by Lou Allin
Such pleasant time passed while she and Jim hunted for the egg, yet what kept dragging her from the dark and quiet river passages which led past the cherished pictographs? Jim was cozying the canoe against the cliffs, bracing with his paddle so that she could take pictures of the red ochre figures which seemed to be distorting despite her efforts to focus the camera. Slowly she became aware that Freya was coughing and whining and licking at her. And the dog had never, ever, asked to go out during the night. Belle rubbed her eyes, burning with something more pungent than sleep, and forced herself up to hit the light switch. The room seemed to be blurry, foggy.
Suddenly all too awake, she felt the marrow freeze in her bones, despite the blood temperature of the water bed. Smoke was seeping through the ventilation panel cut to the living room. A fire, with her trapped on the second floor, the worst nightmare! She clawed free from piles of bedding, dropped to the rug and crawled to the patio door to rip into the plastic sheeting taped inside to conserve heat loss and shove the door open. The frigid air cleared her head momentarily. Fearing that the lights might go out at any moment, she retrieved a flashlight from the dresser. The bedside water glass doused a T-shirt, which she wrapped around her face. Freya stayed behind her, sneezing and hacking.
Yet the door to the downstairs was cool. Fire or no fire? Belle cracked it slowly against the thick smoke which followed the draft, backing down the stairs on her knees, blessing the thick broadloom that had cost her a trip to Curaçao. Why didn’t she have a contingency plan, a rope ladder from her balcony? Ed had always teased her about it. Like a scorched worm, taking a gulp through the soggy shirt, she flashed a teary look at the living room stove. Smoke was billowing out of the keys. Something must have blocked the chimney from above. Holding her breath until her lungs ached, Belle tightened the keys and turned the damper to shut down the blaze.
As her lungs finally rebelled against her brain and opened wide, she pushed outside with a gasp into the softly dropping snow, oblivious for a moment that she stood only in T-shirt and underpants, standard bedtime attire. Spasms of coughing punished her shoulders and back as she braced against the deck post. “Wow!” Belle yelled, lifting her feet one after the other like a phony fakir on burning coals. Holding her breath again, she reached inside to the hall closet to grab her snowmobile suit, boots and mitts. Could a squirrel have fallen down the pipe? There was no protective mesh at the top, couldn’t be because of creosote build-up. But no roast beast smell filled the air. Shivering more from fear than cold, Freya stopped hyperventilating as Belle hugged her and stroked her fur. “Breathe on your own, girl. I just couldn’t do CPR on that hairy mouth.” Safe now, the air clearing inside with the door open, she debated whether to put out the fire with water, or climb to the roof and stuff down the chimney brush. The smoke damage would be horrendous.
Breakfast and some creature-comforting noises in mind, Belle walked down to Ed’s, blowing her lungs clear as the sun’s red eye backlit the trees. Sailor take warning? As she trudged, she missed the amenities of socks and long underwear, but blessed the fleece-lined moosehide mitts that did the job at any temperature. Northerners knew what was important.
She hated to wake her friends, bang into their morning stillness, but what were pals for? “All right, you slackers, everyone out for volleyball,” she called, pummelling loudly at the back door and causing fearful yelps from Rusty, asleep in the mud room.
Thumps and bumps came closer as lights flashed on in sequence through the house. “What the hell?” Ed said. “Are you crazy? Say, what’s all over your face?“ He sniffed at her as he pulled her inside. “Were you smoking in bed again?” He fastened his robe as Hélène shambled in from the bedroom, her eyes puffy with sleep.
“It’s safe enough on a waterbed. I got smoked out. My chimney is plugged at the top. There’s no fire. I shut the stove down, but can’t do much more until daylight. Can I get warm here?”
“Thank God you’re OK, Belle,” said Hélène, giving her a firm hug and passing her a tissue for her face.
“Thank Freya. She warned me, saved my life. I was too groggy to know what was going on,” Belle added. She availed herself of their bathroom in an unsuccessful attempt to scrub off the smoke.
“What about your alarm?” Ed asked as they sipped coffee and stuffed themselves with hot blueberry pancakes. Squirts of whipped cream added to the impromptu picnic. Heavy food was appreciated when cold work lay ahead.
