“I’ll just have coffee,” Mrs. Etherington said, sounding like one of those people who couldn’t function until they’d had their morning java. “Where is it?”
“Sit down,” Peggy said. “I’ll get it for you.” She went to the urn sitting on a table in the corner and selected a cup. “How do you like it?”
“Just black.”
“Would you like a cup, too, Mr. Etherington? We also have a variety of teas if you wish, and hot water in the kitchen.”
Elizabeth hadn’t expected to see Peggy acting as hostess but maybe Shirley was giving her mother something to do to take her mind off the past few days.
“Coffee is fine, with a little cream.” He picked up his plate and headed to the sideboard, where he piled it high. He was going to make up for his wife not eating.
Peggy introduced everyone to Frances and Hugh Etherington who nodded but then ignored them.
Peggy grabbed the sausage plate and hurried to the kitchen. She returned a few minutes later with more sausages and a glass of milk for Cindy. For the rest of the meal she hovered, making conversation, refilling coffee cups, and encouraging everyone to eat more.
“Are you here for the South Country Fair?” Peggy asked the Etheringtons.
Frances’ lips curled in disdain, and Hugh answered. “No.”
“On a holiday?” Peggy persisted.
“We just wanted to get away to some place quiet for a while.”
“Well, I think you picked the wrong time,” Elizabeth said. “Not only is there the fair but we seem to have a bit of a murder investigation going on.”
Hugh raised an eyebrow in question.
“A skeleton was found in a septic tank just down the road from here.”
“Yes, we heard about that,” Hugh said. Frances’ response was to stand and head out the screen door. On the verandah she lit a cigarette then hugged herself to try and stay warm in the cool air.
“So what happens at this South Country Fair?” Brian asked, looking down at his plate.
“Well, there are musicians, poets, an arts and crafts mall, street performers, something for everyone who likes a little fun,” Peggy answered. “It’s not expensive if you want to have your supper there.”
“Do a lot of people attend?”
“Yes. It is very popular around here.”
“What about former residents? Do they come back for it?” He asked the questions casually but Elizabeth noticed that he paid particular attention to the answers.
“Some do, like Mrs. Emmerson,” Peggy answered. “She’s seventy-three years old and her son brings her out from Calgary every year. She was one of the founding members of the fair.”
Elizabeth finished her plate and Peggy immediately urged her to have more. She would have liked seconds but it was already past time to get on the road.
“No thanks, Peggy,” she said standing. “I’ve got to go. Tell Al and Shirley the meal was excellent.”
In the parking lot Reverend Raymond’s car was parked beside hers. He must have come in quietly sometime during the night. As she left she noticed that Al had put up a ’No Trespassing’ sign in the front driveway.
Chapter 13
“Thanks for doing that, Mom” Shirley said, as she cleaned off the plates and put them in the dishwasher.
“Don’t mention it. I was a bit flustered but I enjoyed it.” Shirley had asked her to act as the breakfast hostess. She’d done it in the past but only when Shirley was sick.
“So, do you think it’s him?”
“It could be. He’s fatter and doesn’t have the hair. And that moustache and beard hide a lot of his face.” Shirley had told her yesterday about the possibility that one of their guests was her old boyfriend, Mike Altman.
“Well, it has been seventeen years. People do change.”
“Why would he come back now?” Peggy asked.
“Maybe he knows something about the bones.”
“But why not admit who he was?” Peggy covered the remaining food and put it in the fridge. “Why use a different name? Isn’t he at least curious about what happened after he left?”
“I guess not.”
“If not, then why would he stay here? It’s been all over the news about us.”
Shirley shrugged. “I don’t know.”
“Have you told Al?”
“No. I wanted your opinion as to whether it was him.”
Peggy shook her head. “I really don’t know.”
“I’m sure it is. I wonder if he recognized me.”
“He should have. You’ve hardly changed. But if so, why hasn’t he said anything?”
