The Bone Seeker: An Edie Kiglatuk Mystery (Edie Kiglatuk Mysteries)

by M. J. McGrath

  She laughed and pulled a leg from the goose. ‘They’re in moult.’ For a week or so before they got their new feathers the snow geese were more or less flightless. If you were skilled enough you could almost pick them off the tundra.

  Sammy came over. ‘We got eggs too, you prefer omelette.’

  ‘You keep filling your belly with those ramen noodles, you’ll turn into a white man,’ Edie said. The meat was sweet and made him ache for something he’d never had.

  She waited for him to finish eating then asked if he’d seen her note.

  ‘I got back from the lake late. Survey took me a while. Didn’t see any sign of Alfasi.’ He told her he wasn’t worried.

  ‘Only thing in the house, I found a bunch of flowers,’ Edie said.

  Derek finished up the goose leg, laid the bone down and licked his fingers. ‘Oh well, that’ll be it then,’ he said. ‘Kid’s got a girlfriend somewhere.’ He’d go down to the radio station later and ask Markoosie to put out an alert for him. If that failed, he’d call Alfasi’s employers at the meteorological service in Ottawa, see if he’d checked in with them.

  They were on their own now. Sammy had gone off to do something in the tent. He lowered his voice so only Edie could hear. As he outlined what Drei had told him about Muloon he could see the moisture sparkle in her eyes and was overcome by a desire to reassure her.

  ‘This doesn’t change the odds that Muloon had something to do with Martha Salliaq’s death. We still don’t know whether he did or not. But it makes it more likely that he’s being protected if he did. Whatever he’s working on, there must be some connection to Glacier Ridge.’

  Edie was staring at smouldering heather and biting her lip.

  ‘Don’t feel bad,’ he said.

  ‘I never could read him, but I guess I just thought it was because he was qalunaat.’ She picked up the goose bone he’d left and threw it into the fire. ‘I’d feel better about it if I’d let my heart rule my head.’ A sad smile played on her lips. ‘But I’m afraid neither were responsible.’

  Derek heard himself give a laugh and felt his neck flush. ‘You’re not the first to have made that mistake.’ He thought immediately of Misha. Still dreamed about her sometimes, woke sweaty and frustrated. He blinked the thought away.

  ‘If Muloon was involved in Martha’s murder, we’ll keep at it till we get him. But we need to be very careful now, keep making discreet enquiries and see what Klinsman comes up with.’ He glanced towards the tent and was glad when she picked up his meaning.

  ‘Sammy hardly knows anything.’ She was using a tiny willow twig to spread the dying ashes.

  ‘Keep it that way,’ he said. ‘And Edie, I won’t allow anyone to be protected from justice. Not anybody. You know that, don’t you?’ He wiped the remains of the goose grease off his hands and picked himself up. ‘Thanks for breakfast. You think of anything you want to tell me, you know where I am.’

  • • •

  She waited for Sammy to return.

  ‘Derek knows I’m keeping something back from him.’ She and Sammy had spent the small hours discussing her conversations with Willa.

  ‘You’re not. You’ve just decided not to bother him with something that’s irrelevant to the investigation.’

  Sammy was aware how little she’d trusted Willa in the past and resented her for it.

  ‘The fact remains that the only person we know Martha saw between her leaving school looking cheerful and winding up crying on Tom Silliq’s wall was Willa. You have to admit, it looks bad.’

  ‘And that’s why we’re not going to be telling Derek about it,’ Sammy said, kicking the fire embers to cool them off. ‘You know how it is. Willa being such a hellraiser in the past. People have long memories. Prejudices. It looks bad but it isn’t.’

  Edie began to gather up the bones and leftovers to give to the half-starved dogs which roamed around the settlement. She delved into the ashes, plucked out the bone she’d thrown there, burning her hand a little in the process. But it felt good. It felt deserved.

  ‘You’re right,’ she said.

  ‘Willa’s got nothing to do with the death of that girl, so why drag him into it?’

  He had a point. But Derek wasn’t stupid. Sooner or later it would come out that Willa and Martha had a connection, then it would emerge that she had kept her knowledge of their relationship from him. Either way she would end up betraying someone.

