Murder Below Zero

by John Lawrence Reynolds

  “Took him fishing,” Jack said. He turned to stare out the window. “Taught him that. Taught him a few things when he was a good little guy.”

  The first week went well, they told Max. Ted slept in a spare bedroom, helped with some chores, kept to himself.

  “Then one night he came home and he’d been drinking,” Flo said. “Been drinking a lot. Could hardly stand up.”

  “Told him we didn’t want him drinking,” Jack said. “He wanted to drink, he’d have to go elsewhere. He didn’t listen.”

  “Two nights later he’s just as drunk, but this time he has a woman with him,” Flo said.

  “She was as drunk as he was,” Jack said. “Some tramp.”

  “We told him to find another place to stay,” Flo said.

  “He laughed and said okay, but not until the morning.” Jack shook his head from side to side. “Had to put up with the sound of them giggling and groaning all night long.”

  “They left at dawn,” Flo said. Her expression changed to sadness. “I was glad to see him go, but sorry too. Like I said, he’s not really a bad…”

  Jack interrupted his wife. “We thought he would head for Toronto. Or Nova Scotia. But he stayed around these parts. Saw him downtown once or twice. Then we didn’t see him until he came here the day before yesterday. He brought our generator back. Said he was sorry he took it.”

  “Asked us not to tell the police,” Flo said. “But we thought we should tell you not to keep looking for it.”

  “Where had he been living?” Max said.

  “Don’t know,” Jack said. “But he didn’t look too good.”

  Max asked what he meant.

  “Kind of scruffy.”

  “He was dressed well when we saw him downtown a few times,” Flo said. “Had some new clothes. Got a haircut.”

  “Didn’t look too good yesterday,” Jack said. “Hadn’t shaved for a while. Lost a bit of weight too.”

  Max finished her coffee. “Where can I find him now?”

  “No idea,” Jack said.

  “Don’t have a clue,” Flo said.

  “How did he get around?” Max said. “He didn’t walk everywhere. You said he pulled into your driveway one night. In what?”

  “A truck,” Flo said. “He drove it all the way from BC.”

  Max felt her pulse quicken. “What kind of truck?”

  “Pickup,” Jack said. “Black Ford.”

  “Thank you,” Max said. She forced herself not to leap out of the chair and run for her car. She was doing police work, but that didn’t mean she had to be rude. “By the way, do you own a freezer? A full-size model?”

  Both shook their heads.

  Max thanked them for their help and said she needed to leave right away.

  “Take a tart with you,” Flo said and handed her one.

  On the way to the front door, Max turned and said, “Where did you say that sugar camp is?”

  TEN

  The area around Ainslie Falls is wooded with maple trees. Some had been damaged in a late-spring ice storm. Broken limbs covered much of the ground. A few trees had died. Some had only a few leaves.

  Max drove slowly along the road, looking for a lane into the woods. She found one and saw that someone had cleared the road of broken branches. But there were too many to believe they had all fallen from trees. The large ones had been used to block the path into the woods.

  She recalled her parents taking her to a maple-syrup camp. She had been a child, maybe six years old. The memory was still clear to her. There had been wood fires under metal vats filled with boiling sap. Horse-drawn sleds came from deep in the woods, carrying barrels of sap. She watched the clear sap being poured into the vats. She could still taste the hot syrup that had been spread on the snow to harden into toffee. The visit taught her about life in the bush and how much goodness could come from trees and nature.

  All of this came back to her as she drove deeper into the shadow of the woods. She was glad she had called Margie to say where she was. Margie had asked… no, demanded…What in the blazes are you doing out there all alone? Max said she would explain later.

  Margie had been right to ask. The deeper Max drove into the woods, the darker it became.

  After a kilometer or so the road curved and rose ahead of her. At the top of the rise she saw a large wooden building to the left. It was badly in need of repair and a coat of fresh paint. A pickup truck coated with mud was parked nearby. It was a black Ford with BC license plates.

  Max parked the cruiser and stepped out, her gun in her hand. She looked into the truck’s cab, then turned to the building and called out, “Is anybody here?” Hearing no answer, she walked to the door and looked inside.

