Mind Over Mussels

by Hilary MacLeod

  No victim. No suspect. Jamieson came out of MacAdam’s and headed for the big Victorian on the Shore Lane. Part way, she slipped, and slid into a puddle. The back of her dress was covered in red clay. She tried to wring it out and made her hands filthy. She was close to tears of complete frustration at how badly this case was going, how out of control she felt. Perhaps that’s why she banged as hard as she did on the next door. McAllister had told her about the reclusive tenant.

  There was no answer.

  Jamieson pounded again, harder this time, in case she couldn’t be heard above the storm.

  Still no answer.

  She looked around the side and back of the house. When she turned, she missed the slight movement of a curtain in an upstairs window.

  After she’d circled the house, Jamieson knocked one more time and then gave up.

  She looked up at the dome, down at her clothing, into the wind and the rain and the thick black clouds rolling off the coast, and decided that call could wait. Billy would have told them not to go anywhere, and she would question them later, when she found something more respectable to wear. Ed Bullock was a recipient of the Order of Canada. He’d rubbed shoulders with the Governor General and the Prime Minister. She couldn’t let the RCMP down. She couldn’t question him looking like this.

  The wind and the rain and the mud and the dress and the jacket that stunk of fish were taking their toll on Jamieson’s confidence.

  She turned away from the house and saw the police cruiser outside April Dewey’s.

  Murdo was still sitting by the warmth of April’s old-fashioned wood range while the storm raged outside. He was comfortable, smiling between bites of food, chatting to April, and finding her absolutely charming, in spite of, or perhaps because of, the children. All six of them were in and out of the kitchen, grabbing cookies and muffins and complaining about the weather, hanging onto their mother’s apron, running around her and using her as a shield from each other. She would give them an absent-minded pat on the head, shove a cookie into grabby, grubby little hands, flour dusting their faces and hair as well as her own and the floor.

  Murdo found the domesticity pleasant, and April’s sweetly rounded body appealing, as appetizing as the plate of food in his hand, that never seemed to empty. Every time he lifted a cookie or a slice of bread to his mouth, another would appear on the plate, like a rabbit out of a magician’s hat.

  “We’re to tell everyone to stay put.” He was talking through a cheek full of white cake and butter icing. Heaven. He was eating heaven.

  “And I think you should do just that,” she said, ladling soup into a bowl. “Wait the storm out. You’ll only catch your death of cold. Then what good will you be to us? I’m not going anywhere, are you?” She shoved the hot bowl onto his lap. He winced. Then beamed up at her.

  No. Murdo wasn’t going anywhere.

  Not until Jamieson appeared at the door.

  Chapter Eleven

  Hy, Gus, and Annabelle were in the Hall’s kitchen, cleaning up after the meeting. Hy had said nothing about why she’d been driving the police cruiser, and none of the women had asked, except with their eyes. But Hy had avoided them, and they left in ones and twos, disappointed. When they had all gone, Hy told Gus and Annabelle everything – Lord was dead, his body clothed in the sixties outfit, the sign clasped in his hand, the gaping wound in the back of his head. That the body had now disappeared, stolen by the ocean.

  “My Land.” Gus opened her eyes wide. “Another murder.”

  “Well, now,” said Annabelle.

  “Still and all.” A stock phrase Gus used to insist she was right and would not be budged. She stuffed Styrofoam plates and cups into a large green garbage bag. “I say they was murders at that cookhouse. Don’t say they wasn’t.”

  Gus loved to hear about what Hy had seen there last year. To pass the time on long winter nights, Hy had told Gus, over and over in fine detail about the dead man and the lobster eating away at him. About the crazy, dying lobster lover and the millionaire and the complicated relationship they had. Gus, who could trace the lineage of just about anybody on the island – through an endless list of aunts and uncles, cousins and nieces, nephews and grandparents – could never seem to get the relationship of those three people straight.

  It was because they were strangers.