“He did seem a bit rattled when I introduced myself last night,” Shirley said. “Maybe he’s scared to.”
“What about you? It must have been a shock, too.”
“It was,” Shirley turned on the dishwasher. “But I was able to hide it by acting the hostess, showing them their rooms.”
“His daughter looks to be in her mid-teens,” Peggy guessed.
“Yes. He must have married soon after leaving here. He obviously didn’t miss me too much.”
“Now, Shirley.”
“Oh, I know, Mom,” Shirley said, with a smile. “Just teasing.”
“So long as that’s all it is,” Peggy said.
“Believe me, it is. I have no more feelings for Mike Altman, or Brian Sinclair if that is his name now, than I have for a stranger on the street.”
“I’m glad,” Peggy said. “And I’m glad that you didn’t follow too far in my footsteps. Falling for the new man in town and marrying him.”
“Well, I did do it a bit differently. I got pregnant by the new man in town.” There was a catch in her voice.
“It was long time ago,” Peggy said softly. She gathered Shirley into her arms.
“I know.” Shirley wiped a tear. “But it still hurts that I lost her. At least if I’d given her up for adoption I would know she was alive and might want to find me some day.”
* * * *
Since she was working east to west, Elizabeth drove through Lethbridge and began recording from its east end, where she would be entering the city from Medicine Hat.
She went to the Nikka Yuko Japanese Gardens, which were a symbol of Canadian Japanese friendship. On the grounds she found the Friendship Bell. An inscription indicated that if she struck the bell with the wooden club hanging beside it, good things would happen in both Canada and Japan at the same time. Elizabeth struck the bell heartily and hoped the saying was true.
The gardens were built so that anyone who took a slow and leisurely stroll through them would find peace and serenity. Her own walk through the green shrubs and rock gardens and beside the gently flowing water wasn’t very slow or relaxing. Being a travel writer was quite different from being a tourist. She had to keep to a schedule, which meant that for some places, she couldn’t relax and enjoy them.
Back in her vehicle Elizabeth continued along 7th Avenue South to Henderson Park. She’d heard about Henderson Park and Henderson Lake before she’d come to Lethbridge and when deciding what to visit in the city she hadn’t been sure if she would stop. Now she knew she had to. She found a parking spot and slowly walked to the lake. This was where her mother and her team had competed in the Lethbridge Dragon Boat Festival. She’d said that the winds gusted on the lake, which made paddling more of a challenge.
Elizabeth thought back to the dragon boat festival she’d attended in Edmonton. There had been forty-six teams entered, six of which were breast cancer survivor teams. Breast Friends had two teams, Breast Friends Juggernauts and Breast Friends Titans. Her mother had been on the Titan team. The teams competed in the regular women’s division races and for the Breast Friends Pink Ribbon Challenge Cup.
The teams raced from the footbridge up the North Saskatchewan River for five hundred metres. She could remember the thrill of watching the races her mother was in and then going to the race time board to see how they had placed. The Challenge Cup was at noon. The
re were two preliminary races and then the final for the three top teams. Both the Edmonton teams and one Calgary team made it. For that race the teams were so close together that it was hard to tell who was in the lead when they went by. Elizabeth had yelled herself hoarse. Breast Friends Titans won the race with the Juggernauts a close second. Her mother was so pleased with her gold medal.
Then came the moment that sent tingles down everyone’s back. The other survivor teams had remained in their boats and all teams paddled out into the middle of the river forming a circle. Before the race each of the women had been given a pink carnation, representing the women who had died from breast cancer. To the song ‘The River’ performed by Garth Brooks, they waved the flowers in the air. At a signal from their drummers they all threw the flowers into the water.
Her mother had told her the ceremony here on Henderson Lake had been much the same as the one in Edmonton. She pictured her mother sitting in the boat waving the flower in the air and then throwing it in the water. And she remembered how much her mother’s unwaveringly positive attitude had inspired her to continue trying for the writing career she’d longed for. She’d decided the fun she would have outweighed the possible rejection slips she would receive.