  The building was empty. Well, almost empty.

  From the doorway Max could see a large sleeping bag on the wooden floor. A pair of torn jeans, two T-shirts, a jacket and worn boots lay nearby. Old potato-chip bags, soft-drink cans and coffee cups were everywhere.

  She stepped inside. A large cardboard box sat on a low table in the corner. She walked to it and looked inside. Dishes, knives and forks sat among salt and pepper shakers, cooking oil, a cast-iron pan and a large knife. Next to the box was a camp stove. Someone had made their home here for a week or more.

  Max walked to a window on the far side of the building, looked out and caught her breath. There it was. A large white box with a hinged cover and a black power cord. The kind of home freezer a family would use to store food. Or something else.

  Had she the time, Max might have felt smug. But she had no time. A glimpse of movement on the path to the creek caught her eye. She hurried to the other window and stood to one side, looking down the path.

  The young man walking toward her carried a fishing rod over one shoulder. His other hand held a rope strung through the mouths and gills of two large trout. He did not look pleased about his catch. He looked nervous and frightened. One moment he seemed to fear someone would leap from the bushes. The next moment he appeared as though he might break down and cry. He also looked sad and lonely. Almost in spite of herself, Max felt a pang of sadness for him. He was a handsome young man who would grow into a handsome adult someday. As he drew closer Max could see the blue in his eyes, the curl in his fair hair and the lean frame. He knows what he has done, she thought. He just doesn’t know how soon it will all be over. What a waste of a life.

  Coming from the creek, the young man couldn’t see Max’s car parked behind the old building. At the open door he set his rod against the wall and walked inside. His mind appeared to be elsewhere, perhaps thinking about the trout he would fry for his dinner.

  He looked up to see Max. The sight of her appeared to shock him as much as the sight of the gun in her hand. “Ted Huffman,” she said, “I am arresting you for the murder of Robert Morton.”

  Huffman stared back at her. He chose not to speak and didn’t move. His shoulders sagged, and he looked down at his feet.

  “Turn around and place your hands behind your back,” Max said, her gun aimed at his chest. “Keep your wrists together.” Max pulled the handcuffs from her belt. “If you try to flee, I will use my weapon. I will aim for your legs, but I could hit you anywhere. So do what I say.”

  Huffman did a strange thing. He smiled. Then he dropped the fish and turned his back to her, his wrists together. “Believe it or not,” he said, “I’m glad to see you. I’m glad it’s over.”

  Max put the cuffs on his wrists. Then she warned him that anything he said could be used against him. If he could not afford a lawyer, one would be provided. The usual stuff.

  With her free hand on his elbow, she marched Huffman to her cruiser. Outside the building, he looked this way and that, as though searching for someone. “It’s just you?” he said when she opened the rear door of the car. “There’s nobody else here? You did this all by yourself?”

  “All by myself,” she said. She placed a hand on his head to push him down and into the cruiser.

  “You must b
e one hell of a cop,” he said.

  “Actually, I’m the chief,” Max said and closed the door. Slipping behind the wheel, she saw the butter tart she had set on the dashboard after leaving the Brenner home. She reached for it and then looked in the rear view mirror at Huffman. “I’d share this with you,” she said, “but I think I earned it.” When he said nothing she added, “Too bad those nice trout you caught will go to waste.”

  The paved road back to the highway seemed shorter this time. Seeing it ahead, Max called Margie. “Get a holding cell ready,” she said. “Then call those guys in Cranston. Tell them I’ve arrested the prime suspect in the murder of Bob Morton.”

  Margie hooted with joy through the police radio. She called out to Henry in the station, “She got him! She got the killer!”

  Max tried to tell Margie to calm down, but Henry’s voice over the radio interrupted her. He asked if it was true and how Max had done it and what the guy looked like. Max cut him off and told him and Margie to act like professionals. “This is not a joke,” she said. “A young man is facing a charge of murder. We have to respect the law and all that it means.”