  But Gus knew something about Lance Lord that Annabelle and Hy didn’t know. Was now the time to tell it?

  “Jesus, it’s Jamieson.” Murdo scrambled to his feet, one cheek and one hand closing on a muffin.

  “Jamieson?” April dusted off her hands on her apron and peered out the window – to see the bedraggled woman, fighting her way up the path in the wind.

  “She’s in charge of the case.” Murdo spoke with his mouth still full. Was she – officially? It didn’t matter. Where Jamieson was, she was in charge.

  Three loud raps on the door. April skittered across the room. When she opened the door, she was impressed by Jamieson’s dignity in spite of her clothes. April looked down at her own floured apron and track suit and wished she could rise above it.

  Jamieson was staring at Murdo, from the hand squeezed in panic on the muffin, the crumbs going onto April’s floor, to the full mouth trying to swallow.

  April saw the look. “He’s been questioning me,” she lied.

  “And you are?”

  “April. April Dewey.”

  “About what?”

  April looked puzzled.

  “About what has he questioned you?”

  “I…well…I…”

  “No,” Murdo chimed in. “I didn’t have a chance yet.”

  Jamieson eyed the crumbs on his shirt, his jacket hung by the stove.

  “So you’ve just been passing the time of day?”

  Both Murdo and April lowered their heads.

  To April, Jamieson said, “Follow us to the Hall.”

  “But…”

  “No buts.” The house had a good vantage point. This April might have seen something.

  “But I have to call someone to come for the children.”

  Jamieson had a purpose in making things difficult for April. She didn’t expect the woman would have much to tell her, but she would tell others they were dealing with a tough cop.

  “Make it fast.” Turning to Murdo, Jamieson held out her hand for the keys to the cruiser.

  “We have a murder to solve.”

  And a victim and a suspect to find.

  Both Jamieson and Murdo had the same thought.

  Hy lifted the last dish into the drip tray. Annabelle grabbed it and began to dry it when Jamieson and Murdo came into the Hall. Billy was already there, having knocked on all the doors within walking distance and told people to stay put and wait to hear from the police. Moira Toombs had been his last stop. She had been unsure if she should go out and clean today and tomorrow or not. She’d been due to help set up the Hall for the ceilidh. She’d ordered Billy to go and help in her place. Used to taking orders from women, he had done just as she said. Now he was moving chairs and tables out of the way.

  Jamieson, dripping wet, marched over to him. Her glare made him put down the chair he was shifting.

  “Where’s the community policing office?”

  “At my house.”

  Jamieson rolled her eyes. “Where’s that?”

  “About five kilometres down the road.”

  Too far, she thought. Jamieson liked to be in the centre of things.

  “What facilities do you have? Phone? Fax? Internet? Anything else?”

  Billy looked down at the floor. “None of it.”

  “None of what?”

  “Nothing. It’s in the shed.”

  “What’s in the shed?”

  “The office,” he said, his voice so low she could barely make out what he said.

/>   “The office – in a shed?”

  “It’s the only room we had,” he mumbled.

  Jamieson looked exasperated. She’d have to set up here.

  Hy, Gus and Annabelle came out of the Hall kitchen behind the main stage, from which a young Queen Elizabeth and bald but handsome Prince Philip looked down through red velvet curtains pulled to either side of a graceful arch.

  The rest of the Hall was one large main room, with a hardwood floor, gleaming with layers of dance wax.

  On one wall was a plaque to the brave sons of the village killed in the two great wars; on another, framed and mounted unevenly, a collection of “Best Float” certificates from the annual Harvest festival; and oddly placed at irregular intervals on another wall, various photos of celebrities – the premier, the local MP, and Shania Twain – all of whom had apparently visited The Shores.

  Jamieson turned to the three women.

  “Is there a phone here?”

  They looked at each other.

  “No.” Hy reached in her pocket. “But I have my cell…”

  Jamieson shook her head, irritated by the movement of hair on her shoulders. She liked to keep it pinned back in place, not straggling all over. She must look a mess to these women.