  She watched Sammy disappear into the tent. A moment later there was a loud crash of pans and he came out, looking foolish.

  ‘I guess I was never much good at all that domestic hoo-ha. That’s why I need a woman about the place.’

  They laughed, but there was something sad in it.

  • • •

  Leaving Sammy with the keys to her ATV, she made her way on foot to the Kuujuaq Hotel, driven by a nagging but distant sense that Gutierrez would have been willing to tell more when she’d come to see them if Derek hadn’t closed her down. She’d felt a kind of connection between them. Two tough women in a tough place. There was an ally to be made in Gutierrez and Edie believed she could make it without having to give too much away in return. Gutierrez had hinted that she knew the Defence Department was up to something. Maybe she’d uncovered more about Chip Muloon.

  Inside the bitter aroma of burnt coffee greeted her but there was no sign of Sonia or anyone else. She shouted up the stairwell and, receiving no response, took the stairs two by two, turned left and went down the corridor to room number 7. When nobody answered her knock, she tried the handle. The door was locked. In this part of the world that was unusual. Taking out her multitool, she slid in the pick, felt for the pins and let herself in.

  The room had the still-warm feel of a place recently vacated. Gutierrez’s things were lying around and the window was part open. A laptop and some papers sat on the desk. Edie went over and began flipping through the pile: contracts, technical manuals, legal documents relating to the land claim at Glacier Ridge and subsequent decontamination agreements. She noticed a bunch of tundra flowers sitting in an empty vase on one side of the desk. They were early summer varieties, vetch, Arctic catkins, dried now, but perfectly preserved: looking closer, she could see they were tied with the same yellow cord as the bunch at Rashid Alfasi’s place. Rashid Alfasi and Sonia Gutierrez? Somehow she couldn’t see it.

  The sound of footsteps echoed up the stairs. Someone was heading her way. Her eyes swept about, desperately searching for somewhere to hide, but it was already too late. Then the door opened and Sonia’s face peered around. She saw Edie and her expression dimmed.

  ‘What the hell do you think you’re doing? I left this room locked.’

  A throb rose up in Edie’s forehead. She found herself reaching for the knife in her pocket, the old hunter’s instincts. For a second her mind began to unravel, then she took a breath and gathered herself. Her head flicked towards the papers on the desk.

  ‘I’ve had a snoop, in case you’re wondering.’

  The lawyer rested a hand on her hip and looked at Edie through narrowed eyes. ‘Come to any conclusions?’

  Edie returned the look with a cool stare. ‘I’m glad I’m not a lawyer.’

  For a moment Gutierrez seemed to be fighting back a smile, then went over to her papers and began rustling them into a neat pile.

  Seizing the moment, Edie said, ‘Nice flowers. You pick them yourself?’ She already knew the answer. When these flowers were blooming, Gutierrez was still in Ottawa or wherever it was she came from.

  Gutierrez glanced at the bouquet. ‘You must know, I found them up at Glacier Ridge. That time you saw me there.’

  ‘Mind if I take them?’

  The lawyer’s eyes narrowed. She leaned back and crossed her arms.

  A smile bloomed on her face and she cocked her head and clasped her chin between two fingers.

  ‘Dios mío! You haven’t stopped looking for the killer, have you? Ha!’ She lowered her voice. ‘You got cojones, Edie Kiglatuk.
I’ll give you that much. I suppose you know that boss of yours is out of his depth, don’t you?’ She looked away. ‘Don’t worry, I’ll play dumb. Take the flowers and leave. You won’t find it so easy to get into my room next time.’

  • • •

  Edie filled Derek in on her visit to the hotel and laid the flowers on his desk.

  ‘Maybe Alfasi came across them just like Gutierrez did?’

  ‘A man wouldn’t pick them up.’

  Derek conceded this.

  ‘What if Alfasi was Martha’s boyfriend?’

  Derek sighed. She watched him push the idea aside. Why he was so dismissive of her boyfriend theory Edie couldn’t make out. Maybe just because it wasn’t his. Men could be assholes like that sometimes. She was about to tell him so when she saw from his face that he was thinking something through.

  ‘How did Alfasi seem when you went to talk to him?’