Back in her vehicle she followed her map of Lethbridge to the coulee containing Indian Battle Park and Fort Whoop-Up. She looked up at the High Level Bridge, which towered over the park. A short train chugged over it.
“This is one of North America’s largest bridges of its height and was built in 1909. It is over 1.6 km long and 96 metres high,” Elizabeth recorded.
Indian Battle Park marked the site of the last great native fight between the Cree and the Blackfoot Confederacy, made up of the Blackfoot, Blood, and Peigan Tribes. In 1870, a group of Cree and Assiniboine attacked a camp of Blood natives. A band of Peigans came to the rescue and about two hundred Cree and Assiniboine died in the clash. Except for a few minor altercations, that was the final war between the tribes and peace was finally declared in 1871.
She toured the replica of Fort Whoop-Up, the first of the ‘Whiskey Forts’ to be built in southern Alberta. She’d read that when whiskey trading became illegal in the United States, fur traders from Montana headed north of the border and set up about a dozen trading posts called ’Whiskey Forts’. Fort Whoop-Up was the most powerful and active one. The fur traders passed a small amount of the whisky or ‘Whoop-Up bug juice’ through wickets in the fortified walls of the post to the natives in trade for buffalo, wolf, or fox skins.
It was because of these whisky forts that, in 1873, Sir John A. MacDonald, Prime Minister of Canada, declared that law should precede the settlers who would soon be headed west. Thus, the North West Mounted Police was formed.
Inside, the fort was complete with Indian tepees, covered wagons, aboriginal handicrafts and period clothes.
Elizabeth let Chevy out of the Tracker, put him on the leash, and they walked to the Helen Schuler Coulee Center and Nature Reserve also in the park. The reserve was situated on seventy-eight hectares and had prairie, coulee and floodplain habitats. They strolled along one of the trails. The vegetation had been left in its natural state, and many animals continued their untamed existence. She spotted two deer. Luckily, Chevy was occupied by a squirrel chattering from an overhead limb or he would have wanted to give chase.
When her walk was over Elizabeth went looking for a convenience store. She immediately saw the Lethbridge Southern Sun Times. Its headlines read: IS THERE ANOTHER BODY? Then in smaller print: Is Missing Man’s Lover Buried Somewhere on the Acreage?
She bought the newspaper. The reporters were hard at work looking into Raymond’s allegations. She wondered if the police were, too. It took a lot of willpower not to read it right away, but she needed to focus. Right now, she was a travel writer not a detective, and she had to stop in and see the Davidsons. She found the paper with their address on it and spread out her map. It was an easy drive there.
The houses along the Davidson’s street were about forty years old and most of them had aluminum siding. Their house was cream-coloured with a brown trim. The yard was neatly kept with flowers blooming in beds and two pruned, cone-shaped spruce trees that sheltered each side of the steps.
Elizabeth parked in front, and went up the steps. The inside door was open but she refrained from peering in through the outside glass and screen door. She rang the bell then looked at her watch. It was just past twelve-thirty.
Martha smiled as she opened the door.
“I hope I’m not too late,” Elizabeth said.
“No, we’ve got a few minutes. Come in.” She held the door wider.
Elizabeth stepped in and was immediately in the living room. Warren was sitting at one end of their couch reading a pamphlet. He stood up courteously and nodded when she entered.
“Sit down,” Martha said. “Would you like some tea?”
“No thanks,” Elizabeth responded, sitting in the easy chair by the door. Warren also sat.
She noticed a bunch of brochures for holiday tours on the coffee table.
“I have a copy of the book you wanted.” Martha picked up a soft-covered book and handed it to her.
The title was A Pioneer’s Story and the front had an old black and white picture of a grain field being harvested, probably back in the 1920s or 1930s.
“Do you know what that is on the cover?” Warren asked.
“A threshing machine,” Elizabeth replied, a bit smugly. She’d seen some examples at Heritage Acres.