“It kept going off for no reason, well, not exactly no reason. Bugs, I guess, so I jerked it. And naturally I forgot to reconnect it.”
The DesRosiers drove her back in the truck. While they aired out the house, Belle shovelled hot ashes from the stove into a bucket and used asbestos gloves to carry out the smoking logs. Then she collected the fibreglass cleaning rods and brush and climbed an aluminum ladder next to the house.
Ed scolded her as he followed. “Why do you leave this up? Thieves could get to your bedroom balcony.”
“I clean the chimney every three weeks, and I’m not excited about digging out the ladder after every blizzard. Besides, Ed, I have glass patio doors. So do you. We live out here because we want to see the lake, not hole up in a fort with arrow slits. Someone wants in, they get in.”
Checking for tracks on the roof under several inches of new snow proved fruitless. Ed said, “What a mess around the chimney, all trampled. You won’t get clear prints here.” His probe with the brush revealed a soft mass several feet below the top which he pushed down the chimney. “Have to take the pipes apart in the living room. She’s caught up on the damper.”
“If the chimney had caught fire, the house might have gone up in flames. Still, it’s deadly enough. Most people in fires die of smoke inhalation,” Belle said, shivering in the brisk wind on the roof as she surveyed the grounds. “What’s that by the big yellow birch? Looks like it was tossed off the roof like a javelin.” It turned out to be six-foot wooden stake for delphiniums, probably from a pile under the deck, except that the end was sticky with black creosote.
Dismantling the pipe, fanning themselves against the smoking rags and despairing of the falling cinders, they cleared the mess and reassembled the pipes. Belle had goosed the propane furnace, but with the doors still open, it was barely above freezing in the living room. Luckily the computer room and TV room had been closed. The fish would have to hang tough until she got the stove going again.
“So where did those rags come from, Belle?” Ed asked as he pitchforked the pile onto the snow.
“Looks like old towels I hung over the propane tank. Used them to wash the van last fall.”
Hélène looked on the verge of tears. “Please stay with us for awhile, Belle,” she pleaded. “Or Ed can—”
“You’ve been great. But I’ll be OK. And yes, I will report this.”
Finally alone with her thoughts, Belle left a detailed message for Steve. If he had been mad in the past, this would send him into overdrive. He’d blame her for going to the Paramount, for snooping at the lodge. Derek had warned her about Brooks’ interest, and now she’d seen Nick with him. “But what exactly does he think I know?” she wondered aloud as she watched her fish slowly tour their kingdom, blissfully unaware of their near-death experience.
Steve skidded down the driveway after lunch. “They told me you’d been hit again. Look at all the tracks! Grand Central or what! Did you have to trample everything? I got here as fast as I could. Since morning I’ve been north of Parry Sound where a gas transport accident blocked 69 for hours.” In his irritation, he ignored Freya’s barking. Usually he loved to play with the dog.
Belle felt a defensive surge. This was her territory, her violated home. Why did he have to make the situation worse? “It’s been snowing heavily, so any tracks are gone. What do you want to know? Someone stuffed the chimney. From what we found when we pushed down into the stove, it was towels left by my propane tank. I’ve been through a rough night, and I had the funny idea that you were my friend.” She bit her l
ip and turned away, knowing she was in for a grilling.
He reached into the squad car for his notebook and wasted no time pinpointing the obvious question. “And your smoke detector?”
She sighed deeply. “No contest. I did something stupid. It’s reconnected now in case you feel like jailing me for building code violations.”
Taking a look around, Steve seemed ready to continue the third degree as he scribbled her remarks and his observations, but with a glance at her sitting slumped on the deck stairs, he took a deep breath. “The burglary attempt or whatever that you didn’t even bother to report is one thing. That’s common enough in cottage country in the winter. This looks serious, but I can’t see why they didn’t cut the hydro. Must have had a kind heart or been real amateurs.” He put a hand on her shoulder. “Everything should be fine if you mind your own business until Saturday, our big night. Make it look like the scare worked. Lock the doors; look over your shoulder. Maybe have a friend stay with you?” He paused to consider her snort. “No, eh? Well, fine. Freya’s track record is good enough.”