  ‘He got kind of jumpy when I asked him whether he thought Martha was with Namagoose and Saxby by choice. I assumed he disapproved of the drinking, but maybe there was something else to it.’ She closed her eyes for a moment, thinking. An idea bubbled up, an awful, unspeakable idea but not an impossible one. Turning it over in her mind, she felt her blood quickening. ‘He skipped his shift on Saturday night.’

  ‘And those two things are connected how?’

  ‘Suppose Alfasi and Martha had arranged to see one another on Friday after school. When I spoke with her at the end of class Martha was looking forward to something. Suppose they met up and had some sort of a fight, Martha got upset and went to the bar to drown her sorrows. Namagoose and Saxby came with her to the Shack at her suggestion.’

  Derek raised an eyebrow. He was playing the scenario in his head.

  ‘If she was dating Alfasi she would have known that he would be there,’ Edie went on. ‘What if she was trying to provoke him into some reaction? What if it worked?’

  Derek’s features sharpened. ‘We need to find this kid.’

  • • •

  Sonia fiddled with the lock on her door but could not get it to function. The damn Inuit policewoman had broken it when she’d let herself in. Of course she could file a complaint somewhere but really what was the point? In any case, there were more pressing things to do. Chief among which was to ensure her safety. It had been completely pointless to voice her concerns with Palliser. He didn’t seem to have any idea to what lengths the Defence Department would go in order to avoid exposing a scandal. The tiny woman was a bit more switched on, but that wasn’t saying much. It wasn’t that she didn’t rate them. You’d want to be with them in a blizzard. In the face of a charging polar bear she imagined they’d be magnificent. But they couldn’t see that the greatest danger to them personally and to their community lay just a few kilometres down the road at Camp Nanook.

  She left the door and went back inside to fetch her purse. There was a fixing on the door to which she would be able to attach a padlock. The store would surely sell those. As a precaution, she sifted through her pile of papers, selected those few she needed for her ongoing investigations and stuck them in her daypack, then headed into the settlement.

  The tide was out now, leaving behind it a dirty hem of rotting bergy bits and gravel-crusted ice, and for the first time in weeks the air was cooler outdoors than inside. She checked about as she walked, wondering whether she wouldn’t be safer in Ottawa. She had folk looking out for her down there. Here she was vulnerable. Palliser had already said he wasn’t prepared to offer her police protection. The only other person she could ask was Charlie Salliaq, and he was in no shape to help. She made a mental note to ask at the Northern Store about getting a plane out. Get back to Ottawa, file the cease and desist papers against the Defence Department from there.

  The store had not long been open. The owner and his wife were still sorting out keys and dusting down the cashier’s desk. She caught the man’s attention and asked for a combi lock.

  He stood up and rubbed his head. ‘Don’t get any call for locks. I’d have to order one up on the supply plane.’ He began fishing around for the mail order catalogue. Oolik, that was his name. She remembered now. Bit of an asshole.

  ‘When are you expecting the next supply plane?’

  Oolik turned his head back to glance at the ‘Great Canadian views’ calendar on the wall.

  ‘Should be tomorrow afternoon, weather permitting.’ He pushed the catalogue at her. ‘Too late to order you a padlock for then. It’d probably take a couple weeks.’

  ‘What’s the likelihood of being able to get a seat on tomorrow’s plane?’

  The man began scratching at his head again. He was in no hurry. ‘Where you need to get to exactly?’

  ‘Iqaluit, Ottawa, it doesn’t really matter.’

  Oolik sighed. ‘I guess I could call North Star Air, see if they could take you. Depends on their cargo commitments. But they usually don’t fly unless they’re full both ways.’

  ‘I’m happy to pay a premium.’

  She saw Oolik frown disapprovingly and kicked herself. Offering an Inuk a backhander was like showing up on a first date with bad breath.

  Predictably, Oolik returned a few minutes later shaking his head. ‘I could book you on next Monday’s plane.’

  There was nothing like being told you couldn’t leave to make it seem all the more imperative that you did.

  ‘Any other way of getting off the island?’

  ‘You had a boat, Resolute Bay’s about three hundred and fifty kilometres that way,’ Oolik said. He tipped his head to the southwest. ‘But you’d need to know all the currents and get lucky with the ice.’