  Margie and Henry went silent, and Max felt guilty about her speech. “But I know what you mean,” she said. “We proved something to a lot of people. We proved we can do all the things they expect of us. And we will. But let’s save the party for later, all right?”

  She was so busy lecturing that she failed to see the silver Mercedes-Benz speeding away toward Sunset Hill.

  ELEVEN

  “I’ll say one thing for him,” Margie said.

  She had just come back into the office after serving Huffman sandwiches and coffee. She’d put him in the cell with a view of the parking lot. “He’s one good-looking young man.” She glanced out the window. “Here comes another one.”

  Max looked up from her notes to see Ronald Boucher stepping out of his OPP car. “This one,” she said, “might give me more trouble than the guy we just locked up.”

  When Boucher entered the station he treated Max and Margie as though they were blocking traffic on a busy street. “I’m here for the prisoner,” he said. No hello and no smile. “Give me what I need to sign, and I’m on my way.”

  “What we will give you,” Max said, “is a chance to sit in the room with me. While I question him.”

  “We will do that in Cranston,” Boucher said. “And we will record his statement. On video. With three cameras.” He looked around the station. “Do you have the means to do that?”

  “No,” Max said. “We have an old Sony tape recorder that still works. And a nice room with three chairs and a picture of the Queen. More than that, we have the legal right to talk to him first because the crime took place here in our town.”

  Boucher rolled his eyes.

  “There’s more,” Max said. “Margie has the key to his cell. She will not use it to let Huffman out until I ask her to.”

  Boucher turned to see Margie holding a large metal ring. Two keys hung from it. He looked back at Max and said, “You’re cute, you know that?” His sarcasm hung in the air like a bad odor.

  “No, I’m not,” Max said. “I’m a small-town cop who wants to see things done the way they’re supposed to be done. I will not do things the way somebody else wants me to do them. Unless I agree. And right now I don’t.” She took the keys from Margie and began to walk to the cells. “Let’s get started.”

  Ted Huffman proved more than willing to talk. He answered each question Max asked him. He was polite and sometimes seemed about to cry.

  As the young man spoke, Max looked at him more closely. Margie was right. This was a handsome guy with a lean and strong body. He was also, Max felt, not the type of young man to commit murder. Raise a little hell now and then, sure. And break a lot of young girls’ hearts, without a doubt.

  The country was full of men like him… young, good-looking guys who liked girls, pickup trucks, beer and hockey. By age thirty most would be married with kids, a job and memories. Those young men were many things. But most were not murderers.

  Max knew Ted Huffman had killed Bob Morton. But from the moment she saw Huffman at the sugar camp, she knew he had not done it alone. And she would bet that it had not been his idea.

  In his soft, deep voice, Huffman told Max and Boucher how he had met Beth Morton after the Brenners had ordered him to leave their home.

  “I was going to drive all the way to the east coast,” he said. “Look for work. Maybe on an oil rig.” But Beth Morton changed his plans for him.

  “How did you meet her?” Max asked.

  “I was in my truck,” Huffman said. “At a stoplight. I heard the car next to me sound its horn. I looked over, and this woman was smiling at me. Then she waved for me to pull over, and I did.”

  He said she asked if he had a job. When he told her he didn’t, she said she needed someone to do yard work at her house.

  “Said she’d pay me as much as I’d make on an oil rig,” Huffman said. “Gave me money to get a motel room instead of sleeping in my truck.” He ducked his head and smiled. “When she said she’d come and check my room, make sure I was set up good, well…”

  “There was more to it than cutting grass,” Max said.

  Huffman nodded. “Driving all the way to the coast didn’t sound like such a good idea after that.”

  Bob Morton met him two days later. “He didn’t like me much from the get-go,” Huffman said. “Guess he kinda knew what his wife was up to. Weren’t the first time, way I saw it. Her gettin’ a young guy like me to keep around.” He looked at Max and Boucher. “Know what I’m saying?”

  Max nodded.

  Boucher said in an angry voice, “Keep talking.”

  The next time Huffman showed up, he heard Morton tell Beth he did not want that dumb hick around the house. Huffman said he could hear them screaming at each other while he was in the yard. Beth said Huffman would leave over her dead body. In reply Bob said, So you want me to do to you what you did to Frank Higgs?