“And I do have a shotgun.”
“Load it with rock salt. You won’t do any real damage.” That got her smiling. “Come on, now. We’ll put Brooks and his sleazy friends away until the Leafs win the Stanley Cup.”
Belle met his eyes and cleared the phlegm from her throat. “I’ll lie doggo. Not a bark.”
After Steve had to make three tries up the slippery drive, somewhat to Belle’s satisfaction, she called a painting firm listed in the Northern Life. With business slow, they promised to come the next day with the colours she wanted. The job could be done quickly if she didn’t mind the smell. Then a small Golf drove down the driveway. Melanie got out, and Freya capered around her, friendly as ever with females, even strangers. Size? Conformation? Pheromones? Voice? Who knew what lurked in the genetic memory of a canine?
The young woman presented the newspaper and widened her eyes at the sight of the lake. “What a paradise, Belle, but it’s colder here than in town. Natural refrigeration. Your sign’s sure easy to find. Neat owls.” Her chirpy tone changed as she noticed the smudges on Belle’s face. “My God, what happened?”
“Just a smokeout. Somebody stuffed my chimney. And I didn’t even have a ham in the rafters.”
“Are you OK? How did you get out?” They walked inside as Belle made coffee and told her story once more. Each time it became more exciting and elaborate, and each time she realized her dumb luck.
“Hope you don’t mind smoky coffee. Maybe it’ll be exotic. I’ve had the place airing, but as you can see,” she said as she pointed to the dirty stone-white paint in the living room, “there is damage. And I’ll have to wash the pine on the ceilings, too, or negotiate for a cheap steakhouse franchise.” They sat on the leather sofas which Belle had swabbed hastily with soap and water. She looked down tiredly and scuffed the rug with her foot. “Good old commercial stuff. Totally resistant against dog hair and wood debris, but I should call a steam cleaner.” She rubbed her bloodshot eyes.
“Aren’t you afraid, Belle? It looks like someone is out to get you.” Melanie’s warm expression reflected a genuine concern.
“Yes and no. It has to be Brooks. But we’re getting closer. Franz showed me a spot near his bush camp where a cocaine exchange was made. It won’t be long until Brooks is sitting in jail, his friends, too. Maybe one of them will talk about Jim’s death and make the connections we’ve been after. Meanwhile, I’ve got Canada’s best security system.” She snapped her fingers at Freya, who trotted out Mr. Chile and obligingly laid him at a bemused Melanie’s feet. “Guess I’ll cruise on propane for a while to be safe. I know it’s stupid, but that woodstove has me nervous. It’ll probably cost the earth to keep the place at 20°, much less my usual 25°.” She pressed at her temples and gave a small moan.
“What’s wrong? Did you fall last night?”
“It’s just a stupid headache. Carbon monoxide, maybe, or my sinuses overreacting. It’ll go away with time and a few pounds of aspirins.”
“Let me try something.” Melanie moved next to her and cradled her head with a touch that was curiously cool and warm at once. “I’ve been taking a healing course, reiki, it’s called. One of the techniques might help.”
Belle made no protests, and after a blissful ten minutes, she sat up with a stunned grin. “You’re a miracle! What did you do, and can I hire you?”
Mel seemed pleased at the praise. “I’m not discounting conventional medicine, it’s my job, but I’m sure therapeutic touch can help any patient, especially where stress is involved. It’s more than just massage.”
“I’m impressed. Anything else to it?”
“I’m glad to talk to someone who takes me seriously. At the hospital I have to walk a narrow line so that I don’t sound like a crackpot. But I’ve been experimenting with sending healing messages from afar, in one case to a nephew who had been in a coma from an auto accident. I surrounded him in white light, tried to rejuvenate him with an aura.” She blushed. “Do I sound like Shirley MacLaine?”
“Hey, I’m not laughing. Flo Nightingale lived before her time, too. And your nephew?”
“He’s in rehab in Toronto. Should make a complete recovery. Prayer, natural energy, modern medicine, luck, who knows? I like to visualize a bright white fluffy cloud around me wherever I go.”
