“Wow!” I said. “I think he did that on purpose—let him get close.”
“Yup. Good thing, too. Dad’s out of control, I think.” There was a curious light in Arly’s eyes. She looked almost proud.
Kountry Kow made it over the finish line about a foot in front of the Watson’s tub. The spectators were roaring and clapping and stamping their feet and the noise was deafening.
“. . . never before in the history of the race,” the announcer was shouting. “By a hair. By a nose. Well, hey folks, by a cow’s head, eh?” Maybe most of the crowd was too excited to notice what happened next. I almost missed it myself, because the announcer, still practically hysterical, was directing the crowd’s attention to the awards stage at the other end of the docks, where the winners would receive their prizes. Although the race was over, and Kountry Kow was put-putting slowly back to the dock, Archie was still in pursuit. The water was crowded with tubs—all the second, third and fourth runners up gathering for the ride back to shore. In the midst of the tub scrum, Archie finally got within striking distance of the Kountry Pantree tub. Then he picked up the net again, reared back with tremendous force and whacked Kountry Kow heavily between the shoulder blades with the metal edge of the net. The mascot fell forward slightly, and the tub started to tip. Immediately, the Sea-Doo guys were there. Maybe they had suspected, maybe they had seen it. Whatever the case, Eddie did not go over. They steadied the KP tub and escorted him back to shore. Archie, his rage apparently spent, followed.
I hurried down to the dock and was there to help Eddie ashore. Even after all that, he was determined to stay in character. When I asked urgently if he was okay, the big fuzzy head just nodded. With the help of the young Bath Tub Bash official, we got him through the jubilant crowds (who all wanted to pat his back and shake his hoof), and into the back door of the Art Show space. I thanked the official and closed the door, then quickly removed the Kountry Kow head.
“Eddie, are you sure you’re okay? He hit you awfully hard,” I said. Eddie’s face was radiant.
“I’m fine. I’ll have a bruise, that’s all. Man, that was a blast!”
“You were amazing,” I said.
“Did you see how I tricked him? Let him think he was going to win?”
“I saw, Eddie.”
“Man, Mr. Watson was crazy! You should’a heard the things he was calling me.”
“I heard some of them. He thought he was talking to David Kane, you know.”
“Oh, I know. That’s why it didn’t bug me. It was like I was in someone else’s skin, you know?”
“Hah. You’ve just discovered the joy of acting, my boy. You’ll be doing amateur theatre, next.”
“You got any water? I’m like dying in here,” he said. Just then, there was a hurried tap on the door. I expected it to be Dimmy and Yolanda, but it wasn’t. It was David Kane, dressed in a baseball cap and dark glasses. He slipped in quickly and took off his hat.
“Did you see it, Mr. Kane? Pretty good, eh?”
“Better than good, Eddie. You were magnificent. Now quick, get out of that thing and let me put it on.”
“What?” I said.
“Part of the deal, Polly,” Kane said, brushing me aside and grabbing at the costume as if he wanted to tear if off Eddie.
“Well, let me get . . .”
“Quickly, dammit!” Kane said. “There’s TV cameras out there.”
“Jeez, Mr. Kane.”
“Jeez is right, David. Have you no shame?” I said.
Kane turned his face toward me, his eyes masked by the dark glasses. “Shame? Bullshit.” Eddie turned around so I could undo the velcro. Kane stripped off his sweatshirt and put his glasses in a pocket. “Hurry, hurry,” he said. I looked into his eyes. They were unbelievably red.
It only took a second to suit him up. Kane grabbed the mascot head but refused to wear it. “I want them to see me,” he said. Then he was out the door and wading into the crowd, shaking hands and posing for the cameras.
I turned to look at Eddie. His radiance was gone, replaced by a kind of pathetic disappointment that made him look six years old.
“Oh, man,” he said.
Thirty-One
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—An ad in the Laingford Gazette
Neither Eddie nor I had the heart to go watch the awards ceremony. We heard it, though. You could hardly help it, as the announcements were still being made at a volume cranked to top a roaring crowd. The crowd wasn’t roaring now, although they responded dutifully as Dick Dolly of MEGA FM thanked the participants, the sponsors, the organizers and the media people. It was too hot to close the rear window, which let a cool breeze in from the river.