  She did. Gus could barely keep her eyes off her.

  A police officer? In a flimsy wet dress, revealing too much? Covered in dirt and a smelly old jacket and billy boots?

  She needed a change of clothes, but Gus had none to offer that would fit.

  “No, a cell won’t do.” There would be reports to file, McAllister’s photographs to upload, backgrounds to check. Soon she would have to let the detachment know the body had disappeared. Jamieson wasn’t looking forward to that.

  “I’m going to have to set up an Internet connection. I assume you don’t have high speed. I’ll need a land line.”

  “A what – ?” Gus.

  “A land line.”

  “A what – ?” Gus repeated. Everyone knew telephone lines were up in the air, not on land. Her opinion of Jamieson dropped another notch.

  “I think there was one. Yes.” Annabelle pointed to the far corner of the Hall.

  “Over there.”

  Someone once had the idea that it would be a good community gesture to install a phone for tourists staying in cottages without phones. Olive MacLean had since deemed it an unnecessary expense because everyone now had cell phones.

  “It’s not in service, though,” Annabelle added.

  The first thing Olive had done, on assuming her role as treasurer of the chapter, was to cancel the phone service and remove the phone. It was sold at their annual flea market.

  Jamieson marched across the Hall to inspect the connection. It would do. A call to the company would have it in service, as long as there was nothing wrong with the line itself. She’d have to find a computer, but surely there was one in the village. She turned to look at the three women.

  “Who’s in charge of the Hall?”

  Again, they looked at each other. Who was? No one knew who owned it. They couldn’t find the deed. The building had, over the years, become the responsibility of the W.I. The women maintained it through nickel-and-dime fundraising, including bake sales, flea markets, ceilidhs and the annual Christmas pageant. There was the odd rental, too, for wedding anniversaries, family reunions, and the like. But who was in charge?

  Annabelle shrugged. “Us, I guess.”

  “Us?”

  “That would be Institute. All of us.”

  “I’m going to have to use it as a centre for my investigation,” said Jamieson. “The Shores is cut off. I have to have somewhere to operate from.”

  A branch came off the old maple in the picnic area next to the Hall. It struck the large plate glass window, then flew off on the wind and lodged in the power line. The lights flickered.

  “Where will you stay?”

  Jamieson looked around her.

  “Here, I suppose.”

  “Now that ain’t fittin’.” Gus pulled her apron over her head, suddenly conscious she was wearing it in front of an officer of the law, though this one looked like a wet rat. “We have plenty of room. My house is just across the way.”

  “No, thank you. It’s better that I stay here if I can. It’s, well – ” A flush of colour appeared high on Jamieson’s cheeks.

  Understanding came at the same time, as it often did, to Hy and Annabelle.

  Suspects. They were all suspects.

  Gus didn’t get it, and persisted.

  “Now I’ll not have it said The Shores don’t know how to treat a stranger.”

  Hy put her hand on her friend’s shoulder. “Gus, it’s okay. Officer Jamieson would be more…uh…comfortable here.”

  “Comfortable? More than in one of my rooms? With the mattresses bought fresh for the tourists, time was.”

  “Time was” ten years or more since Gus had taken tourists. The beds had been well-slept-on by a succession of visiting sons and daughters and their families, nieces and nephews, and the odd stranger who stumbled in, seeking shelter from a thunderstorm. The Macks’ door was always open to strangers in storms, such was Gus’s fear of them.

  “Them’s good beds. With my good quilts atop ’em. Now talk sense.”

  It was Gus who wasn’t making sense, thought Hy. When Gus said her “good quilts,” she didn’t mean any of the two hundred she’d cut and pieced and sewed and quilted herself. She meant a pair she’d bought from Sears. When youngsters came to stay with the Macks, she whipped off the “boughten ones” and substituted a couple of “old quilts” – beautiful hand-made creations of her own, less valued because she’d made them herself.