She turned the book over and there was a photograph of an elderly woman. “Harriet Barber.” She read the name underneath.
“That’s my mother,” Martha said. “She died two years ago.”
“I’m sorry.”
Martha nodded.
“When did you write this?” Elizabeth thumbed through some of the pages and looked at the old pictures.
“Mom and I worked on it for about three years and we self-published it five years ago. She was quite proud of it.”
“Where did you sell it?”
“Oh, we just went to farmer’s markets and bazaars. We donated some to the library, to the schools, and to seniors’ homes. We weren’t out to make money. We just wanted her story told.”
“I look forward to reading it,” she said. “What do I owe?”
“Nothing. You can keep it,” Martha said.
“Thank you.” Elizabeth smiled appreciatively and set it down on the coffee table next to the pamphlets. “Planning a trip?”
Martha sat beside Warren and picked up one. “Yes, we take one very year. This time we’re thinking about Australia.” A shadow of sadness crossed her face, and Warren patted her arm comfortingly. “We still miss Mom coming with us.”
Elizabeth nodded understandingly before changing the subject. “I heard that you used to own the acreage where the skeleton was found.”
Warren Davidson’s face tightened and Martha winced. It was a touchy subject.
“Why should that concern you?” Warren asked stiffly.
“I’m writing an article on the Crowsnest Highway and this might be of interest to the readers.”
“You think they will enjoy reading about a murder?”
Elizabeth shrugged. “What can you tell me about it?”
“Nothing,” Warren stated. “I’ve told the police officers that, and I’ve told the reporters that, and I’m telling you that.”
“What did the police ask?”
Warren waved his hand and looked away. Martha answered for him, although her voice wasn’t very steady.
“They kept asking us if we knew who it was, if we knew how it got there.”
“And you don’t.”
“Of course we don’t.” Warren threw his pamphlet on the coffee table. “We didn’t know anything about the skeleton until the police contacted us. And it doesn’t matter who questions us the answer is still the same. We know nothing.”
“Did you farm?” Elizabeth tried a different direction.
They looked at each other. “We tried, then sold the land a couple of years after we married,” Martha said. “We kept the house and the acreage for a few years because Mom liked it there.”
Elizabeth stood. Again, Warren did the same. He reached under Martha’s elbow and gently helped her up. Elizabeth was touched by their affectionate ways.
“Thank you for your time and this wonderful book,” she said, shaking their hands warmly before she left.
* * * *
Warren and Martha stood in the doorway and watched Elizabeth walk to her vehicle.
“Now what are we going to do?” Martha asked, as Warren closed the door. “The police and reporters, and now this writer. The questions are never going to stop.”
“We don’t do anything.” He walked over to the couch and sat down. “We just continue to tell everyone the bones have nothing to do with us. Eventually, they will get tired of asking us.”
Martha sat beside him. “I hope so. I don’t know how much more I can take.”
Warren put his arm around her and squeezed. “We’ll be okay. Now let’s plan our holiday. I think we should book it for as soon as possible.”
Martha brightened. “Yes. Let’s get away from here now. Maybe when we get back it will be all over.”
* * * *
“What did you mean by ‘that place has caused us more headaches and maybe all for nothing’ during our last conversation?” Ed Bowman demanded of the couple as soon as they sat down on the other side of his desk. Those words had been bothering him since he’d heard them.
Hugh Etherington looked over at Frances before answering. “As you have probably heard, hog prices have been low in Alberta for some time.”
Ed nodded.
“There are a number of reasons for that,” Hugh explained. “But the most important ones are our high Canadian dollar and the fact that the United States has been restructuring their industry for the past twenty years so that they have gone from our biggest customer to one of our largest export competitors.”
“Plus,” Frances continued the reasons. “Feed prices have risen because of new demands for biofuels from grain and lower supply because of the droughts in Australia and Argentina. And our Canadian packers are too small scale to be competitive with the US processors.”
The Travelling Detective: Boxed Set Page 16