Eddie was obviously exhausted, and probably dehydrated as well. After Kane left, he drank down a whole litre of Kuskawa Springs water in less than a minute. Then just sat there in a chair with his eyes shut.
“Third runner up, and the award for most sportsmanlike, goes to Rodney Cooper of the Sports Cave!” Loud cheers, and some whistles.
“That was the guy who called the Emma’s Posies girl a bitch,” I said. “A real gentleman.”
“I go to school with him,” Eddie said. “He’s a football jock.” As if that explained it.
“You should eat something, buddy,” I said. “You want me to go get you a slice of pizza?”
“In a minute, that would be great, Polly,” he said. “But let’s hear the awards, first.”
“We could still go down and watch, if you want.”
“Nah. Hearing’s better.” He was still sitting with his eyes shut. It occurred to me that he just wanted some company, so I said nothing. It must have been hard, having performed so well, to have his glory torn away so brutally. Not that he had been unprepared—after all, Kane had made it clear that Eddie was to be a secret stunt double, but the greedy way in which the developer had barged in and grabbed the Kountry Kow identity had been unsettling, to say the least. I wondered if Eddie were picturing his long desired car, the one he could now afford a down payment for, behind his closed eyelids.
I wandered over to the window and looked out, but the crowds were still thick, and although I could see the top of the awards tent, I couldn’t see what was going on.
“The second runner-up is the feisty Ashley Bernard, of Emma’s Posies. C’mon up here, dear, and gimme a kiss.” More applause. Some “woo-hoo” noises that indicated Ashley’s compliance. I wondered how long it would be before Laingford entered the twentieth century, never mind the twenty-first.
“And the first runner-up, last year’s winner and the senior participant this year, Mr. Archie Watson!” Loud cheers, which tapered off. “Archie? Anyone seen Archie? Wait . . .” A pause. “Well, folks, I guess our fallen champion has retired to the Slug and Lettuce, or maybe Kelso’s, eh?” Laughter. “What’s that? Oh, sure, dear. C’mon up.” A murmur. “Ladies and gents, on behalf of Archie, here’s his daughter Arly, to collect his prize.” Some applause and cheering. Then Arly’s voice, clear and defiant. “My dad doesn’t drink, Dick,” she said.
“Heh, heh. Well, maybe he just started, eh? Beaten by a cow?” Loud laughter and some applause. “And now, the moment we’ve all been waiting for, our grand prize winner, and the finest tub racer we’ve seen in ten years of the Bath Tub Bash, Mr. David Kane, or, as he likes to be known, Kountry Kow!” The crowd cheered, whistled, stamped and laughed, presumably as Kane joked around on stage with Dick Dolly. Then Kane took the mike and started thanking people, and I didn’t want to listen any more, so I closed the window, breeze or no breeze.
“It didn’t sound like we missed much,” I said and turned around. Eddie was fast asleep. I tiptoed around for a while until the back door opened and Yolanda and Dimmy piled in. Eddie woke up immediately and was soon grinning and lookin
g more like himself again as my friends praised him. I left them talking over every detail of the race, like a bunch of guys at the horsetrack, and zipped out to buy Eddie a big slice of pizza.
While I was standing in line at Pete Holicky’s Pizza Madness, I felt a light tap on my shoulder. It was Serena Elliot, dressed casually in blue jeans and a silk tank top.
“What an exciting race, didn’t you think?”
“The mascot was terrific, wasn’t he?” I said.
“The mascot was, yes,” Serena said. “David talked too long at the awards, though.” I raised an eyebrow at her. “Oh, yes, dear. I figured it out right away.”
“You did?”
“Of course. The person in the costume during the race was at least six foot two, probably taller. David Kane is five-eight on tiptoe.” She laughed, tilting her head back and making people, as usual, turn to look at her. “What a silly little man he is,” she added.