  “I’m not havin’ people lying on the floor here, when there’s perfectly good beds…”

  “No, really,” Jamieson broke in. “McAllister’s right. It’s going to be a day and night operation. If we can just fix up a couple of cots…”

  “A couple – ?” Gus looked bewildered.

  “For the other officer, too,” Hy propelled Gus in the direction of the kitchen.

  “Come, I’ll help you pack some leftovers for Abel, and we’ll find some sheets and blankets.”

  “The other officer? That Murdo Black – and him a married man?”

  “He’s not a married man,” said Hy.

  “And him a single man? That’s not fittin’ either,” Gus said, as Hy bustled her off.

  “And who will pay the lights?” was Olive’s first question, on being informed later in the day.

  It wasn’t just the lights, the term villagers used to refer to power in general. There was going to be the cost of the furnace. It was technically summer, but most villagers turned their heat on in August. “To take off the chill,” said Gus, as her furnace pumped out an even eighty degrees on a cool August night. Gus still thought in Fahrenheit. She claimed she didn’t feel warm in Celsius.

  Moira loved finding out secrets. She liked knowing things about people that they didn’t know she knew. It gave her a kind of power. She didn’t use the information, but hugged it to her in silent satisfaction.

  She knew, for instance, that April’s husband Ron – he of the catfish moustache – was seeing a woman in Winterside. She knew because she’d been in town and seen them coming out of a bar in the middle of the day – imagine, the middle of the day! – drunk and falling all over each other. A month later, she’d been down to the shore in May for a bracing walk. She thought she’d be the only one there. It was a blustery, moody day with thick grey clouds rolling in on the waves, a sharp edge of chill on the air. There was a car parked at the end of the lane, and there was Ron, on his knees, doing something to a woman’s leg sticking out the driver’s door. The same woman, Moira knew instantly. She could tell from the bleached blonde hair.

  Ron looked up and saw Moira. She w
hipped around and strode back up the lane, in righteous indignation. She didn’t tell April. She liked the way Ron treated her after that – very solicitous, knowing she’d held his secret. And she liked the way it made her feel superior to April.

  So Moira was happy when Suki showed up at her door. She was a rival for Ian’s affections, but Moira could tell that Suki needed her, wanted to befriend her. She suspected Suki had a secret and wanted Moira to help her keep it.

  The island weather had stripped Suki of her glamour. She was wearing a rain jacket of Ian’s and a pair of his rubber boots. With oversized vanity bag in hand, she announced:

  “Time for a makeover, Moira.”

  Chapter Twelve

  Hy and Annabelle had made tea and offered some to Jamieson. She said no, she didn’t drink on duty. Murdo and Billy were happy to have some and to inhale the muffins April had brought to her interview. Never having been called to a police investigation, she had been in a flurry about what to wear, what to bring. In the end, it didn’t matter. She’d brought her blueberry muffins – they could be counted on for any social occasion. After corralling her brood to her sister’s, she’d had no time to worry about her appearance.

  When April gave her statement to the officers, instead of makeup, she had the usual streak of flour across her left cheekbone. Abel Mack may have found it fetching, but the fastidious Jamieson found it repellent. She declined a muffin with a frown. She didn’t eat on duty either. And she didn’t take bribes.

  April made her statement. She had seen nothing, knew nothing. Jamieson dismissed her, having achieved her goal. April thought the policewoman was a…well, she wouldn’t use that word, so how would she tell everyone? Murdo gave April an apologetic look as she left the Hall.

  Hy and Annabelle sipped their tea in the kitchen.

  “Suki.” Hy shook her head. “Suki.” She spat out the word and some of the tea with it.

  “Yes?”

  “Well – ”

  Annabelle said nothing. Maybe Hy was finally going to open up about her feelings for Ian.

  “That is his long lost love? That…that…she’s an absolute horror. She’s…she’s…” Hy was rarely at a loss for words. Then, with a big grin, she found them, “…our Lady of Lactation.”