  Somewhere inside her chest a dark bud of panic began to swell. She thought about Charlie and the Ellesmere Police and, most of all, about Camp Nanook, and suddenly felt very alone.

  ‘I need a weapon.’ She heard the words before she realized they were hers.

  Oolik was staring at her, part baffled, part bored. ‘We don’t keep any guns in stock. You have to order them up.’ He reached around to a shelf behind him and heaved a huge and tattered catalogue onto the cashier’s desk.

  ‘A knife then?’

  Oolik tutted. ‘We’ve got a moratorium on those. Out of respect for the family.’

  ‘Pepper spray?’

  Oolik threw back his head and laughed.

  ‘Bear spray then.’

  The laugh became a hoot. ‘Ha, lady, I like your sense of humour. Polar bears are mean. They freshen their breath with bear spray.’

  As she left, a damp grey fog of resignation began to pick at her bones. She wanted desperately not to go back to the hotel but her legs seemed to carry her there as if she had no choice in the matter. A part of her still needed to believe that the Department of Defence lawyers would return her calls and the matter of Glacier Ridge would be handled in a civilized manner through the courts, but the larger part of her knew this for what it was. A wishful fantasy. Whatever she had touched on had gone too far for the polite processes of the courts. She had crossed over some boundary into the terrain not of the law but of realpolitik and in that territory anything was possible.

  The hotel foyer was surprisingly cool now. She stopped a moment to listen for the sounds of intruders and hearing nothing went up the stairs and turned into the corridor. As she approached her room she saw that the door was slightly ajar and through the gap there was some movement. She moved forward, propelled by some sense of destiny, then caught herself, too late to leave but not too late to overstep the bedroom door and tiptoe to the bathroom. She slid her backpack behind the door and walked back to meet her fate.

  The door to her room swung open and two men in military police uniforms stepped out and came towards her.

  ‘Sonia Gutierrez?’ The older of the two, a man of Hispanic origin like herself, reached out and took her arm. She felt herself tense, the rush of adrenalin a welcome relief from the numb, animal resignation of before. A cuff closed around her wrist.

  The policeman
said he was arresting her for trespass on military property, but that hardly mattered. She felt a hand on the small of her back, pushing her forward.

  26

  Rashid Alfasi’s boss at the meteorological office in Ottawa hadn’t heard from him in a couple of days. The stats from the various outlying met stations were collated once a week on Mondays and the staff were only contacted if there was something unexpected in the figures.

  ‘Is he in trouble?’ the man asked.

  Derek switched the phone to speaker to allow Edie to listen in. She’d watched him become increasingly preoccupied over the last twelve hours. He hadn’t said as much, but Edie was sure he was regretting focusing all his energies on the two unataqti in the early stages of the case. It made the work of broadening the investigation more difficult, not least because they were now having to do it without alerting Klinsman. But, in the absence of firm proof against any of the other suspects, the link between Alfasi and Martha Salliaq was too important to ignore.

  ‘You ever have any problems with Rashid? Skipping off, going AWOL, that kind of thing?’

  ‘No, sir. The kid’s reliable.’

  ‘Did he volunteer for the Ellesmere posting?’ Southerners who chose to spend time in the High Arctic were usually trying to escape something or other.

  ‘Well, yes,’ said the man in a wary tone. ‘Rashid could be a bit of a loner.’

  ‘Isn’t it right that the met service seconds some of its workers to the military?’

  There was a pause. ‘That is correct, yes.’

  ‘Is Rashid Alfasi one of those?’

  The man cleared his throat. ‘I can’t answer that question, sir. You’d have to go through the proper channels.’

  ‘I see,’ Derek said. ‘Well, call us if he gets in touch. We’re concerned for his safety.’ Derek left the detachment number. ‘I’d rather this was between us for now. I don’t want to concern the family.’

  ‘Of course, the family.’

  Derek ended the call and sat staring at the phone, wondering if the whole goddamned island hadn’t been converted into a single vast military installation, with the locals, people like him and Edie, serving unwittingly as guinea pigs in some giant defence experiment. Sure it was paranoid, it was probably all-out insane, but that didn’t mean it wasn’t true.