“Shh, Serena. If the secret gets out, Eddie doesn’t get paid.” We were at the front of the line by that point, and we each ordered two slices of the deluxe with everything.
“Well, you tell Eddie, whoever he is, that he did a fine job,” Serena said while we waited.
“I will,” I said. “You observant woman, you. I wonder if anybody else noticed that.”
“I doubt it,” she said. “Actually, I’m glad I ran into you.” We were served our pizza slices, paid and moved towards the door. “Do you have a moment?” Serena pulled me aside, and we leaned against the wall of the store. The smell of the pizza was making my stomach rumble. “I remembered what it was I forgot when we talked yesterday,” Serena said, picking a single mushroom off one of her her slices and nibbling it. I did the same, then thought to hell with it and took a big bite.
“Mmm-hmm?” I said.
“In the hospital. The thing I meant to tell you, and seeing that man take credit that wasn’t his reminded me.”
“Kane, you mean.”
“Yes, David Kane. He was there at the end of the hall in the ward where Vic was. He said the strangest thing to me after I came out of Vic’s room. I was a little bit tearful, you see.”
“What was that?” I had swallowed my bite of pizza and had forgotten the rest.
“He said ‘it’s no fun making little girls cry’. Then he went down the stairs, and I didn’t see him again until the meeting at the Real Estate office.”
“So he was there at the hospital. Hah. He said he was at the construction site, remember? He lied. Did you think he was talking about you? About your tears?”
“Well, I hardly knew. Then I thought maybe he’d said something unpleasant to young Arly Watson—she was crying too, you know.”
“Wow,” I said. So Kane had been there. Had he dropped in to see Vic? Before Serena had? Before Archie and Arly? Or afterwards? Maybe he said something to Vic after everyone else had left—something so awful it stopped the older man’s heart. But he had been there. That was important, wasn’t it?
“I’m glad you remembered, Serena,” I said.
“So am I. I didn’t put David Kane on my list, you see, because he wasn’t waiting to go in, like the others seemed to be. My mind must have filed it away in a different place.”
“Glad the file came up, anyway. I should go get this other slice to Eddie. See you around, I guess, Serena.” She gave me a little wave and picked off another mushroom.
On the way back to the Art Show space, I wondered if David Kane had, in fact, said something to Arly to make her cry. Who knows what? When I’d seen Arly and Vic Watson exchange greetings at the Oxblood Falls the week before, after Vic’s near-drowning, Arly hadn’t seemed to like her uncle very much at all. So I found it hard to believe that she was weeping in distress at Vic’s being ill in hospital. On the other hand, if Kane had said something unkind to her regarding what might, according to rumour, have been their relationship (they did share a picnic together at the falls), wouldn’t that have upset her? It would also explain why she seemed to have turned against Kane later. At the Art Show space, she wasn’t secretive about her contempt for him. That must be it. An older man seduces a young girl and then dumps her. Old story, and none of my business, except to confirm that Kane was a decidedly yucky guy.
When I got to the Weird Kuskawa Art Show, Eddie was gone.
“Arly came in just about twenty minutes ago with David Kane, and they took Eddie away with them,” Yolanda said. “Arly said she needed him to help set up this photograph she was going to do of Kane at Watson’s.”
“At Watson’s? Is she nuts? Her father won’t let Kane in there,” I said.
“The store’s closed today, Polly,” Dimmy said. “And whatever Arly said at the awards about her father not being a drinker, I certainly saw Archie in the Slug and Lettuce, drowning his sorrows. It sure looked like beer to me.”
“Arly said the photo was going to make Cal’s shot at the council meeting look like amateur night,” Yolanda said. “Kane was all for it. I think he might be on something, you know. Very manic guy.”
“I thought Arly couldn’t stand Kane,” I said, thoroughly confused.
“Sure didn’t look like that to me,” Yolanda said. “They were all over each other.”
“Yuck. And Eddie went, just like that? I have a slice of pizza for him.”
“He said he’d be back in a few minutes,” Yolanda said. “He said something about getting a cheque.”