The girl’s too good to be true, Belle thought. Protected by a cloud. Why not? They used to call them vibes; now it was auras. Melanie spoke also of cleansing the mind of grudges, bitter failures resupped from an old menu. For this she recommended buying a candle for each harmful person or experience. Forgive the trespass, and watch the burdens of the past burn away harmlessly. Ageless witchery mixed with common sense psychology. Every day in every way, getting better and better. Murders, however, needed resolution, and sometimes, though “Mordre will out,” according to Chaucer, it needed a helping hand.
SEVENTEEN
A few days later, Belle pulled up in front of Shirmaz Jewellers and Gifts, a tiny shop in the older Donovan area, long bypassed by commercial concerns defecting to the malls. Small, square, compact homes, living relics of Sudbury’s frugal past, showed the blue collar priorities of keeping warm while avoiding a crushing mortgage. A wiser time, perhaps, she thought, waving at a sturdy grandmother shovelling snow, woollen babushka on her head. Omer Shirmaz ran his eccentric store more for hobby than profit. He and his wife Thema lived upstairs in the frame building, a shaky, enclosed staircase running up the side.
A bell jangled as she entered. “Omer, hello,” Belle said to Sharif’s double. What elixir did these men sip, growing handsomer by the years, refining their manners and elegance? Any woman transformed into a queen under their shadowy gaze; the smart ones they complimented for their beauty, the beautiful ones for their brains. Immaculately combed, his dark pewter hair bearing a touch of pomade, a hint of frankincense or myrrh in the air, Omer wore a warm vest with a gold watch chain peeking from the pocket. The fine timepiece along with a stamp collection had been his only baggage arriving from Leningrad at the end of World War Two. An envelope of rare Czarist stamps had bought him his shop, he had told her. “My Russian grandfather was the village postmaster, a very important position. I had the complete 1866 issue, one to twenty kopeks. Not a blemish,” he had said as his voice turned to velvet. “My dearest black and lilac, I miss like an old lover.”
He bowed to give her hand a zephyr’s brush of a kiss. “A delight to see you, my young friend.” Belle could swear that he winked. “You are looking so well. Don’t tell me you are going to offer me your mother’s Doulton ladies at last? Or have you come to check my price list?” Discontinued figures appreciated substantially in value and might make a newspaper ad in Toronto worthwhile.
“This is another matter. Your expert opinion is required.”
The deepening lines around his kohl-dark eyes crinkled in curiosity. “Come into the back room and let us be more comfortable. I will hear the bell
if she rings.”
At a heavy oak table in a cubbyhole heaped with boxes and newspapers, they sat close together, an ancient brass chandelier casting its flambeaux of crystal in an effect eerie and intimate. Omer found a dusty bottle of Slivovitz and poured them both a small glass.
“I always think of you when I eat plums,” Belle said, raising a toast.
“Every morning an inch, and you will never have a cold. I guarantee it. Fabled Turco-Cossack remedy.”
“An inch! Best not tell the breathalyzer.” She licked her lips as delicately as she could, then placed the gold drop in Omer’s palm. “Here’s a mystery for you.”
He examined it with his loupe with no change of expression. “Pure, very pure. I can test it if you like, but see how soft? Never for jewelry. Where did you get it?”
“From a dead man’s pocket. Where did he get it?”
Not a blink. “Alchemy was a romantic but false science. There are only two directions. Fine gold from rings, plate and even teeth, can be melted down in a crucible. That is my domain. Or from the richest vein, dripped straight from the ore by intense heat. I have heard that it is possible. You would have to ask a geologist.”
Belle tossed the drop lightly in her hand, embroidering the moment with a wry smile and a final sip of brandy warming her throat. “It’s part of a very maddening puzzle. I just can’t make the pieces fit. What would it be worth, just hypothetically?”
He fished in his vest and put a dime into her other hand. “A bit heavier than your drop. 2.4 grams, not quite a tenth of an ounce at the current $280.00 U.S. quote. Negligible.”
“For larger amounts of this raw gold, Omer, a constant supply . . . out of the proper channels, would there be a buyer?”
“There is always a buyer for everything, and a price for anything. The war taught me that. Northern Ontario has more prospectors than doctors, but this is a small town. Many noisy tongues. In Toronto? Montreal? Without question, though at a considerable discount.”