  “She’d told her husband about Higgs one night when she was drunk and mad at him,” Huffman said. “Told him what she’d done to her first husband. How she gave him something besides the pills for his heart. And how he kept tryin’ to get out of the pool. She’d keep pushing him with the pole.”

  Boucher looked at Max and said, “Does anyone else know about this?”

  Max said, “Yes.”

  Boucher looked at her with his eyes wide and his mouth open.

  Max ignored him. “Why would she tell this to Bob?” she asked Huffman.

  “She’d be drunk and angry. He’d tell her to stop fooling around with guys. Guys like me. So she’d brag about what she could do. About what she had done.” Huffman lowered his head into his hands.

  “Keep going,” Max said. She glanced at Boucher. His mouth was closed, but he was still glaring at her.

  Huffman heard Morton say that if Beth didn’t get rid of Ted, he would tell the police about Higgs’s death. “He said they’d charge her with murdering that Higgs guy,” Huffman said. “She told him there was no proof, they’d never believe him. She’d say they were both drunk and that he was making it up. She’d had him cremated, her first husband. He’d died of a heart attack, that’s what the corner had said. That’s what was on the record. Death by heart attack and no body to check. So where was the proof? But I think it still scared her.”

  The next day Beth told her husband she would stop seeing Huffman. She said she was sorry she had upset him and that she’d sent Huffman away. She and Bob would plan a great night together on Saturday and renew their love for each other. Then she told Huffman not to come back to the house until she called him.

  “Don’t think he believed her,” Huffman said. “Her husband, I mean. Who would? But he went along with it. Maybe because he loved her. Maybe because he wanted to.” He gave a short laugh, more of a bark. “Maybe he was just stupid.”

  Beth called Huffman at the motel and told him to be at her house at
10 o’clock Saturday night. “I didn’t know what she was up to,” he said. “I didn’t really want to go. But Beth, when she says to do somethin’, you tend to do it. Like a fool, I went. I had no idea what she planned to do. I swear.”

  Later he learned that Beth had cooked a special dinner for herself and Bob. After dinner she mixed drinks for them. “The way she mixed them,” Huffman said, “the only one who’d get drunk would be her husband.”

  When Huffman arrived, Bob was passed out on the sofa. Beth told Huffman she had told Bob she planned to leave him. “Said she’d be with me, just the two of us. That’s what she told me.”

  Her husband’s reaction, Beth said to Huffman, was to explode in anger. “He told her if she did that he’d shoot us both, Beth and me,” Huffman said. “She told me, He’s got a gun, a big one. She said it was in the house, and she couldn’t find it. She told me when he woke up he would get it and kill her and me.”

  Huffman put his head in his hands. “I said, Let’s go, let’s get out of here. But she said, No, he’d track us down, he’d find us. There was only one thing we could do, she said, and she’d do it if I would just help her. That’s all. Help her.”

  “And you did,” Max said.

  “Not at first. I kept saying we should call the police. She said we couldn’t because Bob knew things about her that she didn’t want the police to know.”

  “What did she mean by that?” Boucher asked. He had stopped staring at Max.

  “About her first husband,” Huffman said. “How he died.”

  Max spoke, and her voice was soft, almost sympathetic. “Why not call and tell us what was going on? Why not just walk away and let us know?”

  Huffman thought about that. Then he said, “I can’t explain it except that she was, um…” He started over. “She was wild in bed, and she said she would give me things. She said we would live in Muskoka, her and me, in that big house on the hill. I like this town. I wanted to stay here. But I told her I couldn’t kill anybody. And then…” He closed his eyes, shook his head. “She said if I didn’t help her, she would do it herself. If she was caught, she would say I did it. That she had gotten away with one and she could get away with another. Murder, she meant. If I helped her, she would never forget it, she…” He stopped for a moment. “She loved me. She was doing this for me. It would take just minutes to do. Let’s get it over with, she said.” He began to cry. “So I did. I helped her. We did it, both of us. I still can’t believe it, but we did it.”