“Oh, yeah. He has to hang around, I guess, to make sure Kane pays him. I wonder if it was worth it.”
“Maybe next year he can race without being anonymous,” Yolanda said. “And he seems excited about the car.”
“I guess.” I suddenly thought about Susan, and how on earth Eddie was planning to explain his sudden increase in wealth. A lottery win, maybe? Then all thoughts of Eddie were crowded out of my brain, because Detective Constable Mark Becker walked in, followed by Constable Marie Lefevbre.
They were both in uniform, and they looked pretty serious. I found I was having a hard time looking at Becker, so I shifted my gaze to Lefevbre instead. She smiled pleasantly at me and nodded. We had, after all, met before. I don’t know where I’d got the impression that she was so drop-dead gorgeous. She was actually rather plain and looked like a nice person.
“Is David Kane here?” Becker said. “We were told he came in the back door here a while back.”
“They came in about half an hour ago,” I said. “Why?”
“Who’s they?” Becker said.
“David Kane and Arly Watson,” I said. Becker exchanged a significant glance with his partner.
“Do you know where they went?”
“Maybe. Why are you looking for him?” I said. Yolanda and Dimmy had retreated towards the back of the store, perhaps sensing that I wanted to deal with this alone.
“Polly,” Becker said, a warning note in his voice.
“No, it’s a fair question,” Lefevbre said. “She knows what’s going on, doesn’t she?”
“Jeez, Marie, will you let me handle this?” Becker said.
“You seem to be antagonizing the witness, actually,” she said, lightly.
“Witness?” I said.
“Whatever,” Lefevbre said. “Listen, Ms. Deacon. The lab report that we got on Vic Watson indicates that he had a heart attack following a massive rush of adrenaline—you know that, right?”
“I heard. So you think David Kane, who was seen at the hospital, said something to him to upset him enough to kill him, right?”
“You have proof he was there?” Becker said.
“Yes, I do, Becker. So, constable?” I said to Lefevbre.
“So, it wasn’t just adrenaline. It was epinephrine. The active ingredient in a thing called an epi-pen, used for people who have anaphylactic reactions to things they’re allergic to.”
“Oh, my God,” I said. “An epi-pen. David Kane is allergic to wasp and bee stings. He carried one everywhere.”
“That’s what we wanted,” Lefevbre said, turning
in triumph to Becker. “I told you she’d know.”
“You have a reputation as a snoop and a know-it-all,” she said to me. “No offence, but Morrison said to tell you about it. He said you’d connect it with something.”
Becker was getting red in the face. “Hello,” he said. “Remember me? Your partner? Your fellow police officer?”
“What?” Lefevbre said. “Oh, go ahead, then.”
“Polly, where the hell did they go?” he said.
“Oh, Lord,” I said, suddenly remembering Kane’s red eyes. “He’s got Arly and Eddie. He’s high on something, and if he injected Vic Watson with epi-whatchamacallit, he’s capable of anything. They both know things he doesn’t want people to know. We’ve got to go to Watson’s right NOW!”
Thirty-Two
“I never met a pickle I didn’t like.”—Mae West
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—An ad in the Laingford Gazette
Watson’s General Store was dark inside when we got there. David Kane’s Mercedes was the only car in the small parking lot to the side. I had jumped in the back of the cruiser, against Becker’s wishes, but with Lefevbre’s blessing. Becker had torn up Main Street with the lights flashing and the siren going, which would have been fun if I had been thinking about that. But all I could think of was David Kane with his hands around Eddie’s throat, or Arly’s.
By the time we were out of the cruiser, the teeming Bath Tub Bash crowds were starting to converge on the store, attracted by the flashing lights, gawking like they were watching a film shoot.
“Okay now, Polly, you stay here,” Becker said.
“As if,” I said and sprinted for the front door. It was locked, and I peered through the front window into the gloom. Someone was sitting motionless on the stool at the cash register. Further inside, I could just see a pair of black and white, fuzzy-fur legs, poking out from one of the aisles.
Polly Deacon Mysteries 4-Book Bundle Page 75