’ll be back in a few minutes.”
I walked through the fairgrounds, circling the groups of people who were huddled together. Where was Bruce?
The rest of the evening was a waiting game. We lined up at one of the six interview stations the firefighters set up on the fairgrounds. When I reached the front of the line I was in, I gave the officer my name, told him where I had been in the fairgrounds during the fireworks and how I could be contacted. “Who was shot?” I asked him. “Is he okay?”
“Sorry, ma’am, I’m not at liberty to say. Next, please.”
While I waited for Jamie and my daughters, I checked out the people who were still lined up to talk to the police officers. I spotted Hank and Shirley in one lineup. Ivy waved at me from another. I went over to her, and she introduced me to her young man.
“Have you seen Bruce Stohl?” I asked her.
“We saw him with Wilf Mathers before the fireworks started,” Ivy said. “Wilf took a picture of Glenn and me, and we told Bruce that we’ve spent Canada Day at the fairgrounds for as long as we can remember. Bruce wrote it all down.”
Glenn put an arm around her. “We may be in The Times next week.”
“Did you see Bruce after the fireworks ended?” I asked.
They looked at each other and shook their heads.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
I wanted to pull the covers over my head when the alarm clock buzzed the next morning. Instead, I dragged myself out of bed and into the car. I caught the news on ELK Radio but there was no mention of the shooting at the fairgrounds.
I claimed a table in the Dominion Hotel’s dining room and gave the waitress my order. A few minutes later, Crystal joined me.
“What a rigmarole they put us through last night,” she said as she reached for a menu. “I didn’t get back here till after midnight.”
She watched the waitress place a bowl of yogurt and berries is front of me. “Is that all you’re having? I couldn’t face the day on that.” She ordered a fruit cup, fried eggs, ham, hash browns, and a double order of toast.
I’d be fifty pounds heavier if I ate a breakfast like that every morning, but Crystal looked great—a big-breasted woman with a tiny waist. Add masses of red hair and a pretty face, and you had a gorgeous woman. Until she opened her mouth.
“Do you know who was shot last night?” she asked.
I thought of Bruce, but I pushed that thought away. “No. There was nothing about it on ELK Radio this morning.”
“It could have happened while we were talking.”
I’d met Crystal at the fairgrounds just after I left Bruce. Where did he go?
Crystal’s breakfast arrived, and she gave it her full attention, leaving me free to worry about Bruce.
“I’m ready for my day now,” Crystal said when she’d polished off the last piece of toast slathered with raspberry jam. “I’ll have another coffee, and we can head out.”
I signalled the waitress to refill our cups.
“You think Bruce will be at the newspaper now?”
“I doubt it.” I poured milk into my coffee. “It’s Sunday morning. Sunday is his day off.”
“But there’s been a shooting. Wouldn’t he go in for a big story like that?”
“The Times is a weekly,” I said. “Its deadline is days away. More details will be available tomorrow.”
I took a sip of coffee. “Crystal, you knew Frank Prentice, the man who rented the locker where you found Bruce’s mother.”
Her eyebrows shot up. “Who told you about Frank?”
“Frank had family in Braeloch. His father grew up here. You were with Frank at his grandmother’s funeral last fall.”
Her gray eyes narrowed. “So? Jock was away that weekend, and Frank was an old friend. Jock never understood about Frank.”
I wasn’t interested in her love life. “Frank’s aunt took both of you to his grandmother’s home after the funeral. To look at some furniture she wanted to give Frank.”
“He was going to drive up with his truck the next week and put it in storage.”
“Was this furniture valuable? Antiques?”
“Old Canadiana pieces.” She closed her eyes for a moment or two. “I told him what he should take. A lovely old Quebec armoire. A table and four chairs, a cradle and a cherrywood slant-top desk.”
“That was why you bought the contents of his locker.”
“Hey, I felt terrible about poor Frank but I needed a hit. He’d shown me the storage place outside of town where he was going to put the furniture. ‘I’m not going to tell nobody about this,’ he said. ‘You find a buyer, babe, and I’ll give you a twenty percent commission.’ ”
She stared at me defiantly. “I did nothing illegal. When I heard about Frank’s accident, I watched the auction listings. When I saw one scheduled for Glencoe Self-Storage, I figured it had to be Frank’s locker. I went to the auction and paid nine hundred dollars for the contents.”
“Last night you said
the locker was disappointing. No antiques?”
“One end table, that was it. I hate to speak badly of the dead, but Frank screwed me royally.”
“His locker was probably gone through after he died. His mother must’ve found the rental contract among his papers.”
“Yeah, I suppose she took the good stuff and didn’t bother to pay the rent.” Crystal took another sip of coffee. “Well, crying won’t bring those pieces back.”
She set her mug down on the table. “We’re off to Bruce’s place?”
“Bruce is out of town today.” Which I hoped he was—settling in at Raven Lake.
She glared at me. “Why didn’t you say so?”
“I didn’t want to spoil your breakfast.”
I picked up the bills the waitress had left on the table and took them to the cashier at the front of the room.
Crystal couldn’t say I’d left her hungry.
I turned on the car radio to catch the 10 a.m. news.
“A man was fatally shot last night during the Canada Day fireworks show in Braeloch,” a male newscaster said. “The body of the Glencoe Highlands resident was found face-down at the northeast edge of the fairgrounds at approximately 10:15 p.m. The fireworks were called off, and police spent the next several hours questioning everyone at the fairgrounds. The identity of the deceased is being withheld until his family is notified. We’ll have more details later today.”
I pulled onto the side of the road. My hands were shaking. Whoever had tried to frame Bruce for Vi’s murder had killed him. With evidence now pointing to Bruce Stohl, the killer hoped that the police would close the case.
I turned the Volvo around and headed for Bruce’s cabin.
Bruce’s Chevy wasn’t in the driveway, and the front and back doors of the cabin were locked. I scanned the lakefront from the top of the stairs. There was no one in the water or on the beach.
I broke the speed limit driving back to the cottage.
“What’s the matter, Mom?” Laura asked when I joined the girls on the porch.
“The man who was shot at the fairgrounds last night…he died.” I told them what I’d heard on ELK Radio. “I think it was Bruce.”
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